Cultivating positive mental health!

These skills, sometimes referred to as social-emotional competencies, are abilities that can be passed on to your child from an early age. These skills enable them to adapt to life's various transitions. Seven major skills, also taught at school, can be further developed and help contribute to a young person's well-being.

1. Knowing yourself

Self-knowledge implies knowing one's characteristics, in particular one's tastes and interests, strengths and limitations. Knowing oneself well enables one to make choices that are consistent with one's values, needs, and limits, which in turn can promote one's well-being. 

Helping children to get to know themselves can be done by encouraging them to explore a variety of activities, whether physical, cultural, or recreational, allowing them to learn about themselves and test their limits in a variety of situations. 

2. Managing emotions and stress

To manage stress and emotions, you need to recognize the physical signs associated with them, but also have the vocabulary to express them and be able to identify their sources. For example, knowing that oral presentations are very stressful for young people, you can suggest that your child practice in front of you, or discuss the subject of the oral presentation on a walk outside.

3. Making informed choices about healthy lifestyle habits

Whether through diet, physical activity, or sleep, lifestyle habits have a major impact on health. Behaviors related to sexuality or substance use are also part of this.

It's important for your child to understand the impact of one choice versus another, and you can invite them to reflect on this. You may not feel comfortable talking about certain subjects, but there are plenty of resources that can help, including those available at casecultive.ca. 

4. Managing social influences

Young people are exposed to a wide range of influences, both positive and negative, including peer pressure, advertising, social norms, and even family culture. They need to develop strategies for resisting negative influences and for critical thinking. As parents, to raise awareness, when watching a film or program, point out the positive and negative influences and invite your child to express their opinion about them.

5. Interacting positively with others

Conflict resolution in a peaceful manner is a key to positive social behavior. Interacting positively with others requires consideration of needs, empathy, open-mindedness, and cooperation: all qualities that promote social well-being. 

6. Asking for help 

We can ask our teen for help with certain tasks that are simple for them, for example, how to make an Instagram post. Being able to ask for help for yourself or others demonstrates an ability to take charge of the situation when we approach or exceed our limits.

7. Becoming active in the community

Social involvement is a way of spreading goodwill within our community. Young people can get involved in activities that have a collective impact, such as a food drive, or get involved in causes that are close to their hearts, such as shoreline waste collection to protect waterfront environments. And to encourage their participation, you can join in too!

Living environment conducive to positive mental health 

To cultivate positive mental health in your child, you also need to offer them a space conducive to their mental health, with a climate that will facilitate the development of the skills mentioned above. 

There are a number of things you can do to foster this kind of atmosphere, including setting up a parent-child contract to limit the use of screens at home. This contract sets out clear guidelines for the whole family's use of screens, while offering some latitude for cultivating positive mental health.

Whether through small gestures or a family environment conducive to positive mental health, you can help improve your child's well-being every day! 

What about you? How do you work on these skills with your kids? 

Reference (in french)

Ça se cultive