“When a child gets angry, throws a tantrum, throws toys, hits another child, or cries loudly, parents often will use force to stop the child”

That should read:
“When a child gets angry, throws a tantrum or cries loudly, parents often will use force to stop the child”

There is nothing wrong with using force to stop a child throwing toys (property destruction), hitting another child (bodily harm). And I’m not talking about hitting the child or any derivative but just physically stopping the actions of the child, you can talk all you want afterwards but the action should stop, in a comment you talk about your daughter writing on the wall, do you let your daughter continue while you look for and present alternatives to her? Or do you use your superior force to stop her first?

I also notice that after that first sentence you do not use the hitting/throwing examples anymore so it may have been an unintended inclusion.

Keeping the above in mind I would generally agree with what your post.

i try to teach my girls how to use deep breathing and hugs to calm them down. we have a set of beanbags we go outside and throw to vent anger and i have to say we do use time out as a pull away from the situation and calm yourself technique rather than a punishment and i think this works as i use it myself.

There’s another aspect to compassionate behavior that I think is just as important as dealing with problems. And it’s one that most people mostly overlook: rewarding DESIRED behaviors and attitudes.

Lots of people give their children attention and comforting when their child has or creates a problem… yet ignore or fail to reward good behavior.

Imagine walking into a room containing two children. Both are physically okay. One is crying, and one is happy. Most people will immediately pay attention to the unhappy child. What does that teach both of them? That unhappiness is important and gets support and attention, while happiness is NOT important and does NOT get attention.

In the short run, the unhappy child got comforted. In the long run, both children got encouraged to be LESS happy in the future. This is not compassionate, folks!

Imagine walking into the room and paying attention to the happy child. How long is the unhappy child going to stay unhappy? Probably not very long, because as soon as they get happy, they get to have fun with the happy people!

This works with adults, too. When I realized I was getting a lot of attention and sympathy for being unhappy, I asked my friends to please quit rewarding me, and offer hugs and attention when I felt better. It made a big difference. I now do something similar for my friends. Complaints? I act ho-hum or change the topic. Problems? In an emotionally neutral manner, I help them brainstorm solutions. Successes and triumphs? I become warmly supportive and enthusiastic! After I did that for a while, my friends became happier and more upbeat, and started telling me they like to talk with me because I make them feel good. :-)

(Is this manipulative? I say no. I’m doing the same thing I used to do when I rewarded complaints, only now I’m doing it consciously and in ways that benefit others. Everybody wins.)

Switching your focus to rewards doesn’t mean ignoring pain and distress. Just give it LESS attention then success and happiness, and do your best to keep emotions neutral. And when people do things right, reward them! (Caution: you must use something THEY find rewarding, which might not be what YOU find rewarding. The book “The Five Love Languages” has suggestions for figuring this out.)

The best book I’ve found for learning positive reinforcement is Karen Pryor’s marvelous book “Don’t Shoot the Dog”. Karen’s a professional animal trainer, but the best part of her book is where she talks about using rewards with people.

Encouraging people to feel happy and succeed in life is about the most compassionate action I can think of. Especially for kids, because what they learn now can benefit them for a lifetime.

Doing something you “hate” — and explaining this openly to your child — is basically modelling to your child, that lying to your heart *all the time* is ok. If you’re *not* explaining openly to your child, that you are spanking him although you hate it, then it’s “violence” (after your own explanation in the text above) and you’re telling him that it is ok to use violence as a means to an end.

How can you expect your child to understand your unlogic behaviour, and to understand that the method of lying (to get what one wants) is false, if you resort to unlogic and false methods yourself?

In the hopes that one day your child will find out that there *are* other methods to get what you want, or to support a child to commit to honesty, your child will be truely disappointed if you didn’t even try to find other methods or possibilities — I think you owe him giving it at least a try.

Johanna

PS.: if you want to give it a try, maybe this: is too “free”:

http://joyfullyrejoycing.com/changing%20parenting/nomorespanking.html

But maybe you could try a book of “Alfie Kohn” or “Naomi Aldort”