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How to Understand Your Child’s Emotional Needs

February 2nd, 2009

To understand your child’s emotional needs is to accept the fact he is an individuals with a sense of self, separate from you. Your child is not the extension of yourself or of his other kin such as his grandparents or siblings. Every child is not the facsimile of his parents or any other person — he is nothing more than himself, a separate individual whose needs and rights must be nurtured and respected if he is to grow up a useful adult worthy of becoming a responsible parent himself.

Child’s Emotional Needs

Child’s Emotional Needs

The goal of emotional development is a wholesome sense of self, a feeling of wellbeing. A happy child is a fulfilled child of fulfilled parents who have a deep understanding of his emotional needs.

But this does not necessarily mean giving the child a surfeit of expensive toys (even if the parents can well afford it) and other material things his neighbors could not even dream of having. These excesses will only lead the child to believe he is far more superior than the others and thus deserves better treatment like the sons of irresponsible congressmen.

The sad truth is that these kinds of parents are mere show-offs, emotionally unfulfilled adults who need the approval of his peers and sadly their own children.

Nor is it good advice to pamper your child so that he is led to believe he has all the right to the. complete attention of his parents without in turn doing his duties of respecting and honoring his elders, and doing his share of household chores, making school homework, reviewing for tests, etc.
In short, a positive sense of self is the centerpiece of a well-adjusted emotional life. They are self-confident because they have

To be able to help your child achieve a positive sense of self, you must support his emotional development.

Empathy is the mental entrance into the feeling of another person: an appreciative perception and understanding. It is the ability to identify with another person’s emotional experience, a putting of oneself in another person’s shoes. When you listen to your children, they feel understood and comfortably sheltered from emotional harm. Children look up to their parents for validation or approval. Children need a lot of attention; when they feel unaccepted, they feel emotionally hurt.

Love involves affection, tenderness and support for the well-being of the child. Parents learned to love by being loved themselves, and so they are able to transfer this virtue instinctively to their children and without effort.