|
Raising Self-Confident Children: How to Build Self-Confidence?
- written by Helen Williams, a family counsellor and parent educator from New Zealand
Don't solve your children's problems for them!
 Instead, see the problem as an
opportunity for learning and growth and set them up with the chance to
overcome the problem themselves within reason.
Many parents allow their children to avoid reasonably challenging
situations so they won't be inconvenienced themselves.
Your children know when you will bail them out, and when you aren't being totally
honest, and they will muster their skills to have you rescue them.
Try to separate out from feeling sorry for your children when you see them placed in awkward situations.
For instance, uneasy relationships between children often develop on the school playground.
These are tremendous learning opportunities - discuss them - talk out the problem - but don't rush in to fix it!
Often many of your buttons are pushed in these situations. However, if
you aren't careful, you can 'repair' something that isn't actually the
problem.
It just feels like it because it often feels similar to your own
childhood experience.
Let your child do the fixing and call yourself out when you know you are interfering.
Interfering is a difficult word to use when
describing care of children. However, if you are honest with yourself,
interfering with your children's decision making abilities is the right
name for your attempts to monitor and control them.
Do take the time to look at this concept in terms of your parenting style. Understanding the difference between interferingenabling your children,
provides for very powerful parenting.
Interfering is not enabling behaviour, but produces fearful, timid children who lack confidence and decision
making skills.
It's hard to think of loving parenting as
over-parenting or over-protective parenting, but the line is crossed so easily and
is often hard to go back on.
with and
Encourage Risk Taking
Have lots of open-ended conversations with your children to help them
question how they would cope with different situations. Sprinkle you speech with open ended questions - use the six starting
words.
How,
Why, What, Who, When, Where.
Engage in conversations that begin with -
What do you think will happen if you do that, or don't do that?
How
would you handle it?
Where
would you go?
Why
would you suggest that?
When
do you think that's appropriate?
Who
would you ask?
This encourages your children to think for themselves.
Listen to how you speak to your kids
Do you tell, or do you
suggest?
Do you talk or do you listen?
Building self confidence is about building self esteem.
Self esteem tools come through communication.
Let Them Know - Commend Them
If you set up situations for your
children to practice their confidence
with, you are also giving yourself opportunities to commend them for
their thinking, their actions and their attempts.
Make the most of these.
Get into the habit of telling them:
I noticed today that you were easily on time.
I noticed how thoughtful you were.
I saw you really thinking carefully.
Reinforce their confidence by noticing, by
consideration, and by listening.
Bedtime is a wonderful opportunity to reinforce all their
goodness.Before your children go off to sleep thank them for their
input into your family life.
Let them know that you observe, respect and consider them.
Help them to reach upwards towards their best potential by giving them
opportunities for practice.
Don't Do it For Them!
About the Author:
Helen Williams is a family counsellor and parent educator from New Zealand currently living in Dubai, UAE, where she runs a busy practice called Counselling Dubai. As well as counselling clients, Helen runs regular Consistent Parenting and Becoming Authentic workshops. Helen has four children and is a proud grandmother and believes that being a consistent parent is both vitally important and totally necessary to ensure a happy family life. However, becoming a consistent parent is rather like trying to push water uphill if we are not consistent within our selves. Consistent Parenting Advice addresses HOW to adopt a firm, clear, consistent parenting approach, while enabling parents to enhance and increase their emotional well-being and become consistent themselves.
|
