It is Monday morning, the start of a new week an as I do most Mondays I am making my plan for what I want to achieve this week. The added bonus this week is that my starting point is a very positive place place following a lovely Mother’s day yesterday full of kindness and thoughtfulness. On a number of occasions throughout the day I found myself being thanked and acknowledged and at the same time thanking and acknowledging my husband and children.
This only served to remind me of important the balance of positive feedback and negative feedback is to our sense of well being. The research evidence has found again and again that for people to thrive and flourish the ratio of 5:1 is essential. In other words negativity is very powerful and so each time we experience negative feedback we need 5 positive pieces of feedback to restore the balance.
For many of us positivity comes automatically, others of us have had to learn to recognise our patterns and become more positive and when we have children some days can be more challenging than others. When we experience days when our children constantly push the boundaries and we find ourselves saying “NO” “That’s bold” “How many times do I have to tell you?” , the whole day can start to have a very negative feel to it.
On days like that, finding the opportunity to catch thee child being good can require more effort on our part. When a tantrum is over creating the change of energy to restore the sense of the positive can take more effort on our part as the parents a the tantrum may have pulled our energy down too
And so my personal plan this week is to be more aware of how I am creating the positive feedback loops within which my children may flourish. So here are some of the actions I am going to take:
1) Each time they help in the kitchen,( even if I have had to coax and cajole the help) I will thank them for their efforts.
2) I will listen carefully to their descriptions of the day and acknowledge good behaviour and efforts on their part.
3) I will acknowledge their efforts at school.
4) If they do something wrong I will stay calm and focus on what they are learning from it as much as possible.
5) I will be grateful and thankful for all the good things that will come my way.
6) I will find opportunities for laughter each day.
Now I will acknowledge that when I, or my children get overtired, or take on too many activities so that we are just rushing around all the time, stress and frustration can creep into our normal conversations. The basic principle of acknowledging the efforts of others can be forgotten and so I will extend my principle of good manners and always say please and thank you to include always acknowledging the efforts of other people as I encounter them.
I am going to have a positive week and my goal will be to create the conditions for my and my family to flourish. Have a great week.
This article was written my Mary Corbett, Author, Parent and Life Coach and a founding member of the Parenting Club.
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