There's so much that can go into this, so many nuances. I want to give a couple basics that you can consider and think about that might help you. Determine where you are and help your child. Supporting your child's emotions in a way that promotes it. Number one, do we allow our child to feel empowered? Do we allow our child to be responsible for their own feelings? Or do we feel like we're responsible for our child's feelings?
This might look like they're sad.How can I help you? What do we need to do? Do you need this? You need to give you a hug? Oh, and so there's this. Energy, this feeling behind it that is worried about it, that it's trying to solve it for our child. And we kind of present them with the feeling like, oh, that feeling is not OK.
If we do it frequently, it eventually fades and my mother must assist me in coping with these emotions. Dad must assist me in order to improve the situation for me as an adult. Let it be when we acknowledge our emotions. If we know that, we can even assist them categorize more precisely. We can observe their reactions because of this. They frequently respond with "No," "Not sad," or "Tell me if I'm off." But it allows for that acknowledgment, and that is just a truth.
It's that sweet spot in the middle where we accept it as reality and it kind of restores their sense of accountability. We can even inform them of this. I do have difficult days. And if, for example, it peels them off as they are heading to school, they choose not to attend or choose not to complete a task. Yes, sometimes I experience the same thing. These issues have come up for me. Next, tell them that even adults experience that occasionally, but that this does not negate the fact that it is still difficult.
Therefore, we're just gonna stop or somebody else is gonna do it for me. Yeah. So that's what we're going to continue forward with. Ask questions that are empowering and questions that are empowering are not ones. But we come in with the solutions we want to guide our child to notice their feelings, to notice that. Their actions and their thoughts play into those feelings and when it's as an example, go to school like every time. As a parent. I've been on the parent side and I've been on the teacher side of my child or a student not wanting. To go to school that day. And sometimes it's students who feel that way often, and sometimes it's just every now and again. So we might ask them questions like, “Tell me about what's going on?” We want to know, is this just something like you don't want to do or is there bullying going on? Is there something that really needs our attention? If it's something they can handle on their own, like just not wanting to go to school and ust struggling like not liking your teacher or somebody who is bullying, it's because they interpreted it a certain way or they're not allowing space for other people's feelings and so these are things they're capable of handling on their own.
That's a port with those questions that we might ask them. What adventures have you been on with that person or in that situation? There's always the part where iit seems impossible, the main character isn't going to make it. They've tried multiple things and it's not working. But as they continue, at the end, at least of the ones I like to watch, there's a resolution and their character is stronger, more empowered, more capable than they were at the beginning of the journey.
They've had growth and that's what we really want. So we all know, if it's going to school again, we can ask him. I'm excited to hear what adventures you have today and how you come through those adventures or at the end of the day, I'm excited to hear about your adventures. What would you like to tell me about those adventures? And then we can strategically ask questions that empower, rather than disempower them. We might ask, what did you do to try to overcome that challenge? Whether that challenge is our emotions or an academic skill or an interpersonal skill, we could ask them What did you try to overcome the challenges? Then we can ask more questions. How did you? How did that work for you when you tried that? How did it feel when you tried that? And we're going to just keep asking them these questions, and sometimes we can ask that same question more than once to get a more detailed answer.
Like children, they like to give us blanket statements. How was school? It was OK. They don't give us the details and so asking the same question again or asking it in a different way can help them really let them know word listening. We really want you to think about this because if you're capable then we can continue to ask questions like what did you learn from that or what might you try tomorrow?
It might be because it can put pressure on kids. What're you gonna try tomorrow? What's gonna be different? You know we kind of expect this, but like what might you try tomorrow? What is something you could try? And just getting them to think about it and not giving them answers. And if we do get to the point where we want to give them some answers, they're really struggling. Then we're gonna ask permission. I have an idea. Would you like to hear that idea? There were couple things I tried when I was in a similar situation. Would you like to hear about that? And if they say no, then however much we want to share, please accept that answer as no. So these are just a few of the basic things that we can support our child emotions and a growth way. Remember, children are great by their very natures, and it's our privilege and our responsibility to raise them.
