Growth psychology | don't let flattering personality ruin your child's life

Recently, a video of a second-born mother in Bengbu, Anhui Province, taking care of her brother, locking the crying sister in the toilet, and the sister cried and said sorry to her mother poked the tears of netizens, netizens commented that "the sister is afraid of her mother's anger, and in the long run will form a flattering personality."

What is a flattering personality? What is the impact on the child's development? How parents should identify and respond, we invite experts to interpret in detail in this issue.

Psychologist: Mu Yan

Intermediate psychotherapist, national second-level psychological counselor, family education instructor.

Explanation of terms

Flattering personality

Flattering personality refers to: the personality that blindly pleases others and ignores their own feelings, which is an unhealthy psychological state. Children with a flattering personality, the root cause behind flattery is low self-esteem. They have a negative belief in "their own qualities and values" in their hearts, form a psychological thinking that they are not good enough, incompetent, and unworthy, living in a self-constructed prison, depression, anxiety, fear, and dare not strive for good opportunities, and it is difficult to have a happy life.

Case overview

Please don't please others

The bully girl is disgusted with school

Xiao Man, a 13-year-old junior high school girl, has achieved excellent results since childhood. One night, she suddenly screamed like crazy: "I don't want to go to school anymore." Xiao Man's mother was very shocked, how the child who had always been sensible and obedient rebelled, and patiently comforted her. But the next day, no matter what her mother said or said badly, Xiao Man did not go to school.

The mother panicked and sent the child to psychological counseling. After empathetic listening, the expert let Xiao Man open her heart and say in her own words: "I don't seem to be doing anything wrong, I seem to be born a mistake, I have tried my best to study hard, my mother still feels that I am not careful and not motivated; I also try my best to integrate into the group and have a good relationship with my classmates, but the classmates think that I am a strange person, isolated and excluded me." I really don't think it's fun to be alive and I don't want to go to school. ”

It turns out that Xiao Man's parents are Kochi type, perfectionists, they are particularly demanding of children, always see Xiao Man's deficiencies, and rarely encourage children. Xiao Man studied hard just to gain the approval of her parents, but no matter how hard she tried, she could not meet her parents' expectations.

In addition, Little Man's language development lagged behind when he was young, and now he occasionally stutters slightly when he speaks. In order to gain friendship, she always suppressed herself to please others, but she was always excluded by everyone. Xiao Man has long lived in an environment of denial, criticism, and rejection, resulting in self-doubt, "I am not good enough" and "I am not worthy of love", extreme pain in his heart, and wants to cut off all troubles by not going to school.

Experts use a combination of expressive art therapy and family education guidance to guide Xiaoman to discover, share and repair past traumas, deal with negative and negative emotions in the present, rebuild self-awareness, and learn to correctly accept and pay attention to himself.

At the same time, experts analyze the harm caused to children by wrong parenting methods to parents, provide new parenting ideas, assign homework, adjust parenting attitudes and methods from all aspects, and relink good parent-child relationships. At present, Xiao Man has returned to school and gradually adapted to school life.

Cause analysis

Family upbringing is the main cause High sensitivity is secondary

1. Personal factors: children are highly sensitive, inferior, low sense of self-worth, in order to make others happy, even if they suffer losses, they are willing.

2. Family factors: parents with strong desire to control always deny the parents of their children, parents who are pleasing personalities, want to make their children into "perfect children", when the children can not meet their expectations, they will criticize, suppress, and even "emotionally kidnap" to manipulate the children.

In addition, the unstable family atmosphere, the family atmosphere in which parents quarrel all day long, always complain and accuse each other, or are full of violence, etc., will make children feel insecure, afraid of being abandoned, and become trying to cater to their parents' ideas.

3. Social factors: The child's self-boundaries are not clear, the principle is not strong, and he is always on the weaker side in interpersonal communication, so that he is in a negative mood for a long time.

Expert advice

Three ways to correct the child's flattering personality

1. Provide a healthy and enlightened family environment. Parents should take responsibility for their own emotions and do not let their children bear responsibilities that do not belong to them. In a warm and harmonious family atmosphere, children will not suppress themselves, and can easily express their emotions and needs.

2. Respect the child and love the child unconditionally. Parents treat their children as independent individuals, respect their children's wishes; "love what they are", accept the child's truest appearance; listen to and understand the child's emotions; discover and pay attention to the child's shining points, and encourage them in multiple dimensions.

3. Let go in time to cultivate children's ability to think independently. Some parents themselves belong to the flattering personality, always against the heart to please others, and even require children to please others, in this process the child will subtly learn, and internalized into their own behavior patterns. Parents should know how to let go in time, let the children explore on their own, and cultivate the ability to think independently, so that the children will not be swayed by the thoughts of others and have no self.

Self-assessment: May be a "flattering personality" if the following traits are met

1. Fear of expressing true inner thoughts and feelings.

2. Always cater to others, regard others as important, and think of yourself as low.

3. Do not know how to refuse, respond to the needs of others, and feel embarrassed to reject others.

4. Say everything well and don't express different opinions.

5. The sense of identity comes from others, always paying attention to their own shortcomings and deficiencies.

END

This article is from the New Parents Daily, Issue 969-970

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