Some time ago, many mothers saw a piece of news. A 71-year-old man who set up a stall used snacks to lure girls to take advantage of it. He was too strict with his children at ordinary times, and his children were more likely to be tempted by bad people when they were greedy.
So Dr. Clove found Mr. Qin Nan and asked for advice [how can guide children to refuse the temptation of strangers].
When a child is at a young age, it is often difficult to resist the current temptation of [food]. Almost instantly, parents see their usual painstaking efforts come to naught.
Why is it difficult for children to resist the sugar-coated cannonball tempted by delicious food? It should be viewed in two aspects.
The younger the age, the weaker the self-control, the more opportunities the temptation has.
The younger the child is, the easier it is to surrender to temptation when faced with something he likes. Strangers’ food often means that they can get it [at no cost], so this series of temptations has defeated many children.
I always tell my baby not to be greedy at ordinary times, but when he sees his friend’s child with delicious food in his hand, his eyes are full of light. Every time I am especially angry, why do you think he is so worthless!
This [worthless] performance of children is actually very normal. Children’s psychological development at this stage has one characteristic-weak self-control and inability to control themselves when faced with temptation, which is the common feature of this stage.
However, it is also because of [poor self-control] that strangers’ food temptation has an opportunity.
Children’s self-control is a kind of ability that can be trained the day after tomorrow. It cannot be required to be in place at one time. It should be guided and trained slowly.
Lack of scene discrimination ability, allowing danger to take advantage of
Another important reason for deciding whether children will be tempted by dangerous food is the lack of judgment on [safe environment].
Scene 1: The child was playing at his little companion’s house. Other parents gave the child a chocolate. Knowing that his mother ordered him not to eat it, he stuffed it into his mouth…
Scene 2: The child is playing at the door of the house. A strange uncle gives the child a chocolate. After the child hesitates, he still cannot help reaching out his hand…
In these two scenes, adults can immediately judge whether [safe] and [dangerous]. However, the children’s first concern is the immediate [whether the food I like to eat], ignoring the judgment of the dangerous environment [who is giving me food].
Can the temptation of facing snacks be solved by letting children [not lose their mouths] as Ding Dad said?
Of course not!
[Don’t lose your mouth] can only meet all the requirements of children, and can’t help them resist temptation. It will also plunge parents into the endless black hole of children’s [desires] until the day when they can’t afford it.
There are also some parents who adopt a “one size fits all” approach to tell their children that places outside their homes are dangerous, which in turn will make their children flinch and lose the courage to explore the world.
The lack of self-control and safety awareness is the problem hidden behind [food temptation].
Only by improving children’s self-control and safety awareness can children refuse strange temptations.
How helps children resist [dangerous temptations]?
1. Meet reasonable needs in a timely manner
Isn’t it said that children’s needs cannot be met indefinitely? Is it true that whenever children have what needs, they have to wait deliberately or try their best not to be satisfied, so that children can form a refusal to temptation?
Of course not! In this way, children learn only [endure], not [control].
When we talk about self-control, we mean that children take the initiative to control their own desires, not the desire deliberately delayed or rejected by parents. Often this deliberate delay will only make children surrender faster when facing temptation. Because once they leave the parents’ [deliberate monitoring], the so-called [self-control] will disintegrate in an instant.
Meeting children’s reasonable needs in time is to give children trust and affirmation of self-control ability. The more children trust adults, the longer they will be able to control their desires.
At the same time, it should be noted that if you have promised your child that if you resist the temptation, there will be rewards, please be sure to honor the rewards, because this will not only increase trust, but also make your child more independent and self-controlled, and will be more confident to deal with the same scene problems in the future.
2. Establish a clear non-boundary to help children establish a safe situation.
For children who lack the ability to judge the situation, most of the time they will only pay attention to the food itself in the face of temptation. Then it is especially important to use [parental authority] to tell their children that what can and what cannot appear at this time, which is far more important than [earnestly].
So, tell the child:
The food given by the family guests can only be eaten after permission.
Outside alone, anyone should politely refuse food.
Security guards and police in shopping malls can be trusted.
… …
Every time, help the child to establish his own safety situation as much as possible and establish clear boundaries between right and wrong. This will enable the child to make quick and direct judgment when he cannot judge or temporarily faces temptation alone, and can also find the help object faster when facing danger.
Acknowledge and affirm the feeling of resisting temptation
Sometimes when a child resists temptation, he will show pain and entanglements. At this moment, don’t say [it’s okay, it’s okay, just endure for a while]. This is actually an emotional denial of the child’s resistance to temptation.
However, this kind of negation is not conducive to the growth of children’s self-control. On the contrary, it will lead to such negative emotions as [why am I always enduring, I can’t bear it] because normal emotions are not accepted. Don’t evaluate children [bad] just because they seem to show or show that they can’t help it.
So this is the best way to tell the child
I know you wanted to eat this food very much at that time. I think it must be hard at all. But you did it! Let’s look for a good way to succeed in what.
When feeling accepted, even if he still [didn’t eat it] in the end, the child’s self-control will grow imperceptibly. Accumulation over and over again will make him perform better in the face of the next temptation. This comes from feeling the respect and affirmation when being accepted by his parents.
4. Security Begins with SAY NO
Sometimes, children are not unable to resist the temptation and dare not SAY NO in the face of strangers’ hospitality. Therefore, we may need to let children learn to say “no”.
In this case, parents can use drills to improve their children’s skills in refusing others. For example:
Decline: Thank you, I don’t need this
Postponement Request: Can I think about it again?
Warning Rejection: My father/mother is nearby, I need their consent first.
Setting up different scenes for children and training preset refusal words can also help children to save themselves from [embarrassment] when encountering similar other problems.
According to statistics, 433 cases of sexual abuse of children were publicly reported in 2016, and many suspects used food and toys as bait to attack children.
As parents, we cannot always protect our children, nor can we create an absolutely safe [vacuum environment] for them. We must tell them that there are good and bad people in this world, learn to refuse the temptation of strangers, learn to protect ourselves, and prevent children from becoming the next victims.