ScreamFree Articles

It has been six months since our book release. We have 10's of thousands of book sales. We have pages of 5-star reviews on Amazon.com; myriad positive comments from the media and publishing worlds; we’ve been invited back to be on great shows like the Bob and Sheri Radio Show. Perhaps most rewarding, and humbling, we have thousands of emails, web downloads and comments, and feedback from real parents about how ScreamFree is "Revolutionary", or "Changing everything for the better”, or “It’s like putting glasses on…it’s so clear now.” We are so grateful, and honored to have all that. Yet at our booth at a recent fall festival, we were stirred, even mortified by hearing one woman in passing proclaim to a prospective customer…“That ScreamFree stuff doesn’t work.”

Sometimes, in an effort to show a mature, rise-above-criticism sort of attitude, people will proudly proclaim, “I don’t care what other people think.” Pro athletes defending their end zone antics, teenagers declaring their immunity to peer pressure, even fragile-ego’d authors deflecting the occasional drive-by criticism (like the one above). What they (we) are trying to protest is that no matter the response, “I’m still gonna do what I’m gonna do.”

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But know one thing for sure. Whenever you hear someone say, “I don’t care what other people think,” they’re lying.

Of course we care what other people think. Of course we do, because we’re in constant relationship with everyone around us. If someone truly didn’t care what type of response their actions created, then they wouldn’t be a cool cat worth admiring, they’d be a sociopath worth fearing.

The truth is, we care deeply about people’s responses to us. And we should. People’s responses to us are what make relationships two-sided, what makes them reciprocal. People’s responses are what help to form priceless feedback loops, where we can learn about our impact on others around us, and learn countless, priceless lessons of wisdom, and to grow. Even those who proclaim they don’t care what other people think know this, because they care very deeply that you think they’re above what other people think—why else would they go out of their way to proclaim it?

In truth, those people, like most of us, fall on the other end of the spectrum from the sociopath. We care too much what other people think. We constantly care about the responses around us. That’s what we live for. That’s what motivates us to do everything we do—trying to get a particular response from those around us. Especially those closest to us.

Take, for instance, this past weekend. After five years of promises (and one year of my son’s begging), I finally bought a basketball goal for the driveway. I had no idea how much construction time this purchase would involve, but now I’m glad that I got to spend nine wonderful building hours with my 6-year-old son, Brandon. We examined the directions together, wrenched the bolts together, and even called each other “sir” the whole time. It was very cool.

We finished as dusk approached on Sunday night, so our playing daylight was limited. But we did play. We celebrated accomplishing achieving our “goal” with several neighborhood kids, all shooting (and mostly missing) with exuberance. As I watched my son’s pure joy, I reflected on our weekend together—man, I love just spending time with that kid. As I then stopped playing and began picking up all our tools, I realized that the least of what we had built that weekend was this basketball goal.

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That was when I felt the pounding on my head—my adorable, maturing son had just rifled his basketball at my head.

“YOU SAID WE WOULD PLAY FOR A LONG TIME!!!” he whined through ungrateful tears.

How quickly the cherished moments can pass. This was not the response I expected. How dare he? I thought. Well, that’s it! He’s gonna learn what a long time is…in his room! In a dungeon! Without food or water!!

I was, needless to say, angry. And hurt. This was not the response I expected.

That’s probably what the woman who issued the critique above had experienced. And that’s what’s behind the question I receive all the time, whether ScreamFree Parenting “works.” That’s the question I most often receive when people begin to seriously inquire about our program: Ok, this all sounds great, but does it work?

And I always have to be careful in my response, because I don’t really know their definition of success. Most of the time, the definition of a “successful” parenting program is whether it gets your kids to behave the way you want them to. But, as anyone familiar with the ScreamFree philosophy could guess, that only serves to further the problem, that parents are too focused on their kids’ behavior in the first place. Kids have a mind of their own, and ScreamFree parents celebrate that, rather than try to squash their children’s spirit or strong will.

But so many parents are in such anxiety-filled patterns with their kids that they don’t want to hear that. They want a program that will guarantee success, guarantee that their children will behave, and do it quickly. That’s what the woman was saying. That’s what I was feeling when I so wanted my son to appreciate me and our time together.

But the truth is that ScreamFree Parenting does not “work” that way. It does not guarantee anything about your kids’ responses because it is not about your kids’ responses. It’s about your own. Choosing to focus more on your responses than your kids’ does work, but only according to a different definition of success. It works very well when your definition of success is how well you are able to yourself, act the way you want to, regardless of your kids’ behavior. The beautiful thing is that this gives you the best chance to be a Calming Authority in your home—not to control them, but to be a positive influence on them.

Whenever we need a particular response from our kids, it actually decreases the chances of getting that response. This is because whenever we’re more concerned about their response than our own, it comes across as manipulative and controlling. And this actually serves as an invitation for them to defy us, just so they can retain their individuality.

So here’s our challenge: to care deeply about people’s responses to us, and yet to care more about our own responses to them. That’s what it means to act with integrity. That’s what creates great relationships.

And quite often, such an approach does “work.” Occasionally, after an amazing amount of hard work to act with integrity and care more about our own growing process than about the results of that growth, we actually get the results we crave.

Now, as for my son, he gets to taste the price of a lack of integrity. In caring more about getting the response he wanted (me to play longer with him) than about how he behaved, he gets to experience the consequence of losing his basketball for two days. As a journeying ScreamFree Parent, I was able to calmly inform my son of the consequences, enforce them, and move on. My memory of the day is not about how he may have misbehaved, or how he didn’t respond entirely as I may have wanted him to—no, my fond, cherished memory was about our wonderful relationship building Sunday afternoon that we shared together. And I look forward with delight getting back out on the court with him again.

Now, if only I could find that woman who didn’t like ScreamFree, I know I could convince her otherwise…I know I could change her response to…