When your daughter is born, she recognizes your voice as deeper than her mother’s. As a toddler, she looks up at your enormous frame and realizes that you are big, smart, and tough. In her grade school years, she instinctively turns to you for direction.

Whatever outward impression she gives, her life is centered on discovering what you like in her, and what you want from her. She knows you are smarter than she is. She gives you authority because she needs you to love and adore her. She -can’t feel good about herself until she knows that you feel good about her. So you need to use your authority carefully and wisely. Your daughter -doesn’t want to see you as an equal. She wants you to be her hero, someone who is wiser and steadier and stronger than she is.

The only way you will alienate your daughter in the long term is by losing her respect, failing to lead, or failing to protect her. If you -don’t provide for her needs, she will find someone else who will—and that’s when trouble starts. -Don’t let that happen.

Nowadays, the idea of assuming authority makes many men uneasy. It smacks of…