When I read the book Persuasion: The Art of Getting What You Want by Dave Lakhani, I was thinking of my role as a parent. For parents, being persuasive means making the children do what we ask them to. Here’s a quote which, I think, is relevant to us.

“In order to be persuasive your persona must be developed to fully support your message. You must look the part, sound the part, and act the part. If your message and your persona are not congruent, people you hope to persuade may take an unfavorable decision about you.”

This quote reminds me of the complaints that a parent made of his child. That is, the child takes teacher’s words seriously but not his. This is a common phenomenon among children. Teachers’ words are like those on the law books and are followed to the letter. This is partly because the teachers “look the part, sound the part, and act the part.” Their role is that of an educator while ours that of a loving parent.

Here’s my point. It is both difficult for us and confusing for the children to view a mom playing two roles: loving parent and a strict educator. We really need the authoritarian air of a teacher to play a teacher role at home. I know I do not possess that air.  That’s why I have not been a good role-player when I tried to act like a teacher to my children at home.  Some people are luckier than this.