Kids are naturally selfish – me, me, me and mine, mine, mine. Not surprising: in the early months and years, it is all about them. So how do we teach our kids to think of others and to treat other people with kindness and compassion?

Kindness and compassion are rooted in empathy and stem from the golden rule of treating others how we wish to be treated ourselves.

Some days, though, I can spout the golden rule ‘til the cows come home and yet it feels like it never sinks in. You encourage compassion, you support acts of kindness, and you try your best to demonstrate empathy, and yet five minutes later the kids are arguing over who sets the table more often and wrestling over the Xbox controllers.

“Be nice to your sister!” you say. “Don’t talk that way to your brother!”

“Blah, blah, blah,” is what they hear.

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I walked into the huge doors of the high school, overwhelmed by emotion. It was all mixed up – joy, excitement, fear, pride, worry, disbelief.

My daughter was oblivious to it all. As she walked beside me she had her own feelings, but she hid hers beneath a cool smile, chatting with her best friends.

We were walking in to her high school orientation. This was her first glimpse at the next four years of her life. It was my first glimpse of how fast time had truly gone.

There are big transitions we face with our kids when they’re little. First steps, potty training, first day of kindergarten. So many milestones in such a short time. As they get older the milestones are harder to see.

There’s driving and first dates and graduation. All of them monumental in their own right. If we rush or blink too much we might miss some of the other things: middle school, first dance, first A, first F. They’re all part of a lifetime of steps on the way to adulthood.

My oldest starts high school in the fall. And this feels like a big deal. Even in middle school I was able to reason through how she’s still a kid and life might be going fast but we’re in the middle.

High school feels so much bigger, older, more like a getting ready for a goodbye. This shift feels complex for both of us. We are doing our best to feel ready. But not by looking at grades and course selection.

Here are 10 things that will help you both prepare for the high school years, no matter where you are at the moment.

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What would your child do in the following situations?

⇒ Your child sees some kids on the playground laughing at another child.

⇒ Your child sees someone drop money without noticing.

⇒ Your child breaks a framed photo while playing ball in the living room.

We hope they will say something to the mean kids. We hope they will chase after the person who dropped the money. We hope they will tell us when accidents happen and make different choices in the future.

We hope our child will do the right thing when no one is looking.

A child who knows what the right thing to do is, even if it’s hard, has a strong inner compass. Whether we call our inner compass a “conscience” or “having good character” or “strong morals,” we want our child to have an inner voice that guides them to be a good person.

How do we help our child develop this inner sense of right and wrong?

Here are 3 common parenting myths that get in the way of helping our children develop a strong inner compass, and three alternatives to use.

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When Jill brought her second baby home from the hospital, her 4-year-old daughter, June, jumped up and down with delight to the point of exhaustion.

There was a big party to welcome her baby brother, and she had a total blast. As the last guest was leaving, June ran after her and screamed, “Wait, lady, you forgot your baby!!”

June’s delight turned to dismay. She cried for days, was fussy all the time, and behaved as if the worst thing in the world had ever happened to her. The sibling rivalry that ensued between June and Luke got worse as they got older, especially as he started crawling and becoming a real person.

Everything became a competition. They always fought over toys, and although they hugged and said they loved each other, Jill was deeply worried about their long-term bond. She just wanted them to grow up and be friends – maybe not best friends, but certainly close enough to rely on each other. Meanwhile, she wanted a home without the constant yelling, crying, and bickering.

Does any of this sound familiar?

OK, let’s begin by talking honestly about conflict. Sibling rivalry is all about conflict. In fact, our sibling is one of the first people we will routinely have conflict with.

The truth is, when any two or more people spend lots of time together, conflict is inevitable.

Conflict is a form of energy and life. It’s evidence that more than one thought, feeling, and approach exists. Without conflict, we would stagnate and wither.

Conflict lets us know we’re alive and that we have a point of view in the world.

Conflict, in and of itself, is not a problem.

As parents, our goal as we raise self-assured independent thinkers cannot be to avoid conflict. The goal is to work through our conflicts with our relationships and sanity intact.

Strange as it sounds, a conflict-free home is NOT a peaceful home.

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The journey of childhood is defined by the transition from a state of complete dependence to one of personal autonomy. To go from being a helpless infant to an independent adult.

To achieve healthy independence, kids need to be taught how to feel comfortable with every aspect of who they are. This is especially important for children with elevated anxiety levels. They must be provided with enough structure to make them feel secure, but not so much structure that their ability to make decisions is curtailed.

You’ve heard of helicopter parenting? How about the lawn mower parent? Both these parenting strategies come from a place of fear. Fear of failure. Fear of danger. Fear of the unknown.

And both these types of parenting, according to Julie Lythcott-Haims’s book How to Raise an Adult, prevent children from developing resourcefulness, resilience, and critical thinking skills. This overparenting cripples our children and prevents them from becoming healthy, independent adults.

Practicing Autonomy Supportive Parenting is one way to end overparenting and achieve our true parenting goals with minimal stress – to them and us.

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