The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Families - is it pious rubbish or does it have some nuggets of genuine wisdom buried in it somewhere?

[Monkeytrousers]

Cos I suspect the former.

I found this in another MN'ter friend's loo and borrowed it.

Two other books recommended bt MN'ers have been very helpful - 'The Pocket Book for Parents' (OBM) and How to talk so kids will listen and listen so kids will talk (Codster) - all very useful once you get over the awful american cheesiness ('Boy, you sound angry' - 'I feel swell', etc)

Question Has anyone actually read anything in this book that has been helful, not just interesting in a vague way - has it helped you become a better family or has it just made you resign yourself to never being a 'highly effective family' and who the fuck is Stephen R Covey anyway?!

'highly effective families'?! The mind boggles. WTF is an effective family, anyway? One where the children are still alive at age 18?

never heard of it

and it sounds awful from the title

theres prejudice for you

Littlebella posted something recently, hang on will find it

here, was same book

I think the consensus was the former, eg pile of shite

seven habits worth having

take shoes off
bath children together
mother has priority in all situations/power of veto
if any adverse event occurs when no adult is present refuse to listen to any childs stroy and punsih all of them
have group hug after any squabb;le even if they artch there backs in horror
always eat at the atble
a holiday is for long walks with lots of stiles and hills

Yeah, I think that prescriptive element is it's biggest weakness - write a mission statement! Well if that just isn't right for you and your famly then have you failed? Oh fuck!

admit mistakes
never let the sun go down on your wrath

The title has a good idea in it..

He's a god botherer too

lol Zippy

A mission statement? So your family is a capitalist enterprise? Blimey, and there was me thinking it was just about me and dh and ds being related to each other.

What happens if the kids don't get the right GCSE grades, does the City insist the board is sacked and replaced with some poltroon with an MBA from Harvard?