? Emotional vaccination
A kid pushed your child in the playground. What should your child do? Push back? Come running to you? Do nothing?
Situations like these are confusing. We want our kids to be able to stand up for themselves. But we also want them to avoid using violence—even if it means self-defense.
This week, we're exploring the answer to this question using a mind-blowing concept: emotional vaccination. A bit of emotion before they get the hold of our body.
I first heard about emotional vaccination through the words of clinical psychologist Dr. Becky Kennedy. I believe she's the one who came up with the term. I find it brilliant.
When someone pushes my buttons, even when I achieve to give a proper adult response and I'm proud of myself, the child in me has a hard time settling.
"You should have hit back!" she says. "They stepped on you."
A good way to deal with this tension between the adult and the child in me is to give my inner child a proper voice.
Through imaginary role-play, I try giving a "childish" response to the one who hurt me. I try to be as reactive and immature as I can be. This way, the child in me gets to have a say. I get to navigate all of my emotions without having to act on them.
In this week's article below, you'll find a similar plan to help your children when other kids are mean to them.
Finally, I recorded a video talking about 5 C's that build resilience in children. With vineyard vibes again. :)
Hope you enjoy this week's issue!
? Remember
“We cannot, nor would we want to, protect or rescue our kids from all adversity and negative experiences. These challenging experiences are an important part of growing up and developing resilience, along with acquiring internal skills needed to cope with stress and failure and to respond with flexibility.
What we can do is help our children make sense of their experiences so that those challenges will more likely be encoded in the brain consciously as “learning experiences,” rather than unconscious associations or even traumas that limit them in the future.
When parents discuss experiences and memories with their kids, the children tend to have better access to memories of those experiences. Kids whose parents talk to them about their feelings also develop a more robust emotional intelligence and can therefore be better at noticing and understanding their own and other people’s feelings.
Neurons that fire together wire together, changing the changeable brain.”
Excerpt from “No-Drama Discipline” by Daniel J. Siegel & Tina Payne Bryson.
? Read
Your child was pushed by another child. What next?
Advising your kid to hit back won't build up their confidence. Giving them certain words to use won't work either. Here's a new way to help our kids handle conflicts.
? Watch
How to build resilience in kids? » 5 C's
Here are some insights from the resilience theory to understand what makes children resilient.
? Laugh
? Grow
Consider becoming a premium member to support Apparent, learn emotional coaching, become calmer, and lead your child's brain and emotional development to its full potential. » Become a member
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[Ebook] Attachment for Parents: The Science of Human Connection
Attachment is not a parenting buzzword. Neither is it a parenting philosophy. It’s how we bond with our caregivers, make sense of the world, and build relationships. Parenting philosophies may come and go. Attachment is here to stay.
That's it for today! ❤️
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Let me know what you think! Always here for you: on Twitter and at basak@apparent.today. Or just reply to this e-mail.
See you next week!
Love, Basak.