The Problem With “Do what I Say Not What I Do” Parenting
Many parents have no problem with telling their kids to do what I say not what I do. Obviously, this is the epitome of trying to take the easy way out of parenting. However, there is no easy way out of parenting. There is only the right way and the wrong way. What’s more, telling a kid to do what I say and not what I do is the wrong way.
Firstly, kids nearly always do what you do and not what you say. Secondly, because kids nearly always do what you do and not what you say, when a parent fails to lead by example their bad example becomes the example they lead with.
This is why so many people confuse nurture and nature. When a parent’s bad habits become the child’s bad habits it’s thought that somehow nature passed the bad outcomes through the genes. More often than not, nature has nothing to do with a child’s bad outcomes. Instead, it’s the child following a parent’s bad example.
If you are a parent who doesn’t want your problems to become the problems of your children, skip the lecture and look within first. Simply stated, change your behavior before you seek to change your child’s behavior.