Have you ever lost it with your child, but then afterward thought, “Wow, where did THAT come from?”
This has certainly happened to me… I’m trucking along in my day and then (wham!) something happens with a family member and a sleeping dragon gets woken up from inside me.
If you’ve ever gotten caught off guard by your feelings, or if you want to understand yourself better then you’ll love this topic.
One of the most important parts of mindful parenting is noticing and understanding what is going on for ourselves. In a perfect world, we’d be able to “tune in” to ourselves before we interact with our child, understandably this is challenging to do in real life with our kids when things are fast-paced and can happen unexpectedly.
But don’t despair, even afterward “tuning in” to ourselves and understanding our feelings can be a game changer. It’s so useful to understand what we, as parents, bring to the table, when we’re with our kids.
Today I wanted to teach you the 3 simple “tuning in” steps that I’ve been teaching my individual coaching clients and the parents of The Village community. These steps are from the work of Dr. Marshall Rosenburg and his book, Non-Violent Communication.
I made this 2-minute video to share these steps with you.
Have a lovely week!
I look forward to reading your comment after you watch it.
After reading the blog today, do you want more parenting support from me and meet similar parents?
You and I can personally talk in there if you’re struggling to figure out how to talk to your child.
The third step is a challenge since my son takes my questions with such defensive approach and end up arguing and being both frustrated and upset !
Cynthia, thanks for this comment. It’s really hard when kids get defensive and start arguing. The third step is mostly about identifying our own unmet needs, but also thinking about your child’s unmet needs can be a way to address the defensiveness. After that, a possible 4th step is to talk to our child. Sometimes we might meet our own needs, sometimes we might ask our child to help us meet those needs, e.g. “I see that you’re on your phone. I’m guessing that you’re feeling tired, and need to have a little fun on your phone after a long day at school. I’m feeling concerned because you might have homework to do. Would you be willing to tell me what your plan is to get your homework done, so I won’t have to worry about it?”
There are a few parts of this example. We own our feelings and our needs. We’re acknowledging our child’s feelings and needs. And asking, not demanding, for their help. Our child might still say “no” but we’ve at least talked to them openly and without blame. Good luck!
Thank you so so much for this . I needed to hear this so badly thank you . My daughter has a phone and I am struggling with all of these anxious feelings all the time as you mentioned . These are my own and I need to own them and be aware of that and thank you for making me have some sort of a plan for when I do feel these things and to recognize whether or not it’s an issue or my own responsibility to take care of my own emotions . Thank you
Wow, I really love this! I especially like the first step of just observing without adding your own narration to the situation. I often find myself reacting to what I assume is happening and it hardly ever ends well (especially with tweens/teens!)
Alisha, I have the same issue too… that I react to my assumption and wowza, my teen is like, “Mom, chill. I’ve got it under control.” Hahaha! I’m continuing to practice what I preach.