Three C’s: The Foundation for Terrific Parenting

What are the most important components of good parenting? I invite you to consider the power of the calm, caring and consistent parent.

Calm.

This is, of course, about remaining calm in the face of difficulty and struggle. It’s not about remaining calm when things are easy. Most of us can do that.When life isn’t giving you what you want, this commitment is about keeping your cool in the face of challenges. You may often find that your children don’t give you what you want (in terms of behavior and emotion). When you can stay calm in the face of parenting struggles, you can begin to use reasoning, intellect, and the skills that you’ve learned throughout the years to solve the problem in front of you. However, when you lose your cool, none of those resources are available to you. The tools you have learned about all go flying out the window!

Staying calm in the face of turmoil provides an additional benefit. You provide a healthy model of how to walk through the world. Our children will often find that the world doesn’t give them what they want…and keeping our cool is essential for success.

Caring.

This may seem obvious, as I have never met a parent who has stated that they didn’t care about their children. That would be crazy! Of course we care!The secret here is about HOW and WHEN we show that we care. It’s not about unconditional love for our children, as that is a given. It’s about the caring behavior that flows from that love, and learning to master HOW we offer our caring.

For example, nurture lots of caring and attention for the moments that you value. If you care about kindness, be attentive to it. If you care about hard work and effort, notice it. If you care about cooperation, give your attention to it. If you care about healthy eating, nurture it.

Give lots of caring to the things that you really care about.

On the other hand, make sure that you don’t show lots of caring for things that you don’t value. If you don’t want more drama, whining, negativity…then don’t show lots of caring attention.

Thus, the lesson here is to learn to care with discretion…when it comes to specific moments and behaviors. Care in a way where you give your energy and caring to that which you really care about…and make sure that you’re not caring about the things that will not serve your children.

Consistency.

Let’s imagine you put up some fleas in a jar and put a metal lid on the jar. After doing so, you would hear this “ticking” sound as the fleas where jumping up against the lid of the jar. The fleas are quite literally bumping against the limits of their reality at that moment.

Within just a few moments, the ticking noise calms to a complete quiet, and we would see the fleas jumping in the jar, and coming within a half an inch or so of the lid.

Even with their tiny “flea brains” they have learned to respect the limits imposed by the lid on the jar. Every now and then for a few minutes, you might hear an occasional tick, but then it is eventually it is completely silent. The learning is complete.

You can then do a magical thing. Take the lid of the jar off, and you’ll see that the fleas keep jumping, but stay within the limits they just learned moments ago. They don’t jump out!

How did the fleas learn to honor this limit so quickly…with just a little flea brain? They learn because there was a consistent limit.

This “metaphor” is remarkably important as you consider the role of consistency in your parenting. Just think about it…a flea learns to honor the limits when limits are consistent. But lets imagine for a moment that that lid on the jar kept changing…moving up and down when the fleas would jump. Would they ever learn with an inconsistent limit? Doubtful.

The same is going to be true for your children. If you place limits on their behavior, and the limits keep changing from day to day, or from parent to parent, children have trouble learning where the limits are. If bedtime is at seven thirty, but it moves to eight o’clock when you have a “good day” then you are going to be in trouble. The same is true for homework routines, healthy eating and all the rest. Your children will be constantly negotiating and pushing the limits…if you are inconsistent.

The three C’s set a solid foundation. When you remain calm, you show discretion in your caring, and you’re impeccable in your consistent setting of limits, you will undoubtedly establish a solid foundation for your children.