I listened to this yesterday as Corey and I enjoyed our final bike ride for this season up the canyon (should snow this week!) The things she shares in part 2 about parenting are a must listen! Start at 25:00, so good!
Part 2
https://youtu.be/vaPuHxYFEjw
Part 1
https://youtu.be/MuHJL3qGJq8
And lucky for the world - they transcribe their episodes! So here it is for Daniel - and I'm just going to paste the part I like here, but will try to go back and bold or underline my favorite parts later -
I am going to begin with a practical application idea of trying to raise Zion children in the midst of Babylon because Daniel, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego were Zion youth, and they became Zion men. They lived in literal Babylon. We are also in the midst of Babylon, and it's often referred to in that way by our prophets. Elder David Stoney gave a speech not long ago called Building Zion in the Midst of Babylon because that's what's happening here. We are admonished to try to build Zion because the Lord will not come until there's a Zion people to receive him. We can be in that path right now and should be. If we are believers, we should be seeking that Zion life, not creating a Zion cult, not trying to organize before the prophets call it to happen because this will come in wisdom and in order through our leaders, through the prophet himself when the time is right. We need to be prepared by living that Zion life, which basically means being on the road to sanctification. That comes through consistent obedience. I've used the term before on this podcast, boring obedience, boringly consistent obedience, where we do not falter, as did these wonderful people that we read of in the scriptures. They stayed faithful no matter what.
Hank Smith: Steady and deliberate.
Dr. Lili Anderson: 00:26:21 That is the road to living as a Zion person. That would qualify us when the time comes. We're not going to become Zion people after Christ comes. We need to become Zion people now. Anyway, how do we help our children and give them the best possible opportunity to become Zion children in the midst of Babylon? Because they are growing up in Babylon.
Hank Smith: 00:26:41 Which is exactly what happened to these four boys.
Dr. Lili Anderson: 00:26:43 Literally happened to them. We don't hear about their parents, but we could give a tribute for a moment. The teachings that came to these young men in their youth that helped instill in them through their own choices, their own acceptance of those messages, and their own acts of obedience. Instill that testimony. They learned this from somewhere. We could think for a moment of their parents that began that teaching. Then I want to start with kind of a sobering statement, another prophetic statement, by Neal Maxwell in a speech called Becometh As a Child from April 1996. We're talking over two decades, almost two and a half decades, before now. Ever since I heard this in conference, it has been something on my mind. 00:27:29 He said, "I have no hesitancy, brothers and sisters, in stating that unless checked, permissiveness, at the end of its journey, Daniel 1-6 Part 2 followHIM Podcast
Page 13 will cause humanity to stare in mute disbelief at its awful consequences." He is specifically talking to parents about permissiveness, and he's warning them that permissiveness brings awful consequences. 00:27:58 Let's talk about that. I'm going to repeat the statement one more time. "I have no hesitancy, brothers and sisters, in stating that unless checked, permissiveness, at the end of its journey, will cause humanity to stare in mute disbelief at its awful consequences." 00:28:15 Having that in my mind and working as I do with families, that has come to my remembrance many times as I've seen struggles that parents have with children in a world, that is, Babylon. We are not immune in the church as we all know. 00:28:32 Some of these statements come from a man named Leonard Sax in a book that he wrote called The Collapse of Parenting. I think it kind of helps to set a little bit the stage for what Elder Maxwell was warning against. "Over the past four decades," says Leonard Sax, "there has been a massive transfer of authority from parents to kids." 00:28:53 Now that's one way of describing permissiveness, a transfer of authority from parents to kids. You remember... I'm not suggesting we go back to the harsh days where children had to be seen but not heard and could never budge. There was too much maybe roughness about that. 00:29:08 We've gone way too far to the other end of the spectrum here. The pendulum has swung all the way to now, where that doesn't seem to be just diminished. It's reversed, where kids have authority, and parents don't. 00:29:21 Now think of the TV shows that we see or the movies we see. There are studies that show that the 150 most popular shows in our media... Not one of them depicts a parent who acts responsibly or reliably. 00:29:38 Men in particular, studies have shown, are often... Father figures particularly are characterized as buffoons. They cause trouble that the children have to solve. That's when they're not evil because sometimes fathers are depicted as evil. 00:29:54 Now mothers don't get a lot better treatment, but it's not quite as bad as some of the depictions of fathers in this popular media. Those of you who are as old as I am or watched
Page 14 Nickelodeon when you were young, maybe you remember shows like The Andy Griffith Show. I mean, there were others like Father Knows Best. There's some really good family principles taught in that. Andy Griffith is a widower, and he has this son, Opie, who grows up a lot during the show. He has a teacher, Miss Crump. If he was ever disrespectful for Miss Crump, and that became the episode, what happened? The whole town came down on Opie. Floyd the barber is snatching him off the sidewalk, "Opie, you don't talk to your teacher like that." Gomer Pyle and Barney, so beautifully depicted by John here... The whole town knew about it, and they all sent the same message, "You cannot disrespect adults. You have to be respectful." Then here we read just a few weeks ago in Isaiah that in the last days, a child would vaunt itself against its parents, and little children would rule over them. That's what Leonard Sax is talking about. He's not the only author who does this, by the way. This is a pretty well-known phenomenon amongst those who are studying parenting and showing that we've got this reversal of things where children now are consulted about everything."Along with that, in many families," this is Leonard Sax again, "what kids think, and what kids like, and what kids want now matters as much or more than what the parents think, and like, and want. Let the kids decide, is often kind of the manner of traveling of families." In one study... This is terrible. The attitude of American teenagers toward their parents was described as ingratitude, seasoned with contempt, ingratitude, seasoned with contempt. We've seen it. It might have happened in some of our homes. 00:31:54 It's not healthy. It's not right. How much influence can you have over a child who sees you with ingratitude and contempt, and has basically abandoned any thought of parental authority? Billy Graham once said, "A child who is allowed to be disrespectful to his parents will not have true respect for anyone." We can see how that would include God because God is a parental figure. He is a father.
How do kids learn to respect deity? Well, they start with the parent figures that they grow up with because a little child... That's what they know. If they learn to treat that parent with respect, it is not difficult to transfer that respect to a heavenly parent. If they grow up without respect towards their earthly parents, why should they respect God who is just another parent after all? 00:32:50 This is so dangerous because then, we do see how this can kind of set kids up for abandoning their faith because they weren't able to develop that respect for parental authority and then transfer it. Many people have been in this situation. 00:33:03 My own mother had an abusive father, and she had a hard time feeling God's love for her because He was a father too. That's when I first heard about this connection, was long before I was married. My mom would talk about how that had been a challenge for her. 00:33:17 Since then, as a counselor, I've worked with many people who've had a painful relationship with a father. Sometimes it's the mother too because she's also a strong parenting figure. It can make it difficult for a person to feel loved by God and to feel trust and respect for God because He is a parent. 00:33:34 My mother overcame that, and it is possible to heal from that. She was intentional about that and realized that she needed to come to know a different kind of father, one that she could trust and feel loved by, not overlooked by or disdained. She very successfully navigated that path. I've tried to help others along the way who've been injured in that way. 00:33:54 You can see the connections. They're so important. How a child has a relationship with their earthly parents very much impacts their openness and their approach to a relationship with a heavenly parent. 00:34:07 This is not a small thing. That's what Neal Maxwell is talking about. Permissiveness can cause us to stare in mute disbelief at its awful consequences at the end of the road. That has happened incrementally as the world has descended into more and more permissive attitudes where we have fewer and fewer children who are taught to be respectful. Parents don't even know that they can demand it anymore. 00:34:26 You didn't have to demand it in Mayberry because everybody expected it, and everybody supported it. Now hardly anybody Daniel 1-6 Part 2 followHIM Podcast
Page 16 else is doing it. You have to swim upstream if you want your children to respect you. You have to teach them. 00:34:39 I even remember, my husband's always been wonderfully supportive, but he had to travel when we were in Chicago. We already had four little kids and had two more there. I remember those young women's lessons that talked about how your husband should teach your children to respect you. 00:34:55 I thought, "Well, that sounds like a great idea," but sometimes dads aren't around. They go to work every day, and if they have to travel, especially. I realized I couldn't wait until Chris came home in order to teach my kids to respect me. I had to do that. Honestly, I was very prayerful about it because this was something I hadn't learned early on. I prayed to learn how to help my children learn respect for their parents. Of course, to do that, if we're going to have integrity, we have to behave in respectable ways, not perfect ways. 00:35:26 There's a lot of on-the-job training for parents. No matter how many manuals you read, it's an on-the-job learning course. If we are diligent in trying to be good examples, not perfect but good examples, and trying to be respectful to our children, and when we make mistakes, we apologize, and repent, and show that we are willing to improve as parents, we can deserve their respect, but we kind of have to teach it. 00:35:52 Otherwise, the world is teaching an entirely different message. Their friends are often not taught these things, even from good families. There are many good families who have kind of slumped into permissiveness. This is so incredibly important. 00:36:06 I just want to hit a few points. There's a great researcher, Diana Baumrind, from Berkeley who developed a Baumrind parenting model that's used in research all the time. I'm very quickly going to describe it. 00:36:17 It's basically a graph, like the old geometry graphs with two axes. The horizontal axis represents warmth and responsiveness, the quality of the relationship between parents and children. Now that's individual because with some kids, you might be very close, and other kids might be a little more defiant or less compliant. It's a little bit of a harder relationship with them.
Page 17 - We have to look at children, individually, not just as a group, and see, are they feeling my love? Do they feel safe with me? Because that is an essential component of healthy parenting. Even though we may love our children, it's different maybe how they feel that and if they can feel safe, or that we're trustworthy for them. The vertical axis is demand and regulation. It's how well do we enforce the rules of the family and enforcing not in a brutal, harsh, demeaning way that's never acceptable to God, but in a successful way that does demand respect and compliance, a measure of compliance for appropriate standards. Now we are so blessed to have the gospel of Jesus Christ because we can know what's important and what's not. If it matters to God, it should matter to us as parents. If it doesn't matter to God, we should drop it. To fight over red socks or blue, that's foolishness. That's not going to make a difference as to whether or not they're qualified for the kingdom. Telling lies, that's different. That matters to God. He's a God of truth. We can't have a positive relationship with God if we're liars, and we can't really have a relationship with anybody else that has much quality if we lie. If it matters to God, if this is something that would help our children qualify for the kingdom someday or have an opportunity to do that, if they choose to pursue that path, then it should matter to us as parents. It's worth enforcing. If it doesn't matter, let it go.
Hank Smith: Like verbal abuse.
Dr. Lili Anderson: Verbal abuse matters. Being kind, being honest, being respectful, doing your work, learning to do work that is not comfortable, because that's a big problem for permissive families, is that the kids might do the work that they like or that has an immediate reward. Maybe they're good students. They do their homework because they get rewarded. Their teachers like them. They get high grades, other opportunities. They do that work, but they don't want to clean the bathrooms because there's no reward in that that's immediate or all that pleasant. They just do the things that reward them.
Page 18 00:38:31 Maybe it's athletics. Maybe it's music. Maybe it's art. They may have these areas where they feel rewarded on a fairly quick basis. They pursue those and maybe put a lot of effort into it. We think, "Oh, at least they're learning some self-control and discipline," but it's not really self-control and discipline unless it's tasks that do not provide an immediate reward. 00:38:51 That's where self-control and discipline are manifest, in conquering the natural man and doing the unpleasant tasks of life. Cleaning your bedroom, learning to do the wash, cleaning the kitchen, cleaning the bathrooms. What we find is that a lot of our kids are only doing the things that bring a pretty immediate reward, and then they go on a mission. 00:39:09 The mission doesn't have an immediate reward attached. A lot of grueling days on a mission. You're just one of a whole hoard of missionaries. You're no longer special. You might have a companion you don't particularly care for, right? Hank Smith: 00:39:23 Right. Dr. Lili Anderson: 00:39:23 You might be in an area that they don't have a lot of people who are interested in the gospel. These are real trials to your faith. If all you can do are things that are comfortable or bring a reward, it's pretty hard to be successful in a setting that's very different, and yet that's the kind of steadfast obedience we've been talking about, doing it no matter what. Hank Smith: 00:39:41 It's important to God. Dr. Lili Anderson: 00:39:43 It is so important to God that we be able to do the right thing without reward and even in the face of an immediate consequence that's negative. We're really robbing our children if we only let them do the things that they enjoy, and that they're naturally good at, or that they find a reward in pretty quickly. 00:40:00 Anyway, I'm just going to say that in this Baumrind model, the upper right-hand quadrant is the good one. It's high in both dimensions. It's high in warmth and responsiveness, and it's high in demand and regulation. 00:40:13 Now, as members of the church, we're not perfect. We certainly can have parents with real problems, but it's not hard to love your children. It's not hard to provide that warmth and responsiveness if we were fairly decent and not too messed up by our own past. Loving our kids is not typically the hard part. Daniel 1-6 Part 2 followHIM Podcast
Page 19 We do need to check it and make sure that our kids feel it well, and they're receiving that well, and so on. 00:40:37 The hard one is usually the vertical axis, which is demand and regulation. Both of them need to be high in order for us to be the kind of parent God is. This is called authoritative parenting. That's the kind of parent God is. He's authoritative. The love is undeniable. 00:40:54 Then he says things like, "I'm bound when you do what I say. When you do not what I say, you have no promise." There are conditions. There's a high demand, and it's enforced with consequences. John Bytheway: 00:41:04 There's boundaries. Dr. Lili Anderson: 00:41:05 Limits. Yes, limits. There are boundaries. There are standards. There are commandments. John Bytheway: 00:41:09 Expectations. Dr. Lili Anderson: 00:41:10 Blessings are contingent on our compliance. Not everybody can get a temple recommend, but those who comply with those requirements to a certain extent. Not everybody will enter the celestial kingdom but those who comply. God is clear about that. He is definitely in that upper right quadrant, the authoritative parent. That's where we should try to be. That is not permissive. Permissiveness is the lower right quadrant where we're high in love. Like I said, this is pretty easy for Latter-day Saint parents. It's low in demand and regulation. Hank Smith: 00:41:44 I love you, so you can do whatever you want. Dr. Lili Anderson: 00:41:46 Yes, that's right. I don't want to fight. That's what moves a lot of permissive parenting, is I don't want to fight with my kid
because I don't want to lose the warmth and positive nature of
our relationship. Instead, I'll just say, "Okay, I'll let it go," or
sometimes we slip into the authoritarian quadrant where we
say, "Because I said so."
Hank Smith: 00:42:06 My house, my rules.
Dr. Lili Anderson: 00:42:08 Yes, that's the upper left quadrant. It's at the cost of the
relationship because if we become frustrated and then we just
lay down the law, we tend to get a little too harsh or too
authoritarian. We impose some pretty severe consequences, or
at least it varies in degree. That's not good for the relationship.
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That becomes more fear-based. Do it or else. That's at the cost
of the relationship.
00:42:28 There are some authoritarian parents still on the planet, and
sometimes we swing into that quadrant. We move around a
little bit. I would say most good parents, I mean, most decent
human beings actually want to be authoritative parents in that
upper right quadrant, high in both dimensions, whether they
know the model or not because they want their children to feel
loved. They want them to grow into useful citizens and maybe
even citizens of the kingdom someday.
00:42:50 We have that desire. The problem with staying in the
authoritative quadrant is that kids push back. When they say, "I
don't want to," or, "I'm not going to," parents don't know what
to do, so they tend to drop into the permissive quadrant. Okay,
let's not fight, and we let them get away with it, or we jump into
the authoritarian quadrant and say, "Because I said so," but that
doesn't work either because it becomes fear-based. As soon as
they're old enough, they're going to shake the dust off their feet
and get out of town. They're not going to look back or maintain
the values we've tried to teach.
00:43:19 The authoritative quadrant is the one where we're able to
transfer values and help our children become more acceptable
to God, to harness their natural man, to see the blessings of the
gospel as well as, because they are harnessing their natural
man, they become eligible for the visitation of the spirit because
when we don't do what's right, we chase the spirit away from
us.
00:43:41 When we are rebellious, or obnoxious, or disrespectful, we
chase the spirit away from us. Then what are we, going to
launch these kids into Babylon without the spirit? That's an
abnegation of our responsibility as parents. If we can help our
kids learn to harness that natural man by authoritative
parenting, our children harness their natural man because they
do have to comply with expectations and standards that are not
conducive to the natural man getting what he wants or what
she wants.
00:44:10 They have to overcome that in order to qualify for approval or
the rewards that are established, the positive consequences.
Then they are fit to take the spirit with them when they leave
our homes. This is such an important gift to give our children.
00:44:23 Neal Maxwell saw all of this, obviously, when he and many
other prophets have warned us about teaching our children
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when they're young. The earlier we start, the better. Now, can
you do this with a 16-year-old? Yes, you can. It's harder if you
haven't done it before, but don't give up. You can still teach
good principles.
00:44:41 Some parents say, "Well, I've never done this before. If I do it
now, my kids are going to complain and say, 'You never did this
before. You didn't do this for the older kids,'" or whatever. My
answer is always, "Yeah, but you upgrade your software, don't
you?" What does that mean, you never did it before?
John Bytheway: 00:44:56 It's a good way to put it. Well, I've upgraded since last time.
Dr. Lili Anderson: 00:44:59 That's right. I've upgraded. Aren't you lucky because you're
going to benefit from my upgrade.
John Bytheway: 00:45:08 You're going to get parent 4.0.
Dr. Lili Anderson: 00:45:08 That's exactly right. It's going to keep growing. The Collapse of
Parenting by Leonard Sax. It's a little bit older book now. I mean,
it's been around for a while, but it's still very relevant. We could
update some of the data that he includes there, but it's going to
be along the same trend that he has identified. There are many
good voices out there about this, but I do particularly like this
book.
00:45:28 The Baumrind model is different, but it's used in a lot of
research. You actually hear about it sometimes even in kind of
just news reports or magazines and things like that because it's
been such an effective model in research. People don't talk
about it from a religious point of view, but it fits so well with
gospel principles that it's a very useful model, simple to
describe, and incredibly useful.
00:45:48 Now let me explain a little bit how to stay in the authoritative
quadrant because it's not hard to want to be there, but to stay
there when the kids push back is difficult. To avoid permissive
parenting, which is what Elder Maxwell is warning so stringently
about, is to be able to maintain the rule when the kids push
back without becoming brutal, without resorting to my way or
the highway, or becoming harsh, or angry, or punitive.
Hank Smith: 00:46:20 You're creating resentment, creating the rebellion.
Dr. Lili Anderson: 00:46:24 They very well might throw the baby out with the bathwater
and leave the gospel behind too, if that's what the gospel seems
to produce in their parents. In order to maintain structure and
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compliance with rules, we need to consider... This whole phrase
matters, "A structure of consequences consistently enforced
that yields the desired behavioral outcomes in our children."
Hank Smith: 00:46:48 I can't make up new rules on the spot?
Dr. Lili Anderson: 00:46:52 No, but I must say some trial and error may be involved
becauseHank Smith: 00:46:56 Okay.
Dr. Lili Anderson: 00:46:56 ... children are different in how they perceive consequences.
Some kids love to be sent to their room, and some kids hate it.
We have to be a little bit idiosyncratic about how to motivate
our children with that structure of consequences.
00:47:09 The truth is that every human behavior is motivated. This is
really pretty basic. God knows us so well. What it comes down
to is that every behavior has within it costs and payoffs.
00:47:22 There are certain costs to the behavior, and there are certain
payoffs. If the payoffs exceed the costs, the behavior will
continue. It's more worth it than not. If the costs exceed the
payoffs, the behavior will stop.
00:47:40 This is true of every human being. Now some are more
stubborn than others. That difference might have to be greater,
but it is true of every human being. Now where we really differ
is in our perception of costs and payoffs. People look at us as
members of the church and say, "You guys are fools. You're
missing all the good parties and all the good fun."
00:47:59 What are we saying? We're saying that I perceive that the
reward to come in the hereafter is such a huge payoff that I am
willing to make whatever you think is a sacrifice now because
there's no contest to me in terms of the cost and the payoff.
Others are like, "Yeah, I don't know if it's worth it. I'm having a
lot of fun now. I don't really believe in what's to come or
whatever," or they think that God will beat them with a few
stripes, and they'll be at last saved in the kingdom of God.
00:48:26 Anyway, we perceive things differently. We do need to kind of
know our children and know ourselves to recognize what's
going on there. In parenting, it's good to look at our children
and say, "What does constitute a cost that will help to help
change their behavior?"
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00:48:39 A couple of examples. When I was an early morning seminary
teacher, and I may have mentioned this in a previous episode,
but I taught the juniors. They were mostly driving. Almost every
semester, somebody would come in and say, "My parents took
my car keys." I'd say... Oh, I never said, "That's too bad," by the
way, because I was delighted that the parents were trying to
parent.
00:48:57 Instead, I would ask, "Oh, what happened?" It was usually
grades. Report cards had come out, and they had not been too
diligent. The parents were like, "You can't drive the car." Again, I
wouldn't say, "That's too bad."
00:49:07 I would ask, "How long do you have to get your grades up? Do
you have to wait for another report card?" Or, these days it's all
online and stuff. "How many weeks do you have to get your
grades up to get your keys back?"
00:49:17 Every single time... I taught for five years, so this happened a lot
over those years. They would say, "Oh, I don't have to do that.
After two or three days of getting up to bring me to early
morning seminary, they'd give me the keys back."
00:49:33 I wish your parents could hear you now. You totally have their
number. You hold your breath for a few days, and they back off
on the consequence. You get your way, and you don't have to
change. That happens all the time.
00:49:46 We really need to look at ourselves and say, "What am I doing?
Am I really getting the desired outcome?" If not, I need to go
back to the drawing board and make sure the costs are high
enough. Again, not brutal, not demeaning, never abusive. There
are plenty of costs. They owe everything to us in the tangible
sense.
00:50:04 They live in our houses. They use our media. They use our
internet. They're usually paying for their devices. They're driving
cars. People will say, "I can't get my kids to do anything." Then
I'm like, "Well, you're not trying very hard because you actually
have a lot of things that you can impose as consequences."
00:50:18 Some of them can be incentives. If you do this, then we can do
this. Some of them are costs. You lose this privilege for a while.
Parents just don't want to do it. Why? Because of what those
parents were saying about early morning seminary.
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00:50:28 When we impose a cost on our children, we impose a cost on
ourselves, by definition. Sometimes parents are too soft on
themselves because it's hard to impose that consequence in a
consistent, long-lasting way that is sufficient to change their
attitudes or change their behavior. We give up long before the
kid does.
00:50:48 Once, one of my daughters-in-law came to me. Her oldest was
probably about three at the time. She's now over 16. She's a
wonderful kid. I mean, nobody would believe this because she's
like an angel child. When she was a little girl, she was pretty
stubborn.
00:51:01 My daughter-in-law called and said, "She won't pick up her toys.
I just can't get her to pick up her toys." I told her the basics of
this model. I said, "Okay. When are you asking her to pick up
her toys? Is it at bedtime?" She said, "Yeah."
00:51:12 I said, "Well, that's a lousy time because the payoff of not
picking up her toys is that she gets to stay up later, and she
doesn't want to go to bed." Three- year-olds usually don't want
to go to bed. They want to stay up.
00:51:21 I said, "That's a bad time to do it. Do it before lunch. Now I
know you really want it picked up at night, but you can change
the time later. Let's just get compliance first. Let's get her used
to doing what she's asked to do. Do it before lunch because you
have a built-in, cost-payoff thing."
00:51:37 She doesn't get lunch until she picks up the toys. It's a simple
task. I mean, it was like a basket, and she had to put some
things in there. I mean, it wasn't some grueling task that wasn't
age-appropriate. It was totally age-appropriate, and it was a
good way to start her complying with a job, a chore that she
needed to be responsible for that didn't have a built-in reward
by itself, but that she was being obedient to her mother.
00:51:59 My daughter-in-law said, "Okay, I'm going to try that." Then she
called me back the next day, and it was like 1:30 or something.
She said, "She won't pick up her toys, but she's crying because
she says she's hungry."
00:52:11 I said, "Okay. Make her favorite sandwich. I mean, it's peanut
butter and jelly dripping with jelly, really good and juicy. Then
kind of wave it under her nose, like, 'Boy, I sure hope you pick
up those toys because as soon as you pick up those toys, you
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can have the sandwich. If you don't pick up the toys, you don't
get the sandwich.'"
00:52:30 She told me that at some point, her daughter's holding her
stomach and saying, "I'm so hungry. I need to eat." I said, "That
girl is not going to starve to death today. Let her be really
hungry. If she's really stubborn, take a bite of that sandwich."
00:52:44 Say, "Wow, it's sure a good sandwich. I sure hope you pick up
your toys and have this." See, you can then even be an advocate
for your child. Even though you're imposing the consequence,
you can encourage them.
Hank Smith: 00:52:56 You can cheer them on.
Dr. Lili Anderson: 00:52:57 Yes, you can cheer them on instead of having it just be about a
temper battle between the two of you. "Yes, you will." "No, I
won't." No, we want to avoid that. We want to just say, "No,
here's the structure. Even though I'm the one who created, I
mean, enforcing the structure or both, but I sure hope you'll get
the prize. I sure hope you'll get back this privilege because as
soon as you do, it's going to be a lot nicer, and I know you're
capable."
00:53:18 She called me later, and she said, "She picked up her toys." She
had to do that a few days to kind of get that principle lodged in
her stubborn little girl's heart and mind. Then there was no
problem.
00:53:29 Like I said, if you start when they're young, there's a really great
spillover effect. If they learn to be obedient in their early years,
they tend not to be inclined so much to be rebellious. The
sooner they find out they can get away with it, the harder it is to
turn that course.
00:53:46 Don't give up. You can do this with a 16-year-old. It's a little
trickier. If they have their own money by then, that's harder
because they can just go buy what you're taking away, or if their
friends have money or transfers... Anyway, it's a little harder as
they get older. Don't give up. Be prayerful because God wants
us to get this right.
00:54:02 Why is this so important? Well, because being authoritative
parents rather than permissive blesses our children in millions
of ways and ways I'm sure that we can't even measure at this
point, but we'll see it someday very clearly.
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00:54:16 Children who are raised permissively tend to have poor levels of
self-worth. Now this makes perfect sense if you understand
where self-worth comes from. Self-worth comes from selfmastery. It doesn't come from somebody telling you you're
good. Now we tried that in the '80s. They used to send magnets
home or lists home for the parents, 100 ways to praise your
children.
00:54:40 You know what? They don't believe you if they're not doing
good things. They know that they're not doing what's right, and
you can't... Was this Ezra Taft Benson who said, "You can't do
wrong and feel right"? That's what happens to our children. We
can say, "You're wonderful," and somebody else can tell them
they're wonderful, but if they're not doing the things that they
know are right, they're not going to feel like good people. They
have this kind of shaky or worse self-image because it comes
from appropriately mastering ourselves and the appropriate
parts of our environment.
00:55:09 Think of a little kid who learns to tie his shoe. He is so pumped.
He feels so good about himself because he conquered that fine
motor coordination, which is tricky for little kids. He conquered
something in himself and an appropriate part of his
environment. You can't take that feeling away from him or her.
00:55:26 We take that away from our children as they grow because we
don't ask hard things. We don't want to fight. We don't want to
have to come up with a consequence. We let them slide. They
grow up not feeling good about themselves. This has been born
out in lots of research because this model is used all over the
place as if we needed it. That's the problem.
00:55:43 That's one of the problems that Neal Maxwell saw,
prophetically. What happens if they don't have a good selfimage? They are much more vulnerable to depression and
anxiety. Shocker.
00:55:56 We have increasing levels of depressed and anxious kids at
younger and younger ages and, of course, suicide accompanies
that. Since our lockdowns and whatever, that has really been
aggravated and exacerbated at scary levels. These kids are not
flourishing.
00:56:13 We have some great kids that still learn things in a good way. I
don't mean that this is every child. I'm saying there is a
tendency here that is easily seen if we look. It is not going the
right direction. That's why our prophets warn us against it.
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00:56:28 I remember when I saw those stats start to rise meteorically on
anxiety and depression at younger and younger years along
with suicide. I remembered Neal Maxwell's statement, which
was well before those numbers went up. This is one of the
things he saw, that there are awful consequences to our
children that happen when we don't teach them authoritatively
to harness the natural man and to develop, thereby, strong selfworth, that we have too much permissive parenting.
00:56:59 Those parents are loving parents. It's not that they want bad
outcomes for their children. I know that's true. I've talked to so
many. They don't know how to expect enough of their children,
and the neighbors aren't doing it. The kids get used to going
with that natural man impulse. They do a work if they feel
rewarded. If they don't, they don't. They don't develop that
strong sense of worth.
00:57:22 Their identity... What did President Nelson tell us just recently
at that Worldwide Youth Fireside where he talked about
identity? We need to know. Our children need to know we are a
child of God, a child of the covenant, and a disciple of Christ.
How can they know that if they don't feel good about
themselves, or how can they know what that means and how it
can protect them if they don't really know who they are?
00:57:43 They don't feel solid and good because they have not been
asked to do things that are uncomfortable, and to get good at
those things, and to be rewarded from that capacity growing in
them, not because there's an instant reward attached but
because it's the right thing to do. We are robbing our children of
that strength, and then they are gathered by every wind and
tossed.
00:58:06 We can do better. The gospel of Jesus Christ teaches us how to
do better. Before I saw the Baumrind parenting model...
Because my mother, as wonderful as she was, was not a
disciplinarian. Probably because her dad was so authoritarian,
and nasty, and abusive, she didn't want to be like that. She kind
of over-corrected, and she was a little bit more permissive but
at a less dangerous time, I will say.
00:58:30 The world wasn't quite marshaled against kids at that point as it
is now and will be in the years to come. I didn't learn this from
my mother. I learned lots of wonderful things from her, but I
didn't learn this. Then we started having all these kids. I hadn't
anticipated having so many kids so close together, but it was
the right thing.
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00:58:48 We felt guided, and blessed, and were healthy. It was a huge
blessing in my life. I hadn't even babysat when I was a teenager
because I felt overwhelmed by trying to get kids to do stuff.
00:58:59 I didn't know how to be a disciplinarian or even have any
authority. I prayed my guts out as a young mother, "Lord, teach
me how to teach discipline to my children, self-control and
delayed gratification. I don't know how." He taught me through
the Spirit. There were experiences that I had that I could see He
was guiding me and molding me.
00:59:19 I learned to do this as a young parent because God loves us, and
He loved my kids. He loved me, and He wanted me to learn
what I was asking to learn. Line upon line, precept upon
precept, I learned these principles. They work. I can testify they
work. Now I know that there are exceptions. There are kids who
are particularly defiant and stubborn. We are not blaming the
parents for that.
00:59:42 Remember we've said this before, that the product of parenting
is not the child. Ultimately, the product of parenting is the
parent. It's what we learn to do that makes us more like God
because He is an authoritative parent. Our children will exercise
their agency to comply or to not comply.
00:59:58 Nevertheless, we have been told that there is more likelihood
that children will comply when parents know how to teach. This
helps us to grow in our roles as parents and to become more
like God Himself. It gives our children the best possible chance.
01:00:15 Then they make their own choices, and we don't blame the
parents for that. That's too spurious a correlation. It's not
consistent, and it's not founded in truth. Look at God Himself.
He would be condemned with all His rebellious children. We
don't measure God by His rebellious children. We measure Him
for who He is and how He is, and that's how God will measure
us.
01:00:37 These things are so valuable. When I saw the Baumrind model
in my PhD program, many years later, my kids were all grown, I
recognized it for truth because that was what God had taught
me in the trenches. I was so grateful that God will speak to us.
We can learn this. We can bless our children with a positive selfworth, positive, strong sense of identity that can help them to
withstand all these philosophies of men.
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01:01:06 The benefits of parental authority are substantial when parents
matter more than peers. How often does that happen in our
families these days? It should, and it can. They can teach right
and wrong in meaningful ways. That is the intergenerational
transfer of values because, ultimately, we don't want to just
corral our children's behavior in the process of not being
permissive and having consequences, incentives and
disincentives.
01:01:33 We need to be teaching them and answering the question, why.
That's where we really, again, transfer values and help to
convert them to the principles of the gospel. We don't want
them to behave like this when we're watching. We want them
to behave like this on a desert island, alone, because it's the
right way to behave. They trust in what the Lord is asking them
to do.
01:01:52 That transfer of values happens with parental authority.
Otherwise, we try to teach our lessons, and they just blow us off
because we don't have any real authority or power in their lives
or respect. They don't seem to think that we are deserving of
respect. We can then help our children develop more robust
and more authentic sense of self. That's what we've been
talking about.
01:02:14 Then we can teach our children, as parents with authority, to
educate their desires. That's about harnessing the natural man.
This is a non-LDS author, but he has the principles down. We
can help to educate their desires, which is to help them harness
the natural man which qualifies them for the attendance of the
spirit so that when they launch, they take the spirit with them
instead of offending the spirit because they still serve the
natural man too much.
01:02:38 This instills in them a longing for higher and better things: in
music, in the arts, in their own character, spirituality, and in
their worship of God. There is good evidence that you can boost
a child's conscientiousness including his or her honesty and selfcontrol in a matter of weeks without spending any money. We
do still need to learn how to be the kind of parent God is, which
is good for us. Do not allow yourself to be paralyzed by your
own inadequacies.
01:03:11 I think that's great counsel for parents. Of course, we're not
going to be 100% consistent, but if we keep trying, and praying,
and seeking revelation and guidance from the Spirit, and we are
earnest in our endeavors to become a better version of
ourselves as a parent, to learn more about God-like parenting,
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God will bless us. He will bless and consecrate that experience
for our good, and our children will be recipients of that better
parenting, whatever they choose to do with it.
01:03:39 Raising your child to know and care about virtue and character
is not a special, extra-credit assignment reserved for the
superior parent. It is mandatory for all parents. When you are
given a mandatory assignment, you must do your best,
regardless of your own shortcomings, regardless of whether
your peers, other parents are paying attention to the
assignment or not.
01:04:05 I am telling you, you're going to be swimming upstream because
when you're asking your kids to do things that the neighbors
aren't... Most of the neighbors aren't asking that of their kids.
There is no greater responsibility given to a parent during that
season of life.
