December 5, 2016
The other day a parent and I were talking about the Love and Logic program. I had dispensed this information to this wonderful mother a few years earlier as a starting point for a better way to parent and in turn feel as a parent. She had not started it at the time for reasons that were hers alone.
A year later, the recommendation was remade. In our conversation this year, she relayed to me how useful this program was and that she wished she had started it earlier.
I bring this point to bear for the simple reason that we often receive advice that we should take but delay to our own detriment. We are all guilty of this. It is human nature.
That being said, the Love and Logic program is one of those bits of advice that we all should pay attention to with the same vigor as drinking adequate amounts of water, sleeping 7-8 hours nightly and exercising.
The advice dispensed during the seminars and readings of Love and Logic are so simple and powerful as to be at times ridiculous that we don't intuitively do it, yet, we do not.
Nicole and I took this course years ago and have found that we routinely practice Love and Logic with our two monkeys. To be able to say to my son that "I love you too much to argue" or "feel free to join the conversation when you are calm and able to talk" or "that is right that life is not fair and I love you for recognizing that" allows both of us the time to move forward with the issues at hand without me being in an angered and non productive state.
2 rules of love and logic:
1) Parents set limits or put up guard rails without anger, lectures or threats.
2) When children cause problems, parents lovingly hand them back to the child to figure out.
Love allows children to grow through failure.
Logic allows them to learn through their choices.
Dr. M
