Let's admit it with children it is easy to lose patience. Tantrums, crying, begging ... you're in a hurry and your son puts on a show for you at the supermarket because he wants the toy on duty or he has decided on the worst day you have to get stained up and down. In those moments we can lose patience and do and say things that we later regret. Let's see what are the 6 tricks to not lose patience with children.
The art of patience
Is that the patience is an art that you have to work on. It does not matter if you have patience or not, your children will blow everything up in a matter of seconds and your patience will reach the limit in many moments. Keep the patience becomes a challenge, and sometimes it's easy to explode and make the situation even worse.
The task of education is not an easy thing, and we do not have a manual to teach us what to do. Children are restless, they don't keep up with us, they are unpredictable and easily frustrated. We also have many more obligations to attend to at the same time: work, home and family.
What happens when we lose our patience with children?
- When we lose our patience all we get is make the situation worse. We fill ourselves with tension and shout hurtful things, which do a lot of damage to the children's self-esteem.
- A climate of tension much worse than there was before, and the children, instead of calming down, become more stressed. Not knowing how to manage tension, we become even more stressed, and conflicts are created.
- We are teaching them a bad example of impatient behavior to our children, of what not to do. You already know that children learn a lot by imitation.
- We are not respecting the child's development. Children are children, and they do not understand the rush or rhythm of adults. And it also worsens parent-child relationships by creating a climate of tension and lack of understanding.
All parents want more patience to be able to better lead their family life and set an example of patience, so we leave you some tricks to not lose patience with children and not lose your nerves.
6 Tricks to not lose patience with children
- How many up to 10. It is the best known technique and for a reason it is. If instead of reacting to the emotion, we breathe and count to 10, we make the emotion relax and it is easier for us to react appropriately. It won't take you long either. With practice you will see that you no longer need to reach 10 to relax, you will achieve it much sooner. If you prefer, you can go to another room for a while.
- De-dramatizes. When we minimize things, they are not easier to manage. If we do not arrive on time, then nothing happens, we go with children and it is understandable. We can't control everything. The sense of humor is an excellent tool to dedramatize.
- It is not personal. Children are not there to annoy adults. Children do things all the time to know where the limits are. They will know it over time, they will test your limits like all children.
- Remember that you were one too. Although we forget it easily, we too were children and did the same things. Remember how it would hurt if someone scolded you furiously and you didn't understand what was happening. Practice your empathy and put yourself in their place.
- Ask for help. Many times we are burdened with a thousand responsibilities that only create stress and tension. Learn to ask for help to ease your burden and you are less stressed.
- Encourage them to express their emotions. If we yell we are inhibiting their emotional expression and they withdraw. From the calm it is easier to ask them what is wrong with them and create a climate of trust between you.
Because remember ... try not to react under intense emotion so you don't have to regret it.