Guest post by Maria Fuller, founder and thought leader behind RaisingAPowerfulGirl.com.
Guest post by Maria Fuller, founder and thought leader behind With rates of anxiety, depression and even suicide rising for children these days, a huge contributing factor is that children do not have the coping skills they need to manage the situations that arise in life. Instead they are left with these emotions bubbling and boiling inside of them with no way of being processed. This can either lead to making poor choices as a reaction to the behaviour or the child retreats, feeling “abnormal” or that there is “something wrong” with them, leading to isolation.
But before we can even tackle giving girls coping skills to manage stress and anxiety we need to start at the beginning and this is Emotional Intelligence.
Emotional Intelligence
Emotional intelligence refers to 3 main areas:
- emotional awareness or the ability to identify and name one’s own emotions
- the ability to harness those emotions and apply them to tasks like thinking and problem solving
- the ability to manage emotions which includes regulating your own when necessary but also cheering up or calming down others.
So let’s talk about some characteristics that a person with strong emotional intelligence has.
Strong Emotional Vocabulary
When we think about emotional intelligence and children we need to remember and be aware of how old they are and their life and educational experience. Part of having strong emotional intelligence is having a strong vocabulary of descriptive words to be able to really describe what it is they are feeling so they can move forward and figure out how they are going to act or what they need to do to work through it.
Working with your girls on helping to develop an emotional vocabulary with lots of words to really pinpoint and identify how they are feeling is very important. So often with little ones we tend to simplify our language with them but it’s important to use big words like frustration, empathy, confusion, overwhelmed, impatient, satisfied and more.
The more you model and use the same words back to them the quicker they will learn it as well. It’s important for girls to be able to differentiate between say anger and frustration because the means to address these two very different emotions is different.
They Pause
The pause is as simple as taking a moment to stop and think before you speak or act. Easy in theory, difficult in practice. For so many of us as parents and caretakers this is a hard one to model but learning how to pause before choosing an action can be lifesaving.
How many times as a person or a parent has a situation arisen and something happens which fires you up and you blurt out the first thing that comes to your mind and instantly regret it? Well for children this same thing can happen or with smaller ones who are still learning impulse control this can mean the difference between saying something or pushing someone on the playground.
When The Pre-Frontal Cortex Goes On Vacation
This pause before action can help children from making bad impulsive decisions later in their tween and teen years when their pre-frontal cortex which is responsible for impulse control, critical thinking and evaluating other people’s emotions (to name just a few of its important jobs) goes on vacation during the teen years.
This is when the amygdala, or emotional centre of the brain, kindly takes over the decision-making department. The result is that tweens and young teens become more reactive and dramatic, and less likely to control their impulses. If we can instil in them at an early age to pause before reacting, this habit could benefit them greatly in their teen years.
As parents modelling that same behaviour to children also allows us to be better parents, can help us to maintain a calm composure when your 2 year old has emptied every single drawer in her room and covered herself and the dog head to toe in diaper cream and more.
They Strive To Control Their Thoughts
We don’t have a lot of control over the emotions we experience in a single moment but we can control the reaction to those emotions by focusing on our thoughts. A big part of this is helping girls to acknowledge their feelings, all of them, even the not so fun ones and understand that there are NO bad feelings ever and that we have the choice of how to react and respond to those feelings and emotions. This is the early stages of teaching self care as well.
Acknowledging & Accepting Emotions
So we want girls to be able to acknowledge and accept the emotions they are feeling and then decide how they are going to respond to said emotion in a way that helps move them in the direction they want to move.
Your child might be crying and fussy because they are tired/and or hungry and you have a general idea this is the case, so instead of offering them a snack, ASK them, “how are you feeling right now? What do you need?” and let them see if they can figure it out.
If not use some words and ask, “are you tired?” “are you hungry?” and once they figure out how they are feeling then you ask, “what would you like to do about that?” The goal is to help girls learn to do this process on their own someday in their head.
The Deep Dread Of Criticism
If there was one gift I could instil in my own girls it would be to not have the visceral response that I am still working on when receiving criticism or feedback. Because of my visceral response and deep dread of criticism, I have also learned the importance on how to give feedback in a manner in which it is well received and talk my children through the process of why feedback is important and the opportunity it gives us to grow and expand as people and how even as adults it is important.
Feedback
I wanted to share a quick study with you. Now my work primarily focuses on girls issues but this study also outlines the importance of feedback for boys.
“At the 5th grade level, girls routinely outperform boys in every subject, including maths and science… [but] bright girls [are] much quicker to doubt their ability, to lose confidence, and to become less effective learners as a result.”
“Bright girls, when given something to learn that was particularly foreign or complex, were quick to give up — and the higher the girls’ IQ, the more likely they were to throw in the towel.”
Further research has shown that this arises from how girls and boys understand their abilities differently: “More often than not, bright girls believe that their abilities are innate and unchangeable, while bright boys believe that they can develop ability through effort and practice.”
The Difference In Attitude With Boys And Girls
This difference in attitude is believed to develop in large part due to the kinds of feedback children receive from parents and teachers. “Girls, who develop self-control earlier and are better able to follow instructions, are often praised for their ‘goodness.’ When we do well in school, we are told that we are ‘so smart,’ ‘so clever,’ or ‘such a good student.’ But, these phrases imply ‘that traits like smartness, cleverness, and goodness are qualities you either have or you don’t.'”
Meanwhile, “boys are given a lot more feedback that emphasises effort (e.g., ‘If you would just pay attention you could learn this,’ ‘If you would just try a little harder you could get it right.’)” The difference in feedback teaches both groups subtle messages about what it means when they encounter something difficult: “girls take it as sign that they aren’t ‘good’ and ‘smart’, and boys take it as a sign to pay attention and try harder.”
What Does This All Mean?
This means that we have the opportunity or obligation as parents to give our children productive feedback and then to teach them how that feedback is a GIFT to propel them forward. In our house you will hear things like:
“Wow that looks challenging, it’s really great seeing how you are really trying hard on that tough problem”
or
“Well that didn’t go as you had planned, what do you think you could have done differently or next time”
We praise on the work and the effort and we leave conversations open that there is never “mastery” that there is always room for improvement and innovation.
While this teaches children to benefit from criticism, it helps to develop a strong mindset and aids them in becoming critical thinkers
They Apologise
It takes strength and courage to be able to say your sorry. Emotional Intelligence helps you to realise that apologising doesn’t always mean your wrong, it means you value your relationship more than your ego. The two biggest mistakes I see parents make are 1. Failing to apologise to their children or others in front of their children because of ego and 2. Telling children to apologise after an action instead of guiding the child to come to that conclusion on their own.
Over-Use
The big problem with this is the overuse of the phrase “I’m sorry” and how it lacks meaning for so many, so much that it has become a speech crutch for people.
One of the most powerful ways we have to teach our children is through modelling the behaviour we want to see from them which is why it’s critical as parents to model apologies to our children. We all know we aren’t perfect and that perfectionism does not exist and that we are going to make mistakes when raising our kids so when you yell when you don’t mean to or you choose a consequence to a behaviour that doesn’t sit well with you PLEASE follow your gut and tell your child.
“I’m sorry mommy yelled, I was so frustrated and I didn’t pause to breathe and just let everything come out and that wasn’t fair to you.” Or “I’m sorry I said you can’t go to Jane’s party tomorrow, I don’t think that was the right consequence for what happened earlier, I made a rush decision, let’s talk about this together.”
Modelling Behaviour
By modelling this powerful behaviour you show your child that you too make mistakes and get caught in emotions but you then show them how to handle it when that happens. I think asking girls really good questions and teaching them introspective thinking and coming to the conclusion on things like apologies on their own will teach them this powerful quality much better than just telling a child to say sorry.
It is not an overnight thing but with time and modelling powerful behaviour you would be surprised how much they pick up from us.
Emotional Intelligence
Emotional Intelligence is the foundation to brain health, self-esteem and confidence. It’s a simple idea that has massive impact on girls lives and it is something we should be aware of and working towards instilling in our girls everyday if we wish to see more female leaders and change makers in the world as well as address self-esteem and mental health issues in girls today.
If you like this post, why not read our article on 6 ways to build your daughter’s confidence.
Bio
Maria Fuller is the Founder and Thought Leader behind RaisingAPowerfulGirl.com whose missions is to foster independence, leadership and strong personal identity in girls so that they can change the world and the newly launched empoweredgirlapp.com for Clever, Creative and Inquisitive Girls.
Maria has spent more than 10 years helping women and girls shed unhealthy beliefs and smash through stereotypes and unhealthy behaviour. Her work has been featured on Ariana Huffington’s Thrive Global, Yahoo and Google news as well as other smaller publications. A mother of two POWERFUL girls who challenge her and help guide her on the journey she lives with her High School Sweetheart turned husband on a Lazy river in Ct.
