Anyone who has worked with me in my “principal” role will tell you that my favorite quote stems from an adaptation of a quote by Henry Cloud.  I say, “A person will not change a behavior until that behavior becomes uncomfortable.”  Then I go on to help the parent know how to reach “uncomfortable”!  This week’s topic is “discipline.”  My daughter’s blog absolutely nailed it on the head as to how to cultivate self-disciplined kids.  I will not repeat, but instead only add that the most successful graduates of our school – the ones who have truly done something great with their lives – are the ones who were self-disciplined… who had their own goals.

    So, how do you as a parent get your child to the “self-disciplined” point?  There are three key components, as far as I see it.  The first is modeling.  Self-disciplined parents raise self-disciplined kids.  That doesn’t mean, I never had to spank my son or put my daughter on time-out, because I did.  It means that my husband and I shared our failures, the self-disciplining we did, and then the later successes with our children.  We told them that learning was a life-long process, and while no one expects you to be perfect from the get-go, they do expect you to be fixing things along the way.  Failures were not things to be hidden; they were ways to show our kids that trying is what mattered.

   The second component is, of course, making sure that the undesirable behavior has an undesirable consequence. Parents, every kid can “wait out” a lecture.  It’s easy… because they’re not listening.  It’s important that you as the parent identify undesirable behaviors before they occur.  Go ahead and assign a punishment for those anticipated behaviors ahead of time as well.  Then when your child chooses to do the undesirable behavior, he/she chooses to accept the punishment that goes with it.  This method takes you out of the equation completely because the child made the decision, not you.  This is what society does.  When I speed, I know what the consequence is if I get caught.  I am not surprised to receive a ticket; I chose that consequence when I decided to break the law. 

   The final component is consistency.  Parents will tell me of trying “this” and trying “that,” but a key ingredient to a discipline working is making sure it’s a consequence every time.  The students at my school are gifted.  They can wait out any parent.  If they know that the parent is only going to follow through on a threat once, they will simply wait until the parent forgets, or do the behavior at a time that they know the parent will be too tired to follow through.  My students have even bragged about letting the parents “reason” with them and acting like they really “learned their lesson.”  Many can cry on demand!

    Pick your discipline and stick to it for a bit.  If you have been consistent and the behavior persists, than you may have not chosen an undesirable consequence, so make the punishment stiffer.  If the punishment is already stiff, and your child persists, maybe it’s time to re-evaluate your rule.  Usually, if a child is willing to accept punishment, there’s a good chance your rule is faulty.

     I’m not trying to come off like some guru of discipline.  Believe me, I work on self-discipline 24/7!  A friend once told me that no one could be harder on me than me!  This is just some of what I’ve used when helping parents along my journey.  I hope you find it helpful as well!

-        Michelle