I teach incarcerate men how to be good dads.
In my last post, How to be a good dad, I talked about the 4 Objectives of a good dad, and said that in order to achieve the 4 Objectives, you must meet four emotional needs. Then I introduced The 4 Emotional Needs.
Knowing the 4 Emotional Needs will help you understand why children misbehave. Once you understand that, the dad-skills you will soon learn will make more sense, and you will be able to practice them with confidence.
In this post I explain the 4 Emotional Needs in a little more detail.
Up to this point in class, I’ve written the following on the whiteboard:
I tell my students, “I want to help you understand the 4 Emotional Needs and then show you how to meet those needs by using dad-skills.”
Then I add, If anyone asks you, ‘how do you be a good dad?’, you tell them:
Meet the 4 Emotional Needs
If I can get my students to understand the 4 Emotional Needs, I can get them to understand why the dad-skills (to meet those needs) are so important to practice.
So let me ask YOU the same question. How do you become a good dad? I hope your answer was:
Meet the 4 Emotional Needs
They are the 5 most powerful words a dad can live by.
The problem we should be focusing on
Back to my class. Here’s what I tell my students:
Children misbehave for a reason. The question we should ask ourselves is not, “How can I improve my child’s behavior?” but rather, “What is causing my child’s behavior, and how should I deal with THAT?”
There can be many reasons for misbehavior. There is, however, one reason that is common among all children:
They have four emotional needs that are not being properly met.
Let’s talk about each of the 4 Emotional Needs.
Sense of belonging
The first need is to feel a sense of belonging.
To a child, belonging means to feel connected, valued, and recognized as part of the family.
Each child yearns for dad’s undivided attention and approval. When dad meets his child’s need for a sense of belonging, his child feels connected, important, noticed, included, accepted and loved.
However, if dad does not meet this need, his child feels disconnected, unimportant, left out, forgotten and rejected. A child cannot bear to feel that way.
If dad does not meet his child’s need for a sense of belonging, his child will go after it on his own. Every waking hour will be spent exploring methods (or behaviors) that will give him a sense of belonging.
For example, a child might think hitting, teasing, throwing tantrums, whining, and getting into mischief is a good way to get dad’s attention. And getting dad’s attention gives him a sense of belonging.
Children learn that although these behaviors bring an angry reaction from dad, it is better than no attention at all.
Angry attention is better than no attention.
Sense of Personal Power
The second need is to feel a sense of personal power.
A sense of personal power means to feel independent. It means to feel important; to feel in charge of one’s self and having the freedom to choose.
Kids want to explore and experiment. They want to do things their way, and they don’t like grownups telling them what they can and cannot do.
It’s how they become independent, and ultimately, isn’t that what we want them to become: independent, able to think for themselves, take care of themselves, and make decisions? That starts with personal power.
If a child does not feel a sense of personal power, she will go after it, and the easiest way to feel personal power is to simply say “no” to a request or demand.
When she discovers that refusing to obey brings a feeling of personal power, she will repeat that behavior. Choosing to obey is something she has complete control over.
Moving Forward
In this post you learned what I teach my students about the first two emotional needs. In the next post, you will see how I teach the last two emotional needs.