Unlock Trust: My Proven Ways to Improve My Children’s Listening Skills

Getting your child to listen and trust you is very difficult. I managed to win mine’s trust by doing this. Maybe it will help you too.

“Discipline my friends! Discipline! Discipline! Discipline! You need to keep them in order and in check and verify what they do! Always be there to tell them what they did wrong!”, is not what I am about to tell you!

But I might not tell you what you want to hear either.

But first…

Why listen to me?

I have no idea.

I have two children: a 13-year-old boy, and an 8-year-old girl. I get along very nicely with both of them. I am strict and friendly! We play and talk and cry and love!

But why listen to me? I have no particular reason for it. Other than the fact that I am proud of how my kids are and how my relationship with them is. I would suppose this is what all of us want to feel. Pride of ourselves for doing a nice job as parents, right?

What I am going to do is share how I got here. Hopefully, it will help you too!

The trade!

I have a question for you. Have you ever respected a guy after being mean to you? Or a cashier that would rush you with your groceries? Or would you give a tip to an Uber driver whose talks are sexist or hateful? There were, actually, 3 questions 😁 but still, I suppose the answer is no. You would not show any respect to those people. You will, at most, tolerate them.

So as you probably realized, you tend to respect people who respect you back, right?

Respect is something that you trade! Is not something that you just have. You trade respect. You receive respect if you offer respect.

Of course, there will always be people that don’t know how to appreciate respect, or even identify it. They are in a different category from you. You are better than that.

This trade is valid with your children as well! You want their respect, you need to respect them.

And the exact same trade applies to listening. Do you want them to listen to you? You will have to listen to them.

So listen to your children. When they talk to you stop what you are doing bend a little to their height and listen to them. Give them all, and I mean all, of your attention.

If you don’t have time, just tell them that you cannot now, but you will get back to them. And, for the love of God, get back to them. Show them how important they are and how much you respect them. And when you get back to them, offer all of your attention. Listen carefully, be interested, ask questions, listen.

That will teach them how to listen, first of all. And how important they are for you. And that will make them listen to you when you need them to listen. They know how to do it, because they saw it in you, and they respect you enough to offer you the energy because you respect them as much.

Please don’t…

… expect your children to respect you because you are their parent. They don’t even know what respect looks like if you don’t show them.

Would you know how to change the oil of your car if nobody teaches you or would you even know you have to? Image you would have to do all that by yourself with no help. Or, even worse, you would have someone yelling at you from time to time because you did not do something right, but when you ask how you would get a vague and weird answer if you get one in the first place.

This is exactly how it must feel like when you expect your children to respect you when they have never seen or, better yet, experienced respect.

So, show them what respect looks like, give them the chance to experience being respected, to understand why it helps to respect someone.

Respect your children, and they will respect you and the world around them. And once that happens, they will listen.

Keep it short

I remember when I was a child and I was afraid of my parents. I was afraid a lot of them because I got a lot of beating if I did not listen, or I would get bad grades or stuff like that.

But even with all that fear and knowledge of what can happen, I would still get bored of my mother’s looong talks about how I should be and what I should do.

There were times when she would tell me the same idea over and over again, for at least 30 minutes. Sometimes even more. An idea that I have gotten from the start. And I remember she would get so mad if she realized that she lost me. But I could not help it. The topic would get boring as hell in the end.

So please don’t do that.

How is your concentration after 40–50 minutes of a meeting? How about a boring one? Are the messages getting to you?

Imagine that your children are in one of those meetings when they are listening to you. Be conscious about what you say and how you say it. Be as short as possible and ask for feedback. Involve your child in the discussion. Ask stuff like “Do you understand?”, “What do you think about that?”, “How would you like to…?”. Make it a dialogue instead of a monologue.

And, very important, ask them what they understood. Finish your ideas with “Tell me what you got from this!” or “What are you gonna do now?”. This will make them conscious of what they understand. If what they said is what you wanted them to get then that is awesome. If not, try again. But kind and patient.

Be patient! It takes time!

And last, be patient! You know Rome wasn’t built in a day. So is your children’s trust in you and their capacity to listen.

There will be moments when they will be very energetic and will ignore you totally. Be patient and understanding!

There will be moments when they will start listening to you and get lost in the middle of your idea. Patiently grab their attention again.

There will be moments when they have listened to you but in the middle of doing what you asked, they get sidetracked and forget. Patiently and kindly remind them what you asked them to do.

They are kids. There is an entire world out there to explore. Everything is new, everything is interesting. They will get sidetracked, they will get distracted, and they will get bored. So be kind, be understanding, and be patient.

I know…

…what I am saying is hard. You get back from a day of work, your boss might be an arsehole, your colleagues might be mean to you, and your clients might be difficult. You get home, after a full day of someone requesting your patience, and now your children want the same.

I know it is hard! But nobody said being a good parent is easy. And, your children did not choose to be here. You chose for them. That means that you, probably, chose to offer them the patience and the kindness they need.

But, other than that, there are some things that might help. At least there are some things that I do to help me.

First, be honest with your child. Tell them what is happening and why you cannot play, listen, or understand NOW. Tell them that your work is hard and sometimes it is hard for you to be there for them. But put an emphasis on NOW. And get back to them when you feel better. Always get back to them when you feel better.

Second, spend time with them when you have the energy. If you have a day off, or you feel better today, go and play with them. Go and have an interesting discussion about something they are interested in. Use the energy to show them you are there for them. You cannot do it always, but when you can, you do it. Show them they are important. And next time they will want something and you tell them you can’t now, they know that the “now” means “now” and at some point, you will be there for them.

Third, if you can, split the parenthood with your spouse. Remember you are not alone here. Ask your spouse to tag in if you cannot. Tell that to your children as well. “Dear, I am a little tired right now. But Mommy can help you!”. They will understand that you are a team and they can trust any of you!

To get to the first part of the article. Yes, it is about discipline, but your discipline. You need to be disciplined about listening to get your child to listen. Interesting, right?

And that is kinda of it. You do this as best as you can and that is better than most of the parents, and your relationship with your kids will be a lot better. And they will listen and trust you a lot more.

If you liked this article, maybe you will like these ones as well: