“Many parents see behavior as the measure of who our kids are, rather than using behavior as a clue to what our kids might need. What if we saw behavior as an expression of needs, not identity? Then, rather than shaming our kids for their shortcomings, making them feel unseen and alone, we could help them access their internal goodness, improving their behavior along the way.”
“Finding the good inside can often come from asking ourselves one simple question: “What is my most generous interpretation of what just happened?”
“Multiplicity is what allows two people to get along and feel close—they each know that their experience will be accepted as true and explored as important, even if those experiences are different. Building strong connections relies on the assumption that no one is right in the absolute, because understanding, not convincing, is what makes people feel secure in a relationship.”
“Our ability to experience many seemingly oppositional thoughts and feelings at once—to know that you can experience several truths simultaneously—is key to our mental health.”
“At our core, we all want someone else to acknowledge our experience, our feelings, and our truths. When we feel seen by others, we can manage our disappointment, and we feel safe and good enough inside to consider someone else’s perspective.”
“Children are more able to experience strong feelings than they are to regulate those feelings, and the gap between experiencing strong feelings and regulating those feelings comes out as dysregulated behavior (think hitting, kicking, screaming).”
“Boundaries are what we tell kids we will do. Boundaries embody your authority as a parent and don’t require your child to do anything.”
Without boundaries, behavior usually escalates further because they feel a lack of containment
Boundaries, validation, empathy
“Empathy comes from our ability to be curious: it allows us to explore our child’s emotional experience from a place of learning, not judgment.”
“Once you understand the roles of a family system, you can reframe how you think about your child’s difficult moments. Viewing their struggles as job fulfillment will help you remember that these are good kids doing their jobs, not bad kids doing bad things.”
“Before they can talk, children learn, based on interactions with their parents, what feels acceptable or shameful, manageable or overwhelming. In this way, our “memories” from early childhood are in fact more powerful than the memories we form in our later years; the way parents interact with kids in their early years forms the blueprint they take with them into the world.”
“Feeling satisfied with oneself, tolerant of failure, firm in boundaries, capable of self-advocacy, and connected with others … all of these important adult dynamics come from our early wiring. The first years of life set the stage for the next hundred.”
“Remember, children are learning how relationships work at the same time that they’re locked into a relationship with us, the parents. They’re utterly dependent on us for survival and they know this, deep in their bones, so they collect data on their environment and then wire themselves accordingly to maximize attachment and keep their parents as close as possible.”
“A child who sees a parent as his secure base feels a sense of safety in the world, a sense of “someone will be there for me and comfort me if things go wrong.” As such, he feels capable of exploring, trying new things, taking risks, suffering failures, and being vulnerable. There’s a deep and critical paradox here: The more we can rely on a parent, the more curious and explorative we can be.”
“Reminding ourselves, “Connect! Connect!” encourages us to first be present in our child’s experience instead of leading our child out of his own experience.”
“Unhappiness certainly isn’t my goal for them, but here’s a deep irony in parenting: the more we emphasize our children’s happiness and “feeling better,” the more we set up them up for an adulthood of anxiety. Setting happiness as the goal compels us to solve our kids’ problems rather than equip them to solve their own.”
“Parents don’t so much need to protect kids from having tough feelings as much as we need to prepare our kids to have those feelings. And the best way to prepare our kids is through honesty and loving presence.”
“Behavior, in all its forms, is a window: into the feelings, thoughts, urges, sensations, perceptions, and unmet needs of a person. Behavior is never “the story,” but rather it’s a clue to the bigger story begging to be addressed.”
Shame: “the feeling that this part of me is not connectable—no one wants to know or be with this part.”
“Shame is an evolutionarily adaptive feeling. Being alone as a child is synonymous with being in danger, so shame works, within the attachment system, as a signal to a child to hide the part of them that does not successfully gain attachment. Shame feels so awful because it awakens our body to a painful but important piece of information: You will not get your needs met if you keep on being who you are right now.”
Connection first; antidote to shame
“Shame has never been a motivator of positive behavior change at any time, in any place, for any type of person.”
“Connection is when we show our kids: “it’s okay to be you right now. Even when you’re struggling, it’s okay to be you. I am here with you, as you are.”
Unformulated experience: the feeling that something’s not right, without a clear explanation of what’s happening
“Confirming our children’s perceptions sets them up to recognize when things don’t feel right later, and it will empower them to trust themselves enough to speak up.”
“We disconnect from the parts of ourselves that receive negative attention early on.”
Did I ever tell you about the time…?
“I see you didn’t clean your room yet… hmm, all right, I’m going to get dinner started and I trust you to keep your promise to put your clothes away before you come downstairs.”
“Listening is really cooperation, and cooperation comes from connection.”
“Tantrums are biological states of dysregulation, not willful acts of disobedience.”
“By returning to the scene of the emotional fire and layering on connection, empathy, and understanding, you add key elements of regulation on top of the moment of dysregulation. Then, the next time your child has a hard time, these elements will be easier to access.”
Telling the story: reviewing a chaotic meltdown moment in order to build coherence
“Remind yourself, your job is to slow down the situation so your kids can regulate their bodies and have access to their own problem-solving skills; your job isn’t to solve this as quickly as possible. Here, you’re helping your children learn the process that leads to problem-solving; when we fix things for our kids, we just lock them into needing us to problem-solve, and this becomes frustrating to everyone.”
Whining = strong desire + helplessness ↑