The thing I hear most from parents is,
“I feel like I’m not connecting with my kids. They don’t listen or cooperate. We’re stuck engaging in power struggles and I feel terrible about our interactions, especially after I yell and lose my cool.”
The truth about parenting is that it’s not intuitive. Parenting is in fact a learned skill. Which means you can stop blaming yourself for not knowing what to do or how to make positive changes. Instead, you can start learning the skills that will build your parent/child relationship and create easy, stress free days with your kids!
Yes…it’s possible and we’re going to start doing that today..right here, right now!
I’m sure you can relate to the following statement to some degree: Kids and parents are buried in their devices and losing sight of true, deep, connections.
Do you feel this happening in your home?
Kids are looking for their parent’s attention even more as they become distracted by the ability to have a device on hand at all times.
Parents (and kids) are finding it hard to simply turn it off! As a parenting coach, business owner and mom, I get it!
Because of this huge shift in technology and society norms around screens, we find ourselves feeling a big disconnect with our kids and families.
It’s important as parents to have the skills to be able to connect with our kids on a daily basis, but as busy parents we often scramble to find the time, get stuck on screens or feel too stressed due to the constant power struggles.
Days can feel full of crying, tantrums, back talk, anger and defiance. Without the skills, parents are unsure what to do when kids refuse to listen or cooperate, which leads them back to reminders, nagging and yelling. This in turn weakens their parent-child connection and we start to see our kids acting out more.
Parents can get stuck googling what to do to stop unwanted behaviors or spend countless hours searching social media looking for tips and tricks. I want you to stop wasting time doing things that won’t help! No more surface level problem solving! Instead we are going to dig deeper, to find the root of your child’s unwanted behaviors so you can solve them in a positive way.
We need to look at the root of the behaviors and not just the surface symptoms.
So what is the root of the problem?
- Your child is desperately trying to connect with you but they don’t know how.
- They want to feel a secure and consistent bond with you.
- They need to fill their power and attention buckets and have their emotional needs met.
When your child is acting out or not cooperating, I encourage you to imagine your child is wearing a big giant sign around their neck. This sign reads: “help me meet my needs.”
This is what their unwanted behaviors are symbolizing. All children have two emotional buckets, which need to be filled daily; power and attention. If either of these buckets are running low or on empty you will see kids pushing back, refusing to cooperate or listen. They’re trying to fill those buckets of attention and power and meet their needs, but they don’t know how. In turn, you see more pushing of boundaries, lack of cooperation and escalated emotions.
It’s up to you, the parent, to learn the skills to proactively fill those buckets with positive tools so they can stop working so hard to fill them with negative behaviors.
I’m going to share with you a simple, 5 ingredient tool that thousands of parents I’ve worked with around the world use on the regular to ensure they are filling up power and attention buckets in just 10 minutes!
Yes, it only takes 10 minutes!
“Golden Time!”
If you are going to make one change in your parenting, I recommend it be Golden Time. You will be able to strengthen your relationship, decrease power struggles, improve listening, help avoid tantrums, reconnect with your kids and make parenting fun again!
Golden Time Formula consists of 5 simple ingredients:
- One-on-One
- Twice a day, 10 minutes of uninterrupted time
- Child’s choice doing an activity they enjoy
- Unplug, put those phones away
- Name it
Each ingredient is critical in order to ensure you get the results you’re looking to achieve.
One-on-one helps your child minimize the need to fight for attention and power due to siblings, partners or anyone else around. Twice a day allows you to start filling those buckets in the morning to help them feel better.
Tip: kids who feel better, do better! This will help create easier morning routines which is a place many parents struggle with their kids.
Giving your child choice will give them added power. Having the opportunity to choose an activity will give them added power, but also help them to feel seen, heard and understood as you show interest in things they enjoy. Lastly, name it. If you leave out this ingredient, you won’t get the results you deserve to have.
Why?
Because the name is what allows your kids to know that it’s their special time. Without the name your time spent gets lost in the mix of all the other things that happen in a busy day.
You will find once you start, that you’re most likely already doing Golden Time with your kids, but haven’t been giving it a name.
From now on when you’re one-on-one with your child doing something they’re happy to do and enjoying, NAME IT!
“Hey, we’re going to the store just the two of us! We’re getting extra Golden Time, what should we talk about?!”
Be consistent and hold yourself accountable to getting in Golden Time twice daily and you will see positive changes right away in your child’s behavior. Along with this, your bond, connection and ability to help your child open up and communicate will sky rocket.
Golden Time is one of the most important pieces of the easier parenting puzzle. If you want to take advantage of my Golden Time guide, grab it HERE!
Start connecting in an intentional way with your kids today and see positive changes tomorrow!
Parenting can be easy and enjoyable with the right skills, tools and action plan. You’re on your way now!
Let’s keep on crushing parenthood in a positive and effective way!
Tia Slightham – Parenting Coach
Tia is a parenting coach, teacher, business owner, best selling author and most importantly a MOM. She is the founder of Tia Slightham- Parenting Solutions and The Parenting With Purpose Method, where she works with parents to teach them positive ways to decrease the daily struggles we all encounter as parents.
Tia has a Masters degree in Early Childhood Ed., certified in Positive Discipline and has worked with kids and families for over 19 years. Her passion to help families shines through her work and coaching program, which has been proven to work for hundreds of families. Connect with Tia and find more resources HERE