Discipline with love

As my daughters get older we find ourselves having to discipline them more. Not because they are bad kids but they are having to learn right from wrong. And this is important, for them and for us.

It would be easy to just let them get on with it when they are playing up, and I am guilty of this at times. When I’m tired or my pains flaring, I just don’t feel like parenting. I think we both get tired of them when they are running riot.

The naughty corner has worked well, and still does. They are spending less time in it as just the threat of it can be enough for them to wind it in.

But I have also learned an important lesson from educating my daughters, and that is to never discipline from a place of anger. In short it doesn’t work. Being angry and telling the kids off because they are fighting is backwards. There is just resentment being experienced, and transfered all sides. It’s like swearing at someone for swearing.

I have learned to discipline from a place of love and tolerance. It doesn’t mean I don’t raise my voice, with three fired up triplets sometimes you need to be vocally assertive. It means I’m not transferring any more anger to an already electrified atmosphere. I stay cool.

No parent has the patience of a Saint. But we can always improve our parenting skills to raise our children in a way that they can learn right from wrong from a place of love. Without adding more stress to a situation.