I am currently living in three of the four phases of parenting at the same time.
My oldest is 11 and he is already in the coaching phase. Not because I rushed him there, but because that kid is wired differently. Highly intelligent, unusually mature, and coachable in a way that makes you realize your job has shifted completely. He doesn’t need me to discipline him into shape anymore. He needs me to show him what he’s actually capable of, because he doesn’t know yet. And it is my job to make sure he finds out.
My youngest boy is 7 and fully in the training years. He picks things up so fast it’s almost unfair. Sweetest kid you’ll ever meet. Also absolutely capable of hip tossing you into next week with his judo skills, which makes for an interesting combination. We are still in the daily work of molding him into a young man of God. Lots of contact. Lots of repetition. And a whole lot of patience because both of my boys inherited my stubbornness and my perfectionism, which is equal parts encouraging and exhausting.
And then there’s my daughter. She is a firecracker. She will look you dead in the eye and tell you she does not want to give you a goodnight kiss, does not want to do the thing you just asked her to do, and is very clear about what she actually wants to accomplish. She is in the discipline years and we are working it every single day. She lights up the entire family and she has more drive and self-determination than most adults I know. But that makes for a tough combination when you’re trying to establish structure. She does not get a pass because she’s the youngest or because she’s a girl. I have standards and I expect them to be met. She is no exception.
I say all of that because when I sat down with Antony Graf, a man who has spent 30 years coaching thousands of kids and building one of the most respected martial arts programs in the country, what he said about the phases of parenting hit me in a way I wasn’t expecting. Not because it was new information. Because it was a framework that explained everything I was already living.
The Four Phases Every Dad Needs to Know
Antony breaks parenting into four phases and the framework is simple enough to remember and deep enough to build a whole approach around.
Zero to five are the discipline years. This is when your child learns that actions have consequences. Right and wrong get established here. The patterns you set in this phase echo for years. If you skip this work or go soft on it, you will pay for it later.
Six to twelve are the training years. Your child now understands consequence. This is when you build skills, habits, character, and capacity. You are actively shaping who they are becoming. It requires daily contact and deliberate effort. This is not hands-off parenting. This is the grind.
Twelve to eighteen are the coaching years. And this is where most dads blow it.
Antony was direct about it. If you did not do the work in the discipline and training years, you will spend the coaching years trying to micromanage a teenager. And a teenager will push back every single time. That friction destroys the relationship and poisons the final phase.
Eighteen and beyond are the relationship years. This is what you were building toward the whole time. A grown child who trusts you, respects you, and actually wants to be around you. Everything you did in the first three phases was an investment in this one.
What the War on Terror Taught Me About Parenting Phases
I did all of my combat deployments before I had kids or got married, and I thank God for that regularly.
I watched what happened to the dads who deployed during the peak years of the War on Terror. Some of them were gone for the entire discipline phase of their child’s life. They came home and faced one of two impossible situations. Either they came back as a tyrant trying to enforce rules in a house that had moved on without them, or they came back so worn down and guilty that they gave the kids zero structure at all. Neither worked. Both left marks on those kids.
When I had my boys, I was still in the military. I knew I wasn’t going to be able to be everywhere for everything. That was just the reality. But watching what happened to those other dads lit a fire in me. I could not control every assignment or every deployment cycle. What I could control was how intentional I was with the time I did have. Every moment I was home needed to count. Every conversation, every pickup from school, every round of golf, every bedtime. I was not going to be that dad who was physically present but mentally somewhere else. The time I had was going to mean something.
The Behaviors You Praise Are the Child You Raise
This is the line from Antony that I wrote down and have not stopped thinking about.
The behaviors you praise are the child you raise.
It sounds simple until you think about what you actually praise in your house. When your kid has a meltdown and you give them what they want just to get through the moment, you just trained them that meltdowns work. When your kid does something wrong and you giggle because it was kind of funny, you just told their brain that behavior is acceptable. When you consistently reward effort and resilience, you build a kid who tries hard and bounces back.
It is not complicated. It is just relentlessly intentional.
Antony also introduced something he calls the power of the whisper. Kids absorb what you say about them to other people far more deeply than what you say directly to them. When you tell them face to face that you’re proud of them, it lands. But when they overhear you telling someone else how incredible they are, it becomes part of their identity.
I have been deliberate about this for years. I do not say anything about my kids to other people that I would not say directly to their face. I will not complain about them behind closed doors or vent in a way that dishonors who they are. But I will absolutely, every chance I get, make sure they overhear me bragging on them.
How well the boys are doing in judo. How their golf game is developing. How they step up and support their little sister. How proud I am of who they are becoming. I look for every opportunity to say those things where they can hear it without knowing that was the point. Because I want them to know how much I believe in them before they fully believe in themselves.
They never make it difficult to brag on them. Not once.
What to Do With This
Know which phase you’re in with each kid. Zero to five is discipline. Six to twelve is training. Twelve to eighteen is coaching. Eighteen plus is relationship. If you’re still trying to discipline a fifteen-year-old the same way you disciplined a five-year-old, you have already lost the room. Adjust your approach to match the phase.
Audit what you praise. For one week, pay attention to what behaviors you actually reward in your home. Not what you intend to reward. What you actually respond to. Where you give attention, give comfort, give relief. That is what you are training. If you do not like what you see, change it.
Use the whisper on purpose. Find a moment this week to say something genuinely great about your kid within earshot. Not to manipulate them. To deposit something true into their identity before they’re old enough to argue with it.
Do the work in the early phases. The coaching years are only available to you if you earned them. Put in the contact, the consistency, and the correction in the discipline and training years. Your teenage relationship depends on it.
Stop doing their hard things for them. Self-esteem in children is built from doing difficult things. Not from being told they are great. Not from being protected from failure. From doing hard things and getting through them. Let them struggle. Let them fail. Let them figure it out. Then celebrate when they do.
Your kids are not a project. They are a calling. And the behaviors you build in them today are the human beings they become.
Start with what you praise.