Self Control - End of the year, It's a big one!

What is it about self-control that makes achieving it so hard? Many have asked me about this topic as it relates to parenting so I thought it would be a perfect topic for the end of the year. Something you can ponder and experiment with over the holidays. I know how hard this is because self-control has been a recurring theme for me lately. And then I went Christmas shopping and I saw self-control and it’s many faces in full bloom. I saw toddlers and preschoolers being yelled at for lack of self-control. And I saw parents screaming, yelling and grabbing children, seems they also lacked self-control.

What is self-control? And how can you achieve it especially in situations when you’re angry or frustrated? As I said this has been a big issue for me lately, and one that I think I’ve finally gotten a small handle on. I’m nowhere close to perfect, and I realize I still have much work to do in this area, but I have found some very interesting things out about how to achieve self-control as it applies to adults, toddlers and preschoolers.

If you’ve ever heard me speak or read anything I have written, mostly the on-demand seminars, then you know I always like to begin with a definition of a word before I stretch the definition to make my point, so here goes. Webster’s says that self-control means “control or restraint of oneself or one's actions, feelings, etc.”

The interesting thing about that definition is the next statement/question that pops into everyone’s mind, “I know what it means, the question is how can I achieve it? Why do I go from zero to screaming and how can I achieve enough self-control so I don’t do that?”

Okay, are you ready? The answer is simple and so complex it boggles the mind. The key to self-control is to STOP yourself before the anger, rage or frustration comes out of your mouth. It’s that simple and it’s that complex.

Every parent I know wants to have more self-control. Most parents would rather teach than punish. And most parents have the same question, “If I just stop, then what do I do with my feelings? What do I do with my rage, frustration, anger?” Well, that’s where the complex part comes in. The complex part of the equation is all about timing because the key to self-control is in the timing. Let me explain.

Almost every person I have ever met will admit that when they overreact or can’t control themselves, they know it—the moment after it happens. They realize almost as soon as the words are out of their mouth that this was something they shouldn’t have done. So the key is to pay attention to what the thoughts in your head are saying BEFORE the words leave your mouth. This means you have to slow yourself down and stop riding on automatic pilot.

The thoughts circling around in your head are trying to tell you something.

They’re trying to show you where you are emotionally.
Those thoughts are trying to tell you the direction you’re headed.
Those thoughts require that you use self-control and make a decision right now.

The decision is whether or not to act on the thoughts and feelings you’re hearing in your head at that moment.

If you were to be really honest with yourself just as you’re about to scream or yell you’d probably admit that the chatter in your head is all about what someone did to you or what someone else’s behavior has caused you to have to deal with, THAT’S WHAT YOU WANT TO PAY ATTENTION TOO. That’s your moment of decision. That’s the moment when you use your own self-control and actually choose to either continue to be out of control, or angry or raging or to stop.

The more you practice listening to the thoughts circling in your head as you begin to feel out of control the better you will get at this, I promise. It’s sort of like a game you’ll be having with yourself. When the feelings pop into your head that say, how could my child do that, or I’m so mad, that’s when you silently say to yourself, “I’m not going to act on these feelings until I get calmer.”

By doing this repeatedly you’ll begin to experience a pretty big slice of calmness in your life.

Your body will begin to relax
Yelling and screaming will naturally be reduced
You will feel better about your parenting
And you will feel better about your child—it’s that powerful.

Suppose that doesn’t work for you, what then? Well, that’s when you’ll have to really look at your beliefs about control. You’ll have to look:

At the beliefs you have about your role as a parent
Back at your childhood to see what your parent’s beliefs were about control and self-control
At whether you believe that the parent is always right and the child is always wrong?

See how the “simple” quickly turns to the “complex”.

In a perfect world it’s really easy to just stop yourself and not act on “those” feelings. It’s a whole different ball game when you realize you were probably raised with some of these beliefs and now you’ve adopted these beliefs yourself. Some parents believe that parenting requires dumping all your anger on your child in order to teach. Some parents have really clear ideas of who should have control in the house and who shouldn’t. Those are just some of the topics that come up when you begin looking at your personal beliefs about control.

Try some internal self-control this holiday season. You know this the time of year when things either go very smoothly with those you love, or things can explode into another family disagreement. Instead of losing control silently tell yourself, “I’m not going to act on these feelings until I get calmer.”

If you’re anything like me, you’ll need to silently repeat those words each and every time the thoughts to react pop into your head. In the beginning, I had to say that to myself as often as one or twice every 30 seconds, I was that mad! Sometimes you may need a breather, you may need to take a walk or leave the room as you silently repeat over and over again, “I will not act on these feelings until I am calmer.”

That’s how you gain self-control—by repeatedly stopping yourself and talking yourself off the ledge each and every time thoughts of anger or rage or screaming pop up. That’s all there is to it, and that’s how complex it is too. But the pay off is huge! Put the time in now and watch as your relationships unfold in a new direction.

This brings me to the children. Your toddlers and preschoolers are in the learning stage. They DO NOT have true self-control, nor should they at this age, they're just now finding out that self-control is a possibility and it's something that makes parents happy. That might be the first thing you need to know to unlock more self-control. So when you yell, scream or just ignore them you’re teaching them how to act when filled with feelings. I hear a lot of parents demanding that their child gain self-control right now as they stand there and scream at them, modeling lack of self-control themselves. Do you see the contradiction from the child’s point of view?

Today I heard a prefect example. I overheard a child screaming in a store as I was shopping. He’d yell mama, mama, mama, mama and mom would ignore him. He then decided that the only way to get mom’s attention was to begin crying. And do you know what mom did? She began to scream at him to get himself under control now! Then 2 minutes later she began giving him the things he’d been screaming for so she could continue shopping. Then to add insult to injury, as she was leaving the store the child decided he didn’t want to leave so he laid down on the floor and began screaming, she walked away. Okay, I know it’s Christmas and you have a ton to do, this example was just a perfect way to really illustrate my point. What was that mom teaching him? Most of you have been on this list for years and you know the answer, so say it with me—mom taught him that if he misbehaves he can get more of her attention and that if he hangs in there and screams mom will cave in and give him what he wants.

How could this have gone in a better direction? Well, I have two on-demand seminars that deal specifically with this topic. One is Seminar #8 – Self-Control, Are you allowed to do that? And Seminar #3, Power Struggles, I already told you no. Now back to our story.

This mom could have been ProActive! She could have decided that she would not tolerate behavior like that in any store, at any time. My suggestion would be for her to scoop him up as he’s screaming, mama, mama, mama, mama, and take him outside and have a seat just outside the store. As mom and child sit mom needs to inform him that we don’t scream for mama in a store unless we’re in trouble or hurt. When you want me, you tap my hand and whisper. Then mom would need to ask the child to please show her that he understands what she just said by doing a practice run as they sit outside. And after he does it the way mom wants him too, she and the child need to go back into the store and try again. Mom needs to make sure that she pays attention to each and every tap of the hand that the child does, no matter how bothersome. This creates trust that mom will indeed listen when he acts the way she asked him too. In a few weeks mom can make any changes to the method she wants now that her child trusts the method and has given up screaming in stores.

Toddlers and preschoolers look to see how you behave when they are out of control so they can learn about how to control themselves. But if each time they are out of control, you react by being out of control yourself, what have you taught them?

Your toddler or preschooler needs to connect the dots so he can learn, and he won’t learn how you want him to behave by just being punished. He needs to see you control yourself so he can begin to connect the dots and “begin” learning how to apply self-control for himself.

So try making a New Years resolution a little bit early this year. Try this method as a self-control mantra, or affirmation. When you hear the thoughts in your head leaning toward anger, rage, yelling or whatever it is for you, silently say to yourself:

“I am responsible for my own self-control
I take each moment as it comes
I choose how I behave
I do not dump my frustration and anger on my little one as he is learning how to act
I have self-control in this moment, and in this moment, and in this moment.
I’m not going to act on these feelings until I get calmer.”

And sooner, rather than later you will surprise yourself as you find yourself controlling yourself during the BIG emotional times, the times when you were never able to do so before.

News at ProActive Parenting

Since this is the last newsletter for the year I have a bunch of business and interesting gift ideas and fun things to share. So I’m just going to run through them one after another in this section. At the end of this section will be my holiday wish for you and your family, I hope you read all the way through.

There will be no newsletter: for January; it’s my month off.

This is the time to decide: if you want to remain on the ProActive Parenting’s newsletter list. You may want to be removed for a couple of reasons:

Your children may have grown past our focus, ages 1-6.
You don’t like getting more than one email from us in a month. If that’s the case then you will want to consider opting out of this list.

Next year promises to be a big year and in order to accomplish my goals I will need to be informing this list of what we have going, and that will absolutely mean a couple of emails a month. Some businesses send me an email every day or once a week, and I find that I stop paying attention, I won't be doing that!  Just think about it, and if extra emails bug you, consider opting out.

I would love to hear from all of you: I miss the cards and photos that all you used to send before I moved to AZ. I’d like to do things a bit differently this year. If you’ve been satisfied with ProActive Parenting and the methods you’ve learned and you like to support us by letting others know that ProActive Parenting worked for you, then please do this.

Upload a photo of you and your kids and email it to me.
Make sure to include first names only, and the city and/or state or country you come from.
On the 22 of December we will, depending on how many of you send photos, create a box on the home page with the title, Families who love and use ProActive Parenting.
We will post your photos and you get to tell your family and friends that you’re posted on a site that’s read all around the world. We now have clients in 12 different countries around the world!
I get to see how much your children have grown—you know how much I’ll love that!
And you get to be ambassadors telling the world that ProActive Parenting works!

Please send all photos to: sharon@proactiveparenting.net.

If you live in Arizona and would like ProActive Parenting to come and do a free talk for your moms group, preschool school, cooperation or association now is the time to book that talk for next year. Traditionally I do these talks in September and January only. Here’s a testimonial from a mom who heard me speak at one of my free talks.

Yesterday I was scheduled for a talk but  it was canceled because most of the school came down with Strep. I was told that as the cancellation notice was being put up, one mom spoke up (if the mom who said this is reading this, thank you!) and said, “oh, you have to hear this woman speak—she transformed the way I parent my child.” 

The talks are great fun for all involved!

Great gift for Dad: So many lists focus on gifts for mom or the kids or the house, it’s rare to find a gift list that gives ideas that dad will like and that mom will love.

Try the Accu-Mark Level by Black and Decker. This sucker is the best. It helps dad’s hang anything perfectly straight.

Older Children who love to read Harry Potter: J.K. Rowlings wrote a limited addition book called Tales of Beedle the Bard. The five stories in this book “offer the trademark wit and imagination familiar to Rowling’s legions of readers—as well as Aesop’s wisdom and the occasional darkness of the Brothers Grimm—each of these five tales reveals a lesson befitting children and parents alike: the strength gained with trusted friendship, the redemptive power of love, and the true magic that exists in the hearts of all of us.” Up to now there have only been 7 books printed. 6 were given to those most closely connected with Harry Potter and the 7th was auctioned off to help those children who are institutionalized.

Now the book is exclusively on Amazon for $7.95, and 100% of the proceeds, yes, I said 100%, will be going to The Children’s High Level Group, co-founded by J.K. Rowlings and Emma Nicholson to make life better for vulnerable children. All net proceeds from the sale will be donated to The Children’s Voice campaign.  This is a great way to get your child hooked on reading! Warning: this is for much older children who have already survived the Harry Potter series. I'm up to the last book but I refuse to read it because I don’t want it to end!

December spotlight seminar is The Complete Set of 10 EveryDay Solutions Series Seminars On-Demand.
This is a great way to begin a new year, and the price reduction is my gift to all of you.

My Green selection:  Here’s a great Christmas idea. Instead of using wrapping paper for a gift, consider purchasing a cloth shopping bag and putting the gift inside the bag. This way you help reduce what’s in the landfill, and you give an extra gift that sends a small hint about recycling and being eco-friendly!

A gift for the slightly older child: This is a great book idea and is a wonderful way to inspire imagination and spend some quality time with your child. It’s such fun that they made a movie about a similar concept that's coming out on Christmas day. So what’s the book’s name? It’s called The DreamStarter Book: 50 Beginnings for Creating Adventurous Bedtime Stories, Campfire Tales, and Dreams, Knocking on Imaginations Door. by Jennifer Karin Sidford, and Leticia Plate.
WARNING: I wouldn’t attempt this with a child under 5, 6, or 6.5, depending on maturity. A younger child is just learning about what’s real and what isn’t and using this much imagination may scare versus entertain a child.

My Holiday Wish: I heard this song from John Mayer and had to read the words. After I read them I wanted to share them with all of you! It may be just me, but I think the words apply to parenting too.

John Mayer- The Heart Of Life

I hate to see you cry
Lying there in that position
There’s things you need to hear
So turn off your tears
And listen

Pain throws your heart to the ground
Love turns the whole thing around
No it won’t all go the way it should
But I know the heart of life is good

I love the words in this song—just watch any toddler or preschooler, their joy and enthusiasm for life is daily proof that the heart of life is good!

Enjoy your friends and loved ones this holiday season.