by Dawn Hawkins

Created on: February 27, 2009

Discipline among the youth of today is nearly non-existent. Parents do not strive as much to teach discipline to our children as in days gone by. It could, perhaps, be due to a lack of understanding of what the word discipline is.

Discipline is defined by the Merriam-Webster dictionary as "Training that corrects, molds or perfects the mental faculties or moral character". That is a pretty demanding job. It's no wonder that so many of the youth today don't have discipline.

The days of one parent staying home to raise a child is all but gone. Both parents generally must work in order to survive. This means that our children are left in the hands of others. Daycare settings don't allow for much one-on-one activity. Repetition is a key factor in teaching children. This is true with discipline as well as it does when they learn to talk.

Parents don't have the time that it takes to discipline a child well. When they get home from work they have to take care of dinner, cleaning and laundry. A child is lucky if their parents even have time to read them a bedtime story.

Time is one of the problems with teaching children discipline. There is a host of other problems associated with it as well. For instance, parents want to be their child's friend. This is a wonderful fairy tale sort of thinking. What it will get your child though, is lack of discipline. It is not your job to be your child's friend. It is your job to make sure they can exist in the world as happy, healthy and beneficial to society as a whole. In order to achieve this goal, you must discipline them.

You may be a temporary hero in your child's eyes if you let them do what they please. You will eventually be their enemy because they are sitting in jail because they did what they pleased. If you allow your children to run amok while they are small, they will carry this through their entire lives. Allowing them to destroy other peoples property when they are small teaches them that it's okay to do that throughout their lives without consequences. The problem here is obvious. The bigger problem is not so obvious. What they did as a child won't land them in a courtroom. What they do as adults can.

Setting boundaries for your children isn't the hard part. The hard part is sticking to those boundaries. We can call it laziness on the parents' part because that is what it is. It is too much work to chase after a child all the time. It is especially hard when you have been working all day. This is what you signed up for

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