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COPYRIGHT 2001 Mothering Magazine
As I write, it is just eight days after The Tragedy. Emotions are running high both inside of me and in the larger community, and I assume they still will be at the time of this reading. By the weekend after The Tragedy, I had lost all faith in my fellow humans. First, the terrible acts of destruction, then the vengeful talk of retaliation. For a while, we all went mad from the enormity of what had happened. This is not unusual. Whenever we are wronged, we often first react with thoughts of revenge. Whether or not we act on these hateful thoughts is a test of our humanity.
In the family, just as in the world community, I have to choose every day to be adversarial or cooperative. And the more I choose cooperation, the more I must be willing to define, communicate, and enforce my own personal boundaries.
Early on in parenting I chose cooperation. It wasn't easy. My first introduction to nonviolent discipline was the book Liberated Parents, Liberated Children. I felt totally out of control when I read the author's suggestion to abandon punishment. And I recognized, although it was painful, that what frightened me most about abandoning punishment was that I might not be able to have my own way.
As it turns out in the reality of the family, punishment is not actually a very effective tool for getting what we want. An adversarial relationship with our children often escalates or deteriorates as the child gets older because older, taller children are less intimidated by our threats. More importantly, the child who is punished--like our society that has been attacked--thinks not how wise her parents have been, but about what she might do next to get back at them.
In the family, we learn a difficult truth that can provide a model for the current world conflict. Effective discipline is really based on our relationships with one another. Ultimately, it is...
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