I remember it from the time I was young. We loved celebrating the holidays with my mom’s side of the family, where there were many kids and lots of space. Grandpa and Grandma gave us candy and we slept on the floor and stayed awake until late at night, sharing silly jokes. Dad’s side of the family was not as much fun and every year, when the time came and dad said we were celebrating with his family, we were counting the seconds for the holiday to end.
Many parents struggle with keeping their kids busy. One of the things parents hate hearing the most is “I’m bored”. Parents are very busy nowadays and feel they need money to give their kids what they want.
Weekends and holidays are the main stressful times for parents and many of us need a holiday after the holidays to recover, because keeping the kids busy can be hard work.
But in fact, there are many fun and exciting activities you can do with your kids with little or no money at all. You just need to look around a bit.
Today, we are going to explore the way conflicts influence self-esteem and how learning good conflict resolution can boost your self-esteem.
Most of our conflicts with others are caused by mixed or contradicting interests. One person wants something and the other wants something else, and many times, it is impossible to compromise because there is nothing in the middle, or at least, both parties THINK there is nothing in the middle.
The main problem with conflict is that it is a magnifier. If you have low self-esteem and you find yourself in conflict, your low self-esteem will become even lower and you will have more doubts about yourself.
The quote “Do unto others as you would have others do unto you” is widely used by people as a “rule of thumb” for treating others. I must have heard it spoken to kids by their parents hundreds of times in different settings. But I am here to tell you that this way of thinking can get you into all kinds of strife and that if you review your relationships, you will find out how.
Just think for a moment about the many ways in which people vary: age, gender, job title, occupation…
Read Do Unto Others What Works »
As you know, teenagers are very close to my heart. At the age of 16, I decided it was time for people to change their attitude towards teens if they want them to change their attitude towards their life and the adults in their life. Especially parents of teenagers.
I was a bit shocked to realize that the relationship I had with my parents from an early age had led us into constant conflict during my teen years.
Until that point, I thought all teens hated their parents. I thought all parents of teenagers lost their kids’ respect and trust during adolescence. I knew that having these thoughts did not help teenagers or their parents.
Read Parents of Teenagers: This is How to Destroy Your Relationship »
Some parents have aggressive kids. Some parents have nice kids, who behave aggressively sometimes.
Teens, for example, because they are in “the argumentative age”, have more conflicts with their parents and this creates an endless cycle of disciplinary action, which creates arguments, which bring more discipline and then more arguments…
Not all kids know they need to be easy to parent. When they are born, no one tells them they need to do everything their parents expect of them. Or what to do when there are conflicts of expectations.
Read Aggressive Kids »
As parents, one of the things we always worry about is what kind of a world we will leave for our kids. No matter how many times we vote and realize we can only cast one vote in millions into the box, we somehow still feel it is our responsibility to make sure that when our kids grow up, the world will be safe, clean and pleasant for them. It’s OK, it’s natural.
So let’s explore some things parents do “for their kids” and let’s see what they have to sacrifice in the process. If you have any more examples, I invite you to post them in the comment box below.
Last week, I wrote about the things that parents say that turn off communication between them and their teens. Today, I would like to talk about the buttons teens push to set their parents off and “make” them lose their minds.
From their early years, kids have an inherent sense of their parents’ weaknesses. They learn it by themselves – they do not need to go to school to study what works and what does not work. They are so sophisticated, they can tell you what works on Daddy and what works on Mommy, even if they are very different.
It is amazing sometimes to see a young baby, stepping as much as possible on the toes of his parents and making them behave in funny ways. This thing works both ways. Our children know us so well, they can make us do silly things out of joy or out of anger or guilt.
Whether we like it or not, parents are human beings. What can we do?
So sometimes, we have bad days. Sometimes, we need something to be proud of, because otherwise, we would feel pretty bad about ourselves. Sometimes, we just need reassurance that things will get better, preferably thanks to us. This is why we have kids.
If you are working a full time job, fostering aspirations of promotion and glory, you may be spending much of your time at work, or at least being preoccupied with it. When you come home, you are not in the best of moods, your head is filled with things that still need to be done, by you, for which the due date has not moved, despite the sad fact you have not done them today.
Read While You Were Sleeping »
This week, I have read (again) an alarming statistic about the rate of divorce and the devastating effect of divorce on children. When I think about my parents, I know I need to thank them in every way I can for being able to handle all the conflicts between them and reach their 50th anniversary.
Conflicts between parents are inevitable. After all, Mom and Dad are two separate people, coming from different backgrounds and sharing life together – a house, romance, kids and finances – in hope of making it the best experience ever.
In research done in 1982 (R.E. Emery) and 1990 (E. Mark), it was found that even young kids are strongly hurt by their parents’ conflicts. It is actually possible to measure parents’ anger through their kids’ psychological, behavioral an emotional state. When I worked with groups of 2-4 year-olds, I could tell when there was tension at home or when one of the parents was away from home.
Read Monkey See, Monkey Do »
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