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The child is helped when the parent improves their own self-esteem. Psychotherapy initiatives that address the self-esteem of the parents are highly effective.[136] TA works with neurolinguistics programming, which is intended to help a person understand how their own mind works and how they come to think and behave the way they do. By using words to promote a new way of thinking, TA uses words that encourage thinking about ego-states. Looking at yourself from a nurturing parent perspective helps you want to help your inner child. The language asks you to look at yourself as an inquisitive toddler (Little Professor). Imagine yourself at age 3, age 4, or age 7. Who doesn’t want to help a toddler or a young child feel nurtured?  

Emphasize obtaining 'strokes for being' and 'strokes for doing' from significant people in your life in legitimate ways. Emphasize “okayness” and autonomy in your contracts for change. 

A Simple Contract for Change asks a few questions to get to the root of the problem: 

• What is happening now? 

• What are the feelings associated with this? 

• What do I want to stop doing? 

• What do I want to change the feeling to? 

• What do I want to start doing? 

• What will I do to achieve the above? 

• What’s in it for me to accomplish this? (How is it meaningful to me?) 

• How might I sabotage myself from the above? 

• What Strokes do I need, and from whom? 

What do you want to change and when will you know you have? 

In growth, there is often a normal regression at the beginning of the learning cycle. This is a time when unhappiness promotes change; the OK and Not OK feelings resurface. When an individual begins the learning cycle, that time when life is messy and either the world must change or the individual must change, suicide is always a possibility. Learning how to make a simple ethical contract with a youth to “do no harm” during this time is important. Sometimes you have to make a No Suicide Contract.