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Do You Want Your Child to Fear or Love You?

Hey Parents! Denny Strecker here from Skillz Dynamic Martial Arts, again, continuing our series on discipline. And so we want to take a step back today and kind of just look at a general overview of discipline. For two weeks now, I’ve been shooting a video each and every day talking about a different part different aspects of discipline and how to help you and help your ninjas become better at their general discipline or helping your ninja develop discipline. Well, today I want to take an umbrella general overview and there’s two regards. What got me thinking about this is the parents here, a lot of times are amazed or surprised at how well I can get the kids to do what it is that I want them to do, or basically what they end up need to be doing. I’m going to do to I’m going to Bemis Elementary school here in a couple weeks. I’m going to be working with the entire third grade at Bemis Elementary. It’s going to be about 85 to 100 kids and again, the teachers and the Principal are all surprised that it’s me and up to 100 kids. And basically, I’m able to get them to do what they should be doing. So in a presentation, they’re going to be sitting crisscross applesauce when I asked them to, they’re going to stand up and stand at attention when I asked them to, and it’s all part of developing their good discipline. And so we want to be able to share those things with parents that you can use the same skills. It’s not magic, it’s not sorcery. It’s basically just good education, and science.

So you have two aspects when you’re working with children, that you can either decide that you want to rule from an area of fear, make them fear, you make them afraid, so that they’re going to behave or from an area of love and caring. Naturally growing up. Our parents generation was basically you know, rule with an iron stick. Children are meant to be seen not heard, and we heard a lot of things like that when we were growing up. So a lot of times it was corporal punishment. You got spanked, you got backhanded, you got stuff thrown at you if you misbehave, and so it was a fear based process. What we’ve discovered with that, though, is when you come from that angle and you want to operate from fear, people are going to obey, but only to a particular point. And they’re only going to do the bare minimum, to stay out of trouble. And ultimately, that’s not what you’re looking for in teaching discipline to your child so that they develop a good habit, as they grow older.

When you operate from a place of love and caring. Right at that point, they’re going to feel safe, they’re going to know that that you’re coming from that is a area or spot that you care about them, and that you’re giving them these rules, because you want to help them. Therefore they’re going to want to go that extra mile and not only behave, but then take a couple extra steps to show you how much more that they’re able to do. Martial Arts was notorious for this as well. And my time growing up, the instructors walked around with stick. And if you you know, we’re supposed to be in a horse right stance, and if you moved, you got whacked with the stick. If you did something you weren’t supposed to do, you basically got 50 push ups. So again, that was fear based being martial or military. That area makes sense. But what we found is over the years, that doesn’t work for kids, you know, and certainly, I don’t think you want your child to grow up being afraid of you as a parent. I certainly don’t want my ninjas afraid of me. I want them to respect me, I want them to listen to what it is that I have to say. And I want them to do what it is that they’re supposed to do. And I don’t have to yell and scream to do that.

So that’s my goal to you is to be able to teach you that same process. So really think about what you’re doing. Are you coming from an area of fear and you’re trying to rule with that iron fist and say this is the way it is behave or else? And you’re always threatening and you’re always giving you different consequences or punishments, or are you trying to come from an area of love and it’s a whole different approach at that point. You’re going to be able to not have to yell and scream, you’re not going to have to threaten, you’re going to be able to just express what it is that they’re supposed to be doing. And more often than not, the kids are going to do it. Perfect example here at the karate school. This month, we’ve been talking about discipline in classes, and I’ve charged the ninjas with improving their discipline. We’ve got some kids as young as eight or nine years old right now, learning to do the laundry in the house. So they’re able to take the clothes, they take them down to the washer, they sort them, they wash them, they take them out, they dry them, and they fold them. So it’s certainly possible and what’s better, they’re not complaining about doing it. They’re excited to do it because they want to be part of the family. And they know that it’s a good way to help out around the house. We have other kids that are taking out the garbage and doing their chores, which is fantastic. We’ve got some kids learning to put the dishes away from the dishwasher once it’s clean and set the table for mom every night before Dinner. All of those little things start to add up and make a huge impact on the family over time. It’s going to help de stress you as a parent because you know, you’re going to be getting a little bit of help. They’re not whining and complaining about the help. And they’re learning good habits that are going to last them a lifetime. And ultimately, that’s my mission here for martial arts. That is true martial arts lesson is giving my ninjas skills that they’re going to be able to use every single day for the rest of their life. And that’s not a sidekick. It’s not a karate punch. You know, those things are cool, but they’re not very practical in your everyday life. We’re working on being able to improve our ninjas lives with awesome discipline.

So think about your process. Are you coming from fear? Are you coming from love, don’t make the mistake that you think your fear is love two completely different things. So here’s how you decide again, if you have to raise your voice if you have to yell and scream if you have to threaten, you’re probably coming from a place of fear. You’re demanding that the kids listen to you, or else. I don’t do that here.

They know that they have to listen or else but I don’t have to yell or scream, We have a situation where a child wants to do something, hey, all right, we’re doing this, I need you to do this, or you’re going to need to sit down, which one do you want to do? And they get to make the choice. Sometimes they say, I want to sit down. Okay, go sit down, and everything else continues.

So as we talked about in a previous video, I’m not trying to control the person, I’m trying to give them choices and make a good behavior. If you want to be part of my group, this is what you need to do. If you want to do your own thing, then this is what’s going to happen. You decide, right? So that way, I don’t have to yell or scream. The kids know that I care about them. But they also know that I’m going to be consistent in my rules. And when I say something, I mean it. So those are going to be some of the strengths that I have that I would want to be able to pass on to each of you guys.

Now, I’m going to be traveling for the next couple of days, heading out to Rhode Island to see my business coach and spend some time in his school, which is where a lot of this stuff I’m learning is coming from. So definitely giving him credit where credit is due, that this isn’t something I’m creating. I’m going out, I’m learning. Melody Shuman is still teaching a lot of great stuff. So I’ve got my coaches and mentors that I’m working with. So what I would like from you is, in the comments below, write down something you wish that your child had better discipline on. I’m going to take a look at the comments while I’m traveling. And I will answer each of those with exactly what I do, or what I have done with somebody in the past so that that way you can start to implement it in the next couple of days. When I get back next week, we’re going to start talking and upgrading from discipline to self discipline, being able to show your ninja how to take pride in doing it themselves. So now you don’t have to look over their shoulder every single second. And that’s going to be super powerful set up a session that I will be covering for the next two weeks. So Have an awesome day. Write down the comments below one thing that you wish your ninja had better discipline on. I’ll be happy to look them over and answer those questions while I’m on the road. Have a great day. I’m gonna go teach them awesome classes. Take care.