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You can be a strong and reasonable authority figure and still be fun, as well as gentle and affectionate. The first task is to give up on perfection. Go on! Take perfection by the hand, lead it to a tall bridge over deep water, hoist it up the railing, and push it off! You are not a perfect parent. Guess what? You aren't going to be.

Now that we have that out of the way, let's talk about being reasonable. You cannot be perfect, but you can be reasonable. A reasonable parent:

• Tries hard and cares.
• Works hard to model the behavior she'd like to see in her kids.
• Sets her expectations and disciplinary goals for herself, and for her family, at reasonable, realistic levels.
• Defines reasonable limits for her children's behavior.
• Identifies and discusses natural consequences that occur and provides reasonable, logical consequences when things go wrong.
• Is reasonably consistent about it.
• Understands that change takes time, and gives herself and her kids a break.

• You, the Gentle Giant

  The word discipline often calls up for me the image of a woman with a bullwhip, a man with a belt, a fierce, mean face, and a couple of terrified children, afraid to squeak for fear of “getting it.” Okay, we know that discipline means “teaching,” and we know that teaching works best when kids want to learn. Since kids learn best when they are engaged, active, and having fun, dump the attitude and join the learning! You can be fun, and you can be a disciplinarian. Correction is correction without the screams. You're not being lenient when you're gentle and kind, you're imparting knowledge in the most effective way. And it's a lot easier on your blood pressure.

  No matter what style you begin with, you can change and become more gentle, stronger. The first step is becoming aware of how you treat your children when you are angry at them. Try the following:

• Take a deep breath and cool down before you leap into telling your kids why you're mad at their behavior.
• Remind yourself you don't have to look or act angry to get results.

Remember, It's Funny!

Humor is a big part of reasonable parenting, and of positive discipline, for a few reasons:

• Laughter breaks the tension.
• Humor is a good way to deal with stress (it's better to laugh than to scream).
• Teasing and sarcasm don't count as reasonable. Be gentle.
• You don't have to impose your limits and consequences with a heavy hand and a heavy heart. Actually, being too heavy can often work against you (who wants to listen or learn from a mean, grumpy horrible person?).

Just because you're laughing or smiling doesn't mean you're not taking something seriously. Humor is a great way to keep a sense of perspective about things—really now, on a scale of one to 10 of terrible behavior (with 10 resulting in doing time in San Quentin for assault and murder), blowing milk out your nose barely counts at all! Laughing may sometimes be unavoidable—don't worry, you can laugh and still correct your child.

Quantity Time, Quality Energy

Discipline is your parenting style in action. Remember that old debate about quality time versus quantity time? This just in: Both matter. You really need at least some quantity to achieve quality. If, on the other hand, you are together with your child all the time but never pay attention, there's no quality to your quantity. Arghhh! It's an issue of balance. I'm beginning to think it's all an issue of balance!

How can you get both quality and quantity into your busy life? It's not always easy. This is an insane time for most parents, and your schedule is probably stretched thin as it is. Don't waste valuable time feeling guilty: Prioritize! The more quality time you have in your life, the easier it will be to predict trouble.

• Take an hour of your usual TV watching time to spend with your child (turn that set off!)
• Include your child in your day-to-day errand running (keeping in mind your individual child's errand tolerance level—some like errands, some tolerate one, some three, and some hate them all). Use the transportation time to chat.
• Instead of listening to the news, the traffic update, and music in the car, turn the radio off and listen to each other.

Let Your Child Do It

The strong, reasonable, gentle parent teaches self-reliance by expecting self-reliance and competence, and by letting children make mistakes. Trust that your child can do it. Show your trust, encourage progress, and don't “rescue” your child! If you constantly step in to save the day when a child is in a minor jam, he won't learn how to work his way out of his own problems. Sometimes this means letting small mistakes and minor disappointments happen. They're learning experiences. (Hey, I'm not saying abandon your baby to the wolves—just teach him how to avoid wolves, and then watch him do it, standing by in case of disaster.)

The Loving Parent

The most important aspect of being a strong and reasonable parent is showing unconditional love for your child. There's a tight correlation for children between experiencing unconditional parental love, and having a sense of self-respect. Unconditional love is loving a child for who she is no matter what she does or how well she succeeds in life. This kind of love promotes self-acceptance and self-confidence. The child who knows she's loved, who is encouraged, and who has experiences of mastery and success, will grow to respect and cherish herself. She'll have the tools to make positive choices all through life.