Emotional Baseline 2 (Seed 12)

Creative Moments

• Spend ten minutes a day of individual time with each child. Whether it be spontaneous or fixed, make sure the time is mutually enjoyable and made top-priority

• Ten minutes is code for any chosen moment; a chunk of time

• Individual time with your children should reveal both to you and your children that they are important to you

• Be their pillar and provide emotional security; a pillar of strength

• Siblings can be present but focus on one child at a time

Ten minutes of mutually enjoyable, top priority individual time: By giving a child individual time you are telling him that he is important as an individual. He is more important than the ringing phone, the laundry, the messy floor or the crying baby. This time together builds a connection and trust. When, later in life, the child is having trouble, he will turn to a person who made him feel important. Hopefully, that person will be his parents. Everyone needs to feel important to someone. By denying a child individual time, we force the child to seek it elsewhere.

What do you have to do with the child? Anything mutually enjoyable. You can play a game together, go for a walk, just sit and talk. If it’s mutually enjoyable, you can even do homework together. For an older child, even talking together while you wash the dishes counts. The key here is focus. Let the phone ring. Let the other children whine.

Why ten minutes? It is around the smallest chunk of time that actually feels like a chunk of time. Less than that feels like a fleeting moment.