Yesterday was children's day here in Brazil and to celebrate, my husband and I took our daughter for a walk. We went to her godparents' house, they have a 7-month-old daughter of whom my husband and I are also godparents.
Their little girl is an amazing baby and I love being her godmother. As I don't see them very often, I had a good time with the baby on my arm. Until a moment came when my daughter said, 'Mommy, I'm jealous.'
I talked to her and gave the baby back to the parents, but every time I took the baby back in my arms my daughter would repeat, ''I'm jealous and you don't care about me.'' She repeated this a few times, and at some point, I almost got annoyed, but tried my best to keep being patient.
I remembered that at my daughter's age if I felt jealous, I would just sulk and not want to talk to anyone. My parents' friends found me rude easily because of my behavior; I hid my feelings and that reflected my personality and how people saw me.
Noticing that my daughter talks about her feelings made me proud of the education I'm giving her. Stopping to reflect, she always says what she feels no matter what! She says when she's happy, she says when she's upset, and she says when she's jealous.
I'm sure this will make you an honest person with yourself and the people around you. After all, hiding what you feel and mainly pretending that you feel something else, only brings suffering and mental confusion to ourselves.
That's why I'm in favor of teaching children to say what they think and what they feel. But we must teach them to do this gently so they don't hurt other people emotionally.
What do you think about this?