Parenting – Raising Optimistic Children
As a parent, you want your child to be Happy & Successful. Even when going through difficult times you want your child to remain positive and optimistic and face the challenges life throws at them knowing that ups and downs are part of life.
Children who are optimistic can look at the bright side of life even when things are not going their way and therefore will be happier than the children who are pessimistic.
How do children learn to be Optimistic or Pessimistic?
Recent studies have shown that optimism is 50% inherited from genes, 40% determined by the individuals and the way in which they decide to live their lives and 10% by others (i.e. the environment in which they grow up).
So, it is partly Nature and also partly Nurture. The good news is that one can act individually on their level of optimism by working on that 40%.
Parents are the first teachers and the children pick up a lot of things just by observing people around them.
This means that as parent you can guide your pessimistic child towards positive thoughts and actions.
The best way to approach this as a parent is to understand that if your child is currently behaving in a pessimistic way, it could be genetic. It’s not that they’re trying to be negative or misbehave. They can’t help it until they learn ways to turn their thoughts around and see things in a new way.
Pessimism does not have to be a permanent feature of a child’s personality, whether they have the gene or not. However, if it is genetic, it might be the chief characteristic of their personality until they learn how to be more optimistic. Even then, it might be something they struggle with, but having the tools will make a big difference in their life. Children can learn to be more positive, and you can lead the way. It’ll be a good lesson for them and will help them throughout their life, allowing them to live a happier life overall.
Parents need to be a good a Role Model
Like most good parenting, modeling the behavior you want to see in your children works better than telling them not to do the behavior that you don’t want to see. Children need clear examples of how to act in all sorts of situations, and they learn from you first.
Kids Copy Everything
Everything – from how you hold your fork, to the types of food you like, to how optimistic you are about the things happening to you each day – are things kids pick up on and emulate. Even if they don’t fully understand it, they love to copy what you are doing.
Think about how a two or three-year-old will say “thank you” and “please” and other words that you also use when you are dealing with others. Or how a four-year-old will pat the back of an injured playmate just like their mom or dad does for them. Think of some things your child started doing just by watching others around them. That proves that being a role model is crucial for raising an optimistic child.
Modeling Starts Young
Raising a child who is optimistic starts from the age that they begin observing the behavior of people around them and copying it. You probably only notice it when they do something embarrassing in public, but not so much when they’re not being embarrassing.
But don’t worry; even if you’ve not done a great job of modeling the behavior you value in the past, it’s okay. And even if you’re not the most optimistic person yourself, both of you can learn to be more optimistic together. But you must start with yourself first because your child looks to you for the example of how to be human.
Know How Your Behavior Impacts Your Child
To be a role model for your child, it’s important to realize how your actions affect them and how important it is, so that you can eliminate your own misdirection and bad habits before working on theirs. Good role models know that they are role models and that the children are watching and copying their every move. As a parent, you’re automatically a role model. You’re the main role model.
As the primary role model for your child, whether you want to be or not, it’s imperative that you realize that this is how your child learns to live a meaningful life, live with honor, integrity, honestly and hope for the future. Your life is the example they will look at to inform their own behavior and life.
Role Models Sometimes Make Mistakes
Even as a role model, you will sometimes make mistakes. However, this is another opportunity for you to become a great role model for your child by demonstrating how you handle making a mistake.
Parents who own up to their mistakes, tell their family and children they are sorry, and seek to make amends for the damage the error caused, are teaching their children valuable lessons that cannot be taught in any other way effectively.
As a parent who recognizes the impact your behavior has on your children right now, you know the unique power you possess to help your child live a happier and more fulfilled life.
Study after study shows that people who are more optimistic report being happier. And if you can improve your child’s outlook on life so that they are more satisfied by merely modeling optimism over pessimism to them, why wouldn’t you do it? It really does make a huge difference.
Things You Can Do to Raise an Optimistic Child
While nature sometimes wins out, when it comes to nature versus nurture for raising an optimistic child, you still have some power over the situation due to the fact that children respond so well to parent-modeled behavior and input from their parents and other adults in their lives. There are many ways to raise an optimistic child, and if not outright optimistic, at least able to see the good and enjoy the good in life.
Parenting is to Listen More without Judgement
When your child talks to you about their problems, always take the things that they say seriously. Don’t downgrade your child’s emotions in order to teach them optimism. Children have disappointments in life too just as you do. The feelings they feel are just as powerful as yours.
Parenting and Showing Your Feelings
Being optimistic is not about having no feelings that are viewed by others as unfavorable. It’s about having those feelings but being able to see the bright side anyway. For example, if you’re on vacation at the beach but every single day you wake up it’s raining, all day, every day, it’s okay to be upset that this is happening.
But you don’t want to stay there in that negativity. It’s raining, and that is disappointing, but it’s not the end of the world. An optimistic person will find something else to do than what they planned and be happy about that, even while expressing some disappointment about the rain.
Give Affection
Children who receive more affection – including pats on the head, hugs, back rubs, genuine smiles and so forth, tend to be happier and more optimistic. Being ready always with open arms, a smile, a kiss, and a hug goes a long way to help alleviate negative feelings from the outside world. Believe, this is the most important aspect of parenting.
Role Model Positivity
When you are living your life, both bad things and good things will happen to you. Show your child how to react positively by your behavior when things happen. This isn’t to say that if something bad happens, you should always act positively. It’s okay to have feelings. But if it’s raining and you wanted to go outside and play frisbee, that’s not really a good reason to have a meltdown. Instead, you can be thankful for the rain and find something else better to do today.
Praise Your Child for Success
When your child experiences even small successes, find ways to praise them. For example, if they try out for track team but don’t make it, it’s still worth it to celebrate trying.
Do Not Punish Failure
A hard-won D on a test is still better than getting a D or F when you did not even try. Not trying is not a good thing at all, but trying and failing is not hopeless. If you studied hard but you still didn’t do as well as you wanted to, it’s not the end of the world. You can pass this type of attitude on to your children through your own example of trying and failing.
Be Patient When Teaching Life Skills
Another way of parenting you can be an excellent demonstration of optimism to your child is to be very patient when you are teaching them ordinary everyday life skills like potty training, tying their shoes, keeping their area clean, organizing and studying and so forth. No one knows how to do anything until their mom or dad, or someone teaches them, and it’s okay not to get it right away.
Give Your Child the Freedom to Play
Don’t schedule every single moment of your child’s life. It’s actually crucial for brain development for your child to get bored. Boredom can lead to creativity. Plus, playing is fun, boosts the immune system, helps release feel-good hormones, and leads to more positivity about life.
Keep Reality Age-Appropriate
While you don’t want to hide everything from your child, you do want them to learn about most of life before they go out on their own. However, you want to try to keep reality age-appropriate. Your four-year-old doesn’t really need to know about bombs in other countries, children starving, or that classrooms get shot up sometimes. While these things are facts of life, let your child lead the discussions and ask questions so that you don’t put more on them than they can handle.
Avoid Using Food as Comfort
It’s very tempting to bribe kids with food for things like potty training and so forth, but it leads to a very unhealthy relationship with food. Instead of teaching them to comfort themselves with food, teach them other methods such as meditation, yoga, and positive affirmations.
Accept That Children Have Problems Too
Just because your child is a child doesn’t mean they have it easy and have no problems. It’s tough being a child sometimes. A real challenge in parenting is that you’re not used to feeling strong emotions, and life can be confusing. When your child expresses feelings, don’t cut them down and act like kids don’t have problems and real feelings. They do. Show them that it’s normal.
Point Out the Good in Every Situation
When something is not going well, take the time to start pointing out the good things. To use the earlier example, if you are at the beach and it’s raining every day of your vacation, point out the awesome movies you’re getting to see, or the indoor games you’re playing that you don’t normally do, and other aspects of the trip that are still awesome.
Provide Many Happy Events and Occasions for Your Child
Finally, ensure that you provide many happy experiences for your child as part of your family life. Be happy at dinner, in the morning, and during events, and laugh about things when they don’t go exactly as planned. Because remember, it’s not really about everything being perfect. It’s about being optimistic despite things not being perfect. That ability ensures that your child will live a much happier life than someone who cannot do that.
The main point is that every part of your day is a chance to demonstrate positive and optimistic behavior and thoughts to your child. That’s how you teach them. You show them the example, and they will soak it up like a sponge and repeat it.
