Why Most Family Rules Don't Work (And What Does)

Most family rules don't work because they're designed to control behavior instead of guide decisions. "Clean your room" is a rule. "We take care of the spaces we share" is a principle. The difference matters more than you might think.

The Problem with Rules-Based Parenting

Rules assume that if you can control behavior, you can create character. But character isn't about following rules—it's about making good decisions when nobody's watching. Rules tell you what to do. Principles help you figure out what to do. Rules work for simple, recurring situations. Principles work for complex, novel situations. And family life is mostly complex, novel situations dressed up as simple, recurring ones.

What Principles Look Like in Practice

Instead of "Don't hit your sister," try "We solve problems with words, not hands." Instead of "Be respectful," try "We speak to each other the way we want to be spoken to." Instead of "Clean up after yourself," try "We leave places better than we found them." Principles give context. They help kids understand not just what to do, but why it matters. They create framework for decision-making instead of just compliance.

Building a Family Constitution

This is exactly the kind of work I do with families in Family Constitution Development sessions. Instead of creating more rules to enforce, we identify the principles that actually guide your family's decisions—and make them explicit so everyone can use them. A family constitution isn't a list of rules. It's a shared understanding of how your family operates. What you value. How you make decisions. How you handle conflict. How you support each other's growth.

The Process

Family Values Conversation: What do we actually care about? Not what we think we should care about—what we actually prioritize when life gets complicated. Decision-Making Framework: How do we make choices as a family? Who gets input on what? How do we handle disagreements? Conflict Resolution Process: What happens when someone violates the principles? How do we repair relationships when things go wrong?

Why This Works Better

Principles scale as kids grow. A five-year-old and a fifteen-year-old can both apply "We speak to each other the way we want to be spoken to," but they'll apply it differently based on their developmental capacity. Principles create internal motivation instead of external compliance. When kids understand why something matters, they're more likely to care about it even when you're not around. Principles acknowledge that parents are learning too. Instead of pretending you have all the answers, you're modeling how to make good decisions based on shared values. Family constitutions aren't perfect. But they're better than rule-based systems because they're designed for real families with real complexity, not ideal families with ideal behavior.