About our Boot Camp...

The tips and thoughts in the article shared are from Reb Bradley's site -- Family Ministries. Yes, he has some ideas that run much like The Pearls, and that tends to bring out the flames and arrows in folks, but think about it for a minute...

As the article says, if the military can take a rogue child without an ounce of proper training growing up and turn them into a respectful, functioning adult, why can't parents manage to do that?

Why do your children have to be 'independent' to the point of plain ignorance, arrogance and disrespect all the time? Why can't parents claim their children while young, and train them to behave properly while outside the home (as well as inside the home)? Don't say most do -- I walk through the same Wal-Mart's and other shops the rest of you do. I've seen the same children, some young and more sad, some over the age of 10, climbing in and out of clothing racks, running all over the store, playing with and grabbing at virtually everything they come near, yelling and talking disrespectifully to their parents, throwing fits when they dare to be told no for something, and worse, any store personnel who dare to correct them for their actions receives the same treatment. They ride bikes, bounce balls, totally tear apart everything in the toy aisles, grab everything off the shelves as they paw after food treats as though starved and they are a nuisance and sheeer annoyance to every other person in the store.

And the parents do nothing. Or they make very feeble attempts to plead and bargain with these children to get compliance on any level.

Why are parents bargaining with their children for proper behavior? Why on earth would a 20-30-40-something adult have to beg and plead with a child, offer deals or compromise their own ideas of behavior for a child so they an do as they please and disrupt the day of every other person they meet?

Plain and simple, what gives you the right as the parent of that child to allow that behavior out in public and disrupt my day? It isn't affecting your day -- you created that behavior and grew it up to where it is, but what gives you the right to inflict it on anyone else? Sure, that sounds arrogant of me to say I imagine, but we've all thought the same thing once or twice when confronted with children like that in a store. It's one thing to allow that behavior toward yourself in your own home, but don't you have an ounce of shame in your lack of parenting skills to want to hide the fact you have untrained, undisciplined, unruly children who think they deserve their own way all the time and demand it? I would. Shoot, I do. If mine act up like that, we push the cart to the front, apologize to the store clerk for thier having to place our items back into stock and we leave the store. Period. I have no right to make everyone else suffer the disobedience of my children. That's my burden to bear and my shame to repent of.

Have we really become a society where the children rule the world simple because we are too lazy?

Don't even answer that. I already know that answer without having to think long about it. Children do as they please because lazy parents have trained them that way. Every time you bargain to get your authority back, you create the monster of greed in a child. Every time you have to plead and beg with a child of any age to get them to quiet down or sit down or simply be still for a few minutes, you are building an arrogance in that child that festers until we have the teens and adults we have out there now. Unless they find fun or entertainment in a thing, they wll not subject themselve to it. They feel somehow privileged because they breath air or something. The world owes them something. Sweeten the pot and maybe they will submit to it a little bit, but it's only going to be temporary and totally on their terms.

Why do we have to bribe children with treats, gifts and what-not to get them to obey even basic rules of proper behavior? Why do you have to bribe a child to have their room cleaned? It's their mess. They made it. Doesn't matter one bit that it's in "their room" -- it's a part of the family home and as such is still under the same rules. Bugs and rodents don't just live in one room -- they just start there. Why are we bribing children to behave while we go to the store for groceries? Don't they eat? Isn't it in their best interest, technically, to behave in that store so the food needs can be bought? Maybe you need to leave the shopping cart and go without groceries for the week and see if they decide it's better to behave for that brief time than to get their own way and go hungry without the treats and meals they demand. I know most parents won't do that -- they aren't going to limit their own selfish wants to make a point with the child. I'll wager their parents didn't either. It's called the trickle down effect.

Parents don't discipline because they can't discipline. They have no authority in their own homes. Television has shown children nothing but weak, insignificant parents and called it funny. They get in their groups at school and dismiss their parents with an ease no decent child should feel comfortable with. They have no conscience about talking rudely, disrespectfully or down-right hateful and wicked about their parents, their teachers or anyone else in authority around them. They do not have rules and guidelines in their lives and it shows in bright, glowing colors. Even if you don't see it, trust me, others who deal with the children do. Look around that Wal-Mart next time you're in there. There is a world of children from age 2 on up through teenhood who feel they have every ounce of power and authority -- and sadly, I suppose they do. It's been handed over to them by wimpy parents who don't want to rock the boat in their own home. They want thieeir children to have fun. They claim to be 'choosing' their battles, but in reality, they are 'choosing' nothing. They don't want to get off the phone to deal with the behavior of their children. They don't want to miss that football game or movie on TV to deal with their children. They don't want to get off that computer chat group to deal with their children. It's easier to give in and let them do wha they want. They want to be buddies and best friends with their children instead of the God-called, God-ordained teachers and true parents of their children.

So....(yeah, finally...) as we are having some of these same issues in our home, we are having Boot Camp here beginning Monday. We have to decompress and deprogram from the past month of chaos and upheaval here, and get down to the business of adjusting to Dad being gone for a time. I have to teach my children that rules are rules, period. They are not guidelines to be heeded only if their are fun. They aren't going to get out in the 'real world' one day and be allowed this sort of free-will, rampant arrogance they think they prize at home. They will never have job where they can come and go as they please, or skip altogether because they don't feel like getting up and getting there. They are not going to get to work and decided they don't want the task they have been assigned and simply wander off to do something more fun and entertaining. If they aren't schooled (and we have really slacked off there all month!), they won't even be able to complain about flipping burgers at McDonald's, if they can even get that job. They will not be able to provide properly for their own family one day and we'll just repeat the cycle over and over again for generations.

Gee, kind of like those wicked families where there was no Godly influence heeded all throughout Scripture.

I don't want that for my family and I plan to work hard to discourage it. If I have disrespetful children who grow into adults with that heart of disrespect, it's all on my shoulders. No one else will bear that shame except me. I don't want to stand before God one day and answer to all the times I allowed unGodly behavior in my children.

I'll post the Reb Bradley Boot Camp article in the next post...