Parents are responsible for taking care of and giving our children everything they need for their healthy development, from their physical health to their emotional education. And without a doubt, one of the things that most concern us as parents is to make sure our children are happy.
It is well known that the first years of life will be the basis for their social and emotional development in the future, so it is extremely important to ensure that we are giving them the necessary tools. Therefore, today we talk about how to raise happy children and we share the keys to a positive upbringing.
Happy children: The goal of all parents
Happiness is something we all aspire to. Having a life with which we feel calm, full and happy, is undoubtedly one of the goals that many want, not only for us, but also for our own children. As parents, our mission is that: to help our children to be happy. But how to do it? What steps should we follow to achieve it?
In it, we can observe some of the most important points to achieve raising happy children, so starting from that, we share a little more about each one, and how you can carry them out at home.
Secure attachment
In babies and more we are promoters of upbringing with attachment or respectful upbringing, as well as positive discipline, of which we have spoken on several occasions.
There are different types of attachment , but the one that will help us have happy children is secure attachment, which is one in which a relationship is fostered where there is communication, care and emotional demonstrations, providing children with security, but also the necessary tools to develop their autonomy.
A healthy environment
The environment in which children develop greatly influences not only their emotional development, but also, the possible problems they may face in the future. Several studies have found that growing up in a conflict or violence environment increases the chances of having problems at school or of falling into risky behaviors, such as alcohol and drugs.
Remember that the environment in which children grow will also lay the foundations for the type of relationships they have with other people, so it is important that they develop in an environment of respect and affection, in which they are taken into account and where Family conflicts are resolved in the most friendly and peaceful way possible, regardless of whether the parents are together or separated.
Recognize your efforts
One of the keys to being happy is to feel good about ourselves. But feeling good about oneself is something that comes from within and that begins to be fostered since childhood. So as parents, it is up to us to guide our children so that they have good self-esteem, confidence and self-confidence.
To achieve this, we need to pay attention not only to the way we treat them, but also to the words we tell them and how we tell them: do we recognize only when they do something well or do we also praise their efforts? It seems like a simple question, but the answer is more important than we think.
Sometimes we believe that the best we can do is make them see their mistakes and only praise them when they manage to do things correctly, but this could make it difficult to handle frustration when they fail. Instead of just pointing out their mistakes, we should also praise their efforts, so that they continue to try and go little by little increasing their confidence in themselves.
Have limits and be constant
Contrary to what some people believe, parenting with respectful attachment or upbringing is not the equivalent of never setting limits and letting children do what they want. Doing it that way would only result in disoriented and insecure children, because nobody ever told them how far they could go.
Our role as parents, in addition to being guides and providing them a safe place, is to set limits clearly, firmly and consistently, explaining them so that they understand them and can understand how important they are, and always doing so with respect and with the example.
Work on your emotional education
The school is responsible for academic education, parents emotional education. Working on it since they are babies and helping them manage their emotions when they are older is fundamental to their healthy development and happiness.
We must support and guide our children so that they can understand, identify and manage their emotions, not only to avoid emotional illiteracy, but also to have a positive relationship with themselves and with other people.
Take care of our mental and emotional health
And finally, but not least: our mental and emotional health. How do we pretend to educate happy and safe children if we do not take care of those aspects of our life? Being mothers and fathers it is easy to forget ourselves, but if we are not emotionally well, we will not be able to transmit that well-being to our children, nor encourage a healthy development in them.
For this, we must find a time for ourselves alone, in which we can dedicate ourselves to doing those activities that make us feel better, as well as to attend to any mental health problem or concern that we have.
With these keys based on a positive upbringing, we can help our children grow and develop in a healthy way, making them children and, eventually, happy adults.
