Raising Kids with Emotional Maturity
Dr. Chandana D. Karathully
Emotional Intelligence is a key factor in understanding oneself and forming successful relationships. It was Daniel Goleman who popularized the concept of emotional intelligence, which is the ability to understand, use, manage and communicate our own emotions and understand, and empathize with the emotions of those around us. It helps us in effective communication, resolving conflicts and overcoming challenges. It is a set of skills, including self awareness, self regulation, empathy and managing relationships etc. An emotionally intelligent individual will be highly conscious of our own emotional states, positive or negative, and even subtle changes in them. Such people can understand the emotional states of those around them; their sensitivity to emotional signals will help them regulate their interpersonal relationships. Not everyone is blessed with emotional maturity, certain people are masters in managing self, but others might be wearing their hearts on their sleeves. But those who just suppress their emotions, and just pretend that everything is okay around them might not be resolving their emotions successfully, they might be successful in letting others think that they are okay, but they will not be able to tolerate conversations that might trigger their emotions.
Emotionally intelligent people will be emotionally mature. When someone is lacking the emotional maturity, it will be hard to hold a conversation with them. Their reactions will lead to a breakdown in communication and lead to difficulties in relationships. Instead of blaming someone else for their behavior, emotionally mature people take accountability for their actions and act accordingly. Emotional maturity helps people regulate their own behavior so that their actions won’t be hurting others. We may call behaviors that might stem from emotional immaturity ‘childish’, yet we are so unaware of the fact that children are emotionally immature. We may shout at them for having tantrums, we may get angry at them for getting angry at trivial things, we may be annoyed at them for crying for even more trivial things and we may even punish them for putting us in difficult positions with their huge emotions. But are they really supposed to be emotionally mature so that our life would be perfect? Of course not, that’s why they are called children, not tiny humans. We adults are supposed to be emotionally mature and are not expected to act out on silly emotions, but we do act out, we do have silly emotions, and we may be light years away from emotional maturity. But we seek the highest level of maturity possible from our little ones. Isn’t it a little bit too much to ask from them?
Just like adults, emotional maturity is very important to a child too. Children who are not emotionally mature act out on their negative emotions, they may get angry, they may yell, they may get into fights with others, they may even throw things at you. That doesn’t mean that they can’t be taught to act more maturely. Of course, emotional expressions and intelligence have a genetic basis, most of the personality factors are part of the nature of the child called temperaments, but the personality traits are also dependent on the psychosocial factors of an individual. That means the environment that a child is raised in, the parenting strategies that their parents may have used consistently, the messages that they had received from their homes and schools play an important role in the development of emotional maturity. Most of the behaviors are learnt during childhood. Children learn how to regulate their emotions from their parents and loved ones. A parent who is emotionally mature, who can efficiently empathize with the kid and can deal with their own emotions and their kid’s emotions too can be a great role model for the child. They can learn how to manage their own emotions, and how to effectively communicate their emotions from their parents. But how can a child learn emotional maturity from an emotionally immature parent? A parent who is frustrated most of the time, who is unpredictable in respect of emotional expression, who yells at the kid for silly matters, who reacts with too much of anxiety, is not a great role model for demonstrating skills for emotional maturity. Hence, it is completely necessary for a child to have a parent who can demonstrate emotional maturity for the child to be emotionally mature. An emotionally mature parent will never yell or punish a child just to release their own negative emotions. They will never expect their child to act more maturely, so that they can lead a stress free life. They will help their child to navigate through their own emotions, without being bothered by the thought that ‘what might happen if I hurt my parent’s feelings?’. They will always look out for their children, will give priority for their children’s feelings, will regulate their own emotions without hurting their child’s emotions and thus give their children the space to discuss anything without insecurity and without hurting others. Children from such households can freely express their emotions while keeping them within boundaries; can learn to be assertive without hurting others and can take decisions without worrying about ‘what their parents might think’.
Raising kids with emotional maturity also means to deal with the negative emotions of the child more effectively. Children are supposed to be having negative emotions, they don’t need to suppress it all the time, they need to freely communicate and express their emotions in a healthy way. A parent should be able to empathize with the child when he or she is trying to communicate something with them. Instead of shouting at them and yelling them not to ‘feel’ this way, the parent needs to listen to the child with patience, let him or her let out what’s bothering them, and communicate empathy that ‘I too would have felt the same way’. They need their parents to acknowledge their agony, so that they can accept it themselves and move on. If we persist on denying the negative feelings of the child, the negative feeling will persist and that will be targeted against us. Instead we need to stay through with their emotions, help them name what they are feeling right now and help them see more carefully what’s actually going on. Only then, they could resolve the negative feeling and take appropriate action.
That’s why it has been said that a child who is out of control needs a parent who is calm and in control of his or her negative emotions. Easily said than done, right??