Set the Pattern

Have you noticed how some teens have a ready, “Thanks for the ride!” when you drop them off somewhere?  For others, it doesn’t occur to them to say this.  Perhaps these haven’t developed the maturity yet, to step outside themselves at this teenage season of self-consciousness.  Which is fine, but while the empathy for others is developing, how wonderful it is when they have the ready response of thanks.  We give our kids a gift when we give them polite words to say from the start.  The feeling of gratitude will catch up later.

Pretty Please and Thank You

“What is the Magic word?” Mommy prompts her child to say please when he asks for a cookie.  “What do you say?” Daddy encourages his little girl to say thank you after she receives a toy from the top shelf.  These children are constantly reminded to say Please or Thank You—those magic words.  They may not really feel the concern for another’s time spent getting that toy down or the gratitude for the cookie.  But the habit is in place.  Later on, when they have learned the skill of empathy or have experienced going without some wanted item, the child gradually learns the feeling behind those words.  But the action is already in place, the automatic response.  If Mom or Dad wait until the child can feel true gratitude before requiring a “thank you,” the desired words would not be automatic.

I’m Sorry

In another arena, I heard a mom announce, “I never require my children to apologize.  They don’t feel it!”  I wonder how old a child will be when they finally learn to truly feel what the other child feels when hit or teased or bullied?  Timing is likely different for every child.  But in the meantime, if “I’m Sorry” is already a patterned response, the feelings of sympathy and remorse will catch up.

We can help young children begin to feel compassion when very young.  We can talk to them about how another child feels: “Zac got his finger pinched—that must really hurt!”  Helping them to verbalize their own feelings and then to remember them when another is going through the same things helps them learn to feel for others: “Remember how you felt when you had a fever?  Emma has one right now. She must feel really hot and tired.”

Family Patterns are what Lloyd & Karmel Newel empathizes in their article in this month’s Ensign magazine, “Building Spiritual Patterns.”  They give a wonderful example of how upset a family felt when they learned of the terrorism on 9/11, even fear to go to school.  Until their 8-year old brought up that they shouldn’t be afraid, that these people who did this were just like the Gadianton Robbers they had read about in the Scriptures. “We don’t need to be afraid of them,” she emphasized to her siblings. Then the children left peacefully to school and the parents turned to each other and said, “That’s why we do this every day.” Their pattern of scripture reading every morning got them through a scary situation.  And it wouldn’t have worked if they had waited until after the crisis to start teaching from the scriptures.

“Teach [your children] to pray while they are young,” they quoted Gordon B. Hinkley. “Read to them from the scriptures even though they may not understand all that you read. Teach them to pay their tithes and offerings on the first money they ever receive. Let this practice become a habit in their lives” (emphasis added). President Hinckley also taught us to set basic spiritual patterns for our families (August 2018, p. 68).  The understanding and the feeling behind an established habitual response will catch up later. And with these habits already in place, children feel happier and more secure.

Repentance is not required of our children when they are not accountable under the age of eight. “Little children need no repentance, neither baptism” (Moroni 8:11). But if we wait to teach repentance until then, it is way too late.  We must teach them to feel sorrow and to make things right, so that they will have it ready when they do need the process of repentance.

OK, Mom and Dad

Here’s another example of a pattern put into place. My husband and I wanted to teach our kids to be obedient.  More than that, we wanted to make it a natural response to obey.  So we decided to use the words, “OK, Mom!”  “OK, Dad!”  When Mark asks a child to go brush their teeth, I prompt them, “OK, Dad!”  When I ask a child to come to dinner, Mark asks, “OK, Mom!”  We expect the child to repeat the words, but we don’t require it.  Hearing it said has been enough to make obedience a habit.  It becomes automatic.  If we waited for the words to be said, forcing the child to say the actual words, they have the choice to rebel.  It becomes an issue.  But if we relax and set the pattern, the internal response becomes the pattern of obedience.  The feeling that “I want to be obedient” catches up later, but the pattern of obedience is already in place from the time the children are tiny.

I Love You

Sometimes we may wonder if our children even love each other!  Sometimes they sure don’t act like it.  But we can still help our kids get into the habit of saying “I love you” to each other.  Maybe we habitually tell each other at good-byes or good-nights.  Maybe it will become a habit when Dad goes off to work or when Mom finishes her story.  Any time we chose could become a trigger for those special words. But if our children get into the habit of expressing their love often, the feeling of real family love will more likely catch up later.

I Won’t

What if your child refuses to say the prescribed words?  Do we force them to keep up the family’s pattern?  I would say definitely not!  We never force, we model and teach and direct, but stop short of forcing.  We put the pattern in place, then we can relax and just follow through, knowing the understanding and empathy will come when it comes.  What if it is hard to establish?  Consider this scenario:

One day, young Lily wanted the same toy that Trey had, so she went over and pushed him, and he began to cry.  Mom went over to the crying Trey and picked him up.  “Are you hurt, Trey?” she asked.  “Where does it hurt? Oh, that’s too bad.”  Then, after showering the attention on him, the victim, she went over to Lily.  “Let’s go over and make this better. Let’s say ‘I’m sorry!’” Mom walked over with Lily, and even said the words.  Lily heard the words even if she didn’t actually say them. Mom put the offending toy on the top shelf until the kids had later worked it out.  The situation was righted and the pattern was kept in place, the pattern of apologizing when we do wrong.

Later on, when Lily does choose to say the words ”I’m Sorry,” Mom could make a big deal over that choice: “You said “I’m sorry” all by yourself! You must be growing up!”

Sometimes, Children don’t actually say the word we are trying to get them to say for a good habitual response. “I did say I’m sorry!” they insist. I think that is fine. In fact, I submit that sometimes when children hear words, they think they actually said them. Hearing the words said is almost as good as saying them. The goal is to get the words into their minds and help them form the good responses, while waiting for the feeling to catch up to it.

See also “Train up a Child” in Parenting with the Spirit:  The Answer is More Love, Chapter 4.