Have you ever been critical of your children in hope that you will get them to behave the way that you want them to? I saw this in action the other day when a mother was in the shops with her children and she shouted at her son (about 8 years old) saying in a nasty tone, ‘What did you do that for? Can’t you see everyone looking at you, thinking how horrible you are’? The look on the boys face made me feel embarrassed and rather than think he was horrible I felt sorry and upset for him.
Why is it that being critical just seems to be universally accepted within our society? We must all have done it and certainly been on the receiving end of it, yet if people gave some thought as to just how damaging criticism is, I am sure more people would think twice about doing it.
If you want your children to grow up happy confident and well behaved, criticising your child is not the way to go about it. Just think about how it makes you feel when anyone criticises you? I know it never makes me feel like I would like to do better or work harder.
6 reasons not to criticise your children;
1. Being critical of children can lead to long term emotional damage, and can be the cause of phobias, compulsive behaviours, inferiority complexes, nervousness and amongst other things, cause children to be self conscious.
2. Children who are perpetually criticised are more likely to grow up afraid to use their initiative, be self critical, lack ambition and have little confidence in their own abilities and self worth.
3. Being critical is a negative thing to do and all negative thoughts and actions attract negative thoughts and actions back.
4. Being critical will not bring out the best in your children or encourage a loving affectionate relationship, but it is likely to make them feel resentful towards you. Is this what you want?
5. They are likely to grow up critical of others, particularly behind their back and blame others for their mistakes, making them reluctant to learn from their own mistakes.
6. Children may grow up to be extravagant; they may start over spending to try to feel that they have to prove that they are as good as everyone else.
If you feel that your child is behaving in any of the negative ways mentioned above, it is worth checking yourself out to see if you are being too critical of them.
You may find yourself justifying your criticism by saying things such as ‘Yes but he was behaving really badly’, or ‘Well, they were being really nasty’, just try to remember it is always destructive and never encourages long term good behaviour in your children. Using a more positive approach to your children’s behaviour can be hard work at first and you may like some ideas on how to do this. If you understand more about your children s behaviour you are much more likely to help them to feel good about themselves which what most of us want for our children.
Author Resource:
A Child Behaviour Specialist author of A Parents Guide to Children's Behaviour and founder of http://www.childbehaviourdirect.com . I have 30 years of experience of working with children and an honours degree in psychology.
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