Three Ways to Cultivate Emotionally and Socially Intelligent Kids.

The ability to think, reason, and make rational decisions decreases.  And our emotional grounded-ness goes right out the window. Add all this to a small child with big feelings, and you’ve got the recipe for an emotional firestorm – or as we parents know it, a tantrum of colossal proportions.

Emotional intelligence gives us the ability to respond rather than to react. And in order to teach this life-long skill to our kids, we need to first put it into practice ourselves. Step one for us as parents, is learning to cultivate self-awareness, or learning to recognize when we are REACTING unconsciously, rather than consciously RESPONDING. When we are able to make this differentiation, we then have the ability to CHOOSE what we do next – continue to react, or regroup and respond from a place of awareness. That is emotional intelligence! And if we can teach it to our kids, we are setting them up for a lifetime of benefits.

Learn more about the smartphone app ” My Light Shines Bright” created by Deepak and the Chopra Center to help kids developing their social and emotional learning skills.

Children with higher emotional intelligence:

• Have less anxiety and depression

• Are more attentive and less hyperactive

• Do better academically

• Tend to have greater leadership skills

• Likely to have quality relationships with others

• Are less aggressive and less likely to bully others

• Are less likely to abuse drugs, alcohol, and cigarettes

Here are 3 Ways to Build Emotional and Social Intelligence in Your Children:

1. Express Emotions

“If you can name it, you can tame it.”

• Marc Brackett, Ph.D.

Director, Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence

Expressing emotions thoughtfully requires us to first be aware that we are having them in the first place. As an adult, think about how overwhelming your emotions can feel in the throws of an argument with a partner, or how sad you may have felt at the loss of a pet, or the anxiety you may have felt preparing for a job interview. Now imagine how big those feelings of anger, sadness, or anxiety might feel to a child who lacks the life experience or emotional maturity to deal with them.

One of the best things we can do for a small child dealing with big feelings is to give her a vocabulary of words to help describe her feelings. Invite your child to share her feelings with you. Give her words like: “I’m feeling sad,” or “When this happens, I feel…,” or “I don’t like when…”.

As adults, we can model this behavior for our children by using those words ourselves to express when we are frustrated, impatient, annoyed, and even overwhelmed. We can invite children to share their feelings with us. And happy emotions count too – surprise, excitement, and joy are wonderful to share. Create a safe, non-judgmental space, and enjoy the authentic connection that will come from sharing feelings with one another.

2. Actively Listen

Have you ever found yourself only half-listening to your child–responding with comments such as “hmmm…” or “really?” while silently continuing your own train of thought?  It’s understandable. Listening takes energy, intention, and attention. However, when we listen deeply to another person, we are communicating “I hear you and I care.”

Active listening requires you to be fully present with another person, so that you can understand what he/she is thinking and feeling. When a child shares something with you, help keep the door of communication open with comments that reflect empathy, compassion, and support:

• I’m really interested…tell me more…

• Wow!What was that like for you?

• That must have been…(hard, easy, fun, exciting, etc.)

• I’m wondering if you might be feeling…(sad, lonely, hurt, angry, etc.)

You can foster active listening with eye contact, acknowledging comments, and questions that reflect curiosity and interest. Teach your children how to actively listen to others too and notice the increased sharing, kindness and caring that results!

3. Engage in perspective-taking

You might be wondering what perspective-taking has to do with emotional intelligence. Well, most of us approach our daily lives from our personal, or egocentric perspective, thinking about how this or that is affecting us. However, cultivating the ability to experience or imagine another person’s perspective—or an allocentric perspective, broadens our thinking, builds empathy and compassion, and reduces hurtful behavior towards others. 

To help cultivate this skill in your child, consider some easy topics for practice. For example, while reading a story or watching a movie together, talk with your child about the characters. Explore how different characters might have been feeling, as well as what might have contributed to any conflict the characters had in the story:

• I wonder how (character) might have been feeling when x happened. I was thinking he might have felt sad because…What do you think he was feeling?

• Gee, I was really surprised by ….. or  I wonder what might have caused (character) to act that way.

• What do you think might have been a good way to solve the disagreement they were having?

• If you were in the same situation, how would you have wanted (character) to have treated you?  What would you have wanted him/her to say?

With older children, try perspective-taking with news events. You could explore an issue from several sides. Issues such as immigration, global warming, health care, oil drilling, and animal rights can all be explored from multiple perspectives—with an attitude of curiosity and inquiry. Together, you can build cultural perspectives, appreciation and respect for others, and heighten awareness of inequities and mistreatment. As children try on the perspectives of others, they often can become more flexible in their thinking and less rigid in their positions.  They can come to be more accepting and tolerant of others AND themselves.

We know that emotional intelligence is a path to self-esteem, loving and harmonious relationships, responsible decision-making, success in the workplace, and overall wellbeing.

As Daniel Goleman, author of Emotional Intelligence and Social Intelligence, states:

“If your emotional abilities aren’t in hand, if you don’t have self-awareness, if you aren’t able to manage your distressing emotions, if you can’t have empathy and effective relationships, then no matter how smart you are, you are not going to get very far.”

By learning to express emotions, listen actively, and take multiple perspectives, your child will develop more positive, caring, respectful relationships with others, resolve conflicts more easily, and become less stressed and more confident and optimistic. When we cultivate social and emotional intelligence in our children, we are fostering healthier, kinder communities and, ultimately, a more peaceful world.