When we desire a specific new action, we describe it in detail giving our child the experience of how it will be, what to expect, avoiding any surprises if possible.
We celebrate small steps giving meaningful specific praise, and positive encouragement-
“Your jacket is closer to the hook today. Maybe tomorrow it’ll be even closer.”
“You are too nice to talk to your little sister that way.”
“You ate all your broccoli – you’re going to grow really strong.”
Joy and Happiness are the milk of human interaction, the pleasure of a secure attachment, reinforced with meaningful rituals, celebration, and love- built upon in a lifetime of living. –
We all make mistakes, and that is the fact of it. Sometimes the mistake ends up being more of a blessing than if it had turned out the way we’d wished. All those mistakes are opportunities for empathy to heal us. Telling the truth can be so liberating. At any age, reinforcing that family attachment with empathic communication, understanding, and reconciliation is possible.
In Infancy to age 5, physical contact of hugging and touch is foremost in creating that secure joy and attachment bond. But remember, touch is still needed at all the other older stages, in smaller doses perhaps, and in other guises. If you can establish some home rituals around mealtimes, prayers or affirmations, table manners, and bedtimes, make sure they are meaningful and you are all able to express feelings, your family identity, and a connection to something bigger (nature, the higher self, spiritual feelings, world peace are all ideas that you can use). Holidays can provide opportunities for fun rituals that are special just to your family, or the two of you. Unleash your creativity to find the things that bond you, and be consistent. Starting Sunday evening (or any evening) family gatherings as soon as possible can consolidate family strengths for a lifetime.
With aged 5-12 year old children, their developing autonomy requires less touch and parents would be wise to insure that hugs and holding is not waylaid completely in the rush of activities and peer fun that characterize this age. Reminders of “how we do things” in our family, are important touchstones for closeness to be maintained. This is the age when children develop true empathy and values, with reason and logic helping them to understand how to truly be an Empatharian out in the world.
But they make loads of mistakes and Reframing those mistakes as progress on a continuum of learning, encourages positive thinking about accomplishments. And bravery to try. Chores are important at every age, but especially at this age, children feel good about contributing to the family functioning. While having a share of the family income might be fair enough, rewarding for specific chores within the regular set of expectations can be counter-productive to team building.
To Help Behavior Change, a parent can give positively skewed feedback and encouragement, or the environment provides feedback directly. Praise works best when specific to a specific situation, in the here and now. By providing a slightly prejudiced viewpoint to the positive, a parent can train the child’s mind to do the same: amplifying progress, celebrating tiny changes as positives, and reframing a failure into “a good effort”. Effort can always be celebrated, and the child makes progress with continued right effort being encouraged.
The next blog post will be about Adolescence and some hacks for parenting adolescents. Teens are definitely challenging, but then so are 2 year olds! And 6 year olds! If you survived this long, you will survive. Rest easy in that till tomorrow!