Lesson 6--Let Empathy and Consequences Do the Teaching

Anger causes the child to look at the adult’s anger, instead of at his/her life and his/her decisions.


An equal balance of empathy and consequence causes the child to look at his/her life and his/her decisions.

Parents help kids profit and learn from their mistakes in two ways. The first is by proving our empathy and understanding, before letting them know what the consequence will be. The second is by not displaying our own anger and frustration.

Many of our models (grandparents, parents, teachers, etc.) taught us, through their actions, to use anger. The hardest job of parenting may be to overcome the influence of our own parents.

Once our anger catches us off guard, we’re likely to punish our children. When we punish our children, we provide them with a great escape valve, an escape from the consequences of their action. Their focus (and their anger) gets directed back toward the punisher—us.

Empathetic responses may not come to you naturally. Practice and rehearsal is critical to success.

Empathy with consequences allow children to hurt from the inside out, rather than from the outside in.

This means that the child associates the consequence with his/her bad decision, not with the adult’s anger.

As soon as the child is able to suffer the consequences, he/she can make the decisions.

Children as young as nine months can begin practicing making their own decisions, and recognizing the consequences.