Tag disobedience
The Awesome Thing About Your Kid’s Misbehavior…
The rough-looking teen’s tough veneer had softened. I detected tears in his eyes. “No one has ever said anything like that to me.” Just minutes before, I met this teen in a line at our local amusement park. After a…
The Power of Defiance
Jesus was defiant. He defied Satan’s temptation. He defied the religious structures of the day. He defied legalism. He even defied death. One of our problems as parents is that we treat our kids’ defiance as if it is entirely…
It’s Not Defiance—It’s Science!
Pretty much every kid loves to experiment with chaos: dropping food, smearing things, investigating cupboards or containers, throwing toys — you name it, a toddler has probably gotten into it. It can be easy to get aggravated when your child…
Powerful Strategies to Fill Your Parenting with Peace and Confidence [podcast]
Recently Jim and Lynne sat down with the folks over at the Positive Parenting podcast to talk about how to discipline in a way that actually connects with kids. The full podcast is 30 minutes — Listen or download below:…
How Do Your Kids Feel When You Discipline Them?
As a typically impatient, “get it done” sort of dad, I found myself in our early parenting years using my big voice and strong presence to move my kids into action. This approach worked great for me! …But my wife Lynne,…
Why You Don’t Need a New Parenting Strategy
John was fed up. He told me that everything he’d tried had failed. No matter what consequences or logic John put in place, his 6th grade son Ben just wouldn’t take responsibility for getting himself up and moving and out the…
What do I do when my child just says no?
Recently we received this question from Michelle: I am struggling with a tween who often says no to my requests. She is a good girl most of the time, but she will be disrespectful to me and I have no…
3 Signs of Unhelpful Consequences… and How to Fix Them!
“You’re stupid!” says the frustrated child. The parent feels annoyed, even a bit angry and responds, “You can’t talk to me that way! You’re grounded for the rest of the day! You go to your room and think about what…
When is defiance better than obedience?
I’ll never forget her statement. I was speaking to a grade-school teacher in a Christian school about behavior problems with her students. In the context of the conversation she actually seemed more upset about the obedient kids than the…
The Real Reason for a Lot of Misbehavior
Have you ever noticed that kids rarely misbehave when they feel truly happy and deeply secure? There’s a reason for this. When our children misbehave, there is almost always underlying discouragement or anxiety that drives the misbehavior. Rushing to address…