Attitude Is Everything

In the 1960s, psychological theory made the jump from academia to popular culture. This jump had profound effects on childrearing, one of which was that parents began to believe in behavior modification—specifically, that the successful discipline of a child was a matter of using proper consequences vis-à-vis proper methods. Behavior modification held out to parents the promise of a simple, formulaic, and reliably successful approach to child discipline.

Time-out was the first such methodology to achieve popular status, helped along by the author of a widely syndicated newspaper column. Then came “1-2-3 Magic,” which said author thought was stupid from the get-go, but parents were getting desperate, and behavior problems were getting worse by the day, so counting to 3 became, for a while, the disciplinary method du jour.

The author in question eventually came to the conclusion that time-out worked well with children who were already respectful and obedient; otherwise, not so well. Same with counting. Anything works with children who are already obedient.

It took several more years for said author to realize that methods were useless unless accompanied by a proper attitude on the part of the disciplinarian.

He began telling his audiences, “Without the proper attitude, no disciplinary method is going to work for long; with the proper attitude, methods may never become necessary.”

What, pray tell, is this attitude? It is the attitude embraced and projected by all effective leaders, and the successful raising of a child is a matter of leadership. Discipline is the process by which a parent persuades a child to follow his/her lead. The first step in that process is getting the child in question to pay attention to you without having to raise your voice, issue threats or promises or engage in argument.

You get a child to pay attention to you by simply acting like you know what you’re doing. Your confidence in your parental decisions is confirmed by the fact that when your child demands to know why he must do, cannot do, or cannot have so-and-so, your response is “Because I said so” or some variation on that theme. Contrary to mental health professional propaganda, “Because I said so,” calmly spoken, is nothing more than an affirmation of the legitimacy of your authority.

As a parent, you must always occupy the position of authority figure. The message behind that occupancy is “Whether you like my decisions or not is not my concern. I am here to do the right thing in your behalf, not get you to like me. I love yo

u enough to make the supreme sacrifice for you, which is to say, I cannot love you more. You won’t be able to wrap your head around that until you have children of your own; therefore, I am not going to explain myself to you. I will not argue with you because in so doing, I would become your de facto equal. You cannot upset me, no matter what you do or say. You’re welcome to give that a try and find out for yourself. I am a rock in your life. You need a rock. You would rather have a vending machine, but what you want is rarely what you need. Therefore, I am your very own, personal rock and you are going to discover that you cannot move me.”

Parents who master that attitude have no problems when it comes to discipline. Why? Because a child’s NATURAL reaction to the proper delivery of authority in his life is obedience. That means that if your child is disobedient, it is not because of some congenital condition. He doesn’t have a biological quirk that makes it impossible for him to pay attention and do what he’s told. He doesn’t have some personality quirk that makes him immune to authority.

If your child is disobedient, doing something to HIM is not going to address the problem, because the problem is YOU, not HIM.

You may not like hearing that, but it’s actually good news. You’ve been trying to change HIM and getting increasingly frustrated in the process. For you to change YOU is going to be a whole lot easier than trying to change him. So, change you. Become the rock your child needs.

Copyright 2024, John K. Rosemond