Media.. Powered by You
Turning Anger Towards Children Into Empathy
By Moazzam Ahmed
The ability to influence has a direct impact on success in our lives. What deprives us of this key life skill? Anger from anyone in authority while growing up is one. I will try and show what experiences it takes to learn this ability and how anger rids our children of it.
Chris Langan is currently known as the most intelligent man on Earth*. His IQ is 195, 45 points more than Einstein and around 75 more than an average smart person. Yet, Chris is not an executive at a corporation, or a research scientist at NASA. He lives on a simple ranch and writes theories that are not famous and have not been adapted by any Think Tank or University. How could this be? Malcolm Gladwell in his book "Outliers" goes through Chris' early life and implies that Chris had the brains but never learnt the ability to influence, and hence wasn't given chances to progress upward in his career.
Consider another example from Outliers: Several years ago, Korean airways had the largest rate of air accidents. This was attributed by aviation experts to a cultural trait Koreans carry with them: the tradition to not speak up in front of their superiors. To many this tradition may seem demeaning but to Koreans it is a sign of respect. Nevertheless, in a pilot to first-officer relationship, this tradition turned out to be futile because the first officer was not able to communicate dangers he or she saw up ahead from the cockpit, another example of failure from an apparent lack of ability to influence.
So what does it take to learn to influence growing up? First, the ability to take risks and bounce back from failures. Second, to be able to present ideas in front of superiors and third, to be able to calm oneself down in the face of heated or intense emotional confrontations.
Environments in which children are consistently exposed to being scolded or put down by parents or other authority figures instill in them the exact opposite of the above skills needed to learn to influence. They instill in them a fear of authority & a fear of making mistakes at any cost. This then robs them of precious learning experiences on coping with failure, bouncing back from it, and mitigating it in front of their superiors or loved ones, be it their spouse, their parent or their boss.
Imagine yourself in your child’s shoes (little tiny ones): assume that you made a mistake and are being confronted by your parent. You didn’t mean to break the vase or hurt your little sister, but your parent angrily insists that you be did it on purpose, that you can’t do anything right, that you’ve made a grievous mistake that can’t be undone & that you should be punished. If this happened over and over, imagine the affect this would have on you: you would shy from confiding anything in your parent next time, you would start mistrusting yourself and lose confidence, you would promise yourself to never risk playing around the vase or your little sister; worst of all you would dread confrontations at any cost.
Now imagine yourself in the same tiny shoes but this time your parent confronts you with empathy, respect and firmness. They first try to understand what happened and whether you meant to break the vase or hurt your sister. They ask how you felt about the incident, they allow you to express yourself and then ask how you would do things differently the next time. And if they even impose a small punishment on you such as cleaning up the mess or treating your sister to ice cream, you’ll gladly do it because you had a good experience. You will be willing to risk playing even more and best of all, you’ll not be afraid of confrontations.
Consider one last example: there was a comparison done on success between upper middle class and lower income families*. What they found is that both type families gave enough love to the children. Actually, the low income families gave more love. Yet the kids from upper middle class were more successful because of one difference: they were taught from an early age that it was ok for them to ask questions, for example at a doctor’s appointment. On the other hand, the lower income families taught their kids to not rock the boat or respond back to authority (Outliers).
I know it’s hard to keep your calm when children make mistakes and it’s natural for some of us to feel that if we teach them a hard lesson now it’s for their own good. If we keep in mind the long term effects of our anger on them, I’m sure we’ll have fewer outbursts of anger and more conversations in which we engage with our children with respect and dignity. This is especially crucial for mothers and teachers who spend a lot of time with children; constant nagging or condescending remarks can cause long lasting damage even though they seem casual and just in-passing. Of course, the effects of harsh reprimands by an authoritarian father can be even more damaging.
The Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) was an excellent example of this. He always treated children with respect and never reprimanded by scolding them. His firm yet empathic way toward children nurtured and built confidence and kindness in them. I would also like to remind all of us that numerous scholars have said that hitting anyone, let alone a child is haram. We all know the numerous ahadith on anger, InshaAllah let’s all aspire to turn our anger towards children into empathy.
Further Reading
Following are some excellent books on raising children who grow up to be successful, kind, empathic people. These discuss concepts such as resilience, influence, secure attachment & unconditional love.
1. “Raising Emotionally Intelligent Children” – John Gottman (read about secure attachment)
2. Nurturing Resilience in Children - Robert Brooks (Author), Sam Goldstein
3. The Resilience factor - Karen Reivich and Andrew Shatte (This is an excellent book for those of us who recognize that they grew up with anger around the house and struggle with the above abilities)
4. *Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell
-----------------------
Moazzam Ahmed is the founder of Muslim Calendar and lives in Seattle, WA.
The ability to influence has a direct impact on success in our lives. What deprives us of this key life skill? Anger from anyone in authority while growing up is one. I will try and show what experiences it takes to learn this ability and how anger rids our children of it.
Chris Langan is currently known as the most intelligent man on Earth*. His IQ is 195, 45 points more than Einstein and around 75 more than an average smart person. Yet, Chris is not an executive at a corporation, or a research scientist at NASA. He lives on a simple ranch and writes theories that are not famous and have not been adapted by any Think Tank or University. How could this be? Malcolm Gladwell in his book "Outliers" goes through Chris' early life and implies that Chris had the brains but never learnt the ability to influence, and hence wasn't given chances to progress upward in his career.
Consider another example from Outliers: Several years ago, Korean airways had the largest rate of air accidents. This was attributed by aviation experts to a cultural trait Koreans carry with them: the tradition to not speak up in front of their superiors. To many this tradition may seem demeaning but to Koreans it is a sign of respect. Nevertheless, in a pilot to first-officer relationship, this tradition turned out to be futile because the first officer was not able to communicate dangers he or she saw up ahead from the cockpit, another example of failure from an apparent lack of ability to influence.
So what does it take to learn to influence growing up? First, the ability to take risks and bounce back from failures. Second, to be able to present ideas in front of superiors and third, to be able to calm oneself down in the face of heated or intense emotional confrontations.
Environments in which children are consistently exposed to being scolded or put down by parents or other authority figures instill in them the exact opposite of the above skills needed to learn to influence. They instill in them a fear of authority & a fear of making mistakes at any cost. This then robs them of precious learning experiences on coping with failure, bouncing back from it, and mitigating it in front of their superiors or loved ones, be it their spouse, their parent or their boss.
Imagine yourself in your child’s shoes (little tiny ones): assume that you made a mistake and are being confronted by your parent. You didn’t mean to break the vase or hurt your little sister, but your parent angrily insists that you be did it on purpose, that you can’t do anything right, that you’ve made a grievous mistake that can’t be undone & that you should be punished. If this happened over and over, imagine the affect this would have on you: you would shy from confiding anything in your parent next time, you would start mistrusting yourself and lose confidence, you would promise yourself to never risk playing around the vase or your little sister; worst of all you would dread confrontations at any cost.
Now imagine yourself in the same tiny shoes but this time your parent confronts you with empathy, respect and firmness. They first try to understand what happened and whether you meant to break the vase or hurt your sister. They ask how you felt about the incident, they allow you to express yourself and then ask how you would do things differently the next time. And if they even impose a small punishment on you such as cleaning up the mess or treating your sister to ice cream, you’ll gladly do it because you had a good experience. You will be willing to risk playing even more and best of all, you’ll not be afraid of confrontations.
Consider one last example: there was a comparison done on success between upper middle class and lower income families*. What they found is that both type families gave enough love to the children. Actually, the low income families gave more love. Yet the kids from upper middle class were more successful because of one difference: they were taught from an early age that it was ok for them to ask questions, for example at a doctor’s appointment. On the other hand, the lower income families taught their kids to not rock the boat or respond back to authority (Outliers).
I know it’s hard to keep your calm when children make mistakes and it’s natural for some of us to feel that if we teach them a hard lesson now it’s for their own good. If we keep in mind the long term effects of our anger on them, I’m sure we’ll have fewer outbursts of anger and more conversations in which we engage with our children with respect and dignity. This is especially crucial for mothers and teachers who spend a lot of time with children; constant nagging or condescending remarks can cause long lasting damage even though they seem casual and just in-passing. Of course, the effects of harsh reprimands by an authoritarian father can be even more damaging.
The Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) was an excellent example of this. He always treated children with respect and never reprimanded by scolding them. His firm yet empathic way toward children nurtured and built confidence and kindness in them. I would also like to remind all of us that numerous scholars have said that hitting anyone, let alone a child is haram. We all know the numerous ahadith on anger, InshaAllah let’s all aspire to turn our anger towards children into empathy.
Further Reading
Following are some excellent books on raising children who grow up to be successful, kind, empathic people. These discuss concepts such as resilience, influence, secure attachment & unconditional love.
1. “Raising Emotionally Intelligent Children” – John Gottman (read about secure attachment)
2. Nurturing Resilience in Children - Robert Brooks (Author), Sam Goldstein
3. The Resilience factor - Karen Reivich and Andrew Shatte (This is an excellent book for those of us who recognize that they grew up with anger around the house and struggle with the above abilities)
4. *Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell
-----------------------
Moazzam Ahmed is the founder of Muslim Calendar and lives in Seattle, WA.
Categories: Family
Comment
ADVERTISEMENT
Featured Ad Spot
How About That?
© 2010 Created by Melanz, LLC.
You need to be a member of myCrescent to add comments!
Join myCrescent