Janet’s “all feelings allowed” approach to parenting is sometimes misconstrued as permissive, passive, lax on boundaries. But as Janet clarifies in this episode, the exact opposite is true! She describes how acquiescing to our kids’ whims and demands, giving them multiple chances to comply with our directions, or making it our job to console them when our rules disappoint can be a set-up for failure for our kids and us. She explains how respectful parenting is actually quite strict, and why, in her view, strict is much kinder and more loving than the alternative, builds better relationships, and encourages lifelong emotional resiliency in our kids.
Transcript of “Strict Is Loving”
Hi, this is Janet Lansbury. Welcome to Unruffled.
Today, this is going to be fun. I am going to be talking about being strict. It’s not a word that I use that often, but this idea of strict came up in the last podcast episode I did, where I consulted with a parent who was worried that her respectful approach, her gentle approach that she was using was spoiling her child. And as we looked into what she was doing, there were a lot of places where this parent was not taking the leadership role that I believe our children really need from us. And there were places where she was interpreting what I teach as very focused on encouraging kids’ feelings, and this was causing her to be in a position where she wasn’t taking care of herself.
What I tried to convey to her is that the approach I teach is about a relationship. It’s not about “we do everything to cater to a child’s feelings.” We don’t do anything to cater to a child’s feelings. That’s what accepting feelings really is. It’s not trying to change what we’re doing because our child feels a certain way about it. It’s knowing that they’re allowed to feel however they want to feel. We don’t change our boundaries because of that. We don’t try to appease them. We don’t try to talk them out of it or talk them down. We really encourage them to have their point of view and to be in conflict with them.
And one thing that came out in this conversation is that I said, “Well, I’m really, really strict.” Now, when I looked up the Oxford Dictionary definition of strict, it said: “demanding that rules concerning behavior are obeyed and observed.” It also said: “demanding total obedience or observance, rigidly enforced.” So that’s not exactly my connotation. For one thing, demanding sounds like I’ve got my finger pointed at the child, and I’m telling them they have to do it this certain way. What I do is I ensure that rules concerning behavior are not obeyed as this word says, because obeyed has to come from the child. A child decides whether to obey or not, and that’s not the goal. The goal is that I ensure that I’m holding the boundary for them. I’m helping them to follow the direction or the boundary. But I do have rules, and they are confident, unwavering, solid, strong rules. And that’s how I try to feel when I’m asserting them with children: confident, unwavering, full of conviction.
I’m only actually able to do that because I’m not trying to please my child every minute. I believe that this is the most loving way, and that not having strict rules and not insisting and ensuring that kids follow them is not being as kind to my child, not being as caring and loving. That was a big paradigm shift for me that I’ve tried to help parents find in themselves, because this is what changed everything for me. It allowed me to see things in a new light and realize that a lot of the things I was doing, thinking I was being so nice and loving letting my child do this. Oh, she wants to do that so much. Well, okay, I’ll let her. That wasn’t as loving as having these well-defined boundaries and feeling strong about them, so that my child has a chance to push up against them, question them, be mad about them, be disappointed, be frustrated. That’s their prerogative.
Another reason I thought this would be a good topic to talk about is that when I had Kim Jon Payne, the author of Simplicity Parenting, and he’s got a whole community around the world of coaches, he said to me after we talked in the interview for the podcast, he said he thought we should do another one on discipline. He said that the people he works with really love my book, No Bad Kids, but they also have this impression that I’m soft on boundaries. I said, Really?! And he said, Yeah, right! He knows that I’m not, and that came through to him, but I guess to a lot of people it doesn’t. So I really want to try to clarify that and correct it if I can in this episode.
I think one of the reasons this is a confusing topic for us as parents is that as humans, when we have complex, overwhelming topics that we’re looking at, like raising children, we have a tendency—and I feel this—to want to simplify it so we can understand it better. And in this case, simplifying the kind of things I talk about—respectful parenting, welcoming your child to have feelings, being on their team, being kind and loving when I set boundaries—in a very simplified manner, it can come off like I’m just letting them do whatever they want, and I’m just smiling and nice all the time and trying to keep things upbeat and unruffled.
But what I’m saying is that there’s a duality here that’s an important one for us to try to work from as parents: I can be really strict and strong with my boundaries while also being kind as I set them. That’s the kind of parenting that makes us feel good, makes us feel like heroes. We’re so strong that we don’t have to get harsh and stern and yell at our child. We can say it kindly, because we’re still going to hold onto that boundary when they start screaming no, they don’t want it. We’re not going to get phased by that because we expect it. We expect that they’re going to have a conflicting point of view a lot of the time, and they have a right.
In fact, we can even get to the point, I know it sounds impossible, but we could even get to the point where we welcome that. We know, Ah, they’re venting really powerful things right there that have nothing to do with me personally or the rule that I just held to for them. And when we can be that kind of confident leader in our bones and our souls, that we know this is so loving what I’m doing, that it’s not my job to keep my child feeling happy and smiling all the time. In fact, quite the opposite. It’s my job to take a place in this relationship as the leader that can be strict from a place of confidence. Strict with a smile—and a real smile, not a fake or a manipulative smile.
It’s much easier to say, “Okay, sure, do it,” and then get mad at my child. And I love my child too much to do that. To go, okay, okay, okay and then get to the point where what happens is now I’m angry, now I’m annoyed, now I don’t like my child because they keep pushing me and they keep doing this thing or stalling or whatever it is, I’m going to talk about all that. And now I’m mad at my child, I’m resenting my child, I think I’m a bad parent. I don’t want to do that to my child. It’s much healthier for them to be able to have even their extremist reaction to the reasonable boundaries I set and hold with love. Kids feel the difference when we’re saying, Okay, whatever, and now we’re starting to steam inside. That doesn’t feel good to them. It doesn’t feel clear, it doesn’t feel clean. It feels scary. We can eliminate all of that by seeing “strict” in a positive light as confident, unwavering, strong, the most loving thing.
What does strict look like? Oftentimes, it’s about our ability to anticipate and know what to expect of our child. Not expect that they’re going to be on their best behavior all the time, they’re just not. Not expect that they’re going to say, “Oh, sure, you don’t want me to do that? Okay, I’ll stop.” Or, “It’s time to come inside now for dinner? Okay!” I try to remind myself not to expect that, especially during times of life where I’m having a hard time—unfortunately that’s when it happens the most—and therefore my kids are feeling the tension and they’re going to be having a hard time. Or, just something’s going on with them where they’re having a hard time. That’s when I want to especially expect that the behavior’s not always going to be my favorite.
And that’s okay, because every time I set those boundaries and they yell, they’re getting to share this tension, they’re getting to release it. That’s how they’ll all feel better. When we anticipate, when we can expect—and not anticipate like Dun dun dun, something bad’s going to happen!, but seeing this as positive as much as possible. Seeing this dynamic: I set limits. You don’t like them. I can empathize, but I’m not going to try to kowtow to what you’re feeling or put everything aside and wait and let you have this big meltdown while I’m just waiting for you. I’m going to keep going, with a lot of acceptance for whatever you’re going through because I expect it.
What this also does is helps me to set the limit very, very early, as early as I possibly can. And what does that mean? If there’s a room that’s maybe my bathroom and I have certain makeup things in the drawer or something else that I don’t want my child to mess with. I don’t have to have my reasons, it doesn’t have to be a messy item or something they could ruin. I just don’t want my child in there, I don’t. I keep that door closed. I have a high lock on it. Or if I didn’t do that, then I’m still going to set the limit as early as possible by seeing my child going over there towards that drawer and just saying, “I’m going to stop you. Let me help you out of this room,” or “Hmm, I’m just not going to let you go in there.” And I’m holding them off nicely, lovingly, but assuredly. So they can’t do that.
Because oftentimes what happens when we maybe feel we’re being loving and respectful of our child and we don’t want to hurt their feelings in any way or make them upset, now we’re letting our child open the drawer and we’re saying, “Oh, could you please not take that? Could you please not touch that? Could you put that back?” And we’re leaving them hanging. We’re not being kind when we’re allowing them to do things that we really don’t feel like having them do right then. So that’s one way that strict is more loving.
Another way came up from the consultation in the podcast last week, that the little girl didn’t want to leave the party. And the mom was trying to get her shoes, take her to a private place. The girl was very upset already and going off. And what I said to this parent—and I believe this 100% and I’ve done it with my children and I see it as heroic and important—and that is as soon as I start to see she’s starting to whine, she doesn’t want to leave. Or there’s some sign even maybe before it’s time to leave, because I notice that my child lately is having a bit of a hard time with her behavior and this is a transition, so this is going to be especially challenging for her. I know I have to set this limit that it’s time to leave and I’m already ready to have what I call the confident momentum to get her out of there. I’m ready to have to do that.
Now, I can go a little slower if she seems totally calm and fine about it. But if I see her starting to go off into resistance mode, then I’m going to be that hero and get her out, grab the shoes, don’t spend any time trying to talk her out of it. Don’t allow her to be in that uncomfortable place where, again, I feel like I’m leaving her hanging. She’s getting more uncomfortable, I’m getting more uncomfortable, and now she’s unraveling. It doesn’t bode well for either of us, and it just makes our job way too hard, way too hard. It’d be much better to get her out of there, and maybe she did calm down right away and it wasn’t necessary, but it’s better to err on that side of loving strictness or whatever we want to call that confidence of, You know what? I need to help here. My hero suit is needed and I’m going to be on it right away.
Many of the questions you bring to me are about this, where I just want to say: Help them earlier. Help them right away. Don’t let it get this far, to where you’re annoyed, they’re digging their heels in, everybody’s uncomfortable. It’s not worth it. Much better to err on the side of being overly preventative. Setting limits early, early, early. Call it strict. It can save us so much aggravation.
Here are other ways that I feel very strict. And again, I wasn’t always this way. It’s not my natural tendency, I really had to come to this. I had to find this groove for myself, and that’s why I know that you can too, that anyone can. It’s in you, it’s in all of you.
Behavior in public, which is also this example that I just shared about, but other behavior in public. I remember a parent in one of my classes telling me that they went into the doctor’s office and their toddler was walking along. They were a pretty new walker, so the parent was excited to let them walk around. So they start exploring all the different offices. They go towards one door and peek in. Another door, they’re standing in a doorway. Then they go into an office completely and the mother has to get the child back out again. There’s no reason a child needs to do that. We can have them on our lap. We can hold their hand as we walk them into the doctor’s office when it’s time. We don’t need to give children that freedom, because that freedom isn’t really freedom. It doesn’t feel like it to them. It feels like we’re giving them kind of a false freedom where you’re not really free to do whatever you want here. And it’s just harder for us to have to say, No, no, no, I’m not going to let you do that. It’s unnecessary.
Also, our child going up to another child and maybe harming them or grabbing their toy away. Now, many of you know that in my classes we allow some exploration for children to learn about toys and how to engage with each other this way, and we allow certain things to go on that I would never allow in a public situation where I don’t know the people and they aren’t on board with what I’m doing. So I’d be there right away. “Oh, you’re interested in that? No, I’m not going to let you.” And my hand is there always, ready, not afraid to even take something out of my child’s hand. I’m going to do that right away and not wait, “Oh, could you give it to me? Could you give it to me?” Because that’s making it too hard for my child. At most you could ask once as you’re already considering, I very well may need to take this, but I’m going to give them the benefit of the doubt and ask. Then if I see them hesitate, “You know what? I’m going to help you out here,” and I take it. I really see this as being there for my child: They can count on me. I’m not going to leave them high and dry.
Letting a child run around a store or a restaurant. Nope, I wouldn’t do that. If there’s a safe place for them to be outside, I would take them outside during the meal, take turns with my partner or whatever, and realize maybe takeout is a good thing with this child. I have two children that could sit for hours in a restaurant, and then I had my youngest and he couldn’t sit at all. And so we didn’t do that. We weren’t going to put ourselves and him through that aggravation.
By the way, you may or may not agree with anything I’m sharing here, and you don’t have to be as strict in all the ways that I’m suggesting. You get to choose what matters to you or what you think is important.
But meal times, with the RIE approach that I teach, we notice very early on when a child is able to sit on their own, which is usually towards the end of the first year. They are able to sit while they eat. They don’t need to get up and come back and forth, if we make this a rule and we do it with love and kindness and confidence. We do it with snacks first so that we’re not worried if it doesn’t work out that our child didn’t get something to eat. That feels easier for us to do, right? We actually use small tables, so we’re sitting with our child, but you can do this in a high chair as well. And we say, “Okay, here’s your snack,” and they come and they sit. And then when they start to get up, “Okay, so you’re done? You’re letting me know you’re done.” And then right there, they either get up, crawl away, or if they’re in a high chair, maybe throw something down, and we say, “Okay, thanks. You’re showing me you’re done. I don’t want you to throw the food down.” Simple as that.
But if we don’t follow through, I guess you’d say strictly, with our expectations of This is the way meals go, and I know you can do this, I believe in you. Every child can do this, I’ve never met a child that couldn’t. Even my son, who’s so active, he could sit while he was actually eating. It might be short, but he could do it, and if he could do it, I feel like any child could do it. So I know it can be scary, Oh, they’re not going to get enough to eat. But if we think like that and we keep bending the rules for them, then they have no rules around eating. They don’t learn them. The only way they can learn them is if we really mean it and we show them that this is what we expect and we’re not going to be eating with them any other way.
If we’re in the park, that means we’re sitting on the grass. And I took this even further with children where I didn’t let them walk around with drinks either. We would stop, we would sit, we would be mindful for those moments. When they were done, they would clearly indicate they were ready to get up by getting up or, in a high chair, by squirming and starting to show they’re going to throw food or something like that. “Yeah, okay, thanks for letting me know you’re done.”
Children can learn these wonderful table manners that way, from the time that they’re one year old. It’s quite amazing. But they need us to stay focused with them for that to work. Because if we’re trying to do a lot of other things at the same time as the meal, then they’re less inclined to be able to focus also. It’s good training for us, where so many of us are used to multitasking. But this is what sets us up for those family dinners together. This is what sets us up to be able to have healthy eating habits and have our child have manners when they go to other people’s houses. We can instill this much earlier than a lot of people believe. And you can see some examples of how this works in a couple of my posts on my website: Baby Table Manners and Respectful Discipline in Action (Seeing Is Believing). These have video examples of me with very young children, so you can see how it works.
Another thing I’m strict about is when kids are telling us what to do. It can be very insidious, it doesn’t even hit us that it’s a negative thing that they tell us to switch places in our seats with our partner or they tell us they want us to play with that toy for them a certain way. And we think, Well, that’s harmless. I can get up and move. Or only mommy can put me to bed and no one else can. But it’s not easy for us to be available that time, and our partner is. Children need us to be clear and confident in our choices there and not do things for them on command. And again, it can be hard to see, and maybe there’s a fine line for some of you on this, Well, I don’t mind doing this or that. Usually if it is becoming a problem for your child, it’ll start to get worse, where now they’re asking for more and more unreasonable things. That’s when we can clue into, Hey, maybe I shouldn’t be letting a two-year-old tell me what to do.
Another one: our personal boundaries. I talked about this before with our stuff, we just don’t want a child in our stuff. Even if it would be safe for them, we just don’t want it. Personal boundaries are part of all of these points that I’m making. I don’t want to be following you around with food and picking up after you. I don’t want to be running after you in public. I don’t want you to tell me what to do. I don’t want to feel like I’m being ruled by a two-year-old or three-year-old or four-year-old or five-year-old. I want to be able to sit with you and have a moment where we’re just together eating. Personal boundaries come into all of this. This can be something like, I don’t feel like playing this right now. I don’t want you to take out more stuff, I’m going to put this stuff away. I don’t want to be outside anymore, I’m getting hot.
This is where we take care of ourselves. And it’s so crucial, because we need to take our place fully in this relationship for us to be able to be the kind of parents we want to be, for us to be able to be strict with a smile or that confidence to feel trusting of our child. If we’re letting ourselves be walked all over, it’s going to drain us of our energy, our child’s discomfort is going to increase along with ours, and we’re far more likely to end up yelling or hating this job, feeling like failures. None of which we deserve to feel in the least.
For the next point I want to make about being strict, I have a note that I received from a parent, so I’m going to respond to this:
My daughter’s tantrums seem to happen when she wants to do something or have something and can’t. For example, it’s been 20 minutes that she’s been brushing her teeth and washing her hands and playing at the sink, and she won’t cooperate to get ready for bed. If I pick her up to take her to her room, she loses it. But I can’t always wait an hour for her to tire herself out at the sink to get her in bed. I have things to do and she needs to go to bed. Or she doesn’t want to get dressed in the morning and I’m out of time and I have to get her to daycare so I can catch a train to work. If she refuses to get dressed and no amount of making it fun, distraction, etc. has helped, then I have to force the clothes on her and she loses it.
What do I do when I can’t let my daughter go through the tantrum? When I have to get her in the car to get to an appointment or daycare or catch a train? What happens if there simply isn’t the opportunity to sit back and allow her to go through the tantrum?
I love this note because it actually covers a lot of things that I’m talking about here and really epitomizes the struggle that so many of us have. Yes, tantrums happen when children want something that we say no to or to have something they can’t. Yeah, those are the boundaries and how boundaries allow children to vent feelings. That part is how it’s supposed to be, if we could see it that way.
She says, “it’s been 20 minutes that she’s been brushing her teeth and washing her hands and playing at the sink, and she won’t cooperate to get ready for bed.” So one other example I wanted to use for being strict, this was a popular podcast I did at the beginning of this year: stalling and dilly-dallying. Don’t let kids stall or dilly-dally. Be on that as early as possible with the boundary, for all the reasons that this parent’s situation exemplifies.
First of all, she so generously lets her do all this stuff and then she still won’t cooperate. And if she gets picked up to be taken to her room, even after the 20 minutes of messing around, she loses it anyway. So what do we have to gain out of this besides a lot of frustration and aggravation? Don’t let your child go there. If she’s taking too long to brush her teeth, help her out, stop her. “Okay, here we go. Oh, can you finish up there? Alright, I’m going to take the toothbrush. Let’s put it away.” You can always give those moments for her to do it herself, but I would have in the back of your mind—especially at the end of the day when kids are tired, she’s had daycare, it’s an exhausting day for children. As it is for us when we have to go to work, then come home and deal with this, right? So for yourself, for her, don’t leave her hanging. Just stop her, take the toothbrush, put your arm around her back.
Do this early, early, early, early so you’re not letting it continue to unravel and her to build steam and discomfort. We’re uncomfortable because we’re waiting and we’re annoyed, and now that’s making her even more uncomfortable. We’re playing off each other in that way. That is just a recipe for frustration. So help her wash her hands if she’s trying to stall. Don’t let her play at the sink, it’s not a time to play, not a place to play. She won’t cooperate to get ready for bed? She needs a helping hand.
And if you start this much earlier, you’ll have more cooperation. I would let her know before any of this, say, “We have this time where it’s really hard for you and you’re playing around, and then I get annoyed, and then you won’t go to bed and then you have a big, screaming meltdown. We’re not going to stop and let you do all these things. We’re going to keep going. And you could scream and have a meltdown, but we’re going to keep going forward. Because it’s my job to get you to bed.” So you could say this to her, but definitely say it to yourself. That this is a hero’s job right now. It’s not about letting her do what she wants and take her time. That’s not going to work, as this parent’s noticing.
“Or she doesn’t want to get dressed in the morning and I’m out of time and I have to get her to daycare.” So put the clothes out ahead of time, help her get dressed, don’t expect her to do this herself. It’s hard to go through these transitions first thing in the morning or at the end of the day, especially. She’s feeling your tension, so try to allow yourself plenty of time to be able to dress her and hear all her screaming as you do. You’re not going to stop everything. If it’s time for you to be somewhere, just keep moving forward. “Oh, you don’t want to do this. You don’t want to do that.” If she’s fully in a tantrum and she can’t function—because that’s what happens, children go into this physiological state—then take her hand, help her get to the car, bring the clothes there. Don’t sweat this.
You will have more time if you’re not waiting for her, if you’re helping her strictly, if we want to think of it that way, helping her move forward. Confident momentum. I’m not going to let you stop me from moving forward with you because I need to be the hero here. You’re having a hard time. You need my confidence.
This parent says “no amount of making it fun, distraction, etc. has helped.” Right, so don’t do that stuff! It doesn’t help. That is a drain on your energy. This is where I take playful parenting ideas with a big grain of salt, if I take them at all and I mostly don’t. Because it’s putting such a burden on us and it’s distracting us from our job, which is to be the leader and to allow her to vent at us if she needs to. Try not to take it personally because we know kids have their reasons. I don’t want to distract her out of that. I just want to welcome it as I help her through. Making it fun, oh my gosh, I don’t know how parents can put on a smiley face and try to make a game when they’re looking at their watch and ready to go. It’s really asking so much of us. Then, as she said, it doesn’t work anyway. So gosh, how awful does that feel as a parent? Unless we’re a saint, we’re going to be really mad at our child, right? I would be if I went to all that trouble to make it fun. Don’t add that to your already very full plate.
She says, “What happens if there simply isn’t the opportunity to sit back and allow her to go through the tantrum?” Don’t sit back. Keep going when you’re in between like that. Maybe you can pause if you give yourself enough time. But if you’re on this early and not waiting around and asking her to do things that she can refuse, like get dressed, but actually taking it upon yourself to say, “Now we’re going to get dressed. I know this is hard for you sometimes, it’s hard in the morning, so I’m here to give you a helping hand.” Putting that in your routine. The momentum that we come in with in the beginning, setting those limits early, moving forward early, will override a lot of the conflict actually.
Especially if we’re not afraid of the conflict. That’s the interesting dichotomy here: the less we fear the conflict, the less there’s going to be. Because what children really want from us is a more fearless parent. None of us is perfect, but if we know that and we know we have it in us, and we can do it with a little more strictness and a little more being on top of it, we’ll discover that it really does work. And tuning into that feeling of being annoyed, that is really important to start listening to. Maybe we’re not used to doing that. That’s the voice telling us, You need to set the boundary now. Don’t let this go on. It’s not a good place for you or your child to be.
Coming back full circle to this idea about feelings and how important it is to allow kids to have their feelings: All of the strictness that I’m talking about is what allows kids to express and experience their feelings in the healthiest way. It’s not playing the games and letting them stall, letting them behave certain ways and asking them not to, giving up our personal boundaries to try to keep them happy. That is us avoiding their feelings, if we think about it. I mean, why would we want our child to get upset? We don’t. But that’s why it’s so important to reframe it. We’re encouraging our kids’ feelings this way, not by placating and going along with it, but by not being afraid to go up against them. Giving them that structure that they need. And their freedom to express feelings and go through all the feelings they need to have in life to be healthy and know that it’s all a part of life, it’s all okay. That’s a by-product of a stricter approach.
I really hope some of this helps and clarifies. And if I’ve given false impressions in the past, I’m really sorry about that. But I think some of it also stems from the fact that we do want to please our children so badly, we just want happy kids, that it’s not the instinct most of us have to feel confident about being in the position where they’re not going to be happy. And then ironically, that actually is why they feel happier because they don’t have an annoyed parent, or they have a less annoyed parent. They feel safe, they can express all the things, and we still love them, even when they get so mad or have tantrums. They can count on us, we’re always going to be there, we have their back. That’s what brings happiness to a child.
We can do this.
