Just in Time for Father's Day.... New Parenting Strategy Embraced!!

Though filed under the byline of Count Raoul, this post was in fact
written by his friend, confidant and personal counsel, Murray Beasley of
Athens, GA.

Just in Time for Father’s Day…. New Parenting Strategy Embraced!

Globally, frustrated parents, especially fathers, are finding out about and rapidly embracing the new and poorly named ‘You’re Doing It Exactly Right-Strategy’ for raising children.  From the steppes of the Mongolian desert to the Scottish Highlands and everywhere in between, dads have found their children changing from easily bored and not-too-motivated progeny into what are in many people minds darn good kids.

This change has happened rather suddenly, partly because The Strategy (as it is thankfully called in parenting circles) is so easy to master that it can be adopted and put into practices by all families of a humble cul-de-sac and even entire towns in the space of a weekend. To date, no father following the guidelines of this parenting game changer has admitted to anything other than total satisfaction.

The Strategy was developed in the United States by exiled Lithuanian pretender Count Raoul. Nominally a renowned boulevardier and cheesy tart critic, Count Raoul reared (almost.. sorta.. not really) three children himself with modest
assistance from his wife, their mother. Although his early parenting techniques could be called ‘predictable’ during his children’s pre-adolescence, The Strategy itself is said to have come to him in a dream and immediately put into practice on his then 18-year-old son, his first child.

“Ironically, the old fashioned parenting technique of recounting your own childhood hardships is the catalyst for my ‘You’re Doing It Exactly Right-Strategy’,” said the Count in a recent radio interview from Gstaad. “My technique is very simple, but at the same time rather difficult to execute” he continued in his affected continental lisp most real men despise. “You tell your child that their petulant habits are in fact exactly how you behaved a generation ago and like magic, the little bugger does precisely the opposite just to prove you wrong.  Last summer I told my son I was pleased he had not gotten a summer job and hoped he enjoyed growing fat during his school break as much as I did some thirty years ago.  By the time I had returned from the Whist Club, he was mowing the neighbor’s lawn and handing out flyers to passing motorists.”

But Count Raoul cautions that The Strategy is not a simple reverse psychology ploy. In the same interview he detailed the incredible complexities of the double negative motivational gambit. 

“It wasn’t easy yelling at my seventh grade daughter," the Count remembered.  “But when she shut off the telly and went upstairs to study at 7PM, I knew I had to strike. I cautioned her to never let me see her doing homework again. This twisted reversal of motivational logic worked as I had prayed and she started doing her homework earlier and earlier just to get under my skin. That’s when I knew I had to share The Strategy with the world.”

So it’s just that simple and just that scary. If regurgitating your own experiences fails to motivate your children; and you know it doesn't, then take a chance, be a
Dad. Tell them they’re doing everything exactly right.