Chinese children ruined by guilt and guilt

My friend\’s daughter Yanyan is 8 years old this year. She is an innocent and innocent age, but she suffers from depression. Yanyan said to the doctor: \”I feel sorry for my parents.\” The relationship between her friend and her husband has always been bad. Every time they quarreled, the friend couldn\’t help but get angry at her daughter: \”If it weren\’t for you, we would have divorced long ago. .\” Yanyan felt that it was all her fault. Without her, her parents would not be quarreling like this every day. She felt very guilty. At the same time, she was also very conflicted. She felt that her parents cared about her, still loved her, and were even willing to sacrifice their freedom for her. She was very touched. But what\’s more is the pressure. Her parents didn\’t give up the family for their own sake. She treats this hard-won family relationship with caution and works hard to make herself excellent so as not to disappoint her parents. Living up to her parents\’ expectations, Yanyan\’s grades have always been among the best. However, this semester, her grades have gradually declined. She fell into the mid-twenties in the final exam last semester. During the summer vacation, mom and dad always asked in a condemning tone: \”How could it be possible to regress like this and do so poorly in the exam? We are doing this all because of you. Who can deserve your results!\” Yanyan felt guilty and blamed herself, and became sensitive. Suspicious and extremely insecure, I shut myself in the house most of the time and often shed tears secretly. Under the influence of guilt emotions, children are afraid of losing their parents\’ love and do things they don\’t like to do against their will. It is inevitable that they will feel resentment towards their parents, but they cannot find relief by venting their anger and frustration. Therefore, most children will suppress these unpleasant feelings, and over time they will surface in repressed forms, such as depression, anxiety, etc. Psychologists say: \”The energy level of unconscious guilt is close to death, and it has a devastating blow to human vitality. Countless people have self-mutilated and committed suicide due to shame and guilt.\” Ingratiating behavior controlled by guilt is not a true inner need. , it’s very tiring to hold on. Child psychologists have done such a study: In a laboratory with various toys, the experimenter told the children to watch the hamster in the cage and not let the hamster run away. Within 25 minutes of the experimenter\’s absence, nearly all of the children took their eyes away from the hamster cage for a moment. When they turned their faces, the hamster in the cage was gone. Then observing the child\’s reaction, the results show that children at the age of 4 begin to have the bud of guilt, and 5 to 6 years old is the period when children\’s guilt develops. This study shows that children over the age of 4 can experience feelings of guilt when faced with mistakes, after doing something wrong or when they think they are at fault. Therefore, parents try to exploit their children\’s feelings of guilt. They believe that since the child has a sense of guilt, it means that he knows that he is wrong, and will do what they want, and most of the time he will get satisfactory results. Therefore, parents who have tasted the sweetness will intentionally or unintentionally create some guilt in their children, so that their children can develop in the direction they expect. But this brings about a problem. In order to eliminate guilt, children often do things that they don\’t want to do but can cater to their parents. They are controlled by guilt and gradually lose themselves. Zhihu netizen Yangu Moqing said: \”Creating a sense of guilt is a very common education model, and the reason is to gain a sense of control.\” The United StatesPsychologist Susan Forward vividly defines this behavior as \”emotional blackmail.\” In the parent-child relationship, whether it is a threat or a move, when parents put their efforts or demands on the table, the children have already fallen into emotional blackmail. The book \”Emotional Blackmail\” also mentions: \”When intimacy and security are destroyed, the child\’s happiness and mental health will also die. Children who are emotionally blackmailed by their parents will fall into sudden and unspeakable predicaments. .\” Some time ago, Zhu Yuchen\’s mother, who was popular in WeChat Moments, liked to use guilt to control her children. Zhu’s mother gets up at 4 o’clock every day to make pear soup for her son, forcing him to drink it and checking the empty bottles every day. Other mothers were happy that their sons were independent, but after seeing that her sons could cook, Zhu’s mother felt sorry for her son and felt that she had neglected her duty as a mother. So the 70-year-old lady carried 80 hairy crabs all the way to Beijing to work as a personal chef and nanny to take care of her son. Mother Zhu\’s parenting style not only affected her son\’s feelings, but also affected her daughter\’s view of marriage. Zhu Yuchen\’s sister is in her 40s and is still single. She has a phobia about marriage and frankly said that she cannot take on the mountain of responsibilities like her mother, so she does not dare to get married and have children. Zhu Yuchen also resisted Mother Zhu\’s almost suffocating love, but it had no effect. In the end, Zhu Yuchen changed from resistance to acceptance, and he wanted to become a bucket. \”Why do you have to accept it? You are already so tired? It\’s okay, it\’s because of love.\” This sentence showed Zhu Yuchen\’s helplessness. He gave up his desire to break free and took care of his mother\’s emotions so as not to make her feel uncomfortable, otherwise he would feel even more guilty. So he suppressed his needs and lied to himself that it was because of love. Chinese parents like to use guilt to cultivate \”filial piety\”, but they don\’t know that guilt is the emotion with the lowest ability. It will not only increase the unbearable emotional burden on children, but also fail to induce a healthy \”gratitude\” in children. Therefore, please stop kidnapping your children with guilt. True love should not become a burden! A psychologist once said: \”The worst influence parents have on their children is to make them feel that their parents are not living a good life.\” In the previously popular TV series \”The Best of Us\”, Yu Huai\’s mother always He appeared as a victim and kidnapped Yu Huai in the name of love. \”I take care of your grandparents all day long, and your dad works alone in Africa to make money. Look, how many years have I been wearing these clothes? Do you think I don\’t want to wear new clothes? We are all doing this for you.\” Yu Huai\’s mother Always say that. She lives frugally. She wears one piece of clothing every few years because of Yu Huai. Her husband goes to work in Africa because of Yu Huai. She even lives because of Yu Huai. Although Yu Huai is sunny, cheerful, helpful, and strives to make progress, he is burdened with too much pressure from his family and his mother, which makes him anxious. This is why Yu Huai is the kind of \”unlucky kid\” who always has problems when it comes to important exams, because he can never take it easy. He knows that he is the hope of his family and cannot make any mistakes. But things tend to be like this. The more nervous he is, the worse he can do. He didn\’t perform well in the college entrance examination, so he went to the experimental middle school in a neighboring city to repeat his studies alone, refusing to talk to everyone.connections, including best classmates. The long-term sacrifice of his parents made Yu Huai unable to deal with his failure calmly. He felt guilty and self-blame because his mistakes had dashed the hopes of his family. Parents transfer their pressure to their children. Once the children do not do well, they will feel sorry for their parents and useless. Over time, they will develop an inferiority complex, which is very detrimental to the growth of their children. Appropriate guilt-motivated behavior may make up for your mistakes, but continued guilt will not bring substantial benefits to the relationship. Between parents and children, no one owes anyone anything, and it is healthiest to live together as equals. The reason why children often feel guilty may also be because mothers often feel guilty themselves. If a mother often feels guilty, it will affect her children. For example, if you can\’t give your children better conditions and can\’t accompany them often, you feel sorry for your children; if your children can\’t get the emotions of their parents, they can\’t help but feel sorry and considerate of their parents, and feel that they haven\’t done a good enough job, which leads to guilt. Parents use their own guilt to feed their children\’s guilt and use their children\’s guilt to achieve control. “Your poor grades are heartbreaking for your parents,” parents blame their unhappy feelings on their children. Communicate to children that their happiness or unhappiness is caused by the child\’s behavior. When children see their parents\’ pain, children may feel guilty and adjust their behavior to suit them. Unfortunately, this adjustment was made to avoid guilt rather than out of a love of learning. There is a \”south wind effect\” in psychology. The north wind and the south wind competed to see who could take off the coats of pedestrians. The north wind first came with a bitter and biting cold wind. As a result, pedestrians wrapped their coats tightly in order to resist the invasion of the north wind. The south wind blew slowly, and suddenly the wind was warm and sunny. Pedestrians felt the spring warmth on their bodies, so they unbuttoned their coats and then took off their coats. The south wind had won. Chinese parents’ “guilt control” and “emotional kidnapping” education methods are unable to cultivate children’s self-consciousness and positive and optimistic attitude. Yin Jianli said in \”A Good Mother is Better than a Good Teacher\”: In habit development, if the child is often made to feel unfree and guilty, he will form bad habits in this regard; on the contrary, if the child is always made to feel With initiative and a sense of accomplishment, he will form a good habit in this regard. Therefore, please do not artificially create guilt in your child, especially guilt that does not belong to him. Even if he has made a mistake, please allow him to let his guilt settle the account after making amends. Only in this way can he be himself and re-establish a healthy parent-child relationship.