The four What?
So, you’re probably wondering what I mean by pillars. A pillar is a vital part of a structure, or, in our case, a person, that provides support and stability. Missing or weak pillars cause it to become unstable and eventually lead to collapse.
In every area of life, there are pillars available to help you succeed if you commit to them and work hard to strengthen and balance each one.
Let me give you some examples:
Think back to when you were in school. What did the best students always have in common? They typically sat in the front row of class, spent hours after school in the library, and studied for tests a week in advance.
They didn’t try to just “get by.” Instead they decided to be the best students they could be, they were always the hardest working and never took the easy way out.
What about the pillars of the sport? You must practice and become extremely skilled physically, emotionally, and mentally. If an athlete has great physical abilities but withers under pressure, he will never be good at his sport.
What makes Tiger Woods and Michael Jordan so good? It’s not just his physical talent. Instead, it is the way they handle themselves mentally and emotionally in difficult situations. They have trained themselves for years because they decided to be the best athletes they could be, they always worked their hardest and never took the easy way out.
The pillars of weight loss? Anyone who has tried a special diet knows that it won’t work in the long run, as much as all those “diet and fitness experts” would like you to believe otherwise. To lose weight permanently you must eat right, do cardiovascular and strength exercise.
Missing any of these will cause you to fail. You can exercise 8 hours a day, but if you’re eating more calories than you burn, you won’t lose weight. Therefore, you must make a decision once and for all that you will get and stay healthy, work hard, and never take the easy way out.
Are you starting to see a pattern here? To be good at anything you must:
o Decide you want to be cool
o Dedicate yourself to putting in the time and effort
o Never take shortcuts or look for the easy way out
What does this have to do with parenting?
Being a parent requires as much work as anything else, and sometimes more. You have to work as hard as the best golfer or the smartest student would. You can’t expect it to be easy. You must continually learn and spend time to strengthen and balance The Four Pillars of Parenting. Only then will he understand what it really is to be a good father.
So have I hit this on the ground enough? Have I made it clear that being great takes time and effort? What will not be easy?
Let me explain each of the Four Pillars so you know exactly what you need to do. All of these are equally important and it is not until you have achieved balance in all four areas that you will realize your potential because relying too heavily on one will cause you to collapse.
Pillar 1: prevent the pattern
This pillar, also known as your “Family of Origin,” includes your family history, family traditions you want to continue (or don’t), and most importantly, how your parents raised you.
In all aspects of life, you can only do the things you know how to do. You can’t be expected to do something you’ve never learned, and this can be very dangerous if your parents were negative, unloved, or abandoned. If most of what you were taught was negative, most of what you teach your children will also be negative, unless you make a change.
But don’t be too hard on your parents because chances are their parents have acted the same way towards them, as well as their parents’ parents, etc. This is the Negative Parenting Pattern that you must prevent from continuing. You don’t want your children to have the same negative experiences that you did.
Divorce, alcoholism, and different types of abuse are extreme examples of negative patterns that are passed from generation to generation. Yours may not be as extreme. Instead, perhaps it was a lack of compassion, affection, or love. It may be that your parents always expected too much of you and nothing you did was good enough. Whatever it is, if it’s hurtful or negative, it needs to stop.
Most of the family problems I deal with on a daily basis are not problems with children. Instead, parents have unmet needs from their past that they project onto their children either consciously (they know they are doing it) or unconsciously (they don’t realize they are doing it). So the way your parents raised you is something you need to address because once you start to make peace with your past, you can become emotionally available to your children.
Most parents I’ve come across skip this altogether. Why? Because these can be difficult and sometimes very painful problems. If your parents hurt you physically or emotionally, if they divorced when you were young, or if you have different beliefs than theirs, it can be very difficult for you to go back and face that. That’s normal, but it can also be very dangerous. So you must learn to accept your past and stop negative parenting patterns before they harm your children.
Pillar 2: conquer culture
Times continue to change rapidly and you need to understand what you are up against as a parent. There are more distractions, temptations and influences now than when you were a child and you need to be aware of them.
Here are some easy questions for you about the culture your kids live in right now to see how “in the know” you really are. (See the bottom of this section for answers.)
1. Who is a normal teenager by day and a pop star by night?
2. What are you doing if someone “stings” you?
3. Who is Troy Bolton?
4. Who is Tom? And are you friends with him?
So how did you do it? Have you got all or most of them right? I hope you did because these are questions you should be able to answer if your children are old enough to go to school, have access to a TV or a computer. Because I guarantee you that even if you don’t know these answers, they do.
Children have so many influences in today’s culture. Sex, drugs, and violence are everywhere: on the Internet, on TV, in movies, and in video games, all of which have an incredible influence on the minds of young people.
Do you allow your children to access the Internet without supervision? When should they be allowed to start watching PG-13 or R rated movies? Which TV channels are okay and which ones need to be monitored or banned? These are some of the issues you need to address.
There will always be a new influence out there, so you need to keep up with the culture to be prepared.
Answers:
1. Miley Cyrus/Hannah Montana 2. You are on Facebook. (What is Facebook? You need more help than I thought.) 3. She is the star of Disney’s High School Musical. 4. Tom is one of the founders of Myspace.com and currently has 225,916,857 friends online, yes that’s over 225 million people and counting.
Pillar 3: Teach the tools
This is what you are constantly looking for, something you can use to solve your parenting problems. These tools are important and you need to learn as many as you can to be prepared for any situation you may face. But more importantly, you need to learn WHEN and HOW to use these tools correctly because good parenting tools are worthless if used incorrectly.
For example, different actions work in different situations. Timeouts may work for a specific child in a specific situation, but not for other children or situations. Removing privileges may work very well for one child but not the other. and how long do you take them off? One day? One week? All of these actions have been shown to work if used correctly.
Therefore, you need to learn WHEN to use WHAT to get the best response from your child. You need a whole bag of parenting tricks. You can’t just be a one-trick pony parent. Sometimes you need to know whether to trick or treat your children. Too? Yes, I thought so, but you get my point.
These tools should focus on three key areas: Empowerment, Discipline, and Punishment. (Discipline and punishment are NOT the same)
Empowerment: tools to raise children who can take care of themselves: physically, spiritually, emotionally, mentally, sexually, financially, socially, and any other word that ends in -ally.
Discipline: Tools to reinforce good behaviors, stop bad behaviors, and teach your child to be honest and respectful.
Punishment: This is part of discipline, but it is an area that can be extremely confusing. Therefore, additional details on effective punishment techniques used to stop misbehavior are essential. Pay attention to the word “effective” because many of the punishment techniques you can use can be ineffective and may even reinforce bad behavior.
Pillar 4: Cultivate Character
You have an obligation to your children and society in general to raise children with good character and values. It is your responsibility to raise them to be positive, happy and caring. The world is filled with so much anger, hate, and negativity right now that this will be difficult, but you must do it. Because, as cliché as it sounds, we need to make the world a better place, one generation at a time.
So how do you do this? You must set a good example and teach your children how to act correctly. Some examples are:
o Teach your boys how to respect girls.
o Teach your girls to value their bodies.
o Volunteer time and money to those less fortunate.
o Grow spiritually or religiously.
Creating a child of character is more important now than ever. The good news, however, is that if you lead they will follow.
Why aren’t you a great father?
“It would be better, but I just don’t have time.”
“I would learn everything there is to do, but I don’t have the money to buy all those books.”
“I would try harder, but my kids won’t listen to me anyway.”
You can make up all the excuses you want, but the only reason you’re not the dad you always dreamed of being is that:
You have chosen not to be.
It’s that easy. No matter what the people around you do or what situation you find yourself in, you can become a great father if you want to. It completely depends on you.
You must commit to building and balancing The Four Pillars of Parenting so that you can grow as a parent. Don’t keep looking for new “revolutionary” ideas because without strong supporters around you, the “amazing” new tool or technique will never be successful in the long run.
They may not be as elegant or interesting as some of the ideas out there, but they work. You should never feel “lost” as a parent. You should always have a choice and these pillars give it to you.
So are you ready?
It’s time for you to make a change, a real and lasting change in your parenting. You have to decide right now that you will never look for an easy way out again and dedicate yourself to working hard, learning and perfecting The Four Pillars of Parenting.
You must be 100% committed because it will take time and effort. It won’t be easy, but nothing worthwhile is. This is not a quick fix for your problems, but it is the only way to make lasting change.