10 Secrets From Parent Who Raised Happy Kids

Caring parents will go the extra mile to ensure that their kids grow up to be happy and successful. It is essential for parents to get involved with their kids’ life and education.

As a parent, you want your kids to love and be loved; to find success, and to be happy. But how much control do you have over your kids’ happiness?

Keep in mind that their happiness is not predetermined. Although depression has a genetic link, our genes are adjustable. You can switch them on or off.

Thus, even if you were grumpy while growing up, it doesn’t mean that your kids will be bad-tempered, too. In various studies, they revealed that happy children are a product of optimistic homes and not of genetic makeup.

But what can you do to ensure that your kids’ happiness will surely flourish?

source

1. Make them feel connected

The key to your children’s happiness is a connected childhood. Make them feel connected to you, your spouse and other family members, as well as neighbors, friends, and even to your pets.

In the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, it showed that connectedness is the chief protector against emotional distress and suicidal thoughts. When children feel that they are cared for by the people at their school, they’re less likely to use drugs or engage in violence.

2. Establish strong relationship

Whenever you have free time, make sure to spend it with your kids to help you establish a healthy relationship with them. During breakfast time, for example, consider talking to them as if you were a friend and not a parent. Teach them about moral values. In that way, they’ll know what is right and wrong. By being a good friend to your kids, they’ll never try hiding anything from you. Instead, they share everything with you.

3. Avoid granting their every wish and desire

Doing so will help avoid putting kids in a bubble. If you grant their every request, they will grow expecting that their every desire is granted.

But we all know that the real world doesn’t work that way. As a parent, you must recognize the fact that you’re not responsible for their emotions. In that way, it’ll be easier for you to allow them to experience anger or frustration. As a result, your kids will have a more natural way to deal with negative emotions.

4. Be a good listener

Let them know that you understand them and that they can talk to you anytime. Ignoring your kids’ feelings will only cause them to keep their feelings and not share them with you. Be a good listener to them so they can trust you.

5. Ask for their help

It’s true that they’re still innocent creatures. But they like it if you make them feel special, especially if you ask for their help. Don’t lecture or scold them. When you ask for their help, do it politely and not in a way that they feel they’re being reprimanded.

6. Have a family discussion with them

It can be during breakfast or dinner time. Every day, ensure that you have a family discussion with your kids about the latest news, stories, or even gossips. You can talk about science so that you can share your knowledge with them and they can interact with you.

7. Promote social skills

source

Kids with excellent social skills are happier and more successful than kids who are socially incompetent. Children, who live in one of the best cities to raise a child, socialize with their peers and neighbors. When your kids developed these skills, they can easily cooperate with their peers. They become more helpful, and they can empathize.

8. Allow them to fail

By letting them fail, they’ll learn that failure can happen to anyone and that it is part of growing up. Let them realize that it is a chance for them to learn and grow and it is not an ending to their life.

9. Foster their growth mindset

Praising your kids for being good-looking, for example, will give them a mindset that physical appearance is vital above all else. But what happens if they lose their beauty? Should they undergo surgery just to make them feel worthwhile?

Instead of praising them for their beauty, compliment their effort, rather than the result. In other words, you need to appreciate their hard work associated with success and not the achievement alone. But don’t withhold praise. Instead, you need to redirect it.

10. Teach them to keep a daily gratitude journal

Having a feeling of gratitude is linked to emotional well-being. In a study, it showed that by practicing gratitude, they feel more optimistic and they feel better about their lives.

If your kids don’t like keeping a journal, you may start asking every member of the family to state something that he is thankful for. Make it a ritual. It is a habit that can foster different kinds of positive emotions that may help in having the lasting happiness to your kids.