BOOK REVIEW | Parenting: Getting It Right

I heard Andy Stanley speak several years ago…even before we had kids. He talked about the season of parenting and pointed out some choices that he and Sandra had made when their kids were young. He talked about putting his golf clubs and other hobbies in the attic so that he could be fully engaged as a husband and father through those critical years. When he was talking about things that they were focusing on, he said “it’s simple…we want to raise our kids in such a way that when they grow up and don’t HAVE to be with us, they still WANT to be together.” I’ll never forget that. In the meantime, I’ve gotten to watch, from afar, as the Stanley kids grew up. One of them even married a guy who graduated from our school…so we watched a lot of that! Andy and Sandra have put all of those parenting principles together in a book called Parenting: Getting It Right. I’d encourage you to check it out and consider gifting it to other families that you know who are entering parenthood. **As a bonus, my pastor recently recorded a podcast about the book with Andy and Sandra and you can listen to it HERE.**

I highlighted several things while reading and posted those notes below…

  • Direction determines destination. p. xvi
  • We stated it differently back then, and it was longer, but eventually we reduced this big idea to a single, memorable, portable, applicable goal: Kids who enjoy being with us and with each other even when they no longer have to be. p. 3
  • Behavior modification is not the foundation of a healthy relationship. p. 10
  • Never argue with your children.  Arguments are for peers.  p. 19
  • The Four Stages of Parenting:
    • The Discipline Years (0-5 years old)
    • The Training Years (5-12 years old)
    • The Coaching Years (12-18 years old)
    • The Friendship Years (18+ years old) p. 24
  • Connecting Over Correcting:
    • Cultivate constant conversations.
    • Don’t bail; let ’em fail.
    • Get interested in what interests them. p. 45
  • Be a student of your kids.  Figure out the best approaches based on their unique personalities, temperaments, and quirks. p. 46
  • Figure out what lights up your kids.  Learn it.  Encourage it.  Invest in it. p. 53
  • Anytime we asked one of our children a question that we thought they may not want to answer truthfully, we would preface the question by saying, “I’m going to ask you something, and you may be tempted to life.  I really don’t want you to lie to me.  Our relationships is too important for that.  Ready?” p. 73
  • The goal is discipline is to teach your child how to restore the relationship they damaged. p. 78
  • That’s why we say, “You owe them an apology.” Restitution is the process of making up the honor they owe the other person. p. 84
  • The approach to discipline reinforces the idea that ever act of disobedience dishonors someone.  Typical methods of punishment don’t reinforce much of anything relationally.  Discipline connects the dots between actions and the people affected.  And it teaches your child more than a lesson.  It teaches them a life skill. p. 87
  • Don’t give up what’s unique to you for something someone else can do. p. 107
  • Nighttime questions for kids:
    • Is everything okay in your heart?
    • Did anybody hurt your feelings today?
    • Are you mad at anybody?
    • Are you worried about anything?
    • Did anybody break a promise to you today?
    • Is there anything you want to tell me but you’re not sure how?
    • Is there anybody whose failure you would secretly celebrate? p. 172

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