Text | Bugs and birds
At noon, when I was eating, I saw that her sleeves were always sweeping around on the tabletop, and the clothes she had just changed this morning, and then sweeping like this, it was estimated that in less than half a minute, it was all dirt. I couldn't help but pull her aside, not expecting the child to react extremely strongly, and immediately shouted "Ah--" I said, "When eating, pay attention to your sleeves, don't get dirty." She reflexively responded, "It's annoying." I was stunned, I didn't expect her to be so disgusted with my interference.
I am actually quite aggrieved, obviously I have not done anything wrong, why does this child have this reaction? Still being so rude to your mom? I was stunned by the half-ring, and this half-ring I quickly snuffed out my own negative evaluation of the baby's reaction. I told myself, "I have the power to influence the baby in a positive way." ”
After half a ring, I laughed. "It's annoying. I also feel particularly annoyed. I said. Hearing me say that, she laughed too.
Seeing her resistance dissolve, I began to informally tell her about just this.
Mom: For what just happened, I want to explain, would you like to listen?
Eva: What explanation?
Mom: I just pulled your sleeve directly, it's really annoying. No wonder you react so strongly. What I just wanted to remind you of is "the coat you just changed and swept around and then dirty", you know, the table in front of you is a lot of oil stains.
GW: Oh.
Mom: Because I'm worried that your clothes will get dirty, my mom will definitely be tempted to remind you. You don't want your mom to be so "annoying" you, right?
EVA: Yes.
Mom: So in order to avoid your mother bothering you, is it okay to wear sleeves when eating?
EVA: Okay. Mom, you help me find a pair of sleeves. I want to be a little more relaxed. (My baby has always disliked wearing cuffs, she always felt that the sleeve retractable belt was uncomfortable with her wrists, and she usually refused to wear them.) ）
Then I put on her sleeves, and the atmosphere of the meal returned to light and pleasant again.
To summarize this little thing:
01
Baby's emotions are like a flood beast, and the only thing that can be channeled is "empathy"
I've been practicing empathy. It is more or less mentioned in many parenting notes that have been written before.
In fact, what I would like to say to myself is that the empathy ability of parents needs to be cultivated for a long time, and if it can, it will turn "empathy" into a habitual reaction. You never know when your emotions will come, and when they will be ignited and exploded in an instant. Especially adolescent children, children around 2 years old, he said that he lost his temper, cried when he cried, and made trouble when he said he made trouble.
The child can not deal with their emotions, he threw the emotional baggage to the parents, he shouted at the parents and cried and made a fuss, the result is that the parents not only failed to help her unload the emotional baggage, but also gave the child another heavier emotional baggage, think about what will happen to the child at this time? The results were certainly not satisfactory. It will not only affect the emotions of both parties, but also affect each other's parent-child relationship. Instead of leading things to a worse outcome, it's better to have a wave of empathy.
Empathy is hard, try to do it continuously. Being able to press the pause button when your emotions arrive, being able to constantly hint and believe in yourself – "I can still solve this problem of the current baby in the simplest positive way."
02
Saying "Don't..." a thousand times is better than a positive behavior command
There is a famous experiment in psychology called "Don't Think About Pink Elephants". The result of the experiment was that "the more you tell yourself not to think about the pink elephant, the more you will be full of pink elephants." The more you control yourself from thinking, the easier it is to think.
Why? Because the human brain is always the first to identify and react quickly to more figurative things. "Pink elephant" is figurative, while "don't" is abstract, compared to "don't", people actually think of "pink elephant" first. So when we ask children to "don't move", "don't scribble", "don't write homework and bite your fingernails", "don't play with erasers"... Parents say so much "no", but the child can't help but "I want".
Instead of saying so much "don't", it is better to give the child a positive behavioral indication. Change "Don't be in a daze" to "Come, let's read the question first"; change "Don't bite the eraser" for "Let's put the eraser away"; change "Don't scribble" for "The table color is a little ugly, Mom finds you a piece of paper, we draw them all on paper"...
03
But "as soon as you exit, all the previous efforts are in vain."
When we say "but" to our children, we don't think there's anything wrong with that.
In another scenario, suppose it is the workplace, suppose it is the superior who comes to talk to us. He said a whole bunch of nice things about you gently, and then he turned sharply "but—" "But I hope you can report in time..." "But this matter, you still need to pay attention to..." "But I hope you can fully mobilize the resources around you, the colleagues around you..."
Do you feel the true intentions of your superiors in these scenes? Maybe the superior is also well-intentioned, in order to take care of our self-esteem, he has laid so much in front of him and said so many good words, but in fact, all our attention may be focused on the words after "but", where can we still take care of standing in the perspective of the superior to be grateful for his "kindness"?
In the same way, the same goes for children. When we say "but", the child's attention must also be in the back, because the back is what we have to say, what we want to express and ask him to do.
I'm still pretty thankful that I didn't say "but" today. Compare the following two sentences:
The first sentence: "It is really annoying to be suddenly pulled on the sleeve." No wonder you react so strongly. But you really shouldn't be so unhygienic, it will stain the sleeves. ”
The second sentence: "It is really annoying to be suddenly tugged on the sleeve." No wonder you react so strongly. In fact, what I just wanted to remind you is that "the coat you just changed and swept around is dirty", you know, the table in front of you is a lot of oil. ”
Above all, encourage!