Raising My 9 & 7 Year Old With Emotional Intelligence
The girls are 9&7 and I happened to google The Nine Year Change from the Waldorf prospective & it definitely got me thinking about their growth leading up to this point.
9 years old. I remember being 9. In Fact I would say it was a pivotal point in my childhood where I suddenly had this awareness with emotions, not just mine but more so with others.
Needs shift too.
I noticed my oldest staying close to me when out & placing her head on my shoulder. I started to make it a habit to ask if she wanted a hug when she did that because it was mentioned in the article I read.
To my surprise she always says yes.
I guess they do eventually stop running up to us with bear hugs.
Lately as I have been learning about siblings so close in age (when am I not? Lord help me ha!) - there has been a lot of fighting, conflict & just roughness all around with them both.
Can I blame the moon being in Aries at this time? Well -It definitely propelled us into this lesson - for sure!
We needed to come together. More importantly - we needed to come back to love.
Learning how to communicate and share our needs has always been huge for me, so we sat down one morning & we shared our values & thoughts.
As I started talking - a new language just spilled out that I haven’t had a chance to work through yet.
I guess now is the time.
Language about seeing the good in people.
I have been noticing a lot of complaining happening & I also linked it with how they have been processing their friendships.
I started to tell them that if they continue to only see the “bad” or undesirable qualities of each other and those around them that it would be hard to find that spot in the heart where love is.
Ryleigh’s face was like - ding, ding, ding - it suddenly made sense to her.
I then went on to say that if we catch ourselves in that circle of only noticing undesirable qualities - to make sure to name the qualities we love about that person too.
It opens the heart space up & I feel like overtime the heart space for that other person could possibly grow.
(FYI - I am not touching on abusive talk or actions here as that is a whole other conversation)
We need to see both sides sometimes because we will be around people who we wouldn’t necessarily hang with all the time but when we can see more good within - it will then help us have a little space to be able to love & communicate better.
Ryleigh then immediately brought up Bruno in the movie Encanto. She said - so like how Bruno was treated?
YES! LIKE HOW BRUNO WAS TREATED!
How smart is this girl? It’s that 9 year change ya’ll!
They both then went on to describe and relate to what we had just talked about to Bruno’s journey in the movie.
How that person or family member might feel if there is only a focus on their undesirable qualities.
The language they use about Bruno/ brother / family member.
& how it all comes together at the end.
I did mention that there are families out there that are split. The siblings get older and separate and don’t have many good things to say about each other - or even the parent / child relationship. Which is a whole journey in itself but I wanted them to know it doesn’t have to be that way or that we can start to value each other as we grow.
We start to understand each other better as we practice seeing through different lenses.
We might end up turning that undesirable quality into something we love about them!
Or we realize there is a projection happening or mirroring with this other person / family member - but that is a whole other conversation as well with many layers.
Only time will tell with this little experiment on how our family will grow and as we all age.
I’d like to say I’m on to something though.
This is also important to me I have learned because I am an only child. It does pain me to see adult siblings not getting along & I often wonder as I raise my girls how we can combat that.
To conclude our conversation together - we listed what we loved about each other. - If you have never done this with your kids, especially if you have siblings close in age - it’s a game changer.
The following days seemed to flow so much better.
Sometimes we need that reminder to see the “good” in others if we find ourselves focusing on the “bad.”
I know I do as well.
