Don’t you agree with me that to be able to survive in nowaday’s society needs this skill? I can see my kids practicing this skill ALL THE TIME! Even when they were an infant.
Can you imagine what a 3.5 years old and a 2 years old can fight for? They can fight for a particular spot when sitting on a BIG couch. Fight to be the first one washing their hands. Fight to OWN me, e.g. one sitting on my lap and doesn’t allow the other to sit on my lap even if I have 2 legs. They each got a goody bag for Christmas from a drop-in early learning center. There’s a pencil, candy canes and a sticker book in it. One got a blue pencil and a green sticker book, the other got a green pencil and a red sticker book. From an adult’s view, they are exactly the same. From my kids’ eyes, THEY ARE DIFFERENT! That causes another fight. Carina got the one with a blue pencil from the teacher. When we got home, she wanted the one with green pencil. Of course Colton wouldn’t let her to have or even touch his. Waa waa waa….. Carina was pulling Colont’s bag, screaming and crying from the bottom of her throat. Colton was not any weaker than Carina. He held his bag so hard and tried to grab his bag back with his “NOoooo!” together with the crying, screaming and whinning.
You must be laughing at me when you read this. But I deal with this quite often. I learnt that getting mad at them won’t work, describing or speaking too much to them won’t work coz they won’t listen at that mood.
Separate them and pull them away from the scene, describe or explain after they calm down seems to be one of the ways to settle them. What a good way to train my EQ !