Allow Them To Feel

You may notice I talk a lot about allowing things to happen because that would be the opposite of controlling. Yesterday was about allowing our children to make mistakes. Today's focus is allowing our children to feel.  The controlling parent route is rigid and external. It’s using your dominance as the parent to eliminate mistakes, eliminate screaming, crying, pouting etc. None of this is allowed.

The thing about Teachable Parenting is that having children who know how to shut up and butt out is not the ultimate goal. Our kids are real people, with real emotions, fears, and heartache. We have to teach and model for them a variety of real life feelings and how to handle them. 

We are so distracted in this day and age that we as adults want to numb our feelings and cover them up with television, computers, eating, drinking, or whatever the drug of choice is. We do the same with our children at times. We pacify them with phones and iPads or threaten them with punishment depending on if their cries are an inconvenience. Or sometimes it just plain makes us uncomfortable. We don’t want our children to feel bad so we inadvertently teach them not to feel. Don’t get me wrong , I bribe my children. I give into to their whaling more often than I should, and sometimes the relentless screaming is flat out inappropriate. So I don’t want to take this to an extreme, because there is a time and a place to vent.  I still feel like the topic of expressing emotions is  worth consideration and evaluation.

In the book Wild Things it says: 

“Boys need help in discriminating among their feelings. We can help by teaching them to develop a rich emotional vocabulary. Beginning when he is very young - but you can do this at any age - help your boy connect words to his feelings."

“Boys who have a large vocabulary of “feeling words” are better at expressing their emotions using language rather than behavioral outbursts. As caregivers we need engaging ways to teach boys a vocabulary for emotions and to help them identify feelings within themselves and on the faces of others. We have to teach them empathy.”

Girls in general tend to connect with their feelings more easily than boys and are able to identify instead of suppress emotions. However, these tips are a great practice for either gender and can apply to both! For example let's say the child is having a melt down over a lost helium balloon. Instead of saying 

Oh really? Your upset now? What do you expect sweetie? Your balloon flew away because you took it off your wrist! That’s what you get. I tried to tell you! No more balloon. We are done.

Or taking it the other direction

 “SHHHHH! It’s okay. It’s okay. You can have another balloon. No big deal. Settle down."

You can say 

“Oh man, does that make you sad? Your tears make me think you are so sad. Why do you think that happened? ”

Your child maybe too young or too old for this scenario. And for the record, full disclosure here, you will most likely see me exhibiting example A or B on a hot day at the carnival when a balloon goes flying off into space. I am trying though! We know Jesus had feelings that were expressed in the Bible and those feelings which we also have were created by God. The Bible even tells us to be angry and sin not. So today’s assignment is to try and allow some of those feelings to be expressed both for our children and for ourselves.

This is Day 8 of a 31 day series. To view the rest of Teachable Parenting click HERE.