{"id":984,"date":"2012-09-13T09:35:54","date_gmt":"2012-09-13T13:35:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/lifeasaconsciousmom\/?p=984"},"modified":"2012-09-13T20:38:49","modified_gmt":"2012-09-14T00:38:49","slug":"what-would-ever-possess-a-child-to-be-so-mean","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lifeasaconsciousmom\/2012\/09\/13\/what-would-ever-possess-a-child-to-be-so-mean\/","title":{"rendered":"What Would Ever Possess A Child To Be So Mean?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>I was recently teaching a class to my Advanced 12 Month Conscious Awareness group and we were looking at the energy and information that we carry related to how others see us and interact with us.<\/p>\n

As we were exploring I was reminded of my older brother\u2019s favorite chant when he was little \u201cYou\u2019re stupid, fat and ugly\u201d which was usually followed by a \u2018thunder thighs\u2019 comment.<\/p>\n

For whatever reason, I was able to know in my own right that I was not stupid, but on the body image side, I bought in hook, line and sinker.<\/p>\n

To this day, I still see larger thighs, no matter what they actually look like. What\u2019s interesting is that I can know that they are not huge, but when I look in the mirror, they look gigantic. I just ignore the mirror image.<\/p>\n

But what possess people, young or old, to say things like this?My brother could have just as easily been loving, supportive and encouraging. I\u2019m not mad at him, but I still marvel at the experience and I’m certain he doesn’t even remember saying these things, but they left a lasting impression on me.<\/p>\n

When I look at this dynamic of either emotionally or mentally diminishing someone, I see that it has to do with feeling more powerful. I\u2019m going to use two fictitious names here, let\u2019s say Kelly and Lisa. If Kelly can put down Lisa, or make Lisa feel inferior, then Kelly feels superior, feels validated, feels more powerful. Lisa feels small, feels scared, feels uncertain and learns to question her own value. These experiences start when we are children and we carry them with us into our adulthood.<\/p>\n

Sadly, kids who learn that they can use words to feel more powerful often grow up to be adults who continue to use this diminishing tactic.<\/p>\n

I think as parents, teachers, grandparents, care givers; as anyone who lives with, works with or is around children we have a responsibility to support both Kelly and Lisa. Kelly needs to learn how to validate herself without the need to diminish another. She needs to learn to love herself and learn how to make herself whole, healthy and happy from within. Lisa also needs to learn to validate herself and learn how to make herself whole, healthy and happy from within, but unlike Kelly, Lisa also needs to learn to manage her space. Someone who is susceptible to verbal and mental diminishment is usually incredibly sensitive to emotions and to energy. So Lisa also needs to learn how to energetically protect herself and needs to learn how to release rather than suppress negative feelings and experiences.<\/p>\n

Sometimes is it helpful to talk to those on the receiving end about what might possess another to speak and act so\u00a0cruelly. Sometimes, if a child can understand that this behavior is not about them, but about the other person, that it is about that person’s fears and uncertainty, the child being diminished can start to claim back some of their power.<\/p>\n

In the end though, mental and verbal diminishment is something we should not tolerate. Just because there are no visible signs of hurt or wounding, does not mean that these forms of attack are any less real. This is a conversation we should be having with our children from a very young age. We should be reminding them that words have energy. Words can makes us feel good or they can make us feel bad. We need to talk to our kids about where their sense of self-validation comes from and the tactics \u00a0they use to feel good about themselves. We cannot and should not assume that ‘our kid’ will never be mean. If it’s not in their nature, it’s amazing how easy it can be to jump on the bandwagon. Power is intoxicating at any age.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve heard people say \u2018Kids will be kids\u2019 when one child is speaking cruelly to another child. In my world, that\u2019s not acceptable. Kids will be who we help them to be. If we don\u2019t point out that their actions and behaviors are hurtful, they will only know the power they feel when they make someone feel bad.<\/p>\n

Step in to help and support both children.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I was recently teaching a class to my Advanced 12 Month Conscious Awareness group and we were looking at the energy and information that we carry related to how others see us and interact with us. As we were exploring I was reminded of my older brother\u2019s favorite chant when he was little \u201cYou\u2019re stupid,…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":495,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,3],"tags":[525,410,409,9,408,358,25,407],"class_list":["post-984","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-conscious-parenting-2","category-life-as-a-conscious-mom","tag-bullying","tag-children-and-self-validation","tag-children-and-words","tag-christine-agro","tag-mental-abuse","tag-the-conscious-mom","tag-the-conscious-moms-guide","tag-verbal-abuse"],"yoast_head":"\nWhat Would Ever Possess A Child To Be So Mean? - Life As A Conscious Mom<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lifeasaconsciousmom\/2012\/09\/13\/what-would-ever-possess-a-child-to-be-so-mean\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"What Would Ever Possess A Child To Be So Mean? - Life As A Conscious Mom\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"I was recently teaching a class to my Advanced 12 Month Conscious Awareness group and we were looking at the energy and information that we carry related to how others see us and interact with us. As we were exploring I was reminded of my older brother\u2019s favorite chant when he was little \u201cYou\u2019re stupid,…\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lifeasaconsciousmom\/2012\/09\/13\/what-would-ever-possess-a-child-to-be-so-mean\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Life As A Conscious Mom\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2012-09-13T13:35:54+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2012-09-14T00:38:49+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/lifeasaconsciousmom\/files\/2012\/09\/MP900448468-300x256.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Christine Agro, The Conscious Mom\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"What Would Ever Possess A Child To Be So Mean? - Life As A Conscious Mom","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lifeasaconsciousmom\/2012\/09\/13\/what-would-ever-possess-a-child-to-be-so-mean\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"What Would Ever Possess A Child To Be So Mean? - Life As A Conscious Mom","og_description":"I was recently teaching a class to my Advanced 12 Month Conscious Awareness group and we were looking at the energy and information that we carry related to how others see us and interact with us. As we were exploring I was reminded of my older brother\u2019s favorite chant when he was little \u201cYou\u2019re stupid,…","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lifeasaconsciousmom\/2012\/09\/13\/what-would-ever-possess-a-child-to-be-so-mean\/","og_site_name":"Life As A Conscious Mom","article_published_time":"2012-09-13T13:35:54+00:00","article_modified_time":"2012-09-14T00:38:49+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/lifeasaconsciousmom\/files\/2012\/09\/MP900448468-300x256.jpg"}],"author":"Christine Agro, The Conscious Mom","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lifeasaconsciousmom\/2012\/09\/13\/what-would-ever-possess-a-child-to-be-so-mean\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lifeasaconsciousmom\/2012\/09\/13\/what-would-ever-possess-a-child-to-be-so-mean\/","name":"What Would Ever Possess A Child To Be So Mean? - Life As A Conscious Mom","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lifeasaconsciousmom\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lifeasaconsciousmom\/2012\/09\/13\/what-would-ever-possess-a-child-to-be-so-mean\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lifeasaconsciousmom\/2012\/09\/13\/what-would-ever-possess-a-child-to-be-so-mean\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/lifeasaconsciousmom\/files\/2012\/09\/MP900448468-300x256.jpg","datePublished":"2012-09-13T13:35:54+00:00","dateModified":"2012-09-14T00:38:49+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lifeasaconsciousmom\/#\/schema\/person\/9ab2ad4b6b50dd6754949eada3dd3331"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lifeasaconsciousmom\/2012\/09\/13\/what-would-ever-possess-a-child-to-be-so-mean\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lifeasaconsciousmom\/2012\/09\/13\/what-would-ever-possess-a-child-to-be-so-mean\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lifeasaconsciousmom\/2012\/09\/13\/what-would-ever-possess-a-child-to-be-so-mean\/#primaryimage","url":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/lifeasaconsciousmom\/files\/2012\/09\/MP900448468-300x256.jpg","contentUrl":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/lifeasaconsciousmom\/files\/2012\/09\/MP900448468-300x256.jpg"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lifeasaconsciousmom\/2012\/09\/13\/what-would-ever-possess-a-child-to-be-so-mean\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lifeasaconsciousmom\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"What Would Ever Possess A Child To Be So Mean?"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lifeasaconsciousmom\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lifeasaconsciousmom\/","name":"Life As A Conscious Mom","description":"Parenting, Parenting Advice, Tips For Moms and Lifestyle Advice for Women","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lifeasaconsciousmom\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lifeasaconsciousmom\/#\/schema\/person\/9ab2ad4b6b50dd6754949eada3dd3331","name":"Christine Agro, The Conscious Mom","description":"Christine Agro has degrees in Naturopathy and Western Herbs from The School of Natural Medicine and is an internationally recognized Clairvoyant and Spiritual Teacher. Her work focuses on supporting women, families and children in all phases and stages of their lives. She is the author of 50 Ways to Live Life Consciously and the creator of The Conscious Living Wisdom Cards (Standard and Special Moms' Edtions). Using her unique approach, Christine provides clients with a truly holistic overview of their health, wellness, well-being and their life journey. Praised by grateful women, parents, and celebrity clients across the globe for her intuitive and extraordinary gifts as a healer, she has been hailed as \u201cmagical\u201d, \u201ctransformational\u201d and \u201cinspiring.\u201d Christine has been featured in The New York Times and hailed a gift to moms by RealSavvyMoms.com. She has been interviewed on radio shows around the world, quoted in health and consumer magazines and e-zines nationwide and she is the founder of The Conscious Mom\u2019s Guide website. \u2022 Christine enjoys supporting women in all stages and phases of life. \u2022 Christine sees the power of today\u2019s children and seeks to support them in retaining their inner light. \u2022 She believes in living life passionately and purposefully. \u2022 She believes in the body\u2019s natural ability to heal and supporting that ability. \u2022 She believes children are conscious beings who have an unlimited capacity to understand and learn. \u2022 She believes children should be treated with respect and given the support and guidance to help them understand the world they have chosen to live in. \u2022 She believes all relationships offer us insight into what we want to learn and heal this lifetime. \u2022 She believes we all have the power to live a passionate and purposeful life. Using her clairvoyance combined with her background in naturopathic healing, herbs, homeopathy, aromatherapy, nutrition and more Christine offers conscious insight and healing support into areas such as relationships, parenting, pregnancy and spiritual growth. Find out more about Christine Agro, her work and how to schedule a reading at www.christineagro.com and check out The Conscious Mom's Guide at www.theConsciousMomsGuide.net to join a growing group of conscious parents.","sameAs":["http:\/\/www.theconsciousmomsguide.net"],"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lifeasaconsciousmom\/author\/cagro\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lifeasaconsciousmom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/984","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lifeasaconsciousmom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lifeasaconsciousmom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lifeasaconsciousmom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/495"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lifeasaconsciousmom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=984"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lifeasaconsciousmom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/984\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":988,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lifeasaconsciousmom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/984\/revisions\/988"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lifeasaconsciousmom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=984"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lifeasaconsciousmom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=984"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lifeasaconsciousmom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=984"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}