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As parents, we aren’t really taught how to bond with our kids. Many of us are just repeating what we learned ourselves growing up. The problem with this though, a lot of us grew up in broken homes so, we’re effectively recycling our own traumas onto our children. We sometimes do this without us even knowing.
Now, when I say bonding with your children, I mean nurturing their interests and pushing them toward their own autonomy. This includes engaging in the things that they enjoy while allowing them to have their own input on it. When my mom and I would bond, would we do so through our own mutual interest? But I would also encourage parents to bond with their children through their children’s interests, and their children’s interests only. Bonding with our children only when we have mutual interest could signal to a child that they should always conform to other people’s wishes if they want to bond with them. As parents, it’s our responsibility to nurture our children’s interests. We learn so much about them when we take the time out to actually listen to them and bond with them.
So, how do we do it? Here’s a list of 3 ways that you as a parent can effectively bond with your child/children. This is not an exhaustive list. However, I do feel that these are the most important aspects to adhere to when it comes to raising emotionally mature children.
- Ask Open Ended Questions to Create Dialogue
Have you ever thought about the way that you converse with your child? This doesn’t have to be convoluted, a good rule of thumb to get a conversation going is to ask open-ended questions. Don’t just ask your child mundane questions such as “How was your day?” They are children, they are only going to answer with a very short answer. A better way to bond and get a conversation going would be to ask them something that holds a little more sustenance. Something that makes them think; Something that makes them confront their emotions. Instead of asking them how was your day, maybe rephrase the question and ask them something like:
“How did you feel about your day today?”
“What made you happy today?”
“What made you sad?”
Ask questions that will evoke an emotional response. This teaches your child how to effectively communicate, label, and identify their emotions so that they can build healthy interpersonal relationships.
2. When You Notice a Certain Interest in Your Child; Nurture It.
As an adult, the hobbies that we neglect now are just the hobbies that we had as children that were never nurtured. To our parents, the interest may have either been stupid, childish (well duh), or just not worthy of their attention. That’s no slight to you either, they were just clearly busy with their own interest and issues that they had no time to address. They probably never noticed it until you started to withdraw from your usual activities. Even then though, many incoherent parents still wouldn’t have noticed.
It’s important to nurture your child’s interest. When we are engaged in the things that our children actually enjoy, it signals to them that it is safe to engage there. It allows them to fully submerge themselves into their own autonomy so that they do not subjugate themselves to things that they don’t actually enjoy.
3. Allow them to practice their autonomy.
In my opinion, micromanaging your child is the most singlehanded way to ruin their autonomy and sense of self. If we never allow our children to make their own decisions and reap the benefits and/or consequences of the said decision. Then it will be tough for them to make decisions and trust themselves when they become adults. When we allow our children to be themselves and to explore their own autonomy. It signals to them that it is safe to be themselves in a world that pushes you to be everything else. When parents allow children to make their own decisions, it empowers them. We all need to feel in control at some point in our lives. Children aren’t robots. They are perfectly adept at crafting a personality of their own. Here are some ways that you can help them nurture their autonomy:
- Allowing your child to dress themselves.
- Allowing your child to choose their own books.
- Allowing your child to express their like and dislike for things.
- Allowing your child to experiment with their own foods.
- Inviting them into the decision-making process about their own life. (Hobbies, Schooling, Choosing Friends, etc.).
Of course, we should guide them, but we DO NOT CHOOSE FOR THEM. Creating children that have their sense of self is the real power of allowing autonomy.
Many parents struggle with the ability to bond with their children because they were not taught effectively how to do so. Some of our parents grew up themselves without this type of relationship; You can’t replicate what you don’t know. I wrote this article with the hopes that more parents will work harder to nurture their kid’s interests. Children who experience securely attached relationships with their parent/parents while they are still young will eventually grow up to become emotionally mature adults. If we can do more as parents to ensure that our kids feel safe and validated. Then we can help make the world a much better place by raising socially aware and securely attached children.
My name is Samantha Johnson, emotional and spiritual coach from Michigan! I routinely write about things that will help you grow in spirit and individually! If you’ve enjoyed this article, please be sure to follow and subscribe to receive my post via e-mail.
Until Next Time!