With Caleb heading into his Senior year and Mia starting High School this fall, I find myself with a new sense of urgency when it comes to teaching them ALL-THE-THINGS, but sometimes it feels like my words fall flat. Not only do my words seem to go in-one-ear and out-the-other, but I also come across as a nag: “Pick up your room. Don’t stay up too late. Get off your phone. No ice-cream before (or instead of) dinner. You’ve been playing video games for too long. Clean up after yourself in the kitchen.”
I can see how, from their perspective, those statements come across as nagging and nitpicking. The thing is I have good reasons behind my requests, but I often let the frustration of dealing with the same issue for the hundredth time take over. Then we begin to have an argument about the behavior, instead of having a conversation about why it’s important to me to make sure they understand and adhere to certain practices.
I decided to have a heart-to-heart with my kids, and I communicated with them that two of my main goals as a parent are to equip and empower them to thrive in life. I explained to them that most of the things I ask them to do or want to teach them fall in either one of those two categories – equip or empower.
Shortly after, I asked them to clean their rooms and I was able to bring it back to how my job is to equip and empower them. In this case, I wanted to equip them by helping them create the habit of having a tidy room. I went on to explain, “Creating the habit of having a tidy room will pay off in more ways than one. For example, you will always be able to find what you’re looking for, which will reduce stress in moments that might already be stressful, like if your alarm didn’t go off and you’re running late. There are certain things you can do to make your life easier and keeping a tidy space is one of them. Somehow that made sense to them and they proceeded to clean their rooms (at least that one time).
A similar lesson can be attached to just about any other behavior because the truth is there’s always more to it than the behavior itself. What we’re really trying to do as parents is to instill values and life lessons, we just fail to communicate how these will benefit them long term, so they feel like we’re just bossing them around.
Of course we have to practice what we preach. Tidying is one of my strong suits so that’s an easy one for me to model. As for the things I struggle with I pray God fills in the gaps and grows me and them in those areas too. Nobody’s rocking it in every area of life, but at the very least we can teach them what we have to offer.
They might not truly understand the value of what we’re trying to teach them even after we explain it to them. But it is more likely that they will get a hold of it if we explain to them the purpose behind why we ask them to do x, y, or z, and if they see us practicing those things as well.
Praying we all get to see the fruit of the seeds we are planting in our children’s souls. And the sooner the better!
Your Turn!
- Schedule a time to have a heart to heart with your teens.
- Think about the life lessons and values you want to teach them behind the behaviors you’re trying to correct.
- Share how those life lessons and values have benefitted you personally and in relationships.
- Share a life lesson you had to learn the hard way.
- Lead by example.
Photo by Hassan OUAJBIR from Pexels
