Back in February Libby and I attended the Love and Respect Conference, a marriage conference led by Dr. Emerson and Sarah Eggerichs based on his best selling book by the same name. The conference was actually quite a bit better than I had anticipated, even given the fact that I was the one who registered so that we could attend. We had a great time at the conference and found out we’re doing even better than we thought! That alone was well worth the price of admission.

The gist of the material is essentially that: Women want Love and Men want Respect.

Now, I don’t want to give too much away, the book is well worth the read and the conference is actually one that I would recommend for couples in any state of marital bliss or dysfunction. What struck me though was something that I want to share with anyone who has the privilege of parenting boys.

Among the characteristics the Eggerichs list when recounting a man’s desire for respect the include five desires:

• A desire to work and achieve
• A desire to protect and provide
• A desire to be strong and lead
• A desire to analyze and council
• A desire for shoulder-to-shoulder friendship

When I read these, and I should add agreed with them, a surprising revelation leapt off the page at me. What struck me immediately was that for a guy all five of these desires might be realized in an interesting way…by playing video games. With the advent of the ability to play video games collaboratively online a relational element was added that makes it much more realistic that young guys can and will find significant “respect” by gaming.

Moms have you ever yelled at your kid for gaming when they were supposed to be doing homework? Ever stormed into the room and turned off a game mid-battle? Ever been surprised at the vehemence of the ensuing anger outburst? Your son can’t articulate it but you’re attacking them at the core of their manhood.

Dads have you ever called your son down to dinner and jumped all over the “I need to finish this level first”? Ever grounded them from gaming? Ever been caught off guard by them sneaking in to play anyway and been surprised by the heat of the argument? Your son can’t articulate it but you’re cutting at the heart of their masculinity.

So what does this mean for parents?

Given this weird additional context to the reality of parenting boys I want to suggest four guidelines for helping your sons navigate the transition from childhood to manhood:

Appreciate that gaming is more than a diversion, distraction, or waste of time.

It IS all those things at times. But realize that scoring a goal while playing on world class, or beating back the flood on legendary, or accomplishing the one remaining achievement that has taken months to beat reinforces their masculinity and meets those inner desires that drive them as developing men. Understand that and you can begin to see gaming as a tool that YOU can use rather than as the enemy.

Expect them to get angry if you take it away and understand their anger is not directed at you.

On the one hand they ARE angry with you but it goes beyond taking away their toy. They can’t express it because they don’t understand it but particularly if it is mom who is cutting off the gaming system you’re also psychologically cutting off something else. And you can guarantee they won’t like THAT. As much as it might frustrate you need to find ways to negotiate cessation of play…we’ve found it helps to give them something like a thirty-minute warning.

Create guidelines that allow them time in their schedule for gaming.

Creating schedules or rules like: 45 minutes after school but no more until homework is done can help set expectations that help avoid confrontation. Allowing them to game all they want on their free time or at a minimum respecting their desire to game also helps. I’m not suggesting you allow them to become couch potatoes just make room in the schedule for them to beat the baddies.

Engage them in conversation about the games they play most often.

Once you realize this is more than just a time wasting pass time you can begin to fund ways to engage your sons in conversation about the games they play. Expect the conversation to be a little odd at first, you’ll have to catch up on jargon and understand the specific game’s rules. But you’ll find they enjoy talking about their conquests.

Why not go one step further. Why not join them?

Moms, ever consider gaming with your guys?

How do you think your sons would respond if you told them you want to play video games with them?