I asked a question today on social media about punishment and nobody answered. I think it’s interesting that people ignore my questions when they are a bit harder and answer when my input or question is pretty simple and staight forward.
This just shows me that we are not there yet to openly and honestly show ourselves with our ‘sunny’ and our dark sides.
I don’t believe for a second that nobody that saw that post punishes themselves. It could be that many people don’t even see bad self talk as punishing themselves and I want to explain a little more what my opinion is about punishment.
When we talk bad to ourselves we are not doing us a favor. It is a punishment to think, I will do another round of pushups today because today I feel so fat. This is a thought I had yesterday. So, if I had done this extra round, I would have punished myself and I would have thought bad about my body which in itself is not loving at all.
I did answer this voice in my head with compassion and then told it to shut up. I told my body that I loved it and didn’t buy into this punishment and didn’t do it.
In my opinion, if you want to love unconditionally, you can’t buy into the concept of punishment. You can’t punish yourself, nor can you punish your children, your spouse, your parents, anyone!
And another step back is that you can’t love anybody else unconditionally when you don’t give this same unconditional love to yourself. You can’t give something to others that you don’t have for your self.
Understanding this is a big stretch, I know. It took me years, but i am now at this point where I totally understand and am sure of it to be true.
I am sorry, but this means for a lot of people out there that they do not love their kids unconditionally, although they would never want anything different for their kids.
If you think that you do your child a favor by punishing it for whatever behavior, you condition your child. You are loving your child conditionally. Which means that you are only loving him/her if he/she meets your expectations/conditions.
This will teach your child two things. Firstly, he/she will develop this inner voice that will make him/her punish himself/herself. And secondly, he/she will have expectations for other kids, people, friends,… and punish them when they don’t behave the way he/she wants them to behave.
The thing is that this includes you too! You will be punished by your child when he/she doesn’t like your behavior. This might also be called ‘power struggles’.
It could be something simple like your family going for a walk and everybody has to go. So, a child who wanted to rather stay home, could be a pain in the bum, whining and wanting to drag you back and trying things that you really don’t like, that trigger you.
In our family the boys know exactly how they can trigger my husband when sitting in the backseat. They start kicking him in the back and start a swear party by singing all the swear words they know. They know that they will get his attention with it. It’s manipulation, but that’s exactly what punishment is too.
So, as you can see, I am an advocate of unconditional love. For ourselves, for our children and everybody around us.
I do not believe in punishment. It’s a conditioning that absolutely disrespectful and rude. It’s overpowering and abusive.
I know that it’s a process to understand and to implement in your daily lives. It’s nothing that can be done in a day when you have practiced it for many years, even decades. Usually we were conditioned by our parents, so it’s been a long time…
First step is to witness what’s going on. Watch yourself closely and create a consciousness about when you actually punish yourself and others. Be gentle with when it happens, don’t punish yourself because you are punishing! Maybe you can recognize patterns.
The next step is to actually stop doing it and do something else instead. You can make yourself a plan of what will you do when the same or a similar situation happens again… When you catch yourself in the act, stop. Take a deep breath and act with awareness.
It’s not a bad idea to talk to your children about it too. It’s time to apologize to yourself and to them too. Explain to them that you don’t believe in punishment anymore and that you guys will find ways of talking things out. It’s a lot of explaining needed when you want your kids to do something for you and they don’t want to… You will have to think about many things and their importance… How can you let go and let your kid be their own person who can decide for himself/herself without you being the one dictating them what to do.
Your kids will thank you for being a respectful person and they will do things for you when they feel that something is very important for you.
But they are not your servants! Your relationship to each other will transform to a wonderful respectful bond. You won’t have to hide behind this authoritarian mask anymore either which is great because it’s soooo exhausting to be the ruler over everything and to micro manage little humans.
It’s so much more relaxing when family members respect each other for who they are.
But for sure it’s a progress to work through your own conditioning and the many triggers that you will experience on the way. You will learn so much about yourself and this in itself is so rewarding.
Good luck and have fun! If you don’t understand and have questions, please get in touch, I am here to help.
Much love and gratitude, Annika <3