One sings "Red Face", one sings "White Face", a recipe for parenting?

Source| Zeng Qifeng Psychological Studio

ID:zqfxlgzs

During the holidays, parents spend all day with the "divine beast", often feeling "mixed feelings" and "helpless".

Various experts supported the move, and the elders also intervened one after another, suggesting that parents implement the parenting law of "one singing red face, one singing white face".

After all, this well-known phrase is an ancestral recipe.

Moreover, many parents do use it every day, and find that this method seems to be really good, and it can subdue the "divine beast".

But what kind of baby will be raised in this way of parenting?

Today we will talk about the "red face" and "white face" in family education.

The gray area between "red" and "white"

In the American drama "Growing Pains", Mike wants to go to an event when his mother has recently returned to work and his father works from home.

Mike consulted with his father.

Dad asked, "How would Mom respond if it were?" ”

Mike Chigo.

Dad said, "Your mom will say no."

Mike said, "Yes, just those words."

Dad solemnly told Mike that he didn't want Mike to negotiate with him in order to bypass his mother. But now it's really Dad who runs the family, he has his ideas, he wants Mike to take responsibility for his 15-year-old self.

Dad did not shy away and directly told his wife that the two had a disagreement on the matter. Mom thinks 15-year-old Mike can't take responsibility for himself yet and is adamantly opposed. After full communication, the two respect each other's ideas. Dad convinces Mom to hold Mike responsible for his decision.

As a result, Mike was drunk from his friend, and the 15-year-old drove alone and scraped a police car...

After going to the police station to bring Mike back, the angry dad ran back to the room and got angry alone.

Bring in and think about it, if you are a mother and originally disagreed with your father's decision, are you complaining or comforting each other at this moment?

Yes, the mother in the play does not complain, but tries to understand and comfort her husband.

The angry dad talks to Mike and shares the stupid things he did when he was 16 with Mike. Help Mike unload his guilt.

We see that mom seems to be singing "red face" and dad is "white face" in this matter, but whether it is dealing with disagreements or finally facing each other, the two of them are always trying to communicate rather than opposing each other.

This gives us an inspiration that as parents, we can have different parenting methods and opinions, but as parents, we have to face each other together.

Work together when things come in, rather than blaming and complaining to each other.

From this point of view, the distinction between "red" and "white" can be a difference of opinion, but the final result should be the same, it can be "red", it can be "white", or it can be "red" and "white" middle ground - "gray". It is important that both parties be considerate of each other and know that they are aligned in each other's goals.

So, what does "red face" and "white face" mean, and how do people's views of it come about?

The secret behind "red face" and "white face"

"Red face" and "white face" can refer to both parents, or it may be the previous generation and the next generation, in short, the division of labor between roles and generations.

Teacher Zeng Qifeng said that the axis of parents should be long enough to keep the old man out. This means that the boundaries of the nuclear family should be clear.

Assuming that the boundaries are not clear, "red" and "white" may be the division of labor and difference between generations. For example, when eating, parents ask children to eat on time, and if they don't eat, they are hungry, and the elderly secretly feed or chase. In this matter, the parents bear the "bad".

From eating to sleeping or living or otherwise, rules and boundaries cannot be established. Perhaps the child will benefit himself through the existing contradictions in adult life or through the unconscious creation of contradictions. Even take advantage of loopholes to escape the problem.

How many children who are spoiled and raised by the elderly have no sense of rules, not that their parents are completely absent, but that their parents abdicate and give the dominance to the elderly.

In this way, "red" and "white" carry the inconsistency of parenting concepts between generations, one by one, creating antagonistic contradictions in relationships, and also creating confusing values for children.

Professor Li Meijin once told a case. One of the children had good grades, and after graduation, his aunt helped him go to the bank. He was later fired from the bank for taking public funds privately.

The aunt found Li Meijin and said that there was no shortage of money in the child's home, how could this be?

Li Meijin responded that the child should have developed a dual personality due to the inconsistency of the concept of discipline in the family. For example, one party spoils and raises shamelessness, and the other party is strict and nurtures fear and fear.

The strict parenting performs well everywhere, and the child moves to an unfamiliar environment as "good". And when alone, the selfish part of nature comes out.....

This is in line with the truth that the boy's father has been out for a long time, although he is absent but strict with the child, the mother is raised alone, and all the requirements of the child are met.

The child's heart is artificial. Conflicts between parents can be internalized into conflicts within the child.

Thinking along this line of thought, whether it is intergenerational or the "black and white face" between parents, it will be internalized into the child's internal conflict and create the child's inner uneasiness.

Perhaps a considerable number of children survive in the gap between "red" and "white", believing that the contradictions of their parents are created by themselves and are not good for themselves, so they get the belief that they are not worthy of being loved, and they cannot accept themselves.

You may say that sometimes it's just the parents performing the "red" and "white" sides, and there is no real contradiction.

But we need to understand that children before the age of 9 have no logical thinking ability, they don't know whether adults are acting, joking, or really contradictory, and they don't distinguish between what should be ruled and what can be ignored.

Under "red" and "white", they cannot internalize the rules, but they will inadvertently internalize the "red" and "white" of the parents in the relationship.

Because children will grasp the unintentional words and deeds of their parents at any time, and accept, imitate and internalize them all.

The power struggle between "red" and "white" opposites

As mentioned earlier, the inconsistencies in the thoughts, feelings, and handling of a thing are understandable.

It is important that we see the high degree of inconsistency in parenting methods that emerge as opposing conflicts and contradictions behind the parts. She may be a projection of contradictions and anxieties in relationships that adults are powerless to handle. Or the obsessive repetition of the growing "me" to be seen, noticed, and valued.

"Red" and "white" are a contest of winning and losing, right and wrong. It's a power struggle.

I think of a man who visits, has a small career success, but often blames himself excessively, and faces the panic that the authority cannot control, which causes him to often behave abnormally in front of the authority.

Turning over his growth, his parents had no time to take care of the growth of the brothers and often quarreled. Dad is high-pressure and strict, and Mom is weak and has no boundaries, often complaining about Dad behind his back. He was helpless to the relationship between his parents, and from an early age, he was burdened with the burden of listening to his mother, but he did not know how to comfort his mother.

When in the consultation, he saw little by little that he was carrying the anger of a weak mother, carrying too many imaginative expressions of anger and aggression against his father, and the desire to get close to his father and get his approval, he also gradually clarified the hidden hostility attacks in his relationship with authority, as well as the intimacy expressed by attacks, the uneasiness of wanting to get approval from authority but not knowing how to express.

He gradually understood himself, why he always had to ask the consultant for verification, "You say I did the right thing."

In reality, parents make differences "red" and "white", and also create irreconcilable divisions in their children's hearts.

They are at a loss and are in a dilemma.

A girl with a stern father and a gentle and contented mother. Her grades have always been excellent, but in the past two years, her parents have a tense relationship and often quarrel, and when her parents are separated and divorce is on the agenda, her excellent grades have suddenly plummeted rapidly, and she no longer wants to go to school.

Yes, maybe you know, it's a child who is incredibly loyal to his parents, maintaining a relationship with his parents with his own problems. For children, they have no other choice but to use the most primitive ways, such as illness, or the most arousing of the attention of parents at present, such as poor grades, not going to school, etc. to call on parents to reconcile their relationships with each other.

It is not so much to reconcile the relationship between the parents, but to make the broken self less painful.

This is the child, who is incredibly loyal to their parents' love and often uses life to prompt them to look back at themselves.

Without complacing ourselves, being a parent for the first time, we can allow ourselves to do less well. After all, as parents, our feelings and needs also need to be seen and valued.

It's just that conflicts between adults need to be handled in the adult world.

epilogue

There is a passage on the Internet where an owner has a dog and is named "Don't Move". The password that this owner often uses is: "Don't move, come here." ”

The ending is that the dog is crazy.

I think that if you listen to this passage, you may think of the mouse in the bellows, the picture of the two ends being angry, and it will also be related to life, when the "red-faced" and "white-faced" parents issue opposite instructions, how painful the child will be.

The ideal picture in the family is that the parent is stable behind the child, and the child looks forward, fully doing himself, and developing outward.

If parents often disagree, the child will have to turn back and distract himself into the parental relationship, and the outward and inward exploration will be hindered.

In this way, if you do not simply listen to "red" or "white", you will be disturbed by the outside world, you will not be able to fully and clearly see your inner feelings and needs, and you will lose your own thoughts and opinions. Either you keep investing your energy in the struggle with your parents' "red" and "white" views, destroying the relationship and getting entangled in the relationship.

Both reduce the degree to which life is activated.

Parents are the child's heaven and earth, and to belittle either party is to cut the child's inner circle, destroy the integrity of his personality level, and damage the child's inner sense of security.

And the child does something wrong, one side harshly accuses or even scolds, and the other side comforts. In the long run, as long as the child survives the harsh side and does not need to adjust his thoughts and behaviors through self-examination, he will miss the opportunity to grow.

In real parenting, the difference between "red" and "white" is not so important, it is important that as parents we remember that we love our children deeply. They need to be warmed and held, they need love, they need rules.

Not only children, but also us as adults also need love and boundaries. Perhaps at this moment, "red" and "white" have become "gray" in the process of being taken seriously, and the difference is naturally used to create harmony.

Author | Mo Lihua, the article reprinted from Zeng Qifeng Psychological Studio, nearly 2,000 original parent-child/gender/personal growth psychological articles, psychoanalytic learning, 7 years of companionship, less inner conflict, more spiritual freedom.

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