What Are You Really After When You Demand RESPECT From Your Child?

Imagine the situation: a five year old Tony was looking for his remote control car, and in order to find it he got a lot of other items out of his storage cabinets. He eventually found the car and started playing with it.

Tony’s mum comes into his room and sees everything out on the floor and says, “what a mess, please put it all away now!”, but Tony ignores her. She then says louder, “Tony, I’m talking to you!”, but he still not even looking her way. She feels like her blood is beginning to boil in her body, so she comes to Tony, snatches his remote control and shouts “I am talking to you and you are ignoring me! Put all your stuff away right now!” Tony gets angry and shouts “No!”. Tony’s mum yells “You are so rude and disrespectful! You are not getting your remote control back until everything has been put away!” and walks out with the remote. Tony starts crying and through tears, puts everything away so he can then play with his remote control car again…

The word “respect” or even “disrespect” comes up a lot when it comes to parenting.

Everyone likes to be respected, right?

In my over 13 years of working with parents and their children in different capacities I have noticed that the word “respect” or “disrespect” is often misused to describe any type of children’ behaviours that a parent struggles to tolerate.

Tony’s scenario in adult world...

Imagine you are reading a book on your armchair whilst drinking a cup of tea. Once you had finished your drink, you place your cup on the coffee table next to you and carry on reading. A minute later your spouse or your friend comes into the room and says to you “can you take your cup to the kitchen, please?” You then answer, “I will as soon as I finish reading”.

Let’s pause and see what has gone on here. Did you not take the cup to the kitchen because you disrespect your spouse? Or did you not do what they said immediately because you were still busy with the book and you were after some human autonomy, so you could take this cup back on your own terms?..

What if then, your spouse would raise their voice and said, “take it to the kitchen right now or I will take your book away from you!”

Firstly, let’s notice how it feels:

·     do you feel calm and cheerful or

·     do you feel on guard, uneasy and maybe even frightened?

You then have two options really; 1) to take the cup to the kitchen or 2) to stand your ground.

In option one, if you were to take the mug to the kitchen, would you really do it because of respect you feel for your spouse? I think you would “obey” in the scenario if you felt threatened and intimidated by the other person and feared the consequence. With the option two, if you were to stand your ground, would that be because you disrespect your spouse? Or would that be because you actually showing respect to yourself and protect your autonomy?

And the last two questions in this scenario; would you feel your spouse/friend was being respectful to you when they demanded you putting the cup away or would you see them as dominant and controlling? And lastly, what would happen to your feeling of respect towards your spouse in this situation?

What is actually going on?

Majority of us were raised in very dominant homes where we were to “do as we were told”. However, did we really do everything our parents asked us to do because we respected them and loved the idea of doing what they said, or did we do it because we feared what would happen if we didn’t?

We were raised with believe that by never saying “no” to our parents, never standing our own ground we were showing respect. Let’s face it, the way the word “respect” has been conditioned into us is far from what it is in adult world. When parents demand “respect” from their children, often they are after a child who FEARS their parent and who is submissive into control and obedience.

Who do you respect?

Let’s think of a workplace. Can you picture a boss who works purely from their ego with a “stick in their hand”, expects unrealistic results without showing any consideration or care to their employees? If you happened to work for one of these managers, I would imagine you would not raise your hand if I asked you whether you had genuine respect to that person. I assume, you were doing as you were told but when you talked to your colleagues, you were saying how much you hated your boss.

However, if you are lucky enough to have experienced working for a strong manager with effective leadership skills, you probably know what a difference it makes when a leader takes your needs into consideration, leads with curiosity and empathy, coaches you in your job with clear guidance and feedback, and in return you feel motivated to do the job. I have experienced a manager like that, and I can say strongly that I genuinely had a lot of respect for that person and still do now.

So, what is Respect?

If we look for a definition of “respect”, the most common one what comes up in search engines sounds like this.

“Respect means being treated with consideration and esteem and to be willing to treat people similarly.. It means to have a regard for other peoples' feelings, listening to people and hearing them, i.e. giving them one's full attention. Even more importantly, respect means treating one with dignity. Respect is the opposite of humiliation and contempt”.

Respect is something that comes from the inside. Respect cannot be demanded; respect is a sensation and feeling you experience towards another person which is based on relational experience.

At last, if we can’t demand respect, how do we get it from our kids?

·     Connection

Connection is something that happens in between the times where you ask your child to do something. Connection, first of all, means safe attachment. Connection also means the willingness to be WITH a child on the same page, enjoy their company, give them full and undivided attention, and tune in with them. This becomes the basics for the next point…

·     Relationship

Command and obedience are the basics of dog training, it is not a human approach. Human beings are relational creates. To build strong relationship with our children, parents really need to work on areas such as active listening, emotional intelligence, compassion, and effective communication – all these are also the basics of good leadership skills. When we move away from giving commands to children and expecting unquestionable obedience, but instead, talk to them respectfully, with consideration and compassion, children feel understood and respected. When they feel respected (just like you - by a good leader in a workplace), they learn to do the same and they are more willing to cooperate and lean in towards you.

·     Trust

With strong bond and healthy relationship always comes trust. When there is trust between two people in any relationship (especially parent and a child), respect comes mutually and naturally.

References

Farid, Sana. "Respect." Beyond Intractability. Eds. Guy Burgess and Heidi Burgess. Conflict Information Consortium, University of Colorado, Boulder. Posted: July 2005 <http://www.beyondintractability.org/essay/respect>.