Come on, do it my way. Parents who have invested too much of their own ego in their kids can't allow their kids to be different from them, even in small matters. We need to think of choice situations as legally binding verbal contracts. The kids do. Sometimes a child can be bribed into another choice.
Children learn many lessons by making choices.
They learn that every choice is connected to consequences. In the early years, if a child chooses cereal for breakfast, she gets cereal. She can choose not to eat it and be hungry. No one starts the waffles or the eggs after the cereal has been served just because the little darling changed her mind. Such a simple lesson teaches children that their choices will have a consequence.