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Instil confidence in them, and you have created powerful beings. Dr Rose Misati, director and founder of Effective Parenting Solutions speaks to Jacqueline Mahugu on what a parent can do to build healthy self-esteem in a child.
1. Affirm your child everyday
The most important determinant of self-worth in children between the ages of one and 12 is the perception of how much their parents value them.
From the age 12, the opinion of peers becomes more important than that of you as a parent. If you had laid a proper foundation, they will choose the right friends.
You affirm the child by making them feel special and appreciated. Many times, parents only pay attention when the child has made a mistake.
That is the time they will call out their name and talk about the mistake. It is important for the parent to affirm them every day and let them know they are special and appreciated.
Do not do this just on physical looks that the child has done nothing to achieve. Commend them on things like their diligence, hard work and persistence and even the fact that they are a special blessing.
2. Give chores and instil responsibility
Do this and allow them to do it on their own. Parents often rush to rescue the child when they have given them a task.
It is important to let them do it to completion, even if they do not do it well. It instils confidence in them and they think, “I can do it.
I can be trusted to wash dishes and arrange my shoes.” Let them do it and resist the urge to rescue them, to help or even to redo it after the child has done it.
Even if they do not do it perfectly at first, keep on giving them the opportunity. Eventually, they will perfect the skill.
3. Let them make their own decisions
Guide them in making decisions and resist the urge to make decisions for them. If you do not, eventually they grow up into overly emotional people even in adulthood because their parents made all the decisions for them.
Even if they make a wrong decision or make a mistake, the parent has an opportunity to sit down with the child and review that decision.
The child can then accept and learn from the mistake and they can plan the way forward on how to make better decisions next time.
This will give the child the confidence that they can do it and also learn how to accept mistakes and learn from them.
4. Express your love and affection even when they fail you
I had a session with teenagers and I asked them how many were sure of their parents’ love despite bringing home bad grades.
Only a handful raised their hands. Many of them actually said they believe that when they bring home poor grades, their parents do not love them anymore.
You need to non-verbally express this love and attention unconditionally even by hugging them, keeping close to them, maintaining eye contact when speaking to them, etc. Body language is crucial.
What the parent does speaks loudly that the child cannot hear what you are saying.
Even when you say that you love them, demonstrate it by paying undivided attention when your child is speaking to you, because experts say that 55 per cent of communication is non-verbal. Tone of voice is 38 per cent.
5. Teach your child positive self-talk
At least 75 per cent of our daily thinking patterns are negative. Therefore you may find a child thinking, “I am not good enough, I cannot do this” and so forth. Teach them to speak positively to themselves.
6. Help them develop a skill or ability fully
Everybody is gifted in some way. It may be in music, speaking, playing a sport etc. Encourage that.
Once you see that they are gifted in something, encourage them and support them in it so that they can develop it fully and be excellent in what they do.
That also reinforces the fact that they are unique and special. They will thus avoid comparing themselves with others.
7. Dress them appropriately
When they are younger you can dress them, but as they grow older, encourage them to dress in clothes that are well-fitting and appropriate for the occasion.
It is very difficult for a child to feel good about themselves when they go somewhere and their clothes are ill-fitting or the colours do not match, especially as they get into teenage-hood.
Help them learn proper colour co-ordination and dress in well-fitting clothing appropriate for the occasion.
Even when they are very young, they need to dress well, because dressing reflects how we feel about ourselves and how we feel about our bodies.
They should be appropriate for the body – not too small, too big, too tight- as they grow older.
As boys grow older, you tend to see a lot of them with trousers that are too short. As a parent, you need to be vigilant and keep checking on this and replace appropriately.
8. Demonstrate a healthy self-worth of yourself
The most important determinant of a child’s self-worth until the age of 12 is derived from the parent. Children will copy you.
Parents need to demonstrate that they value themselves in everything that they do, so that the child will copy that.
Many teachers say that when a parent comes for a school meeting, even before they introduce themselves, they know that that is so-and-so’s parent, because the children have copied and they carry themselves just like the parent.
9. Ensure that the child maintains a healthy lifestyle
This is by ensuring they eat wholesome food and have adequate exercise. We live in a time when body image is very important.
A child cannot feel good about themselves if they are labeled ‘fat’, ‘fat mama’ among other terms.
Even if you try to instill confidence in them, when everyone else is commenting about their big stomach and ill-fitting clothes, it is difficult for them to feel good.
If they eat wholesome food and maintain adequate exercise, they will most likely maintain a healthy weight and will feel good about themselves.
10. Resist the urge to compare siblings
Sometimes parents ask, ‘Why are you not like your brother?’ ‘Why are you not like your sister?’
When the child goes out, other people express surprise that that other child is their sibling. They will say things like, “Oh she’s more beautiful!” or “She’s slimmer than you!” That means the child is always under the shadow of their sibling.
They never have a name or an identity. It’s always, “You are so and so’s sister.” Out there it may be difficult to control that, but as a parent, you can control it at home.
Once you resist that and treat the child as a unique individual with their own special sense of ability, gifts and talents, the child will be resilient and even if they go out there and someone is trying to put them down, sometimes with good intentions or in ignorance, they can stand up and say, “Yes, that is my sibling, but this is also me. This is who I am.”
