Emotionally Strong Boys
How do we help our boys express their feelings and grow up to be unafraid of them? How do we help them understand that they can be masculine — and have feelings too? How do we help them survive the tests of masculinity intact and on their own terms? In the book Raising Cain, co-authors Michael Thompson, Ph.D. and Dan Kindlon, Ph.D. present the following strategies, designed to help parents nurture and protect the emotional lives of their boys, to respect their interests and needs, and help them grow up to be caring, intelligent, successful men.
Strategies from Raising Cain
An excerpt from the book, Raising Cain: Protecting the Emotional Life of Boys, by Dan Kindlon, Ph.D. and Michael Thompson, Ph.D.
- Give boys permission to have an internal life, approval for the full range of human emotions, and help in developing an emotional vocabulary so that they may better understand themselves and communicate more effectively with others. "The simple idea here is that you consciously speak to a boy's internal life all the time, whether he is aware of it or not. You respect it, you take it into account, you make reference to it, you share your own. There is something of the prophecy fulfilled here. That is, if you act as if your son has an internal life — if you assume that he does, along with every other human being — then soon he will take it into account."
- Recognize and accept the high activity level of boys and give them safe boy places to express it. "Many parents of boys do embrace the physicality of boys...some do not. Most teachers of boys also love boys; some, unfortunately, do not. Boys are tremendously sensitive to adults who do not have a reasonable tolerance level for boy energy, and when they do sense that a person has a low threshold of boy tolerance, they usually respond to it as a challenge...Boys need to learn how to manage their physicality to do no harm, but they need not be shamed for exuberance."
- Talk to boys in their language — in a way that honors their pride and their masculinity. Be direct with them; use them as consultants and problem solvers. "Because boys are miseducated to fear excessive feeling and vulnerability, it is important to communicate with them in a way that honors their wish for strength and does not shame them...Is communicating with boys sometimes difficult? Yes, it often is. Is it impossible? Almost never. Only with the most angry, contemptuous, and suspicious boys is conversation impossible. If you are willing to ask consultative questions, put your emotional cards on the table, and not be disappointed by brief answers, you can communicate with boys.
(Reprinted with permission from Raising Cain: Protecting the Emotional Life of Boys by Dan Kindlon, Ph.D. and Michael Thompson, PhD. Copyright 1999, 2000 by Dan Kindlon, Ph.D. and Michael Thompson, Ph.D. Reprinted by arrangement with Ballantine Books, an imprint of the Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc.)
