I remember as my children started getting older, I was so worried about making a mistake or doing something wrong with them. I would often beat myself up over things that I regretted saying. One time one of my little boys got into some bright blue nail polish and painted it all over their entire room. It was all over the dresser, all over the bed, all over the walls, all over the couch, and all over the carpet! I was pretty steamed about the whole thing and I hollered pretty good at them. I remember my daughter saying that she prayed so that I wouldn't be mad anymore about it. Boy, did I wish that I had acted more kindly in that situation. After I calmed down, I apologized to my children and we cleaned up the nail polish as much as we could. I discovered in that moment that I would never regret acting in kindness when it came to my children.
Resilience
I'm sure that most parents have regrets as well, and wish they could go back and do things differently. I was excited to read William J. Doherty's take on these types of situations. He said, "The reality, according to loads of
research, is that, if underlying parental
care and attachment are present,
most children are resilient in the face
of ordinary mistakes in parenting. If
children can handle most of our nonabusive mistakes, they can certainly
handle our strong responses to them
when these responses are fully called for.
Children mostly know when they are off
base, and feel safer when their parents
step in assertively." (Take Back Your Kids: How to Teach and Get Respect, 2013, p. 2)
This gives me hope that even though I will make mistakes parenting, my children are resilient enough to handle those mistakes as long as we have a good relationship. One way to foster secure attachment with our children is through the process of emotion coaching.
Emotion Coaching
According to Dr. John Gottman, emotion coaching is parenting children in a way that helps to raise emotionally intelligent children who understand, identify, and successfully regulate their own emotions, and also develop empathy for others. The Gottman Institute outlines the five following steps on emotion coaching:
- Be aware of your child’s emotion
- Recognize your child’s expression of emotion as a perfect moment for intimacy and teaching
- Listen with empathy and validate your child’s feelings
- Help your child learn to label their emotions with words
- Set limits when you are helping your child to solve problems or deal with upsetting situations appropriately (Lisitsa, 2012)
One of the reasons this is so important for children is because it helps with their emotional health. When children have good emotional health, there is a stronger parent/child attachment, they learn to have empathy for others, they do better in school, and they can more easily regulate their emotions.
Maybe your feeling like you need to see emotion coaching in action. What does it look like when one person helps label emotions, validate feelings, or listen with empathy. Check out this clip from the movie Inside Out, and especially notice the difference between Joy and Sadness.
Did you notice how Joy was dismissive and tried to distract Bing Bong when he got upset? She seemed very uncomfortable with Bing Bong's emotions and tried to do everything to get him to be happy again, because she cared more about getting back to what she wanted to do. How did that differ from Sadness' reaction. She helped name and label Bing Bong's feelings, and accepted that he was sad about it. Because she did this, Bing Bong was validated in his emotions and able to more successfully regulate his emotions.
Anger
When I found the nail polish all
over the bedroom, I was so upset and felt that all I could do was yell. It reminded
me of the quote that I read from H. Wallace Goddard who said, "Anger often
seems irresistible. A child breaks a glass or hits a sibling, and we erupt. Can
such an automatic process be interrupted? Can volcanic anger be replaced with
civil helpfulness? It seems it would be easier to tum the mighty Mississippi
upstream than to redirect the energy of wrath. We feel helpless in the face of
our passion” (Goddard, 2006).
I believe that we can change that process in ourselves by following those same steps of emotion coaching. When we learn to regulate our own emotions better, then we can also help our children regulate their emotions.
Nurturing Children
Emotion coaching takes time and practice to master but it is well worth the effort if it helps our children to grow into confident and empathetic adults. "To nurture a child suggests that we protect, support, and
encourage that child. Nurture involves giving time, interest,
and affection" (Goddard, 2006). The most important thing we can spend our time doing is nurturing our children whether it be through spending time together or being their emotion coach. The time spent will be worth the reward.
References:
Goddard, H. W. (2006). The soft-spoken parent: More than 50 strategies to turn away wrath. Leatherwood Press.
Lisitsa, E. (2012, June 8). An introduction to emotion coaching. The Gottman Institute. https://www.gottman.com/blog/an-introduction-to-emotion-coaching/
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