Tag Archive for emotions

Give Your Child the Gift of a Lifetime

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You have a gift your child needs, an ability she cannot live without. Giving your child this gift will result in an ability she will cherish for a lifetime. She will reap the benefits of this gift over and over as it “keeps on giving.” This gift reveals the extent of your love for your child businessman holding giftand flows from the depth of your life experience. Very simply, this gift is the gift of emotional regulation–the ability to be aware of and attend to our emotions, to understand and label those emotions, and to manage them in the service of reaching our goal. When your child learns to recognize, attend to, label, and manage her emotions, she will have more joy and peace, greater academic success, and better social relationships. She will also be better able to respond to situations that arise in life. Even better, you will discover that emotional regulation has contributed to deeper intimacy between you and your child! To give the gift emotional regulation a parent must do several things.

  1. Model emotional regulation in your own life. Let your child see how you use the passion of anger to resolve an injustice or the energy of concern to accomplish some legitimate goal. Allow your child to witness your strength and courage in soothing your cantankerous emotions, enjoying your cheerful emotions, and expressing your painful emotions.
  2. Match your child’s emotion. You can match your child’s emotion by expressing a level of animation similar to the one your child expresses. Don’t mimic or mock. Simply be aware. If your child has little animation because of sorrow, don’t try to cheer them up with an upbeat tone of voice. Instead, let your tone express a sadness similar to your child’s. When your child is bouncing around with excitement, respond with an excite tone rather than one of agitation. You get the idea. Match your child’s emotion by matching her level of animation.
  3. Don’t wander to safer subjects, drift to happier topics, or try to shift to some more enjoyable emotion. Attend to your child’s emotion state and whatever topic or situation triggered that emotion. Pay attention to whatever your child is focused on and stay focused on that until you reach understanding.
  4. Call it as it is. Steps two and three will help you understand your child’s emotion. Simply feeling understood will help your child better manage her emotion. Now take it one more step. Label your child’s emotion. Call it as it is: anger, excitement, confusion, sadness, joy, rage, etc. Find a name for that emotion that resonates with your child’s experience. Call it as it is.
  5. Accept your child’s emotion. As you label each emotion, you communicate that emotions (all emotions) are acceptable. Limits must be set around the expression of emotion, but the emotion itself is acceptable. Accepting and labeling your child’s emotions also informs your child that you are not overwhelmed by her emotion. You are more powerful than her emotion. You can manage her emotion and help her learn to do the same.
  6. Make a plan. Once your child feels understood and her emotion has a name, problem-solve. Help your child determine what priority her emotion reveals. Explore the most effective way to communicate that emotion and the related priority. Plan ways to utilize the energy of that emotion to reach your child’s goal in an effective and healthy manner.

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As you practice these six actions with your child, you will experience two immediate results: 1) greater intimacy with your child and 2) the joy of watching your child mature. As time goes on you will witness many other benefits—improved academics, better social interactions, and greater self-control to name a few. You will have given your child a great gift—emotional regulation.

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Your Child’s “Best Teacher Eh-verrr”

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I still remember the day it happened. My daughter came home raving about her teacher. She loved him. He was the “best teacher eh-verrrr.” In fact, he was a good teacher. She learned a lot from him. But, he really wasn’t THE best teacher she ever had. I know because the best teacher any child ever has is not a teacher from school. The reward for “best teacher ever” in a child’s life actually goes to (drum roll please)…his parents.  It’s true. Parents can’t help but teach their children. Even if they never teach a single formal Father Daughter Chatlesson, their child will learn more from them than any other teacher he will ever have. Parents teach the most important lessons of life—like values, priorities, how to manage emotions, how to manage difficult situation, etc.—on a daily basis. That whole “daily basis” idea is why parents become the most important teacher in their child’s life. Only parents have the opportunity to “join with” their child in a variety of situations on a “daily basis.” Only parents get to “experience life” with their child “24/7.” From this position of “experiencing life together,” parent becomes the most powerful teachers in their child’s life.  Parents, utilizing wisdom gained through their own life experiences, assist their child in managing the emotions of difficult experiences. Parents find their child acutely interesting and learn to know him very well. Based on knowledge of their child’s interests, parents can direct their child’s energies into safe avenues of adventure and joy. In other words, when a parent and child “experience life together,” a parent helps his child organize and understand himself and the world around him.  let me say this very plainly: Parents, you are your child’s “best teacher eh-verrrr,” whether you like it or not. To help you enjoy the rewards of “best teacher ever,” follow these four tips.

  1. Join in, experience life with your child. Don’t lecture. Join instead. This means active involvement and participation in your child’s life.
  2. Stay calm. Remember, your child learns how to respond to emotions by experiencing them with you. If you rant and rave when angry, your child will most likely do the same. Let your example teach him to express and share his emotions effectively.
  3. Listen to your child. Listen to understand your child’s motivation, intent, and perspective. When you understand your child’s motivation and intent, you can explain your ideas in a way he can understand. In a sense, you have to understand your child’s way of thinking before you can explain your own more mature thought.
  4. Allow your child to be a child. Do not expect your 4-year-old to discriminate between what is real and what is magic or your 16-year-old to be excited about the same things that excite you. Instead, enjoy the magical world of your 4-year-old and share in those things that excite your 16-year-old, channeling those thrills in a healthy direction.

 

Congratulations Mom and Dad. You truly are your child’s “best teacher eh-verrr,” especially when you take the time to join with your child and “experience life together.”

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A New Christmas Tradition

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African American father and mixed race son making Christmas cardsWhether we are savoring a slice of homemade cheesecake or the accomplishment of a life-long dream, we enjoy it to the fullest. When we savor something, we take the time to relish in the moment, get lost in the experience, and mindfully focus on every joyful sensation. I want to encourage you to have that same enjoyment by savoring your family this Christmas. Savoring your family builds intimacy. It establishes a family environment of safety and security. It creates joyful memories that will last a lifetime. How can you savor your family? Let me share four ways.

  1. Laugh together. You can laugh at funny stories, jokes, or even TV shows. Whatever you choose, find ways to share laughter. I don’t mean just a little chuckle now and again. Share belly busting, rip roaring, roll on the ground, bring tears to your eyes laughter. Let the laughter bring down the defenses and draw you into one another’s joy.
  2. Acknowledge your pleasure. Give voice to how much you are enjoying the family experience or activity. Talk about it. Tell your family how much fun you are having with them in the moment. Let them know how much you value your time spent with them.
  3. While you acknowledge your pleasure, label any positive emotions you experience and share them with your family. Happiness, joy, peace, calm, delight, elation, glee…name them all. If you find something beautiful, exciting, hopeful, or lovely, go ahead and state it for all to hear. Pleasure increases and positive emotions grow when we verbally share them with others.
  4. Take some pictures. Pictures keep the moment alive. After all is said and done, you can review the pictures and relive the joy. You can even put a few pictures on the fridge where everyone can see them. Every time you look at the pictures you can savor the moment of remembered joy…and repeat steps one through three for even more savoring!

 

Savoring family builds intimacy and establishes a family environment of joy. It builds a deeper sense of safety and security. It creates joyful memories that we will cherish throughout our life. These four ideas can get your started. Why not start today? The Christmas season presents an excellent time to build a tradition of savoring your family.

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Did It Again-The Emotional Cocktail of Parenting

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Well, I did it again. For the second year in a row I took my daughter to college, unpacked her belongings, said good-bye, and left her hundreds of miles away from “home.” I’m not complaining. I am proud of her…and excited to see where life takes her. She has grown and familysunheartlearned so much in only one year of college. Still, I find myself holding back the tears when I drive away after dropping her at college. In fact, several diametrically opposed emotions fill my heart as I drive away—pride in her growth and excitement for her future, yet heart-breaking sorrow that she is growing up to leave home and deep pangs of missing one of “my little girls.” I’m not sure why I’m surprised at this mix of emotions. Parenting has always led to the uncanny experience of having more than one emotion at the same time. I remember the time my then 3-year-old daughter decided she did not want to eat her dinner. She got her mother’s (my wife’s) attention and began to talk to her in an animated manner, one hand making broad gestures. She maintained great eye contact and a wonderful give-and-take conversation. She held her mother’s rapt attention, face to face and eye to eye they carried on a conversation. In the meantime, I watched my daughter, unbeknownst to her mother, use her free hand to carefully remove pieces of meat from her dinner plate and deposit them under the table. We had to discipline her. She can’t go through life deceiving the authorities in her life in order to avoid tasks she did not like (I know, a little melodramatic). At the same time, I have to admit to a bit of pride in her creative ability to do two things at one time (hold her mother’s rapt attention and carefully get rid of her food) to achieve a goal even at such a young age. There it is…concern for her future and pride in her ability—a mix of emotions.

In elementary school our daughter decided she did not want to attend gym class one day. Having seen other children hand in notes to “get out of gym,” she decided to do the same. She got her crayon and very carefully, with the penmanship of any first grader, wrote: “Please let me out of gym today” (or something like that). Being the diligent student, she flower girlcarefully signed her name. The gym teacher was a little angry at her seeming deception and push against the system. Our daughter ended up in the office. She got in trouble and we got the call from the school (go figure). Her only excuse: “I didn’t want to go to gym today.” We had to talk to her about the whole incident, even discipline her so she would understand what she had done and not do it again. But, when she was in the other room, my wife and I admired her ingenuity and laughed at her ill-conceived attempt.

And then there is the “wedding incident.” Yes, parenting is filled with mixed emotions. Like me, you can probably recall moments when you were angry at your child’s behavior, but also extremely, gut-bustingly funny…or, times when your child’s risky behavior raised concern and worry, but also filled you with pride. And then there is college…filled with excitement for their future, but concerned for their safety; filled with pride while worried about their wisdom and the choices they have to confront while away from home; filled with joy for all the new experiences while experiencing your own heart-breaking reality that they are leaving home and, in fact, will call some other place their home while merely visiting your home.

Yes, parenting is filled with mixed emotions. We let them learn how to walk on their own. We watch them fall down. We help them stand up again and we send them on their way. We celebrate their successes and encourage them to “chase their dream.” We trust they have learned what we tried to teach them. We pray that God will keep them safe and guide them. Oh…and we look forward to the emotional cocktail of walking our daughter down the aisle of marriage or seeing our son marry the woman of his dreams. What can we do?  Enjoy the journey.

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8 Ways to Teach Children to Be Kind to Others

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  1. Model kindness. You didn’t think I would start anyplace else, did you? Whatever we want our children to learn, we have to practice ourselves. So, be kind to your children. Be kind to your spouse. Be kind to friends. Be kind to strangers.
  2. HandEncourage children to think kindly about others. Here are three ways you might consider doing this include: Pray for others. Take turns with your children recalling kind deeds you observed during the day. Take turns with your children recalling kind deeds you engaged in during the day.
  3. Let your children take personal responsibility for the acts of kindness they engage in. Instead of giving your child money to donate to a charity, let them earn the money through chores and give a portion of their choice to the charity they choose. Be creative coming up with ways your children can take personal responsibility in their show of kindness.
  4. Teach your children to consider other people’s feelings. You can do this by acknowledging their emotions—“That seems like it really makes you sad” or “Wow, you really look happy.” Acknowledge other people’s emotions as well.  Perhaps a friend was mean because “he doesn’t feel well” or a friend was crying because “she gets sad when people tease her.” You get the idea. Help your child look beyond the outward behavior to see the underlying emotion.
  5. Expose your child to need. Of course, we need to do this at an age appropriate level, but do not shelter your child from the needs around them. Depending on their age, they might understand the need for water in some countries, an elderly person’s need for friendly interaction, or a friend’s need for a hug.
  6. Along with exposing your child to need, give them the opportunity to volunteer and meet the needs of others. This can range from helping an elderly neighbor with yard work to working with an inner city food bank to raising money for a mission to taking a mission trip. When you child sees a need and expresses a desire to help, assist them in volunteering.
  7. Create giving traditions. As a family, develop traditions that involve giving to one another and to those outside your family. You might give toys to a charity each year or a financial donation to some charity. Maybe you will give gifts to friends and neighbors at special times throughout the year. Be creative and develop some giving traditions.
  8. Encourage small acts of kindness. Teach your child to pick up trash rather than simply pass it by. Encourage your child to hold the door open for others, speak politely, offer to pick up something they see another person drop, give a hug to a friend in need…the list goes on. Encourage small acts of kindness.

 

What are some ways your family has carried out these 8 suggestions? What other suggestions would you add? How have you taught your children to be kind?

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Parents, Are You a Slingshot or an Anchor?

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Michael Byron, Smith, retired Air Force officer, wrote an excellent blog for the National Fatherhood Institute (click here to read it). In this blog, he wrote: “Families should be slingshots, throwing children into the world prepared for what lies ahead. Unfortunately, the problems of dysfunctional families are like anchors, dragging down their children’s potential….” So, I have to ask: Have you created a family environment that will serve as a slingshot for your children or an anchor? 

Anchor families:

  • Punishment concept.Place unrealistic expectations on their children.
  • Make demeaning, degrading, and discouraging remarks about their children or their children’s activities.
  • Imply greater acceptance of their children only after they have performed to a certain level (good grades, starting team, practiced their instrument, etc.).
  • Punish or demean children for times they experience failure.
  • Offer rude criticisms about their child’s character or performance.
  • Engage in name-calling.
  • Disregard their children’s feelings…or even punishing their children for “negative” feelings like anger, frustration, sorrow, or tearfulness.
  • Tell or imply they know more about what their children feel, think, or like than their children do themselves.

 

These behaviors act as anchors around your children’s neck. They weigh your children down, drowning them under the waves of guilt and shame.

 

Slingshot families, on the other hand:

  • grandfather and granddaughter with computer at homeLearn about the development of children, their children’s development in particular, so they can maintain realistic expectations.
  • Encourage their children.
  • Make sure their children know they are loved even when they fall short of perfection or have a particularly bad day.
  • Teach their children that failure is an opportunity to learn. They encourage determination and healthy persistence.
  • Offer their children constructive criticism in a loving manner.
  • Use “negative” feelings like anger, frustration, sorrow, or tearfulness as opportunities to grow more intimate with their children.
  • Remain curious about their children’s feelings, thoughts, and interests…using them as touch-points from which to deepen intimacy.

 

These behaviors serve as slingshots for your children. They help your children develop the skills necessary to navigate the world with courage, confidence, and poise.

 

So, I ask again. Which one are you—an anchor family or a slingshot family?

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Why Do Children Misbehave?

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Parents often ask me how to change their children’s behavior. There are often several factors that contribute to children’s misbehaviors. And, each of these factors influence how a parent can best respond. Let me list just four factors that might influence children’s misbehavior…and a good response to each one.Exhausted Mom

  • Children may misbehave out of a desire to confirm the limits. Children need limits. They will often test the limit or work to confirm that limit in their own mind. They might do this by misbehaving, looking at a parent as they prepare to misbehave, telling on another child, or simply asking for confirmation. These actions either confirm or test limits the parent has already established. Parents often see this behavior as an effort to assert power. However, children need firm limits to establish a sense of safety. Engaging in this “limit testing” behavior is like leaning on a fence. It confirms the strength of the fence and so the ability of the fence to keep us safe.

o    Remember, it is your children’s job to test the limits. Our job is to consistently and respectfully reinforce the limit. Explain the limit beforehand. Remind them of the limit. Explain alternative behaviors allowed within the limit. Allow natural consequences to occur when they break the limit.

  • Children may misbehave out of a desire to gain attention. Children need to know that their parents are available to them. They want to know their parents delight in them and watch over them. When they feel threatened in any way or fearful of something inside them or around them, they will seek attention. This could be as simple as feeling overwhelmed and threatened by all the sights, sounds, and traffic of a store…or by watching their parent giving attention to a person on the other end of the telephone. When children perceive a threat or feel some fear, they will often “act out” to gain their parents’ attention and confirm their availability.

o    Remember, your children need to know you delight in them, watch over them, and remain available to them. Respond to their material and emotional needs.  Comfort them in the face of overwhelming situations. Help them understand their feelings and teach them healthy ways of responding to personal fears. Remain responsive to their needs.

  • Children may misbehave out of a desire to feel adequate. Childhood is full of challenges…and comparisons. Children compete with each other. They also get judged by their performance every day in school.  It is easy in the midst of the demands of home (chores), school (classroom behavior, homework, tests), and friends (how to fit in), to experience feelings of inadequacy. In the midst of these challenges, children need recognized and reaffirmed. If they do not receive that recognition they may misbehave to get it.

o    Remember, your children need to know that your acceptance and love is not based on their performance ability in sports or academics. Instead, encourage them to simply do their best. Teach them that achieving to the best of their ability brings personal satisfaction. Allow them to explore their interests and to invest in areas they find most motivating. Take a personal interest in those activities yourself…it will show your children how much you value them and their interests!

  • Angry little girl with beautiful hairstyleChildren may misbehave out of a desire to communicate a priority. This often comes across like anger or revenge. We tend to become angry about those things we find important. The same is true for our children. Perhaps they misbehave because they are angry and feel unheard or unimportant or neglected. If you search under the angry behavior you may find the priority of wanting to be heard, viewed as important, or paid attention to. Of course, the misbehavior miscommunicates this priority and need. We have to teach them how to communicate this priority in a way others, including us, can better understand it.

o    Remember, your children have feelings too. Emotions are not bad in themselves. They are opportunities to connect and learn about one another. We do want to teach our children how to express their emotions in a way that will help others understand and respond. In addition, when our response is directly in response to their need or priority, we take a big step in reducing their anger. When a person feels heard, anger often dissipates.

 

Knowing why our children misbehave or what influences their misbehavior will give us insight into how to respond to that misbehavior. Look past the behavior into the deeper influences. As you address these underlying factors over time you will see your children’s behavior improve.

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Are You Manipulated or Accepting of Your Child’s Emotion?

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“No, you can’t have a cookie. We’re eating supper soon.” As soon as the word “no” came out of my mouth, my daughter’s eyes watered, her lower lip protruded, her chin began to quiver and a tear gently rolled down her cheek. I watched…my heart went out to her…what should I do? 
 
“Give me your cell phone. We told you not to text past 11 pm and you did. Now you’ve lost your phone for the weekend!” My daughter heard the words and gave me the death glare. “Fine,” she barked before throwing her phone onto the table, turning away and stomping up the stairs. “I guess I’ll never talk to my friends again.” Her anger was palpable. What is the best response?
 
Each scenario brings the parent to a decision point…how do I respond to my child and their emotion? We hate to see our children suffer. We do not like to see them cry, miss out on something they really want, or hurt because of unfulfilled desires. We dread the times when our children become angry with us. We don’t want their anger to jeopardize our relationship. We just want “everyone to get along.” We long for close relationships filled with joy and untouched by moments of anger or disappointment. Unfortunately, emotions happen, and not just happy ones. We will experience our children’s sadness, anger, disappointment, hurt…. The question is: how do we respond when those negative emotions arise? Do we allow those emotions to control us? Manipulate us? When our children poke out their lower lip and fill their eyes with tears, do we give in and let them have what they want so we don’t have to watch their hurt and disappointment? If so, we have allowed their emotion to manipulate our actions. Do we yell after our children, filled with anger because they reacted to our discipline in anger and stomped away? If so, their anger has manipulated our response. When we allow our children’s emotions to manipulate our response, we teach them that we are more concerned about their “feeling good” than we are about their character and integrity. We teach them that their emotions are more powerful than us. We teach them that their emotions are more powerful than truth and discipline.
 
Or, do we accept their negative emotions? Do we acknowledge their emotions, empathizing with them while still upholding our limit? When our children pout and cry, we can accept their disappointment and hurt by simply saying, “Yes, I know it’s disappointing not to get your cookie now; but you still have to wait until after supper.” When our children throw down the phone and stomp up the stairs, we can accept their anger. Let them be angry and realize that they have still complied with the limit by giving you the phone. Later, after they have calmed down, you can talk to them. You can acknowledge their anger, empathize with the frustration of losing privileges when rules are broken…and explain that a natural result of breaking the rules is losing privilege. As we accept our children’s negative emotions we allow them to learn how to manage those emotions. We teach them that there are uncomfortable, even painful, consequences to misbehavior. We teach them that the truth, their good character, and our love are all stronger and more important than “feeling good” or “getting my way all the time.”
 
So, which do you do? Do you allow your children’s emotions to manipulate you? Or, do you accept their emotions—acknowledge and empathize with their negative emotions while still holding the line and responding in love? Acceptance may be the harder route, perhaps even the gracious path, but it produces the priceless fruit of a self-disciplined, maturing child.
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Mom & The Power of Gentleness

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We lived in a second floor apartment and I had fallen down the stairs. I remember sitting on the bottom step, about four-years-old, crying and holding my leg as my mother sat next to me. With gentle words and a soft touch, she comforted me and assured that I was not hurt too badly. My mother’s gentleness convinced me I would survive and empowered me as a young child to get back up and play. I had survived, empowered by gentle words and gentle touch. As an adult, I have watched my wife offer the same gentle words to our children when they were hurt, scared, or upset. In each instance, our children were strengthened and empowered to overcome the obstacles…all through their mother’s gentle words and gentle touch.
 
Perhaps the whole family can learn from the example of a mother’s gentleness. The power of gentleness enables a person to keep their emotions in check, controlling those emotions so they do not overwhelm the other person. Gentleness learns to bring up sensitive issues with kindness–softly and carefully in order to avoid overwhelming the other person. It avoids harshness, critical statements, and sarcasm. Gentleness speaks the truth in love, in a tone and manner that enables the other person to hear it, understand it, accept it, and act upon it. A gentle answer even turns away anger and rage (Proverbs 15:1). It prevents many an argument and encourages strength in relationship.
 
Gentleness also means knowing when to step back and allow a person to learn some truth on their own, even though we know the answer already. It is a “strong hand with a soft touch;” a hand that guides without pushing and leads without pulling; a hand that simply rests on a shoulder to offer support and strength to the journey.
 
All in all, a gentle person has great power—the power to comfort, strengthen, encourage, calm, and soothe; the power to turn away anger and find restoration; the power to have the truth heard. Isn’t that the kind of power we want to wield in our family? Isn’t that the type of power we hope our family members develop? Those who have had the privilege of living under a gentle mother know that power. We have benefitted from the rippling effect of that gentle power in our own lives. But, the power of gentleness is not confined only to mothers. We can extend gentleness to every family member. Families can strive to make gentleness a staple in the whole family—so mother, father, son, and daughter alike will exhibit that powerful trait. Let us all endeavor to practice gentleness and, as we do, watch how it promotes a stronger, more intimate family filled with the joy of peace!
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Cherishing-A Warm Blanket in a Cold World

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Many wedding vows include the phrase “to love and to cherish, till death do us part….” That word “cherish” is often passed right over…spoken, but not really heard. Paul, writing to the Ephesians, also tells husbands to “cherish” their wife (Ephesians 5:28-30, NASB). The word Paul uses for cherish literally means “to keep warm,” “to foster tender love and care.” This definition makes me think of a man who takes off his jacket on a chilly night and wraps it around his wife (the one he cherishes) to keep her warm and safe against the cold. The warmth of cherishing stands in stark contrast to the numbing cold of being unloved and uncherished. My daughter took these pictures of the ice sculptures and an ice city during a recent trip. Although these sculptures are beautiful and amazing, imagine living in a real “city of ice” and you have imagined living in a home where no one cherishes the other, a home without cherishing.
 
When we cherish our wife and family, we wrap a warm blanket of emotional support around them and offer protection from the coldness of the world. Even more, we keep the embers of love alive. Our cherishing actions kindle a warming fire of affection that draws the one we cherish toward us and away from the cold, hard world. We have a high regard for the person we cherish; and that high regard warms our desire to love and care for them. That desire to care for the one we cherish translates into a loving empathy that opens us up to their needs and ignites a compassion that compels us to relieve that need.
 
Cherishing turns the focus of our life toward the person we cherish and how we might connect with them. It exhibits an unconditional acceptance that calls forth and nurtures the best qualities of the one we cherish while accepting them just as they are. And, family intimacy grows as we cherish one another. Wives are drawn to the warmth of a husband who cherishes her. Children are drawn to the warmth of their parents when husband and wife have learned to cherish one another in their marriage. And friends are drawn to the warmth of the home in which family members cherish one another. I invite you to cherish your family this week. Throw another log on the fire of compassionate love, wrap a warm blanket of emotional security around you and your loved ones, and cuddle up to share a night of cherishing love.
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