Connect Before You Correct

“All children need a laptop. Not a computer, but a human laptop. Moms, Dads, grannies and grandpas, aunts, uncles – someone to hold them, read to them, teach them. Loved ones who will embrace them and pass on the experience, rituals and knowledge of a hundred previous generations. Loved ones who will pass to the next generation their expectations of them, their hopes and their dreams.”
General Colin L. Powell, Founder of America’s Promise – The Alliance for Youth

A key concept in building an EPP home is that you “connect before you correct”. This idea and suggestion follows the reasons I suggest abandoning the reliance on punishment as a primary or frequent parenting tool.

Using “Connect before you correct” as a parenting principle might present another challenge to your internal parenting dialogue. First, I suggest you eliminate or limit punishment. Now I’m here to suggest that you use humor, affection, ritual, and other positive relationship builders before you correct your child.

I know what you are thinking. “Are you suggesting that I reward misbehavior and reinforce it with positive attention?”

No, absolutely not.

I’m suggesting and asserting two things:

1) You can’t spoil a child with love or the symbols, gestures and affirmations of love

2) Children will learn best when in right relationship with you and the world around them

You Can’t Spoil a Child With Love

It’s not a radical concept that children need to know and experience the feeling of unconditional love from their parents. However, our culture is hyper focused on the risk of spoiling children that we often withhold symbols of that love in an effort to create better behavior or stop inappropriate behavior.

How often, when seeking parenting advice over a particular topic have you been given the advice “Hug them”? You rarely hear that advice because we tend to accept without examination the idea that a positive interaction during a moment of misbehavior will reinforce the misbehavior.

As a result of believing this assumption, we end up withholding gestures that communicate love.

Dr. Ross Campbell, a practicing psychologist who authored several excellent books on the topic of children and love, speaks eloquently on the distinction between a child being loved (most are) and feeling loved (many don’t). He talks about the absolutely, fundamental and primary need children have to feel loved and in right relationship with their parents. His metaphor of “filled love tanks” provides an excellent image through which we can begin to understand how children are best set up to behave and utilize their best behavior and resources.

Dr. Jane Nelsen, a noted and excellent author on the topic of Positive Discipline, says it succinctly “Children who feel better, do better.”

Many times in my own helping of families, I have seen negative dynamics, chronic inappropriate behavior and challenging situations turned around with only a program of connection.

Focusing on connection does many things for your family and has a synergistic effect. When you focus first on connection, you help your child be able to hear your later words of correction. They are assured of your care, love and concern. You remove the worry that they’ve lost status in relationship. You provide the unconditional safety net so they can accept correction knowing that it is correction of their behavior; not of their personhood.

Focusing on connection especially helps a dynamic that’s been negative for a period of time. Focusing on connection after a prolonged (and it doesn’t take long) negative span of days helps the child feel better and helps you feel better about the child. You will literally have a better reaction when the child does do wrong and your child will do wrong less by virtue of feeling better. It’s the remedy to the negative dynamic.
Focusing on connection is restorative, proactive and positive.

Children will learn best when in right relationship with you and the world around them

When children feel insecure or out of right relationship with you, they are unable to gain access and consistently utilize their maximum maturity, impulse control, “listen ability” and ability to do better.

When they perceive a break in the relationship, a question in the interaction, a pause in the love, they feel insecure and threatened. At this juncture to expect learning is unfair for them an exercise in frustration for you.

I’m not suggesting that you be happy about the misbehavior, that you adopt a syrupy sweet tone or that you try to “nice” your child into compliance.

I’m merely suggesting that affirming love and the relationship makes the chances of discipline working better and diminishes the likelihood of continued misbehavior less.