Give Your Child Tools To Drop Emotions & Thoughts

Question: You’ve talked about how four-year old children [and younger] don’t usually experience embarrassment. But in my own four year old daughter, I see often times what I think is embarrassment - she cries out of embarrassment from what she has done, not necessarily that she hasn’t reached her desire. Am I understanding this correctly or is it just a tantrum?

Sat: It depends when the child begins to realize that it is just a body as to how they feel. Some kids are earlier and some are later. But it’s really hard for a grown up person to really analyze and realize what the child is feeling because I’m not even sure they’re clear about the way they feel. Just a tantrum comes and in a 4 year old it is definitely much less than as they grow and become familiar with the idea of shame. Unfortunately, because that’s one of the main problems with ego. Then they would react to it more and some kids might be very expressive in their emotions and some just keep it inside. So it’s not bad if the child is showing - and it’s better in some cases that they show it in their emotions and get help with how to control the emotions from the mother [rather] than to keep it inside and it turns to anger later in life.

So it’s hard to say but the main thing is that the discipline should not be in public - it just shouldn’t. Because most parents that I’ve seen when they discipline their child loudly in public, they really are trying to save their own face as a good mother. And that should never, ever be the purpose for which we want to discipline our kids. It shouldn’t be about the mother - it should be about the child and its feelings. So if it is in public, I would take the child aside and just kneel down to their height and just tell them this is not acceptable. If they continue throwing a tantrum in public or using language that’s not acceptable, we’re just leaving or something like that. But to shout at the kids in public, and say, “You can’t do that, stop,” and all that, eventually it makes the child shy, definitely. And it shakes their self confidence.

I’ve seen it in Iran when I was growing up. Thank God My parents were not like this. But I used to see how this discipline - particularly from the father - would come as an egoistic “I am the father, I have the authority and I can discipline you anywhere I want to, in any language I want to,” and I know we don't have this problem but I think it’s nice to know.

The other thing I want to say about shame is when a child begins to feel shame it also feels imperfection in itself and that is not the truth of the child at all. This is why I think shame is a very, very important trait the child picks up in this world and has to deal with it. It is really, for Me, it is very important that with every emotion that the child has, or feelings, that we have a tool to give them to eliminate itm, rather than discipline it. I always say if your child is throwing a tantrum let them do it if it is not in public and then really give them a tool by asking, “Does it feel good?” And some kids say “Yes, it feels really well” because they’re still upset and say, “Ok then that’s fine.” And the main thing I would like to emphasize is giving the child a tool to eliminate this growing lack of self confidence that the world presents to them and let them know they can let go of a thought, how easy it is to let go of an emotion, how easy it is to find the peace and all of that.

And I think as we practice as parents, it gets easier and easier for us to give children tools because they also come to this world, once their mind is developed, they come to this world with past tendencies. And so it’s not just what we do as parents, it’s what they picked up as an impression of their years in the past. And it’s up to us to be able to help them eliminate what they couldn’t do in the past. And one of the main things again is to tell your child they are the light, they are light. They probably will not understand what you’re saying that to them, but you continue saying that to them daily. And praising when it’s needed and keeping silence when it’s needed and most of all helping them deal with their emotions in a spiritual way, not in a common way. We always tell our kids what is good and what is bad and we miss the fact to tell them who they are. So what is good and bad becomes a burden on their shoulders because they can’t control their mind. And if they cannot control their mind, they cannot control their actions and they are being blamed for something they cannot control. So the best approach is to cut down on discipline of what is good and bad and keep telling them to go into silence and keep telling them who they are - that really shortcuts their misery in life. And I wish I was told like this.

And I see it in My own kids and those that witness My kids around Me, that they do have self-confidence because they were told who they are. And that’s the main thing. And positive reinforcement, meaning that taking them back again and again to their grandeur and their perfection. Like I do with all of you. Constantly taking them back to that, whether they understand or not it really doesn’t matter. There is a vibration when a mother tells the truth of a child’s being that surpasses any type of regular, right approach to raising a child. So just remember that - that the main thing, the main gift that you can give to your child is to do that.

And you can do that through stories. As I’ve said many times before, and I think I’m going to say it again, I used to tell a story for six years going on our ride to elementary school. Every single morning I would continue making up this story. In this story, we started with a child and its dog. And whatever you want to teach your child that is making them successful - inner success and outer success - you can bring it into that story. And there were six, seven months that the story went to see God in everything we see. So, the mountain, I would say, “Yea he went up the mountain and he realized the mountain also was God, this was God, that was God.” And one day I was taking them to school and I said, “Okay tell Me, what do you see God in?” And my younger boy, who at that time must have been a second grader, said, “Mom, I see God in the flat tire of a car.” I was really shocked. I said “Oh yea, how come?” And he said, “Because I always have a fear of flat tires but if I see God in it, I will be okay.” So, these are more important than the unimportant things we want our children to learn. So be very aware of that, that you are not feeding the child the impression that society has of what is a good kid or what is a bad kid, although that is important too, but the most important, besides telling them to be polite and all of that and respect other people, is who they are. If we can do that - we’ve done our job.

But more than that, far more than that, is for a child to know oneself and to free itself of pain and suffering. Particularly explaining to them that lying is not acceptable. But more than that, far more than that, for a child to know oneself and to free itself of pain and suffering give them the essence of their being, and who they are. If we can do that - we’ve done our job. All the other stuff will dissolve itself because their inner will guide them. We don’t have to put so much effort in the details of their lives.

Question: Sat I really would like to do that but how can I tell my children to drop their emotion when I can’t do it with myself?

Sat: First of all I don’t think it’s so much about letting go of the emotions and all of that for them because this is a very impossible task. Just give them the technique and encourage them and there is no failure. If they cannot do it at time, just give it understanding and say yes it happens to me too but at least we know that we have a choice. We are not looking for the perfection of the personality so much because it’s like correcting the image in the mirror. But what we are doing is giving the child the way that if it’s used, most of the time can help him at least not to stay in that emotion too long and then we leave it alone. We don’t say, “Oh, you didn’t do it now, you should have done it or this and that.” No, just give [the tool] and remind them and we leave it at that, otherwise it becomes responsibility and who wants another responsibility on top of all the other stuff? So, our job is to use it when we can and to remind our child if it is in discomfort. That’s really all we can do.

Parenting Call
1/23/21