This is bullshit. No kid should be treated like this. Below is a bully situation and how you can teach your kid to SMARTLY, and CONFIDENTLY deal with it. You want a confident, charismatic kid? Here’s the smart, confident way to teach your child to approach the kid that’s bothering him.
The names have been changed to protect the innocent.
Harvey: Hey you! What are you doing? That’s my seat. Get out of it now!
John is smart. He knows not to fall into Harvey’s dominating frame that he’s set up. Instead, he uses his calm confidence to take a moment and evaluate Harvey’s body language. His parents have taught him that bullies aren’t really mean; they are just finding a way to compensate for their insecurities. In other words, this is Harvey’s twisted way of making a friend. Regardless, John was taught to either ignore negativity or make it positive.
John: Hey! What’s your name?
If John’s parents didn’t role play a bully situation with him beforehand, he wouldn’t have been ready to calmly approach the situation, but instead react with fear. John now knows to speak loudly and with strong eye contact when talking to someone like this. Not in a confrontational way, but in a way that shows he is not a pushover. Insecure bullies tend to gravitate towards insecure wallflowers. It’s like a ying and yang thing.
Harvey: Um.. Harvey.
John: Hey, Harvey. Come here and sit with me. I have something to tell you.
Harvey: Why?
John: Just come here.
John has no idea what he’s going to say to Harvey, but he’ll find out when he sits down. This is where those creativity exercises pay off. (Coming soon.)
John: Have you ever played thumb wars?
Harvey: Yeah, duh!
John: Sure, but you’ve never played DOUBLE thumb wars! Here, I’ll show you what to do. First we make one thumb war with these hands. Then, we cross hands and make the second thumb war. Now, are you ready? Let’s go.
Together: One, two, three, four. I declare a thumb war!
John saw a negative situation arising and he rerouted it before it got out of hand. He wouldn’t have been able to do this without doing a bully role play beforehand with his parents. Remind him to keep his cool and not to become negative, as that can lead into something worse.
Oh? This wasn’t enough bully lessons? Big Bad Bully part 2 coming out this week. Keep your eyes on the look out. You are the best parents in the world because you want to do everything possible to help your children grow. Even if your child is not having any issues, reading and learning and listening and observing are the best tools. Always strive to help make your children grow.
If you want to make sure this doesn’t happen to other kids in your neighborhood, or even around the world, the least you can do is pass this message on. Click the “Like” button, now. The blog post will land on your Facebook feed, and you will have possibly saved a child’s life.
Love ya’.
Anthony
Before I wrote my book, I wrote a series of essays inspired from the countless hours spent working with children. They had to do with how I felt adults were speaking to kids in a way that wasn’t conducive to good conversation. Adults naturally think that kids just don’t know how to “throw down” with the “big dogs”. My argument is that they do, and surprisingly well. Sometimes better than adults. Here is one of the essays that inspired this idea, later resulting in the book being released THIS Friday.
Adults ask close-ended questions to children to save kids from the horror of expressing themselves. I used to get these all the time; it saved me from having to speak to others. My way out of it was that maybe I was “shy”, or when I said I didn’t know, maybe I really didn’t know the answer! If they do start off with an open-ended question, they will begin to lead after the child takes too long to answer (answer for him) or seems uncomfortable with answering. And children love the infamous scapegoat word known as “Good,” to suffice as an answer. Let me give you an example:
Aunt Lisa: Hey Mikey! How was school today?
Mikey: Good.
Aunt Lisa: Did you have fun?
Mikey: Yeah.
Aunt Lisa: Did you play with your friends?
Mikey: Yah.
Aunt Lisa: What did you guys do?
Mikey: I don’t know.
Aunt Lisa: Awww… Okay go play with your cousin Johnny, he’s waiting for you upstairs.
Now, from a four year old, this doesn’t seem to be the worst thing in the world. After all, they have only been on this earth for four years. And though this is true, social skills are built at these ripe ages. So what do you do? Well first, locate the problem. Like I said before, I used to be a kid, so I know how it feels to be asked these questions… BORING! People still sometimes ask me these type of questions and it bores me to sleep. So what do you do to get your child expressing him/herself? Ask questions that they would want to answer. You don’t even have to go that far, just ask a question that sparks their interest. A fun open-ended question.
Aunt Lisa: Mikey! My man! I’ll bet there was something funny that happened at school today …Aside from maybe dinosaurs attacking the bathroom.
Mikey: Hahah! Ummm….
Here is where you wait. Children luckily live in the emotion of the moment, so it may take them a while to have to track back in time even a few hours ago to what happened in their day. Just last week I waited almost 20 seconds for a child to answer my question, but surely.. he did. You may find it hard not to lead them, but trust me, just look at them expectantly and something good will eventually come out.
Mikey: I colored animals that talk!
Let’s try to get him to really express himself about things by pushing further…
Aunt Lisa: Haha! Oh my gosh I love animals that talk! What did they say?
Now see, we have just set up a good dynamic in this conversation. This child is ready to start blabbing to you like crazy, your job is to LISTEN. Even if you get bored, just keep 100% commitment to listening to what they have to say, it is the most important thing in their day. Most importantly, you must be interested in what they say… in every little word. If you don’t seem interested in what they say, they won’t think they are interesting to other people and will become shy. You can’t even fake it… human beings are smart people… we all can usually tell if someone is being fake… even your own kid. Really get excited about everything your child is saying, have a fun conversation with them. Make them feel like what they said is great.
When you are having a conversation with your kid, talk to them like a friend. When it is time to be a parent, be a parent. Continually push for more effort in conversation as your child grows, you can begin to ask them questions like, “How did that feel?” and “What do you think of that?”. Always be receptive. Get their opinion, and please try to avoid “Yes” or “No” questions at all costs, they are detrimental to your child’s personality and growth.
The most charismatic people in the world are the best listeners, because being charismatic is not about what you say—it’s about your ability to respond.
Don’t believe me?
Try having a conversation with your bedroom wall. How charismatic are you?
Charisma can’t happen if you are not taking the other person into consideration. The next time you’re having a conversation with someone, take a moment to think if what you’re saying could just as easily be said to that bedroom wall. If so, you’re not having an interaction—you’re just talking at yourself.
In the last post, John showed us how his confident body language and loud and resonant vocal tone was what put him in a good position to turn a potentially ugly situation into something friendly. Instead of “sticking up for himself” which is something weak people do, he was approaching the situation from a totally different reality. He looked at Harvey as an equal, rather than someone who should be getting picked on.
Sometimes, though, it’s not as simple as the bus situation. Two years pass and John is now eight. He was playing outside during recess, and a new bully, Frank, began to get jealous about who John was playing with.
Frank: You can’t play with Maria. She’s my friend. Get out of here!
Though going to a teacher is a way to fix the problem, it’s only a temporary solution to a bigger problem. John needs to deal with this part on his own, or he’ll never be able to do it when he gets older.
Trying to argue with someone that enjoys making problems is a waste of time. John would just get sucked into a bad situation and before you know it, he’d be in detention. Instead, John was taught to ignore negative comments or make them positive. Bullies are always looking to get a negative reaction from someone. But when they find that you are impenetrable to negativity, they go try bothering someone else.
John: Hey!
John knows that a loud dominant voice, good eye contact, and a smile set him up as the leader. This shakes Frank out of his negative trance for a second and takes him off guard.
John: Come play with us! We’re playing basketball and need a referee.
Done with confident and positive body language, Frank will either accept the invitation or go find someone else to pick on. If, however, he doesn’t, John can choose to walk away with Maria and play on something else. It’s not a big deal. The main thing is to not get upset. Bullies like to get negative reactions out of people. But if John doesn’t give him a negative reaction, Frank won’t bother him anymore.
What’s your bully story? What happened when you were bullied as a kid? What happened when your own kid got bullied? What have you learned? How has it become different? Shoot me an e-mail and let me know. I’ll get back to you tomorrow… promise.
Love,
Tony (Anthony’s ‘cool’ alter-ego)
P.S. – If you are a CharismaticClub member, expect to be getting some videos sent to you in the next week.
