The Five Don’ts Of Parenting

We get carried away with the right things to do as a parent that we forget to look at what we need to avoid. Growing up, our parents and the society has taught us some habits of parenting that have stayed with us, and sometimes these habits need to be changed or unlearned.

In this episode, I would like to share some of the Don’ts Of Parenting we need to get rid of, and create habits that are more beneficial to us and our children. Our goal as parents is to empower the leaders of tomorrow, and to do that we need to make changes today.

Praise Effusively

What is praise? Praise is expressing warm approval or admiration. And praising our kids to acknowledge their efforts is a good thing, but too much of it is not. Too much praise might lead to kids’ needing external validation every time, and it might influence them until adulthood. Instead of praising them, acknowledge the efforts and the process. Don’t focus on the child, focus on their characteristics, and focus on the effort they put in.

Stop Criticizing Them For Their Mistakes

When we constantly criticize them for their mistakes, we’re teaching them to not fail. And failures are nothing but feedback to improve or to make them better the next time. It's about not giving up and learning from mistakes. Teach them instead of criticizing them, guide them, support them. 

Don’t Threaten Or Punish

Threatening or punishing is a result of our anger. Therefore what we need to do is to self-regulate and not get carried away with our kids emotions. Instead, we need to support and guide them, to share our calm with them. What we’re teaching them when we threaten or punish them is not to listen to themselves. But what we can do is set healthy boundaries. This way we don’t dismiss their feelings, but we create a healthy compromise. This teaches them that we don’t always get what we want, and that should be okay.

Don’t Tell Them To Stop Crying

Crying is a way to express their emotions, and when we tell them to stop, it means invalidating their feelings, and that we really don’t want to listen to their feelings. Instead, we need to learn to hold space for our children to feel their feelings. We want them to feel every emotion, whether it's happy, sad, mad, or angry. Whatever the emotions are, we want to guide our children to feel their emotions, to navigate on their emotions. Emotional intelligence is very important. When we know better, we do better. And in moments when we feel like we need help, seek help. It’s all about modeling behavior to our children. Showing them how to accept, navigate and handle emotions will teach them to be better individuals.

Giving Too Many Choices All At Once

Giving our kids too many choices confuses them. And since they’re still young, their brains are still developing and don’t have the capacity to really make up their minds. Instead of giving too many options, we should give them at least two options. This makes their brain process things easily, and this builds the muscle for making choices.

Conclusion

Raising the future generation is a huge responsibility, but it’s also rewarding to see them grow to be good people. That is the goal we need to have in mind, and aside from thinking of Do's in parenting, we must also pay close attention to the Don’ts of parenting we need to avoid. Again, our children are the leaders of tomorrow and it is our duty to raise responsible, loving, emotional, and kind individuals.