Are you a parent with high hopes? How your positive thinking affects your child

Quick… which song won an Academy Award for best song of the year in 1959?

If you know that trivia, congratulations! It was the song, High Hopes in the movie Hole in the Head (not the most famous movie, I admit). The song became more popular after Frank Sinatra recorded it in 1961.

In the wake of today’s turbulence, the lyrics seem banal:

The next time they find you, with your chin on the ground,

There’s a lot to learn, so take a look around.

Just what makes that little old ant

Do you think it will move that rubber tree plant?

Anyone knows that an ant cannot move a rubber plant,

But he has high hopes, he has high hopes…

And an ant may not be able to move a rubber plant on its own, but if you hold out hope long enough, your chance of success increases, because with a hopeful attitude, inspiration has a place to strike. And with hope, resilience reigns. Without it, despair can paralyze and slow effective solutions to a halt.

High hopes can seem like a myth when we look around us today at all the suffering, disarray, unhappiness and fear, terror and paranoia. However, brain research continues to accumulate data that hopeful people are more effective at solving problems. Furthermore, it is very clear that what we pay attention to grows. And conversely, what we don’t pay attention to shrinks. If we focus on our hope, our hope grows. If we are overwhelmed with despair… well, that, of course, eliminates our hope.

Are we seeing our child’s strengths or are we overwhelmed by their lack of motivation? If we don’t pay attention to his strengths, they will surely not grow and the motivation “problem” will surely increase. Are we noticing our daughter’s consideration or are we always commenting on her bad mood? That’s the way to grow a bad mood. The human brain is not a capricious device that acts randomly. No, it acts according to a finely tuned set of principles. And one of those fundamental principles is that the focus of our attention, to a great extent, creates the reality that we experience. This is not New Age gibberish, although the new-age have capitalized on this fascinating aspect of our brain’s operating system. There has been much academic research on the subject. In fact, Appreciative Inquiry, one of the cornerstones of PCI’s coaching model, is a process methodology that stems from this research. Appreciative Inquiry itself has been researched to work powerfully because it strategizes with the propensities of the human brain in mind.

The fact is that hope will increase, if we pay attention to hopeful events. Soon enough, there are more hopeful things to talk about and our talk fills with more hope. With more hope in front of us, we detect it in others and in our world more often and more quickly. Before we know it, the negative things are being reduced by inattention and the positive things have been increasing, almost as if by magic! Of course, then we have more hope… the upward spiral continues… more good things happen.

Our world challenges us enormously to focus our attention on hope, on what brings and improves life. And I think it profoundly affects our upbringing. How can we stay focused on hope, on the positive, and on what is working in our daily lives with our children?
Here are five considerations for hopeful parenting in tough times.

In his research, CR Synder (The Psychology of Hope, The Free Press, 1994) found these important pointers:

1. Hopeful parents know how to get what they want. They are determined and enjoy being enterprising and flexible, especially in difficult times. Determination can be found in having a clear vision of what we want for our children and our families. Determination means having the mental energy and physical stamina to stay with a challenge long enough to sweat out an effective solution. If we give up, we can be sure to be defeated. Your self-care goes a long way in helping you stay determined when the going gets tough. Pay attention to the signs when you feel like giving up. Instead, think about what you can give yourself and your children that will focus on your inner strengths and enhance your perseverance.

2. Hopeful parents listen well. Listening and paying close attention to our children’s strengths increases our flexibility to change course if our parenting strategy isn’t getting the results we’re looking for. We can often learn from our children what is needed once we follow our instincts and answer this question from our integrity: What will make this situation more alive? As we look at our children from this perspective, we may suddenly realize there are many things we can do to give them a sense of accomplishment, to appreciate their talents in the moment and look to the future with hope.

3. Children see hopeful parents as successful. Hopeful parents seem to demonstrate their autonomy by feeling successful. This definition of success is not the definition that our world seems to care about: big house, big car, lots of money, etc. Rather success is measured as “Having high self-esteem and positive self-images.” This affects children on many levels: Positive parents with high self-esteem raise hopeful, happy, confident children with high self-esteem!

4. Hopeful parents comfort each other well. When things get worrying or really tough, hopeful parents comfort kids and act supportively during high-stress situations. Being there emotionally is a characteristic of the most hopeful parents. They do not allow negative energies to affect their ability to be present and available to their children. They are able to keep negativity at bay so that children don’t translate it as, “There’s no time for me.” Anxiety-ridden parents may not be responsive to children’s emotional needs. Hopeful parents instill confidence and openness in the communication process between parents and children, keeping those doors open, even during adolescence!

5. Hopeful parents support children’s autonomy and competence. This does not mean that everything goes. What it does mean is that by focusing on what the child does well every day, over time, the parent builds a strong sense of self in the child. With that comes conviction in the child of his talents and abilities. In the words of one of the children in Synder’s research: “The most important thing I remember about my parents is that they taught me to do things for myself. But I always knew that they would be there for me if I got into a tight spot. …If I messed up something, they would talk to me and not me.”

It seems that the bottom line of raising high hopes is that it can help us stay our best, even in tough times, and bring out the best in our children.

Then everything is possible… for us, our children… even our world.

Copyright Gloria DeGaetano, 2010. All rights reserved.

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