Child Behavior Solutions Webinar: Overcoming Anger, Aggression and Violence in Kids

0:00 all right so welcome everybody to our webinar on helping the angry child heal through aggression bullying violence and uh mean types of behaviors and uh what you're going to learn today is why children act out aggressively or violently three steps to transforming aggressive and violent behaviors and how we can help our children deal with anger and those intense feelings are at the root of violent Outburst or attacks we'll also talk about the Democratic parenting approach to intervening in violent attacks like when a child is hitting or biting or kicking another child how can we intervene in the moment using the Democratic parenting model so first of all who am I what

0:47 makes me an expert on child behavior and why should you listen to me well my name is Dr blae Ryan and I'm a doctor of traditional Chinese medicine which means I treat the root cause of disease not just the symptoms and when I became a father my training in Chinese medicine led me to question the standard approaches to Parenting from the old school authoritarian approach to the more modern day permissive approach and I asked myself you know might might there not be an easier way a less stressful way that is is easier and um you know less less exhausting for myself and also for the child and so my interest in this led me to do a lot of research and I found a child brain health and the parent learning club.com and over the years I put together all the information that

1:32 we've accumulated into a book called Democratic parenting now Democratic parenting is not a term that I invented it's been around for quite a while what I tried to do is just to to make the uh the methods and the techniques more accessible to more people because it worked so well for me and for all the parents who used it so I want to really tell you what an honor it is for me to be on this webinar and to spend this time with you I know that each and every one of you is really a wonderful parent if you're investing the time time and energy into learning about a more um gentle and less less aggressive way to deal with your child's own aggression and violence so I just want to take a moment to acknowledge that now also I want to just say a bit of a disclaimer here is that I don't have all the answers you know no one can tell you how

2:18 to raise your child better than yourself that's why you're their parent that's why they chose you as your parent and and um and deep down inside no one knows the entire situation the circumstances surrounding your child and your family better than yourself also my opinions and suggestions in this webinar don't substitute the benefits of getting personalized medical and psychological advice if you need to okay so if need be definitely consult your family doctor for some really intense situations so I just want to see that little disclaimer there so we can start off on the right foot now why do kids act out aggressively or violently well it's because of strong feeling and emotions right namely we're talking about anger

3:04 and aggression and these children don't know how to express these strong feelings in healthier or more nonviolent ways and this frustration and anger you know there's there's different degrees of anger we can start off on one end where it's just kind of annoyance and this is something that we we all experience all the time children often can annoy us with just subtle behaviors right and that's kind of the very beginning stages of anger and that can also be moodiness that can grow into moodiness where it's just kind of this pervasive lingering or underlying anger that kind of comes up now and again and then there's irritation right just to be irritated and then there's frustrated and we see a lot of especially children who are having a hard time with certain challenges uh can get frustrated really

3:50 quickly with trying to overcome those challenges and then that can grow into being upset and then we have downright anger right when when the emotion has come to the point where they're angry and then we can go to the next level where a child or even a person is Raging and then finally they freak out and they just lose it and that's when the the violence or the aggressive Outburst can happen so it's important for us to kind of recognize all these stages here because we're really talking about the same feelings and the same emotions just the different um you know the different polarities on the whole Spectrum we need to be aware of these because the more um sensitive and aware we can be of the more more subtle degrees of anger when they start showing up with our child the more we can kind of act preemptively to

4:36 avert and prevent um the the anger the emotion from accumulating and growing into an outburst or into an aggressive attack um so when we can kind of see that a child is starting to get frustrated or irritated then we can take kind of proactive measures to bring the child back on track and uh and and reduce the anger so it doesn't blow up now um because I come from a Chinese traditional background I have a a different perspective on emotions and I just wanted to share this all with you because first off what I want to do is kind of explore the the emotion of anger you know and like anger's been the cause of so much violence and so much pain and suffering for Humanity for you know centuries and Millennia and uh you think

5:22 that at our stage in evolution that we would teach children in school and uh how to deal with their emotions and spe specifically how to um to express their anger in more healthy ways because you know frankly isn't that something that we could all use and you know a lot of us find ourselves as adults having a hard time dealing with our own anger uh let alone trying to help our children to that so um CH the Chinese medical model has a has a pretty cool perspective on emotions and by understanding the emotions um from this model then we can kind of start to see the energies of these emotions and find uh find more Harmony and balance with them so in Chinese medicine there are five types of emotions we have anger Joy

6:11 pensiveness sadness and fear okay so pensiveness refers to uh just kind of thinking and um ruminating that kind of thing and then we can now these are the the five basic emotions and of course just like anger just like we explored with anger there are different degrees Within each one of them okay now these five emotions correlate to what are called the five elements in Chinese medicine now these five five elements these are um like it's a metaphor okay to understand different movements and tendencies and drives within within our being and within life because um the Chinese mapped out these five elements centuries ago and Link them to um to the entire from from everything in the

6:56 entire universe to everything inside the body and found the these links between these five elements um now I'm just going to show you how these five emotions connect to the five elements and then that will help us get a better perspective of how to work with anger so anger is associated with the element of wood and joy is with the element of fire pensiveness is with the element of Earth sadness is with the element of metal and fear correlates to the element of water so there we have the five elements of Chinese medicine wood fire earth metal and water and they all work in harmony provided that they are all balanced and working correctly and if any one of them goes out of balance then it can also affect the others so we can see that

7:43 anger is associated with the element of wood and wood represents growth movement Freedom it also represents like springtime right the sprouting of seeds the growth of plants right because that's what we're really talking about is the the wood energy like that which moves through trees and it also represents planning because as we move forward and as we grow we need to plan to where we're going it represents our ability to make decisions right because if we're growing and moving in One Direction uh we're choosing that direction over another and um that's something where where we can see how people's abil how people's um wood element how imbalanced it is in Chinese medicine by seeing how well they can

8:30 make decisions and stick to their decisions it also represents ambition right just like trees and plants are growing to uh up towards the light it's the that's the ambition of the plants of the wood element so our ambition is directly correlated to how healthy and balanced the the element of wood is in in ourselves it represents goals and achievement as well all our ability to achieve and to plan for goals um is all beh all falls under the category of the element of wood okay so wood really represents the upward movement of life okay it makes sense right because we're talking again about trees and plant everything is growing upward and we all have this this wood element um this

9:15 energy this tendency within us as well right and like a plant you know if you're not growing you're automatically dying and that's pretty much with everything that's alive on Earth if if they're not growing if they're not expanding then the opposite of growth you know is stagnation which eventually turns into um into into death right and um and destruction so anything that inhibits our upward movement in life I.E the um the wood element inspires anger okay so that gives us a good perspective of how this anger comes about is it's just an inhibition of the natural wood element now anger activates what I call the fighting Spirit okay now the fighting spirit represents our ability

10:01 to conquer difficulties in life to overcome obstacles and to meet our challenges head on okay so the fighting spirit is not bad the problem is when we turn our fighting Spirit onto another person when we make our anger personal that's when violence whether it's subtle or or obvious violence and pain whether physical or emotional pain can erupt right when we make our when we make our anger personal and direct that fighting Spirit onto a person rather than the challenge or the obstacle um that we that we're trying to get through so the fighting spirit is within all of us and it's like a sword that we all carry that allows us to be autonomous

10:47 strong and confident people in our own lives now we can't discard it not nor do we want to and if we don't learn how to use it properly then we can hurt our El with it or another right just like as if we're carrying a sword if we don't know how to wield it and use it properly then when when when it comes out when we take it out which it will because it's an innate an inherent and instinctual part of us then we can easily end up hurting ourselves or someone else with it so we don't want to repress we don't want to repress a child's anger through scolding them through punishing them through distracting them or through giving them bribes because all repression seeks expression right any if we try to to repress that anger that fighting spirit

11:32 that is that is trying to um to express that it's feeling that it's feeling in inhibited then that we we can we can definitely distract the child for a while or we can we can repress them and shut them down through harsh punishments but that anger that resentment that fighting spirit is not going to go away and it's just going to simmer underneath and it's going to find a way to express you know and outbursts are just that right they're the bursting out of feelings that have been been buried or that are lingering or that are there or that need expression right that's what outbursts are the bursting out so how do we help our children Master their fighting spirit and retain their willpower and learn how to express their

12:18 feelings in healthy and productive ways so the Democratic parenting approach to discipline focuses on fixing the root cause of behavior and if you read my book Dem attic parenting or listen to our other webinars you know that I talk a lot about the three reasons for misbehavior which are the three root causes behind all types of behavior okay so we're gonna we're going to go through that right now just a broad overview and the first one the first reason why any child will will U be aggressive or or have anger or have really strong feelings or be violent or be mean um one of the reasons could be unmet legitimate needs right things that they actually need that they're not getting therefore they're driven to find ways to have

13:06 those needs met and that's not always the most healthy way the next is stress right now uh children get stressed really easy and it's something that we often Overlook as parents is how much um the our uh our fast-paced kind of adult centered lifestyle can stress children out just by the sheer overstimulation of a lot of the schedules or um or uh Lifestyles that that we keep that our children are kind of forced to keep up with us uh in this modern day and age also the you know the pressure that children experience in schools or um you know in life nowadays uh that those can also accumulate into leading a child to be stressed not to mention all types of other stress and you know there's there's four specific types of stress

13:51 which again I talked about my book Democratic parenting and I go deeply into stress on um the webinar on helping children heal from childhood stress and trauma but I'll just review this quickly just to to because this is a really important part of of understanding how to help children overcome aggression violence because I'd say a lot of the time if not all the time if a child's acting aggressively or violently then there is some stress there and there's uh four types of stress we have um active stress or aggressive stress which is caused by by by being coming into contact with violence or aggression themselves like being hit or scold or or kicked or or or spank that kind of thing then we have passive stress okay passive stress is the uh the stress that a child uh

14:39 acquires by um by prolonged um unmet needs so it's the pressure of unmet needs over a period of time will develop into stress you know just to talk about uh the one of the needs perhaps is that you know if a child for example uh one of the needs we have is to have adequate sleep right and to get the sleep we need need for a body to rejuvenate now if a child doesn't get adequate sleep then uh it's going to start to stress out the physical body not even to mention their their their their psychological aspect as well um you know or if a child's need for attention goes unmet too long then they're going to start to you know exhibit behaviors um that are are are bent on trying to get that need for attention met we've all heard the saying

15:24 that you know sometimes bad attention is better than no attention at all and um that's often the reason given to why kids can be be naughty at times so so if the need for attention or any of the needs uh the legitimate childhood needs that the kids have go unmet for a period of time it will develop uh into a type of stress and the child will get anxious to some degree um and then another type of stress we have is situational stress and situational stress is really nobody's fault their their stress is just caused by Life Changes like moving houses changing schools natural disasters um you know hearing about um about wars or natural disasters on the news that's kind of like a situational stress it's something just in the

16:09 environment that the child will hear and then can and embody uh some of the worry and fears associated with hearing that type of news um you know death of a family member or even a pet those are all different examples of situational type of stress and then of course the fourth type of stress it is birth stress okay caused by birth trauma which can affect children um you know throughout their whole life but specifically we see this manifested right uh right after the time of the child being born within the first couple of years um so typically if we want to help that then we need to take proactive measures right away to help resolve some of that the birth cause stress so those are the four types of stress um that can um that can be at the root cause for for um some of these

16:56 types of difficult Behavior and the third reason we have is Role Models right children are natural born models they model the the the whole world around them and that's how they learn how to walk and talk and behave and relate and connect with people is by modeling the people in their lives and their primary role models are of course the parents and secondary siblings and other family members and even um characters that they see on TV or in movies or on the news or on the street or in their neighborhood all the the the behaviors that see anywhere act in some way as a type of role model for children okay so uh the the child might see someone behave in a certain way and therefore try that behavior out and so

17:41 sometimes that is a cause of of the of Behavior now specifically when it comes to aggression violence um you know we all also have to take a look at whether or not our child is um is is having role models in their life which are showing the same type of behavior whether whether it's parents or or um aunts or uncles or other family members or whether it's their siblings that might be bullying them or other students in school who might uh who might be aggressive and you know we can see how this transfers sometimes where a child might be pushed by another at school but they won't say anything and they'll kind of uh turn more Inward and and be more withdrawn and then when they get home they're also very withdrawn you can tell something's wrong with them and they might kind of uh they might um they

18:28 might exhibit that same type of violent or aggressive behavior towards a younger sibling or uh even a pet sometimes um because they they kind of took on that that violence or aggression and they're transferring on so we need to take a strong a very careful look at the root cause of these behaviors and understand that these three reasons will be at the root to some degree of why a child is acting out in angry bullying or aggressive ways okay now how do we transform violent and aggressive behaviors in children now we're talking about from Toddlers to teens I want to I wanted to make this webinar as simple and straightforward and as pragmatic and practical for you as possible so you can kind of get some nuggets from this and

19:14 use this right away so I I've kind of outlined a very simple approach but a very effective approach um to to dealing with this type of behavior and this will work from Toddlers to teens there's actually no difference in fact um the this type of um approach can even be used with with adults because we're really talking about human relationship here and of course there's different things we need to consider when we're when we're working with adults to to toddlers right there's a a whole different um psychological components and different circumstances and stuff but the same basic approach will will work when you apply it okay so um so um the three steps okay there's three steps to transforming violent and aggressive behaviors in children

19:59 the first one is meeting their needs okay straightforward because we just talked about when we look at the root cause of behaviors unmet needs is a big one and there will be some unmet needs there uh if a child is acting out aggressively or if they're angry there will be unmet needs there that you need to address in order to fix it on a on a root cause uh level and create that permanent shift in your child if you use punishments distractions threats that type of thing to try and control and reign in the U the violence or the aggression you you won't be addressing the underlying need therefore you're not going to create a long-term uh change in the child's Behavior okay the next one is we want to heal their stress and

20:45 Trauma because again we just talked about how stress is a really big factor and it's almost always at play when we're talking about these types of emotions and then finally intervention okay and this is uh this is for when the the we where there and a child tries to hurt or hit uh or or cause pain to another child how do we intervene in the moment okay so let's go through this so first let's talk about some of the needs that quell the fires of frustration okay now I did I do a webinar on the uh 15 childhood needs I kind of I I outlined uh 15 essential needs that you can meet for your children there are are practical uh ways to to help um help your child feel like everything is good and that and that

21:31 life is good and therefore they they act in much more cooperative and easy ways but what I what I took out of those 15 is I found the main ones that I find at play for most of the time when we're talking about anger frustration aggression and violence and the first one is the need for autonomy okay this is a big one and it's something that we all have we need to be autonomous we need to feel powerful we need to feel independent um and it's something that especially children have right because they they you know they they need to kind of they they need to learn Independence right and children and human are are um are different than most animals because the majority of animals on Earth you know achieve their independence much quicker than humans uh

22:17 where you know humans stay dependent upon their um on their parents much longer but at the same time as they're growing and as they're learning they um this need for autonomy is very strong and if if a child feels that their need for autonomy is not being met if they're not given enough choice if they're not given enough responsibility with uh Power um they'll start to act out they'll become extremely defiant and um and that can also escalate into aggression need for connection now this is the biggest need that all children have and this is because instinctively children know that their very survival depends upon their connection with the adults in their life right we're the one we're the ones who feed them and and take care of them um and anything that

23:03 threatens or undermines their sense of connection and I emphasize their sense of connection because it's not so much whether you feel like you're connected to your child but it's whether they feel like they're connected to you okay anything that undermines or threatens that will instinctively cause them to feel stressed because they sense that their their very survival is threatened right if they feel that disconnect or that breaking ction they go into um kind of the uh the the fight or flight response right because instinctively they're feeling like their survival is a bit you know is being threatened so to reestablish that connection is the shortcut to helping CH children through all types of behavior issues and I'm not just actually it's not just children even teens even adults right when I'm

23:51 working with adults um my onetoone counseling the the biggest and most important part is connection uh whether it's my connection with with my clients and patients or whether I'm helping them through challenges which usually correlate around their connection with people in their lives okay so this need for connection is extremely important and anything again that threatens that will cause children to act in all types of difficult ways need for attention right that's the straightforward that children need uh have a strong need for attention and we can see often times where we have siblings that are fighting um there there's a as you know especially when um when there's a new baby in the picture and they come uh you know and the older child that you know that was uh the youngest one previous to

24:37 that might feel like they're they're not getting as much attention as they were before um and so then they might start to act out and even act aggressively or violently towards the baby okay and that's a a a natural response that we see often and really what it's pointing to is that they they need a bit more connection they need a bit more attention Okay um uh and uh just by giving them that we usually we'll usually uh quell those fires of of anger that are underneath their their violence next we have the need for nurturing environment okay now of course children and everything living needs to to grow in a in a nurturing environment and this refers to their house um their uh their Community where wherever even their

25:23 school right that it's a nurturing and safe environment so if at school there are children who are are who are bullies um that are affecting your child that's not a nurturing environment right so we can see that that need is not being met if your child lives in a in a war zone or lives in a house where um the parents are always fighting or squabbling um then that can also affect the child and it's not such a nurturing environment if the um if the child is also not getting um you know um adequate uh you know if there if there's sometimes too much clutter even in the environment in their home or house that can affect their their their psyche and their um their ability to just to be at peace um and it can cause them to act out as well next

26:08 we have the need for processing okay now processing here I'm referring to processing experience processing information and processing feelings and emotions okay now children experience feelings and emotion very intensely okay much more so than than adults for the most part because we've learned over the years to kind of subdue our sensitivity to the world U and to the stimulation but children's um you know their antennas are still very sensitive and wide open so they you know they children need time and space to just process things again whether it's just experiences that they that they've had uh at school busy day at school or gone to a a birthday party or time with

26:54 family um or just a running errands you know to give give a child just time to process that uh can can just do wonders for the child and the same thing if they if they have really strong feelings or or emotions um like anger or sadness or fears um to to allow them the opportunity to process those feelings okay is really important um because that way we can drain those feelings and the child can return to a state of clear thinking uh good judgment zest and be present and connected again to the world around them another need is for for information okay children need information this refers to uh to sometimes just learning things and knowing things and so especially with the younger children uh Toddlers and

27:39 whatnot you know when we're limiting um and intervening in any type of aggressive behavior we also want to give them information uh verbally and intellectually to tell them you know of course that that's not appropriate you can't do that um you can't hurt another child um or you know you can't hurt your brother or kind of thing um also to give them information to kind of uh to reduce the unexpected surprises which can which can sometimes affect children right because a lot of these uh behavioral issues that we see in children come up during times of transition right when we're changing out of patterns um so sometimes unexpected things um or unexpected transitions can really upset children so by just offering more information through communication by

28:26 talking to them um you know by just sharing them by telling them okay we're going to go here we're going to do this or such and such is going to come over or this is going to happen you know and just kind of setting them up a little bit to kind of preempt them and give them something to give them the information they need to kind of flow better through the day and you know every child is different every child you know's need for processing and need for information varies so with all these needs um you know you have to just use your good judgment in terms of how best to meet your your spefic specific child's needs considering all the circumstances in your life that's why I said before that you know you're you are by far the best person alive um to parent your child and to use all these tools with your child because uh you'll

29:13 know how best to deliver this information and how much information too and talking about the need for information a mistake that I see a lot of parents make is they actually give their child too much information especially around kind of adult or more uh mature content okay by talking about news or politics or Wars or disasters or those types of things are Beyond most children and they can actually stress them out a fair bit because uh typically those types of things are talking about the more negative aspects the things that aren't working in life and it really detracts from the child's sense that everything is good in life so the information we want to give to the child is more about um information they need in order order to feel happier to feel

29:59 more content to connect easier with other with other children other people and um and just to kind of set them up for for happiness and success in life and being a whole person okay not so much in terms of telling them how how the world is and telling them how they need to think and telling them what they need to watch out for okay so we need to use our discernment around that another need is the need for affection right we all know that you know every every living animal needs affection and you know we've heard about the the um you know the experiments done on on um poor babies a long time ago where they you know the orphan babies were not given physical affection and and you know a lot of them fell sick and died and uh you know something that that all

30:45 children I think all animals probably need is that just that physical affection I'm talking about hugs and gentle gentle touch and cuddles and that type of thing and uh you know that can really um help to who are aggressive and violent just to come back into the soft aspect of their body rather than the hard and the fighting aspect need for chemical balance okay now I'm talking here specifically about affecting our chemical balance naturally through the E through an easy way by uh working on our diet our sleep and our exercise right because all these things affect our hormonal system which affects our chemical balance and I'm definitely not referring to um to balancing the the brain brain chemistry through U through drugs or pharmaceutical medication

31:32 because for the most part I'm I'm against those unless absolutely necessary to save lives um but we can affect our child's chemical balance by giving them Healthy nutrition making sure they're getting adequate sleep making sure they're getting enough exercise and also helping them process uh you know stress um to to relieve the body of any accumulation of stress hormones which can come up if a child is stressed or trauma okay so those are the um are meeting the needs and that's the first step we talked about in helping children uh overcome this type of aggression to transform it to bring the child back to a state of empathy of Love connection and Care permanently right so that we can we can we can do away with this this

32:18 type of anger we're not repressing or suppressing it but we're moving beyond that we're addressing underlying root cause the next step is healing stress and Trauma okay because we talked about that's again that's the stress is the second reason for uh difficult behavior and when it comes to violence or aggression there is always a certain degree of stress there and in my book I talk about the eight specific ways to heal from stress and Trauma and I'm going to go through those quickly right here okay the first one is talking just talking about our feelings and that's why um Talk therapy you know with psychiatric help or um you know psychologist or therapist is effective because just by talking and venting oftentimes we can resolve uh some of our

33:04 internal pressure or stress crying crying is uh very beneficial for reducing stress and there have been um scientific studies showing how um stress hormones which are actually toxic to your brain and decrease your ability to think clearly and have good judgment those uh toxic stress hormones are actually reduced by having a good emotional cry and that's why children are cry cry often and naturally right because it's their kind of inborn repair kit to heal from stress is to is to cry it to cry it out so it's not something we want to repress in children we do not want to stop a child from crying right if they need to cry what we want to try and do instead is to assist that child

33:51 to drain those feelings to completion by just being there with them and connecting with them while they have a good cry and they can just get that frustration and the anger or the feelings the sadness the fear whatever it is that's uh behind those emotions that's coming out through the tears we want to just be there with our child and help him drain that so that when they're finished that that crime they see that we're there right with them and that connection is so strong and again that connection like I said is the most important thing that that a child really needs in order for them to be truly happy content and empathetic right because the more connected they are with you and with the world obviously the less less aggressive and violent they're going to be because they'll be more sensitive and empathetic so crying is a great way to heal from stress and Trauma

34:38 symbolic play right and we see children do that all the time where sometimes they kind of you know they're playing kitchen or playing um you know doctor or other types of things that um oftentimes it's a great way that's how they kind of process uh experiences and that type of thing but it's also it's similar to talking in a way to kind of proc ESS uh some pressure or tension or even stress is just by playing um symbolically laughter is H another great way to heal from stress we all have heard the the saying that the best medicine is laughter so that's why there's a technique in my book called natural Giggles which is a very effective way to bridge the connection and reduce uh stress and tension for children sleeping right obviously our whole body recovers from the stresses of

35:24 our day by having a good sleep sweating that's a great way to cleanse out the stress hormones that can accumulate um throughout our days or or after traumas or stressful incidents um it's just a purifying mechanism of our body muscle release right we hold tension when we're stressed right that's why people get kind of stress headaches and that kind of thing for muscular tension so uh releasing the muscles helps diffuse the tension and stress through the whole body that's why massage therapy and those types of touch uh therapeutic approaches are really good to reduce stress and it happens naturally for a lot of us when uh when we're falling asleep or just relaxing as the muscles will start to release as well and then getting sick okay and getting sick is again a way for us to kind of just uh

36:09 cleanse out the toxins and I'm referring mostly to kind of colds and flu and that type of thing uh but there's you know children can sometimes have um you know vomit or diarrhea or these types of things which are sometimes just their body's natural way to heal from an emotional stressful um situation or built up pressure or tension but not always and that's why I have that little star there because I just want to say that you know obviously you have to you have to be careful and use your good judgment and if your child is sick and you need to take them to the doctor then definitely take them to the doctor okay okay so that's how um eight specific ways to heal from stress and again if you want more information on this you can get my book Democratic parenting a go bit deeper into this or you can um uh watch the webinar on

36:56 helping children heal from stress and Trauma where I go much deeper into into this whole um into stress and how to help children through that next let's talk about the third approach which is intervention right when our when a child is going to hit another one how do we use it how do we stop that violence in his tracks using democratic parenting methods so I practice tai chi I actually teach Tai Chi and um one of the principles of taiichi is to use water to put out fire okay now if if some of you don't know what taii is it's a it's an ancient uh Chinese kind of martial art but it's it's all very slow moving it's kind of like aeto where it's slow and soft and um what again some of the principles are again to use water to put

37:43 out fire so and also to use soft to overcome hard okay so it's all about the yin and the Yang so you know Chinese medicine talks about the yin and the Yang and the yin is kind of like the receptive part the Yang is more active part so if someone is aggressively attacking you that's kind of more of a an active Yang um approach and then you use more of a yin approach to kind of to uh to to receive that that energy but then you we want to turn around by using the water or using the soft okay so here are four steps that you can use to intervene in a violent attack the first one is to use a physical limit to ensure everyone's safety okay so if you see a child that's moving towards another

38:29 child with the intent to strike then we want to set a physical limit so what we do is we actually you know put our hand out or our our body there and create a barrier to prevent the child from hurting the other one so the first step is we need to ensure everyone's safety and create a physical limit to restrain um the aggressive child next we want to use connective communication to reach through the disconnect and diffuse the situation okay connected communication is a specific Democratic parenting method that I have an entire chapter on connective Communication in my book um but what it is is it's basically how to use your communication that increases

39:16 connection that either increases the sense of connection or that reaches through the disconnect okay it kind of acts like a bridge so if a child is freaking out and aggressive and angry they're really disconnect at that point to the point that they're hurting people okay so connective communication acts like a bridge between you and that child to uh to get the child back on track and for them to connect back to you okay next the next uh step we want to take is to examine the three reasons for misbehavior and figure out the root cause Okay so after we've kind of make sure everyone's safe and stop the situation and use connective communication to bring the child back to a state of connection then uh when we have the time okay maybe not right there

40:03 at the at you know during the attack but you know if if you can see clearly what the reason might be you can do it right then and then you can respond all that much quicker but at some point you want to examine the three reasons and figure out why the child acted that way do they have unmet needs are they stressed are they modeling this type of behavior somewhere okay and then the the final step is to schedule some play ATT attention time with the child in order to better understand their needs and their frustration okay play attention time is a very powerful Democratic parenting technique again there's an entire chapter written about it in my book and what it is is it's um it's you schedule time with a child where you give them your full attention and you let them kind of direct the Play Take the Lead in the play and you kind of act

40:50 more like the follower the support the support in the play but you give them your full undivided attention for a specific period of time preferably about you know an hour to an hour and a half maybe even two hours um on a regular basis and um you know it's it it meets this technique is really powerful because it meets a variety of the child's needs and it also you know increases that connection so much because you're giving them uh a period of extended time with nothing but your pure loving full attention and the child will will tend to open up during the play attention time or sometimes to opportunities for them to to have a good cry or to have a good healing or to you know talk through some of their challenges or to have good laughter or

41:35 to um you know to use any of those techniques to heal stress oftentimes those opportunities will arise during the play attention time and again it also gives you a chance to better understand their needs and their frustration so you know this is uh you know especially if you're working with an older child you know a teen or something like that uh and you're not sure exactly what the what the reason reason for their misbehavior might be why they're acting that way then by scheduling this play attention time um you know it's just time with them where you can start to just kind of get to know them again and get to figure out maybe what's missing or what's bothering them okay and of course during this play attention time you don't do any probing you don't do any asking or anything like that you really let them kind of direct the play um and then at some point they

42:22 will reveal for themselves uh what they need to share with you to help them to help them overcome this so um so so that's kind of how you want to use the play attention time is more just focus on the connection and be patient and wait for them to kind of share with you what's important and you know you can when you get more skilled with it you can kind of start to you know take uh advantages of opportunities that can arise during the play attention time to better connect or to go deeper into your understanding with your chop but um again you don't want to take over the play and uh and move away from the full attention the connection to a more questioning or probing or counseling type of interaction you want to stay away from that and just focus on the connection and you might need to

43:07 schedule several play attention time um with your child maybe or maybe even regularly to help them uh really work through their frustration or their anger okay so if you follow these four steps it will really help you intervene in a violent attack um and to overcome this uh the behavior in the long term so first we want to set a physical limit and then we move on to the rest so let's go uh a little bit deeper in talking about setting this these limits okay so first we want to look at our main goal for Democratic intervention is to assist our child in draining these intense feelings okay so there's a reason like they have these strong feelings there we want to help them really drain that we don't want to suppress them we don't want to repress them we want to assist

43:53 them to drain them get them out and then they can come back back to uh to to their relationships and people in their lives without those feelings kind of hanging over them and that will allow them to return to the state of clear thinking to have good judgment and to have zest for life again okay so our main focus is really connecting with our child and we can do this by using a technique I call reaching through disconnect so the way we do this is there's a couple things you want to pay attention to the to reach through disconnect first we want to we use our eye contact okay by making eye contact it's an immediate way to connect with another and we give them our full loving attention the key word there is full okay undivided full loving attention we

44:41 use our tone of voice and uh affectionate touch okay so all of these things we use together to really reach through the disconnect with the child now how do we use limits specifically setting kind uh Democratic non harsh limits to heal from anger and stop aggression and violence well there's three types of limits you know there's verbal limits by using her voice healing limits to help them heal through stress and physical limits like I said to create a barrier so vermal limits is using your words you know it's like saying no or putting a a barrier or limit just verbally and also we can repeat things to help draw them deeper into their feelings right so um for example a child who's really upset and

45:26 angry um you know and trying to hurt another child when we create the physical limit and make sure that they're safe we can use verbal limits um you know to to repeat to repeat them by saying you know something like sweetie I'm not going to let you hurt your your brother right now and then they're they're going to struggle and they're angry and they're pushing and they're growling and maybe they're even cry crying and on the verge of a big tantrum or maybe they're tantruming already and then you just say it again I'm not going to sweetie I'm not going to let you hurt your brother and then they just rage and rage and then you say it again and then finally they might just explode into a big cry um you know and that draws them deeper into their feelings by just repeating that limit there um and you know because limits kind of give children something to push up against so it's kind of a barrier and when they

46:12 have these really strong feelings and there's no way to kind of vent an aggressive way but you put a limit there that that they can't move then they can start to vent at the limit and you create a safe limit there for them to vent against so no one can get hurt and then finally um all the feelings drained that are behind that that that frustration or the the anger okay now we want to also embed the connective communication when we're using the verbal limits so to do that again we want to use a tone of voice like we talked about reaching through we want to use a soft loving yet firm tone of voice okay so we so that they know that that this is serious and we're not going to let them hurt their brother but we're still loving and we're still soft because we still want to connect and we we can use terms of endearment to help

46:59 bring the child back to their heart so in the example I just said there said sweetie I'm not going to let you hurt your brother right so I said sweetie because that's a term endearment which just kind of again brings them back to their heart rather than kind of calling them you know by using the old authoritarian approach by saying you know Charles Buckley James you better not hurt your brother you know by you that using their whole middle name and everything like that it's not really a term endearment more it just kind of evokes Fe more than anything and increases the disconnect right but again we want to connect through our communication so that's why we use these types of Terms of Endearment okay also we want to use neutral phrases instead of blame phrases okay so the neutral phrase is when you're talking more your

47:46 situationally and blame phrase is when you're you're talking more personally okay so um you know for for example when the a child tries to hit hit hit his brother you can say you know sweetie um I'm not going to let you hurt hurt your brother right now right um rather than saying you know don't don't hit your brother right that would be a blame phrase where we're saying you know don't hit your brother versus I'm not going to let you hit your brother okay so you can see the difference is that one has a really strong emphasis on blaming them for their action um and it has you know a lot of um um connotations around making them feel guilty and making them feel bad where the neutral phrase is we're talking more about this situation and we're we're taking any type of blame

48:33 or guilt or um any type of those negative emotions out of the context all right next we have healing limits okay this is when we set up a limit and then the child erupts into having a big cry or tantrum or this type of thing which is actually a healing effect okay so again there's we follow the same um the four stages okay and this again is the cried in the Democratic parenting book under the the chapter of U of setting limits it's a pretty thick chapter where I go through all these uh details about setting limits but the first one again we want to ensure everyone's safety no one is hurt we focused our loving attention on connecting with the child we want to listen to the strong feelings and then repeat okay so we want to allow the feelings to drain to completion that's

49:20 why we repeat it and we repeat it when necessary you know if uh if we we set a limit and um the child you know has a has a big cry we listen to their strong feelings or is just upset and just venting verbally talking about how upset they are we just listen to them um we focus on connecting with a child and then U and then that might be good and if it comes up again you know the next day or in a couple weeks or whatever we repeat this and then that will eventually allow the child to to heal that stress behind there okay um now we talk about um the next thing we're going to talk about is the three keys to healing stress um through Tantrums outburst and raging so we talked about reaching through disconnect listening to the tears feelings allow them to flow to completion so this is just a summary of

50:07 what we've talked about so far is to kind of follow uh these three keys here is to reach through the disconnect listen to the feelings and allow those feelings to flow to completion that's when we're intervening in in a an outburst or an aggressive attack or something and we have the time to really listen to to those feelings and allow them to flow to completion obviously uh you know it's everything circumstantial sometimes we might be in the middle of the grocery store or whatever and we don't have it's not the appropriate time or place to really listen to these feelings to flow so we have to wait for another opportunity to arise okay now we talked about setting a physical limit now we use this to intervene um to stop a child from hurting another so we can use our body or hands or arms to disarm

50:54 the aggressive child we could use some holding or shielding or create a barrier to do this okay now there are some important guidelines for you to consider when using a physical limit first off you need to temper yourself okay you don't want to hurt the child because if you hurt the child it just increases the the pain The Suffering The the aggression right it's instead of fighting h fire with water you're you you're you're fighting fire with fire right which is just going to cause the the child to to be more upset so the keep your physical body soft okay especially when holding or embracing we we again we want to use the metaphor around using water to put out fire and using softness to overcome hardness so

51:40 if the child is attacking another child or hitting another one we want to use our body and use our hands um and try to keep our hands our body soft um you know so that when our when eventually the child kind of stops fighting and falls into our body is more welcoming and the softer we are when we're creating a physical limit with an aggressive child the more quickly and readily they will they will stop their fighting and just relax into our an Embrace with us so they can kind of just hug us because you know a child who's Who's acting out aggressively is a hurting child right they're upset they're in pain and they're trying to to um they're trying to make another person feel their same pain that's why they're trying to hurt the other person so if we can recognize

52:25 that they're in pain and we can kind of embody that a loving you know fully empathetic and fully compassionate body and being that they they know and they can feel that okay they can just let go of their aggression and they can just uh be in their pain and we'll hold them we're we're creating we we'll create a safe place for them to relax into and that's our Embrace and that's often what will happen is um is if you're really connected with your child um you know if you kind of stop them from hurting another one and you stay there with them and they're really upset or raging um and you keep your body soft and you keep reaching through that disconnect then more often than not the child will eventually just kind of uh collapse into your arms into an Embrace and have a big

53:11 cry and just completely drain those feelings and then when they come out of that they'll be happy and zestful and connected and they won't have any resentment or upset with the person they they earlier tried to hurt and you know it's always amazes me how Bor and um children are and how quickly they can transform and shift things much quicker than adults so you know one moment a child is really upset and hating another child and then the next moment after they work through their their feelings they're totally best friends again and totally connected so that's the good news here because um by using these methods you can create quicker change um than you may think with your child because of just the nature of children how how um how how easily they can shift and change things

53:57 and the other thing you want to remember is to keep reaching for the child through your tone of voice uh your eye contact your full attention and your loving touch right what I talked about before but really reaching through the dis the disconnect and using these different tools you have your tone of voice your eye contact your full attention and your loving touch right and connective communication um to reach through then uh that again that will diffuse the intensity and return the child to love and connection much quicker now take comfort in knowing that all feelings have a beginning and an end the hard part is that strong feelings in others bring up strong feelings in ourselves now that means that if we don't allow ourselves to drain our own

54:43 frustration as parents then it's hard to listen to anothers especially our children that's why it's important for us parents to clear our own mind and to fill our own cup okay so we need to take time out to rejuvenate to refresh to recreate we need me time okay and you need me time you need to take the me time that that you need in order to fill your cup and to really be present with your child to to to dissolve any anger or frustration or resentments that you might be carrying so you can really be present for your child and help them overcome that um adult to adult listening time is a great method to do this as well and there's a chapter in my book about how to do this um and it's a great way again to just to drain any Intense or difficult feelings you might have that you can use it with with

55:29 anyone else in your life that's willing to to practice this with you you know meditate do chiong yoga Tai Chi Sports um you know anything you need to do to kind of again clear your mind fill your emotional reserves and refresh your body you know write that's another great way to vent or talk and meet with friends and keep learning right keep growing keep expanding um you know keep keep being a person who's alive and who's uh who's who's uh who's who's achieving more and is H and and and that all these things help you achieve more happiness and more um you know more emotional um emotional strength and Agility as well so just a quick review of some of the

56:14 main Democratic intervention methods when we're dealing with a child who's aggressive or with a bully or who's angry or who acts out violently and this can work again from Children of all ages we talked about setting limits okay we talked about connective communication we talked about play attention time and how important that is to really um meet a lot of your child's needs and to increase the connection and then there's also some other methods um that are in my book Democratic parenting and I'm going to briefly talk about here because they can also be useful for children who are going through this one is called self-directed play and this is the same thing as play attention time the only differ difference is that self-directed play they're doing it by themselves so

57:00 this is a a great opportunity for them to use that kind of to create therapeutic type play or the um you know symbolic type play and to work through their own feelings and it's also an opportunity for them to increase their needs for autonomy um and um you know creative expression all these types of of things as well another important method is to use what I call Media control and that's just controlling how much exposure your child has to Media whether it's television movies uh computer radio uh newspapers magazines um all these types of media cell phones okay all these types of media Outlets um often have uh you know

57:45 inappropriate images or information on them that can really stress children out and a lot of the stuff especially on the news okay and we see that everywhere now as TV or radio or even newspapers are really kind of violent and aggressive things in there which can upset children and uh and that can really carry forward into how they behave so we want to try and limit that as much as possible we want to try and shield our children for as long as possible from these more negative um influences and from this more kind of adult content because Tru the truth is is that they don't they don't need to hear and know this stuff um what they need is to kind of grow up in to you know self-sufficient happy people who have you know strong skills

58:31 in problem solving and creative thinking um you know and who are who are resilient and buoyant and who are adaptable okay um and they're going to have plenty of times when plenty of time when they grow up to uh to watch the news and to you know and to figure out what's going on in the world of politics and and uh and wars and that kind of thing but for in my opinion while they're children let's let them be children let's let them play let's let them enjoy let's let them learn about how wonderful life is how beautiful life is and how much fun life can be uh rather than just bombard them with you know electronic stimulation and uh negative news family meetings okay in my book Democratic parenting I I talk about family meetings and um I have a specific

59:17 approach we could say more the Democratic parenting approach to family meetings where these meetings are really focused on uh connection now the family meetings from a democratic approach uh will vary based upon your child's age and these are really can be effective um especially helping uh older children through difficulties and emotions and stuff like that by doing regular family meetings and it creates an environment where the child or the Teen um will feel equal um uh and safe for them to really express what they might need to express to other people okay so by setting up a democratic parenting style of family meeting um that gives the child that autonomy and the um and the responsibility to to just speak openly

1:00:03 in an environment where they won't be punished or reprimanded or it won't come back to bite them because a family meeting uh space is kind of like a Sacred Space where we can really express ourselves um in in loving ways as well so that's can be especially useful for older children younger children not so much mostly family meetings for younger children are just times of play you know even just getting together for for family meals in some ways can be like family meetings as well because again the focus is more around connection rather than uh communication for family meetings so and then we have natural consequences okay the difference between natural consequences and uh what most people use uh for consequences what I call coercive consequences is that natural consequences are what would be

1:00:48 the outcome if we didn't interfere coercive consequences or Consequences that we kind of create for our children if they do this or if they don't do this that those are consequences that we make up and therefore we have to enforce but natural consequences is more the natural outcome of things now when it comes to um to working with aggression and violence and these types of behaviors we typically don't use natural consequences with children it's not the appropriate time to use this okay so we have to be very careful when and when not to use natural consequences there's a full chapter in my book also on this which gives more detail on it um but I wanted to mention here because especially for teens or older children who um you're

1:01:34 you're at your wit's end and you've tried everything and they're resisting you uh you're having a hard time getting through then to some degree you have to allow the natural consequences for their actions um to to happen and to let them experience that now again with natural consequences we always want to let the child experience those within um within safety okay within the safe limit so that they don't get hurt and no one else gets gets hurt so obviously with um with violence that type of thing we don't want uh to you know we we want to stop stop the violence so it doesn't go to that to that extent but you know some ways we can use natural consequences is sometimes just to point out to the child that well their behavior their their

1:02:19 aggression their their bullying um you know their anger is just you know it's causing it's it's causing that person to feel this way and just communicating it to in a connective way um in a way of giving information not in a way to make them feel like guilty or to blame them but just in a straightforward neutral

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