I was in a courtroom recently. I’m not an attorney so probably like you being in a courtroom doesn’t happen very often to me.
In the proceedings the witnesses were only allowed to specifically answer the questions. They could not elaborate. In fact, they were chastised by the judge if they tried.
At the end of the proceedings, it seemed to me that the facts were presented but the understanding of the situation was not understood. The courtroom missed the true narrative of the story with their rules. Made me glad I didn’t pick law school for sure!
Of course, I applied the situation to parenting and thought about how hard it is sometimes with our kids to go from information — facts — to really understanding a situation. When we understand a situation, we can see through the facts to the underlying causes and then speak into the situation and our kids’ lives much more effectively.
How do we get past the facts with our kids and understand?
Watch our tone. Just like the judge with his rules, our tone can keep our kids from wanting to share the true story with us.
Ask questions before we instruct. At some point again like the judge we have to make a ruling. The more we really understand about the situation, the wiser decision we will make.
Talk to your kids in a safe way to move from simply the facts to a deeper understanding of issues and watch your parenting decisions get better!!
Would you like more help understanding your kids? Try our Guide to Building Family Culture. We have a session in there called Safe Haven where we teach you how to listen to your kids (James 1:19 says be “quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to become angry.”) much more effectively so you can understand them and be a wiser parent.
That is just one session and there is so much more there and in our companion Guide to Building Family Relationships.
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