Ready-Set-Go Gently Parenting

READY-SET-GO GENTLY defines a balanced pattern to common sense parenting skills. In three simple steps, you understand and focus your own parenting abilities.  

READY-SET-GO GENTLY is a mantra.  You think the words inside your head, and they give you a framework for your interactions with your child. 

KEY WORDS:  READY-SET-GO-GENTLY  is a BALANCED parenting style. It is ACTIVE and POSITIVE.  

if you are like most parents, you have all the skills you need, but you may not realize it.  This website uses imaginary families to help us focus our skills.  We met Benjamin and April Nelson in the first box.  April is overwhelmed by her two young children.  She cannot focus.  You may not be where April is, but you can sympathize!  Let's take another look at her evening.

Benji is a young married father.  He came home about 9 PM after a meeting with an auto parts supplier. He found his wife, April, sitting disconsolately on the couch eating cookies. Their two children were in bed, presumably asleep. Unfortunately, unbeknownst to Benji, April had experienced a major struggle with both children all evening. April was clearly not happy.

“Is anything wrong?” asked Benji. “Are you mad at me?”

“I’m not mad at YOU, Benji. It’s just that our kids are AWFUL, and I don’t know what to do!” April sounded upset.

Benji did not know what to say. He did not think their kids were awful, but this did not seem like a particularly safe time to disagree with April. “Um.” said Benji.

April continued: “And everybody gives me all this advice. ADVICE. ADVICE. ADVICE! Spank them. Don’t spank them. Put them in time-out. Reward them. Punish them. Spend more time with them. Spend less time with them. I don’t think anybody really knows anything! How in the world does anybody manage to get their kids raised at all?”

Benji knew he needed to say something, so he tried again.

“Um.” Benji had been quite talkative at the sales meeting, but this situation seemed beyond his conversational skills!

April stared at him. Benji gathered his confidence, “Well, we turned out OK, I guess.”

Thank goodness April appeared to be satisfied with this remark. “You’re right!” she said. “We turned out VERY WELL! Nobody else turned out any better than we did! Most people don’t know any more than we do either. And our kids are perfectly OK normal kids! But I feel like I’m just muddling through parenthood. I wish there was some sort of system!”

The READY-SET-GO GENTLY technique is a bit of a system. It is a simple name for what the best parents among us instinctively do. We can think these four simple words to give structure to our parenting. We claim our own strengths when we say, “I use READY-SET-GO GENTLY parenting.”

READY: We must be a little bit prepared for what we are trying to do. At least most of the time. We take one second to THINK before we act.  

SET: We must “set the stage” for success. We clearly EXPLAIN things (to our child or sometimes to ourselves.)

GO GENTLY: We must ACT. We are the parent. The child cannot make needed changes. The child does not know what he needs to do, or how she is supposed to behave. We must guide him or her. Being a parent takes ENERGY. It takes time. It takes actions. These are our “GOs,” And we must always be GENTLE.

Let’s learn!

Begin to think the READY-SET-GO GENTLY pattern for every interaction with your child. This takes ENERGY. Being a parent is not for "wimps."  But your responses to your child are the cause of how she acts. When your responses get better, then life with your child quickly gets easier.  

READY:  Your child is always doing something!  As a parent, you must interact with your child, minute by minute. Being READY means that before you leap up, OR choose to ignore, you take one second to think: “Am I ready to deal with this situation in an effective and gentle way?”

SET: Getting SET involves minute-to-minute communication. It’s quite simple. You give your child one calm, clear statement of what needs to happen over the next minute or so. And only one! Then you follow up with a "GO GENTLY."

GO GENTLY: GO GENTLY means action. As soon as you say your calm "SET" statement,  you follow up. GO GENTLY means getting up and taking gentle action every time you make a request of your child. It might be a word of praise, or it might be a gentle enforcement of what you asked, but it's an interaction!  GO GENTLY means interacting with GOOD behavior also:  talking with your child, praising your child, and playing with your child. There are hundreds of GO GENTLYs each day! 

Some GO GENTLYs are a response to misbehavior. These are necessary. You will find many specific examples  in most of the other boxes on this website.   Please take the time to learn how to do these!  

But in any given day, you must perform MORE POSITIVE GO GENTLYs than you do GO GENTLYs for misbehavior.

Examples of POSITIVE GO GENTLYs are:

• Freebie attention given for good behavior.
• Courteous responses to your child’s requests.
• Pleasant responses to your child’s attempts at conversation.
• Sharing food together in a relaxed and pleasant manner.  

You can think of many more POSITIVE GO GENTLYs.

That's it!  The heart of READY-SET-GO GENTLY are the tiny interactions that you do all day long! Over time, you will see the results on a larger level.  Parenting will become easier!

As you get to a better place minute-by-minute, you will also get to a better place in a larger sense.  Change happens by DOING.  Here is where your relationships can go, using READY-SET-GO GENTLY:  

READY: On a larger level, being READY is a mindset. It means thinking about your child in a positive way. Overall, you feel happy and good about your child. If this is not the case, you take a look and begin to change your thinking. If there are problems that are making interactions with your child miserable and a terrible chore, you find a way to restructure. READY means that you anticipate that any situation can be managed successfully. If not, then you will rethink that situation until it becomes manageable. As you read how our characters learn to manage better, you will gain confidence too.  

SET: On a larger level, you SET the stage for success by doing specific things. If any aspect of caring for your child is not going well, YOU can and must make changes. It is easier than you think, because you just start small. Getting SET requires a little planning for an activity or a bit of “tweaking” to a routine. As you learn to “set the stage” for success, everything becomes easier.

On a larger level, GO GENTLY might involve working out some time issues or solving some problems in your own life. It might mean a consequence, such as locking an Xbox in the trunk of your car. But none of that is the place to start. Just start small.  As your interactions with your child begin to change, then your child begins to change. The important thing to realize right now is that your child cannot and will not change unless YOU do something different!

Please keep reading, to see lots of examples!  In our next frame, we will follow Benji, April, Devin, and Kyleigh on an outing to the park the very next morning after April’s outburst.We will see how Benji automatically puts the READY-SET-GO GENTLY strategy into action. Later, we will look at why April has been having trouble with the kids, and we will see what she does about it.