Parent Advice Articles

Pro-Active Parenting Tips

To be pro-active in your parenting means that you take steps to provide your child with the influences he needs to behave well and to develop into her greatest potential BEFORE the child displays a behavior problem.

To the extent that you practice pro-active parenting you will feel more in control. Proactive parenting also protects the child from the pain and the pattern of getting into trouble.

To parent pro-actively you need to understand the basic influences that go into the shaping and formation of a child’s personality and behavior patterns.

Modeling represents one of those influences:

Children become like those they spend time with.

Therefore, model the behavior that you want.

When your child displays an inappropriate behavior pattern, examine your own self-conduct to see how you may be modeling something similar.

For instance, if your child treats his mother disrespectfully, it may be a pattern he has learned from the disrespectful way that his father relates to his mother.

If a child steals, that behavior may be learned, in part, from dishonest behaviors that one of the parents displays, like sneaking into events without paying or using other ways of getting free or discounted goods or services through deceptive means.

If a child is making things up, one of the parents may be using a lot of fabrication.

If a child argues much, one of the parents probably demonstrates an argumentative pattern.

The shy child probably has at least one shy parent, even if that parent has learned to hide shyness behind a pretense.

The child who displays much anger is probably exposed to a very angry parent.

The child displays an overly physical aggression pattern may have adopted that as a result of being spanked or treated with or exposed to excessive physical aggression.

The child who demonstrates excessive helplessness may be reflecting an attitude of over-dependency or low self-confidence expressed either consciously or unconsciously by one of the parents.

The point of understanding the role of modeling is not to chastise yourself for your child’s behavior problems.

It is to help you to be more understanding when your child demonstrates a problem that you have taught her, and to encourage you to work on improving your own self-conduct to bring out a higher level of behavior from your child.

Not all modeling comes from parents. Allowing a sibling to behave poorly toward or around a child will produce the same problems, as well allowing your child to spend much time around other children who display behavior problems.

As you work on recognizing and overcoming your own weaknesses and on fulfilling your own higher potential, your modeling leads your child into a higher level of self-expression. It also teaches your child to remain dedicated to self-work for personal development.

Dedicating yourself to your own ongoing personal development is the foundation of successful, pro-active parenting because YOU are the instrument through which you function.

As you improve your SELF-management you will improve your results in all areas of life, including your relationship with your child. Being effectively in charge with your child begins with being in charge of yourself.

In addition to self-work, being a proactive parent involves taking charge of your child’s surroundings, to the extent that you can. Every influence in your child’s environment impacts your child’s behavior and development.

Providing children with clean, orderly, harmonious surroundings that cultivate the child’s finer tastes and sensibilities is a pro-active way of bringing out a child’s best.

The quality of relationships surrounding the child influence the behavior that eventually comes from the child. As mom and dad relate in a kind, respectful, honest way with one another, they nurture and support their child’s capacity to relate well with others and even to treat himself well.

The more you rush around a child, the more uptight and frustrated you feel around a child, the more you clash with others around a child, the more chaos and instability you expose a child to, the more you foster behavior problems in your child.

While you cannot control every aspect of your child’s surroundings, you can at least remain dedicated to growing into your own higher potential, which provides your child with at least one positive influence. And you can always do at least small things to improve the influences surrounding your child.

To Be Continued