How to Raise Courageous Children
Children need courage to embrace life fully, so how can we help to facilitate them to be courageous?
I think there are 5 key things…
Acceptance
Accepting our child fully for who they are. Avoid labelling your child with a set personality type or traits that could impose limitations on them. Instead, celebrate their uniqueness. Understand that they are individuals who think differently, have different experiences and see their world through different eyes to us. Full acceptance means examining all the ideas in our head about who are children should be or who we want them to be and noticing and embracing who they actually are.
Attention
When we give our children our attention and fully listen to them, we show them that their thoughts matter. This helps them to be brave in their thinking and to trust that what they are thinking is worthy. Attention doesn’t have to take long either, but it does need to be regular, uninterrupted time where you connect with them and allow them to take the lead in the dialogue or in play.
Appreciation
Telling our children what we love, admire or appreciate about them helps them build up a positive picture of themselves. If you, as their parent, tell them they are creative or responsible or are good company or whatever else you love about them, they believe that about themselves. They can use that belief in moments in life when things don’t work out and they need resilience to get through. They can use that belief to contribute with courage and to feel capable of trying new things.
Praise in Moderation
Praise isn’t bad per see, but if we only praise our children for the things they produce or the things they do, they start to believe their self-worth is the sum of these things. They feel the need to do these things in order to win our approval, rather than feeling valued for who they are and the qualities they possess. It can lead to a need to produce perfection in everything they do and anxiety around their performance. Instead, substitute appreciation for praise as much as possible. (for more on this read my blog post Appreciation vs Praise)
A Courageous Role Model
How courageous are you? How able are you to be vulnerable, to try new things, to stand up for what you value, to fully embrace life? It can be tough to face up to some of the changes we need to make to role model the things we’d love our children to learn, but if we do, we gain so much. Not only do we get a wonderful opportunity to live courageously, but we can also confidently know we are leading by example.
The coaching I do is about giving parents the attention and support they need so that they have the courage to parent confidently and to be the role model that they want their child to have.
