| When a baby finds that her signals
are validated and responded to appropriately—that troubles
are soothed and pleasure enhanced—she begins to sense
that her feelings, expressions, of her very being, are of
value and important. A baby learns that she counts for something.
This is the foundation of the development of self-esteem—a
combination of who you are, how you feel about yourself, and
what you think about your future potential.
Self-esteem takes root or withers depending on how you handle
your child’s signals of fun—interest and enjoyment—and
validating and attending to the signals for help—distress,
anger, fear, shame, disgust, and dissmell.
As parents you are the most important people in your baby’s
world. You provide your child with his first definitions of
himself. You tell him through your every word, gesture, and
action just how important he is and how he is perceived by
the outside world.
Over the coming months and years, as your child matures and
becomes an adult, his self-esteem will become a more complex
web of interlocking emotions and thoughts about himself and
about how he sees and is seen by others. It’s common
for growing children and as well as adults to fluctuate between
episodes of high and low self-esteem over the course of months
or years. However, a solid foundation of self-esteem—built
by appropriate responses to a child’s signals and nurtured
throughout childhood—will help most people maintain
a basically optimistic view of their lives and their future
over the course of life’s ups and downs.
Your goal now, with your baby, is to help him develop a sense
of himself that is reasonably solid and stable. As he grows,
that will allow him to perceive his talents and abilities
accurately, respond to life with flexibility, and look at
his goals and capacities realistically.
Of course, the real key is loving the very essence of your
child—loving and valuing the child for himself or herself,
who he or she is. But this is often easier said than done—especially
if the parents have not been loved and valued. Yet, understanding
the nine signals can be useful here too: Much of the child’s
essence is wrapped up in her interests and enjoyments; and
understanding and attending to the negative signals can help
prevent the cycles of frustration, hurt, and anger which can
so contaminate the parent-child relationship and erode the
child’s internal world.
The Foundation of Self-Esteem
From the first days of your baby’s life, you can lay
the foundation for self-esteem by responding appropriately
to your child’s signals for help (distress, anger, etc.)
and fun (interest and enjoyment).
Many experts believe that another important building block
of self-esteem involves a child’s experience of competence.
Competence is initially achieved as a result of the brain’s
capacity to create order out of the disorder of all the incoming
stimuli. An infant’s inherent ability to develop competence
lays the foundation for later, more sophisticated mastery
of interaction with the world and people, which in turn may
produce a sense of self-esteem. One part of this development,
as a child grows, is learning that he is able to exert control
over external events. Another, as he interacts with his environment,
is learning how to adapt in a healthy way to the external
world’s social requirements and expectations.
How to Help Your Child Build Self-Esteem
Focusing Appropriate Attention on the Child.
Babies thrive when they feel they are of genuine interest
to you and are the center of your universe. They use their
nine signals to express their entire range of emotions. When
a baby cries, or fusses, or coos, she expects you to react
with as much enthusiasm or distress as she does about what
is happening to her.
What parents sometimes forget is that to babies those reactions
of distress are proportional to the situation. Not being able
to get a hold of a ball that rolled into a corner is terrible!
And your baby wants you to pay attention to him when he announces
it in no uncertain terms. He finds himself incapable of righting
the situation himself—no matter what he does, he’ll
never be able to reach the ball. Talk about frustration! So
he asks for your help in the only way he can—by making
a scene. If that doesn’t elicit your sympathy and attention,
if you don’t respond and help your baby out of his distress,
he will begin to think that his problems don’t really
matter, how he feels doesn’t count. Instead, if you
take the opportunity to pay attention, validating and confirming
his feelings and perceptions, you will help your child become
confident.
Provide Reward and Praise. Along with paying
attention, reward and praise from you are essential to child’s
self-esteem. You must never forget how much your child wants
to be like you and to be liked by you. Kids need to hear that
you approve of them and think they are wonderful. They long
to see the “gleam in your eye” that signals love
and approval. You can’t assume they know how you feel.
They don’t. They need to be told, over and over and
over. In the long run, reward and praise tend to be better
and healthier motivators than fear and shame. Of course, whenever
you’re dealing with behavior, it is also important to
explain to the child the pros and cons, the reasons and rationales,
for whatever issue is at stake.
Offer Protection. If a child perceives the
world as threatening or dangerous, it is almost impossible
for her to feel brave and strong, to know that she can make
her way through it successfully. But when you respond to your
child’s negative signals of distress and anger by allowing
expression of the signals and then removing the triggers,
you have begun to give her the tools to deal with the world.
When it comes to feeling confident, nothing helps a helpless
baby like knowing she can depend on you to shield her from
danger and distress.
How Self-Esteem is Damaged
Some parents inadvertently diminish their children’s
self-esteem by interfering with or belittling their signals
for interest and enjoyment. This triggers the automatic, built-in
response of shame, and shame erodes self-esteem.
In my clinical practice, I frequently work with families
in which both the parents and children have a variety of troubles
related to a poor sense of self and self-esteem. The adults
in these families often don’t understand how feelings
and emotions work. The family ends up in a toxic situation
because there is a mismatch between the child’s expression
of emotional needs and the parent’s ability to respond
appropriately. Often, then, the children fail to develop a
solid sense of self—who they are, what they like and
don’t like, a confidence in their perceptions and feelings,
and so on. The resulting tension that develops between parent
and child can contribute to the erosion of his self-esteem.
The child may become angry, defensive, intolerant, and inflexible,
or withdrawn, self-destructive, envious, and fearful. In fact,
a whole variety of the less pleasing personality traits can
be directly attributed to a person’s lack of belief
in his own essential worth. Think bully. Think timid. Think
depressed, depleted, and drained. These different qualities
result, in part, from a lack of self-esteem.
The results of these kinds of parenting missteps can be heartbreaking.
But the results of positive parenting are tremendous. You
and your child are able to enjoy one another’s company,
to delight in the deepening of your friendship. You gain access
to the delightfully quirky way the world looks to a child.
You learn as your baby learns. You gain confidence in your
parenting skills; your self-esteem increases. Over time, you
become ever more able to allow your child to grow into a unique,
self-confident being. And because she has a solid sense of
self, she will become capable of forming fulfilling relationships
and of maintaining a healthy autonomy. |
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