06/02/2026
And they often need us to show them and share our calm. They don’t know what to do with those feelings and emotions yet.
If you force a child to quiet down every time they get loud, angry, or sad, you aren't actually teaching them how to handle their feelings. You are just teaching them how to hide them.
The adults who completely freeze, shut down, or panic when life gets heavy were usually the kids who were praised for being exclusively quiet and convenient. They learned early on that their place at the table depended on keeping their internal weather entirely to themselves.
But a feeling that is forced underground doesn't disappear; it just turns into adult anxiety.
We cannot expect our kids to learn how to navigate a massive internal storm if we treat the storm itself like an attack to run from. They need to practice feeling highly uncomfortable while staying safe in the room with an adult who isn't falling apart. It means sitting with them right through the worst of the wave, letting the dust land, and proving to their nervous system that the feeling is completely survivable.
True composure isn't the absence of big feelings. It is the quiet certainty that you can experience the full spectrum of being human without letting the chaos take over. ❤️
Image Quote Credit: ❣️
