| Raising children well | What is the assisting model? "

To put it simply, the supportive parenting method means that caregivers "use the greatest empathy to support children to be who they are, rather than to cater to society's standards or meet adult expectations." This concept is completely different from the parenting concept that has been popular throughout history, because the main axis in the past is that children must sacrifice the needs of natural development to meet the requirements of adults.

The book "Raising Children Well into Great Harmony" mentioned six parenting models that have been popular from ancient times to the present. In addition to the latest "assistant model", the others include the "socialization model" in which most of us are brought up. There is no real basis for respecting the needs of children's physical and mental health and development. With the advancement of the overall awareness of society, most people have abandoned the two popular discipline methods of the "socialization model" in the early stage of corporal punishment and humiliation. We all understand that these are outdated and harmful to children's physical and mental health, so we use praise, Rewarding, encouraging, and teaching are hailed as positive approaches, yet these forms of nurturing are in some cases counter to the healthy development of mind and body.

Pay attention to the state of mind and starting point

What we should pay special attention to is the mentality or starting point behind praise, rewards, encouragement and teaching. Do we want our children to show what we desire in our hearts, or do we want to meet their needs, support them to trust themselves, and do what they want to do? No matter how gentle our praise, rewards, encouragement and teaching are, doing so may negate the children's true self and damage their self-esteem and self-confidence; it may also make children focus on external identification rather than following the passion within oneself.

For example: A father told me that once before his son set out to climb a mountain with his teacher and classmates, he gently said to his son, "Come on! Can you take a photo for me when you reach the summit?" This journey is not easy , When the team reached a certain height, the weather turned bad. The teacher was worried about the safety of the students, so he asked the younger and weaker children to stop there and start the return journey. Only a small number of students were allowed to try to climb to the top faster. When the little boy knew that he couldn't move forward, he was suddenly very sad and cried to death. The teacher later told my father that the child was troubled because he felt that he had not reached the top and was afraid that his father would be sad. At this time, the father realized that such gentle encouragement would also make his son feel great pressure, and it turned out that the son did not enjoy the process and acceptance. own capabilities and achievements.

How does Assist Mode work?

How exactly can we "support our children to be who they are with the greatest empathy, without forcing them to meet our expectations"? First, we must be willing to meet the needs of children's natural development, nourish them, and accept their emotions. When the environment and our own limitations cannot satisfy the children, we should not say that they are inappropriate, blame them, or point out how they should cooperate. We only need to sincerely express our difficulties and feelings with the relevant people, and have enough empathy parents can even express how eager they are to find a solution that satisfies them, and discuss solutions with their children. Doing so will not turn into spoiling the children. Instead, they will sometimes be willing to compromise when they cannot be satisfied because they deeply feel our love, empathy, trust and compassion, and even care about us and others in reverse.

Let's look at another example: young children who are not ready to go to school every day without being separated from their caregivers for a long time may feel abandoned and betrayed. Children with relatively healthy emotional development may continue to cry about this, clearly showing their inner failure to withstand separation and overwhelming emotions. Our usual socialized coping method is to continue to induce children to separate every day, thinking that they will one day accept reality , to cooperate with us, in the process we may need to use up our strength to fight wits and wits with the children, use both soft and hard methods, coerce and lure, hope the children will compromise but want to avoid causing the children too much pain. However, when the child finally stops crying and seems to go to school voluntarily and show happiness, we will feel that the child has adapted, understood, and we are at ease, but have they established the "how can I cry/sad/painful/ It is useless to be sad, no one will help me", the sense of powerlessness of "I am not worthy of love", or the defense mechanism of "calmness and reason are the way to survive", etc. ?

From a support mode perspective, how do we handle this situation? The mentality of the auxiliary mode is to meet the child's natural development needs as much as possible, to accept any emotion and to have a healthy parent-child relationship (that is, both parties find a happy balance). Separate schools gradually, propose feasible plans to selected schools, or delay the start of school, and even ask children's trusted relatives and friends to help them join more flexible co-study groups, etc. And when the child is sad and crying during the process, we may put aside what we were going to do, listen to the child first, hug and comfort her, accompany her to release her emotions, slowly restore calm, and then reflect and make necessary adjustments. In short, as long as we have the mindset of wanting to satisfy and accept our children, stop ignoring the consequences of chronic emotional trauma, and stop clinging to our own inherent frameworks, we will naturally find creative and humane solutions.

Core Elements of Assist Mode

The core elements of the support model include but are not limited to true love, trust, unconditional acceptance, non-judgment, empathy, respect, autonomy, openness, companionship, mutual understanding, expressing true emotions and feelings, creative problem solving, flexibility, diversity, Be grateful, love yourself, etc. Families whose upbringing is based on the support model will surely increase their sense of well-being, and if more people in the society recognize the great benefits of this model for personal and social development, they are willing to invest in learning this method and supporting families with children The emotional needs of the society, the benefits of society in all aspects in the future will make people overjoyed.