{"id":9105,"date":"2014-01-08T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2014-01-08T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites-stage.familylife.com\/flministries\/?p=9105"},"modified":"2014-01-08T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2014-01-08T00:00:00","slug":"administering-discipline-for-attitude-problems","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/articles\/topics\/parenting\/parenting-challenges\/discipline\/administering-discipline-for-attitude-problems\/","title":{"rendered":"Administering Discipline for Attitude Problems"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>

Just how do you go about administering discipline for a stinky attitude or other problems as your child edges into adolescence? Admittedly, what follows is just an overview, but you should find these pointers helpful:<\/p>\n

1. Affirm your love<\/em>. A child about to be corrected must be reminded that the parent\u2019s actions have the right motivations.<\/p>\n

2. Speak the truth<\/em>. Be clear in your communication. Explain what has happened, why it is wrong, and make sure the child understands clearly the offense.<\/p>\n

3. Call for admission of guilt and repentance<\/em>. The purpose of your confrontation is to expose the problem and see it rectified. The child needs to acknowledge wrongdoing and appropriately express regret. The purpose of repentance is to take a new direction\u2014not to repeat the same action over and over.<\/p>\n

4. Assign a consequence (if necessary)<\/em>. Examples of discipline for this age group include withholding of privileges, grounding, delaying the opportunity to double date or single date, and so on.<\/p>\n

5. Reaffirm commitment and love<\/em>. Always end a discussion like this with a final reminder: \u201cI love you; I want the best for you. I\u2019m in your corner.\u201d<\/p>\n

We had a great opportunity recently to do this in a very visual, memorable way with one of our teenage daughters. This child had been somewhat devious about some upcoming plans\u2014just exactly what her itinerary was to be one evening and how many stops she planned to make with the car.<\/p>\n

The three of us were having a heart-to-heart chat about this issue in our master bedroom. Barbara and I were on one end of the bed, and our teenager was flopped down on an opposite corner. It was already 11:15 p.m., but we knew we were in the middle of a great teaching opportunity. Our daughter needed to understand that accountability must be total for a teenager; she just wasn\u2019t free yet to do everything she wanted to do without approval from parents.<\/p>\n

We sat on the bed and talked in circles for about 30 minutes. She was not getting our point, and in fact was resisting, refusing to acknowledge her wrong attitude. It was one of those moments when the Spirit of God just plops some insight in your lap. I sensed it was time to forget the \u201cfront door\u201d approach; I needed to try a side door.<\/p>\n

This illustrates an important concept for parents of teenagers: What worked yesterday with a child may not work today, and you have to be flexible. So instead of persisting in confronting this child with her sin, I sneaked in the side door and said: \u201cYou know, you\u2019re seated on the corner of the bed over here, and it\u2019s like you\u2019re in one corner and you\u2019re putting us in the opposite corner. I want you to know that this isn\u2019t a battle between you and your parents. Honey, we\u2019re in your corner! We\u2019re not in a boxing match with you! We\u2019re for you, and we\u2019re trying to help you be successful!\u201d<\/p>\n

Her expression softened.<\/p>\n

\u201cDon\u2019t let the enemy convince you otherwise!\u201d I continued. \u201cWe want God\u2019s best for you, and we\u2019re committed to helping make that happen. A part of that is teaching you some things that will help you mature and grow into the kind of person God made you to be.<\/p>\n

\u201cAccountability is not a minor issue! This is a big deal, because if you hide just a little thing, the next time you\u2019ll be tempted to hide something bigger. If you can get away with it, before long you\u2019ll go down a trail called deceit that can destroy your life as a teenager and as an adult.\u201c<\/p>\n

At this point the light bulb flashed on. She heard what we were saying and her attitude shifted. And at about midnight\u2014mission accomplished\u2014we all went to bed!<\/p>\n

\n

Adapted from <\/i>Parenting Today\u2019s Adolescent: Helping Your Child Avoid the Traps of the Preteen and Teen Years. Copyright 1998 by Dennis and Barbara Rainey. Used by permission of Thomas Nelson, Inc., Publishers.<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What worked yesterday with a child may not work today, and you have to be flexible<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":43,"featured_media":8102,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"none","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"The discipline that worked yesterday with your child may not work today. Be flexible. We hope you'll find these tips helpful.","_seopress_robots_index":"","inline_featured_image":false,"_uag_custom_page_level_css":"","episode_type":"","audio_file":"","podmotor_file_id":"","podmotor_episode_id":"","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"","filesize":"","filesize_raw":"","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2852],"tags":[],"equip-category":[],"cwp_profile":[3051],"class_list":["post-9105","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-discipline","cwp_profile-dennis-and-barbara-rainey"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/1001\/2018\/04\/Marriage-1040x326-Default-graphic.jpg","uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/1001\/2018\/04\/Marriage-1040x326-Default-graphic.jpg",1024,320,true]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"Dave Meritt","author_link":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/author\/dave-merittcru-org\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"What worked yesterday with a child may not work today, and you have to be flexible","meta_box":{"_cloudsearch_visibility":"","profile_obj_manual_select":false,"profile_obj":false,"separator":false,"enable_link":false,"login_restricted":"","content_type":"","disclaimer_banner":"","currency":false,"pricing_subtext":false,"element_type":false,"date_field":false,"date_format":false,"theme_header_position":"","post_header_is_sticky":"","is_header_overlay":"","series":false,"ignore_sticky":false,"conditional_blocks_category":false,"cta_selection":false},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9105","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/43"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9105"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9105\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8102"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9105"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9105"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9105"},{"taxonomy":"equip-category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/equip-category?post=9105"},{"taxonomy":"cwp_profile","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp-stage.familylife.com\/www\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/cwp_profile?post=9105"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}