“The difference between the exact right words and the almost right words is like the difference between lightning bugs and lightning bolts.”  – Mark Twain

Avoiding toxic words and wrong motivations helps maintain a solid relationship while effectively confronting your teen’s mistakes.

I haven’t met a teen yet who doesn’t want to know they will continue to be loved when they’ve made mistakes. Loving someone seems easy when everything is going well.  It’s a quite different matter when your teen breaks your rules, and their life spins out of control.   In those times, the best way to demonstrate your continual love for them is to take care in the way you confront their misbehavior, avoiding toxic words and wrong motivations.

The first step is to let your teen know why you are confronting their misbehavior. It is that you love them and want to help them avoid bigger problems later in life. Demonstrate your respect for them by your demeanor, assuring them that you will move toward them in times of difficulty and struggle, not away from them.  Tell them that you can’t possibly love them any more than you do, and you’ll never love them any less, not even when they are at their worst.

Be mindful that your teen knows what they have done, and it’s already uncomfortable for them without adding verbal or emotional fireworks. Focus on fixing the behavior, not the person. Remember, behaviors can be changed, but people rarely do.

Keep the word “you” to a minimum when talking to your teen, other than when praising them or saying positive things about their character. For instance, instead of “You broke curfew,” say, “Curfew was broken.” It seems like a little thing, but as soon as you use the word “you,” the teen feels as though they are being attacked personally.

Also avoid using definitive words like “never,” and “always,” in such discussions.  Statements like “You never listen to me,” or, “You always come home late,” attack their character, not the behavior. The more you attack their character, the more likely they’ll feel the need to defend themselves and their actions in return.  They may even begin identifying with the behavior and work hard to live up to it, thinking “I’m just the black sheep of the family.” So make it clear that they have it within them to do better; that they are a better person than their behavior is demonstrating.

Getting what you want from a discussion with your teen has nothing to do with how right you are and how wrong they are. It has everything to do with your motivation and approach. Ask yourself, “Will my approach move this discussion to a positive resolution, or away from it?” “Could my words increase our mutual respect for one another, or decrease it?” And finally, “Will my words encourage my teen to improve, or encourage them to just hide their behavior from me in the future?”

So, be sure to also check your attitude and hurt feelings at the door before approaching your teen about an issue that needs to be addressed.  Focus on what you are trying to accomplish, not on how you feel about the situation.  Inappropriate motivations can all too easily sneak into your conversation, which will interfere with bringing about positive results.

Here are inappropriate motivations to be avoided:

• To unload your frustration . Don’t dump on your teen – they’ll resent it.  They probably already have enough frustrations of their own.
• To prove yourself right and your teen wrong . It is not a matter of who is right and who is wrong, it is a matter of dealing with the matter at hand, and solving the problem.
• To crush them into submission. This is an ungodly response to a poor choice, and sets a terrible example.  It usually doesn’t work for the long-term, and will give your teen the desire to take revenge; another inappropriate response.  Never threaten or demean a teenager into changing their behavior. They might appear to make the change when they are around you, but behind your back they’ll do the opposite.
• To change them into something or someone else. Teens don’t change based on what their parents tell them. They change when they want to and  in response to the consequences or pain they experience from making a bad decision. And most kids are already uncomfortable in their own skin, so telling them that they need to change to be accepted by you only makes them more confused and uncomfortable.
• To threaten them. Anything more than stating that a consequence will be applied should they step over the line is just bullying them.  Empty threats are even worse.  Your teen will come to know you don’t really mean what you say when you don’t enforce threatened consequences.

Now, here are appropriate motivations and goals to focus on as you have that talk:

• To be clear and concise, and make sure your teen understands your concern for them.
• To better understand your teen, or communicate you’d like to better understand them.
• To give them rest from a wearying situation — yes, their transgressions can be emotionally burdensome.
• To more clearly communicate your household beliefs, rules, and consequences.
• To solve the problem at hand and prevent it from happening again.

You’ll notice that I positioned “To solve the problem” last on that list, not first. That’s because you’ll never get to really solving the problem unless you first work on the relationship. Problem-solving demands a good relationship and trust by your teen that you have their best interests at heart.

Please don’t hear me say that a parent should act subservient or apologetic to a teen when they are confronting inappropriate behavior. Say what you mean when you speak, and mean what you say, but choose words that won’t cause your teen to have to defend who they are as a person, and make sure your motivations are right.

I also recommend adding some levity to the discussion. It reduces the tension and allows you to focus on the issue without sounding angry or upset. And sometimes it doesn’t need to be a long drawn-out discussion. For instance, when I confront kids I usually do so with a big smile, saying something like, “Wow! You really blew it! What happened? ” Approaching it this way tends to make the teen respond, “Yeah, I guess I did.”  Getting them to agree and take ownership for their mistake is a healthy first step.  And asking them “what happened?” gives them an opportunity to respond and explain themselves without inferring that it was all their fault.

Did you see from this example that I didn’t attack their character nor them personally for making a mistake? In fact, if anything, I told them that they did a really good job of messing up!  Moreover, I set them on a path to do a really good job of not messing up again in the future, because I then applied consequences, saying, “Well, I guess you already know that means you’ll be raking a lot of pine needles this week?” (one of the traditional consequence for kids in our residential program who step over the line). “Yeah, I guess so,” they’ll respond. Then, I let the consequences do the teaching. As they rake pine needles (without being entertained by their iPod, by the way) it gives them ample time to think about their behavior and ample reason not to repeat it.

After they complete the assigned consequence, we again have a chat. That’ s when I reassure them that the error is now forgotten and that it is water under the bridge; thereby restoring open communications. And I again express confidence in them that they have it within them to avoid making that mistake again. I might even offer some advice from my own mistakes in life to help them from making the same mistake again.

The way that you manage confrontation is more important than you may think.  How you relate to and interact with your children at such pivotal times will determine the quality of your relationship with them in the future.  How you stand with them even in their times of misbehavior will determine if your children will mature into caring, loving and responsible adults.

– Mark

CHRISTMAS GIFT:  Some have asked how they can support the efforts of our Heartlight Ministries Foundation to help parents and teens. We have prepared a link to a secure place where tax-deductible donations will be taken online. We even have a special gift for those who donate. Check it out by clicking the link. Thank you for your support.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Mark Gregston is an author, speaker, radio host, and the founder and director of Heartlight, a residential program for struggling adolescents located in East Texas. Mark’s blog can be read at www.markgregston.com or he can be followed on Twitter at http://twitter.com/markgregston. His radio programs can be heard at http://www.parentingtodaysteens.org.

Parenting teens is not just about caring for their physical and educational needs. It’s also about training your teen to handle what life will later dish out, with body and soul intact.  It’s about teaching self-control. 

After all, your child will spend 80% of his lifetime away from you.  So, you need to ask yourself this question: “Am I willing to relinquish control to my teenager before he leaves home in order to help him learn how to act and become the one God desires him to be?”

Teens gradually need to get their feet wet in decision-making, since one day soon they will be fully in control of their own life and self-control will be paramount.  Your main goal, then, should be about preparation for making good life decisions. It’s more than teaching how to handle the finances, or how to pick the best classes, or driving responsibly. It’s about training them to be godly men or women and developing their character.

“But,” you say, “My teenager is too immature and irresponsible. He’s not capable of handling much right now.” You might be thinking that it would be better to wait until your teen begins to show some slightest signs of responsibility before you begin to trust him with more. But if you wait to see your child behaving responsibly, you may never hand over control.  They may fail at first, and that’s OK. They need to know that failure is a part of life.  This begins the important process of teaching responsibility and maturity.

Independence, But With Limits!

There is one big mistake some parents make when they turn over control to their teen, and that’s where problems can arise.  Some parents go too far, too fast.  They totally back off and don’t set proper limits for their teenager.  I see this happen most often in the life of a child who’s parents divorce, who feel guilty for what they put their child through. Other parents just want to be friends with their children and they throw out their parental role.  Children raised by such parents often become selfish, demanding, independent, and aggressively controlling as adults.  Kids need their parents to be parents, not their “peerants.”

It’s been my experience that a teen wants limits, even though they may balk at them. We all live with limits, don’t we?  Clearly defined limits give a teenager security and direction, like being limited to driving on the right side of the road to avoid a crash.  If you don’t provide limits in which to frame their decisions, they will feel unprepared for their new freedom and become confused and frustrated.  Limits you set should line up with the law, your closely held beliefs and your teen’s maturity.

Once your teen demonstrates that he can handle the first baby steps of freedom, expand that freedom to a new level. Determine if the limits also need to be adjusted or kept the same. Teenagers will become impatient with the step by step process, and there may be a need to back up to a previous level of freedom if the limits are not adhered to, but this is a necessary process to move them on to maturity.

Teaching Self-Control

Your child needs to go through a process of learning self-control, which means to not be controlled by hormones, other things, or his peers. Here are some ways to begin the process of teaching your child self-control:

1. A good place to start is with asking lots of questions. Ask your teen questions about moral issues, and wait for their answer without giving your opinion. “How do you think that person felt about being treated that way? What do you think would be the best thing to do in this situation? What would you do if you were asked to have sex, steal or take drugs? Tell me what you think about…? Allow your teen to come up with his own answer without injecting yours. Don’t use it as an opportunity to lecture or teach.  Let them realize the fullness of their answer by hearing their own words.  Their answer will often be immature or even irresponsible, but that answer will echo in their mind and begin them thinking about the issue and how they would really act if that situation were to arise.

2. Put limits around their decisions to cause them to be more responsible. Once you’ve given them more freedom, allow them to make their own decisions within that area of freedom, good or bad. For example, if you allow them use of the car and give them gas money, and if they instead spend the money on concert tickets, then they will have to figure out how another way to get around. Don’t just give them more gas money. Let them walk, if necessary, to show the foolishness and reality of spending money unwisely. Once they have to walk, they’ll never make that foolish decision again. Or, if they use the car outside of designated hours, they lose that privilege for a time.

3. Set your boundaries, make them clear, and enforce them if they are broken. For example, if you see your teen watching an inappropriate movie, something that is out of bounds in your home, ask him – “Is this an appropriate movie for you to be watching?” Allow him the opportunity to respond as he should, by turning the movie off.  Let him come to the right decision on his own. If his immaturity causes him to not respond as he should, then move in and make the decision to change the channel or turn the TV off yourself. Then reinforce the rule with consequences the next time the rule is broken, such as loss of the freedom to watch television for a time. If the rule is consistently broken, then remove the TV from the home altogether. It will be an inconvenience for you, but it shows your teen how passionately you feel about the issue of watching inappropriate material on television.

4. Encourage your child in their good decisions, and point your comments toward their successes, not their failures. Don’t say, “I told you so,” or, “I should have made that decision instead of you,” when they make a mistake. Instead, patiently allow them the opportunity to make the right choice and look for progress. Whenever you see your child respond with maturity and responsibility, congratulate them and explain that because they made a good choice you are now moving them up to a new level of freedom.  Keep in mind that instant feedback is always best.

5. Randomly offer examples of good decisions in your own life.  While teens will respond to your own stories as examples out of the dark ages, revealing your own good decisions at key moments in your life will come back to them when they have the opportunity to make similar decisions.  They will give the teen fuel and courage to make a similar decision in a similar situation.  And they will also offer something to think about if the teen makes a different decision. Developing a portfolio of good decisions (both by you and others that the teen may admire) and injecting them in conversations randomly (not to make a point when the teen does something wrong) is a good way to teach your teen self-control by example.

My advice today for parents of teenagers is to begin to shift control to your child before you think they will need it. Give them the opportunity to show what they can handle asking them to do so, and don’t bail them out or condemn them if they fail. Give them the chance to figure it out, learn from consequences, and find a better way for the next time they are faced with the same decision. Giving teenagers increasing levels of independence, coupled with proper limits and parental guidance, will begin to teach them the most important type of control, self-control.

Some parents mix the idea of rulemaking with ruling their home. Reasonable rulemaking and proper boundaries will help a teenager mature into a confident adult, while living under a “ruler” can lead to frustration, rebellion and eroded self-esteem. Which kind of home is yours? One that has rules or one that is ruled?

Rules for your home should fall into three main areas of concern, which are foundational to all other character and maturity issues. They are honesty, obedience, and respect. After all, isn’t the ultimate intent of creating and enforcing rules in your home that of keeping a child’s poor choices from consuming him and destroying his relationships with others?

So, when you think about the rules that govern your home, you might want to ask yourself two questions. The first is, “How much will this rule matter after I am gone or when the child is out on his own?” The second is, “Will this help build my child’s character and cause him to become more mature or responsible?” If the rules for your older teenagers are not centering on character, then you’re most likely ruling your home instead.

“Ruling” works and is necessary when kids are younger, but as your children reach the teenage years they naturally begin weighing decisions on their own. When they choose to break the household rules, they need to deal with the resulting consequences. Teenagers understand consequences. That’s how they learn, not from lecturing or parental anger.

When a teenager butts heads with a “ruler,” conflict and frustration will result. The only thing they’ll then learn is either how to better hide their improper actions or how to scream louder than the ruler does. Neither of these modes are productive and can also lead to a legacy of poor parenting.

Rulemaking in Your Home

Rules need to make sense. We can all think about rules set down by our own parents that made no sense at all and others that were beneficial to us (even though we may not have liked them).

Rules also should be relevant, attainable and beneficial, not a source of shame, frustration, or failure.

And rules need to be communicated in advance, right along with the consequences for breaking those rules. Think of it this way. If no one knows the rules, then your teenager will have to learn them by trial and error and will constantly get into trouble. Likewise, if consequences for breaking the rules aren’t known, then a teenager has no way to weigh those consequences against whatever pleasure they find in breaking the rule. This balancing of actions versus consequences is a critical skill for adolescents to learn and exercise.

Finally, rules need to evolve over time, as lessons are learned, kept in line with the growing maturity of your teenager. I’m not talking about “giving in.” I’m saying that out-of-date, irrelevant or demeaning rules will lead to animosity, loss of respect and rebellion by your teenager. They can also lead to consequence confusion, since outdated rules are often not enforced. So, regularly update your rules and restate them to your teenager (before they break the rule, not after), awarding them with freedom and added privileges for the progress they make.

Rules Are Enforced Through Reasonable Consequences

Consequences for teenagers should never hurt physically (other than aching muscles from work assignments). They should never be demeaning or undermine the child’s self-esteem. For teenagers, the loss of a privilege is the most reasonable and powerful consequence. Sometimes they don’t realize how many privileges they enjoy — at least not until they lose them for a time.

Think about some reasonable consequences for your home. And keep in mind how important it is that they are communicated well in advance so the teenager doesn’t attribute the consequences they receive to your poor mood or a bad day. When they break a rule they should know exactly what the consequence will be. And just like laws in our society, parents need to build in progressively stronger consequences for rules that are broken again and again (since the initial consequence was obviously not enough of a deterrent).

Setting up rules and enforcing consequences — more than any other thing you manage as a parent — is the best way to help your child learn right from wrong and to change from selfish to unselfish thinking.

Don’t Cut Off Relationship When They Do Wrong

When you line out the rules, make it clear that they are developed in the context of longing for your child to do well in life, more than a selfish need for you to be in control or your home to be pristine. Above all, keep in mind that your relationship with your child is more important than their breaking any rule.

Don’t correlate your teen’s rule-keeping or rule-breaking to your love or acceptance of them. Regularly let them know that you will continue to love them, even when they mess up. Express your sorrow when your teen experiences consequences, but take care not to express your disappointment in them. There’s a big difference between those two sentiments. One is caring and the other is destructive of your relationship.

The Parent’s Admonition: “There is nothing you can do to make me love you more, and nothing you can do to make me love you less.”

When your teenager breaks a rule (and they will!) show your deep love for them by refusing to let them off the hook. Teenagers mostly learn from consequences. So avoid taking the consequences away or lessening them. When consequences are known well in advance, it shouldn’t damage your relationship when they are handed out. Surely, your teenager weighed the consequences at the same time they chose to step over the line, and chose to do it anyway!

HOME ASSIGNMENT: If you have teenagers in your home, line out some rules for your home, and begin to think about what consequences to apply. Decide things like: who pays for what, what time frame is expected for certain things like curfew and chores, what you expect from them for school and grades, work, their spiritual life, their friends. Address issues like respect, honesty and obedience, with clear rules — no lying, no cheating, everyone gets respect. Call a family meeting and work on the rules and consequences together, so everyone is part of it. You’ll be surprised. Your teen will often suggest penalizing bad behavior with consequences more severe than you were thinking.

Remember, “ruling” your home is not a good measurement of the effectiveness of your rulemaking.