Do you want to know how to talk? So a teenager will listen. I'm Nicholeen Peck
and I teach all about parenting, good communication and how to build strong
family relationships all over the world through the lens of the principle. And
in this video we're talking about opening that door to more talk.
So many parents struggle reaching their children, especially in the teenage years,
and that's because teenagers are starting to want to pull away, develop a little bit of autonomy,
and there's sometimes some other reasons why they start not wanting to open up to their parents. But
parents will notice this problem, try to fix it, but sometimes they struggle. In this video, we're
going to be talking about what struggles parents have and what you can do to have better results.
So a parent, let's say, is wanting to have a good connective moment to talk to their teenage child
about a problem. Maybe it's curfew or maybe it's phone usage, or maybe it's that they're not doing
their chore or something like that. What is the first thing that a parent usually does? Well,
usually what they do is they start to get negative at the child. They start to nag the
child about things. They start to make statements like, well, you never do whatever it is. These
absolute statements, those types of statements are never going to work in any relationship, not
even with a teenage child. So the problem that we have is when children are little, we can say, oh,
that is bad. Don't do that or, Hey, don't forget to do that, and we can do these nagging things,
or we can just say, that was bad, that was wrong. And the child can go, oh yeah, that was bad, that
was wrong. Oh yeah, I better fix it. But once the child's brain starts to develop a little bit more,
and they're a little bit more sophisticated, they want to be communicated with in a more
sophisticated way, they're thinking more things. They can problem solve more things.
They want to have some of the opportunity to do some of the problem solving themselves,
and they want their ability intellectually to be respected. And if they don't feel like it's
respected, then they're not going to want to have a conversation with you about whatever it
is. Many parents, when they start approaching a topic with a young person will make some classic
blunders. Classic blunder number one is don't talk too much, don't lecture.
After about 30 seconds, you should be able to get to the point, right? In 30 seconds,
a person should know what it is that you want to share with them about that particular thing.
So instead of going on and about the child not ever helping out and how frustrating that is,
and how other people don't like that, they're not pulling their load or how you feel about them not
pulling their load. Instead, what you should do is probably just look at them and say, Hey, I've
noticed that you haven't been getting your chores done lately. Why do you think that's happening?
That's it. Now they're going to say, well, I don't know. Probably this. Probably that I'm, and then you
might say something like, instead of saying, well, okay, well, just because that you know,
can't have excuses, da da, da, da. Instead, you might say, that's good to recognize that. How do
you think we could adjust our time so that we can still get those things done and our chores
too? More questions. Instead of just telling the child that they are doing everything on ro all
wrong because they're bad or villainizing them in some way, which is never going to do one thing
for your connection. In fact, it's going to do just the opposite. As soon as you start thinking
you know why they do every single thing, or you start villainizing them in some way and they can
feel those negative thoughts about them that are inside you, they will immediately put up
walls and disconnect. They will decide that this conversation is not meant to be helpful, but it's
meant to hurt. They will decide that they cannot attach to you the whole point of any conversation,
whether it's a conversation about something that is a feeling or something that is a task
that needs to happen or some sort of correction. The whole point is to have a moment where a person
can connect to you and thereby have increased learning and understanding. They need to feel
understood. If you are lecturing them and talking and talking until you feel like they have given
you an indicator that they are now going to see things your way. You have talked too much and
truthfully, you have stepped over a boundary line in any relationship. We should always be taking
time to understand, which means you want to ask more questions than make more statements. I've
got more tips for you on how you can reach your children and have a great conversation
with them. But first, do you see that subscribe button? That button is for you. If you click it,
you'll see more of these videos, and if they help, you better subscribe. Sometimes we have to give
our children advice. That is the job of a parent is to advise their child and to steer them in the
right direction. And when they're young, when they're minors, we also have to instruct them,
give them no answers, those types of things. Well, we need to prepare our children for
accepting advice from us and even critiques or corrections. And the way that we prepare them
is by having a deliberate conversation about who you are in your relationship with each other. That
needs to be very clear. I've written 11 books. One of those books is this one called Roles,
the Secret to Family, Business, and Social Success. In this book is a story of a family, and they're
having a hard time reaching their children, and they have some key conversations with their
children about who they are to each other in the family. So this isn't just about responsibilities.
Who has to wake somebody up in the morning or whose chore it is to do this or that, but it's
more than that. It's it's who they are to each other as a family unit. And you go through the
process with this family, the Justice family, and you see how they get on the same page with their
children. This case study could be very helpful for you as you're trying to open up conversation
with your children about who you are to each other. Do they know the role of a 13 year old
daughter or a 15 year old son? Do they know the role of mother and father in their upbringing and
in their lives? What does that mean for them? What does it mean that you're a nurturer? What does it
mean that you're a provider or a protector? What do those things actually mean to the child? This
book can give a lot of insights for that. So I highly recommend it. Start with a conversation
where you determine who each other really is to each other and then say, okay, so if I'm a
teacher and you're a learner in this relationship, then we have to make sure that we have a way for
the teaching and the learning to happen in a way where we can stay open-minded and we can make sure
that we're connected during these times. Because part of our roles in the family too is that we're
supposed to be a support for each other. So that means that we have to maintain a certain amount
of connection. So how do you maintain connection while doing a correction? That's another thing
you're going to want to talk about. You might say, okay, so we want to have this type of family or
relationship, and so how are we going to correct problems and not take them personally? Well,
in order to create an environment where you can have calm, effective corrections,
it usually requires the tone of self-government. So when a person learns self-government, that
means that they understand the cause and effect of any given situation and possess a knowledge
of their own behavior so that they can control them. So that means they're constantly analyzing
themselves and making a plan for going forward. So as soon as you start opening these conversations,
you're actually opening the door to bringing in the principle of self-government. Now, ideally,
a young person learns how to do all of the skills of self-government for themselves skills, like
give themselves instructions, give themselves no answers, learn how to disagree appropriately with
other people except the consequences for their actions. Learn how to calmly problem solve their
problems with other people, and how to correct other people without violating the roles that
exist in the relationship. They learn all of these things through self-government. In fact, that's
what I teach all over this channel and on my website. That is what it's all about. So there are
some key things that you can teach your child. You can say, Hey, there are these four basic skills
for success. They are following instructions, accepting "no" answers and criticism, accepting
consequences and disagreeing appropriately. So you teach them those four basic skills which have sets
attached to them. They learn all of those steps, and then you practice them and then you say, okay,
this is how I'm going to correct you. In fact, these are going to be the exact words that I will
use when I correct you, and we'll always have a talk time as part of the correction because I
want to make sure that I understand where you're coming from. So if you lay it all out like that
and then consistently follow through with your plan, your child will use their skills and you
can use your skills too. Sorry that I'm using the word child a lot. I usually use the word child
or youth. I don't like the words teen or kids as much because they're a little bit more derogatory
terms. So when I'm saying child, just know I'm talking about all ages. Here are some other tips
for you that you can utilize while you are trying to have good open communication with your teen and
when you are trying to get it so that they will actually listen to you. Number one, actually be
present in the conversation. When you're having those talk times, make sure that you're listening,
that you're focusing, you're not thinking about what you're going to say, but you're thinking
about what they are saying and you're making good eye contact with them. So it's better to
have those conversations when you're not doing something else if at all possible. But sometimes
talking while driving or while working together can be very beneficial and sometimes just the
right opportunity for having some of those deeper conversations and make them seem a little bit more
light instead of so heavy. Another thing that you're going to want to do is create a habit of
regular talks. So in our family, we have meetings. We have family meetings, and we have individual
mentor meetings. We also have what I call parent counseling sessions, which are one-on-one meetings
with a parent and a child. Learning how to have these types of meetings made it so that my
children were always open to deliver conversation about their relationships, their behaviors,
and any other concerns that they might want to bring to my attention. My children would come and
tell me about people they were dating, people they had crushes on, problems they were having
with friends or peers or siblings. They would talk to me about their concerns that they had because
they recognized they were lying a lot and they wanted to break the habit, or they were thinking
too much about wanting to watch tv and how do they stop that craving, those types of things.
They would come to me and talk to me about them, and we would come up with a plan because they knew
that I was all about understanding them, helping them make a plan instead of just condemning them.
Don't spend your time condemning a person, help them move forward, be proactive, be understanding,
but then also correct and teach where needed with that perfect calm tone. If you would like more
help with your calm tone, I can help you with that. In fact, I have a free course dedicated
to Calmness and Helping You. It is called the Calm Parenting Toolkit, and right now it is free on my
website. So if you go to teachselfgov.com/toolkit, then you can get the Calm Parenting Toolkit for
free. This will be a great start for you as you are beginning your self-government
journey. Click on the link in the description below this video now, and I'll see you there.