Healthy Relationships
What makes Love and Logic work? Some believe it’s the emphasis on setting limits. Others believe the power has more to do with providing consequences for misbehavior. According to the Love and Logic experts, both viewpoints are right—and wrong. Limits are critical, but we’ll never make them stick if we don’t have good relationships with kids. Holding youngsters accountable for their misbehavior is also essential, but have you noticed kids just don’t seem to care much about consequences when they come from someone they don’t have a good relationship with?
Love and Logic believes everything rests on relationships. Limits gain their power from them, and so do consequences. So, if we want Love and Logic to have its full power, we’re wise to do plenty of the following with our kids:
Make every “hello” and “goodbye” a special event
At least once a day, notice something special about them without evaluation. Focus mostly on their strengths rather than their weaknesses.
Remove any hint of sarcasm
Love them even when they’re behaving not so lovable. Make sure that they overhear us talking about how much we love them.
Neutralize arguing.
We know that time spent building relationships pays off better than any other investment. However, at some point, all relationships involve conflict. Knowing how to handle conflict helps the individuals in a relationship work through their differences and preserve their relationship. By modeling healthy relationships, including how to handle conflicts, parents can teach their kids these valuable skills.
Here are some tips for helping your kids learn how to handle life’s conflicts:
Remember that kids learn the most about how relationships work from watching how their parents handle their relationships. How we behave in front of our kids is far more powerful than telling them how they should behave.
Have some healthy disagreements or conflicts in front of your kids. Instead of yelling, arguing, or fighting during these disagreements or conflicts, kids need to see their parents disagree, express their emotions in a healthy way, and handle conflicts directly. Use the language of problem-solving and compromise. It is very important for kids to hear their parents say things like:
“I’m sorry that I hurt your feelings.”
“How can we solve this problem?”
“Here are some possible solutions….”
“Let’s compromise.”
