"If I were to say anything at all about parenting it is that we put way too much importance on what we say. We think that by telling people things that that will somehow connect and get inside. My observation is that the role of a parent includes talking and telling but it extends beyond that to inviting a child to act in accordance with truth. And only when the child acts in accordance with the truth that has been explained or taught can the child come to know for himself or herself the truthfulness of what they have heard and what they are doing. "For ye receive no witness, until after the trial of your faith."
I am going to describe an episode with one of our sons that will sound terribly disrespectful, but given the closeness and the love it wasn't disrespectful. One of our sons did something and I was going off on him. He very appropriately said, 'Dad. I've heard this speech a lot of times, and you have about twelve of them. All three of us (boys) know all twelve of your speeches. And we know what to do for you to give us one of the speeches. So lets just make a deal, we'll number them one through twelve, and we promise that if we do something wrong instead of you taking the time to do the speech - just say 'seven' because we know what speech number seven is and we promise that we will give it to ourselves because we know it as well as you do. It saves you time, it saves us time and it gets the same result.'
Now that sounds so disrespectful, but they were right. Parents think that if I... give them this lecture its gonna do some good. It really doesn't. Its only when in that process of communicating love and working with a child that you help them act in accordance with truth that they get it for themselves. It moves from their head to their heart."
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