3 Ways Kindness is Good for Our Kids
3 Ways Kindness is Good for Our Kids
Your mom may have told you that it was the right thing to help others. Turns out, doing something nice to help others actually helps us, just as much as it helps the recipient. And maybe that old adage, "'tis better to give than to receive" is more accurate than we could have imagined.
Here are three ways that kindness can help our kids:
1. Kindness Reduces Stress
Stress is all around us. Our fast-paced world that thrives on multi-tasking, over-scheduling and little down time impacts even our kids. Yet, there is one surefire way we keep our stress at bay and teach our kids to do the same. Our stress is minimized when we are helping others. This study shows how and why it works.
2. Kindness Prevents Illness
You may have read that inflammation is not great for our bodies and that it contributes to a host of medical issues. While it's true the foods we eat and beverages we put our bodies impact our biology a great deal, so do the things we think and the choices we make. In a study with older adults, it was found that volunteering helped reduce inflammation in the body. If it works that well in an older population, imagine the life-long benefits it could have for our kids!
3. Kindness Makes Us Happier
'Tis true...bringing a smile to someone else's face actually makes us happier, too. This is so because when we do something nice for others, it raises the serotonin in our brains...and serotonin is one of the "feel good" chemicals we teach parents about in our Joyful Parent curriculum. (We can boost our child's serotonin by how we interact with them. That's a protective factor we should all be interested in!)
Just Scratching the Surface
These three things are just scratching the surface. There's a whole host of research out there that's looking at why being kind is so cool! And it can even help you keep that youthful glow, because being kind has been shown to reduce free radicals, which contributes to the aging process. Best yet? You don't have to pay a single cent to be kind, so it means we can ALL do it!
How to Encourage Kindness in Kids
Looking for ways to help steer your kiddos towards kindness? We've been writing it about for years! Go HERE to find 5 tips to raise kind-minded children!
Targeted Help to Teach Kindness
Want more targeted help to teach kindness to your kiddos? Check out our exclusive "Social Skills Heart Bundle" that's half off now. While it's perfect for Valentine's Day, the resources say nothing about Valentine's specifically, so they can be used all year long in your classroom or practice. Find it all HERE.
Click image to learn more about this bundle.
How many acts of kindness can you complete in a day? A week? A month? How does your family display kindness to each other and to the world at large? We'd love to know!
Tell us below!
Until next time,
Wendy Young, LMSW, BCD, is the founder of Kidlutions and co-author of BLOOM: 50 Things to Say, Think and Do with Anxious, Angry and Over-the-Top Kids, co-creator of BLOOM Brainsmarts, and creator of The Joyful Parent. She is the author of numerous workbooks and resources to help from the preschool through the teen years.
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