Values Based Parenting: Blog Post
Values are what we give our kids. We teach them, model them, prioritize them, and evaluate behaviour based on them. So what are your values?
My early years were a struggle. Both my separated parents were trying to find themselves, make ends meet, and be a grown up too. Both in their own ways were trying to figure out this parenting thing while feeling like they were getting it wrong on a daily basis. I know because I heard them question themselves, point out their failures, and admit their guilt regularly.
In my early teens I heard a counsellor say “you become your parents” when you have kids. That scared the crap out of me. I was destined to be a terrible parent (as they had confessed). So, I decided I’d have a home full of dogs, and cats – but no kids.
Well years later, newly married, and peer pressure in all directions, I agreed to “try” hoping it would take a while to wrap my head around and I’d mature enough to be ready. But as luck would have it, I got pregnant on the first attempt.
I pretended I was excited, but in private I was freaking out. I read every parenting book I could get my hands, went to conferences, spoke to psychologists, and spent time with the best parents I knew. The more I learned, the more I became confused and overwhelmed by the conflicting philosophies and approaches. The blaring question I think all parents ask: What is the right way to parent?
What is the right way to do anything? How do you know? What determines your conviction about right and wrong? The answer is Values. Our values dictate what we believe is right and wrong, successful, a good use of time, a life well lived. Values are how we make decisions, who we are friends with, and how we spend our money.
As I dove into values I noted that therapist who worked with values had clients consider which values had come from their parents, and identify the ones they wanted to keep, and what new values could they begin to live by to improve their life. I began with myself, identifying and redesigning my life values, and taking steps daily to ensure these were new ways of being. During this process of redesigning my values, it occurred to me that some values I will easily teach, some I’m learning and will need support to ensure I don’t “become my parents”, and some values may need a village to help me.
For example, my value of health was a no-brainer. I practiced healthy eating and exercise daily, owned a gym, and had a team of health professionals in my life that inspired me to be fit. My child will be surrounded by this, and very likely embrace this as one of their own values. Finances however, was not a strong suit. I was breaking through limiting beliefs about money, and had not figured out how to manage money the way my mentors did. In my work towards these values, I would need my own support, but I’d need others ideas, insights, and examples to help me develop this value in my child.
Once I thoughtfully drawn up my list of values I hoped to instil, it occurred to me that How you Instil values is the definition of parenting! Instilling values is teaching, modeling, focusing. It’s setting goals, taking difficult actions, it’s prioritizing. It’s creating environments for these values to foster. It’s putting people in place to echo your values. But perhaps the most important is providing love, support, and positive reinforcement when these values are being honored, and orchestrating negative consequences and discipline when these values were not.
Human behaviour is driven by feeling loved and being good enough. Who did you have to be for your mother and father? And, as humbling as most parents begin to realize, we can’t control the outcome, we only influence it. I believe parenting is really the attempt to influence your child to adopt your values. But as we all realize, my child’s values will also be influenced by the other people in her life, the experiences she has, and how she is rewarded outside of my scope.
So if influence is all I have, and I am battling with social media, pop stars, teachers, boyfriends, the Youtube influencers, coaches, friends, etc. I better get my ducks in a row!
You become who you hang around. With each value I chose to parent from, I considered how I would influence it in these ways:
- How will I model it?
- How will I teach it and when?
- How will I let her learn this value with others?
- How will I encourage/reward this?
- How will she receive positive reinforcement from others?
- What environment(s) will model this value?
- Who else can teach/model this value for her?
- How can I discipline bad behaviour to reinforce this value?
- What environments, people, activities do we need to discourage/avoid?
6 Ways To Talk To Your Teen:
1. Practice your timing.
Girls often feel like their parents pummel them with annoying questions. What makes them so annoying? Timing, for one thing. “A girl will bristle when her parents ask questions at the wrong time—when she’s deeply engaged in her work, already halfway out the door, or closing her eyes to catch a little extra rest on the couch on a quiet afternoon,” Damour suggests. Pick your moments rather than making every discussion a battle; the pushback may only be because the conversation is based on your timing and your turf. If you pitch a fastball question and miss, be willing to let it go and try again later. Maybe much later. Similar to adolescent boys, be prepared for girls’ openness to deeper conversations to shift later and later into the evening.
The answers to these things will change as she ages – so keep in mind, your approach will need to be revisited every 6 months or so.
Set goals, put actions in your calendar, and begin searching for people and experiences to reinforce your outcomes.
Course correct when the going gets tough. I see parents of teens throw their hands up in frustration when things are not going well. This is the time to review, involve others, and remember you can only influence -you can’t control.
The person with the most flexibility wins. If you continue to change your approach, making decisions concisously with the intention of influencing her to embody your values, you will be able to look back and say you did your best. You deliberately outlined the human you wanted to design, lined up your village, and as much of life’s circumstances as you could, then let go of the wheel. Our best is always all that we can do – and living from a place of intention is admirable!
2. Let her answers shape the conversation.
Girls despise conversations that start with preplanned direction, right answers, and adult agendas. Instead, they want questions fueled by our genuine interest in their lives and their thoughts. Let them put a topic on the table they’re open to exploring. Pick up a lead they’ve left you recently (even if it was in the form of a complaint—e.g., about a teacher, coach, or friend). And hold your idea or probe for later. Great tools for these kinds of conversations include phrases like, “I wonder what that’s been like,” “Tell me more about that,” as well as other responses that mirror back something she just said (“So you’re getting excited about the overnighter with your friends next weekend.”)
3. Be the emotional dumping ground sometimes.
One conversational tactic of adolescent girls involves unloading their own uncomfortable feelings and complaints onto their parents so they don’t have to carry them alone. Damour helpfully reframes this practice: “Complaining to you allows your daughter to bring the best of herself to school.” Most often the teenager who is blowing off intense steam about incredulous teachers, annoying boys, and an unfair homework load is the same teenager who carries herself with relative cool and friendliness through the school day. She’s learning the adult skill of managing her emotions and responses, holding them until she’s in the presence of a trusted adult who can handle a day’s worth of pent up irritation and anger. Research shows we all have a finite amount of willpower, and it turns out that teenage girls’ willpower tends to run out right about the time they close our car door or drop on our couch after a full day at school.
In these moments, we often need not do anything, fix anything, or even say anything helpful. Instead we serve the important function of a nonjudgmental, listening ear. If you must respond, Damour suggests offering a question like, “Do you want my help with what you’re describing, or do you just need to vent?”
4. Help her distract herself from ruminating on problems.
One typical difference between adolescent girls and boys is that while boys tend to look for distraction when they’re dealing with emotional distress, girls turn to talk. They’re more likely to talk about feelings, and while that can be generally helpful, at times over-focusing on a problem can lead down roads of anxiety and depression—whether that problem is their own or one they’ve internalized from a friend. As a caring adult, one skill we can teach girls is to utilize distraction to cope with intense feelings. We might offer to do something together, change up her environment, pull her into fun or even goofy conversations, or serve together in some way that shifts the focus off the current problem.
5. Move beyond her “veil of obedience.”
Damour highlights teenage girls’ ability to keep nodding and smiling while utterly blocking out everything an adult is saying. Though guys can do this too, they’re more likely to verbally disagree or at least look away. Girls, on the other hand, become masters at giving us what we want—compliance—while internally stuffing their own thoughts and feelings. Part of our work as parents and caring adults is to help girls put down these “veils of obedience” and engage with us when they disagree. While this is far less pleasant for us in the moment, in the long term it does girls a big favor because they will learn to advocate for themselves and their ideas. Next time a girl in your life seems to quietly agree with your assessment, instruction, or (let’s be honest) lecture, pause and say, “I see you nodding, but I wonder what you really think?” or, “I’ve just said a lot. I’d like to hear your thoughts and feelings about this, too.” Or perhaps, “What feels right about what I’ve just said? What feels maybe not right?”
6. Teach her to work toward repair—by modeling it.
Conflict, struggles, and relationship ruptures are bound to happen with teenage girls, in particular as they work toward gaining autonomy from their parents. We can help girls grow in emotional intelligence in the midst of these strained relational moments by helping them learn to step outside themselves and take the perspective of the other person. This is a brain-growth task of adolescence, and our part in this work comes by modeling perspective-taking.
For example, after a heated conflict cools down, we may be able to offer a window into our response (“When you said those words, I felt this way, and responded by saying some harsh things in return. Looking back, I see where you were coming from, and here’s where I was coming from. I’m sorry that my response hurt you. Let’s figure out a way to move on.”) Learning to repair relationships through building empathy must first happen in relationships supported by deep trust, meaning parents often bear the brunt of this work. However, the dividends of investing in emotional intelligence pay off in girls’ relationships with peers and, eventually, families of their own.
These six strategies are just a starting point, but hopefully they can take you a few steps deeper in your conversations with girls who are growing into young women.
Radiant Girls teen programs teaches the importance of values to young teen’s as they mature within our Teen Leadership Camp. Check it out here:
