What you will discover this week:

• Why horses and kids have the same reaction to pressure
• How to keep your kids from feeling like you're trying to control them
• How to have less lying and more truth from your teen

Transcript for this weeks message:

Hey, I appreciate you taking your time to join me for this week's You Are Destined For Greatness. This week I want to talk about with horses we have a principle where we say that horses learn from the release of pressure.

So, what does that mean? I like to say that they learn from being in their happy place or a place of love. So, here's what that means. What that means is they don't per se learn from pressure, but they learn from a release of pressure. So, I'm going to kind of demonstrate what that means.

And so, this would be prior to adding this pressure, and then showing the horse where the release is to get what I want. I would have established a foundation from the horse. So, with the horse, so what we do is we, in the beginning, we teach the horse to this principle, okay? We teach him, when we teach him how to be caught, how to put a halter on, which is how we lead the horse, how to be led. Everything we do, we've prepared the foundation of this horse. Because today, in my example, with my, with my snaffle bit and my one reign, I'm going to give, just like, demonstrate how this works with a horse who has had the foundation to understand the principle.

So, here's it goes. This, my hand is going to represent his mouth. This snaffle bit is in the horse's mouth, and this is, this is this horse's head, okay? And I am the rider holding onto my one reign in my example. So today what I'm asking, I'm going to ask my horse to do, is I want my horse to bend to my left. I want him to put his head over here. I want him to bend his head over here so that I'm teaching him how to guide, how to follow his nose and guide to the left, or to bend his head and neck this way to do a specific maneuver. Regardless of what it is, whether it's guiding, I'm guiding his feet, or I'm setting him up for a maneuver. In today, all I need him to do is put his head and neck over here, okay? But right now, he's straight. So how do I get him to do that?

Like I said, important, very important, that I have established the foundation of this concept. So, here's how the concept begins. He's, if he's straight and I want him to be straight, I have no pressure in his mouth whatsoever. This is what you call a loose reign. It's like a soft noodle, okay? There's no pressure in it. So, when I want him to put his head over to my left, I'm going to add pressure, just like I am now. I'm adding pressure to my reign.

So now, let's just think about this. What could possibly be going through this horse's head? “This is uncomfortable. Something's different. ”And, what this horse does, he tries to figure out how to stop this discomfort, okay? So, there's some amount, this is also important to know in this, there's some amount of discomfort that's involved because the long-term objective is to be able to do extraordinary things, to do amazing feats and maneuvers and complex, to have total body control over the horse, and to work in unison as a partnership with a willing partner to be able to accomplish amazing things, okay? With little to no pressure, with little to no pressure, okay, that's the end objective.

But, in order to get there, I need to begin by having my horse understand this principle and I need to begin by adding pressure, okay? More than little to no pressure, I'll say 10, 20, 30, 40, 50 pounds of pressure. I'm really pulling on this. So, what's happening now is, is my horse, like I said, is trying to figure out, "Hey, this is uncomfortable. What do I do with this pressure?" He may put his nose up over ‘here.’ And in that case, I would add even more pressure I would pull when he went back, okay? Then he would comeback. Maybe he'll put his head up here, I even add more pressure. He puts his head down; I continue to add pressure or add more pressure.

Now when the horse decides to start coming my way, I immediately let off the pressure. That's the learning point. Okay, so what I mean is the horse doesn't per se learn from the amount of pressure. Okay, the horse learns that when there is pressure, the way to get away from the pressure is to come to the pressure, and that's how he gets away from the pressure. So, and they learn from the release.

So, let's recap what he's learned. And by the way, this takes… he didn't learn that in one time just for the record. So, over a period of time, we will reinforce this in his mind that when his head is straight and the reign is loose, when I add pressure and he comes this way, he stays out of pressure. Okay? And if we're going straight and the loosened, this is where I want him to be because this is loose and his head straight. And if I want his head and neck over to the left, when I add pressure, if he goes away from it, the pressure increases. So therefore, when I add pressure, his head, he comes over here and where there's no pressure. So, over a period of time, we'll get to where we'll be riding straight, I'll just barely out a half a pound of pressure. He can almost anticipate pressure’s coming and he puts his head and neck over here and he has very little or no pressure going on in his mouth. Andhe's happy and I'm happy and this is your happy place because there's nopressure. And we're acting in unison as our partnership, and everything'shappy. So that's how the concept works.

So why am I talking about this today with You Are Destined For Greatness? Here's why. Here's my example of today. We're going to relate this to your teenager, the same concept, which is this. I get a call. Let's see. Your teenager comes home after school, and we're together. I'm the parent with my teen after school. And he or she says, or I say, “Hey, uh, I got a call from the school today and you weren't in two of your classes. What's up?” Can you feel the pressure? Okay, so I've created a little bit of pressure right now. So, what's going on over here in this horse's mouth, being your teen? Okay, what's happening?

Let's just think of all the things that could be happening with this amount of pressure, okay? He could be, “I wonder what I'm going to say now. What's my consequence going to be? Is somebody going to blow up? What should I do?” And so, he's kind of similarly doing what the horse does, trying to figure a way out of this pressure. Because right now it already is kind of looking kind of uncomfortable. We'll say, and then I say, “You better tell me the truth, or there's going to be hell to pay.” All right, I've just seriously increased the pressure. So, what am I going to do now?

 What's he going to do? He's over here like, "Oh man, there's serious pressure here. What's happening?" So, he says, "I don't know. They must have made a mistake. I was in class all day.” I release pressure. “Really? Okay. All right then.” Pressure immediately came off. If I don't follow up on that and I end up believing that I may have taught my kid that if he lies, that's the way out of the problem, okay?

And let me just say this about horses. Whether I get the desired result that I was asking for, or the horse does something completely opposite, when I release pressure that horse believes that that's the answer regardless of it's the desired result. When you hear about horses that rear up and horses that flip over backwards and hurt people and stuff like that, they've learned that from having the pressure released at the wrong time, okay?

So, horses can learn good, we can get our desired result. They can learn good behavior. They can just as easily or quickly, and it takes along time to heal or to recover from and to change, they learn bad behavior.

Let's come back to your son or daughter, okay? So, let's just think about that. You're in a position where you're asking a question. You expect and want the truth because you expect your kid should want to tell the truth to you all the time, right? Yet at the same time, at the other end of this is either punishment or discipline and it's not looking too good. Lying seems like the answer to get the, may seem like the answer to get away from the pressure, right? If I lie and you don't find out, the pressure's off and I get to go along my way in a peaceful way. But that doesn't make very good sense, and that doesn't, it probably doesn't feel good.

Your son or daughter's got something rolling around the back of their head, their conscience is saying, “This is not good, I got out of pressure but their conscious is not good. And you know that this is not good for them long-term.” Right? So, what's the other alternative? Okay, “Hey, the school called today, and they said you weren't in two in your classes.” “Well, me and my friend were sluffing and we went and did XYZ.” Okay, and you say, “That's bullshit. You shouldn't have left school,” and you know, and then there's a big punishment that comes along with this. And there's a big struggle, and there's more pressure and more pressure. That doesn't necessarily encourage them to be telling the truth, right?

So, what is the answer? A lie isn't the answer, and telling the truth with increased pressure isn't the answer. So, how do we find this place of love, this cooperation, this partnership that we're looking for? And let me tell you something, it's not always a perfect world, okay? But here's what I suggest - First of all, that you lay a solid foundation. What that means is you may want to go as far as involving your teen in the decision, but there's high communication in the beginning. There is high communication that your teen's involved in. And that your teen knows that I'm not gonna punish you, but there is gonna be a consequence. It's either gonna be a natural consequence of your reaction, or there's gonna be a consequence where we're gonna have to make restitution. Or, there's gonna be some form of restriction or something. There is a consequence. There's going to be a consequence when certain rules are broken, okay?

I think kids understand better if they don't believe that you're trying to control them. If they understand what you're trying to achieve, if they truly understand and they believe to the extent that they can, okay? That you're for their best interest, and this agreement that you're getting with them, this agreement that if you do this then there is this consequence. And you get an agreement that they understand, they accept that. Do you agree with that? Can you see why I'm making this consequence, and do you understand where I'm coming from? And then it needs to come from a place of love.

So, first of all, I've laid the foundation, and I've got the agreement. The next thing is, the next part that's super important is, is where we're coming from, okay? So, me as the parent is the leader in this situation. Do I have my head and my mind and my soul in the right place? Okay, because punishment, you know should… What did they say in the count the Monte Cristo, you know, “Vengeance is for God,” right? And punishment is probably, should also be left alone. Which is there's a difference.

Discipline, a consequence for discipline is different than punishment. Punishment more implies that you're not adhering to my will, and so you're going to suffer for it. Where discipline more means that we have an agreement and that these are the rules, or these are the guidelines, and we've talked about this you've agreed to it and you understand. And, you know, I'm coming from a place of love and, you know, that this truly and it needs to truly be for your best interest not because it's just what I want you to do. It's not good enough and kids know that.

So with that, when I come to you, okay, when I come to you and say, “Hey, the school called is everything okay because they said they weren't there?” I need to be adding like two pounds of pressure, not like, hey, brace yourself already. And I need to have my feelings and my inside as a parent under control, okay, to where I'm not operating on any anger or any emotion or any of that.

In this example, if we've done this and we have a track record of our kid of showing that we care, showing that we have control over our emotions most of the time, that we have a decent track record. And if they believe us, then we can add very little amount of pressure, chances are we're going to get the truth. Let's say in this example that we get the truth, okay? If we get the truth, then maybe we can right there find the place of love. So, what I mean by that is, maybe I can say, “Hey, come here.” Maybe I can put my arm around you, and maybe I can show you in that moment that, you know, “I wish you wouldn't have done that because now you've got to do the consequence, and I feel for you.” We can love them; we can normalize it. We can make them feel that it's okay, but we can't let the consequence go and not do it, okay?

So, in order, because what this represents, my horse putting his head over to here, to the left like I was asking him to do. In this situation, when my child comes with me this way and tells the truth regardless of what they've done, what I'm creating is a good citizen. What I'm creating is a more empowered future.

What I'm creating is a more emotionally developed child, okay? Rather than me lashing out and adding pressure, 'cause it doesn't work with horses, and it doesn't work with people.

Hope that makes some sense and there's some takeaways fo ryou. Remember, you cannot fail as long as you Don't Ever Stop Chasing It, You Are Destined For Greatness.

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