Easy to Love, Difficult to Discipline: The 7 Basic Skills for Turning Conflict into Cooperation

I LOVE THIS BOOK!

But there is good news and bad news.

The good news is, these techniques WORK. They truly do. I love that the author explains the development of a child's brain and why they need to be disciplined (or trained, or guided, whichever word you prefer) in a certain way. As a Christian, I love that my belief in the controversial theology that children are innocent and innately good is supported in this book. That is perhaps the most encouraging thing for me as a mother. My children are good people and their behavior is normal.

When I am using these techniques as opposed to a punishment and rewards system, my 3 year old is much better behaved, and the amazing part is, he is kinder and sweeter to his 18-month-old sister. He actually takes from my guidance, and uses my words to relate to her. When I'm consistently reminding him and showing him the words to speak gently, rather than snapping at him with a general remark to "be nice" or "don't yell at your sister," his behavior changes almost instantly.

The bad news is, when you are a busy parent of more than one child, implementing this parenting style all the time is pretty much impossible. Sometimes you just need your kid to quit whining about the shoes you've given him to wear for the day and can't really take ten minutes to sit on the floor with him and empathize.

That being said, you take what you can, and work with the situation at hand, do the best you can, and don't feel guilty about the rest. I don't hand out five-star reviews often, but this book is deserving.

This is my mommy handbook! Bailey's ideas are so Christlike (and it's not a Christian/spiritual book). Her focus is on the parent learning to discipline him/herself, and you can then learn to model better behavior to your children. Excellent, excellent book!!!

This book is life changing, and no, I’m not exaggerating. I feel that every parent should read this book. The book is not about controlling your children, or eliminating conflict. The book is about YOU as a parent. It teaches you to have self-control. That is its main focus. You must be able to have control over your own emotions in order to teach your children. That is exactly what I needed. As I have been working to utilize the Seven Powers of Self-Control, I have a seen a dramatic difference in my life. And I’m not even that good at using them yet! Once you have greater control over yourself, you are able to see conflict as an opportunity to teach your child, instead of control or punish them. The book also focuses on helping your children become assertive and capable of solving problems, which are the kind of children I want to raise. The book teaches you how to be guided by love in your parenting, and how to influence your children through love instead of fear. I highly recommend this book to every parent, teacher, daycare employee, primary teacher, or anyone else who spends time around children. I also highly recommend this book to anyone who wants to have better control over their emotions (this book coupled with Emotional Intelligence 2.0 would be perfect). I love love love this book. Read it!

I had to buy my own copy of this book after I got it out of the library years ago, in part because it was so helpful and in part because I felt the need to highlight so much of it in bright yellow as a reminder to myself. :)

This book is about changing our own outlooks and learning to change the way we react to stress with our children. It is not light reading, since it is so full of deep thoughts, lessons, ideas, plans and things to think about. There is a lot of very helpful stuff in here that can help change the way you think about your children and give you much more peace, plus it's designed to help you learn discipline for your own life and pass that on to your kids. I've read a ton of parenting books, especially attachment parenting ones, and out of all of them this is probably the one I got the most out of.

It has been a while I did not read any parenting books at all. I used to read it a lot when my daughter was in pre-school age. And I relax a lot more when she entered formal education, things were quite manageable. I remember somewhere, when they hit the age of 9, things change again, they are entering the period of teenage life, it is going to be a different game all together. I think I can feel it, it is no longer as easy as before to deal with my daughter who is going to be 10 years old next year. So that probably the reason I pick up parenting book again. Honestly after reading more than 50 parenting books, all of them sound very similar. Parenting is not about giving order, but walk the talk. our kids are the reflection of us ... simple as that. The same as what it said in this book, before we discipline our kids, we discipline our-self first.

This book introduced the concept of 7 power of self control that help us as parents to model the behavior to the children. 7 basic disciplines that help children to manage sticky situation and 7 value of living such as integrity, respect, compassion, responsibility etc.

the 7 power of self control are : The power of perception, no one can make us angry without our permission. The power of attention, what we focus on, we get more of. The power of Free Will, the only person we can make change is ourselves. The power of unity, focus on connecting instead of trying to be special. The power of love, see the best in one another. The power of acceptance, this moment is at it is. The power of Intention, conflict is an opportunity to teach.

From these 7 powers of self control, we eventually will produce 7 basic discipline skills that we can always use constructively to respond any difficult moment or situation. By Doing these we eventually create a home that models the 7 values of living. This will happen automatically. As parent change their attitudes and behaviors, so will their children.

Now, the 7 basic discipline skills are Composure, living the values we want our child to develop. This teaches integrity. Encouragement, Honoring children so they will honor us. This teaches interdependence. Assertiveness, saying no and being heard. This teaches respect. Choices, Building self-esteem and willpower. This teaches commitment. Positive Intent, turning resistance into corporation, this teaches cooperation. Empathy, handling the fusing and the fits, this teaches compassion. and lastly Consequences, helping children learn from their mistakes. this teaches responsibility.

In all ... this is a good book to read after few years out from parenting book. I am glad I picked up this book. It is a good reminder once again, what is PARENTING ALL ABOUT. cheers all.

There is a lot in this book I will never remember (lots of rules in sets of seven for some reason), including a seven-week plan that I will never complete. Fortunately, there is a LOT of good in here too. It was really eye-opening to read about the differences between passive, aggressive and assertive and how as adults we typically fall into one category and that makes all the difference in how our kids respond to us. I also have been practicing attributing positive intent to everything my kids do. It's much harder than it seems, but truly does make a difference. I'm not sure I quite agree with the author's take on rewards/punishments and the use of thank you and please, but it's definitely food for thought. I've been on a kick of parenting books as of late and this is a stand-out for sure and one I'll likely come back to.

I had a very specific purpose in reading this book. Of my six children, one in particular is quite a challenge. Just by the title, I thought it might be a good fit, and the reviews I read seemed very favorable.

Easy to Love, Difficult to Discipline: The 7 Basic Skills for Turning Conflict into Cooperation
(2000, William Morrow) by  Becky A. Bailey has given me a fresh perspective, which is a bit of a feat. I’ve heard everything, tried everything, etc. As a deaf education major in college, my master’s project was to write a review on all the research I could find about discipline in the classroom. I taught middle and high school for three years before becoming a stay at home mom, and have racked up fourteen years of experience as a mother (and a foster mother). And yet, this one child continues to stump me.

Rating: 5 stars

Christian elements: This isn’t a Christian book. However, I felt that the author does occasionally show respect for a variety of religions without promoting one over the other. Here’s an example:

“If your best efforts still do not resolve the conflict, I suggest you step back from the event entirely. Breathe deeply, bow your head, and say, ‘Thank you for all the teaching opportunities I have had today.’ Having observed this moment of reverence, …”

Ideas and quotes: I’ll list a few things, particularly those that I found in the beginning of the book.

*”Your job as a parent is to strengthen, not break, your child’s will. That will has a vital role to play in ensuring his safety and the fulfillment of his potential… His will can give him the strength to choose healthy foods…. It can empower him to refuse dangerous drugs and peers… Your child’s will can only serve him if it is left strong and whole, not if it is weak or broken.”

*”Misbehavior actually serves many wonderful purposes in your child’s development. It would be misguided to try to stop misbehavior. Your goal is better framed as preventing the likelihood of misbehavior being repeated and becoming habitual. You can do this by responding to misbehavior wisely when it happens.”

*The author explains that we (parents, etc.) need to “become the person I wanted children to be… In order to do this, I needed to develop self-control.” (My pastor prefers the term “control of self” to indicate that we want to accept God’s guidance in reigning in our own ungodly behavior rather than being controlled by our own desires. We are in self-control when we throw a tantrum, he would say!) The author lists “the seven powers for self-control,” my favorite of which is “The power of perception: No one can make you angry without your permission.”

*“Every conflict presents you with a choice. You can choose to view conflict as an opportunity to teach or as an opportunity to blame and punish.”

*“When you have been treated with disrespect, you need to respond assertively. If you respond aggressively, you are simply treating your child with disrespect while trying to teach respect.”

What I liked:

There is so much more in this book. I will just add that I was very gratified to see that this book did NOT advocate rewards. I’ve long felt that rewards are for recognizing especially hard work or for the accomplishment of a long-term goal. And if you think about it, it gets particularly sticky when dealing with a whole house full of children. (Why does ___ get a lollipop for finishing homework?)

The last chapter is a summary/refresher course along with specific suggestions about when, how, and in what sequence to start implementing Ms. Bailey’s ideas. This is great, as there’s so much to remember.

What I didn’t like:

My life as a mother isn’t magically fixed. Bummer. However, the book delivered far more than I expected. At times, I am not sure how to apply the concepts taught (or don’t remember to do so), so I’m planning to occasionally browse the areas I marked. Maybe make myself a cheat sheet… I should probably do it before my next book review, as starting next Friday, I will have all six kids home for the summer Don’t get me wrong - I love them. But chaos will ensue. Opportunities for conflict multiply. Hello, summer!

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The bottom line: This book is great to give a parent (or other authority figure) a fresh outlook on discipline. I may try Managing Emotional Mayhem.

This book, as with all Becky Bailey books, is nothing but fluff and "feel good" psychology. Yes, let's love the children. Let's nurture them. Of course, that is what we should strive for. I'm not in disagreement with the basic premises. But what about the 4-year-old who calls his teacher a bitch? What about the 6-year-old who hurls a chair into the face of a peer? Becky Bailey does not provide one ounce of empirical support for any of her assertions. She invites organizations like Head Start to use her books and "rituals" and she holds elaborate conferences on her magical wisdom. Of course, it would cost an organization thousands of dollars to send employees to a conference or, alternatively, cost thousands more to have the great Ms. Bailey make an on-site visit. When you truly have a passion for enhancing the development of young children—a passion that primarily focuses on poverty-stricken groups, such as those found in Head Start—you don’t charge tens of thousands of dollars for consultation and conferences. You use research-based strategies—not feel good fluff—to support your claims. By all means, check out Becky Bailey if you deal solely with higher-SES children and families. But if you work with children who present a diverse range of learning and behavioral difficulties, you are unlikely to find any practical or realistic tips.