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Authority Without Conflict: Decryption
Between anger, whims or even rivalry between children, we often do not know where to turn. You often feel like you are no longer in control. Rest assured, nothing is irreversible. There are a few things you can do if you adopt a few principles that will certainly make your family life a little more harmonious.
Teach him serenity
Your child is speedy, capricious, grumpy and you can no longer calm the game. Let him enter your bubble of serenity. Light a candle, sit across from each other, place the candle between the two of you, and have him talk as much about his experience as possible. What happened ? What did he feel? Is he angry? Sad ? How can we make it right? A Zen parent can tell their child that he, too, has experienced these kinds of difficulties. Explain that these are normal life experiences, that anger and screaming are never the best solutions to problems, that violence always leads to disaster. If nights are a problem, don’t blame him, help him. Children tell with their bodies their refusal to fall asleep and through their nightmares all the emotions and apprehensions that they cannot put into words. To calm your little one’s anxiety, take a quarter of an hour every night at the same time, which you will call “the bubble of calm”. Make yourself or both his father sit in his room, him sitting in his bed, and you next to him on the floor. Teach him to relax. Ask her to relax her whole body (“Make yourself soft like a deflated balloon”), then close her eyes, breathe in gently and deeply through her nose, and breathe out through her mouth. Ten times. It is about teaching him to release all the tensions of his body and to calm down by breathing. Explain to him that at the same age you had the same nightmares and that the fears pass with age, when you grow up.
Adapt to his notion of time
Every time you ask him to do something, it’s systematic, he replies: “Wait, not right away, just now …” Obviously, that annoys you, you can already imagine the delay that his procrastination and procrastination will cause! The Zen solution is to take care of the only time that we are masters of, that is to say: the present. For children, only the present moment exists. When you tell him: if you don’t hurry, we’ll be late, your child won’t understand you. Instead, give him a precise schedule of the timing you have planned: time to wake up, time to get dressed, time for breakfast, time to play, time to bathe… Show him on the alarm clock the exact duration available and if it’s very small, use a timer: “There you go, when it rings, you get dressed, I’m counting on you.” “
Accept your child as he is
Like all parents, you would like your child to be more obedient, or on the contrary more assertive, less timid or on the contrary less daredevil, more autonomous or on the contrary more cuddly, in short, he is never as you would like him to be. it either. And that’s good. Your role is to help him be himself. If he is “the baby” do not push him to grow too fast, by regressing your child “says” that he is on the threshold of a new stage of growth, that he will give up what he knows to plunge into the unknown, hence his fears and his regression to secure himself. If he is afraid of others at school, tell him about your own fears at the same age and how you overcame and overcome them. Your experiences, your lived examples will help him to face the difficulties.
Be firm
You prepare an excellent aubergine gratin, but he only wants to eat shellfish. Being a Zen parent does not mean letting your little treasure do anything and everything just because they are free. A child is like a pupil, he must experiment but within a defined framework. OK for the shellfish diet every day for a week but then we resume the tour with the parents’ menu. Explain to him that when he grows up he will be able to eat what he wants but that in the meantime he is a child who does not know what is good for his health and that is precisely why he has parents !
Don’t impose a ministerial schedule on him
This weekend, you have lots of fun planned, but your child doesn’t want to go out. It may happen that, just like you, your child wants to “cocoon”, to stay quiet at home, not to have to “do” something … Maybe he is tired? If it’s not a repetitive situation, you can suggest watching a video with your family, and then taking a leisurely stroll to breathe and exercise a bit. Your mission is to make your child understand why the walk is pleasant and essential. In Zen philosophy, walking is considered the most important activity to calm the body and mind, to drive away dark thoughts …