I came up with a new concept in parenting today. The concept came to me like a flash--like a vision. I tried it out right away and I was very happy with the results.
Let me preface my revolutionary parenting concept. Every parent--every parent--has the challenge of children who sometimes don't listen and do what they say. Gil and I have discovered that we are part of "every parent" and our kids our part of "every kid". So sometimes I will say something and it will be ignored, "not heard", forgotten, blatantly disregarded, not understood, given to a brother or sister--frankly the creativity of children would not allow me to list all the ways that parental instructions left unaccomplished.
Now clearly, sometimes, occasionally, even, dare-I-say often, our children do what we say. Its wonderful. We like it. We try to reward it.
But sometimes. Oh sometimes. Sometimes, you just need to tip the ratios a bit. You need to get your kids to find themselves obeying a larger number of instructions than they are not obeying. My theory here is that a higher ratio of obeyed instructions improves parental sanity and at the same time increases a child's sense of accomplishment. "Hey, I've done a lot of things that my dad said today. I'm on a roll."
So what, do you ask, is this revolutionary concept in parenting that can single-handedly increase your child's Obedience to Parental Instructions Index (OPII)? Simple and powerful.
Give instructions that are literally impossible to ignore, forget, pass on, etc. Need some examples?
Here are a few of mine:
- "Make sure to bring you hair WITH YOU when you get out of the van." Bam! Obeyed 100% of the time.
- "When you get in this house, your eye color BETTER still be ___." (Fill in with the appropriate hue.)
- "We will only allow smiling with your lips--you MAY NOT use your elbow."
- "Your metaphysical realities must all be together in ONE
CORPOREAL BEING when you enter this house." (A great follow up line
for this one would be, "do you understand me?!")
Now giving out 5 of these instructions has the health equivalancy of a shot of wheat grass. (And we all know how valuable shots of wheat grass are, don't we?) Of course these are just a few examples. You'll certainly need a more to properly impact the OPII ratio.
Maybe you have some contributions of your own?
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