Whether or not you open your mouth to speak, you actually “talk” to yourself all day long. We all have a running dialogue in our heads. This inner voice sends you messages that affect how you feel about yourself. Sometimes the messages can help us through a challenge by boosting our self-esteem and other times these messages can bring us down.
Children often times verbalize these self-messages and parents can be left wondering how best to respond to their child’s negative self-talk. Big Life Journal has these recommendations for responding to your child’s negative self-talk:
Acknowledge the feeling, not the words. Help your child identify what is actually bothering them and separate that from their self-worth.Use humor to help them see things differently. Role-play a situation and make a certain part of it silly and then come back and help tackle the problem.Use specific praise to show your child how great they’re doing. Praise your child’s efforts. This helps them focus on the problem solving tools they’re using. Let them know that you’re noticing their efforts and attitude. This helps create a positive connection to a situation.Talk openly about negative self-talk. Think together about what your child might be afraid of when they say things like “I’m dumb”. By addressing the fear that leads to negative self-talk you can find useful strategies to work through it.Talk about having a growth mindset. Practice having a growth mindset on a goal you’re working towards and let them see mistakes that you make as well as strategies that you use.Discuss your “best failures.” At the dinner table, ask everyone to talk about something that they struggled with that day. Empathize with each other and celebrate everything that you accomplished that day despite setbacks.Create an Affectionate, Welcome Home. Show your child that you support them through their struggles. Let them know that you’ll always be there for them with compassion, acceptance, and support.If you would like more information on self-talk, please feel free to email
Andrea or stop by the counseling office located in the South Fork Building.
.png&command_2=resize&height_2=85 "Symbolic Learning and The Zionosphere")
