Transcript

Make your kids feel heard and understood.

Let’s talk about talking to our kids. I want to teach you three steps that will make them feel heard, seen, and understood. These are not my ideas. This is from a book called Giving the Love that Heals by Harville Hendrix. And there’s three steps, mirror, validate, and empathize.

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Mirroring, you probably have heard about a lot, that’s just reflecting.  The younger the child is, the more straightforward, just rote that can be.

For Example, Aw, you’re sad because you don’t get to play anymore. For older children and teens, you’re not going to be as rote. They won’t like that.

That might be an eye roll for them. You might get an eye roll no matter what you do. We can work with [00:01:00] that. But that is mirroring.

Validating is where you make some statement that lets them know that what they’re saying is not crazy. We send kids so many messages (like what were you thinking) that are invalidating, and we often act like what they’re thinking just isn’t right.

We want to counteract that with messages that let them know that we understand even if we disagree, or even if we can’t give them what they want. We understand. why they’re thinking what they’re thinking. It makes sense, and they can trust themselves because their thinking makes sense. So that is validation.

An example of validation might be when you are making dinner, you know they’re hungry, you know they’re ready to eat, and they want to snack. [00:02:00] Validation may be I get it. I know you’re hungry. It’s late, but I don’t want you to fill up on that. It’s going to be five minutes until dinner is ready.I hear you. It feels terrible and you’re sad.

And I led into the last one there and that is empathize. Empathy is I’m sorry you’re so hungry or I’m sorry that you can’t do that. Again, that doesn’t mean you agree or it is your fault. You’re just expressing empathy and you understand their feelings.

Those are the three aspects I want you to try to hit. You don’t have to do all three every time. Just keep them in mind. Mirror, validate, empathize. And also, you can do this with a boyfriend, a partner, your friends, a [00:03:00] spouse. Most people love when you talk to them in this way because they will feel heard and understood.