Are you currently on your way to realizing your personal Legend? Or have you been subtly subjected by numbing outside forces that allow you to perpetuate a lie. One that most of us tell ourselves, “this life is good, so many people have it worse than me, I’m lucky to be here, and should be grateful.” While those statements are true in a sense and you should be grateful for the things you have, but….there is a hidden lie in those statements. A lie that is nestled in our sub-conscious, and one that has been there since we became jaded from first experiencing some of life’s harshest realities at a young age. The lie that formed in the void where the tantalizing mysteries of our youth once dwelled. I’m referring to those thoughts you had when you were a child. Do you remember ever thinking, “I’m the star in a (sort of) real-life movie, and “I feel like the world is watching over me, they are entertained by my thoughts and actions, and rooting for me to become something great.” We all thought we were special until for some reason those fantasies died suddenly or over-time.

Does any of that sound like you? In order to understand the context of what I’m getting at here, let me ask you this: Has gratitude become a spiritual bypass to your personal truth? Have you settled into the condition that you should be content with the way things are because so many others have it so much worse; or that your life is simply not one destined for greatness? There is a difference between genuine gratitude and one that acts as a coping mechanism.

Here’s a tip to help get you started: Get into a calm state, eliminate some distractors going on at the current moment, and ask yourself; “What lies am I telling myself right now?” The lies may come in the form of, “This relationship is the best I can do and as long as I still get to keep doin ________, I’m good enough;” or “I’m in this field because I had no other options;” or finally, “Without my ________, I’d be floundering to make ends meet.”

Why does this line of thinking occur? We all have told lies like this to ourselves in one form or another; Psychologists refer to this as false narratives or cognitive distortions. These occur when something happens in our environment at a given time which exceeds our ability to process and handle it in a healthy way. The result of this is the development of a false attribution or cognitive distortion; we start to see the world differently. For example, if I child witnesses his father striking his mother, the child cannot hold two conflicting views of his father; seeing him as both good and bad. Therefor the child “splits” (referred to as “splitting”) the most painful aspect of their parent into their unconscious, and does not continue to process and mature thoughts related to that aspect. The result is, the child grows into adulthood and maintains behavioral relationship problems because his or her impression of adult conflict was distorted at a young age. Ultimately we witness, process, and respond to life’s challenges in a way that allows us the best chances for survival at the time. But this does not mean we usually process these events in a healthy way at a later time. We have developed all sorts of techniques and methods over the course of our lives to shut-down or even suppress our feeling “capacity;” this capacity or ability is the very thing that is needed in order to pursue our best selves and start our personal legend. This feeling capacity contains our ability to perceive and act on hunches, intuitive moments, and connect with our inner-most selves.

This brings me back to my main point. When we identify the lies we tell ourselves, we start to see the mold that’s shaped our circumstances. The mold has contorted us overtime to fit within the world’s view of who we are, not our own. I can’t remember who said it, but I love this line; “If we compromise ourselves at the beginning we compromise our whole way.” So, that being said, how do we get on the right path and start our personal journey to our best possible selves?

A Path of Truth

The first task in starting back on the path you deviated from when you were a starry-eye filled child, is to identify the current lie(s) in your life. It’s usually where you least allow yourself to look. Pioneering psychologists Carl Jung believed we all come born with a set of life-tasks, aspects about ourselves that dwell in our unconscious. Jung believed must face those challenges and overcome them in order to become our authentic selves. Whether Jung’s “life tasks” were prescribed at conception and became evident at moments of adversity (i.e. adolescent trauma), or manifested independently from those instances is irrelevant; what matters is we identify those moments and overcome them.

What is it that happened to you that stole your essence, vigor, faith, curiosity, or wonder? What thought or set of beliefs do you keep locked away in your deepest cave; the thought that lurks just below your conscious and causes you to pull back when you should pursue forward, or stand up for yourself when the world tells you you’re not good enough. Here’s a hint, the best way to find out what that thing is, is to see where you’re developing a resistance the moment you start looking. If that doesn’t work, try to complete these statements:

“I’m not a successful ___________, because I always find a way to ______________.”

“People don’t really listen to me because intuitively they know I am _______________.”

“I’m not a good person because deep down I know I _____________________.”

“If it weren’t for ___________________, I’d be ________________________.”

“I can’t really trust myself because ________________________.”

Perhaps answering these questions will help you put a microscope on the lie(s) you tell yourself. Look back at your past, what things have you had to give up, try to control, or avoided in order to keep the lie going? Here is the hard truth about that lie; anything you put in those blanks is simply a thought you developed because, at the time you first developed it, you didn’t allow yourself to fully face, process, or fail in a way that allowed you to learn and grow next time.

Now, you are looking with a purpose of healing and understanding. We are not perfect in any way, we all have wounds that have not healed, and we doubt ourselves in so many ways because of those painful wounds. But when we face those problems head on, something magical happens. Those difficult thoughts and memories start to take on a different meaning, they start to develop into a strength, and eventually blessings, which will start to shape you into your true authentic self.

In order for you to face the challenges the world will throw at you in pursuit of your personal legend (and there will be many), you first need to face the personal challenges that already exist inside you. Figuring out what your current life lesson is, is the key to unlocking the door that starts you on your personal legend; and when that happens, you will be ready.

There are so many different methods out there that claim to have the magic sauce that will help you become a more patient and effective parent. The theories always seem to work so well in our minds, and when we read the quick tips and tricks, they seem so alive to us; thinking to ourselves, “That makes so much sense, I’m going to do that the next time [insert child’s name] acts out.”

I’ve read countless parenting books, some better than others, but only a couple have really stood out in what methods have worked. I have the luxury of testing these methods on not only my four children, but hundreds of other children as part of my vocation as a school behaviorist. I work with children ranging from severely Autistic, to children with Down Syndrome to high schoolers with ADHD. I would try to apply these seemingly iron clad methods to the children I worked when and quickly learned that, as soon as the child starts acting out bets are off. The situation simply does not fit the context of the techniques we read about. Yes, those catchy and witty methods seem to work in this limited and seemingly identical situations. However, as parents we know that no two situations are the same, nor are two children. Therefore, for a technique to truly work, it has to be three things:

Easy to Learn
Quick to Apply
Effective Across the Spectrum

Ok, so here it is are you ready? Spank Them! Actually, I’m just kidding, of course not. We know from years of concrete and universal research that spanking (or any punishment for that matter) is never as effective as positive reinforcement. But, how do we apply that? What does it look like? Even the techniques that have been shown to be so effective, such as Behavioral Modification, are not easy to apply, nor do they come natural.

What does come natural is saying “No! Don’t touch that!” How about, “If you don’t get down right now you're going to get a time out!” You can predict what happens next. For example, don’t think of the color of your first car. See how hard it is not to do something we point out. Children are not mentally developed enough to utilize the brain resources needed to control their impulses. When they se something they want they want it now, right now. The frontal lobe, or the “brakes,” region of our brain does not fully develop until a person reaches the age of about 25. So how can we expect a toddler to stop doing what they can only focus on.

Here are two effective ways to help you help your child feel understood, comforted, and become compliant. First, you need to realize that engaging in a power struggle with your child is never a good idea. First off you don’t win, in fact you lose. You may be thinking, well, how do I loose, I got them to do [fill in the blank] eventually, but at what cost. You did loose. You lost your patience and time. Chances are you toddler will get upset about one of two things:

I want that….
I don’t want to do this (or that)….

Your child may feel upset because they aren’t getting what they want or they feel forced to do something they don’t want to do, or are about to do. So what techniques can you use? Here’s two that work, and are pulled from a few books that have been very beneficial in my vocation and own home (links below).

Say “Yes” “And” these two words are very powerful. They covey both that the child will likely get what he or she wants, but there are also some strings attached. But there is more, you need to show the child you understand their situation. Children won’t listen to you unless they feel they’ve been listened too. Imagine you’re trying to confide in your friend after you’ve just lost someone in your family. You tell them, “I’m feeling really down today, and don’t feel like doing much anything;” and your friend responds with, “That’s ok, we’re going to the city to have some fun, so you’ll cheer up there.” At no point did your friend really empathize and listen reflectively. They should have said, “That’s totally understandable, I’d feel the same way, how can I support you.” Additionally, we want to ensure that we follow the empathy with direction, and try to break things down for them into smaller parts.

For example (three different age groups), let’s say your child says, “I want to watch Paw Patrol,” or “I want to go to the mall,” or “ I want to play soccer;” and you are in the middle of trying to make dinner, or feeding the baby. You can say “YES [with emphasis} AND I know you want to [insert wanted activity] because you like [show you know why the like the preferred activity], let’s do this, help me with the dishes, and then we get to [insert wanted activity].

It’s important to do a few things during this process. Stop what your doing, get at eye level, close proximity, get them to say yes, then start moving.

If your child resists, redirect them to the reinforcer they presented to you [the activity]. You want to do [activity] right? Child will likely respond, “Yes” and then you start immediately moving, gesturing them to the area they need to be at, provide them with an item, in this case a sponge, and simply resume what you’re doing.

DO:

“Yes you can go outside, and I know you really enjoy the fresh air, let’s do this, knock out 5 problems for me, then we get to go outside.”

DON’T:

“Not right now, you need to finish all your homework first.”

It’s important to use language that shows you’re in it with them, such as “let’s and “we.” This method is also largely effective for situation #2 where the child says, "I don’t want to do [this or that].” You simply skip to the part that states, empathy and understanding, and then resume the technique. For example, “I don’t want to do the dishes anymore.” You might say, “I understand you’re over doing the dishes, let’s do this, help me by finishing the dishes, then we get to do [A] or [B], which would you prefer? As soon as your child makes a choice between the two options, they’ve agreed to doing the rest of the dishes, remember to drop what you're doing and to get into their close proximity to communicate. It’s hard to apply these techniques across the room.

Remember:

Connect before you redirect.

Children will not listen unless they feel they’ve been heard.

Pursuing Your Personal Legend

Two No-Joke Techniques to Control Your Toddler