Caring vs Controlling - Basics for Parents

Parents, think for a moment... Would you want your son or daughter to feel more cared about or more controlled?

It is easy to find out how they feel by just asking them this simple question:

How much do you feel cared about by me from 0-10 and how much do you feel controlled?

Hopefully, you will immediately, intuitively know that you want them to feel more cared about than controlled. Let's think of the benefits of this.

- If they feel cared about, but not controlled, they will have no reason to feel rebellious

- If they feel cared about by you, they will learn to care about themselves and others

- If they feel cared about you, they will be more willing to give you honest answers and tell you the truth about things than if they feel controlled. This is because if they feel controlled then they probably also feel afraid of you restricting them, limiting them, or punishing them. All of these behaviors are used to control, and all of them decrease willingness to be candid, while encouraging the possibility of lying.

If their answer is not what you would like it to be, try not to get defensive. But if you do feel defensive, ask them to hang on for a moment. Then collect your thoughts. Remember that feeling defensive will not help the situation. Specifically, it won't help you feel open to their explanation of why they feel controlled to the degree they do.

Ask yourself "How open do I feel to listening and how defensive do I feel" (again from 0-10).

These 0-10 questions are quick and simple, but powerful and effective. If you are having trouble feeling open, remind yourself that you really want to understand your son or daughter, and that debating, defending and denying won't help achieve that goal.

If you get any kind of honest answer at all from your child or teen, consider it a sign that you are doing something right. It would be worse if they don't want to answer or if they give you an answer which you can tell is insincere because they are afraid of your response.

By the way, a simple way to help your child or teen feel cared about rather than controlled is to express your honest emotions by saying how you feel, especially what you are afraid of, rather than issuing commands and orders.

Here is one example: If your child is running near a pool, you could say "Honey, I'm afraid you will slip and fall." After all, wouldn't that be the most honest thing to say? When you say that, the child is more likely to feel cared about by you and less likely to feel controlled than if you just yell, "Stop running!"

Obviously, using threats is a quick way to create feelings of being controlled, so these should be avoided.

Another example is smoking. Saying, "Honey, I'm afraid you could get addicted to smoking and eventually die or get cancer and I don't want that because I love you a lot."

These kinds of messages might sound too simple, but experience shows they work. When you start with these messages from an early age, you gently set limits while avoiding a lot of the power struggles which other parents experience on a regular basis.