Focus on the Family

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Dr. John Townsend: If you get frustrated, go take a walk, go pray, go do something with your spouse. Don't do that with a child. Emotional consequences are not helpful.

John Fuller: That's Dr. John Townsend, and he joins us today on Focus on the Family with Jim Daly. He's going to help you set boundaries with your children. I'm John Fuller.

Jim Daly: John, I'm looking forward to this. My boys are now in their twenties, but this is the kind of information I wish I would have understood and digested with Jean to be able to do this better. We understood the concepts, but we didn't slow down to really apply them as best as we could.

For that reason, we want to make sure you're equipped as a parent of younger children to be able to apply these boundaries because the outcomes are so good. Children feel more confident, more secure, even though it takes a little bit of discipline to be able to apply these as a parent. It's going to be great content.

John Fuller: Dr. John Townsend is a speaker and bestselling author, and we're covering a book he co-wrote with Dr. Henry Cloud. It's called *Boundaries with Kids: How Healthy Choices Grow Healthy Children*. We'll encourage you to get a copy of that.

Jim Daly: Welcome, good to have you back, John. What are some of those obstacles that parents run into when they're setting boundaries?

Dr. John Townsend: There's two ways to look at the obstacles. First is things that kids do to oppose boundaries. They don't like them at first. They escalate sometimes and they blow up or they melt down. Sometimes they withdraw and feel hurt and they don't feel very loved. Sometimes they manipulate to get around it.

But that's not the biggest obstacle. The biggest obstacle is us, the parent. It's some attitudes that we have and mindsets that we've got to look at. That makes the biggest difference in the world.

One is to need the child's love. I need my child to think I'm good and loving and helpful and think positive about me. If you need your child to think positive of you, you'll never say no. You'll be the circus parent.

Another one is a technical term that's very important in parenting: fragilizing. To fragilize means to think that your child is a little broken egg that you've got to walk on eggshells around. So when the child gets uncomfortable because you're frustrating them or saying no, they're going to fall apart or they're going to have a nervous breakdown. That's making somebody who's pretty resilient most of the time fragile. That's a problem in parenting.

Jim Daly: Let me ask you in that regard because this is a really critical point. The fact that culturally we're avoiding allowing that resilience because we're doing exactly what you're saying. We're overprotective. We're overly engaged.

I think this is one of those aha moments for a lot of parents who are watching or listening, who are the helicopter parent, the hovering parent, because they feel that's the responsibility of a parent of a three-year-old, five-year-old, nine-year-old. Why do we need to back down a little bit because of the outcomes that will occur if we don't?

Dr. John Townsend: The best way to look at that is to look at the sources for reality. One is the research. It just says if you are always keeping the child from any discomfort or unhappiness of any kind, you put out an anxious child. They feel insecure like they don't have the strength to handle hard things and they don't have frustration tolerance. All of a sudden, they're very scared about life because somebody took care of this for them.

Second is project into the future. If I don't want him or her at nine to ever feel bad, what kind of a husband or wife or worker or minister or friend are they going to be? They're going to be overwhelmed with life all the time.

The third source is to read our Bible. What does it say in Ephesians? It says that we're supposed to build each other up with grace and truth. Grace is the love and the support and the listening, and truth is there are some house rules here. It's not even a question anymore that the children need to know what no means and to have their own no ultimately.

Jim Daly: That's so good. We're going to do something a little different. We've got some callers who have sent their questions in, knowing this program was going to occur, which I think is great. Our goal here at Focus is to help you do this parenting job as best as you can. Hearing from you in this way is a great way to put real people in this spot and let them ask you a question. Let's take the first one.

Guest (Female): I'm wondering at what age it's appropriate to start disciplining your child. In general, I was always taught that you just start as early as possible, but I'm wondering what age they can start connecting the cause and effect of their actions. I would assume it's before they can have a full conversation, but I'm just not sure what that point is.

Dr. John Townsend: It's a great question. I don't believe in a lot of this during infancy, the first 12 months. That child is busy just trying to figure out what the world is and where love is and where safety is. They don't even have the neurological capacity to understand the meaning of the word no, with a few exceptions. Maybe structure in feeding times and nap times later in the first year.

Toddlerhood is where I believe it needs to begin, which is one to two. That's when they can learn language. Cognitively, they can go, "There's this word called no. I need to understand this." If a parent will lovingly set out the house rules—here's how you treat your dog or here's how you obey mom and dad—and when they have a bad attitude, help to correct that, that's very important and very helpful. It sets the stage. Don't start that too late. Toddlerhood is fine for that.

Jim Daly: Let me ask you especially with young children, the phase we're talking about right now. The mom who is just struggling with "get your shoes on because it's time to go." This sounds simple, but it's so right. She has to repeat that or dad has to repeat that 20 times. "I said, get your shoes on, we've got to go." How do you create a boundary around that and enforcement of timeliness?

Dr. John Townsend: The first thing that you have to do is to realize that if you say it several times, that's a thing that we call nagging. Nagging without consequences creates insanity because the child learns they always say it five times. I'm at number four right now. I'm fine.

Isn't it interesting? They do learn how to delay. Give them the 30,000 picture. "Sweetheart, I used to say it seven times and I think that I want to change that. I'm going to do it one time and then you'll have the timeout or I'll take away the toy if it doesn't happen." They don't believe that because they have a thousand experiences of mom doing it or dad doing it that way.

But then, when you follow that up and after the one time you take the toy away or whatever, the child is now in a new reality. They're living in a new world because they lost something and they followed up. There's going to be a conflict. There's going to be upsetness. But you have to tolerate that and be loving about it. The more you do that and don't nag but say it after the first time, I've had parents who were friends say once we did that, all of a sudden we had all this lack of angst and we had more fun time.

Jim Daly: Interesting, that's the goal. Things happen when asked and consequences are few. They put on their shoes. Which is the goal. My goodness.

Another concept in this same space is something you referred to as emotional consequences. This is another big one that we as parents tend to fail at because we get emotional. We're angry because it's now driven our temperature emotionally up. "I said to get those shoes on now." That's not helpful because that kind of reaction or direction starts to hurt the identity of the child. They think shame. "I'm not doing the right thing."

For whatever reason, the child may not even understand it. "I just enjoy playing. I want to color more. I don't want to put my shoes on." But the parent's unhealthy emotional rise can lead to some issues later.

Dr. John Townsend: It reminds me of Colossians 3 where the Bible says don't exasperate or embitter your child because they'll get discouraged. That is a good scripture. It makes so much sense because when you look at it, there's this little person called a child and there are these big people out here. You want the big people to be sane. They want to be loving and rational.

If mom or dad blows their top with these emotional consequences, these shamey things, the kid thinks, "I live in a crazy world." It's scary because they're not safe anymore. But if the parent goes, "This is the rule. I'm going to be clear about it," and stays warm about it, firm but warm, the child goes, "I live in sanity." Mom and dad are safe and I can do this. If you get frustrated, go take a walk, go pray, go do something with your spouse. Don't do that with a child. Emotional consequences are not helpful.

Jim Daly: I have noticed even in raising my boys, you have to do everything within your power to always be the adult, to always be the calm one, the calm voice. Never move into a place where you get angry and emotionally destructive. That's a challenge because in the teen years, will they push your buttons or what? But you have to come back to "I'm the parent, I'm not the child." But we can tend to as parents to get down in the mud with them.

Dr. John Townsend: Anytime you're in that immediate crisis—a meltdown on the grocery store or somebody smoking dope at 14—don't get lost in the present crisis. Think future. What I'm getting ready to do with my child, I want to play the long game. How am I going to affect them as a parent, as a somebody in their thirties? What I next do will get me into my prefrontal cortex and I won't be amygdala hijacked, fighting and flighting. Just think about the future when that happens and you'll be the adult.

Jim Daly: It's a good distraction too in the present to think about the future. This is Focus on the Family with Jim Daly and today we're talking with Dr. John Townsend about a classic book that he co-wrote with Dr. Henry Cloud, *Boundaries with Kids: How Healthy Choices Grow Healthy Children*. There's so much here, and we've got copies here at the ministry. Stop by focusonthefamily.com/broadcast or call 800, the letter A, and the word FAMILY. We have another parent who wants to ask a question. Let's hear what their question is.

Guest (Male): One of my twins in particular has always been a little more emotionally sensitive boy. Where it's coming out now in these preteen years is a general moodiness or sullenness. It really pushes my buttons, the facial expressions and just the "woe is me-ism." We really want our kids to see all the good that God has for them. How do you handle that without heaping shame?

Dr. John Townsend: This is a really important question because especially in teen years, the hormones take over, puberty takes over. The moodiness happens and a lot of parents think, "I want this child to see the good things that God's brought around." This is a sort of a semi-boundaries and semi-attachment relationship question.

In terms of the boundaries part, when there's misbehavior with a sensitive teen, it doesn't mean you drop the rule and say, "If you're upset, if it's going to make you discouraged, I'll drop it." If it's a reasonable boundary about behavior or conduct, you've got to hold the rule. But you do need to listen more.

What we find is instead of saying stop feeling moody, get happy, which never worked with me, when you keep the structure but you also say tell me more about it. When the child feels understood that my parent is with me even though I'm down. Think about David in the Psalms. He was always complaining to God and that's why we know it's okay, and God was okay with it.

The child begins to feel like you're in the well with me. I do feel bad about my dating life or I'm not doing well in sports. The parent comes in and says, "I know, that's tough." The child feels like, "I'm in this empty well of pain but you're not talking me out of it. You're in the well with me giving me grace and attunement." The child begins to think this is okay, but don't drop the structure and the responsibility at the same time. It's a win-win, not a zero-sum game.

Jim Daly: How can parents teach their children to manage their own responsibilities? That's the golden question because this is what every parent at every stage is going to be troubled by. How do I do this?

Dr. John Townsend: I can give you the big picture in four words if it helps with this because this is the question: how do you incentivize kids to make good choices with the boundary thing?

The first thing is love, because no child can take a boundary or a rule or a job or an obligation unless they know they're loved because they're going to be disheartened. None of us can do things if we think somebody's not on our side and on our team. So you've got to love them and let them know and be attached to them.

The second thing is you've got to give them the rules. Here's the truth. The truth is this is how we conduct things in our house. They've got to be informed. It's not okay to say I'm going to give you a consequence and they never knew. Here's the house rules.

I'll tell a funny story about that. There's universal house rules like obey parents and help out with chores and do your homework. Then there's those ones that are particular to your child, like your child's personality. With an extrovert, you take away their phone because they love social stuff. With the introvert, they can't have a lot of alone time.

Barbie and I when the kids were small, we had horrible bathroom things. I don't know what it is about the bathroom and brushing teeth. They would just do these things. Finally we were writing things like don't put toothpaste on the dog. It was so particular. We finally got, "Wait a minute, this is leave the bathroom like you found it. Okay." You've got to go through the universal rules and the particular rules.

That's the second thing, the truth and the rules. The third thing—this is what's so scary for parents, especially Christian parents—is freedom. You've got to be free to disobey. Because if you're not free to disobey, you'll never learn. The parents that are uber-controlling and kind of rigid, the kid never has a chance to disobey and watch what happens later in life in college.

Jim Daly: I want to emphasize this because this is really good. It's another light bulb. It feels like as we're parenting in our limited ability, and that's okay, we haven't done this before. It didn't come with a manual. You're learning as you go. How many parents want a do-over? I wish I could have a do-over.

In that regard, it's okay for the child to fail. You actually want them to and then be that net to help them learn from that and to do better next time. I think we had a goal of zero failure rate, and that's so unhealthy for the child.

Dr. John Townsend: There's a certain limit to that. You don't tell a three-year-old they can run out in traffic. That's awful. But they need to be able to fail because there's no learning without it. You take Joshua 24, it says choose this day who you're going to serve. God even says I'm not going to make you do this. There's no have-to here.

In those middle years, you want to be around when they fail. We didn't want perfect children in those age because we had the suspicion that if they were perfect with us and then we couldn't be around to monitor things and guide things, in college it's going to be a nightmare. We always felt a little insecure around some parents that their kids are just kicking it and just "how can I please my parents" during the junior high years and the high school years. We thought, "Gosh, we're not that."

Then we found out these nightmares happen in college because now they learned how to choose. Freedom is a good thing. The first step is the love, the second thing is the rule, that's the boundary, the third is the freedom to fail and to disobey.

The fourth is reality consequences. Here's what happens. I've set up appropriate reality consequences, which is giving them something they don't want like chores, taking away something they do want like a phone. There's the whole four words.

John Fuller: In terms of responsibility, there is a moment most of us parents face where our child says "I can't do it." There's something in what you just said that is making me wonder how do we handle those moments? We aspire to "actually you can do that because we think you can." There's some coaching involved in there, some natural consequences, some failure, but how do we help our child understand the difference between "I just don't want to do that" or "I don't think I can" and my parents really want me to?

Dr. John Townsend: That's just a real normal problem. In the book we call it the law of responsibility. How do you bear your own load like Galatians 6 says? A lot of children will think I can't do it because that's uncomfortable. Now some things they can't do. That's why it's important to have age appropriate responsibilities.

In the book we've got a table on that so you can know what's different between a four-year-old and a thirteen-year-old. There are some things they cannot do. But you start with what I call OJT, on the job training. Walk them through it. Here's how you feed the dog. Here's how you do your homework and stay with it for 45 minutes without a break. Here's how you learn how to cook. You walk through them like you would with a job. Then they go, "I'm getting that capacity because mom and dad are training me."

Then there's a learning curve and they don't walk the dog right or they only sit still for 10 minutes. The learning curve means mistakes and you're just compassionate about that but you stick with it. Next, you empathize with the complaining. Let them complain about it as long as they're doing it. Don't trigger.

So many parents don't like the attitude and you either criticize them and shame them or you cave in and say, "Well you're upset." Don't do either one of those. Just empathize. "I know it's tough, get back to work." Then you praise the success. That's how kids learn competency in life for a skill or a marriage or faith.

Jim Daly: Let's hear one more question before we end today. We'll come back tomorrow if you're willing and we'll keep this rolling because it's so good for parents to really understand boundaries. Let's listen to this question.

Guest (Female): My question relates to my 14-month-old. I'm a first-time mother to a beautiful little girl and I'm finding myself saying the word no to her a lot more than I thought I would. She now says no back to me and it feels like a little bit of a game.

I'm just wondering how can I implement boundaries, how can I deter her from doing things that are unsafe, how can I get her to stop doing things I don't want her to do without the use of the word no, especially during a season where communication is limited right now with the skills that she has.

Jim Daly: This is the ultimate question for parents: how we get into this no debate. It's like a tennis match where the ball is the word no and it's going back and forth over the net.

Dr. John Townsend: Let me pose another way to look at this. Why toddlerhood to avoid no? Might as well stop it in early childhood or late childhood or early adolescence. Maybe saying no is a bad thing all the way through life. There's going to be a nightmare. Let's not just think about the toddlerhood.

If you don't like the word no, there's a problem because it's a great word. What does Matthew 5 say? Let your yes be yes, your no be no. It helps us, it gives us structure. What we found out is the only group that shouldn't really have a lot of no is the infant. They really can't metabolize or digest that.

But a toddler on, they need it and they learn it. I'm so happy with this caller because her child is responding with her own no, meaning I'm developing an identity. I'm going to protect myself. I might have a good relationship and not let anybody gaslight me.

When the toddler does what you don't like and you say no, and it's a firm no and it's a nice no but it's not a mean no, then they begin to protest. Set the consequence, make it a reasonable consequence. After it's become normalized that this is the way my family is, this is the way mom and dad are, they calm down. It's like the rails of the crib for a baby. Structure brings security. A kid without a no in their lives is more insecure.

If you look at the long-term research on parenting, it's really interesting. There are two factors of all these studies about what makes a nice person by age 21. One is appropriate warmth, real warmth, listening, getting down on their level, caring. The second's appropriate structure and strictness. That's the two that matter.

Jim Daly: Unfortunately as parents we tend to see those as very different things. Like most of life, we lean into one and not the other. When you do that in an imbalanced way, you end up with problems either way.

Dr. John Townsend: And you end up with the split parent problem: the Disney parent and the uber-strict parent. Then the child learns here's where I have fun and do what I want and here's the one that I'm kind of afraid of and resentful of. Parents need to be integrated in what the Bible calls grace and truth.

Jim Daly: John, I want to cover one thing that seems to be a phenomenon amongst younger parents right now: this idea of avoiding the word no, that it's not a healthy thing. I think they refer to it as gentle parenting. Speak to that issue. It's touching on this idea of being out of balance in one direction.

Some of the best advice I ever got from a friend was he said try to say yes in your parenting more than no. But that came to activity. When your son asks you, or your daughter, "Do you want to play catch?" Try to say yes. Don't say no, I'm busy. That's how he was applying it. I think that's a distinction too. Say yes when it comes to things your child wants to do after work or whatever it might be, rather than saying I'm really tired, I'm busy. Then there's this "don't say no in order to be gentle on the child."

Dr. John Townsend: I think the gentle parenting thought pattern, there's some strengths in it. One is they tend to be more emotionally attuned to how the child is feeling. The attunement's a big deal. Also, it's good to sometimes explain the why instead of "just because I'm the mommy." Sometimes you have to do that. But sometimes it's helpful to say "because it might hurt somebody's feelings and because we want you to be a success." And the fact that it's kind of anti-harshness, harshness can really damage a child.

But here's the weaknesses. No matter how warm we are and how attuned emotionally we are, it can become permissiveness. Then the child doesn't learn structure and responsibility. Also there's an over-validating, they call it sometimes, of always over-praising everything. That can dysregulate the neurology of a child's brain because they know that they're not that great and they begin to feel like they're a sham. "You're telling me I'm going to be the next president? Well maybe I am, but right now I can't even make it through my classes." They feel this disconnect.

Also the collaborative conversation instead of no. "Well, let's work this out together." What that does is the child begins to think, "I'm in charge here too, right? I'm just like these guys are, these big people."

Jim Daly: I've got a vote.

Dr. John Townsend: I've got a big vote. Instead of I'm going to be in a world where there are authority figures and there's a God who owns everything and there's bosses and all this sort of thing, it becomes more confusing for them and sometimes creates a sense of entitlement and the inability to tolerate life's limits.

Jim Daly: That's big and it seems epidemic right now. John, like I said, this is great. Let's go another day and cover some more of the content in the book. What a great book it is, *Boundaries with Kids: How Healthy Choices Grow Healthy Children*. Make a donation of any amount to Focus and we'll send you the book as our way of saying thanks for being part of the ministry.

Just know that you're supporting something that we are having an impact on. I think last year alone, we were able to help 470,000 families prepare for that parenting journey. That's a good thing and I'm grateful that Focus is having that kind of impact.

John Fuller: We need your continued financial support to keep doing that kind of work to support parents. Please make a monthly gift if you can, or a one-time donation. When you do, request your copy of *Boundaries with Kids*. Just call 800, the letter A, and the word FAMILY or stop by focusonthefamily.com/broadcast.

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Dr. Townsend, you're involved with raising up the next generation of strong Christian counselors through your efforts at Concordia. Tell us more about that.

Dr. John Townsend: It's the Townsend Institute for Leadership and Counseling at Concordia University in Irvine, California. It's for people that want an opportunity to enhance their career or get a new career, move up the ladder. We're a fully accredited remote graduate degree school. We've got three programs: you can get a master's or a certificate in counseling, or in organizational leadership, or in executive coaching and consulting.

We have now a PhD in counseling. Actually *Forbes* magazine made us the number one remote PhD in counseling, so we're real happy about that. We have hundreds of students. They're getting great jobs. We're at the bottom third of expense of schools like ours and we have these great guest experts, people like Henry Cloud, Patrick Lencioni. There's a person named Jim Daly who speaks with our students, who's very well known.

Jim Daly: It's always fun to talk to the students.

Dr. John Townsend: We're at townsendinstitute.com.

John Fuller: Thanks for listening to Focus on the Family with Jim Daly. I'm John Fuller inviting you back as we continue the conversation with Dr. Townsend and once again help you and your family thrive in Christ.