10 Ways to Help Your Child Cooperate Without Using Punishments

In the face of your child’s challenging behavior and resistance, it’s hard not to demand immediate obedience from your child. You’re more likely to expect obedience if you’ve been raised with a “power-over” hierarchical familial structure where adult needs trump child needs, and where the biggest person with the most power—the adult—“wins.”

Now that you're the one with more power, it can be difficult to imagine sharing that power with your child. It’s so triggering when they don’t comply—no one shared power with you growing up! It’s your turn to call the shots!

But using punitive tactics like yelling, threatening, shaming, time outs, and imposed "consequences" to get your way doesn’t teach them to identify and express their feelings and needs. They also don't learn the alternative behaviors they could use. Instead, it teaches them to use their size, strength, and power to get what they want. Bribing them or using rewards to coerce your child into compliance is also tricky; they will often coerce you in return, refusing to comply unless given the reward.

So how do you respond when your child breaks rules or flat out refuses to do what you’ve asked?

Well, you’re not going to make your child behave better by making them feel worse. They can’t behave better externally until they feel better internally. Using respectful discipline takes the focus off of the behaviors themselves and puts the focus on the internal struggle causing them. You preserve your child’s dignity, humanity, and self-worth even as you stand firm on your boundaries. Respectful discipline is about letting go of what you can’t control (your child) and holding onto what you can control (yourself!).

Here are 10 ways to gain your child’s cooperation without using punishments:

1. Trade control for influence

You won’t always be the bigger one with more power. That’s why a strongly-connected relationship with your child is a more sustainable parenting tool. Your child will almost always resist your control, but if you have a deep and close connection with them, and they trust you, they’re less likely to resist your influence. You’ll have an easier time helping them get safely to adulthood. A child open to your influence takes your values, opinions, experiences, and concerns into consideration as they make independent decisions.

2. Your child can’t cooperate when their “cup” is empty

Throughout each day, your child’s metaphorical "cup" is being emptied by normal frustrations they encounter as they explore and learn more about their world. When a child’s emotional-relational cup is full, they are in the “green zone.” They’re more flexible, more cooperative, and more capable of logic and reason because their needs for safety are met.

Being sad, ill, or terrified can land them in the “blue...

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