Category Archives: Your Family

Love Maps

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John Gottman, a prominent relationship researcher, says that successful couples have “Love Maps” of each other’s lives.

These couples have made plenty of cognitive room in their minds for their relationship. They remember the major events in each other’s histories, and they keep updating their information as the facts and feelings of their spouse’s world change. They know each other’s goals in life, each other’s worries, each other’s hopes and dreams. Without such a love map, you can’t really know your partner. And if you don’t really know someone, how can you truly love them? (Source)

I think love maps are VERY powerful.

I know someone who says “Every time my mom calls me, she asks me about the weather. I would love it if someday she said ‘How’s work?’ or, even better ‘I know you’ve been frustrated by budget issues at work – is that getting better?'”

I know lots of parents of school age children whose standard question every day is “So, how was school?” Think how much more powerful these questions would be: “I know you were worried about your math test today – how did it go?” or “You and Chris have been having a great time playing ____ together. Did you have time to do that today?”

Read more about love maps:

http://www.gottmanblog.com/sound-relationship-house/2014/10/28/the-sound-relationship-house-build-love-maps?rq=build%20love%20maps

Relationship Skills for Parents

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In every relationship – whether with our romantic partners, our children, our parents, our co-workers, or friends – we have good days and bad days. We can have more good days if we know and use effective relationship skills. Here are some I find most helpful, with links to find more details on whichever tools resonate most for you. (You can also find a summary of these in my Relationship Toolbox handout.)

Turning Toward your Partner (based on Gottman)

When someone wants to make a connection, they make “bids for affection.” These can be questions, invitations, non-verbal gestures, glances, or touch – anything that asks you to connect. When someone bids for your attention, there are three main categories of ways that you might respond.

Turn Toward: Act in a responsive, interested, positive, and loving way. Reach out, touch them, look at them, smile. Say “I hear you”, “I want to connect with you,” “I’m interested in you.” Ask a question.

Turn Away: Act in a way that ignores them, or dismisses their bid. Look away, wander away. Don’t respond verbally, or respond in a way that has nothing to do with what they said.

Turn Against: Act in an angry way that rejects them and their bid. Walk away, glare, make threatening movements. Use sarcasm or put-downs, roll your eyes. Do the opposite of what they asked you to do.

In the most successful relationships, partners have a 20:1 ratio. They have 20 positive bids and/or turning toward incidents for every one incident of turning against or away. Can you aim for at least 5:1?

Expressing Appreciation (inspired by Hendricks and Louden)

When juggling day-to-day responsibilities at work, home, and with children, we  we might start feeling disconnected and invisible, or drained and undervalued. One of the best ways to re-fill our tanks is by creating a “culture of appreciation”. Some ideas:

  • Always thank your partner for the things s/he has done. Even if they’re part of his/her “job.” It’s still nice to know that they are noticed and appreciated.
  • When asking your partner to do something, make it a real question (i.e. something they could say no to) not an order disguised as a question. Say please – and thank you.
  • Five minute writing. You each spend five full minutes listing everything you love about your partner – the big things and the little ones. Pour out all the appreciation you haven’t had time to share. Give your list to your partner.
  • Post-its: leave notes around the house, listing what you love about each other.

Speak your partner’s love language (Chapman)

In Chapman’s The Five Love Languages, he argues that different individuals have different “languages” they use to express love, and that we “hear” love best when it’s spoken in our language. Which one of these sounds most like how your partner hears love from you? Which describes how you hear love?

Physical Touch: Feels most loved when you touch: stroke their hair, hold hands, massage, rub their feet, hugging, kissing, sex. Feels most rejected when touch is missing (or if touch is used in anger).

Words of Affirmation: Encouragement and praise are vital. Being acknowledged for work, appreciated for who s/he is, validated for concerns, cheered on for efforts. Sensitive to criticism.

Acts of Service: Wants active support with household tasks, like laundry, washing dishes, running errands, making a to-do list together. Feels unsupported if you don’t pitch in.

Gifts: Loves any special little thing done just for him/her. A card, something special from the grocery store, pictures of the baby texted during the day. Will be especially upset if you forget a birthday, anniversary or other gift-giving occasion.

Quality Time: Wants your Presence – time together, spent talking and connecting, doing activities together. Feels unsupported if you’re off buying gifts or doing tasks instead of spending time together.

Discuss this with your partner. Are you right about what his/her language is? What does s/he think is your language? Sometimes couples discover that if one is feeling unloved, it’s not that their partner wasn’t trying to communicate love, it’s just that they were shouting a lot in the wrong language.

Spend Time with your Partner

Ideally, you will find a way to have a regular date night with your partner. It doesn’t have to be anything fancy. Just a chance to be together, really listen to each other, really see the other person, and remember why you chose to spend your lives together.

But beyond date night, think about ways that even a few minutes a day can make a big difference. In an article by Carolyn Pirak, she recommends making a commitment to spending 40 minutes a day to improve your relationship: When you separate, spend  two minutes saying goodbye. When you reunite, spend 20 minutes talking about your days. Take five minutes to express appreciation to each other. Devote 8 minutes to showing affection. Give five minutes a day to sharing dreams and planning ahead.

Make a plan for special time together this week. Each day, grab some sweet little moments together.

Conflict Resolution / Communicating needs

Many conflicts arise because one or both of you is not getting something that you need. You can start feeling like opponents on opposite sides of an issue or like competitors for scarce resources. Here’s how to start thinking like allies again, and being working things out.

  1. Identify what you need. Hint: if you often find yourself saying “You never do X” or “You always do Y” or “I never get to do Z,” there’s a hint in there somewhere.
  2. Communicate that need to your partner. Be clear, and specific. Use the “I” word – “I need this”, not the “You” word – “Here’s what you need to do.” Help them understand how you feel about this emotionally. “It makes me sad when…” “I feel overwhelmed when…”
  3. Ask for help meeting that need.
  4. Listen to your partner’s opinions and concerns.
  5. Ask your partner what s/he needs and work together to get that need met.

Next time you find yourself in conflict, try these ideas. Even better, try working preventatively. When you’re not in the heat of the moment, explore one areas of conflict, and see what you learn together.

Speak of “We” More than “Me.”

Couples who mostly talk about “we”, “us” and “our dreams” – versus “I”, “my plans,” “you” and “your problems” – tend to have healthier, happier, and longer relationships. Even when they are in conflict, they have lower blood pressure and lower heart rates than those who talk of “me.” Their facial expressions, tone of voice and body language were all more positive. “We” language helps to foster a sense of connection, interdependence, and shared values. It helps us think of each other as allies rather than adversaries.

Just changing your language reminds you of your partnership.

Here’s a printable handout covering this information on Key Relationship Skills.

Sources: Louden’s Couples Comfort Book, Hendricks’ Conscious Heart; Gottman’s Baby Makes Three.

How Much is Enough? How Much is Too Much?

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Although there are plenty of families in America who struggle with the basic necessities of life like putting food on the table, many other parents have access to a huge array of options. Toys to buy, media to watch, vacations to go on, and activities to enroll in. The job of marketers is to convince us these things are ‘necessities’ and things “you can’t afford to pass up”. Sometimes they play to our fears of the future: “Playing with this toy will help your child get into college.” Sometimes they play on parental guilt: “Help your kid have a great Christmas – show them that they’re loved.” Sometimes they sell joy: “You work so hard – you deserve to have FUN!”

And here’s the thing. Lots of those toys and media are fun! Lots of fun! And going on vacations as a family can lead to fabulous connecting moments and can be part of a child’s memories of belonging in a loving, happy family. And lots of those classes and activities really will help build your child’s knowledge and skills, and help them reach their potential.

So how do we decide which options to take? What is enough? What is too much? Every family has to make their own decisions, based on their child’s needs and their own goals and values.

What do kids need, in order to learn?

Often parents choose toys and classes as enrichment tools to help their child learn and grow. When we go back to the basics of brain development, we know that children learn through: novelty and repetition, guided play and free play, and down time to process it all.

New toys and media offer novelty – lots of interesting stimuli to take in. But if kids are continually bombarded with new things, and not given the chance to play with the same thing over and over, they don’t gain the benefit of repetition, which is mastery. If a child only has access to a few toys, he may complain of boredom, but he gets really creative with those toys!

Classes, camps, activities, and sports teams are all guided play and guided learning. They help your child gain new knowledge and learn new skills. But kids also benefit from free play – just having free time with friends or siblings to goof off and play any game they can think up. And they need rest and quiet solitude to absorb everything and make their own connections.

Kim John Payne, author of Simplicity Parenting, talks about 4 keys to raising “happier, calmer, more secure kids”: the environment, rhythm and schedule, and unplugging. Let’s look at each.

Environment: De-cluttering to make space for creativity.

If there are too many toys, a child doesn’t focus on any of them. They flit from one to the next, never really settling down to play. Their little brains are overstimulated by all the choices. If you keep giving them more toys to “get them engaged” they will get even more distracted.

It is better to focus on having a small number of really excellent toys. Here are some things to think about and look for when choosing what toys to have in your home.

  • Think about toys that build diverse skills: if I had only a few toys, I’d want one in each of these areas: big motor skills (balls, bikes, tumbling mats), small motor skills (puzzles, shape sorters, craft supplies), imaginary play (dress-up clothes, toy kitchen), music toys, art supplies, a set of magnetic letters, some dice for math skills, something to nurture (doll, stuffed animal), and toys for playing outdoors (bucket and shovel).
  • Choose open-ended toys that can be played with in lots of ways and passive toys where the child has to be creative to use them. Things such as blocks, cardboard boxes and tape, puppets, measuring cups and containers. Minimize toys that can only be played with in one way, and active toys where you press the button and it does all the work.
  • Elizabeth Pantley recommends these criteria for choosing toys: long-term play value, durable, washable, solid simplicity, challenge (will teach but won’t frustrate), appropriate for your child’s current developmental abilities, stimulates creativity, engaging, versatile, fits your family values, novelty (different than what you already have), and fun.
  • Spend less time in stores, less time looking at catalogs and shopping online. When you shop, it’s easy to fall in love with toys and end up bringing more home than you need.
  • Try setting up a “toy rotation” system. Make bins of toys, where each bin has about ten toys in it. Keep one bin out to play with and store all the others in the garage or a closet. Whenever the whim strikes (once a week?), swap out the old bin for a new bin.
  • Let your child get bored of their toys…

Think of boredom as a ‘gift.’ Boredom is often the precursor to creativity. Think of a bridge between ‘doing nothing’ and deep creative play. The bridge is almost always paved with (the frustration of) boredom. “I’m bored!” Now *that* is when something interesting usually happens.  – Kim John Payne

Rhythm: Increase predictability by introducing rhythmic moments for connection and calm.

Read my handout on rituals and my post on daily routines. And here are some thoughts on making birthday parties more manageable.

Scheduling: Give kids the gift of unstructured time

You might have the option to enroll your child in anything from art classes to aikido, from piano lessons to pottery, ballet to baseball, soccer to Spanish, gymnastics to geo-caching, wilderness survival to web design. There are so many cool and exciting things to learn! (And, you can’t help but think… it’ll help someday when they fill out college applications…)

Plus there’s the things you have to do – doctor’s appointments, picking up the siblings from their activities, grocery shopping. And more things you want to do – movies, playdates, dinner out, outings to the playground, sporting events, farmer’s markets, hikes in the woods, vacations to the beach…

All of these are cool. And all of them are learning experiences. Just choose your activities wisely. And make sure you remember to make space in the schedule for down-time, and quiet contemplation, and spontaneous, creative play. And for self-care for them and for you: sleep, calm meals around a table, snuggling up with a book.

Unstructured time gives children the opportunity to explore their inner and outer worlds…  they learn to engage with themselves and the world, to imagine and invent and create.  Unstructured time also challenges children to explore their own passions. If we keep them busy with lessons and structured activity, or they “fill” their time with screen entertainment, they never learn to respond to the stirrings of their own hearts, which might lead them to study the bugs on the sidewalk, build a fort in the back yard, make a monster from clay, write a short story or song, or organize the neighborhood kids into making a movie.  These calls from our heart are what lead us to the passions that make life meaningful, and they are available to us… when we are given free rein to explore and pursue where our interests lead us.” (Dr. Laura Markham)

Unplugging: Reduce the influence of adult concerns, media and consumerism on children to increase resilience, social and emotional intelligence.

When allowing your child to use screens (TV, computers, smartphones, tablets, etc.) make conscious choices about the content and about how much, when, and where to use them.

Spend more time outdoors, relaxing, playing, and discovering together.

Allow for quality family time:

Families can benefit by doing things whose only purpose is the joy of spending time together, like playing Monopoly, shooting hoops (with no coaching), drawing pictures, or taking a walk. Being unproductive together tells the child that the parent likes the kid, as he or she is.  (Source)

Learn more:

Growth Based Mindset

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Carol Dweck, a psychologist at Stanford University, has spent decades studying achievement and success. She has developed the concept of a growth-based mindset, summarized here:

Fixed Mindset Growth-Based Mindset
Belief Intelligence and talent are static. They’re something you’re born with: you have it or you don’t. Intelligence develops with effort. The brain is like a muscle that can be trained.
Goals To look smart in every situation.
To never fail.		 To push myself and try new things.
To take on new challenges.
Success Proving I’m smart or talented. Stretching to learn something new.
Evaluation of a new situation Will I succeed at it or will I fail?
Will it make me look good or bad?		 Will it allow me to grow?
Attitude to challenges I avoid challenges.
I stick to what I do well.		 I embrace challenges.
I persist when things get tough.
Response to setback I’m a failure. (identity)
I give up.		 I failed. (action)   I’ll learn from it and move on. I’ll try harder next time
Effort Why bother? It’s pointless. Effort is the key to mastery.
Criticism Ignore criticism or deflect: “It’s not my fault.” Learn from criticism: how can I improve?
Success of others I feel threatened by it.
If they succeed, I fail.		 I find lessons and inspiration in other people’s successes.
I feel good When it’s perfect. When I win. When I try hard. When I figure something out.
Results They plateau early. Never reach full potential. They achieve ever-higher levels of success.

Mindsets in the classroom:

Students were given a test. Then some of the children were praised for their intelligence: “that’s a good score. You must be smart.” Some were praised for the process: “that’s a good score. You must have worked hard.” The kids were then asked what they wanted to do next, and they were given the option of something easy where they wouldn’t make mistakes or something challenging where they might make mistakes but would learn something important. Those who were praised for intelligence chose the easy task. Those who were praised for effort chose the hard task they could learn from. Later, they gave everyone a very hard test – the kids praised for intelligence lost confidence and lost their enjoyment of the task and later lied about their scores. The kids who were praised for the effort and the process stayed confident, worked hard at the problems and remained engaged and didn’t lie about their results, because they felt they had done as well as they could on a hard test.

In other research, by Dweck and Blackwell, a group of low achieving students attended a class that taught that intelligence, like a muscle, grows stronger with exercise. As they learned to believe that intelligence was something they could learn, rather than something they could never achieve if they weren’t “born with it”, their motivation increased. They worked harder. When they had difficulty, instead of saying “I’m just not smart enough”, they would say that they needed to work harder or smarter. Their math scores improved, and continued to improve in the following year.

Another example of where these mindsets play out is in the math classroom. 3 out of 10 American describe themselves as “bad at math.” This leads to the belief that “I will never be good at math, so there’s no point in even trying.” Parents and teachers often reinforce this perception. Research shows that while genetics and inherent intelligence can help children initially score well, over time the kids that do best in math are the ones who work hard, have good study habits, and enjoy doing math.

To help your child develop a growth based mindset:

  • think about how you praise them: praise effort, not talent. Praise process not product.
  • pay attention to how you talk about your own abilities… do you say “I’m just no good at…” or do you say “this is hard for me right now, but if I keep trying I think I’ll do it”
  • think about how you respond to their failures and frustrations. Do you let them give up, or encourage them to keep trying? Do you say things like “I know it seems hard now, but I also know that the more you practice, the better you’ll get.”
  • encourage them to tinker: play around at something – try and try again until you get the result you were hoping for

Learn more about growth mindsets at http://www.whatkidscando.org/resources/spec_growthmindset.html and Mind-sets and Equitable Education: http://www.principals.org/Content.aspx?topic=61219

Read more on math at “The Myth of ‘I’m bad at math’” at www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2013/10/the-myth-of-im-bad-at-math/280914/ and “’I’m not a math person’ is no longer a valid excuse” at www.businessinsider.com/being-good-at-math-is-not-about-natural-ability-2013-11

If you’re in the Seattle area, you can attend a lecture on the Growth Mindset by Tracy Kutchlow on Wednesday, April 29. Learn more here.

Connect your Child with their Cultural Identity

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Identifying your culture and cultural values

If you do an internet search on connecting children to their cultural identity, you’ll mostly find articles for adoptive parents connecting their child to a culture of origin that is different from that of the parents. You’ll find a handful of articles for parents who are part of a religious or ethnic minority group. There is little about how people from any background might do it.

I think people who view themselves as part of “mainstream America” may often not think of themselves as having a cultural identity. I have heard people, when asked their  identity, respond “umm…. white?? American?? I don’t really have a cultural identity.”

But clearly, we are shaped by our background. I have a friend who is my age, Caucasian like me, and “American.” But I was raised in a church-going, military family of four in Wyoming. She was an only child raised by a liberal single mom in Berkeley in the early 70’s. So although that friend and I have a lot of common from our current perspectives, we’ve certainly run across times when we have very different assumptions about ‘how the world works’ and ‘how things are done.’

And that’s what defines cultural identity: what are those unconscious assumptions about big picture ideas like how the world works, what is our role in the community, and the significance of the family. It’s also the little things: when we get up in the morning, when we eat dinner, what we eat. Sometimes you don’t understand something is your culture until you encounter a different culture. Again, it’s sometimes in the little things: at my family’s holiday meals, the cook worked hard to get everything to the table hot and at the peak of perfection – to wait to eat it would have been horribly rude. In college, when I visited friends, I discovered (after some shocked looks sent my way) that in other families, it is horribly rude to start eating before everyone (including the cook) is seated.

Like a fish learning to describe water, the first step of connecting your child to a cultural identity may be for you to figure out what that identity is!

Here are topics you may want to think about:

  • What is your cultural background?
  • How might that be the same or different from other people in your child’s community?
  • What are some of cultural values that resonate with you? Are there values or attitudes you would like to leave behind?
  • What things in your life have helped you connect to your cultural identity?
  • What traditions or rituals do you want to continue to follow?

Sometimes talking with other people about their culture, or reading books from diverse cultures, can help you to understand your own better. I would recommend Parenting without Borders as a great introduction to other cultures’ approaches to parenting.

Beginning to talk about culture

We don’t have to wait till children are “old enough” to understand religion and culture to begin talking about it. Like everything else in their lives, from food to books to dressing themselves, we talk from the beginning about all the things they experience, and trust that their understanding of it will grow and deepen as they get older.

Young children are very concrete. They learn through hands-on experience, and through observing the important people in their lives. They don’t really learn through abstract conversations about abstract ideas. They also learn through repetition, so as you begin to think about what parts of your cultural identity and values you want to reinforce, keep that in mind.

Culture: Routines, Rituals, and Traditions

For a toddler, life often seems unpredictable and random. Routines create a reassuring sense of structure in a child’s life – the more they know what is coming next, the more manageable life seems for them. They appreciate the sense gained from daily routines that ‘this is how my family does things.’ Ritual and traditions take that to the next level: ‘this is how my people do things and how we have done things for a very long time’. For example, from annual holiday traditions, they gain a sense of how time passes, bringing with it lots of change, but also retaining some important cores.

Some places to consider adding rituals or traditions:

  • Daily: How do you begin your days together? What are mealtimes like? What is the typical rhythm of the day? What’s the bedtime routine?
  • Weekly: Could you do “family date nights”? Weekly dinners with extended family?
  • Holidays: Which do you celebrate? How do you celebrate? What are the special decorations? Foods? Gifts?
  • Special occasions: Does the tooth fairy come to your house? What do you do for birthdays? Weddings?
  • Other family traditions: Do you have nicknames or family in-jokes or songs? Stories about the funny quirks of relatives?

Some ways to include cultural identity in your child’s life:

  • Tell stories. Talk about your childhood, how your family did things, about their grandparents’ childhoods, and so on.
  • Read books about your culture, listen to ethnic music or the music your parents played/sang when you were young, eat foods that were traditional where you were raised. (That’s Jello salad and snickerdoodle cookies for me!)
  • Learn the language of your culture. (Or share with your children the regional dialect of English that you were raised with.)
  • Go to religious services or cultural festivals.
  • Make scrapbooks with information about your family’s history: a family tree, photographs, documents of your family’s journey

Learn more: www.growparenting.com/pages/blog_files/Building-Cultural-Identity.php