The best way for us to help children is by empowering them to make better decisions and enhance self-esteem through a life-changing personal attribute: Intrinsic Motivation.

Parents hold the ultimate key in children’s ability to gain intrinsic motivation, which is the impulse to do the right thing, even when no one is watching; there’s no correlated “reward” or “recognition,” or fear of retribution if they don’t do the right thing.

In essence, as parents we have the ability to support our children to create an identity of “I am a good, worthy and responsible person.” 



As parent coaches, this is our focus with our clients. But before we discuss why parent coaches are essential to making this massive shift in the way we think about raising children (the shift: moving away from punishments and rewards and toward developing intrinsic motivation) let’s talk about what it is… 

What Is Intrinsic Motivation?

Intrinsic Motivation is a desire to do something for internal satisfaction, not for external rewards. 

Imagine a child playing with a toy. The child isn’t being paid to play with it, or punished if they don’t play with it — curiosity and enjoyment are enough. 

Inner authority is more life-affirming in the long term than a system based on punishments and rewards. It’s also more enduring — it doesn’t decay like external rewards do. 

Inner authority is made up of three components: 

1. Autonomy: having a choice in what you do, and being self-driven.

2. Mastery: wanting to get more skilled and be recognized for competency. 

3. Purpose: understanding why you’re doing the work. Often centered around helping other people. 

Children gain inner authority as learned behavior, best supported by parents who understand that the “carrot and stick” model of motivation no longer meets the needs of the modern world. 

So our work here at the Jai Institute for Parenting is not about modifying the behavior of children. Collaborative behavior is an outcome, because of the power of modeling the behavior of primary caregivers, for sure!

What we know is that when adults take on the responsibility of changing their behavior, children’s behavior changes! 

Shifting From Punishments and Rewards to LEADERSHIP!

The motivational power of traditional “carrot or stick” methodologies worked in the industrial age. But we’ve evolved. To succeed and thrive in the modern world, we must equip our children with effective decision-making skills, the ability to collaborate with others, the ability to advocate for themselves and others, and emotional intelligence. 

If we are demanding that children comply with external authority (do what a more powerful person says no matter what so that you don’t suffer) we are diminishing the very thing that matters most in our modern culture.

Here, we are dismantling systemic power-over structures and replacing them with communication, values, needs and emotional intelligence.

Our work is about supporting parents to become leaders, guides, advocates and mentors for their children, to release their own embedded trauma and shame, and to understand better modalities for peace in the home, rather than punishments, consequences, manipulation and bribes.

I love human transformation. I love that we can grow and become our best selves when we do the work. But it isn’t easy. Actual and lasting change is elusive. It’s easier to do nothing than to do something.

But, when something becomes painful enough, we can absolutely change it.

Talking about changing behavior is one thing. But, people need coaching to actually change. Especially with parenting. Because we are up against deeply embedded beliefs and behaviors.

The role of the ego is to enforce the status quo. No matter how much we may not like our current circumstances, our Ego will work to keep us from making a change. And so we can want change. 

We can want to stop yelling. 

We can want to stop unloading on our kids. 

We can want change in our relationships. 

We can want change in the way that we’re interacting with our children. 

We can want to be able to have calm, empowered conversations.

We can want to establish effective boundaries. 

But as I’m sure you know, wanting is not having, and there’s a very good reason for that.

The Ego is very, very effective… far more effective than your willpower… to keep things the same no matter how much we want them to change. 

There’s nothing wrong with you! You’re just human!!

So what do we do?

The Ego has to see itself to choose to change. And through the work that we do as parenting coaches, we are providing that mirror. We are allowing a person to see themselves with clear eyes.

Parenting Coaches Foster Behavior Change In Adults, and Children Reap the Benefits 

It's the most amazing thing. In parent coaching, we are allowing another human being to see their choices, behaviors and decisions clearly so that they can choose differently next time, and follow through on their personal commitments.

We support parents to give their children more, more and more opportunities, as they mature to live into intrinsic motivation by intentionally focusing our parenting on fostering children’s sense of autonomy, mastery and purpose. Their lives are forever changed! 

Parent coaches play a vital role in developing inner authority in parents, and give them the capacity to lead and model this through creating a family ethos that is focused on teaching the values that will guide children to increase their inner authority over time. 

These children will grow into the leaders, thinkers and creators that we so desperately need. They will do the right thing. Not for some external reward or validation, and not because they are scared of the repercussions of not doing the right thing… but because doing the right thing is woven into who they are. 

Want more on developing Intrinsic Motivation? The seminal book on this topic is Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us by Daniel Pink. Although it’s based on career performance, the book is so applicable to parenting. It’s one of our favorites here at Jai!

Meet Your Author, Kiva Schuler
Jai Founder and CEO

Kiva’s passion for parenting stemmed from her own childhood experiences of neglect and trauma. Like many of her generation, she had a front row seat to witnessing what she did not want for her own children. And in many ways, Jai is the fulfillment of a promise that she made to herself when she was 16 years old… that when she had children of her own, she would learn to parent them with compassion, consistency and communication. 

Kiva is a serial entrepreneur, and has been the marketer behind many transformational brands. Passionate about bringing authenticity and integrity to marketing and sales, she’s a sought after mentor, speaker and coach.