Useful Concepts For Parents

s you move through the chapters ahead, you’ll acquire many skills. You’ll become more aware of the immense power of attitudes and how they can help you to be more effective. And you’ll also gain some valuable concepts for parenting. The first is a way of viewing human nature; it can help you understand your children’s behavior — and your own.

CONCEPT #1: Three Levels of Self

“My daughter’s an angel at times: so sweet, good-natured and helpful. But other times — look out! She can be demanding, rude, self-centered, unwilling to listen.... Why does she get like that?”

One moment our children and teens can be cooperative, mature and responsible — and the next....well, we all know what that’s like. Why does a good-hearted child or teen become so difficult? For that matter, why do we, as parents, exhibit the patience of a saint sometimes — and other times totally “lose it”? If we can gain some insight into what’s driving difficult behavior, we’ll be in a better position to influence it.

Three levels of self is a way of viewing behavior that parents in our classes find especially valuable. It is adapted from psychosynthesis, a school of psychology developed by the Italian psychiatrist, Dr. Roberto Assagioli. This concept recognizes that as we move through the day, encountering a variety of situations, distinct aspects of our personalities become active. Depending on what’s happening, different “parts” of us come out:

“lower self”
“centered self”
“higher self”

The lower self is on stage when a child or teen is whining, acting out or being destructive — or when a parent blows up or gives up and caves in. When a child or adult is calm and composed, the centered self is in charge; the thoughtful, reasoning part of the brain is active. There is also a higher self, the part of your child that is creative, loving and wise — and the part of you that yearns to become the best parent you can be. The higher self is associated with qualities we admire, such as courage and compassion.

We can use this way of looking at behavior in very practical ways, as we’ll see in a moment. But let’s continue with the concept: there are three levels, and we move back and forth among them, sometimes several times a day. When we’re calm and composed, the centered self is in control; we feel relaxed and can think clearly. But when a child or adult feels stressed or overwhelmed, alarm bells go off in the nervous system. The body tenses as if survival were at stake. Emotions take over; we can slip into a crisis mode controlled by instinct. Reason disappears; we act impulsively and behavior can be ineffective or destructive. The lower self is on stage.

The lower self is often an automatic response to stress. Physiologically, when we feel threatened, our more primitive “emotional brain” takes charge as if our survival were at stake, sending signals to attack or run away. Our impetuous, unthinking behavior is a response to what feels like a “crisis.” If we look at our children and ourselves in that light, it transforms our way of seeing.

Normally, we might respond to a child who is acting out by thinking, “She’s being defiant and selfish,” or “He needs to be taught a lesson in no uncertain terms.” Then we might say something critical or even punish the child. But our response will be quite different if we recognize that the child is stressed and unhappy. To be sure, we will make it clear that the behavior is inappropriate. But seeing this perspective, we can take a very different approach, and do so much more than criticize or punish. We can work with the child, first helping him to become calm (shift to the centered self), then assisting him to learn more effective ways of coping with stress and meeting his needs.

In the same way, we can view ourselves with new insight. When we feel upset and “lose our cool,” we can understand it as an automatic, unthinking response to stress; attempting to cope, we’ve slipped to the lower self. Instead of feeling guilty or ashamed and resolving “never to do that again” (which seldom lasts for long), we can learn how to step back and cool off — and move to a calmer, more level-headed state of mind: the centered self.

A primary goal of this program is to give you the awareness and ability to shift, when appropriate, from lower self to centered self. That removes a central obstacle to effective parenting; it allows you to spend an increasing amount of your time being more centered, open and effective — so you can help your children do the same. (Working with the higher self in parent and child is the subject of the book that follows this one. For most situations, the centered self is what we need.)