The Nechoma Greisman Anthology

Section 3: EDUCATING CHILDREN When Mashiach comes, speedily in our days, we will point proudly to our children and say, "Look at the offspring we have raised."

Effective Discipline -- Putting Values into Practice

The topic of our talk tonight is "Effective Discipline -- Putting Values into Practice." What is discipline? The dictionary definition is "training to act in accordance with rules" or "punishment inflicted in the course of training or instruction." That sounds very straightforward, but, in reality, the topic is a very large and complex one. Although we cannot cover it all, let us try to gain some insight into this subject and come up with some practical ideas, rather than educational and disciplinary theories, since "hama'aseh hu ha-ikar" -- the deed is the main thing.

There was once a psychologist who said, "I like children in the abstract, not in the concrete." It's very easy for us to sit here tonight and speak very convincingly and rationally about our ideas on discipline. It's a totally different thing tomorrow morning when our two-year-old grabs a toy from the baby for the fifth time in an hour, and makes him cry.

We have our children in the flesh, in the concrete, and no theory is worth a cent if it isn't practical and effective with our children in our homes in real-life situations. But I don't promise magic instant solutions. In Pirkei Avos we are told, "According to the toil is the reward," and since we are told that having and rearing children entails the pain of birth, and the pain of rearing children, if anyone promises you a simple easy solution to the difficulties of child-rearing, you can be rightfully suspicious!

When we say the words, "effective discipline," I think some of us envision a home where the children are always obedient, and every word and wish of the parents is carried out immediately and happily. If that is what you have in mind, forget it. I wish I knew the magic formula myself.

Personally, when I hear the phrase "effective discipline," I think of a happy, smoothly running home where the children know they're children and the parents know they're parents, and where challenges to the parents' authority, or misbehavior, are approached with sensitivity, wisdom, and love. I don't believe there is a home in the world where children are born naturally disciplined, obedient and trained. In Torah we are told: "A man is born [with the characteristics of] a wild mule;" "The inclinations of a man's heart are evil from youth." The raw material, the young infant we are handed as we leave the hospital to go home, is our challenge and assignment for the rest of our lives. It's a G-d-ordained shidduch, and the two of us will forever be interacting and influencing one another for as long as we live.

Rabbi Dr. Abraham Twersky tells a story about an old man, a hundred years of age, a resident in an old-age home where Rabbi Twersky worked as a psychiatrist. The old man was still very alert, and after a visit from his son, he asked Rabbi Twersky, "Did you meet my boychik'l?" The "boychik'l" referred to was almost 80!! So you see that as long as the parent is alive -- the child is a child.

Why is putting discipline into effect so hard? Because it is a constant avodah on the parents' part. Few activities in life are so totally demanding and strenuous as that of instilling and enforcing good rules and behavior in our kinderlach. This is no place where you can say, "Do as I say, not as I do." We are told about Aristotle the philosopher who preached the mastery of mind over matter, and the use of philosophical ideas and concepts to rise above one's own instinctive nature. The same Aristotle was once discovered in a very compromising situation with a young man... His response? "Now I'm Aristotle the man, not Aristotle the philosopher..." This doesn't work with parenthood. One slip of the tongue, one bad example in front of our children, can do untold damage to their delicate egos and psyches and personalities. We can never really take a vacation from them. And even when we do, we must put great care into who will be caring for them while we're away. You know you can't trust a new maid!

So that's why our task is so difficult and trying -- it's so total and final, and it is very difficult, if not impossible, to undo something once it has been done. As one woman said, "The trouble with having children is that once you have them -- you have them!" Once they're born, they're yours for keeps. Rabbi Friedman once said, "People today are so foolish. They fail to realize that while there may be such a thing as a trial marriage, there is no such thing as a trial child!"

So we are here tonight, to gain some ideas about how to put our values into practice.

The first and most important concept in disciplining your children is being a living example. The Rebbe Shlita cited as the major reason for the failure of the religious educational system in the U.S., that the teachers were not living examples of what they were presenting. They did not practice what they preached! All the lovely speeches are wasted if the child does not see his parent or teacher personally living by those very guidelines which he seeks to instill in his charges. And we see this behavior expressed vividly in the Torah. We are told to emulate the attributes of HaKadosh Baruch Hu -- just as He is compassionate, so should we be compassionate. Just as He is kind, so we should be kind, etc. "He tells His words to Yaakov, His laws and statutes to Yisroel," i.e. the things which He does. He practices those very things he asks us to do. So too, as parents, if our children get the idea that we're telling them to behave a certain way, but that we ourselves act differently, then all our efforts are "gone with the wind."

What use is telling five-year-old Chanie that she must share with her brother, if the child overhears some selfish exchange between her mother and aunt? The child is told to speak nicely, not use dirty words, and then he witnesses his angry mother say some unrepeatable phrases to the storekeeper that cheated her. Having children means constantly working on ourselves to watch our thoughts, speech and deeds. They must be as perfect as can be, and we must be a living example to our children with everything we ask of them. I'm sure you've seen little children ask for a bentcher or a siddur, even though they cannot read, simply because they see everyone else using one. From the youngest age children emulate others. We are their strongest examples in life.

When they themselves become parents, our children will constantly be modeling their behavior after ours, whether consciously or sub-consciously, and recalling incidents from their childhood when dealing with their own children, G-d willing. It is up to us to fill this part of their brains and memories with pristine examples. In marriage their ideas of how to relate to their spouses will almost duplicate what they've seen as children in their own homes. In a new book called "My Mother, My Self," the author poses the theory that even when women disagree with the way their mothers acted and lived, in adulthood they unconsciously revert to those very patterns they saw and absorbed in childhood. So we must constantly strive to improve ourselves, keep up our Torah-learning, particularly Chassidus, keep in contact with a mashpiah, and keep davening for help from Above, in this most challenging of all roles.

Another cardinal concept in discipline is consistency. Many parents wonder why the rules they establish in their homes are not honored. They are frustrated by children they call wild, naughty, impossible -- who frustrate their every effort to instill discipline. Very often the root of the problem is not in the children, but in the parents. Often a parent will announce a lovely-sounding rule, but when it is tested or challenged the child quickly learns that the parent never meant it seriously, or that the parent doesn't have the strength or conviction to enforce it. And then you have the classic vicious circle, angry frustrated parent, and undisciplined children constantly misbehaving but secretly begging for a firm hand. There is nothing a child hates more than weak parents, just as schoolchildren trample on and resent teachers who cannot control the class. Children by nature respect authority and want limits, but their very childishness forces them to test and try those limits. Knowing this, we don't have to worry about pleasing or making children happy in the short run. As parents we know better. We must think of their whole lives, their futures, and raise them to be mentshen, so that they will be happy and respected in the long run. I recall a mother who I knew to be a failure in disciplining her children, who once invited my children over to play with her children. She said, "We have every Fisher-Price toy." And I thought to myself, "That's one of the reasons her children are so demanding. She has never learned to say no." Everything her children asked for they got, whether it was candy, toys or clothes. And do you think they were grateful or well-adjusted? They were among the most mixed-up children I had ever seen. Truly caring about our children means teaching them restraint from a young age, and that no means no! I recall a conversation with a young Israeli mother who taught English in Tsfas. I asked her about discipline because I knew her children personally, and I had noticed that they were very disciplined. And she said, "When I say no, my children know it's with a capital N capital O."

When children see that a rule is meant seriously, and parents have thought of ways to enforce it with wisdom and sensitivity, they grow up secure and happy. I remember hearing about a day-care center where the play area was on the sidewalk, near a busy street. The street was fenced off and the children played happily. One day the fence broke and needed to be repaired. For the few days that the sidewalk was without a fence, the teachers noticed that the children stayed very close to the building, afraid of the cars and traffic. With the fence in place, they felt safe and secure, but without the fence they felt fearful and uncomfortable. And so it is in life. A child may protest, but he is really comforted when a parent consistently makes sure that rules are carried out and consequences are suffered -- or else!

A note of caution, however. If you are a new mother, it is a good idea to discuss rules with other more experienced mothers, or read books on child development. A rule which is not matched to the child's developmental age and maturity, may be unrealistic and therefore difficult or impossible to enforce. It can also cause a lot of unnecessary frustration and anger. Usually a sensitive parent with experience can develop a sense of what kind of rules are right through trial and error. Nevertheless, it is always a good idea to discuss these matters with other mothers you look up to, before establishing and implementing a rule. There are good books on child development that discuss the skills and attitudes of children at different ages. These can also be very helpful.

A third cardinal rule is that children are very wise and innately perceptive. Don't underestimate them. With proper motivation and parental attitudes, there is no limit to how much they can achieve. But parents must be human and motivated, and have faith in their children. We are all aware of the effectiveness of the self-fulfilling prophecy. A child who is constantly told, "You are a slob, you are lazy, you are a bad boy," will not expect himself to be any different. If my mother thinks I'm so anyway -- why prove her wrong?

Let us stop and think. How do we feel in the presence of someone we know has a bad impression of us? We always feel uneasy and nervous. But in the presence of someone who believes we are great, who has confidence in us, we work to our utmost to achieve to our highest potential. This is one reason why numbered grades are so damaging, for they give the child who was not successful a stamp. "You are dumb, you are stupid." This does tremendous damage to his desire to try harder in the future.

When a child does not live up to our expectations, how do we react? The way in which we react makes all the difference in the world. Again, I quote Rabbi Dr. Twersky, who tells how, as a small child, he did something naughty. His father called him over. He didn't spank him. He didn't yell at him. He told him gently, "That does not befit you." And those few words, he said, were guides to him for the rest of his life. These words imply a great deal. You are much finer. You are a Yid. You have a G-dly soul. You are a soldier in Hashem's army. That behavior just doesn't suit a person as great as you. With such an approach you are separating the person from what he did or said. You show great confidence in the child, and with such a general attitude we can expect fine results. As the previous Rebbe said, "It is an established rule, that a strenuous effort is never unproductive."

Obviously, there is much still unsaid, but as our time is drawing to a close, let me conclude with the following. Being parents and having discipline in our homes is indeed a great and difficult job. But Torah tells us: "There are three partners in bringing a person into the world -- the father, the mother, and G-d." Also, "I do not make demands of them according to My abilities, but according to theirs." If Hashem thought we could not do an adequate job with his children, he would not have entrusted them to us.

Very often parents fail, not because they cannot do a good job, but because they don't work hard enough at it. It is not really their priority in life. And if we put our soul into our G-d-given responsibility, and ask Hashem for help, then we are assured that "He will lead a person in the way in which he wants to be led." When Mashiach comes speedily in our days, we will point proudly to our children and say, "Look at the offspring we have raised!"