Hey, Live On Purpose Parents. I've got 5 tips for you today about what to do
when kids don't listen. Does that ever happen to you? Children are almost like
little emotional mirrors. Like, whatever you're feeling starts to show up in your
kids. Think about it, when you're having a bad day, what do you notice is going on
with the kiddos? They're bouncing off the walls. And they don't seem to be
listening. The first tip that I have for you about
what to do when kids are not listening is to regulate your own emotions. Now,
this is easier said than done. We've got other videos here on the
channel that can help you with that. Here's a quick tip. Breathe.
Psychologically your brain gets all tied up in what we call the fight-or-flight
response. And if your kids are misbehaving or if they're a little hyper
active or if they're not listening to you, that actually triggers a little
thing in your brain that has chemicals flowing through your bloodstream that
prepare your body to do 1 of 2 things. Fight or get out of there. Now,
honestly as a mom, which one's going to help the situation more? If you fight or
run away. See, either one's going to make it worse. We got to get a hold of that
marvelous mind of yours first. The quickest way I know to reverse that
chemistry and get yourself back in thinking mode is to take some slow deep
breaths. And honestly if your kids not listening to you, most of the time it's
not urgent. It's more important than it is urgent. Are you with me on that? So, you
can take just a moment to take a breath. and I recommend that you breathe in
through the nose, hold for just a moment and then out nice and slow through the
mouth. And push your lips a little bit to
restrict that flow. What this does is it it changes the physiology that's feeding
the oxygen into your brain. Anyway, it works really well especially
if you'll practice breathing occasionally when you're not upset. Then
when you are in one of those moments you can reclaim your brain you have to
regulate your own emotion in this moment. So that we don't trigger more problems
or misbehavior with the kids. That's tip number 1. Tip number 2. Now, if you've
been watching the channel for a while, you've already heard this. And I know
I've told you this before. What's your job as a parent? Okay, I can almost hear
you answering. It's to love them no matter what and even if. That's your job.
Tip number 2 is to remember your job. Your job is to love them no matter what
and even if. "Even if they're not listening to me Dr. Paul?" Yeah.
Maybe especially then. It's easy to love kids who are listening to you and
behaving all the time. Your job is to love them no matter what and even if.
That's your job. Now, here's something that helps. If you know that your job is
not to make sure that they listen to you, do you think you can feel a little less
frustrated in the moment when they're not listening to you? I think so. You're
no longer in that threat stage that triggers the fight-or-flight that we
talked about in tip number 1. when your job is to love them no matter what and
even if, can you love them if they're not listening to you? Yes, you can. Can you
love them if they're misbehaving? Yes, you can. Can you love them if they're not
treating each other very nicely? Yes, you can't. See, you've got your job covered.
And that calms you down as a parent. And puts us in position to do some of the
other things that are going to help. So, let's go to tip number 3. Make sure
you have their attention. Kids are attending not all kinds of things all
the time. They'll be looking at this for a minute and then they'll be distracted
by that over there. And they're all over the place because their little minds are
so active. They're constantly observing and monitoring and tracking everything
that's going on. Your voice sometimes is background noise. It's like, "Wah, wah,
wah." Like the Charlie Brown adults, right? They
hear some noise but it's not very interesting to them. You have to have
their attention. So get in front of their face. Move yourself to a position where
you can get right in their face so that they can see you. If they're playing with
something or watching something else, do what you can to eliminate that
distraction so that you got some contact here.
Okay? Now, this varies for different ages and stages of development. S teenager for
example. You're going to get their attention a little differently than you would a
toddler. But if it's a toddler, you wan to... You want to get down on their level, okay?
Not so that you're up here towering over them but get down on their level where
you can get some eye contact and make sure that you have their attention. You
want to use language that they can understand. And the words that they
understand which leads us right into tip number 4. speak very clearly. Once you
have their attention, speak very clearly in language that is on their level that
they understand. And if you want them to do several things, you probably don't
want to give them an instruction that includes multiple steps. Especially for
little kids. See, if you can get them to focus in on what the first step would be.
"Okay sweetie, I want you to go into the bedroom so,
that we can get ready for bed." Now, in some other videos, I've suggested
ways to enforce that too. But all we're talking about right now is that initial
communication. Use language that is clear to them and that it's consistent with
their level of development. Now, I promised you 5 steps, right? Here's
number 5. Let consequences and empathy do the teaching. What we're trying to get
away from here is the old 3 hours of parenting.
You probably remember these. Rant, rave and rescue. This is where we bottomed out
and then we bail them out. We don't want to go there. All that teaches our kids is
that mom is a hothead. All I have to do is put up with a little bit of noise and
then I'm going to get what I want. No. Let's get away from the rant, rave and rescue. And
instead go to consequences and empathy. Now, consequences. We've talked about
those in a lot of other videos. If you want a really great resource, go to the
positive parenting playlist here on the channel and you'll find dozens of videos
there. A lot of which have some very specific consequences attached to them.
So, the consequences are really important primarily because of your child's level
of development. But even with all their children, sometimes they get in a stage
of thinking that has them responding better to consequences than anything
else. Now there's another part to this. Empathy. Empathy has 2 important parts.
It means that you understand and care. Those 2 parts, okay? Understand and care.
How someone else feels? So, don't be this cold uncaring parent who's just always,
you know, angry or shaking their your finger at them. Have some empathy. Now,
you're going to let the the consequences hold, okay? Don't bail them out from their
consequences. Your kids can handle whatever consequences they just earned
for misbehavior for not listening to you. Let the consequences fall. And then
practice empathy where you connect with that child on an emotional level, okay?
Because they're going t be upset, right? They're not happy about what just happened. So,
you connect with that. "Oh, sweetie. I know this is really tough for you, huh?" And
it's not in a sarcastic or and i-told-you-so sort of a way. It's genuine.
"Oh, sweetie. This is really tough for you, isn't it? I know. But I know that you're
really smart and you're going to figure this out." Okay, so that's connecting with
empathy. And it also empowers that child to make some better choices in the
future including the one about whether they're going to listen to you or not. Okay
mom, dad. You've got this. Parenting is a challenging thing. That's why we've got
all these resources here on the channel where you can connect to the positive
parenting playlist. And also, if you haven't checked it out yet, please visit
parentingpowerup.com. We've got a lot of resources there that you can
connect to including a free sample. And if you're picking this up on LinkedIn,
make sure that you follow us. We're going to be posting new videos every day.