One theme that has come up again and again this week is finding the balance between giving love unconditionally and setting boundaries of acceptable behaviors. I struggle with this balance in many areas of relationship in my life, between client and coach, friend to friend, sibling to sibling, but my primary struggle is as a parent. As a mom, I wear many hats. The first and most important is the hat of love and kindness. I love my three children with all my heart. They mean the world to me. I delight in seeing the world through their unique perspectives, and I am awed by and fully support and nurture the unique gifts that each brings to the world.
Then there is the hat of disciplinarian, guiding my kids toward doing the ‘right’ thing in life. Isn’t it the role of every parent to be captain of the proverbial mother-ship, a course corrector, guiding with the wisdom of experience and a hopefully mature frontal lobe, the part of the brain that guides us to make responsible decisions? Isn’t it up to us to use our sense of the bigger picture to gently mold our kids into the best adults they can be? Ah, there’s the rub! How do you define ‘right’? And how do you know the correct path for your child? How far do you push? How much do you pull? And what’s the difference?
When my kids were young, this was all much less complicated. They were so easy to love. They didn’t talk back, pretty much did what I told them to, ate the food I made, wore the clothes I bought, and gave and received lots of hugs and kisses. Then they grew up. And by grow up, I mean they started Kindergarten. By the time they were five or six years old, my kids had very well-defined personalities. Who am I kidding? Their personalities were evident pretty much from the womb. The one who attracted attention as a beautiful baby, an engagingly chatty and hysterically funny toddler, now the life of the party, with a huge social network, known as the class clown. Then there’s the one who came out screaming, needed constant attention as a baby and loves the spotlight now. Or the one who moved constantly in the womb and broke her leg by jumping out of her crib at a year and a half, now the sportiest of the three.
Bigger kids, bigger issues that’s the old adage I have been hearing throughout my parenting years. And I would have to agree. I am now dealing with emerging adults, issues of drugs, alcohol, sex, and doing the ‘right’ thing (there’s that word again). The great thing about older kids is that they tell me exactly how they experience me. They love giving feedback on my disciplinary attempts. For example, my gentle bedtime reminder, “Honey, it’s time for bed. Please shut down your computer and brush your teeth”, is heard as a 200 decibel scream, “GET READY FOR BED!!!! SHUT DOWN YOUR COMPUTER!!!” My kids see me as a pain in the neck. And frankly, I don’t like who I’ve become either.
I was stuck. Incensed that my kids wouldn’t listen to me, the obvious authority on most things in their life. How dare they not respect me! This led to locked horns, increased anger on both parts, and hostility. I wasn’t proud. Suddenly, I had an epiphany: what I’m doing is not working and I need to stop what I’m doing. Do I think I have a right to tell my kids when to go to bed, share my opinions on what colleges might be suit them, regulate TV and junk food? Of course. It’s just that I have become a nag, focusing more and more on correcting than on loving. And that imbalance leads to my kids tuning out and turning off.
Based on John Gottman, Ph.D.’s wisdom on what makes marriages work (whom I’ve referenced before in this blog), increasing positivity in a relationship is one of the keys to making any relationship work. My balance was way off. I was so focused on my role as a guide and disciplinarian, worried that if I didn’t keep stepping in to correct behaviors, my kids would fall off the ‘right’ (there’s that word one more time) path in life. I had lost sight of the most important thing, the love I feel for more children. The intention behind my discipline was love and affection, but it soon became a battle of wills, and I lost again and again.
The good thing is that children are resilient and so am I, and there is always opportunity to make amends, course-correct and move on in a better direction. The Mother-ship has been revamped, ready to nurture and love and get off the battlefield. The discipline will happen, but in a different way. As a friend said this morning, the key is to guide with one hand, love with the other. It’s a dance, and when you are in balance, the dance is a beautiful thing to behold.
So I am holding back. I have replaced “clean up your room, take off your dish, say thank you” with “I love you, your hair looks beautiful tonight, I love the way you connect to your friends”. It takes a lot of discipline to keep quiet, but it’s the most important change I have made in a long time.
How do you balance loving with setting boundaries? Please share your thoughts.
