When it comes to your kids, you can’t control them. You can only control you. You can imagine all you want them to be, do, and have. You can wish and hope and cajole. You can nag and scold, and punish.
Since you can’t control them, yet you long for change, then you must begin to control you! This sounds like a simple shift, but it isn’t easy.
To control YOU, you must raise your awareness of your thoughts, feeling and emotional instantaneous-reactions. You instantly-react to certain things your child does or says. It’s OK. We all do.
When they do X, you react with Y. They know its coming and tune you out. The louder you get, the more they put you on mute. And, the more emotionally reactive you get, the more unreliable you prove yourself to be.
Would you choose to confide your troubles to a friend you know will react with judgment and criticism?
Now is the time to earn the vitally important spot in your child’s life – become the one they can trust. Start by taking a pause between stimulus and your response.
