Do you want to avoid raising entitled children? How can you prevent your child from running your household?
As a parent, you may be tempted to indulge your child’s whims to make them happy. However, overindulging your child can upend your home’s hierarchy and put your child in charge.
Keep reading to learn how to keep your home’s hierarchy in check.
Maintaining the Home’s Hierarchy
Along with protecting your child from hardship and discomfort, you might be tempted to do whatever else you can to make them happy. However, indulging your kid’s every whim can lead to spoiled and entitled children and a miserable and unbalanced household. In this section, we’ll discuss Morin’s tips for avoiding that situation: Don’t overindulge your child, and don’t let your child’s decisions override yours.
Mentally Strong Parents Don’t Overindulge Their Children
Morin says that one sure way to disrupt the balance of power in your home (and to raise a spoiled, selfish child) is to treat your child like they’re the greatest person in the world by praising their every action and granting their every request.
She adds that, naturally, you want your child to be confident and strong-willed, but there’s a fine line between confidence and entitlement. A child who thinks they’re exceptional—more important or somehow better than their peers—is likely to grow into a self-centered adult who’s constantly frustrated that the world doesn’t just hand them everything they want.
The way to stop self-assuredness from twisting into self-importance, says Morin, is to shift your child’s focus toward others; get them to think about how they could help people and make the world better, rather than what they believe the world should be doing for them. For example, a gifted student could reframe their intelligence as an opportunity to help struggling classmates, rather than seeing it as an excuse to coast through school.
Mentally Strong Parents Don’t Let Children Run the Household
According to Morin, another common way parents upend their home’s hierarchy is by giving their children too much authority: letting the child’s decisions override their own or letting the child make decisions about things that shouldn’t be their choice. For example, it’s fine for a kid to decide what to do during their free time, but not to decide whether they’ll go to school that day.
This is important because, once you surrender your authority, you also surrender your ability to discipline and teach your child. In short, if your child learns that they don’t have to do what you say, they’ll have no reason to listen to you anymore.
Morin says you can maintain the hierarchy by setting clear boundaries and expectations. She advises you to be firm, but also to remain calm and avoid being drawn into arguments—simply make it clear that you expect your child to follow the rules you’ve set, and there will be consequences if they don’t.
| Balancing Autonomy With Obedience In this section, Morin emphasizes parental authority and making sure that your child follows your instructions. In How to Talk So Kids Will Listen & Listen So Kids Will Talk, the authors advocate a different approach—they suggest giving your child enough autonomy to willingly cooperate with you. They also offer some suggestions on how to strike the right balance of autonomy and obedience: Speak neutrally and factually. Give your child the information they need to draw their own conclusions; they’ll be much more cooperative if they feel like they came up with the course of action personally. So, instead of scolding your child for having a messy room, you can simply describe the problem, such as “I see dirty clothes on the floor.” You can also use this strategy to guide your child to better decisions, like telling them that their toy could break if they keep throwing it. Provide choices. Come up with a couple of different options that you find acceptable, then let your child pick between them. For example, you might ask whether they want carrots or broccoli with dinner tonight; they’ll get their vegetables either way, and they’ll be pleased to have a say in the matter. Use written notes. The authors say that writing down instructions makes them seem less personal, and therefore makes children less likely to resist them. For example, if you leave a note by the door reminding people to wipe their shoes on the doormat before coming inside, that no longer seems like you telling your child to wipe their shoes; it’s simply a rule that exists. Therefore, this strategy avoids power struggles because the child no longer sees a specific person to argue with. |
