Calm Parenting Podcast - When To Be Tough Or Soft? Specific Examples.

Episode Date: December 26, 2022

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What do you do then? When should you be tough and not give in and just kind of hold the line? And then when do you make allowances or soften your approach a little bit? And what are proper expectations of a child with special needs? Those are tough questions. And that's what we're going to address today on the Calm Parenting Podcast. So welcome. This is Kirk Martin, founder of Celebrate Calm. You can find us at CelebrateCalm.com.

You can also find a really huge Christmas sale there at CelebrateCalm.com. And if you need help, reach out to our strong-willed son, Casey, C-A-S-E-Y, at CelebrateCalm.com. And if you need help, reach out to our strong-willed son, Casey, C-A-S-E-Y, at CelebrateCalm.com. And he'll help you out, put together a special package, make sure it fits in your budget. We'll listen to you. We'll help you out. That's what we exist to do. Just so you know, you know, Casey, for those of you who don't know our story, Casey was our strong-willed son who kind of inspired this. But over the course of a decade, we had 1,500 strong-willed kids come into our home. Casey grew up with that. Casey grew up with kids coming into his bedroom, waking him up. He has a lot of anger issues over that till this day. Actually, he doesn't. He's gotten over.

But that was a hard thing as a kid, but he grew up surrounded by all of these kids. He was one of them, but he's a little bit older. So he's got so much experience with this. So if you reach out to him, he will take really good care of you. And we discuss almost everything as a family. So you kind of get the whole family. So anyway, this podcast came up because of two emails. The first one was awesome. So this couple emails Casey and they say, hey, we've been listening to your dad's podcast for the last year.

It has changed our family and our approach. And, you know, we've never bought anything. So we'd just like to make a donation to you guys. And so Casey wrote back and he's like, well, why would you do that? Just, you know, why not? Like we're here to help you and give you resources in return for that. And so anyway, so they got the get everything package and it worked out fine. So they email us follow up and it was really cool. They said, what was really interesting was we'd been doing really, really well, but we hadn't really reckoned with, there were many situations where we were diametrically opposed in how we viewed things, but we were being kind of calm with it. So we weren't really wrestling with these things. So they'd gotten

with everything, you get the no BS and no BS package. I love, love, love, love, love, because it'll save a lot of fights or help you like kind of work through things. So I asked them, I said, okay, so what were those areas where you guys were kind of struggling? And so I picked out four. One is this, behavior charts. If you have a toddler and they're going to start preschool and you have a strong-willed one, you're going to get calls from the school. The teacher is going to email you because your child is not going to sit perfectly still and is not going to sit still during circle time. And when the teacher is talking and giving instructions, your child is probably going to walk around the classroom or just walk right out the classroom door because they're all caught up in their brains and they've got an idea and this little agenda of

what they want to do. And you're going to be told that your child does not follow directions well and is not listening and doesn't play well with others. Which, by the way, your children don't worry about sharing early on. Kids are not even supposed to begin sharing until they're about age six. They're just not. But we impose all these grown-up things and all of our own anxiety on our kids. Like, oh, he's not sharing. Is he going to be a sociopath? I'm like, no, he's four, right? Most of you don't share that well either, okay?

If I was like, hey, will you share your iPhone with me for a couple hours? You'd be like, nope, get your own. So don't worry about, so the school's going to want to put your child, use behavior charts. Behavior charts do not work with our kids. They're basically measuring every time you mess up without hoping that the child doesn't want to mess up and is going to respond to consequences and change their behavior. But here's what we know. Your kids don't respond to consequences. And most people don't respond that well to consequences. If

consequences work, jails would not be filled and we would not get in trouble like we all do as human beings. So those red, yellow, and green behavior charts never, ever, ever, ever work, except for the compliant children who don't really need them, who live on green anyway. Your child is just going to get a red report every single day. And that's how we kind of parent at times. We're like, well, we just need to lay down the law with this child. Well, look, he's a little guy, okay, or a little girl going into preschool. Here's what will work. Using positive rewards and catching them doing well, noticing every time they make a good decision with your strong will kids, it's going to be giving them challenges, making things harder, letting them do adult kind of jobs or specific jobs in the classroom saying,

oh, I could really use your help because they love helping out and feeling like they're adults. And we begin to create successes for this child. So instead of the behavior chart marking off every time they do something wrong, I want for two weeks for the teacher to send home notes with check marks. So when your child coming home and saying, mommy, I got nine check marks today. You get to talk about all the good decisions that that child made. That will begin to change their brain so they seek the positive intensity, right? So resist the use of behavior charts. Here's one where you're going to fight

picking up Legos. So your child, my guess, if you have a strong-willed child, they're going to pour out maybe 8,000, 9,000 Legos or little things that you're going to step on, you're going to vacuum up. It's going to irritate you and you're going to want them to pick it up. And so your logical approach is going to be, hey, you need to pick up your Legos. Honey, you need to pick up your Legos. And if you don't pick them all up, I'm going to put them in a bag and I'm going to take them to Goodwill and give them to a child who wants them. And many of you are going to have a child who will look at you and say, listen, I wasn't

going to pick them up for you, but I will bag them up to give them away. And they'll just call your bluff because they know you'd have a hard time doing that. But they're just not going to pick them up. And here's what you're going to find. You are going to find yourself on your hands and knees picking up these Legos, cursing under your breath because you're actually picking up more Legos than AR and they're the ones who poured it out.

And in your head, you're going to be thinking, but we're not, we need to teach this child to be responsible. And then your anxiety is going to kick in and that's your greatest enemy as a parent is your own anxiety because it causes you to project out into the future and you're going to start to think well if my child can't pick up his legos and learn to be responsible have personal responsibility at age four or six or eight or fourteen how's he ever going to be successful in life? It doesn't work that way. That's part of the no BS approach is I will try to cut through

the clutter and say, no, that doesn't matter, but this does matter, right? No, that doesn't matter. You're worrying about the wrong things. And for many of you, I promise you, because you're good parents and you're conscientious and you love your kids, you will spend their entire childhood worrying about the wrong stuff and neglecting the really important stuff. And that's where it's kind of an advantage I have of being on the back end of this and working with about a million families is to be able to say, no, no, no, no. Don't worry about that part. Worry about and focus on this part, right? Let me do this one really quickly. This showing work, older kid. Well, I'm not going to show my work. And you'd be like, well, you have

to show your work so your teacher knows how you got the answer right. And your middle schooler especially is going to be like, uh, duh, I pretty much showed my work by getting the answer right. Why would I do the extra work? Well, honey, the teacher's going to want you to uh, duh, I pretty much showed my work by getting the answer right. Why would I do the extra work? Well, honey, the teacher's going to want you to show it. And if you don't, you're going to, you're going to get marked down and they're gonna be like, well, I don't care because grades don't matter in middle school. Right. And you're going to scratch your head of like, oh, what am I going to do? But what we should really do is look at that child and say, you know what, that's really good thinking because you've determined that grades don't matter to you

right now. And you're right. They really don't matter in middle school all that much. What really matters is the fact that you're learning and that you're curious, right? Not that we're fitting some arbitrary standards. But here's what I love about you. You've learned that doing your work, showing your work, why would you do that? Because you already figured, try this sometime. Try acknowledging them instead of fighting them over it all the time. Here's what I know about you. You're really good at doing the math in your head and you see patterns. And so you don't need to go through the steps right now. Now, later on, when math gets a little

bit tougher, you're going to have to go through the steps and you may need to do that. But right now, yeah, I get why you do that. Because why would you put extra effort into something that you don't have to? Because with that extra energy, you could be playing Fortnite and doing all kinds of things that are going to rot your brain. Now, don't say that part, right? But leave out the sarcasm with your kids. But acknowledge the positive parts to them of like, yeah, you're a good thinker. Now I know you're going to wrestle with that, especially the rule followers and compliant people out there of like, oh, but you should, you know, you should, you should always do your best and you should do that. Why? You don't

do your best at everything. You do not. You don't think back on your day to day. Did you do your best at every single thing you put your hand to? No, you didn't. You did your best at the right things and you prioritize. And it is a much, look at us, we fall into these traps of all this arbitrary stuff of like cliches of like, well, you have to do your best at everything. That's just not true, right? And so here's an example. Here's a really good example of what not to focus on. All the cliches. We have to do your best at everything.

What you should be focusing on is teaching your child the far more difficult task of prioritizing in life and saying some things are worthy of my time and energy and some things just aren't. And that's wisdom. And that's good judgment. And very few people nowadays have that. Because everything nowadays is like, well, you just have to do what everybody expects you to do. Why? No, I want you to be a good thinker. And I want you to be able to cut against the grain sometimes. Because sometimes you have to cut against the grain and do what's not popular. And sometimes you need to be able to handle conflict. And instead of trying to convince them

of doing this, what if you spent your time teaching them and showing them how to stand up for themselves in a respectful way? I don't want them going into school saying, yeah, my mom pretty much agreed with me and said, this is stupid busy work. Duh. Like you don't want them going into school saying, yeah, my mom pretty much agreed with me and said this is stupid busy work. Duh. Like you don't want them saying that. And that's not what I'm advocating. But you could teach them how to cut against the grain and how to do things differently without being offensive to people and without being disrespectful. See, that's where I'd rather you spend your time than trying to convince them to do something they're not going to do. Does that make sense? So let's move on to the second part.

So the second email was from a couple who said, listen to your podcast. We finally got all the downloads and listen to what it's really helped us with is knowing when to be tough and when to be soft and how to do it. And they said the outgrowth is we are much more consistent, fewer meltdowns, and we feel much more confident. That's partly why we put this stuff together is so that you can feel confident, you can listen to hours of it at a time

and showing multiple situations, multiple different angles of how to handle this. And they said what we found most helpful is you give us scripts and it's really helped. So good. So here's what I want to do based on that couple's emails. Give you a couple examples. Let's say your child doesn't want to do something that you asked them to do. Now, if it's a situation where it's just like, well, I just don't feel like doing it. Well, that's rational. I just don't feel like

doing it. So my response becomes very rational. Well, yeah. Okay. So you don't want to do that. Well, here's what I want you to know. That's not the way we roll in our home. So if you're going to take that approach and you think you don't have to do things, well, then that's just the way we're going to do everything. And I'm good with that. And where that comes around is later

when they want you to take them to the video game store, their Taekwondo class, or whatever they're doing, or feed them, or do something fun with them, or feed them, or do something fun with them, or give them screen time. Yeah, I don't feel it. That's just not, I just don't want to do it. I just don't want to do it, because you established that's the way we're working, right? And so I can take a very tough approach and say, in another context,

and say, no, that's just not the way we roll around here. See, it's even. It's a matter of fact. It's concise. There's no talking. There's no getting upset. I can't believe that you would say that. I can't believe you don't listen. When I was a kid, there's no need for all the drama. Stop taking it personally. And you're going to be like, yeah, but they're the child and I'm the adult. I'm going to say, I know they're a child. You're the adult. Stop taking it personally. It's just not the way we roll. It's same like with a tantrum. A tantrum is purely rational. I want the fruit snacks. You won't give it to me. So I'm going to roll on the floor and I'm going to roll on the floor in a public place in the grocery store so that it embarrasses you. And my approach there

is rational because like, it's not going to happen. I'll sit on the floor and I'll let them know, look, I'm really cool with your tantrum. I just have two rules in my home for tantrums. Number one is we do everything with excellence in our home. If you're going to have a tantrum, give me all you got. Wear yourself out. Because my second rule is your tantrums accomplish nothing. Your mood does not change my mood. Your behavior does not determine my behavior. You can throw your tantrum if you don't. It's just not going to work. All I know it's going to happen is you're going to be tired and you're not going to get what you want. See, that's, I can be very tough with that, but I'm not being mean. I'm not yelling at all. I'm in complete control of myself. Now, when I get soft is when, let's say I want to take them to taekwondo

class or they have to go to the doctors or some new place or participate in a school play, and they start melting down. When I hear it becoming emotional, then I know there's something else to it. Usually the trigger is anxiety. Sometimes they're overwhelmed, but a lot of times it's anxiety about going to new place or doing new experiences. See, that's where I'm not going to take like, you know what, you're going to get your little butt in the car right now because I know you're overwhelmed and you're anxious and you're super emotional, but you're going to go anyway. No, I'm not going to go there then because that's just going to escalate. So when it's emotional, I de-escalate

first. How do I do that? Acknowledgement. Oh man, if I were you, I'd be a little bit nervous too. Nervous, stomach a little bit upset. Now I get the acknowledgement. I've softened a little bit. And then I go back to being, hey, I know you're going to like this class. So then I give them tools, like giving them a job to do wherever they go, right? Does that make sense? So let me go through a couple other examples of, I don't want to do my homework. Well, that's not an option, right? Like, I'm not going to try to convince you of it, but that's just not an option. Like, the homework's getting done. Chores are going to get done. How you do your schoolwork, oh, that's another matter. See, I will be rigid with, this is going to get done. Where I soften and where I'm not rigid is,

I just don't care how we get it done you want to do your school work bouncing on an exercise ball you want me to review vocabulary words while you're jumping on the trampoline you want to do homework listening to music sitting underneath the table out in the car right at taco bell I don't care so does that make sense let's say a child is kind of talking back to you. The response, see, you use both in the same conversation, right? So your child's being defiant, talking back. Then I go with, hey, just want to let you know, that's not going to work in this home. Just want to let you know that's not going to work.

Because look, the last 342 times you used that tone with me, remember you just lost all your stuff. But what I do know is usually when you talk to me like that, you're anxious, you're frustrated, you're upset. So I'm going to go grab some chips. If you want to grab some salsa, I'll come out in the deck. I'll listen to you and help you out. Or listen, I've got a cooked dinner. So if you want to come in the kitchen, because I'm creating a little space, a little bit of space in between, right? So that we can then calm things down. And I'm inviting them in and saying, listen, talking to me like that, like I'm not going to react to it. I'm not going to get all upset about it because you can talk to me like that.

But all that's going to happen is you're going to lose your stuff and you're not going to get what you want, right? A teenager being disrespectful is basically a teenage tantrum. It's the same exact thing as a four-year-old doing that. And your response is the same thing. It's no on the surface like that. This is not going to work for you, but I'll give my energy to problem solving and I'll show you a different way to handle it, right? If you want to come help me cook dinner, I bet we can problem solve and I can help you with that, right? So you're able to be tough and soft in the same

conversation, but you've de-escalated first, and you're always moving toward tools. You're not giving in to them. So let's work on that this week, being tough and being soft, right? So listen to the, if you have the CDs and the downloads, listen to them, share them with family members, share them during the holidays, share them with teachers, share them during the holidays share them with teachers share them with your parents if you need help learning how to knowing how to share them digitally ask Casey he'll help you we want people listening to these because they change families and they change relationships if you need help contact Casey at celebrate calm calm and go to the website take advantage of one of the Christmas sales we've got going on. But if we can help you in any way, email us. This is personal to us. You're not reaching out to a call center

somewhere. You're reaching out. Your family is contacting our family and we really take this seriously and we really want to take care of you and help you. So reach out. Anyway, thanks for listening. Share the podcast and we'll talk soon. Love you all. Bye-bye. That was awkward, but I'm going to keep it on here anyway, because I'm awkward. Okay. Talk to you soon. Bye-bye.