Discipline: Cracking
The Whip Or Melting Hearts?
Discipline may be required in every walk of life as it helps in better and more efficient functioning. Though most of us begin our tryst with discipline while we are in school, not all of us carry it throughout our lives. This depends on the kind of groundwork or foundation that is laid by parents and teachers while we are students.
In childhood, each of us is exposed to different parenting styles and disciplinary rules. Some styles may work well for us, but others might work against us. As parents and teachers, we need to understand and work out what is best for our children.
Being overly strict may lead to rebellious children or on the other
hand, could block their spontaneity. On an extreme level, an insensitive
approach while reprimanding children might lead to aggression. Considering
the other extreme, being too permissive is damaging.
Children might do well in having good role models of discipline. We, therefore, need to set an example that they could naturally replicate. Interacting with children, thus making an effort to relate to them, also helps in bridging the gap. When children have a sympathetic ear, they behave more responsibly and also show sensitivity to an adult's needs and requests for discipline.
A combination of a sense of empathy to a child's needs and firmness from the adult's perspective would be ideal in inculcating discipline in a child. Just as indiscipline is a reaction to a provocation, so is discipline a reaction to the right kind of provocation. If we want the required reaction, which is discipline, we need to provoke it by providing the appropriate stimuli. Who knows? We just might end up with well-adjusted, self-disciplined kids. Now wouldn't we all want that?
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