Hi I'm Nicholeen Peck, and I'm the creator of the parenting system called teaching self-government.
And in this video, we are going to be talking about how to teach kids to respect their parents
I speak all over the world about parenting and teaching children and parents how to govern themselves.
And parents come to me all the time and they say, "Nicholeen, I feel like there's 2 things
that my family needs. My children need to respect me and I need to better respect my children". And I
will say to them, "You are exactly right. But what you might not understand is you respecting them
and them respecting you, do not look the same. In fact, those are 2 separate principles
that involve an understanding of a family dynamic. That may be your children don't know yet".
So in this video, we're going to talk about that family dynamic. About how to help the family get the
relationships in a functional way. So that respect is possible and will be happening all the time.
We're also going to be talking about. how to prepare the children to have respectful
relationships, and some skills they can use and that you can remember. So that you can correct them
when they aren't respecting you. Let's talk about what respect is, okay? So, respect actually comes
from the word revere, even reverence is part of this. It means relating to another person. When you
respect a person you feel an attachment for them, an appreciation for them, you honor who
they are. Then if we are not respecting each other, if parents aren't respecting children,
or if children aren't respecting parents. Is it safe to say that maybe we are not remembering who
we are or who each other is? I suggest to you that that is true. So for years when I was teaching parenting.
I would talk about different skills that people needed in order to improve their
relationships and the respect in the home. And are going to discuss some of those skills later on
in this video. But there is a key principle that people do not usually think about, and after I
wrote my book which is an international bestseller. It's called "Parenting A House United", people kept
asking me these questions they would say stuff like, "Well, I like that you have this skill in here
and this way to correct them that's calm and stuff. But what if my child just doesn't care?
What if they just won't be corrected, because they completely disrespect me?" And I would say to them,
"Well, that's a role issue", and in my mind when I wrote the book I thought everyone understood roles.
I thought people knew family roles but what I've realized is our society has not been doing a
great job of sustaining and teaching the family roles. So let's talk about those roles really briefly.
I'm not going to go into great detail there but basically the role or each
person's role is a self-evident truth about who they are, and if they don't live in alignment with
that truth within that relationship or that group. Then everything becomes dysfunctional.
So if a parent behaves as a child dysfunction. If children get the authority of parent dysfunction
So we have to keep the relationships organized. Which means, parent has to stay parent,
child has to stay child, mother has to stay mother, father has to stay father. You get the idea. So, what
does it mean to be mother? Think of that, I'm sure you could make a list. What does it mean
to be father? You've probably thought about that before. Even your children have thought about that before.
But what does it mean to be a 13-year-old son? What does it mean? What is actually
a five-year-old daughter? I'm not going to tell you all the answers there. Because I do have a book
it's called "Roles - The Secret to Family, Business, and Social Success", and truly it's a fun book to
read as a family, to discuss. And some of the things that family does to strengthen their roles
and to help their children understand their roles to get rid of dysfunction, are really life-changing.
And I don't want to ruin that for you by giving you all of that now, you can go get that there.
But there is 1 key thing that we have to remember and that is, who's the teacher and who's
the learner. So, any child who is still a minor is definitely still a learner, okay? So, that's 1 part
of their role learner, that's an identity thing. And parent is teacher, that's an identity thing.
That's how it was meant to be, learners come to 2 teachers. That's just the system, that's how we
get children here. So, if the parent doesn't teach and the learner doesn't learn, then we end up with
dysfunction. The children need to understand roles and they need to know that you are
going to uphold their role by doing the teaching, and uphold your role by also doing the teaching.
So, you are dedicated to being that teacher in their lives that helps guide them, helps them
navigate, answers their questions. You have to be willing. It takes work, but it's the most rewarding
work you'll ever do. In the end, it's the work you'll remember most about anything else you've
done in your life. So decide to embrace that role instead of fighting against it, and hoping for that
teenager role when really you're not there. That's gonna set everything straight. So that then they
will feel like they must respect. In fact, a person who does not seem confident in their own role
is never respected by the people that are under them That's just a leadership principle and it
definitely applies to our homes. You can find out so much more about roles by reading the book "Roles",
and you can get it at teachingselfgovernment.com. The cheapest prices on that website, go check it
out, read it, and discuss it with your family and have those conversations. So, step number 1 is,
teaching your child what respect is and what we are respecting, which is the roles, that each person
has in the family. Even if we're not perfect, we have to respect those roles and that's something
that parents have historically always done in order to maintain order, and to help children learn
respect for authority and for their families. But what if the child still chooses not to respect
the parent? What should the parent do then? Well, the parents do have a moral obligation
to correct that kind of dysfunctional behavior. So parents absolutely must correct it. But before
you get into correcting it. It's good for your children to know exactly what you're correcting.
So in the teaching self-government parenting system. We talk about skills that the children
need to learn self-mastery. There are 4 basic skills that every person should know. Those are
following instructions, accepting no answers and criticism, accepting consequences, and disagreeing
appropriately. Every one of these 4 basic skills that are in my parenting course are designed
to keep their roles in the right place. As well as help the person focus on themselves
for learning self-mastery. Instead of focusing on power struggling with their parent or child in
order to get things their way. Pre-teaching or proactively teaching your children the skills
they need for respect and success is definitely a must. Then when they don't follow the instructions.
So for instance, there's 5 steps to following an instruction. You look at the person, you keep
a calm face voice and body, you say "okay" or ask to disagree appropriately, which is one of those other skills.
Do the task immediately, and then check back. If a person does not do one of those five steps
they are not following instructions. So if I told my child I need you to go you do your dishes
and they rolled their eyes and walked away. Even if they were going to do the dishes,
I would need to correct that. Because that is not respect and they are not following instructions.
Because they're not keeping a calm face voice in body and they didn't say "okay", also because they
were rolling their eyes they weren't looking at me were they. So, I would need to correct them.
So it's important that you've set up a system ahead of time for how you will correct your children
when something goes wrong. And one of the most important parts of that correction plan that you
have as a family is how it's going to feel. So how should that correction feel? It should feel calm.
It should feel secure, safe, loving, pointed in the right direction. That calmness though is the part
that is the hardest for most people. Getting that feeling that everything's okay even if someone
did something. That maybe you didn't want them to do or that wasn't good self-government.
When you correct them and you help them come back to a place of respect, because they were disrespecting.
You've got to do it with a tone of calmness. Since you have listened to this video. I have a special
gift for you it is completely free. It is called the "Calm Parenting Toolkit", and if you will notice
in the description below this video, there is a link to the calm parenting toolkit. That link
will give you access to a course a mini-course, where you can start on the road to self-government
and calmness. And if you've mastered that calmness within yourself, it will take you to the next level
which is to prepare you to teach calmness to your children as well. So definitely go and click that
link for the calm parenting toolkit. Get started on self-government, get the tone right so that you
can get the roles right, and so that everyone can master those skills that are required for
respecting each other in our families and everywhere else. Click on the link below.