Respect Without The Power Struggle: Practical Ways to Teach Respect At Home.

The fastest way to lose a relationship with your kid is to treat disrespect like a fight you have to win. We’d rather treat it like a skill that can be taught, practiced, and repaired, especially when emotions run hot and everyone’s patience is thin.

We dig into the most practical building blocks of teaching respect at home: modeling what we want to see, creating small daily rituals, and showing kids how to treat people well in real situations like restaurants, school frustrations, and family routines. We also get specific about consistency, because a “no” that turns into a “yes” after enough whining trains the exact behavior you’re trying to stop. You’ll hear how “let me think about it” and the “yes when” approach can reduce power struggles while still keeping strong boundaries and teaching time and place.

 Finally, we unpack what to do when disrespect is intense or out of character, using trauma-informed curiosity and emotional regulation tools like stop, breathe, choose. Sometimes the blowup isn’t about you at all, and staying calm is what helps a child find that insight.

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Transcript

Welcome And The Big Question

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Welcome to Brain-Based Parenting, the Boys Ranch podcast for families. We all know how hard being a parent is, and sometimes it feels like there are no good answers to the difficult questions families have when their kids are struggling. Our goal each week will be to try and answer some of those tough questions, utilizing the knowledge, experience, and professional training Cal Farley's Boys Ranch has to offer. Now here is your host, Cal Farley Staff Development Coordinator, Joshua Sprock.

Modeling Respect In Daily Life

SPEAKER_03 0:30

Welcome. Today we're going to talk about one of the constant parenting struggles, teaching respect and how to handle disrespect. So what might be some practical everyday ways parents can teach and model respect in the home?

SPEAKER_04 0:40

Well, I I taught a lot with rituals, you know, the way we the way we do things, the way we talk to others. You know, I, you know, I still remember teaching my kids how to introduce themselves, right? I learned a lot from my grandparents about, you know, going to church. The only reason I know how to dress, act, and talk and when to be quiet or not is that people told me, right? People told me. And they didn't just tell me it. I was seeing them do it. Right. So that's really important that every day. If I don't want my kids to use curse language, I should not be cursing in just general conversation, right? Because then they think it's okay or they can't tell the difference, or I'm a hypocrite, or whatever the kid thinks, especially your teenagers, right? They see everything you do. And so, right, modeling, I think, is important.

SPEAKER_02 1:17

You know, they they say that one of the best measures of another person is how do they treat weight staff in a restaurant. So when you go out to a restaurant or even in fast food, how do you how do you talk to the person who's taking your order? How do you treat them? How do you talk about them once they've walked away from the table? Right. Right? Because there's there is no interaction you're having in front of your kids that your kids are not paying attention to that.

SPEAKER_04 1:43

That's that's a really cool thing. You know, this actually happened to me when I, you know, when I was a young, older teen, you know, and I'd go eat at a restaurant. If you drop something on the floor, my thought then was, hey, there's somebody here that gets paid to pick that up. Ironically, a couple of years later, that's me. I'm the guy cleaning up after all the people who who put their babies and their babies make a mess all over the floor, or drop the fries. And yeah, I'm the guy. So, you know, I guess what I'm saying is maybe there's some teachable moments for kids that because we had to learn I had to learn that humility the hard way, right? When I could I could just my point I was able to teach that to my kids. So when we made mistakes as diners, yeah, I could say, hey, it's really important we pick that up. I understand that we spill water, I gotta go ask for something, but I'm willing to help clean the mess because I'm the one that dropped the water or whatever it was, right? And so they get to see the way I act towards that's a really good example, towards servers who literally get paid to serve you.

SPEAKER_02 2:36

And if I come home and I've had a bad day at work and I am bad mouthing my boss, which I would never do since he is present with me here in the street. But um, you know, but people do that, right? We we have a bad day at work, we go home, we're grumbling and complaining, and then the kids come home and say, Oh, my teacher said this, oh, I'm mad at my principal, blah, blah, blah. Is that not the same interaction? Right. And so, how do we how do we model problem solving and how do we handle our frustrations? Because we are directly telling kids, hey, this is how you do it.

SPEAKER_00 3:07

Yeah, they catch more than they're taught.

SPEAKER_02 3:08

Yes, yes.

SPEAKER_00 3:09

I think other ways we model respect, kind of off of what Sam said, is when we go somewhere and we pick up trash out of the field that isn't ours. Yeah. When we talk about, hey, you know, we borrowed granddad's car and we're taking it back to him, but we clean it out before we we do that.

SPEAKER_02 3:25

Or fill up the gas tank.

SPEAKER_00 3:26

You fill up the gas tank. One of the things that we've been working on really hard, even in our own cars, is okay, when you get out of the car, you get all your stuff. Don't I don't want to be cleaning up the mess you made in that backseat. Right. Don't leave your French fries in the backseat, no. But what we're teaching there also is a you've you've got to take care of things. The way you treat other people's things or even your own things shows kind of those levels of respect. And that's important. That's important. It's it's in those small things that we tell kids a lot.

Consistency And The Yes When

SPEAKER_03 3:52

All right. So, how important is consistency making sure our yes means yes and our known means no, and building a culture of respect?

SPEAKER_02 3:58

You know, when my kids were young, I found myself automatically saying no. And and I think that it's important that you don't that you don't do that and then reverse that, right? If you automatically say no and then the kids whine you down, right? And then you turn that into a yes, what you're doing is reinforcing their behavior to repeatedly ask her to wine to get the, you know, and so what I had to do was train myself to say, give me a moment and let me think about it, right? And then really consider is this a yes moment or does it really need to be a no? And I think that as adults, sometimes no just seems easier, but that we we are better served and our kids are better served when we look for opportunities to give yeses, right? As as often as possible, can we give a yes in in that moment? And I think I think that helps us consistently communicate to our kids, which is respectful.

SPEAKER_00 4:51

I think so. And going off what you said, I'm a big fan of the yes win. That real old school TBRI, instead of it being a no, yes, when. And that two things happen there. One, we're setting a kind of parameter of on ourselves not always throwing a no, like Suzanne mentioned, but yes win also reinforces what we've been kind of talking in the background about this the whole way with respect and different other things. There are things that are appropriate at certain times. Yes, and this is appropriate when. Yes, when this has happened, or yes, after we do this, or yes, when we're at the ballgame, you can run around and scream and yell all you want because that's what you do at a ball game, not in the living room. And I think yes when is teaches so much about respect because it teaches you the proper time and the proper place for certain things. Yes, you can be loud when we're not in church. As soon as it's over, we can go outside. We'll sit outside at Rosa's, and you can be a little bit rowdier. Right. The yes when is huge, but we're teaching also that culture of respect. When is the appropriate time and place for all things? All things have a t an appropriate time and place. Is this it? No, but here it will be okay.

SPEAKER_02 5:55

Many years ago, we had a a senior girl here uh on our campus. She lived here more than just her senior year, but she was funny and she was sarcastic. And she just, you know, we probably let her get away with quite a bit of humor. We might should have called her on, right? But she had lived on our campus for years. We knew her well, right? And that was her personality. And and again, man, she was funny. She left here and went to a very large university to our detriment. We really hadn't taught her when was appropriate for that. And so she goes to a large university, and her professors um didn't think her humor was funny.

SPEAKER_05 6:31

Oh no.

SPEAKER_02 6:32

And they thought she was being rude and disrespectful. And that first semester for her in that setting was rough. And she did not do well, and in fact, she didn't continue to go there. And I and I thought we we blew it, we missed our opportunity to teach her. When is that appropriate? What relationship is necessary for you to be able to use that humor, and when is that not an appropriate setting? Right. And so I think that's another example of what you've described.

SPEAKER_04 7:01

Yeah, I also think, you know, when you create an inconsistent environment, like if you don't, if you say no and don't mean it, that that really creates some confusion for the child, you know. And and I really like what you guys are saying because we're we really gotta be so in other words, we gotta be a little more intentional. Like, so yeah, buy yourself some time, think through it before say yet yes or no. Because sometimes I say no and I kind of want to say yes, but I can't right now, like Danny just say yes, but right, or sometimes I say yes and then something happens that's out of my control, and now I gotta change it. And what I don't want them to know is that I'm inconsistent, especially intentionally, right? Because I don't want them to be sometimes I can't be negotiated with, right? There's certain things that I'm gonna say that I mean it, like hey, but I need them to be clear that when I say no, I mean no. And when I say yes, I'm gonna do everything in my power to make that happen. If that changes, here's the why. So I always used to tell my kids, hey, let me think about it or we'll see. I'd love to do that, but I gotta make sure this pans out here. Well, for my personal kids, it was a lot easier than when I was taking care of 10 little girls in placement, right? You know, you get tons of requests with 10 little girls. But with my two kids, it's pretty simple. I knew them, they knew me. I I think my kids pretty much knew, hey, dad's gonna do what dad says, and definitely mom is, you know. Uh, you know, and and that just builds a level of trust. So I could say, hey, no, we we can't right now, or I don't have the money to buy that right now, or for whatever it is, the reason. I also think it's pretty respectful to give them the reason why I say no. Hey, there's a real good reason why I'm gonna tell you no right now, right? And here's why. And yeah, they seem to get it. And we have this kind of maybe a cooperative relationship. Hey, when I can, I'll buy you the video game or whatever, or whatever the request is, right?

SPEAKER_00 8:31

I think that's important. And I think when I think back to when I house parenting is different than your own kids sometimes, and sometimes it's not. And one of the things I used to say when I was a house parent a lot was, and it was my default, I would say, I gotta think about it. And one day one of the boys, I caught one of the older boys catching the younger ones. The younger one came up and asked me about something. I said, Let me think about it. And that was my thing walked off. Then I caught the and the younger boy was gonna follow me and ask again, like in the next five minutes. And the older boy caught him and he looked at him. He's like, Look, you need to figure out how Danny operates. If he says, I'm gonna think about it, and we don't ask 9,000 times between here and there, he's more likely to say yes. He's really gonna go think about it. Just give him some space. If you annoy him, we're gonna get a no here, bud. But what I've learned is they had started to learn kind of that respectful whatever, but they had also learned that I was really gonna go think about it. And if I could find a way to say yes, I would.

Co-Parenting Without Undermining

SPEAKER_04 9:19

Sometimes you got two different parents or two different caregivers. And if they're not consistent either with each other, right, then the kids figure out how to work that system, right? You're not an inconsistent team, for example, right?

SPEAKER_00 9:29

And and that sets up disrespect issues when one parent undermines the other one.

SPEAKER_04 9:34

Yes, right?

SPEAKER_00 9:35

And our kids have figured out that we want to undermine each other. So what they do is we go to the person that's more likely to give us the yes, which I can live with. Because once once the yes is given, I'm not gonna override the yes, unless it's like a safety issue or it's just not something that can happen. Absolutely. Or they went with something with different information, and you know, as parents, you got to discuss that. Sure. But if you if they know you don't override each other, then they figure, you know, where's the balance? Who do I ask for what? But we do that as adults. That's you know, you figure out how to work that. But when when we override each other or we undermine each other, we create unintentionally disrespectful environments because they lose respect for the other adult. You're taking the other adult's power away.

Tone And Body Language Matter

SPEAKER_03 10:11

So, how does tone, body language, and the and the way kids speak play into teaching respect, not just their actions?

SPEAKER_02 10:17

Oh, I can remember my oldest went through this stage where she would say something snarky and then just go, JK, just just kidding, just kidding. That that does not pacify what you just said. Like that is not how you you don't say something rude and then think you can get away with it by saying that you're just joking. And so that was that was a long conversation over the course of months, right? Where we had to talk about how could you how could you express what you wanted to say in a more respectful manner, right? And so I think I think you do have to address it. We also went through a stage where she would, if you said something she didn't like, she'd give you a smirk. And I was like, boy, there was a time in the early teen years where that was really, that was really rough. So, you know, another Karen Pervis response is like playful redirection. And so one day she gives me a smirk and I look at my husband and I said, I got one. And and they both kind of look, you know, questioningly, and I said, I bet I can get more than you can today. And so then my husband and I would see if we couldn't get one of those looks out of her, right? You know, and so like later in the day, I'm like, three, I've got three. What number are you? You know, well then of course she didn't want to do it because she didn't like the fact that we were enjoying it. And we eliminated that behavior pretty quickly, right? But not by saying, You have to stop doing that. It was just something playful. It worked pretty well, and that was, you know, there was nothing disrespectful coming out of her mouth, but it was just that look on her face. And so I I do think you have to address things like that, but know that you can address them playfully.

SPEAKER_00 11:48

Playful engagement is huge. Yeah. I also like that kind of the especially when they said the right thing, but they said it the wrong way. Is try that again with respect. That's one of my favorites. Yeah. Your words are with the right words, kiddo. Say it a little bit different. Let's change the tone a little bit. And I think especially when we're talking about kids in care, they don't always know when that tone's not right. Or when they're adolescents and they're an adolescent brain. They use the right words. And they're not always completely aware of their tone and their body language. And so we have to call it out and tell them this is why, but the words are perfect. Let's try it again.

SPEAKER_02 12:20

We also know the concept of right notion, wrong motion from life space crisis intervention, right? Yeah. Where kids, you know, they have the right mindset, but they go about it in the completely wrong way. And so that requires us as adults to be curious, right? If they if they mouth off and say something and we assume bad intent, then we immediately kick into consequence mode. Right. And sometimes we need to say, hey, when you said that, what were you thinking? Right. And and then how do you think that sounded? What else, what else, what could you do differently? What how what's another way you could say that that sounds more respectful?

SPEAKER_00 12:55

And I think the key to it too is the adults, we have to be aware of our own time.

SPEAKER_02 12:59

Oh, a hundred percent.

SPEAKER_00 13:00

Because is the way that we say that, the what were you thinking, that if we are not modulating our tone, we're setting up a problem. And I love the the LSCI be curious thing. I love to be curious. Like, what were you trying to get out of this? Okay, let me teach you how to get it the right way. The the intent was good.

SPEAKER_04 13:16

I also think the timing of when you're trying to teach is important and the moment is so difficult. Especially if I if I were to read direct the kid immediately. Say that again nice. Sometimes I'll with a relationship, I I'll get a yeah, sorry, dad, or whatever. But on a bad day, that's not the time to stop and make them do it again. Yeah. Maybe they need a minute. We both calm down and we come talk about it. You know, it's like a little after action review. How do so, how did that go? How did you feel? And then we talk about hey, now we have to model it. I like that you went to do it. What I don't like is the sarcasm you use on your way to do it. Can we just cut that part out, right? Can we because I want to teach them, right? Um, about how to act as an adult. That was one of the thoughts I had because I, you know, yeah, some people want to stand toe-to-toe with a kid right then and there and make that behavior change right now. But I'm not modeling respect if I'm doing that, right? So sometimes you gotta, like I said earlier, it doesn't mean you're weak when you don't address it, because your plan is to address it and probably as soon as you can. But we gotta be smart about the when do I address it and how do I teach a kid? How does my kids learn best? Is it better that I just sit side by side with them? Do we like to go on a ride or take a walk together or sit at the table? But and also do that privately, not in front of the whole family.

SPEAKER_05 14:20

Yes, right?

SPEAKER_04 14:21

Because right, my son and daughter are completely different people. How I handled my daughter is not how I handle my son. And how the each of the parents handled each of those two kids too was unique, right? So I could pull my kids aside and do it one way. My wife had to do it a different. Oh, that makes sense.

Responding To Open Disrespect

SPEAKER_03 14:36

So when a child is being openly disrespectful, what's the best way for a parent to respond in the moment?

SPEAKER_02 14:41

Once again, care and purpose. Hey, could you try that again with respect? You're you're not demeaning them, you're not grappling at them, you're just saying, hey, right, that's that's not okay. Could you try it again with respect?

SPEAKER_00 14:52

I think the first step in open, disrespectful with kids is to take a beat. Right. Let's just throw all the modalities in there. So the EQ2 stop, breathe, choose. As soon as they said the thing and I feel, I feel my face get hot. That's when I gotta stop, take a breath. Because it's in that moment, you'll take it the wrong way. So the first thing is stop, take a breath, get yourself in your cortex. If you're not in your cortex, you're gonna take a breath. Then you take it, you know, then you choose your good cool thought, your good move. Hopefully, you thought about before right now. The most important thing is sometimes not to respond too fast. Because the thing that comes off my tongue fast is probably not the right one. And I've even had times where there's that open, disrespectful moment, and I stop it down. I'm like, whoa, I'm gonna need a moment for that one. Why don't you go off? Come back to me again with that. Because right now. And you can stop a moment down because where we get, sometimes as parents, it's almost like you're you're at an auction and you feel like you got to fill the next bid in. They threw a bid and now you gotta top that bid. Well, no, you don't. And what in the world, unless this is a safety decision moment, wherever, what makes us think we have to respond right now? And sometimes for our kids, the best response is not to respond right now. Yeah. The understanding that there's gonna be a talk and it's gonna come later, and having that moment. And also it's okay to if you can't get that real then, if you still feel hot, if you still feel angry, and that's the response that you've got is to come back in extreme anger, is to say to the kid, look, you're angry and now I'm angry. And if we're both angry, this doesn't end well for either of us. We're both gonna take a moment. And and you gotta do that. And and we think that, oh, well, that takes so long. But the truth is once we locked up angry both of us, and we both get disrespectful, that takes longer than us taking a moment and both cooling off. And we end up with more way more stressed and way more angry and way more resentful. And we do like we make a massive withdrawal from the piggy make. And that's and that's where, you know, when I think about times where I would have done that different with the kid, generally it's right there. It was openly disrespectful in that moment. I felt threatened, I got angry, I got out of my cortex, and it devolved. And that's one of the things, and that's an important thing to teach kids about respect is when is it in our southworth? Do we have to immediately respond? Do I have to respond to that right now? And do I end up losing more face in the end by responding immediately? Does it hurt me in the long run? All the time on TV, right? People get hot and then they get mad at each other, then it goes back and forth, and it makes great TV. But you have respect for those people.

SPEAKER_04 17:00

You know, one of the coolest moments is when you have an interaction like that with a youth and they come back to you and say, Hey, I didn't act right. It's pretty rare, but it when that happens, right? You know something went right in their world, right? That there's some trust and some balance there with your relationships. They can come and say, Hey, I'm sorry I didn't act right there. I was mad. I get it, you know. And then how I respond to that kid at that moment makes a makes a big difference, you know. When I'm when I'm redirecting re disrespect, which is we've all can acknowledge that's very difficult. It's a hard thing to endure in the moment. But I really I w I wanna it's not for me, it's not about winning that battle right now. It's about keeping a relationship with a kiddo, especially in one of my kiddos, right? I I always remember, is this is this the is this the hill I'm gonna die on, right? Is this is this worth this fight that I could lose relationship with my daughter or my son when I can just take a minute and and maybe just let's talk about it and reach some kind of agreement. Especially if you got teens, you know, there there are teens can't be reasonable if they're calm, right? You know, uh they're young adults, and then in fact that's our goal is to teach them how to navigate these moments because they're gonna have plenty of it, plenty of practice in future. So why not use the moment that we have that organically got created to use it as a as a teaching tool, not just for them, but for me and those around me. I don't want to lose relationship with a kid over just a snarky face or a snarky remark when I could just address it when we're when we can talk.

Curiosity Trauma And The Real Trigger

SPEAKER_03 18:20

Y'all have talked about curiosity. I was thinking about this, like a lot of times kids will come home and they'll be super disrespectful to you, and it's not in their normal character, not how they normally are. And a lot of times what's going on, I think, is there something happened at school, teacher, friend, something bad happened, and they held it together at school, but then when they get home, they unleash on you that safe, safe person. So LSCI, that's a red flag intervention. And I think the best thing to do is just let that drain them off, listen to them. And then if you can stay calm and get to the point where they get to that insight that they're not mad at you, they're mad at someone else and ask them, is that fair? Most of the time they can get that insight, right? But if you get disrespectful of them, counteraggressive when they're acting out on you, then they will feel justified in their disrespect and it will escalate even more. So um, I think it's so important to be curious when kids come home from school and drain them off, have a time to let them vent their frustrations.

SPEAKER_00 19:10

And in a similar vent, you know, I used this example before in the training we had when we did our you know child care conference in the fall. When you have a response that's at the top to something you did that was small, there's something in that gap. And is it trauma? Is it something else going on? And I can remember some of the most disrespectful situations I got into with one particular teen girl we worked with in a high-level environment. And I remember one time she lit me up real good and it was really disrespectful. I remember the other staff checked in, she's like, Are you okay? I was like, No, I'm fine. I was like, Did you not hear three sentences in? She started talking about dad. She's not mad at me. She's mad at dad. I've read her file. I'd be mad at dad too. You know, and so, but when it allowed me, the the first part was I had to stay calm and get past, realize this level of nonsense is not about me and not about what I just did because it doesn't line up. There's something else in there. But then it let me sit down and I actually thought through, okay, this will happen again probably this week. Next time this kid sees me, it's gonna happen again. She's getting to my face, the cussing will start quick. How am I gonna respond? Yeah, I had to think through that. And so the next time she came in, and it was pretty quick, it was two or three days later, she crossed the house to get up in my face and start cussing. And she was funny thing, the kid was she was as tall as I was. So it was, it was got up in my face and it just started and it was during COVID. And I was wearing my coach, we were wearing masks. And she got up in her face and probably she starts cursing, and then she mentions dad first in it. And I just put up my hand and I said, Hold on, kiddo, look at me right now. What about me? Makes you think of dad. But I couldn't have done that and handled her emotion in that moment if I hadn't sat back and thought through this will come again. How am I gonna handle that in a respectful way? And then she looked at me and she said, It's your blue eyes. And when I see that mask, I don't see you. I say, My dad's blue eyes. And then, of course, then I take my mask off, which was breaking all the COVID rules, but she needed it. And I said, All right. I was like, and I looked at her, I said, I read your file, I'd cuss at dad too. Do you need to cuss at dad right now? She looked at me, just like, you're serious. I was like, No, no, no. Time, place for things that are appropriate. I prefer us not to cuss in front of everybody. But if right now, this is where your emotion is with dad, with everything that's gone down. If you need that, me and you and Miss Caitlin will go over to my office and I'll let you light up, Dad, because you and I both know at this point it's not about me. You're not being disrespectful of me. You're rightfully angry with your father. If you need to get this out, let's go do it. Let's go do it. And of course, immediately she starts crying and she says to me, Well, that's not really fair to you. And I said, Well, I know. I said, But I'm tougher and you're hurt. Let's go over it. Do you need that? And she was like, No. She said, And she said, But I needed this. And I said, Well, you got it. And I'm here, and I'll ride this out with you. But from here out, we both know when you come cussing at me, you're really cussing at dad. And she said, What if it's really something you did? And I smiled at so I was like, It's still dad. And she laughed. And we had a moment, but I think it's in those moments when we contain ourselves. So, what happens at that point? We're set up to empty the piggy bank, the two of us. And she was emptying the piggy bank with me. Like, as as parents, we can't completely weather that. And so we have to plan that next moment. We have to think through that next moment, because it's gonna come. Like, okay, your kid came in and said the thing today that you can't handle whatever it was. It's gonna happen again tomorrow. You have to plan how that's gonna go. And if you don't think through it before that moment happens again, you guys are. Stuck in a reenactment cycle, you're never gonna get out of. But how we engage that in relationship, and that was the important, that doesn't work with that kid if she doesn't know that I like her. If she doesn't know that I care about her, if she doesn't know I have her well-being in the moment, I can't make that intervention. And it goes back to that connect

Reviews Resources And Closing

SPEAKER_00 22:15

before you correct.

SPEAKER_03 22:15

All right, so if you could give this podcast a five-star review and tell all your friends how wonderful this podcast is, you would earn my highest level of respect. Until next time, you might have to loan out your cortex today. Just make sure you remember and get it back.

SPEAKER_01 22:28

Thank you for listening to Brain Based Parenting. We hope you enjoyed this show. If you would like more information about CalFarley's Boys Ranch, are interested in employment, would like information about placing your child, or would like to help us help children by donating to our mission, please visit calfarley.org. You can find us on all social media platforms by searching for Cal Farley's. Thank you for spending your time with us and have a blessed day.