We have known for a long time that the intelligence of a person, which is measured with the intelligence tests that tell us what the intellectual quotient is, is not predictive of the success it may have in life. We all know very intelligent people who have not become happy in their lives and less intelligent people who have ended up working on what they wanted and have known how to be the people they wanted to be.
This difference happens, most likely, because the decisions a person makes, the way in which he relates to others, self-assurance and other very important values are not given by the intelligence of which we speak, but by the emotional intelligence, many times more important than the other. It is an intelligence that, as I say, helps us to be socially competent, to understand the world of emotions, to have confidence in ourselves and, as a consequence, to be probably happier.
Many mothers and fathers wonder how they could help their children develop their emotional intelligence. Well, today we give you Three tips: look at him, talk to him and react to his emotions.
In schools it is already beginning to be done
This is going very slowly, very little by little, and there is still a long time for the change to be final, but more and more are trying to work in schools in this way, trying to develop children's emotional intelligence. I want to say that for a while this part is trying to emphasize a little less in the development of rational capabilities, something that was done at the cost of forgetting much their emotional world, and trying to balance the balance, attending to them when they cry, listening their problems, dialoguing with them, negotiating, seeking understanding, making use of empathy, not to pamper them, but to make them feel understood.
Come on, that in the first years, you no longer try (or should not try) to read as soon as possible, learn to paint as soon as possible and make chips, one after the other, to develop their rational intelligence, but try (or they should try) to help them be good people, to communicate, to relate, to share space, to share emotions, to feel loved, to respect others, etc. with a lot of game involved and so, while playing, they learn.
What am I talking about? Well, no school or daycare specifically, but one that exists in my mind based on various centers that start doing things under this philosophy. None is perfect or ideal, but the intention is beginning to be seen.
In the same way, there are more and more educational, health and psychology professionals who reject behaviorism, punishment and emotional blackmail and who advise seeing the child, not as a hindrance that only tries to achieve its own benefit (a sometimes malefic), but as a person in training and in development with many concerns that must be empowered or sometimes limited, to achieve a correct emotional health that allows you to live in a certain harmony with other children.
But before arriving at school, there is much to do at home
I say, there are more and more professionals who follow this line of action, but many times they encounter real pitfalls: children who come very burned from home. And when I say burned, I mean that they come slumped, angry, with many emotional lacks and trying to impose themselves where they may have some success. Since at home they fail to feel important, because their parents do not make them feel good, they seek to excel where they are most likely to get it. For many professionals, and more when you have more than 20 children, it is very difficult to work on emotions when there are children to whom you have to redirect. Come on, to be clear, it is very difficult to arouse the curiosity of children, teach them games and seek tuning with them and between them when they have to waste time in educating children from scratch who should already come from home.
So, now, to the point, parents have to do everything possible for our children to grow and develop, not only physically, but also as people, their minds, their brains, their emotional world.
For this there are three very simple tips to explain and very simple to carry out, which I tell you below.
Look at him
People think that they are communicating with others only when they talk to them. This is not like this. In addition to verbal communication, we have the non-verbal communication, and often says more than the other. What is someone telling us who we are talking to and who, in the middle of the conversation, starts looking at your mobile phone? Well, basically, "I disconnect from what you're telling me." What does someone tell us that as we speak to him he approaches and looks at us more deeply? Well, he is actively listening to us.
Babies not only communicate with us when they cry. They also do it when they touch us, when we catch and smile and when they look at us. Sometimes they do something and look for an answer, a look. He eye contact with the baby it shows him that we are there, that we see him, that we know he is and we are for them. And in addition, if that look is positive, if we have a calm and friendly gesture on the face, you will perceive affection, love, producing a better brain development (just as skin-to-skin contact causes children to gain more weight and develop better, eye contact, when they are able to evaluate our gesture, it also helps them).
Talk to him
Looking at them helps them, of course, but that's not all, talk to them, to smile at them, to explain to them the things we do or are going to do, it also helps them in understanding language, it helps them to speak before and, therefore, it helps them to communicate. And not only that. When you speak your voice and your words, when you speak, you are dedicating time and eye contact. That helps children know that mom is there for them and with them and that helps them to feel important in your life. Be careful, it is not that they have to feel the most important, or anything like that, it is simply to feel one more, to feel that Mom loves him, that it is enough to be able to build a healthy self-image and to have a good self-esteem.
React to your emotions
When he laughs, you can laugh, when he cries, you can make him pamper, sing, talk to him, when he has a problem and explain it to you, you can show with your voice and with your gesture that you listen to him, that you try to understand him and that you can try to help him. You can be, in a way, the visual mirror of your emotions, and this will help you to understand your own feelings, to know them and to be able to show them when you consider it appropriate.
When this does not happen
If the mother does not act as a mirror, if she does not exaggerate the expression, the tone of the voice (it is not the same to shout a "but how happy my child is!" To say boringly and monotonously, as one who speaks with a snail , "but how happy my child is"), if he does not look at him enough, if he is not there, if he does not show emotions, the child will end up doing the same as his mother. He will be a more rational person than emotional and will avoid, as far as possible, show his own emotions. And not only that, when someone is not able to show emotions, when he avoids them, he tends to do so with the emotions of others. You may feel uncomfortable seeing the signs of joy from others, or uncomfortable at the sight of someone suffering, or crying.
Unable to express their own and unable to help those who express them, they can avoid having personal relationships in order to avoid entering the world of emotions, feeling always more comfortable alone that accompanied by warmer or more open people to tell their feelings.
Yes, I know that I have described a very withdrawn and antisocial adult, but without reaching that extreme, many adults are a bit like that, a little incapable, a little incompetent emotional, with difficulties to establish new social relationships, to make friends, e unable to have a lasting love relationship for not being able to demonstrate the love they feel (if they feel it). And all this because when they were young someone really made them feel small as a person, undervalued, invisible, because they did not look at them enough, because they did not feel they talked to them and because they did not validate their emotions.
Photos | Thinkstock
In Babies and more | The baby's brain, The baby's brain: how to help their correct development (I) and (II), The importance of educating girls in emotional intelligence
