I believe in a Family Constitution because it was the tool that made me truly take the time and reflect on my family relationships and on what was wrong with them.

I believe in a Family Constitution because it enabled me to stop the chaos, the whining, the lack of consistency and clarity in my family. Instead, the structure that the Family Constitution added to our family enabled us to feel much closer to each other and to truly connect, for the first time in years.

I believe in a Family Constitution because it made me listen – truly listen – to my wife and kids and it also helped me to start spending more time with thwm, and enjoying every minute of it.

I believe in a Family Constitution because chores, allowance and kids’ responsibility are now effortless. There are no more arguments, whining or nagging. The kids know exactly what is expected from them, and they know exactly what are the rewards for being responsible and what are the consequences of being irresponsible. There’s no need for constant bargaining and arguing, because the rules are well established and are fair and clear.

I believe in a Family Constitution because it has transformed my family relationships from chaotic and stressful to blissful. I’m confident it can do the same for your family. Start creating your own Family Constitution today! Click here for more details.

Our kids are busy too: their schedules are often packed with after school activities and with scheduled play dates. For many reasons, including modern safety concerns, our kids rarely get to just go outside and play, unscheduled and unsupervised.

I’m not judging anyone here, by the way. My family is a dual-income family, and my kids are busy. These are the realities of our modern life, and while I believe that modern life creates difficulties when it comes to family relationships, I do believe that the conveniences of modern life are amazing and wouldn’t trade any of them!

However, there are tried and true ways to strengthen one’s family relationships. Here are three of them:

1. Spend more time together. Easier said than done? Not necessarily. You do need to truly commit to spending more time together as a family, and this can be achieved by scheduling family meetings and family outings in your calendar and keeping those appointments, just like you would keep a business meeting.

2. Create a Family Constitution. A family constitution will help you stabilize and improve family relationships by adding clarity and consistency to your family.

3. Listen. Many of us are so tired and stressed, we hardly ever listen anymore – to our kids and to our spouse. But these are the people we love. Their ideas and thoughts are important. Taking the time to truly listen to our loved one is a great way to improve family relationships.   

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In a recent post on this blog, I discussed discipline through a system of rewards and consequences. Today, I’d like to emphasize that when disciplining your kids, rewards and incentives are always the best way to go.

When parenting the constitutional way, you don’t want to focus on punishments. Punishments, or consequences, need to be there because rewards will not always work, and you want to make sure your kids suffer appropriate consequences if they don’t follow the rules.

But consequences are there just in case. What you really want is to encourage your children to follow the family rules because if they do, they will earn something that matters to them. You want chores to become a priority for them, because by doing their chores they earn an important privilege or a coveted reward.

When you get to that place, where your kids actually WANT to do their chores, and you don’t need to nag them or issue constant reminders, you will truly achieve better family relationships and family harmony – real harmony, not the temporary peace and quiet that you achieve when parenting the easy way
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To make sure the rewards work, you need to listen to your kids before selecting them. Start by asking each of your children which rewards they would like to earn. Typical rewards could be an allowance, or extra allowance; clothes or toys; extended screen time; a later bedtime; and selecting a family outing.

Obviously, this will largely depend on the individual child and needs to be tailored to meet each child’s needs. The promise of a new item of clothing could make one child behave well for weeks, while leaving another child completely indifferent.

Once you have decided on rewards, FOLLOW THROUGH. Nothing erodes trust or respect more than broken promises. If you want Your Family Constitution to work for the long run, you must always deliver on an earned reward. Of course, you should also follow through on a consequence.

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There sure are many screen temptations these days for kids. It’s not just television and the Internet. There are computer games, console games, and Wii, not to mention iPod Nano, which enables them to watch movies anywhere, even on the go. Screen time is not even limited to the home anymore – kids can do it anywhere.

This may be very good for entertainment companies, but it’s very bad for kids. Our children need to play outside, interact with their friends and be physically active. Spending too many hours each day sitting around and playing on the computer contributes, according to many experts, to the obesity epidemic.

As parents, our job is to encourage our children to be more active, but since we are so busy and overwhelmed, it’s very tempting to just allow them to watch one more show or to play one more game.

Parenting the easy way would mean asking the kids to turn off the TV, but then – as soon as they start protesting – giving up and allowing them to watch more. In the short term, this certainly achieves peace and quiet, but in the long term, we are not doing our kids any favors by allowing them to watch too much TV.

Parenting the hard way would mean barking at them to turn off the television without providing any explanations. This would create unnecessary conflict and friction, and there’s also the risk of being inconsistent – sometimes letting them watch more TV (when you need to get some work done), and sometimes allowing them less screen time.

Limiting screen time the constitutional way means establishing a clear set of rules when it comes to how much time the kids are allowed to spend in front of a screen each day. Involve the kids in deciding how much daily screen time is reasonable, then establish clear rules to achieve this, which include appropriate rewards for following the rules and appropriate consequences for not following them.

A detailed example of “screen time rules” can be found on page 61 of my family guide, Your Family Constitution.

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Today I’d like to suggest parenting the constitutional way as the best solution for the modern family.

Parenting the constitutional way means parenting through structure. You can think of it as a middle way between the easy way and the hard way. The easy way gives too much weight to kid’s wants and opinions. The hard way dismisses them altogether. But the constitutional way of parenting harnesses kids’ energy and ideas and makes them partners in creating a clear set of rules and expectations for the family, and a clear set of rewards and consequences for enforcing them.

Note that I said “partners” and not “equal partners.” Kids are kids, and parents are parents – while the kids’ input is welcome and is always taken into consideration, the parents are the ones making and enforcing the rules. The constitutional way of parenting does not mean turning the family into a democracy, but it does mean improving family relationships and creating a system that encourages cooperation and enhances mutual respect and open communication.

The constitutional way of parenting means that there’s no need for children to use meltdowns and temper tantrums to achieve what they want. The Family Constitution lists their rights clearly, so the constant need to negotiate for more disappears. Children in constitutional households also know that tantrums would get them nowhere, so they don’t even try to use those.

The constitutional way of parenting also means that there’s no need for parents to use severe punishments or threats, since the Family Constitution clearly lists the rewards and consequences for the children’s actions. Instead of threatening, parents can simply follow the constitution and assign the appropriate reward or the consequence to their child’s action.

Photo by Steve Polyak

Today I’d like to discuss a different style of parenting which is also quite common, and is just as harmful to family relationships: parenting the hard way.

Parenting the hard way is a tough, detached parenting. It is very different than parenting the easy way, but it too stems from parents being too stressed to give real thought to how they discipline their kids.

Parenting the hard way can manifest itself in different ways. You may find yourself raising your voice at your children or hurling insults at them. You may be punishing them often, severely.

Parenting the hard way used to work in generations past, when families were patriarchal and autocratic. Of course, even when it “worked,” it came with a price: fathers were often emotionally detached form their children. The children feared them, but did not feel close to them. Today, this way of parenting cannot work. Children have a right to be heard and respected. When you parent them the hard way, you end up pushing them away.

A sad example of parenting the hard way is mentioned in my book, Your Family Constitution [link]. A mother was trying to discipline her teenaged boy the hard way, by telling him that if he couldn’t follow her rules, he wasn’t welcome in her house anymore. Unfortunately, parenting the hard way seriously backfired: her son moved out to live with friends and never came back.

Parenting the hard way is incredibly risky. Next week, I will discuss a better way of parenting – parenting the constitutional way.

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Today I’d like to discuss “parenting the easy way.”

Parenting the easy way is not really easy. It may SEEM easy in the short term, but as a long-term strategy, it’s quite disastrous.

Parenting the easy way means giving up the notion of discipline and boundaries. I often think parents who use this parenting style are afraid of their kids: afraid of their anger, their screams, their tantrums. So they give them whatever they want, and ignore any misbehavior.

These parents are not bad parents. On the contrary: they love their child deeply and want her to be happy. But they often don’t realize that children are the happiest when they have clear boundaries. Knowing you can get away with anything is actually a very scary experience for a child. Kids need to know that their parents are in control.

An example of parenting the easy way:

Mom and six-year-old Emily are standing at the checkout line at the supermarket. Emily grabs a bag of candy and places it in the cart. Mom says, gently but firmly, “no, Emily. We are not buying candy today” and puts the candy back on the shelf. Emily examines Mom’s face, looks at the other people at the checkout line, and promptly starts screaming. Mom looks nervously at the other people in line, and places the candy back in the shopping cart. Emily immediately calms down and starts chatting happily with mom.

Mom achieved temporary peace – but at what price to the family relationships? Emily now knows that a meltdown can get her anything she wants, and the more this happens, the more her belief that tantrums are effective will be reinforced. This scenario, and similar ones, will repeat until Mom finds the strength and the resolve to change her parenting style and stop choosing the “easy way” of parenting.

Photo credit: Jen

Regular family meetings are a great way to strengthen family relationships, bring your family closer and keep communication open.

If you adopt just one thing from my family guide, I suggest you adopt the weekly family meeting.

A weekly family meeting gives busy family members an opportunity to get together, reconnect, and discuss family-related issues. If your family decided to create a Family Constitution, the family meeting is also a good time for recognizing achievements and addressing concerns.

It’s always a good idea to schedule the family meeting for the same night each week, and to treat it like you treat a business meeting – with respect. Stick to it, and avoid canceling or rescheduling unless you absolutely have to. Expect the same level of respect from other family members as you show.

The family meeting need not be formal. It should be an event the family is looking forward to, so it needs to be short, fun and casual. Start with dinner – make it a fun dinner such as “make your own pizza.” Follow with the meeting, and finish with a family board game.

Remember that everyone should be heard during the meeting. Even the youngest children should have an opportunity to speak their minds and bring up any concern or idea they might have. However, as discussed before, while everyone gets the right to speak up, only Mom and Dad have the right to make the final decision. A family should respect its kids and listen to them, but a family should not be a democracy.

A typical family meeting at our house includes a brief discussion about family business, such as issues and proposals, followed by weekly planning of family dinners and events. We then review the weekly checklist and assign rewards and consequences as appropriate, and finish with “family fun” – either playing games at home or going out for dinner or to a movie.

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Getting kids to help around the house can be a real challenge. We seem to be living in the “age of entitlement,” where kids no longer ask “how can I help?” but rather “what’s in it for me?” Motivating our busy, self-absorbed kids to help around the house may seem like a lost cause.

Indeed, many parents give up. They find that just doing the chores themselves us quicker and easier than endlessly nagging their kids. While this may work as a short-term solution, it is certainly not a good idea if you want to raise your kids to be responsible members of your household, and – eventually – of society.

While some experts argue that an allowance should not be linked to chores, it has been my experience that a system of rewards and consequences, which includes allowance and chores, works beautifully to motivate kids and to teach them values such as participating in the household tasks, being responsible, and saving.

My view is that an allowance is a privilege, just like TV or sleepovers with friends. As such, my children need to EARN the right to receive this privilege by making good choices.  Poor decisions mean they lose privileges, including their allowance or part of their allowance. Our Family Constitution [link] specifies that Jack and Max receive a full allowance on each week they complete their chores on time. When they don’t complete their chores on time, they lose part or all of their allowance.

After our Family Constitution became official, we stopped buying the kids “extras” such as toys and video games. The kids are now expected to purchase these items using their own money. As a result, the boys now distinguish between our money and their own. They discern value and spend accordingly, acquiring important life skills of money management and saving towards a purchase.

Tying allowance with chores is working for my family. Please visit my website, Your Family Constitution, to receive additional, useful parenting tips.

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When family members don’t talk with each other anymore, family is in trouble.

It may seem like it’s impossible for family members not to talk with each other. After all, we all live in the same house and see each other every single day. But one of the modern family’s big problems is that although people live in the same house, they are so busy doing their own thing, and their life becomes so chaotic, that they never find the time to just talk.

My family used to be like that. My wife and I are working professionals. Our kids are involved in many extra-curricular activities. The busier we all got, the less time we had to effectively communicate with each other or to set a clear system of rules and expectations, and effective tools for enforcing them. We were constantly in survival mode, never taking the time to look at the big picture and add some much-needed structure to the family chaos.  

Effective communication enabled my family to function again. My family now thrives under our Family Constitution. But the first step to establishing that Constitution was communicating with my children and with my wife. I started by having the conversation with my wife that we should have made time for years ago. We shared our fundamental parenting objectives. We talked about our views on role modeling, encouragement and discipline. We put together a clear vision for our family that we could both support.

Next, I talked with my children. We talked, and I listened, like I have never listened before. We talked about family issues; about things they would like to change. We discussed issues such as chores, rewards and consequences. Our Family Constitution works, because my children’s input was an integral part of its content.

We now maintain our open communication by having a weekly family meeting. The weekly family meeting is our way to make sure we make time to discuss issues, recognize problems, acknowledge achievements, and in general stay connected.

Click here to learn more about my approach to relieving family tension and solving common family problems.

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