More Supportive Parenting Skills

Children have blackboards...

• “It is like they are standing in front of you holding up their personal blackboard saying write on it what you think of me...write on it what you want me to think of myself. This is so powerful. You, as parents, from the minute they are born, begin to write message about them on their personal blackboard. There are intentional and unintentional messages written there.”

Making connections with your children behind walls

• Listening is love
• Love has a tremendous power to pull down invisible walls
• Look over the wall and hear the cry: listen for what they really need, my friend’s problem could be there own
• Find the loose brick: show interest in their interests
• Dismantle the wall: effective communication- love, trust, and respect
• Love: constant, given first, given freely, regardless of their choices
• Trust: have to trust, compliment
• Respect: “The quality of our communication with our children will improve in direct proportion to the amount of respect we show them when we talk together.”

The art of emotion coaching:

• Helping children understand the different emotions they experience, why they occur, and how to handle them
• Comforting them, listening and understanding their thoughts and feelings, and helping them understand themselves
• Help children feel loved, supported, respected and valued

1. Understand how you deal with feelings
• Their child’s feelings are important.
• Their child’s feelings and wishes are okay, even if their actions aren’t.
• Experiencing negative emotions, such as sadness, anger or fear, is important. 
• Negative feelings are a chance for parents and children to grow closer.
• Understanding what causes their child’s feelings is important.
• Negative feelings are an opportunity for problem-solving
2. Believe that your child’s negative emotions are an opportunity for closeness and teaching
• a child’s negative feelings are more likely to go away when children talk about them, label them, and feel understood and feel closer to parents
• once you feel understood, you are more willing to take guidance
3. Listen with empathy and understanding, then validate your child’s feelings
• Share simple observations
• Avoid questions you already know the answer to
• Share examples from your own life
4. Label your child’s emotions
• help your child transform a scary, uncomfortable feeling into something identifiable and normal
• has a soothing effect on the nervous system
5. Set limits while exploring possible solutions to the problem that caused the negative emotion
• Set limits
• Identify goals
• Think of possible solutions
• Evaluate the proposed solutions based on family values
• Help your child choose a solution

Supportive Parenting Skills

Favorite quotes:

• "We should remember that saying 'I love you' is only a beginning. We need to say it, we need to mean it, and most importantly we need consistently to show it. We need to both express and demonstrate love." - Elder Bednar
• "Feeling the security and constancy of love from a spouse, a parent, or a child is a rich blessing. Such love nurtures and sustains faith in God. Such love is a source of strength and casts out fear. Such love is the desire of every human soul." - Elder Bednar
• "When the Lord created parents, he created something breathtakingly close to what he is. We who have borne children innately know that this is the highest of callings, the holiest of assignments." - Sister Holland
• "Parenting has almost nothing to do with training. It has everything to do with your heart." - Sister Holland
• "But it helps us to always remember that these are God’s children as well as ours. And above all, it should give us a perfect brightness of hope to know that when we need help we can go through the veil to get it." - Sister Holland

Loving our Children:

• Spoiling is giving your child things in place of love
• Best adjusted children have the highest levels of parental love
• Children need to be physically touched through appropriate affection
• Praise your children's accomplishments but let them know your love for them is not based on their success
• Home should be a safe haven for children where they can feel relaxed, safe, and secure in a happy, loving environment.
• Children need rhythm and routines in their lives

Being involved in your Child's life:

• Quality time is giving your child your undivided attention, having your mind in the moment with your child, not focusing on something else.
• Take interest in your child's interests
• Be involved in your child's school and other activities

Philemon & 1st Timothy

1st Timothy 4:12

• Scripture: “Let no man despise thy youth; but be thou an example of the believers, in word, in conversation, in charity, in spirit, in faith, in purity.”
• Principle: If we are to be an example of the believers, then we need to show it in word, conversation, charity, spirit, faith, and purity.

I really love this scripture. It was the mutual or young women’s theme one year when I was a youth and I loved it ever since. I looked up this scripture on lds.org and I didn’t look through all the talks, but it is one that is quoted very often in general conference. Just for curiosity sake I found 5 talks from President Monson that the title includes the phrase “be thou and example” or something very close to that. I also found 11 more talks that he quotes this verse of scripture in. I also found 3 talks that President Hinckley quoted this scripture in, 2 talks with the “Be Thou and Example of the Believers,” and many other conference talks that quoted this scripture. I really liked these quotes from President Monson when speaking about this verse. He says, “We need not wait for a cataclysmic event, a dramatic occurrence in the world in which we live, or a special invitation to be an example—even a model to follow. Our opportunities lie before us here and now. But they are perishable. Likely they will be found in our own homes and in the everyday actions of our lives. Our Lord and Master marked the way: ‘[He] went about doing good.’ (Acts 10:38.) He in very deed was a model to follow—even an example of the believers. Are we?” In another talk he says, “I share a three-part formula to serve as an unfailing guide to meet this challenge issued by the Apostle Paul: 1. Fill your mind with truth; 2. Fill your heart with love; 3. Fill your life with service.” I know that as we follow this counsel from the prophet, we can become better examples of the believers!

Philemon 1:8 

• Scripture: "If he hath wronged thee, or oweth thee ought, put that on mine account" 
• Principle: If we have been wronged, then we can place that burden on the Savior. 

I know that this is easier said than done, but I believe it is in large measure why the atonement is in place. The atonement is such as much for the sinner as it is the one that was sinned against, or hurt. Sometimes through no fault of our own we are hurt, it is only through the atonement of our Savior Jesus Christ that we can let that go and move on. If we don't, we might just end up punishing ourselves. I feel like this might be a portion of what was trying to be taught here, that many times we are not strong enough, or we do not have the capacity to forgive on our own, but if we allow the Savior to help, he can make up the difference, he is the difference.