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E-mailTake feelings seriously
Taking feelings seriously, particularly unhappy ones, builds a firm basis for family life, because family members from emotional ties through shared adversity. These emotional ties make each member feel he or she ‘belongs’, which in turn creates a feeling of security . “The stronger these ties, the more likely our children will grow into strong and secure persons”.
Unconditional love and self-esteem.
All children need to know is that they are loved for themselves rather than for what they do or don’t do, or for what they achieve. Unconditional love is the greatest security we can give our children because it gives a child the image of being lovable, they feel worthwhile. In other words, they see themselves as having value. The importance of self esteem cannot be overstressed. With self esteem children will be able to accept failure and will have the courage to face up to crises and work through them.
Focused attention.
I asked my sister who is a mother of two, what she thought children needed in order to cope with life’s crises and she replied “ Confidence to speak out. Children must learn to express their views and feelings. They are too quite.” Focused attention to their question and answering them is most important.
We need to bear in mind that development is a process, not a race and therefore we cannot rush a child through each phase. The hurried child tends to feel unsafe and locks the reserves to cope with anxiety. The same applies to the hurt ad pain of loss-whether this be the death of a pet, the loss attention for the first child due to the birth of a sibling or the loss of a friend because the family has moved away. Children need time to grieve, and need support from close ones.
Rituals.
In a changing world , family rituals maintain some semblance of continuity. They provide security and stability. Taking family photos regularly and keeping a family album for each occasion, helps child remember not only of events and people, but also of feelings attached to these memories.
Discipline.
Discipline does not mean physical punishment , but involves teaching children how to behave and setting limits. Children need discipline. It makes them feel safe and have limits of behaviour defined, as well as knowing their parents are still in control. It is specially during a crisis that they need to know their parents are in control – this is why they often play up during a crisis even if they know their parents are vulnerable too.
The only expertise I claim is knowledge from the trenches, which I share with many parents in pain. But from those trenches comes this essential advice- show your child a positive example. There are days when you don’t feel like getting out of bed and facing a world that seems set on squashing you. Yet, on the whole, if you cope and show your children that you refuse to be one of life’s victims, they will develop the same approach to their own situations. Don’t be afraid to admit to feelings of sadness, failure or anger, but do show your children how you work through them.
RSS 
Nice article!
I’ve always wondered why we don’t put any of the research into parenting that we do into every other aspect of life. Scientists have figured out how to grow plants optimally - bigger and healthier than ever would happen in nature. Why can’t we do that with our own kids?
There is a taboo around offering child rearing advice. It seems like the more apt someone is to reproduce, the less likely they are to seek or accept advice on how to raise children.
I’ve always dreamt of some kind of communal child rearing environment. One where it was a group effort, yet the parents maintained a central role. Where child psychology takes a big role and we actively teach our children how to be good people. One where abuse would be impossible to hide.
Humans evolved to live in 50-150 person communities. I think it would be healthy to recreate that in modern society.
Kids could play with one another and learn to socialize with their peers, but have adults of all ages around to expose them to different ways of coping and experiencing life. There could be ’classes’ that helped teach simple life skills. It’s such a tragedy that we so often pass on to our children our own weaknesses instead of looking for outside help. We defer to what our parents taught us, and to religious tradition for answers. We put so much effort into things like math, reading, and science in schools - but never address the much more important issues of day to day living skills.
I think ’what if’ we could spend our resources as a community to help raise our next generation? Instead of leaving everything up to essentially inexperienced and untrained parents, why not band together to do it as a group, and use scientifically proven models to optimize the children’s growth?
Of course, it would come down to people agreeing on things, and I’ve come to learn that people can never agree on anything - the surest way to keep something from getting done is to make it a group task!
