I woke up this morning wondering if my last post was a little too harsh. Maybe I'm just too judgmental, but I don't mean to be. So, first of all let me apologize if I hurt any feelings. It's just that I feel strongly that if we don't expect our kids to obey they won't.
It seems to me that we've all fallen into a rut where we're afraid to set too high of expectations. We do it in many areas of our lives because we're afraid of failure. If we don't set the bar too high then we won't have to be disappointed, right? But where will we go if we don't ever set higher goals? Not far! And it's true in parenting as well. We sometimes don't want to set our kids up for failure by setting high goals. But if we don't raise the bar sometimes we all fail by default. We don't get to see what they're capable of, nor do they get to experience the success of impressing us with their capabilities.
I'm not suggesting that you should expect your one year old to obey every time you tell them to do something because they're still learning how to obey. But they can obey most of the time. You may have set high expectations for your one year old at first. Maybe you thought it would be easier than it is. And then they didn't catch on the first few days, so you decided that they must not be ready yet. It's natural to want to stop after you feel you've failed. But it's not effective. Teaching children to obey isn't a one time thing. It's a journey that will last 18 years! And you absolutely must be consistent in your discipline and expectations.
I work best with specific examples, so let's use a ten month old who likes to empty the box of tissue you keep on the coffee table one tissue at a time and drop them on the floor. Many people would simply remove the box of tissue from the coffee table and move it to a higher shelf. I however felt that it was a perfectly harmless opportunity to set my expectations for the child rather than waiting until they were in a dangerous situation to start teaching them how to obey. So, when I walked in to the living room one day and found that my sweet little baby had pulled himself up holding onto the coffee table and emptied the box of tissue during my 60 seconds of absence, I went over and told him "No no!" very firmly. Then I cleaned up the mess, stuffed the tissue back in the box, and replaced it to it's spot on the coffee table. Then I sat and waited for a whole 30 seconds before his little hand reached for the tissue box again. Now, with some of my kids simply the firmness of my voice when I said "No" was enough to stop them. But with most of them they would still touch the tissue. At the first act of disobedience I would give their little hand a spanking (I will later share my views on when to start spanking and how because there is way too much I have to say on those topics to share them with other topics). The child would cry for a minute and then reach for the tissue again. I would say "No" and usually they would at least slow down as they continued to reach for and touch the tissue. So, I would spank their hand again. This sometimes would end the game(at least for that day), but with my more stubborn children it may have taken 30 minutes before they would move on. But...I followed through and could say that I "won"! Right then and there I established my expectation: I expect to be obeyed and honored. (Col. 3:20, Eph. 6:1 and 2, Ex. 20:12)
Every child was different, so sometimes this process took a day, and sometimes it took a few days, maybe even a week or 2. But eventually they each got the picture. And then one day I had left my hot coffee on the coffee table (not a wise decision!), but as I saw the hand reaching for the cup I was able to say "No" and he immediately stopped, looked at me, and withdrew his hand. Magic! And another day he started chasing a ball into the street and I yelled, "No! Stop!", and he stopped, looked at me, and then waited for me to get the ball.
As the days and weeks would go on, they would sometimes go back to that box of tissue. Sometimes one of the kids would look at it and then look at me to see if I was looking at them. Sometimes one would go back and empty the box, only to be spanked again in the end. Kids will always test you. They will push the limits. But you have to set the limits and then stick to them. Expect the best from your children, and let them know exactly what the best is. In my opinion the best is immediate obedience every time, and that is exactly what I expect! The minute I accept less than the best from my children by not being consistent with discipline I let them know that I no longer expect to be obeyed and honored. But I know that as we are faithful to consistently and loving discipline our children, we will be blessed through their obedience.
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