Thursday, December 11, 2008
Reading on anger, and responding versus reacting....
Posted in just my thoughts
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Anyone here read Have a New Kid by Friday by Dr. Kevin Leman? No matter what the age of your child, it is a good book to read....and anyone can learn from it. There are a lot of great points in the book, and it is directed at changing your child's behavior by changing YOURS. Bt teaching you how to respond rather than react. You will have to read it for yourself...but I did want to share just these few thoughts with you. In the book, he (Dr. Leman) asks, "what is the atmosphere like in your house?" Is an angry person in control? A person can be loudly angry, or quietly angry. Either way, you know the person is angry, because they WANT you to know they are angry. Anger is an ACTIVE choice to control someone else. It is projecting your thoughts and emotions onto another person in an attempt to change their behavior." (doesn't usually work, by the way, and if it does get your way, the others WILL resent you for it, sooner or later) Now in the book he is talking about children using anger as a way to get their way, and it puts them in the "driver's seat" in their home.Without it, they don't have the control they crave, so the create a temper tantrum that says, "Pay attention to ME!" How many of us as adults do the same thing? Oh, we may not throw a screaming fit, but others DO know we are angry, don't they? Anger is not always bad. I heard a radio sermon once on the different types of anger. I can't recall them all, but the point the preacher was making that we need to be careful of certain kinds of anger. Jesus was certainly in the right in his anger with the money changers. (I wish I could recall the types of anger, or even the name of the preacher) Dr. Leman states in his book, it is not the anger that is wrong, it is HOW the anger is handled that is wrong or right. We can react, (blow up, have a hissy, pitch a fit...you get the picture), or we can respond...(remain calm, remain calm, remain calm, and talk about it) Remaining calm, and teaching your child to use "I" feel this way or that when this or that happens, instead of using "you" jerk, look what you did!" Using "I" statements focuses on how your child feels about what is happening, rather than pointing an accusing finger at someone else. I don't know about you, but that is hard for ME to do, and I am (almost) 39. sigh..... Anyway, I think I went rambling....here is the countdown for what Dr. Leman calls "funday" (Friday), and I think that it is just common sense parenting, and may have some carryover into other relationships as well. (not saying we should treat other adults like kids) 10)Be 100 percent consistent in your behavior. 9)Always follow through on what you say you will do. 8)Respond, don't react. 7)Count to 10 and ask, "what would my old self do in this situation? What should the new me do?" 6)Never threaten your kids ("if you don't stop pulling your sibling's hair, I'm gonna...") 5)Never get angry (yes, kids push our buttons, but we are the adults in the situation, and we decide when we get angry) If we get angry, an explosion of anger is like throwing up all over your child. (I so love that analogy) 4)Don't give ANY warnings (that's right-goes right along with not threatening) 3)Ask yourself, whose problem is this? 1)Keep a happy face on, even when you want to do something else. (like "throw up all over your kids" / It doesn't mean you have to actually BE happy....lol) Anyway....maybe someone out there could make some sense of my bedtime ramblings. Blessings~ C. Lynn |
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