Almost all parents face difficult behaviors of children. Often adults get lost, not knowing how to behave. Here are three important facts about difficult behavior that will help to cope with it.
First, let’s be clear: Difficult behavior is not necessarily bad. As a rule, this is the behavior of the child, which is difficult to reconcile with adults.
Let's see what's at the heart of this. And what is important to remember parents, if "we have already explained and punished, and he continues to behave as before." And yes, everything we're talking about applies not only to a difficult child, but also to a difficult adult.
Fact #1: At the heart of difficult behavior are our simple needs.
What is the basis of any behavior of each of us? It is difficult to imagine that the purpose of someone’s actions is to intentionally bring to white heat, anger or hurt.
Everyone, coming to this world, wants to be happy, loved, understood, to feel care. A person seeks to be friends, grow, realize their abilities and talents, and not experience pain and suffering. Positive needs are the basis of personality and actions.
But when you come to this world, you do not yet know how to satisfy these needs. And he's starting to watch. What can I do to get my mother to come and feed me? What to do when adults do not pay attention, and so want them to hear and understand? By trial and error, carefully observing adults, the child learns. And if the mother is busy and does not pay attention to the baby until he throws a tantrum, it is easy to assume what the child will do to get attention.
Yes, it is often adults who reinforce the most difficult behavior of the child, which then drives mad. Any behavior, even the most difficult and bad, is an attempt to satisfy simple and positive needs for love, security, and care. It is only achieved in a bad and perverse way.
And the way this child finds in interaction with adults. It worked once, two, three – and now the growing person has his own method to get what he wants. And if other ways are not offered to you and not shown, then the same, bad, will remain the main one. There is a need that requires satisfaction, and there is a more or less effective way, there are no alternatives to which.
The difficulty of correcting such behavior is that the child often cannot understand and formulate why he does it and what he lacks.
Fact 2: Behavior is not a quality of personality.
From the above follows the second important point about difficult behavior. It is not the quality of the child. It's just actions and words.
The qualities of the child describe more needs that are often not visible behind the wall of his bad deeds. And these needs, remember, are far from bad. Coming into the struggle with the difficult behavior of the child, do not forget that the struggle is not against him, but with him. And then it will be easy to avoid the classic mistake of many parents who describe behavior, evaluate the child.
The child is not lazy, not stupid, not evil or harmful. Yes, he is sometimes lazy, sometimes angry, he may not know or understand something. Only by refusing to evaluate its qualities, you get a resource to work with difficult behavior. The thief will remain a thief, and the one who stole something here and now may refuse the theft next time.
Fact 3: Difficult behavior is not just about a child.
Faced with the unbearable and causing a storm of negative emotions, it is important to honestly answer a few questions:
• What does this behavior have to do with me?
• Why is it so hard for me to accept him?
• Do you violate the boundaries of the child by demanding that he perform unfair conditions?
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Children more than other people from the environment with their words and actions touch the trauma and complexes of parents. And often, by demanding perfect behavior from them, adults compensate for the insecurity in themselves, as in parents, the fear of the opinions of others. Or trying to correct mistakes. Dealing with difficult behaviors isn’t just about changing a child’s behavior, it’s always about collaboration and changes in behavior, and parents too.
In the following articles, we will continue our discussion of difficult behavior and discuss eight practical steps to change it.