Parent by design, not default
The Strategic Parenting Blueprint audiobook + eBook equips you to--Â Â
⚜️ Raise kids you actually like
⚜️ Raise kids others truly want to be around
⚜️ Raise kids who have direction, like where they're headed, and extend your legacy
It doesn't happen by accident, but it does happen!
The blueprint to raise great humans begins here
1. Determine the stage you're in
Parenting well is a matter of identifying which stage you're in-- because kids need different things at each interval.
2. Decide roles and goals
Clarify what you want your kids to "look like" when they're older. "Reverse engineer" it, and teach the core concepts in stage-appropriate ways.
3. Do the daily work...
The goal of each stage is simply to prepare your child for the next stage... that's it. By working incrementally, you'll shepherd and shape them well!
An unexpected "do over" in parenting
Tammy and I got married in 1979.
A few years into it we welcomed Jarod, our oldest son, into the family. Abby, our daughter, followed close behind…
… and then Eric.
We thought we were done.
In fact, as kids began making their way into college (with others moving into high school, soon to be there with them), we thought that—
✅ Yes, that was a great run— we did a good job raising those kids and preparing them for adulthood
‼️ But there are so many things we would do a bit differently if we had a chance to go back
Most people don’t get a second shot at parenting, but we did. We discovered that Jackson was on the way— over a decade behind the rest of the kids.
Though I had been intentionally applying the lessons I was learning about parenting (it was a wake-up call when Jarod left for college), we intentionally applied ALL of the lessons anew with Jackson…
With one kids in diapers and another living in the dorms, we “installed” the Strategic Parenting Blueprint (though it didn’t have a name at the time) for the next two decades…
… and, with ten grandkids, we’re still doing it— as a support system to our four kids who are now raising and loving their own kids well!
Three phases of parenting
It's important to know where you are, because parenting looks different for each age... and the latter phases work best if we get the early ones right!
Phase 1 | Disciplinarian who builds a foundation, 0-5 years
Role: During this phase you’re teaching right and wrong, correcting and giving guidelines.
Goal: A solid base upon which you— and your child— can build the rest of their life.
Phase 2 | Trainer who develops skills, 6-12 years
Role: Your role shifts to training as you begin teaching them to how to interact with others, how to make wise decisions, and how to navigate the world.
Goal: Your child can hit tangible targets of soft skills.
Phase 3 | Coach who encourages, equips, and empowers, 13+ years
Role: Your role morphs yet again as you begin coaching your child. During this phase you don’t so much “show them” as you help them evaluate and learn to think for themselves.
Goal: They’re empowered to make good “life” decisions as they launch on their own, as you progressively give the more latitude the older they get.
The secret sauce: "the flow"
Parenting can be an overwhelming task.
And it’s easy to think it all depends on massive “wins” in big moments.
It doesn’t work that way, though. Life full of the mundane routines of car rides, bed times, meal prep, and a seemingly never-ending list of errands.
When we frame each of those everyday moments as a parenting “flow” it enables us to achieve great stuff amidst the daily grind.
The Parenting Blueprint not only helps you identify the behaviors and character traits you want to instill in your kids but also helps you identify strategic moments you can leverage…
🛌 Bed time
⏰ Morning routine
🚌 Car pool
🍔 Meal times
And, you’re ALREADY doing each of these, anyway. The Blueprint equips you to experience each of them by design (not default) so you can raise kids with intentionality.
The fine print
A quick review…
What we want to do
We want to raise kids by design instead of default. We want to develop a generation of “great humans” whom we enjoy, others like to be around, and actually like themselves and the life they’ve been given.
How we do it
We identify the stage we’re in…
… and we match the role to that stage.
We affirm that kids need to be raised in different ways at different ages and that the best way to move forward (and breathe life into them) is to steadily encourage, equip, and empower them to take more self-determination in their life.
If we know which stage we’re in, we know the “role” to play as we parent.
And—
If we know what we want them to look like as they enter the next phase, we can reverse engineer those traits and instill them in the child, using the current stage to prep them for the next…
This works best if we tackle it in incremental doses rather than trying to do “the whole job” at once.
When we do it
We make the daily grind a “parenting flow” that’s full of positive triggers and morphs the mundane into something memorable.
