The most important part of discipline is reflection inward.  Yesterday, my daughter was fussing with me about something I have asked her to do and I said to her, “I want you to pause and think about what you said and how you said it” and that evening, I get this message.  Did she get it?  You bet she did. No amount of yelling or spanking would achieve the same result.   

Try video, joining your child in the misbehavior (matching a tantrum can be fun and incredibly embarrassing for a child) or asking your child to go to the mirror for punishment.  I video tantrums and just ask the child to view the video several times and then reflect out loud what they should change.  They see themselves differently.  When you are looking from the outside in, it changes things.  Throwing your adult self on the floor and having a tantrum (using the child’s actions and words) often makes the child stand up, look at you as if you may be crazy and they will probably beg you to stop embarrassing them.  Looking in the mirror is incredibly difficult when you know you have done something that doesn’t align with your integrity.  Works like a charm!  

Yelling and spanking can often create a blame cycle - because you look uglier when you do it and then the child can blame you for the misbehavior.  Yelling is just a different version of a tantrum.  Hitting another person will not align with your integrity.  Try looking in the mirror after you use this type of punishment - what happens?  Same as if you applied the watching the video, modeling or mirror reflection to the child - a glance inward.