Parenting Stint: 5 Sibling Rivalry Fix

Tots who are supported and praised when starting to learn their early childhood skills grow with autonomy and positive self-esteem. But teaching them a little less of autonomy and confidence, and more of appreciation and coöperation may also be as important.

Living in a house with two little nieces of almost the same age got me into episodes of tiny feuds. The 6-year-old miss would not usually put up with her soon-to-be 4-year-old sister.   The “She started it.” and “Why can’t she just use her own crayons?!” lines sometimes distract me from my reading. My hopeful attempts to make my own short vacations at home mostly end up into a bundle of disaster.

These siblings quibbling are not necessarily trivial since they begin at large in the formative years or the first 7 years of life. How my nieces learn to handle brannigan will influence the way they will handle disagreements when they become adults. The role of parents and guardians goes without saying.

As their tita (Aunt) I feel like having to apply what I learned from college, books, and parenting dialogues with the experts. My degree in Nursing has always been a help to a not-yet-mom like me.

Behavior Variations

Toddler and pre-school are the years when children first learn to have enough vocabularies to express their feelings. It is also the stage when they start to learn how responsibilities are shared in the home.

My 6-year-old niece’s familiar lines however prove that there are emotions and responsibilities she cannot fully understand. She is not absolved by the explanation, “Your sister is just a baby. She doesn’t really know what she’s doing”. She often thinks there are privileges and behaviors allowed to her sister that are not tolerated in her.

It is not at all easy since what you think as temperate solution to perils might result into behavior confusion.

See it in general

Approach both lightly and ask without provoking. Provoking promotes defensive reasons as do my nieces. Detecting what’s really going on might help both children; and help parents or guardians learn just how to deal with the kids individually.

Feelings, Oh, Oh, Oh feelings

Bottom-line is, feelings of jealousy occur in some way when there is more than one kid in the house. The key is to help them recognize their feelings by observing them and encouraging them when they do something favorable “I like the way you let your sister borrow your crayons” or “It’s good that you helped her fix her things”.

It’s always not advisable to use the word “bad” when pointing out that something wrong was done. It rather confuses them what they are actually feeling.

For very young children like my nieces, doing some prompting is a big help, “I can see that you feel sad that your sister doesn’t feel like sharing her toys with you now” or pointing specifically to the act, “I see that you took your sister’s drawing book without her permission” and asking follow-up questions like, “Why did you do it?”. Allowing so helps both parents and the kids see the bigger picture.

It’s true that when kids know their feelings are respected, they become more empathetic to others. The rule of the thumb is-- acknowledgement.

Help them communicate

Allowing the kids to express how they feel gives them the idea that their opinion matters. Using words like “she feels”, “she looks”, “you seem” “I think” and avoiding definitive phrase like “It’s bad” will let them distinguish bad behaviors of the person over the person herself.

Set up rules

Kids understand rules more than you think. Rules also help diminish conflicts and help them follow and stick to their responsibilities.

But one important thing to remember is to always be consistent with your rules. Sticking with TV schedules, taking turns, or providing them space will help instill in them discipline, patience, concern, and respect for privacy.

Play is key

Doing activities that foster coöperation like board games, or for Filipino families, bahay-bahayan will encourage coöperation and family bonding.

For more cooperative children games you may refer to Child Care Lounge and Family Pastimes. 

Unfit situations like sibling rivalry can be used as time to teach kids good lessons. How kids are taught will say a lot about who they will most likely become in the future. You might as well do them a favor. I am beginning to.






Photo Credits:
weheartit (dot) com

Anger Management, NOT the Movie

Do you know that awkward feeling when your anger bursts into tears?

When CAPS LOCK is not enough to express your anger             

On Losing Hopes and Giving Up

Life is mostly fair, at one point it is great. But that is of course when everything goes well and problems are easily resolved.

Image taken from weheartit.com

It’s hard to warrant life as being good when too much problems hits you in the eye. When you’re laid off at work and your mother gets cancer; or you failed in the board exam five times, and went through a very painful annulment; or when the society attached you stigma simply because you fall short physically for a human eye.

People you know and who knows you in the same way work up to tell you that life can still get better if only you hold on to it. But you know to yourself that no one thing that they said has come up to give you a hasty remedy because the pain is engraved deeply, an unfathomable form of spiritual emptiness and clutter. Nobody in good shape of life can just plainly understand how difficult it is to get imprisoned in that kind emotional whack.

When the only legal thing life’s trials has ever done to you is to make you feel so deserving of misery, don’t you think it’s easier to give up and lose hope?

When God's Answer Doesn't Make Sense

I have been knuckling down myself, volunteering in a hospital for almost eight weeks. That’s nearly two months. And until now I really wonder how I was able to hold down close to months of physical and emotional burnout of working 40 hours every week without pay, and a slight amount of ill-humor from few random people around.

Image taken from weheartit.com

Honestly, that is even far from other people’s experience. But one of the hardest parts of getting through bad situations is when you reach the point where you can no longer balance yourself well. It happened to me in the past few weeks.

I belong to an entire generation of Nurses who after graduating and getting the license hardly gets a paying job in the same profession. Or when we get a chance we have to start from scratch and become a “volunteer”. It’s one of the trending professional misplace these days. Even supposing, I still find it okay. Sometimes we really have to start from the bottom to get to where we want (the top).

There only came a point when I could no longer find my passion in what I was doing. At times I become so ambivalent of whether my motivations for entering into nursing were really right. Or if I ever had a wrong notion about it. 

Going on duty always seemed like a struggle each day. And often times I think of quitting and never coming back to the hospital again.

When my co-trainees ask me what my plans are after the training or if I’d still ever want to work in the hospital, I stutter and trip over my words hoping to find an answer I would not regret. But even I. Even I was racking to find my own answer to the question. 

I didn’t know what to do. I cried each night and found myself always praying that I would never do any harm to my patients despite the inner struggles I was having for weeks.

I’ve never been this negative in the several years past. But adequate enough to say that losing hopes amidst too much negative circumstance shots no one in exemption.

Waking Up to a Fluffy Eyes

Image taken from ps-iheartyou.tumblr.com

For once, I felt the need to clear everything that happened. I tossed and hang a left as I moved past the late night conversation. I sat down the stairs trying to sort it out. I suppose I made the right decision in laying the real score out in the open.

As I ponder every decision we make in life, especially when it’s a decision that has something to do with persons coming in and out our lives, demands a spit and image of attention we give to some of the other significant things in our life. When emotions are involved, things wouldn’t be way easier. There always has to be a consideration for all the consequences of our actions. We have to weigh them up and see what will serve better.

Decisions shouldn’t also depend solely on emotions because the latter do last and when it does, we eventually realize that we could’ve made a better judgement and decision. Let our emotions be part of our making for our decisions but the basis.

Things should be pondered upon fairly well before it’s laid out. It would be difficult though sometimes we have to take full maturity and responsibility in letting go of things that would only give a more negative effect to many or hold on to things that really matter to us. Now it takes much realization to do.

So today, 1:37 pm as I wake up, I find my eyes flocculent as I look in the mirror and am still contemplating. I only pray for God’s guidance that I could make the most-fitting judgment to all these things that are moving stealthily in my present life.








Image Credits:
ps-iheartyou.tumblr.com

Forever Young

There's nothing more good than being young in mind and heart l 
Image taken from daytobeyou.com

I wanna be forever young! — If only life put up with this.

First, I’m turning 21 this year and am not getting any younger.

Physically, I may still be able to get along with activities that require so much strength but I pretty  sure that my endurance wouldn’t be as sound as a 4th grader could get. 

Emotionally, I cannot just let my tantrums and emotional constipation fly in the air because I’m no more 3 years old and the society expects me to act and deal with things the more mature way; which also means to say that I could no longer just decide on things impulsively and do whatever I want without keeping other people in mind. 

Mentally, I know I have to stretch my brain and understand things the higher level. That 10,000 minus 8,985 is not equals 1015 but finding a job (with pay) and searching for a sideline to get the money coming in for the family’s daily consumption and for a post-graduate study’s tuition. 

And spiritually, I need to realize that going to church every Sunday and memorizing some bible passages cannot help grow my sacred side but act on them.

Second, being young holds for so many opportunities to explore without hesitations of what the people around can say. A young mind and heart is yet spared of the world’s too much vanity. Innocence is professed. 

Lastly, I just miss the times when all I think about is what movie to watch the next day and get mad at the mom for not buying me the pink-dressed doll she promised since two weeks ago.

Photo Credits:

daytobeyou.com

Love Song

Photo by Jessica Allen

Listen to a song, it's from a heart that's bleeding strong now. Hear my heart, are you deaf of its yearning? I bet for all this time, it's time you should know something. Lately I've been keeping all my love, trying to hide everything I've felt, but to keep is not enough, this doesn't really make me tough. so I'd tell you... that I love you even if you love her too, it's just so hard to remain a friend, though I know it's where I'm still going to end. that i need you even if you need her too, a symphony of a broken heart, longing for a better start. A friend's love can grow, and now at least you know, you know that I love you. Listen to a song, it's from a heart that's bleeding strong, hear my heart go wrong, listen to a friend's first true love song. Yours Truly, The Black Anonymous A Guest Post from (About the Author): The Black Anonymous is a Filipino Registered Nurse working for one of the biggest hospitals in Cebu, Philippines.                                            He lives by the rules of basketball and the depths of Shakespeare. Authorship Disclosure: The contributor of this article shall be identified as The Black Anonymous,                                            who prefers to use his pen name. Contents of this article do not necessarily                                           imply that of the author [Syril Tañala], or the website [Pens n' Paper]. This is                                            written and posted with pure intentions to impart literary pieces online.

Image Credits:

I love music photo by Jessica Allen, blog.gigg.com

Last Teardrop

Take time to let go... l 
Image Credit: Taken from the video added by  Asif Want

It takes so much courage and awareness to wrap around ourselves in each time we talk about the concept of hurt and pain.

Yes, you already have had too much of broken relationships, of broken assumptions that your feelings be reciprocated, of broken hopes that there is still someone out there who is really set for you.  And no, you aren’t going to read this article because you think it’s just another form of an emotional drain and customary advice of the melodramatics.

But yes you’re a part of this world and you’ve also been deep-seatedly fighting for that probably similar concern, and you also reach some point of exhaustion.

         “Deep within your heart you know it’s time to move on when the fairytale that you once knew is gone.”   

Every relationship formed is a boost to every person’s character. The idea of acquiring a relationship without exerting too much effort is a big turn on in the attraction part of our brain. Through this we get the idea that we are loved unconditionally. The bond that is created which overrules any unfamiliarity makes us all believe that the affections we receive can be unconditional or at least strong enough not to give in to any possible problems that may arise in the future.

However, points come in our lives when these relationships which we first thought would give us the most nurturing strength break at one reason or another. Each relationship’s needs vary in that it also requires specific efforts to maintain it. It may be a natural process that we get angry and cry over the cut that has been made in us. Although some people manage such situations by cursing the other person & revealing how negative they have been, and others manage it by appearing as the most rueful victim. Either way, we have to remember that when there’s no point for saving a relationship or that saving it would mean sacrificing our dignity for something we’re pretty sure is already hard to heal again, then it’s way better to let it go. 

Deep within your heart you know it’s time to move on when the fairytale that you once knew is gone, says one song. It’s true. Granting that it may be hard and it may happen at different times for different people, we need to accept that there are things in life that have to happen in order to teach us some important lesson.

We might have not been spared of too much hurt.  The damage might have also seemed irreparable. But that doesn’t mean that the other person is a total amiss and hurting. It may only be that they came at a point in our lives when their stage of life and maturity is not yet downright and complete or that their ideals don’t  match with ours. 

There are so many factors to consider, but one thing that’s for sure is that these people have been given to us to teach us lesson that only them can do. Much as there is no good or bad person, only people who teach us different lessons in life. It’s God who works to make the right things happen. To that end, cursing the people who hurt us or appearing like the pathetic victim all the time would be of no help.                        

   “Our vision clears, when our eyes are washed away with tears”                                                                       

We cry largely for all these painful constraints. But tears also serve another purpose, and that is to clear up our vision and straighten out bent beliefs and feelings about the pains of life and how we could better deal with them. These tears serve to help us see things the more helpful way.

Final words though, if it's a choice between dignity and letting go, choose the former. God has given us extensive ways from which we could learn life's lessons-- and one of them is through tears.               

Postscript: Thank you very much for letting pass a time reading this blog post. This is one of the many ideas that I would like to share with you and I'd be glad to make you part of the writing process by freely leaving your thoughts and suggestions. 

                In the meantime, set your mood with this music by my favorite pianist, Yiruma. Let's keep inspiring each other!

                      







Image/ Video Credits:
taken from the video added by Asif Want, youtube.com 
Sigita P, youtube.com

The Paradox of a Smile

 

Smile is the Art of Happiness, says one writer. And being able to master that art is one key to living a beautiful and successful life.

Easy to say at some point when everything that is happening seems to revolve around the way we would want it to. Or should I say that when you get to hold of that “mature concept” of life and everything in it, then it’s way favorable to quote that you have already “mastered the art of happiness”.

Image Credit: Mashable Deviantart.com

Sure there’s nothing wrong in saying that smiles really do affect people, slack of whether or not they’re genuine, spontaneous, or a little bit “held-to-ransom”. The fact that we throw back some of it when it’s flaunted to us reveals that it touches our mood into something of a lighter side.

One study says our emotions are reinforced by the corresponding expressions we make. It’s like a feedback loop. But ironically humans still have the ability to suppress and repress unpleasant emotions, and smiling is one concrete channel of doing it.

We smile at most to show that we can still hold for ourselves no matter how unbearable a situation and our feelings for it can be. And although without smile (no matter how false) we can hardly begin with the cliche’ that the way to happiness starts with oneself. Albeit factual is that cliche’.

For whether or not smile is an Art of Happiness or an Art of Emotional Defense, doesn’t mean we are less truthful and less sensitive to the world than others are.

I’m actually smiling now as I write this post; sublime to whatever problems (personal and the likes) that are wishing me an emotional constipation. I just hope to share with you a little piece of thought and conviction.

“Too often we underestimate the power of a touch, a smile, a kind word,

a listening ear, and honest compliment, or the smallest act of caring,

all of which have the potential to turn a life around.”

– Leo F. Buscaglia

Image Credits:

Mashable at deviantart.com