3. Universal Truth No. 1: All Children Have Emotional Needs
In The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, author Steven Covey uses the metaphor of the Emotional Bank Account to describe “the amount of trust that’s been built up in a relationship.” It’s a way to keep track of where you stand, emotionally speaking, with the people in your life—and it works especially well with children.
The premise is this: Every emotional interaction with your child, positive or negative, is entered into that child’s account as either a deposit or a withdrawal. Just as we feel more comfortable with plenty of money in our actual bank accounts, kids feel more comfortable with plenty of deposits in their Emotional Bank Accounts. The more they have in the bank on any given day, the more cooperative and happy they tend to be.
Maybe, today, you yelled at your daughter out of frustration, and then insisted she run errands with you in the afternoon, and then accidentally embarrassed her in front of her friends. Those are emotional withdrawals. But maybe you also said yes both times she asked you to play with her, agreed to show her how to make a smoothie, and dealt calmly with several other frustrations that came up during the day. In this way, the positive probably cancelled out the negative, allowing you to maintain a decent connection with your child throughout the day.
No matter how hard you try, you will make withdrawals—especially during challenging times in your lives. Your kids will become hurt, frustrated, and angry with you. But so much heartache can be avoided simply by keeping an eye on the bottom line and by acknowledging your shortfalls.
In Playful Parenting, Lawrence Cohen talks about “filling a child’s cup”—that is, emotionally refueling them. Things that fill the child’s cup, he said, are play, friendship, one-on-one time, connection, and doing what they love to do—all great deposits. What empties the cup are stress and strain, rejection by peers, loneliness, isolation, yelling, punishing, failing, fatigue, and doing what they hate to do.
In her book Peaceful Parent, Happy Kids, clinical psychologist and creator of Aha! Parenting Laura Markham also discusses the concept of the Emotional Bank Account and suggests a five-to-one ratio for deposits to withdrawals. She cited one study that found married couples who bank “at least five positive interactions for every negative one” are less likely to divorce. “Maintaining this 5-to-1 ratio,” she writes, “is probably effective insurance in every relationship, including between parents and children.”
The reason we’re kicking off Part Two of this book with the Emotional Bank Account is twofold. First, we want to offer you a practical concept that you can immediately put to work in your home. And, second, it’s an ideal way to introduce you to the simple but crucial concept of children’s emotional needs. Every single one of the deposits named above satisfies at least one specific emotional need. Unpacking the needs one at a time will offer tremendous insight into why your child does what he does when he does it.
ParentShift Assignment: Add Your Own
Read through the list of deposits and withdrawals listed in our check register, then think about the last twenty-four hours. What specific withdrawals and deposits have you made into your child’s Emotional Bank Account? Circle them, or name your own, and then add it all up. Did you come out deposit-rich or do you have some balancing to do?
An Acronym to Remember
Search the Internet for “emotional needs of children,” and you’ll find dozens of words: acceptance, affection, freedom, respect, safety, support, trust, understanding. The list goes on and on. The one thing they have in common? They’re all frustratingly vague. How can you be expected to meet your child’s emotional needs if you can’t even define them?
That’s why we’ve “bundled” children’s emotional needs into a tight pack of seven and given them one easy-to-remember acronym: SPECIAL. SPECIAL stands for:
S = Smile
P = Powerful
E = Explore
C = Connection
I = Important
A = Attention
L = Love
Whenever you are in doubt about why a child is behaving a certain way, we recommend turning first to the SPECIAL needs to uncover the source of trouble.
S = Smile (Fun, Laughter, and Play)
As parents, we know how important it is to include bits of joy in our day-to-day lives—whether it be eating good food, joking around with our colleagues at work, or debriefing with our families at the end of the day. It’s lousy to go too long without something that lifts our spirits. We need things that make us smile.
Kids may not smile for all the same reasons we do, but their need for enjoyment is far more powerful. And this is what makes the emotional need of Smile—fun, laughter, and play—so important. Numerous studies show that laughter has health benefits to the human body. It lowers the levels of stress hormones in our blood. It releases beta-endorphins, the body’s natural opiates. It stimulates the heart and lungs, elevates blood pressure, and improves breathing capacity.
Of course, not everything can be fun, and it need not be a laugh riot at your house 24/7. But when diagnosing challenging behavior or lack of cooperation, do make sure to keep Smile in mind as a quick antidote.
Add Fun to the Mundane
Mary Poppins’s “Spoonful of Sugar” wasn’t just a catchy tune; that was genius child-rearing. When you make things fun—or, better yet, allow your child to make things fun—you are meeting an emotional need while also accomplishing the most mundane, tantrum-inducing tasks. Homework, bedtime, doing chores—you name it—can all be made a whole lot easier when you make room for a little more playfulness. Does this mean you now must be the resident clown all the time? On the contrary. Your job is not to keep your kid entertained and away from boredom—they are responsible for that! But it really helps if we show them how to do it.
For lots of no-batteries-included suggestions about how to add some levity to everyday routines, see Appendix A. That’s where you’ll find:
•Eight Ways to Make Mealtimes Fun
•Five Ways to Make Picking Up Toys Fun
•Ten Ways to Make Getting in the Car Seat Fun
•Six Ways to Make Eating Out Fun
•Three Ways to Make Homework Fun
•Six Ways to Make Waiting Fun
•Six Ways to Make Bath Time Fun
•Eight Ways to Make Brushing Teeth Fun
•Twenty-five Way to Make Bedtime Fun
Your parenting opportunity here is to be creative. Think of laughter as your child’s job— a job that will reap him rewards for the rest of his life. And think of yourself as his assistant. Get off the phone, close the laptop, and put that kid to work!
“Children don’t say, ‘I had a hard day at school today; can I talk to you about it?’ They say, ‘Will you play with me?’”
—LAWRENCE J. COHEN
ParentShift Assignment: How Does Your Child Spell Fun?
Identify one routine or task that your child seems to dislike, and name five ways he or she might make those things more fun. (Remember, our long-term goal isn’t to make everything fun for our kids, but to teach them how to make their own fun.) Flip to Appendix A for inspiration.
P = Powerful
Power struggles—which were reported by most of our survey responders as one of their primary concerns—are the result of a legitimate need to feel powerful. This is part of a very human drive to feel capable of managing our worlds on our own. The problem is that when children don’t feel they are receiving enough authentic, appropriate power at each stage of their development—regardless of whether we think we are giving them enough power—they try to take it. And that almost always leads to conflict.
For kids to feel powerful, they need to call as many shots as they are capable of calling. Feeding themselves, picking out their own clothes, choosing what to pack for lunch (and packing it), selecting their own extracurricular activities, and so on are all small ways to make children of certain ages feel powerful.
Allowing children the freedom to make mistakes is another.
Each time we take over tasks that kids could do themselves, we rob them of both power and opportunity. Let your kid pour his own milk. Let him spill it. And let him learn to clean it up.
Later in this book we will offer a lot of information about boundaries and limits—how to set them and how to stick to them. We’ll also provide you a lot of information about power struggles—how to identify them, how to prevent them, and how to get out of them. For now, though, keep in mind that giving kids power does not mean moving your boundaries or limits. It does not mean handing over all the power. And it certainly does not mean being a permissive parent. Indeed, contrary to what you may have heard, kids demand power not because they need more limits, but because they need more power.
Are You Giving Your Kid Enough Age-Appropriate Responsibility?
When teaching the parents of middle and high schoolers, the Hatfields often hand out the following checklist:
After the parents have had a chance to complete the checklist, they discuss (and often defend!) how few of the boxes they’ve checked.
“My kid can’t be expected to do all these things!” parents often say, to which the Hatfields reply, “Your child is seventeen years old. She’s taking four AP classes and can drive a car, but she can’t get herself up in the morning, make her own breakfast, and do her own laundry?”
Your job as a parent is to be “unemployed” by the time your child is eighteen. Luckily, kids are usually eager to learn new skills as soon as they are given the opportunity. Even toddlers are fully capable of helping out around the house. So take a look at your child’s life and environment; what can you do to give her more responsibility? Can you lower the snack shelf so she can begin preparing her own snacks? Can you give her an allowance so she can begin learning the value of money? Can you let her order her own meals at restaurants? RSVP to her own parties?
Not all responsibilities are “fun,” of course. Some are literally chores. But even chores can be made more fun with just a little forethought. The key is to know what your child is capable of, to release responsibilities a little at a time, and not to force or threaten.
Appendix B has a full list of responsibilities your child is capable of handling at every age, from eighteen months to eighteen years. For instance: Did you know most two-year-olds are capable of choosing their clothes, assisting with their laundry, and making their beds? And that most five-year-olds are capable of being responsible for their own backpacks, getting themselves up in the morning, and making their own breakfast and lunch? It’s true. And the sooner you get them started, the easier it will be to implement a chore system in your home.
Give Chores and Allowances—but Avoid Linking the Two
Both chores and allowances are instrumental in teaching children responsibility and giving them power. In taking on chores, kids begin to feel a part of the household and learn that their contributions matter. By giving them allowances, they learn the value of money.
But if you want to make your lives easier, keep the two things separate.
Paying children for chores or personal tasks—such as cleaning their own rooms, doing their own laundry, or making their own lunch—can send a message that those things are negotiable. They may think that if they give up the money, they could give up their chores. It’s fine to offer “extra” money for “extra” jobs. In fact, we recommend making a list of jobs around the house that children can choose to do on their own and decide how much they can earn for each task. (Washing the car = $4, for example.) But linking chores with a base allowance works against us in several ways.
Unless our kids have their own money to play with, the onus is back on us to decide what they can and cannot buy. We rob our kids of the opportunity to learn financial literacy. And we teach reward mentality: I’ll do the right thing only if I get something in return, and I won’t do anything unless there’s something in it for me. What’s more, by detaching the chores from allowance, you keep yourself from being tempted to take allowances away as punishment, which only invites power struggles.
Be forewarned: All children are terrible with money at first. This is okay! They’ll make lots of mistakes with their money. They may buy the crazy-stupidest junk you’ve ever seen. But it’s such an easy way to make a child feel powerful. And, even if they do make terrible mistakes with their money that they later regret, they get to learn from those mistakes. But here’s the best part: You are no longer the one subjectively deciding whether your kid can have a new toy or book or pair of jeans. You get to be the good guy.
Chore Systems That Won’t Suck the Life Out of You
There is a learning curve when it comes to chores. Two- and three-year-olds love to help around the house—but rarely is it truly helpful. It requires a lot of patience (and probably some broken dishes) at first. But when you raise your child to believe chores are synonymous with living in a family—which, in our opinion, they are!—you’ll save a lot of heartache down the line. That said, a lot of chore systems are a source of stress for families—especially when children feel the chores are being imposed against their will. For chore systems to invite authentic cooperation and relieve parents of constant hassle, they must take into account each child’s age and temperament. They must consider each family’s pace and priorities. And, in our experience anyway, they must adhere to some key criteria.
1.The chores must include your child’s input. If the child is not part of the brainstorming session that gives rise to your family’s chore system, the system is likely to flounder or fail. The “empowerment” part of the chore system comes from your child’s ability to weigh in on the chores being considered.
2.The child must agree on what jobs he is going to do. Being too prescriptive about chores is the most common mistake parents make. They dole out chores with little thought to whether the child thinks those are good chores for him. Again, chores can be incredibly empowering, but hoisting chores on children against their will is the opposite.
3.Parents must aim to be an “equal” part of the system. If only the children are expected to do chores, the power imbalance is likely to lead to problems. If only the parents are expected to make sure chores are being done, the power imbalance also is likely to lead to problems. Better to make parents a part of the chore system and to appoint a “coach” or “boss” that rotates weekly and makes sure chores are getting done.
4.The system must include a self-evaluation process. Instead of paying children for their chores or nagging them when things don’t get done correctly, set aside some time, perhaps once a week, when you can talk about how things are going.
5.Parents must be open to change. If a chore system isn’t working—that is, it’s met with resistance or appears to be disempowering for your child—be willing to revisit the system and change things up. Like all mutual agreements, which we’ll discuss further in Chapter 11, chore systems may have to be renegotiated from time to time.
The Family Job Wheel is a chore system that fits all the criteria, plus has the added bonus of making chores more fun for kids. Here’s how it works:
1.Brainstorm. As a family, schedule a time to sit down and brainstorm all the things that need to be done around the house and all the chores your children are capable of doing at their current ages. (Check Appendix B if you’re unsure.) Be sure the children are contributing their ideas. (This is the key to avoiding nagging later on.) Using a whiteboard or piece of paper to write down the ideas will ensure everyone is on the same page and help everyone consider the options more carefully.
2.Get genuine agreement from each member of the family. As a team, agree on a list of age-appropriate chores. Pare down the list, making sure to get genuine agreement on each job, by asking explicitly, “Do these jobs all look good to you?” Then attach a fun name to every job, as well as a fun activity. For example, the “Host” who helps set the table every night might also get to ring a dinner bell and light a candle of their choice. Be sure to include a “Boss”—someone who is in charge of issuing reminders and making sure that others are on top of their jobs. (Sometimes parents may have to whisper reminders to the Boss.) Then agree on what day of the week and time of day to rotate the wheel.
3.Create the wheel. Cut out two circles from cardstock, one larger than the other (see next page). The larger circle is for the jobs, and the smaller circle is for each member of the family—including parents! Remember, when parents participate, children see the family as a team, a key to gaining their authentic cooperation. Center the small circle on top of the large one, and hold them together with a brass paper fastener at the center. Every week, turn the center circle clockwise. Voilà!
4.Self-evaluate. Every week at the designated time, the Boss asks each person, “How did it go this week? What will you do differently next time?” The leader then rotates the job wheel and announces new jobs for the following week. This, of course, will require some parental guidance, and we recommend being flexible so as to suit the needs of your family.
True Story!
After learning about the power of, well, power in a Parenting from the Heart class, the mother of a four-year-old girl went home and instituted a whole slew of new systems aimed at reducing the number of power struggles she was experiencing in her house. The little girl was overjoyed. Her mother wrote to Ty and Linda the next day, quoting her daughter as saying, “This is such an exciting day! I got my own snack drawer! I got a wallet and allowance! I even got a job wheel, and now I get to pack my own lunch!”
The mom went on to say, “She is thrilled with all the changes, and I can tell she feels very empowered by her newfound trust.”
ParentShift Assignment: Hand Over the Reins
Take a look at Appendix B. Ask yourself, “At what age will I stop doing this for my child?” Then identify one thing you can stop doing today, and hand her the reins.
All the Little Ways We Steal Power from Our Kids—and How to Give It Back
Trusting our children to take on age-appropriate responsibility makes children feel powerful because it is literally giving them power over their own lives. But it doesn’t count for much if we are stealing power from them in numerous other ways. Okay, “stealing” may be a strong word, especially given that most of us are completely unaware we’re even taking it. But that is how children feel. Although we must, at times, tell our kids what to do—or at least guide them strongly in a certain direction—we can do so in a way that doesn’t make them feel controlled, constrained, and coerced.
The trick is to get in the habit of offering choices—lots and lots of choices.
There are three types of choices parents can offer their children: concrete, win-win, and playful.
1.Concrete choices. These choices are literal and limited. They work wonderfully with toddlers and preschoolers, who are concrete in their thinking, but they also work through the teenage years. “Do you want to wear the red pants or the blue pants?” is an example of a concrete choice. “Do you want to empty the dishwasher or load the dishwasher?” is another.
2.Win-win choices. You will learn more about this in Chapter 11, but choices can be used when a limit is in place—a set bedtime or curfew, for instance—and the parent wants to offer age-appropriate power around the limit. You might ask a young child, “Do you want to go to bed now and I’ll read you four books, or do you want to go to bed in ten minutes and I’ll I read you two books?” Or, for an older child, you might say, “We agreed you would be home and in bed by 10:30 p.m. on a school night. You can leave now and watch two movies or you can leave after dinner and see one movie. What would you like to do?”
3.Playful choices. Playful choices satisfy a child’s need for power and fun, thus making the likelihood of cooperation all the greater. You might ask a young child, “Do you want a piggyback ride to bed, or would you like me to wheelbarrow you to bed?” Or, for an older child, you might ask, “Do you want to wash the car in your bathing suit or in your clothes so you can get them wet and soapy?” For playful choices, be sure to have an attitude of excitement in your voice; this will allow your child to choose with ease.
Be sure to give only two choices and to make each choice positive and empowering. One of them cannot be a punishment. “Do you want to get dressed now or sit in timeout?” is not a choice; it’s a threat. Also, the parent must be okay with either choice made and be willing to follow through on whatever the child decides.
Choices are an excellent way to avoid the (highly disempowering) “if-then” approach to getting what we want. Saying, “If you __________, then __________” just sets us up to use threats, bribery, and rewards anyway. Also, the words “If you . . .” convey our doubt in our child’s ability to follow through with a request. Here are examples of how you can replace the if-then approach with choices:
If-Then: “If you get dressed, then you can watch TV tonight.”
Concrete Choice: “You have a choice. Do you want to wear your cat pajamas or your dog pajamas?”
If-Then: “If you finish your homework, then I’ll let you play longer with your Legos.”
Win-Win Choice: “I have more time to play with you before dinner than after dinner. So you can finish your homework before 5 p.m., and I will play Legos with you for twenty minutes, or you can finish your homework after dinner, and I will play Legos with you for ten minutes.”
If-Then: “If you pick up five toys, then I will take you to the park.”
Playful Choice: “Do you want to sing a song while we each pick up five toys or do you want to dance while we each pick up five toys?”
What if My Child Won’t Make a Choice?
It can be challenging when both choices are undesirable. Let’s say your child has a virus, and the antibiotic tastes bad. An empowering choice might be, “Do you want to take your medicine before dinner or after dinner?” But, of course, the child is likely to say, “Neither.” Here, you could use logic. “The doctor says you need to take your medicine, or you won’t get well.” But logic is a feeling blocker—a term you’ll learn about in Chapter 5—and rarely helps in these situations. Instead, affirm his feelings: “It sounds like you’re feeling anxious because your medicine tastes yucky and gross.” If talking about his feelings doesn’t work and he still refuses to make a choice, choose the option you think he would have chosen for himself, and move on. “Okay, we’ll take the medicine after dinner, so you can brush your teeth right away and get that yucky taste out of your mouth.” A loving tone and attitude helps immensely.
Training Ourselves to Cut the Commands
Kids, like adults, don’t like to be issued orders or commands. The more commands they receive, the more likely they are to distance themselves from you.
“Bring your umbrella.”
“Feed the dog.”
“Don’t forget your violin.”
Hey, we all do it. But that doesn’t make it a good habit. Instead of issuing commands, try to give information instead—information that empowers the child to act of her own accord.
“The weather report says it’s going to rain today.”
“The dog looks hungry.”
“Music class is today. Do you have everything you need?”
Across the board, children who are given information rather than commands tend to enjoy closer relationships with their parents, while getting valuable practice thinking for themselves.
Give Information
Whenever you find yourself telling your child what to do or what not to do, try to stop yourself and give information instead. Here are some ways to rephrase common commands:
“There’s a world of difference between insisting on someone’s doing something and establishing an atmosphere in which that person can grow into wanting to do it.”
—FRED ROGERS
True Story!
Often in their classes, Ty and Linda will bring volunteers to the front of the room to illustrate the palpable difference between being given information and commands. In the role of the parent, Ty first says, “Get your lunch, shoes, jacket, and backpack. We are leaving for school now!” Next, he says, “We are leaving for school at 7:30 a.m. What do you need to bring?” After each statement, he asks the volunteers to report how the interaction makes them feel. Almost without exception, volunteers report that the command leaves them feeling controlled and diminished, while the information-giving makes them feel respected and trusted.
Recently, though, the exercise took an unexpected turn when the volunteer heard the command—“Get your lunch, shoes, jacket, and backpack. We are leaving for school now!”—and reported that she felt fine about it. It was precisely the way the mother of two had been raised, and the command seemed both appropriate and normal to her. “You told me what to do,” she said, “and now I know what I need to do. That’s comforting to me.” Without judging the reaction, Ty shifted to an information-giving stance. “We are leaving for school at 7:30 a.m.,” he told the woman. “What do you need to bring?” The woman’s face immediately changed. Her mouth dropped open, and her hand went to her heart. “Oh my God,” she said, suddenly overcome by emotion, “I feel empowered and capable. You trust me.” As she laughed at the sudden epiphany, tears welled her eyes. She knew, in that instant, what she had missed out on as a child.
ParentShift Assignment: Shift from Commander to Informer
Write down a command you regularly give to your child and then reword it, either so you offer a choice (concrete, win-win, or playful) or so that you give information and let the child figure out what to do.
E = Explore
As soon as babies are born, they tend to explore and experiment with their surroundings. It’s the reason we take our newborns outside to look around and the reason we cover our electrical outlets when they become toddlers.
A child’s emotional need to explore doesn’t abate as the child develops. Once, the six-year-old son of a friend of ours put a plastic Star Wars figure in a rented popcorn machine and turned it on. “I just wanted to see what would happen,” the boy explained to his mom, while she scraped the melted droid from the popper.
As always, some limits are appropriate. But keep in mind that “Stop that!” and “Don’t touch!” are exploration-killers, and kids will become understandably frustrated if they hear that too often. Plus, experimentation is a building block of creativity. Pay attention to what your child chooses to explore, and you’ll gain great insight into his natural interests and budding gifts.
Some children are more curious than others and may have a hard time satisfying their need to experiment and explore; it’s like an itch they can’t quite scratch. One four-year-old we know kept stomping on the flowerbed at his preschool. No matter how many times his mother lifted him out and explained that his actions were hurting the flowers, the soles of his shoes always had a way of ending up in the flowerbed. Exasperated, she finally realized her son wasn’t trying to be defiant; he just really liked the experience of it. So she rerouted him. She found a patch of weeds in her own backyard and told him to stomp away.
When It Comes to Joining and Quitting Sports, Parents Need to Get off the Field
A middle school girl we know joined a swim team only to find herself spending a minimum of two hours a day at the pool. Overtaxed and no longer enjoying the sport, she turned to her dad: “When can I stop swimming?” she asked. Her dad replied, “After you get the scholarship.”
He wasn’t kidding.
Children who are groomed to become exceptional athletes often become needy, lonely adults. Studies show that emotional distress is common in high achievers because high achievement is so often associated with pushy parents.
Let your child explore by choosing his own electives and sports whenever possible. Yes, your child might choose to learn Klingon rather than the more-practical Spanish language in middle school, or he might go through an assortment of interests, flitting from ice-skating to roller-skating to skateboarding to ukulele. . . . That’s okay. It’s good for kids to try new things—lots of them! They are young and are exploring. We can spoil that desire by insisting they stay in a sport just because they signed up.
In the heart-centered model, “commitment” to a team is far less important than “commitment” to oneself. If your kid is passionate about something, he’ll stick with it. If he’s not, let him move on.
That said, we are well within our rights to let our kids know our budgetary restrictions when it comes to extracurricular activities, and it’s reasonable to expect them to take on an extracurricular activity—especially given the amount of time kids spend on electronics and today’s high rate of childhood obesity. “You don’t have to do baseball, soccer, or tennis,” you might tell your child, “but you have to do something.”
Signs that your child may be finished with a sport or activity
• Making excuses
• Refusing to get ready, or dawdling
• Telling you they don’t want to go
• Feigning illness
• Showing up late
• Whining/complaining
ParentShift Assignment: What Does Your Child Like to Explore?
Name some things your child likes to explore. Does she like to step in puddles, inspect dead ants, put on plays, set up “bookstores” in the living room, or just generally make messes in the kitchen? What could you do to support your child’s need to explore?
“The challenge of parenting lies in finding the balance between nurturing, protecting, and guiding, on one hand, and allowing your child to explore, experiment, and become an independent, unique person, on the other.”
—JANE NELSEN
When we talk about being “connected” to kids, we don’t mean proximity. We mean being socially and emotionally engaged with them. You know what it’s like to feel dialed into someone. And you know what it feels like to be out of sync with a person—distant, annoyed, unable to see eye to eye with them.
Connection is like a faucet. It’s either on and flowing, or it’s off and dry. When we look at, talk lovingly to, play with, and show affection for our kids, the connection is flowing. When we nag, yell, walk away from, ignore, guilt, shame, hit, or punish our kids, the spigot is turned off.
According to Vickie Falcone, author of Buddha Never Raised Kids & Jesus Didn’t Drive Carpool, parents are constantly facing the decision of whether to “disconnect now” from our kids or to “stay connected.” And our choices in those moments influence the kids’ self-esteem. “Get into the habit,” she advises in her book, “of asking yourself, ‘Does this activity connect me or disconnect me from my child?’ If the answer is ‘disconnect,’ choose a connecting practice instead.”
Falcone described the concept of the “Three Levels of Connection.”
• Low level: You (the parent) may or may not be physically present, but you are mentally or emotionally absent. (You take your ten-year-old to a swimming pool and let the lifeguard watch him swim while you lock into your latest novel. Or you buy your child a karaoke machine and then watch TV while he plays with it.)
• Medium level: You are physically present, but allow yourself only limited mental or emotional engagement. (You sit near the pool and watch your child swim. Or you set up the karaoke machine and show your child how to use it before getting back to your TV program.)
• High level: You are physically present and fully engaged, mentally and emotionally. (You and your child get in the pool and play together. Or you and your child take turns singing your “Achy Breaky Hearts” out.)
We can’t always be connected to our kids at a high level. Life gets in the way. Sometimes we’ll only manage a low- or medium-level connection. Other times, when we’re working late or out of town, we won’t manage a connection at all. But be aware of the level of connection you’re experiencing with your kids daily, and make as many high-level connections as possible.
Connection Is Our Thing
Just remember, we can’t expect children to keep the connection going; that’s on us. Children depend on us for many things, and nurturing the relationship is one of them. Gordon Neufeld, a psychologist who developed a groundbreaking theory on attachment and coauthored Hold On to Your Kids, once said in an interview, “It’s a parent’s responsibility to preserve the connection with their children, to preserve the relationship, so that the children can let go and become their own selves.”
Taking a child on one-on-one dates is a phenomenal way to fill a whole bunch of your child’s emotional needs at once—especially her need for connection. If your child seems to be craving your attention or engaging in a lot of power struggles, this is just what the doctor ordered.
Just as you would on a romantic date, choose something the child wants to do and make it a special trip for just the two of you. One-on-one dates constitute lottery-sized deposits in your child’s Emotional Bank Account and the highest-level connection you can provide.
Here’s what you do:
1. Say to your child, “I want to take you on a date,” and set the date for some time in the future. Make it clear this is just the two of you. No other siblings, no other parent, and no friends. And, remember, impromptu trips to the ice cream shop after school are fun, but they are not one-on-one dates. Dates must be thought out and preplanned. They are not about having time; they’re about making time.
2. Provide guidelines for the date. Discuss which days of the week are available, how much time you have for the date, and how much money you are willing to spend, if any. Although buying something may be part of the date, going somewhere just to buy a toy isn’t the best use of your time together. Let your kid know this is about doing something together other than shopping.
3. Allow your child to choose the activity. Your child might have a special idea without any prompting. But chances are, she might need some help with ideas. Here are a few:
•Go out for breakfast together before school starts
•“Rescue” your child from a school lunch
•Ride bikes, roller skate, or scooter around the neighborhood
•Pack a picnic lunch and take it to the park
•Go on a hike or nature walk
•Go out for ice cream
•Visit a coffee house that plays music
•Support your child’s hobbies and interests
4. Schedule the date. Allow your child to put it on the calendar.
5. Do not cancel!
6. Be present and enjoy each other. Silence your cell phones and leave your problems at home—especially problems you might have with each other. If there is something serious you want to discuss, save it for later. This is about connecting, not correcting.
“Ninety percent of your interactions with your child should be about connecting, so he can accept the 10 percent that are about correcting.”
—LAURA MARKHAM
True Story!
A father we know and his ten-year-old son, David, were experiencing a rocky patch in their relationship. The dad’s time was divided among four kids, and there wasn’t a lot of opportunity for individualized attention. After learning about the transformational power of one-on-one dates, however, our friend decided to take his son to a waterpark alone, just the two of them. In the past, he told us, he would have brought all his children, but this time he took just David. “I had such a wonderful time with him,” he told us later. “We had no distractions, only floating on inner tubes, just me and my son. It was one of the best times I have ever had with David. Something as easy as going to a water park can be a turning point.”
ParentShift Assignment: Plan a Date
Plan a one-on-one date with each of your children, making sure to follow each of the six steps listed. What did you decide to do? And how did you feel afterward?
I = Important
Perhaps you have read that all children have a fundamental need to feel significant, cherished, respected, and valued. We use the umbrella term “important” to cover all of these adjectives. Children need to feel that they are an important—vital even!—part of their families. Now, of course, your child is already an important part of your family, right? But that is irrelevant; again, it’s the child’s perception that matters. The child’s need is not just to be important, but to feel important.
You can make children feel important by asking them their opinions, thoughts, feelings, and ideas concerning things going on in the family; empathizing with their points of view; taking the time to understand things from where they stand; and showing respect for what they say and do.
Involve them, and appreciate them. “Where should I hang this picture?” or “What kind of snacks would you like me to get you at the grocery store?” or “Should we give your baby sister a bath now or after dinner?” are all great questions. And don’t underestimate the usefulness of involving your kid in your life. Appreciate his skills at cooking, decorating, sports, or dance. Watch his TV shows with him. Get to know his friends. Ask him to show you his latest gymnastic trick. All of these little things clearly signal that you value what is important to him.
You might also consider holding an “appreciation circle.”
An appreciation circle is a fun way to remind kids just how important they are and to teach them the immense value of self-respect and self-appreciation—and, no, it need not be a literal circle. Here is how it works:
Choose a family member to go first. The chosen person says, “One thing I appreciate about myself is ____________.” Each family member then takes a turn telling the chosen person, “What I appreciate about [name] is ____________” Continue the process until everyone has a turn, including the parents. Model it, people! Also, be sure to avoid being judgmental. Sometimes kids will say goofy things, and that’s okay. Soon enough you may hear profound heartfelt comments.
Variations:
•During a family member’s birthday party, have the invited guests say one thing they appreciate about the honored birthday person. This is often the best present of the day!
•Write your appreciations down on a piece of paper and put them in a special box. Take turns drawing a slip of paper from the box and then read the comments aloud as a family. Consider keeping them as keepsakes, too. You can save them up and read them on special nights, such as New Year’s Eve.
ParentShift Assignment: Involve Them
Brainstorm ways to invite your child to be involved in the family or ways you could become more involved in your child’s life. Learn more about your child’s latest hobby or attend dance or soccer practice with your kid, for instance. Name your ideas here.
A = Attention
Remember the old adage about starting a business? “Location, location, location!” If there were an equivalent adage for parenting, it would have to be “Attention, attention, attention!” It’s just that important.
To feel valued, children need attention from their parents in good times and in bad. Say your daughter wants you to read the four-page fan letter she just wrote to Lin-Manuel Miranda, or is putting on a play with her stuffed animals and needs an audience, or is spitting mad at you for refusing to take her to the pumpkin patch for the third time in a week. All of these situations demand that you stop what you are doing and gift a thing of great value to your child: your attention.
Psychologist Dorothy Walter Baruch, author of the classic 1949 book New Ways of Discipline, wrote, “When you spot a need, meet it all you can.” This is an especially great adage when it comes to attention. When you spot your child’s need for attention, you could do few wiser things than to meet it all you can.
‘FOR A MINUTE,’ NOT ‘IN A MINUTE’
We aren’t available to meet our children’s need for attention all the time, of course. Sometimes, let’s face it, we’re completely self-involved in our own issues or snowed under with work or just generally short on time.
But, remember, even a minute has value.
When your child asks you to come play with him or listen to his story or help with a project, resist the urge to put it off by saying, “In a minute.” By doing so, you put off the request—and, as every parent knows, you may not get around to doing what you told your child you would do. Next time, try saying, “For a minute” instead. Then stop what you’re doing for one minute and do what your child is asking of you. (Many parents find they stay for much longer because they recognize they are making a high-level connection and don’t want to cut it short.)
As a work-from-home mom, this simple concept has become a mantra for me. No matter how stressed I’m feeling—trying to get this long chapter completed, for instance!—I rarely turn my daughter away when she interrupts me with a new video she made or picture she took. By giving up a minute or two of my time in the short run, I buy myself far more peace, quiet and good will in the long run.
GEMs: Genuine Endearing Moments
This is the first, but certainly not the last, time we’ll mention Genuine Endearing Moments, or GEMs. It is one of the best tools we’ve found to meet every one of the seven SPECIAL needs—but particularly the need for attention. GEMs are based on the concept of “Genuine Encounters” first coined by Dorothy Corkille Briggs in Your Child’s Self-Esteem and adapted by Kathryn Kvols, founder of the International Network for Children and Families and author of Redirecting Children’s Behavior. The acronym evokes an image of a precious jewel that you can give to your child whenever and wherever it is needed.
GEMs are nothing more or less than focused attention. They involve connecting to the unique qualities of a child, they can last twenty seconds or longer, and they can be either a happy or unhappy moment. Here’s how they work:
1. Get on the child’s level.
2. Make eye contact.
3. Try to feel what the child is feeling.
4. Physically connect with the child. Touch his shoulder. Hold his hand. Use any loving gesture that feels natural to you and is welcomed by him.
5. Be present without distraction. The mind is constantly chattering and judging, but turn down the volume for a couple minutes and give your child all of your attention.
6. Just listen. Let the child guide the conversation with little or no talking from you. Acknowledge what he’s saying with encouraging words or gestures and genuine interest—for example, “mmm,” “oh,” “cool,” or “wow.”
Although GEMs are useful any time, focused attention has proven incredibly helpful when children are under stress—new baby, new school, family move, heavy disappointments, that sort of thing. Most of us already are giving GEMs to our kids, but we may not be fully aware of them. Aim for three GEMs a day, and you won’t be sorry.
ParentShift Assignment: Your Three GEMs
Write down three GEMs you had with your child today.
True Story!
After learning about GEMs, a mother we know was on the lookout for organic opportunities for connection with her daughter. One day, she came home from work to find her daughter full of excitement and eager to show her something she’d found while playing in the yard. Soon the girl had presented her mother with a garden worm, her mom reported, “as if it were the most remarkable thing to have ever happened to her in her life.” Mom’s first reaction was understandable: “This is gross, get it out of the house.” But she stopped herself. “I remembered the power of having GEMs with my child,” she told us. “I chose to be present while she talked about all the cool features on her garden worm. I hooked into her essence and enjoyed the moment with her. I now keep my GEMs radar on as much as I can and seize every opportunity I can to connect deeply with her.”
Is Your Child Using Negative Behavior to Get Needed Attention? Do This.
A child’s need for attention can be a tricky concept.
Although all children need attention—and some need more than others—their demands for attention may sometimes seem inappropriate. Consider the child who is legitimately lacking attention but who demands it by interrupting an important conversation, or whining for you to pick him up while you’re trying to make dinner, or tugging on your clothes while you’re on the phone. In each of these situations, giving the child the attention he craves would also mean allowing him to violate your limits or boundaries in that moment.
We’ll talk more about setting and upholding limits and boundaries in chapters 10 and 11, and we’ll talk more about how to respond to unmet needs in Chapter 12. But, for now, we wanted to make sure to introduce you to this valuable and highly practical tool: silent attention.
When we ignore our children, their behaviors usually escalate—rather than going away. The child has to keep creating more and more drama to feel heard, felt, understood, and loved. So the question is: How do we ignore the annoying behavior and connect with our child? The answer: We give them silent attention.
Here are the three steps:
1.Avoid eye contact.
2.Do not speak
3.Gently and calmly move toward your child, and rub his lower back as you continue to focus on what you were doing before.
Say you’re eight-year-old child keeps interrupting a conversation you are having. Instead of ignoring, lecturing, shaming, guilting, or bribing, you keep talking to your friend but, at the same time, step toward your child, crouch down next to her, and rub the small of her back. You avoid eye contact and do not speak to your child. Notice how she is getting the attention she craves without interrupting your conversation?
Or your toddler starts whining for you to pick him up while you’re trying to get dinner ready. While continuing to stir the soup or read the recipe, you touch your child lovingly, rubbing her back, until he loses interest and engages in something else.
Or your four-year-old won’t stop tugging on your clothes while you’re trying to finish a phone call. Without looking at the child, you crouch down and rub your child’s back—thus providing the reassuring comfort of your touch without allowing her to break your personal boundary.
Again, demands for attention are problematic because you are trying to provide attention without allowing the child to violate your personal boundaries. To give a child positive attention when they are demanding it in negative ways can seem like you are “giving in” or reinforcing the negative behavior. Silent attention is an ingenious tool that side-steps the whole problem. You are ignoring your child’s behavior, without ignoring your child.
L = Love
A child’s need for love is one of the most misunderstood concepts in parenting today. We all believe we love our kids unconditionally, and, in a way, we do. They could do anything, and we’d still love them.
But that’s not the way kids see it.
To kids, love isn’t something quiet and still that sits inside our chests and radiates warmth, regardless of anything else that’s going on around us. Love is what they see on our faces and hear in our voices in any given moment. Love is how we treat them at every turn. No matter how many times we say, “I love you,” when children perceive our approval or acceptance of them as being contingent on certain behavior, they perceive our love as conditional.
This is another reason rewards and punishments are so problematic. They are interpreted by children as giving and withdrawing love. Children see that when they get good grades, use good manners, perform well in their sport, are kind to their siblings, or repress their negative feelings, they receive our smiles, affection, and approval.
When they fail, they don’t.
Although it may be hard for us sometimes, unconditional love cannot hinge on a child’s skill set or behavior. Unconditional love looks at the child and sees him as enough as is, warts and all. Unconditional love says, “If you do nothing more than what you are doing in this moment, you are worthy of love.”
After all, if the most important people in their lives don’t see them as “enough” right now, they may never see themselves as enough—no matter what they do or accomplish in their lives.
Interestingly, as Alfie Kohn points out, children tend to push their parents’ buttons in direct relations to the insecurity they are feeling about the parents’ love.
“What we call testing limits,” he said in Unconditional Parenting, “is actually testing the conditionality of our love.” What parents need to be saying instead is: “No matter what you do, I will never, ever, ever withdraw my love.”
Gordon Neufeld, coauthor of Hold On to Your Kids, called unconditional love the “indispensable nutrient for the child’s healthy emotional growth. The child can be ornery, unpleasant, whiny, uncooperative, and plain rude, and the parent still lets her feel loved.”
No doubt about it: This may well be the hardest part of heart-centered parenting.
How many of us, as children, were scolded when we did the “wrong” thing? How many of us suffered “the look” from our parents? You know “the look.” The narrow-eyed, chin-jutting scowl that said, “Don’t you dare do that again, or you are going to regret it for the rest of your life.”
Listen, all parents scold their kids from time to time. We can’t help it. And, again, no one is expecting perfection here. Children are flexible and forgiving.
It’s just helpful to know that punitive modes of communication often are decoded by children as conditional love. Softening our gestures, our words, and, yes, even our facial expressions can do wonderful things for our kids. Plus, it sets the scene for the way they can expect to be treated as adults.
Someone wise once said, “We accept the love we think we deserve.” And it’s true. We give our kids a baseline for their “normal.” How we talk to them now may become how they’ll expect others to talk to them later. Our patience for their foibles or appreciation of their personalities will influence their lives in many different ways.
“We liberate children not by making them work for our love but by letting them rest in it.”
—GORDON NEUFELD & GABOR MATÉ
ParentShift Assignment: All You Need Is Love
Write down three things you love about your child, unrelated to things your child does well.
You Are the Guardian of Your Child’s Needs
According to acclaimed psychologist Alfred Adler, the child’s deepest inner need is to “belong” in his family. Our seven SPECIAL needs add up to this sense of belonging.
Perhaps you’ve heard the old-paradigm threat: “This is my house, and these are my rules. If you don’t like it, you can leave when you’re eighteen!” The message here is the same one children receive when their emotional needs go consistently unmet over a period of time: “You don’t belong in our family or in this house. You are not important here.”
As you might expect, sending kids to look for belonging outside their families carries many risks. Emotionally hungry kids are more likely to fall into unhealthy relationships, to engage in high-risk behavior, and to experience addiction. That’s partially because the relationships with their primary caregivers are disconnected, which causes children great stress.
“Emotional isolation, powerlessness, and stress are exactly the conditions that promote the neurobiology of addiction in human beings,” wrote Hungarian-Canadian physician Gabor Maté in his riveting book In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts.
Every child possesses all seven emotional needs, but not to the same degree. Either because of their temperament or environment, some kids need more power than others. Some kids need more attention. Some kids need more exploration. We mustn’t assume that there is something wrong with a child who is more needy than another.
In Raising Our Children, Raising Ourselves, parenting counselor and author Naomi Aldort wrote, “Instead of listening to the media or to Grandma, observe and listen to your child, regardless of all the opinions. She is growing up here and now while none of the well-meaning advice-givers are. She is the expert on her own needs.”
As you read through this book, try to keep in mind that we are the guardians of our children’s needs. It is never too late to learn how to recognize the needs at the root of our kids’ behavior. It is never too late to prioritize those needs, to support those needs, or to protect those needs.
It is never too late to make a dramatic shift in our parenting direction, and it is never too late to reap the benefits.
Please note: The primary focus of this chapter is prevention—meeting children’s underlying needs in order to keep behavioral issues at bay. But what happens when children’s needs go unmet? What are the signs and symptoms? And what can parents do to get back on track? This is one of the most important and fascinating areas of study in child-rearing today—and in this book, frankly—but you won’t find it until Chapter 12. That’s because unmet needs are far easier to understand, identify and address if you first have the framework of knowledge provided by all ten universal truths.
Your Needs First
The safety instructions on airplanes tell you to put on your oxygen mask before placing a mask on your child. There’s a good reason for that. We cannot give something away that we do not possess ourselves. To fill our children’s Emotional Bank Accounts while allowing ours to remain drained makes zero sense. Yes, we are responsible for helping our children meet their needs, but if we neglect ourselves, we’re more likely to overpower or over-parent in order to fulfill our unmet emotional needs. We are also more likely to become resentful, lose patience, and take our unhappy moments out on them.
Meeting your own needs isn’t selfish; it’s necessary.
Humans have endless ways to get their own needs met, but they vary greatly from parent to parent and from child to child. An activity that is centering and calming for one person—long-distance running, for example—might arouse abject terror in another. Here are some examples of how you might take care of yourself. Circle or highlight those that appeal to you, and feel free to add your own.
•Mental: Reading books, watching documentaries, playing games, drawing, sewing, creating art, visiting museums, learning new skills, writing letters, planning an event, writing songs or poetry, asking for help, going on dates with friends, and making time to do things you love.
•Emotional: Laughing, crying, practicing compassion, journaling, petting animals, engaging in positive self-talk, forgiving others and yourself for mistakes, taking time to appreciate what you did well today, understanding your triggers, making a worry box, listening or playing music, giving/getting hugs, and (our favorite) kindly saying no to invitations or requests.
•Physical: Playing sports or games, taking hikes, dancing, exercising, getting massages, gardening, squeezing a stress ball, cleaning, shredding paper, making something, doing yoga, volunteering, drinking plenty of water, taking daily vitamins, napping, and, duh, sex.
•Spiritual/personal: Meditation, affirmations, mantras, prayer, watching sunsets, reading inspiring quotes, setting intentions for the day, and listening to inspirational speakers.
What’s at Risk? Oh, Only Your Child’s Self-Esteem
We’ve already talked about the vital importance of self-esteem to children’s mental health. The sense of value or worth that children attach to themselves will pave the way for the type of work they choose, habits they form, and people they marry. But how exactly do our kids come to have self-esteem, and how do they lose it? Is self-esteem related to looks, charm, popularity, or grades? Is it based on genetics, culture, or temperament? Might self-esteem be bought with money, or built up by praise and accolades?
The answer to all of these questions is a decisive no.
Believe it or not, our children’s deep-down sense of self-worth—the same sense of self-worth that they’ll take to college with them—is almost entirely dependent on the extent to which they are able to get their seven SPECIAL needs met on a regular basis.
Yes, you read that right.
It’s all about the needs.
If ever there were a sacred text on the subject of self-esteem, it would have to be Dorothy Corkille Briggs’s Your Child’s Self-Esteem, published in 1975. In it, Briggs explained that our children’s self-esteem is the result of two different but equally weighted feelings.
Leg #1: “I am unconditionally loved.”
As you now know, unconditional love is not about our feelings of love; it’s about how our kids perceive our feelings. And when a child perceives our approval and acceptance as contingent on certain behavior (or grades or achievement or a clean bedroom or anything else), he probably perceives our love as conditional. Briggs’s own research showed that many children who were told they were loved as children often grew up feeling unloved because their parents’ “approval ratings” told them otherwise. At the same time, many children whose parents didn’t say, “I love you,” grew up feeling loved because they felt accepted at every stage of life.
Leg #2: “I am capable and can handle myself with competency.”
In this context, “capable” and “competent” have nothing to do with our kid possessing special talents in a certain area. Instead, it means that our child feels capable of getting her emotional needs met and of influencing the world around her. Unsurprisingly, this relates directly to her need to feel powerful, to know she has some control over her actions, and that those actions have a real effect on the people and events in her life.
One can see, then, why helicopter parents (“Let me do that for you!”) or overprotective parents (“Don’t do that!”) are at high risk of damaging their children’s self-esteem. By doing for kids what they could be doing for themselves or refusing to allow children to take reasonable risks, parents send a clear message: “You are not capable.” By expecting too much or too little of children, we communicate that they don’t “measure up” or “can’t handle” certain tasks. As a result, children wind up feeling less than.
“Children rarely question our expectations,” Briggs wrote in Your Child’s Self-Esteem. “Instead, they question their personal adequacy.”
To be clear, although a person may have self-confidence in certain areas (a pro basketball player certainly views himself positively when he’s out on the court), this is not our goal. We aren’t looking for compartmentalized self-worth; kids (and adults!) have a need to feel worthy in general. Again, self-esteem is the feeling of being happy with yourself regardless of what you are doing or accomplishing.
The way we see it, children are born with all the self-esteem they’ll ever need; our job is not to “give” them more. It’s to preserve what’s already there.
Unfortunately, many people still liken self-esteem to selfishness, self-absorption or self-importance—all concepts that speak to an exaggerated or unhealthy focus on oneself. The truth is, though, that a child with high self-esteem is one with a “sober, nuanced, and accepting self-image,” wrote Swedish author Jesper Juul in The Competent Child. The child doesn’t feel better than anyone else. He may not even feel he’s particularly skilled or talented in anything! But he knows, deep down, that he has worth.
And that, for us parents, is the holy grail. Make no mistake here, friends: It’s high self-esteem that keeps our kids’ feet on the ground and their eyes pointed toward the future. It’s high self-esteem that encourages them to find their passions and reach toward their goals. It’s high self-esteem that helps them ward off bullies, allows them to say no to self-destructive behavior, and attracts them to romantic partners who treat them the way they deserve to be treated.
Heart-centered parenting preserves children’s self-esteem because it emphasizes unconditional love while also demonstrating confidence in the child’s capacity to help herself. How so? The following role-playing exercise will show you:
Role-playing: The Two Legs of Self-Esteem in Action
This is a role-play scenario where parents are asked to put themselves in the shoes of a six-year-old who has just been injured on a soccer field. The setup is simple: You are a six-year-old playing soccer and have just run to your father in tears, pointing to a cut on your knee.
Scenario #1: Permissive Dad
Your permissive father says, “Oh, you poor thing! Don’t cry. Daddy will make it better. Here, let me wash it for you and get a Band-Aid, and then you can sit on my lap until it feels better.”
Now, in your role as the child, ask yourself, “Do I feel unconditionally loved?”
Generally, in parent-education classes, parents report that they do feel unconditionally loved, although the love might feel a little like pity.
But do you feel capable of handling yourself?
No way. If anything, you’ve learned that it pays to get hurt, and that someone else is responsible for making you feel better. A consistent pattern of reactions like this one, and you’re likely to suffer a blow to your self-esteem and, eventually, become overly dependent on your parents.
Scenario #2: Controlling Dad
You run to your controlling dad, who says, “Oh, that’s just a little scratch! Big kids don’t cry! Buck up; you’re fine. Your brother got cut last week and had to get stitches. He never cried.”
Do you feel capable of handling yourself? To the extent that you have no choice, probably, yes.
But do you feel unconditionally loved?
No. You’ve just learned that it’s unsafe to show your feelings and that you can’t count on your dad for help. A consistent pattern of reactions like this one, and your self-esteem will undoubtedly suffer. Plus, you’re likely to emotionally detach from your dad, maybe even turning to your peers for support at too young an age.
Scenario #3: Heart-Centered Dad
You go over to your heart-centered dad, who puts his arm around you.
“That looks like it hurts!” he says. As you talk about what happened, he nods and listens patiently until you start to feel better. “What do you want to do?” he asks.
“I need a Band-Aid,” you say.
“Sure!” he says. “Let’s go get a Band-Aid and a washcloth, then you can clean it and put the Band-Aid on.”
Now, do you feel unconditionally loved?
Definitely, because empathy is love in action.
Do you feel capable of handling yourself?
Sure. You are the one who came up with the solution, after all, and you will render your own first aid. Your self-esteem remains high and healthy. And the best part? What could have been a bad memory for you just became an opportunity for your dad to show you just how loved and capable you really are.
While we’re at it, let’s take this one step further. You are still the skinned-knee kid, but it’s ten years later.
You are a sophomore in high school and have a mean teacher. Your permissive dad heads down to the school to confront the teacher, or, conversely, minimize the problem by saying, “Teachers will be teachers.” Your controlling dad, on the other hand, blames you for causing the problem, discounting your position and even making you feel guilty. “What did you do this time?” he says, accusingly. Then there’s your heart-centered dad. He patiently listens and empathizes, but he does not offer to step in to solve the problem, nor does he make you feel bad for having a problem in the first place.
Do you see where we’re going with this?
This is where. You’re now twenty-six. You have moved across the country. You have a job, but the boss is exceedingly unkind to you. What do you do?
Raised in a strongly permissive household, you report the boss to human resources or complain to your colleagues, hoping someone else will solve the problem. When that doesn’t work, you see no clear path out of the mess, and you quit in a disempowering way.
Raised in a strongly controlling household, you allow the boss to treat you badly and stay in a job you dislike. You do eventually quit, but not until you have felt degraded in the job for far too long.
Raised in a heart-centered household, however, you take charge of your situation almost immediately. You brainstorm your solutions with colleagues or friends and then prioritize your options. You try talking to the boss directly, and then you go to your boss’s boss. Things get a little better, but not good enough for you. You find another job and quit this one, feeling confident and empowered. You leave the job undiminished by the experience.
“The most crucial ingredient of mental health is high self-esteem.”
—STANLEY COOPERSMITH
The Problem with “Praise”
“You did a great job!”
“I love what you’re doing!”
“I’m so proud of you!”
On the surface, comments like these sound really nice, don’t they? They read as supportive pats on the back. Extra boosts to make a child feel good about what she’s accomplished and, indeed, who she is.
And yet leading parenting experts will tell you that praise, as a rule of thumb, is something to avoid. Rather than boosting a child’s self-esteem, praise has an insidious way of tearing it down. It is encouragement—a very different concept that we’ll discuss shortly—that must replace praise once and for all.
But why?
In everyday life, “praise” may refer to expressions of acclaim, admiration, approval, congratulations, or thanks. But, in most parenting circles and certainly for the purpose of this book, “praise” refers only to expressions of approval that glorify a child’s behavior or accomplishments, often in hopes that the child will repeat the behavior. The emphasis is on the parent’s judgment, not the child’s.
Praise: An expression of approval that glorifies a child’s behavior or accomplishment in hopes that the child will repeat the behavior or action. Praise puts the focus on the parent’s evaluation rather than the child’s.
Though we rarely realize it, praise often is a form of manipulation. It keeps the child looking to us for validation rather than teaching her to look within for proof of her worth. Especially when used to motivate a child to continue along a certain path, praise becomes a method of control, indistinguishable from rewards.
Praise teaches kids to do things for the payoff and that the payoff comes externally. At its most extreme, in fact, praise can create an almost addiction-like need for more praise. (“Praise junkie” is a term you may have heard.) That’s because the more praise is offered, the more the child feels she must please others, and the more praise she requires to “feel good” about herself. Some actors do not become actors because they love acting; they become actors because they’re addicted to the applause.
When the applause stops, so do the good feelings about themselves.
It’s worth noting here that praise can make some kids, particularly teenagers, feel uncomfortable. In Between Parent & Teenager, Haim Ginott wrote that praise, like all evaluations, makes teenagers feel anxious or guilty, especially if they don’t feel deserving. “Direct praise of personality,” Ginott wrote, “like direct sunlight, is uncomfortable and blinding.”
“A child cannot hold on to praise because it is subject to cancellation with every failure.”
—GORDON NEUFELD & GABOR MATÉ
Replacing Praise with Encouragement
Now, let’s contrast “praise” with “encouragement.” While used interchangeably with praise in the world at large, encouragement, in parenting circles, is the antithesis of praise. Encouragement is the act of noticing and supporting a child’s behavior or action. It emphasizes the child’s opinions and perceptions and often celebrates the effort behind the accomplishment over the accomplishment itself.
Encouragement: The act of noticing and supporting a child’s behavior or action. Encouragement puts the focus on the child’s evaluation of his accomplishment rather than the parent’s.
How can we be sure we’re encouraging rather than praising? One way is to do a quick check-in by asking ourselves:
1.What is my intention? (To manipulate or to support?)
2.Whose opinion matters most? (Mine or my child’s?)
Say your child brings you a drawing and says, “Look at my drawing! I think it’s the best one I’ve ever done!” Knowing your intention is to support your child and to learn more about his opinion you might say, “Wow! The colors are so vibrant! Tell me about it. What makes it the best?”
Briggs, another outspoken proponent of replacing praise with encouragement, drew the following distinctions in Your Child’s Self-Esteem:
• Praise, she said, uses words that judge. (“You’re the best violinist in the group!” “You were wonderful.”). Encouragement uses words that notice. (“Your fingers move so fast on the violin.” Or “You looked so happy when you were playing!”)
• Praise can be manipulative and attached to an agenda. (“Good girl, you did the dishes correctly!”) Encouragement shows sincere appreciation without an agenda. (“Thank you for helping me with the dishes!”)
• Praise focuses on the parent’s thoughts and feelings. (“You made the honor roll! I’m so proud of you!”) Encouragement focuses on the child’s thoughts and feelings. (“Congratulations! You worked so hard this semester. How do you feel?”)
• Praise emphasizes the accomplishment. (“You won the race! You’re the fastest bike rider on the block!”) Encouragement emphasizes the journey. (“Look at you go! It looks like you are loving your new bike!)
Four Alternatives to Praise
In a 2000 Parenting magazine article, “Hooked on Praise,” Alfie Kohn offered four alternatives to praise. As recovering praisers ourselves, we found these helpful and wanted to share them here. Every time you sense yourself wanting to say, “Good job!” try one of these goodies instead.
1. Report what you see. (“You drew a boat!” “You brought in the groceries!” “You went on the big slide!”)
2. Emphasize the impact on others. (“Auntie was so touched by the note you gave her.” “That little girl was so happy you bought her lemonade.” “The dog loves it when you pet her like that.”)
3. Ask a question. (“What was the hardest part?” “How did you pick the colors to use in your picture?” “What swim stroke is your favorite?”)
4. Say nothing. (Let your kid do the talking instead.)
Role-playing: Criticism, Praise, and Encouragement in Action
Here’s one more role-playing exercise, inspired by Redirecting Children’s Behavior, that Ty and Linda use in their parenting classes to drive home the point that criticism and praise are closer than we think.
The setup: You are twelve years old and just returned home with your report card: three As, two Bs, one C, and one D.
Scenario #1: Critical Mom
Your critical mom looks over the report. “I can’t believe you got a D!” she says. “I’m so disappointed in you. Your sister has never gotten a D. No volleyball until this grade changes!”
Do you notice the emphasis on what your mom thinks and how the criticism is punctuated by unnecessary comparisons and punishment with no opportunity for you to share your own emotions or observations?
How would you feel? What’s the message here?
In parenting classes, most role-play participants report feeling demoralized and resentful. There was no chance to discuss the D or to celebrate the As and Bs. In fact, if the hard work that went into these classes is just going to be ignored anyway, why bother to work hard at all?
Scenario #2: Praising Mom
Your praising mom looks over the report, and says, “You got three As! Good job! I’m so proud of you. Don’t worry about that D. That teacher is a real problem. I know you deserved better. Anyway, here’s $25 for each A, $15 for each B, and $10 for the C. Well done! You are such a smart girl!”
Again, this is an example of external motivation, only this time through praise punctuated by rewards. Now, again, how would you feel if you were the child?
First of all, you’re being taught to love good grades (there may even be money in it!) rather than to enjoy school or love learning. In fact, your experience in those classes is treated as valueless.
And is it true that the teacher really is a problem? Or is there something you could work on here? We may never know because you aren’t expected to take accountability for your challenges.
Scenario #3: Encouraging Mom
Your encouraging mom says, “You got your report card!” (reporting what she sees) and “What do you think about your grades?” (asking a question). She waits for you to point out the D, which you eventually do, and she sits with you in your feelings.
“You seem disappointed in the D,” she says. “You worked really hard this semester.” (reporting what she sees, emphasizing the journey). When you say, “Yeah, I’m bummed about that D. I need to get that grade up,” she says, “Hmm. You sound worried. How can I support you?” (offers support, empowers the child).
Although it will certainly seem foreign to parents who are overly focused on grades and achievement, this is, in fact, intrinsic motivation at its best. It’s not about the parent’s judgment of the grade—but about the child’s assessment. It’s not about “making” the child feel good about the As or feel bad about the D, but about listening to the child’s honest feelings and supporting her on the next step of her journey.
So ask yourself: How would you feel if you were this child? And what message has been sent?
Also, if you are finding it difficult to picture yourself responding calmly to a B or C grade, much less a D grade, you may want to pay special attention to Chapter 8, particularly the section on projections.
“Encouragement is more important than any other aspect of child-raising. It is so important that the lack of it can be considered the basic cause for misbehavior.”
— RUDOLF DREIKURS
•“Tell me about ___________.”
•“How do you feel about ___________?”
•“What do you think?”
•“What part do you like?”
•“How did you do that?”
•“It looks like you put a lot of effort into this.”
•“It looks like you enjoy ___________.”
•“Be yourself!”
•“You do you!”
•“Congratulations!”
•“How do you want to celebrate?”
•“I’ll be cheering for you.”
•“I’ll be thinking about you.”
•“I’m always ready to listen.”
•“I’m here if you need me.”
•“I’m so glad you are my daughter/son.”
•“I love being your parent.”
•“Teach me how you did that.”
•“Thank you!”
•“What an interesting observation.”
•“You are an important part of our family.”
•“You are full surprises!”
•“You can do it!”
•“You decide; it’s your choice.”
•“You stand up for your beliefs.”
•“You work very hard!”
•“You did it!”
•“I love you!”
There is no way we’re all going to magically stop judging people (even our kids!) cold turkey. We have been raised in a judgmental culture; we judge a lot. And validation, particularly when it comes to our kids, can be a tough habit to break. But when we understand how judgment lands on our kids (even when it’s positive), we can begin to reduce our praise and replace it with encouragement as often as possible.
ParentShift Assignment: Cut the Praise
Write down three praising statements you have given your child. Then rephrase and rewrite those statements with encouraging statements instead.
A Note about Our Toolkits: The toolkit to follow is the first of many you will find throughout Part Two. Each offers a quick reference to the tools, tips and advice collected over the course of that chapter. Feel free to make notes for yourself, as well, if we missed a key point that you want to remember. The toolkits will be especially important when you get to the ParentShift Solutions Process in Part Three.
The following tips and tools, if used on a regular basis, will help meet your child’s (and your own!) emotional needs, keep the parent-child relationship connected, keep your child’s self-esteem intact, and prevent any number of behavioral challenges both in the short and long term.
•Ask, “How can I meet my child’s EMOTIONAL NEEDS in this moment?”
•Keep your child’s EMOTIONAL BANK ACCOUNT full.
•ADD FUN TO THE MUNDANE (Appendix A).
•Hand over AGE-APPROPRIATE RESPONSIBILITIES (Appendix B).
•Offer three GEMs a day.
•Take child on regular ONE-ON-ONE DATES.
•GIVE CHOICES—concrete, win-win, and playful.
•GIVE INFORMATION, instead of commands.
•Create an effective CHORE SYSTEM, such as the FAMILY JOB WHEEL.
•Consider an APPRECIATION CIRCLE.
•Make HIGH-LEVEL CONNECTIONS.
•Make time for SELF CARE.
•Be mindful of the TWO LEGS OF SELF-ESTEEM.
•Replace praise with ENCOURAGEMENT.