74. How Affirmations Can Boost Your Child's Confidence

Would you love easy tools to empower your child and boost their confidence?

By the time you finish listening, you’ll know:

• How to create realistic and meaningful positive statements that truly resonate. 

• How to provide specific and genuine character feedback to your child, moving beyond generic praise to foster a more grounded self-esteem.

• Practical strategies for integrating affirmations into your daily routine to build your child's self-concept and joy. 

It’s a great time to start incorporating these strategies into the new school year!

Here is the poem I mention: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/44314/it-couldnt-be-done

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Chapters

• 0:03 Starting Daily Affirmations With Children
• 11:50 Building Self-Concept Through Daily Affirmations

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:03

You're listening to Episode 74 of the Sustainable Parenting Podcast with me, flora McCormick, licensed therapist, parenting coach and early childhood mental health consultant. Friend, I'm excited to talk to you today about daily affirmations and how to start them with your kids as we lead into the new school year. I think this is a great topic to visit. If you are anything like me, you're kind of looking at what do I want to do differently this school year. I've been sitting back reflecting, thinking about what do I want to get rid of, what do I want to start up, and so this is a great chance to begin having affirmations with your kids, if you haven't before, and I promise we're going to hit on three key thoughts around affirmations and character feedback to help you have more joy and ease in your daily life with your kids. Hello and welcome to the Sustainable Parenting Podcast. Let me tell you, friend, this place is different. We fill that gap between gentle parenting and harsh discipline that's really missing to parent with kindness and firmness at the same time, and give you the exact steps to be able to parent in ways that are more realistic and effective and, for that reason, finally feel sustainable. Welcome. Before we dive into that, friend, I do want to take one moment just to highlight that this is an open season currently of enrollment into my Sustainable Parenting Transformation group and if you've been listening along and having particular questions you wish you could get answered, wishing that you could have a full tool belt of sustainable parenting strategies that address every situation. That's what this group is all about. We have a pyramid of strategies that help you know, when a child is calm and easygoing, what are the key things we want to do to prevent future challenges. How do we then, if we're going up the pyramid, thinking about elevation of mood or challenge what do we do when they're at maybe a four through six of elevation? We're asking them to start or stop doing something. And then what do we do when there're at maybe a four through six of elevation? We're asking them to start or stop doing something. And then what do we do when there's a little bit of resistance? No, or an upset I think of that as a six through eight of emotion. And then what do we do when it's an eight through 10 of a big giant explosion? We make sure you get every single tool for that pyramid and we do so in a way that's really easy to remember, easy to use and realistic for life, being busy and hectic and chaotic and having unique personalities in the mix, so if this is something you've been considering, reach out to me right now. We have open enrollment right now, until September 15th, and I'd be happy to talk with you about the details. There's a link in our show notes to set up a call All right Now, without further ado.

Speaker 1: 3:15

This topic of how to start affirmations with our children is really a fun one to visit quickly in the season of starting a new school year. Now, first of all, what is an affirmation? Affirmations are saying positive statements that help us think in a more positive way about ourselves and our abilities. We want to be sure we're not being toxic with this, though, so we're going to talk about toxic positivity. We are then going to talk about positive character feedback that we can give to our children, and then we're going to talk about how to have affirmations that the child hears us say with them and we work towards them saying to themselves All right, let's dive in.

Speaker 1: 4:02

So the first thing is to understand toxic positivity. All right, let's dive in. So the first thing is to understand toxic positivity. This is a term that is so important, friend, because we do not want to get into a position where we're saying things that are false and like Pollyanna and obnoxious, like I'm the best person in the world or no one can stop me. Anything I want to do and set my mind to will happen. Now, I'm not saying we can't have some thoughts about projecting positivity and goodwill, but If we are living in a world that also has real challenges, that also has real things that don't always go our way, I think it's important that we equip our children with a mindset that is also very realistic. So toxic positivity is being unrealistic and just saying things in a positive way that do not take into account the realities that we all have a hard day, that sometimes we don't reach our goals and um, and we want to avoid that so that it doesn't put us in a position of then feeling worse instead of better. So let's avoid toxic positivity. One way that we can do that we're going to talk about how we can give positive character feedback, and then we're going to talk about how to start mantras that we say with our kids and they begin to say to themselves.

Speaker 1: 5:29

So the second piece here is what do we do to give positive character feedback. This is like we want to have some affirmation into our child's life. One of my first favorite ways to do that is just catching the things that they're doing that are aligned with positive character traits and giving them that feedback using those character words. Character feedback with character words. This is instead of just good job. I like that it's saying to a child hey, that was so creative how you solved that problem with your sister I watched over there. That was so creative. Or gosh, that was so kind how you just gave brother the last cookie. That was so kind of you. Or boy, I notice you've been very generous lately when your friend is asking if we you, they can play the game their way instead of your way. Or gosh, that was just so helpful how you came over quick and snappy when I was asking you to come to the table for dinner.

Speaker 1: 6:37

Character feedback. Make sure that we're not just saying good job, but gives these character words that speak into the soul of the child and help them start to see themselves with that positive light. And just as a side note, think about we use character words more often in a negative way we can tend to get into like gosh, that was so rude, that was just totally not helpful at all how you're behaving right now. But then on the opposite side, we only say good job. So this is flip-flopping, that. And I encourage you to think about being more boring in your negative feedback Like oh, boy, that was a sad choice. And then using all of these flavorful character words on the positive side Boy, it gives so much more value in terms of the response from a child's behavior. And, third of all, we want to talk about affirmations in a way where you can start doing some clever phrases with your child that help to perk them up and give them some positive self-talk.

Speaker 1: 7:42

Now, the younger kids are, the shorter and more simple it should be. The younger the child, the fewer the words. So you can start with little kids by just saying something like I'm wise, I am strong, I'm a good boss of my body. That could be a phrase that helps them to think about their actions and how they are living in this world. Or you might say you are kind, you are wise, you are someone who thinks before you leap. I am kind, I am wise, I think before I leap. I am kind, I am wise, I think before I leap, and then you teach them what that would be about.

Speaker 1: 8:23

I remember when my child was especially young my first one and I was learning all of the positive discipline tools, I made up this little song that I could sing to him that then could also speak these values into his mind and over time I think it's something that has become a bit of an affirmation, in a subtle way, of him learning it. It goes like this this is an original song from Flora. I am not a singer, but here I go Caleb, caleb the monkey man, with a loving heart and gentle hands. We use kind words and we say how we feel. We make wise choices from the choices wheel Caleb the monkey man. Caleb, caleb the monkey man. So that was my little song to try to speak those values into his heart and mind.

Speaker 1: 9:19

Another way that you can do daily affirmations is to look online for what character trait you're really trying to grow in your child. These can be different for everyone. Some kids you're trying to grow more courage and bravery. Some kids you're trying to grow more self-control and calm. Or some kids you're trying to grow the sense of confidence. So I encourage you to just Google the words that mean the most to you and daily affirmations for a child, and then take what phrases you see there from the internet and begin to either make a little rhyme or use the words that you find there. For instance, I put this in I did the exercise myself around being calm, still and wise, and I got the suggestion that I could say to my child the mantra or affirmation I am strong, I am wise, I can soar to any skies. Or the second one around being calm was I am calm, I am still, I can choose how I feel. Which boy? I could think of a lot of ways. I would really do some teaching with my child around what those phrases meant and then have those be the words they say in the morning. As kids get older, you can look for stories or poems that convey really positive concepts, and I encourage you to think about having your child memorize one.

Speaker 1: 10:47

I was encouraged by my fifth grade teacher to memorize a poem called it Couldn't Be Done by Edgar Guest, and I can still say it by heart today, at 44 almost it's my birthday next week and this is what it is. It has echoed in my head many, many times from memorizing this poem. I'm just going to read a few lines of it for you. Somebody said that it couldn't be done, but he with a chuckle chuck. Somebody said that it couldn't be done, but he with a chuckle replied that maybe it couldn't but he would be one who wouldn't say no till he tried. So he buckled right in with a bit of a grin on his face. If he worried, he hit it. He started to sing as he tackled the thing that couldn't be done and he didn't. That's just one small part and I am not cheating, I'm not reading. As I said that. I memorized it because of an adult encouraging me to, and it echoes in my head still today.

Speaker 1: 11:50

So, friend, I encourage you today I'm going to put a couple resources in the show notes to give you some ideas. But otherwise, do some searching and find the tools and affirmations that exist out there, whether it be a poem or a small phrase that can really connect with what you'd like to speak into your child this school year and start making a habit of them learning that poem by being taped to their bathroom mirror or saying that regular phrase with you each morning or evening together, so that you can build their self-concept and grow more joy in their heart and in their actions. All right, friend, as always, take this as another week that when you parent with kindness and firmness, at the same time you start seeing that parenting finally feels sustainable. Can't wait to see you again next week, friend.