Children are not as immune to stress as adults are. Like adults, they can go through physical and psychological stress. To bounce back and recover from the challenge’s life throws at them, they need to be resilient. Resilience is a life skill, and it’s one of the skills your kid needs to develop positively.

Resilient kids develop immunity to the fear of failure — they take healthy risks and push themselves to grow outside their comfort zone. Bravery, curiosity, and trust are the byproducts of resilience.

Here is the thing, life is hard! Kids who struggle with resilience, will find it difficult to cope with the challenges and trauma of life.

Parents value bringing up their children to be mentally tough and resilient kids. But the big question comes — how would you naturally build resilience in children?

Well, here is how to do it.

The source of resilience

Resilience is primarily shaped by nature and nurture. The temperament, personality, and genes constitute nature — it’s inborn and cannot be changed. External factors like family and local community can be changed — and that constitute nurture.

Resilience in children is analogous to how different planes respond to poor weather conditions. A solid, well-designed aircraft can easily manoeuvre through the storm, whilst a poorly built aircraft would succumb to the adversity and poor weather conditions.

In the same way, resilient kids would withstand stress and other forms of trauma, but kids with no resilience would easily fall during trying times.

The good news is, resilience is a learned skill — it is an acquired skill, and your children can build it. If you do not understand the building processes nitty-gritty, you can seek professional help.

Here are some helpful tips to practice building resilience with your children and within the family. 

How your children can build resilience

Building resilience in children is straightforward — you can do that in four easy steps.

• Create a solid emotional connection.
• Eliminate the fix-it mindset.
• Promote healthy risk-taking skills.
• Embrace mistakes.

Having one-on-one time helps boost the parent-child emotional connection. A caring relationship goes a long way to help your kids develop coping skills — you cannot trade that for anything!

That is, you’ve got to switch off the television, put down your phone, and eliminate other forms of distraction.

Here is the thing, when kids are certain of the support of their parents and loved ones, they tend to be more emotionally empowered during tough situations.

Moving on, as a parent, you tend to offer solutions or switch into the fix-it mode whenever your kids come to you with problems.

It is natural to want to fix things and eliminate any form of discomfort within your child’s world.  It’s hard, but there is a better way to handle the situation.

You should ask questions and bounce the problem right back at them. This way, you are subconsciously teaching them how to think through issues and challenges.

Your home is your kid’s comfort zone. To grow into a resilient kid, you have got to encourage them to take healthy risks. Simple things like joining the school sports team or performing other minor duties will go a long way to build resilience in children.

Healthy risks help develop a strong and healthy belief system.

Finally, you should teach your kids how to embrace mistakes.

The thing is mistakes are part of life. Kids who shy away from failures tend to grow into anxious adults.

Help them develop a growth mindset and let them understand that mistakes are not necessarily evil — it’s a learning experience. Talk through your own mistakes and demonstrate positive coping strategies.

Building resilience in children is necessary — it prepares them for life.

Feel like you need help on building resilience?  Reach out to our qualified behaviour consultants at Tiny Terrors. You can also call 1300 00 14 14 or email  info@tinyterrors.com.au for a consultation/

Now you know the four steps of building resilience in children, how would you start your building process?