Just Do It
Everyone knows the infamous Nike slogan Just Do It. Well, if it’s not everyone, it’s nearly everyone. I have a flare for hyperbole :) So what does that have to do with Anti Reactive Parenting? Well…sometimes you just have to stop thinking about it and get moving. We live in a culture where we have the infinite wisdom (and stupidity…) at the tips of our fingers. Our devices connect us to an international consciousness that can get us just about anything we want to know within seconds. The main drawback? We often have to sift through much, much more information that we were expecting and sometimes that makes it harder to make a decision and get a move on.
What you can’t do as a parent is spend so much time researching that your kids get left in the lurch. John C. Maxwell, in his book The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership takes special note of one law in particular: The Law of Intuition. This “law” as he calls them, centers around trusting your instincts, but even beyond that, it’s about developing your instincts and using them intuitively to make decisions using less than perfect information. General Colin Powell, one of the foremost military leaders of the last generation, was fond of saying that good leaders can take 40 to 60 percent of the information that they would need to make a perfect decision and use their experience and wisdom to make a very good decision. That’s the gap we want to help you fill.
We want to help you as parents identify and maintain values, develop a decision making framework, and most of all, encourage you to study and understand who your children are and what they need from you to grow into highly functional and well-adjusted adults. Stephanie and I have spent years developing our practices and using them in our everyday lives so that we could ensure that we’re bringing you the absolute best content we can. We’ve identified five things that really form the basis of excellent parenting, and we spend our time developing topics to flesh out these five things:
You must have foundational values. Values are the key to being successfully Anti Reactive. When you know your values, then you know the boundaries that exist when you make decisions. Your children know the boundaries, too, and they’ll quickly come to understand how those values are used within your family. When you are Anti Reactive, the “operating system” of your family runs on the values-based code that courses throughout all your thinking.
You must consistently use those values at all times. Consistency is extremely important, especially to young children. Being emotionally, logically, and physically consistent in your family life creates a sense of identity for your children. When you are consistent in your thinking and consistent in the values you use to make decisions, your children do not have to go through complex thoughts to understand what you’re doing. They’re able to anticipate reactions, decisions, and consequences quickly and effectively, and the stability they get from this is absolutely paramount to their identity.
You must understand that children are future adults. Children aren’t ready for prime-time just yet, but that doesn’t mean they are babies. So many parents treat their children as if they are far, far below their actual developmental level, especially in the United States. We’re so impatient that we simply cannot take the time to allow our children to show us what they’re capable of. Parents regularly tell us how amazed they are at what their kids can do when given the chance. Even beyond that, children should be given the opportunity to participate in the values and decisions of the family. They aren’t pets, they’re future adults who need to know and understand what family situations are like, how to interact with life, and how to figure things out.
You must understand, evaluate and teach consequences. It can be extremely difficult to watch a child suffer consequences. Especially if we as parents don’t fully understand them. It’s our primary responsibility as parents to understand what cause and effect looks like for different situations. Some consequences are just too severe to allow a child to suffer, and that’s when we step in and act as the “developed frontal lobe” for our kids. Other consequences aren’t as severe, and can be allowed to occur naturally (think ‘tummy ache after too much chocolate’). Still other consequences we the parents must create to teach valuable lessons. This third category used to be called punishment, but that’s not really what it is…if done properly, it’s called discipline and it’s a really good thing. Building discipline in your children allows them to control their impulses and forego some of the consequences they would otherwise face. Maturity requires a certain level of discipline, and it’s our calling as parents to make it happen.
You must love your children as a parent, not a friend. It’s been said that “tough love is still love” and nowhere is that more obvious than parenting. When our children are infants, we can cuddle and love on them infinitely. We can’t spoil an infant. As they age, their needs change, and we begin to see the person they’re becoming. We can observe how their personality influences their choices, how they interact with the world around them, and it is genuinely a blast! It can be daunting to take someone you love and enjoy so much and have to be stern with them, but it is absolutely necessary. The Greeks had many different words for love, and the primary use case for families is agape (ah-gop-ay), which is most closely identified as unconditional love. The love that applies when the going gets tough, however, is pragma (prahg-muh) which is more akin to a bond that is formed through a deep interest in the well-being of someone else. It’s the love that drives us to intervene when we want to ensure that someone else is making good decisions for themselves. It’s a love that’s more action than emotion. Loving your kids in this way means sometimes you’re raining on their parade, but that’s part of raising future adults, and it’s much, much easier if you consistently use your foundational values.
These five explanations are the foundation of Anti Reactive Parenting, but there is so, so much more to discuss. No two children are the same, no two experiences are the same, and it’s nearly impossible to know exactly what will happen in each of our lives. There will be challenges, there will be triumphs, and there will be a whole lot of just plain survival. We want to take this journey with you and learn and grow together. We’re excited to finally ‘just do it’ and provide a community of support to Anti Reactive Parents as we all raise future adults.
-Dave Hoppe
Host of LYFE Fatherhood Podcast, co-founder of Anti Reactive Parenting
