Improve Family Relationships through Emotional Intelligence
Family emotional intelligence
Family is the best thing. Family is our closest friend, our greatest source of support and love. Our interactions with our family can be filled with misunderstanding, resentment and bickering. People we should know and feel the best of are often treated as strangers or adversaries by those we shouldn’t.
Our first and most powerful emotional memories are made in our family. And they continue to appear there. Emotional intelligence succeeds in places where other attempts to achieve family harmony fail. Empathy and active awareness–the ability to be aware, accepting, and continuously attuned with others–are what enable us to respond to each other’s needs.
Because EQ puts you in control over your family relationships, including with siblings, parents, and inlaws, EQ can be incredibly beneficial in the family. You can’t control others’ emotions, and you can’t blame everyone for family conflicts. As close relationships are based on feelings, most techniques to improve family relationships focus on communicating your feelings.
Family contact can become a burden if there is no emotional intimacy. No one wants to spend so much time with strangers. You must be honest and open with your family to allow them to love and accept one another. The following suggestions will transform from common, practical advice to highly effective ways of bringing your family closer. These ten tips will help you get closer to your family.
Ten Tips to Improve Family Relationships
- You must take care of yourself if you want to care for others. You will need to exercise more if your family is more demanding. Maybe you can find ways together to exercise.
- If you want to be heard, listen. Communication is the most common complaint in families. You may simply not be listening to them.
- Help people make emotional choices. You can manage your mood by accepting all emotions, but not all behavior. Be a role model that encourages respect for feelings and rights and clarifies that you have the right to decide what you feel.
- Show generosity by giving as well as receiving. Giving and receiving are both parts of the same loving continuum. We can’t give if we don’t give. And if we don’t receive, we don’t have much to give. The extreme selflessness that is not beneficial to others is a sign of insecurity.
- You are responsible for the messages you send. Children and the elderly are particularly sensitive to nonverbal cues. Our words and tone of voice, body language, facial expressions, and posture communicate our emotions. To assess our emotional compatibility, we need to pay attention to our voice and look at ourselves in photos and the mirror. Love words through clenched teeth are not loving; they feel confusing.
- Do not try to solve the problems of your family. Caregiving for your family does not mean giving unwelcome advice or taking over their problems. Allow them to discover their strengths and ask for your help when they need them.
- Leave a lasting impression with actions. No matter what you say, your actions will communicate your values. Do not be a nag, but an example.
- Recognize your mistakes to all, even younger relatives. Being sorry for hurting someone you love is a sign of humility and emotional integrity. It is possible to show that everyone can learn, even though no one is perfect. It is easier to forgive yourself and others when you apologize.
- Find out what each person needs. It is impossible to assume that your grandmother will need the same love and support as your three-year-old or that they will have the same needs next season. Ask!
- Be generous in expressing love. Every member of a family, especially young children, needs emotional support in loving words, actions, and looks. People who need the most emotional support may be the least demanding.
Family foundations for emotional intelligence
Be kind to yourself. Family is an interdependent system. However, you don’t have to blame your family for how you got there. The best way to fix any family problem is by taking care of your emotional well-being. You can also hold your spouse and children responsible for your happiness. Your family will soon follow your example if you believe you have the right and obligation to meet your own emotional needs.
Consistency builds trust. Studies show that a lack of consistency destroys trust. People who depend on you and love them, especially children, can become confused and scared if they don’t have emotional awareness. It’s important to share your awareness with family members.
Be open to the possibility that you are not clones. It is unrealistic to expect you to be as talented as your siblings. It can be easy to lose sight of this when we are too attached to the family continuum.
It doesn’t matter how many times you’ve loved someone. Knowing them doesn’t make you a better person. Each of us sees change within ourselves, even though we all change. It’s so frustrating to be treated like a child brother by someone you don’t know, or as if you’re still the same airhead as you were when you were fourteen, despite the fact you are now the CEO of your company. You can help your family avoid stale patterns of interaction and show empathy by modeling the kind of attention you want to receive. Don’t seek the comfort of talking about old memories when you are with your family. Ask for the latest information and show you care by asking questions and listening to your body and mind.
Avoid emotional traumas that can cause you to feel frustrated and weak. EQ is not a way to get entangled in emotional memories. You can take a moment to think about the emotional memories that have influenced your behavior today, whether you are feeling out of control with your family or kicking yourself for being a child with your parents.
We want to cherish every stage in life and encourage our family members to do the same. Accepting that change is inevitable emotionally is the best way to do so. Accept the fear of your parents’ aging, but use your emotional awareness and empathy to find ways you can treasure this moment for its unique characteristics. What can you do now to help your parents get along? Can you have fun while still making sure that everyone feels valued and useful in your family support system?
Ask if you aren’t sure what will work. Accepting your fear of change is a good way to make it easier for you to discuss subjects you might have found awkward. Perhaps your parents are waiting for you to speak up. Let them know. Change is one of many opportunities to enrich your family’s dynamic.
Use your emotional intelligence to get along and communicate with adult family members.
Harmonious relations between parents, adult siblings, inlaws, and adult children are threatened by two elements: lack of time as well as an abundance of emotional memories. These two elements add to the possibility that we will be overwhelmed by our adult relatives and give up on ourselves if they need anything. It is important to spend time understanding what our parents want, building close friendships with siblings, and bringing together without letting go of all the bad jokes about selfish, contentious families.
Emotional intelligence is so powerful that it can give us so much energy, creativity, and motivation that these relationships need not be difficult. Recognizing emotional memories and changes in people is how we recognize them. Your EQ will be strong, and you can ensure that adult family interactions are not dominated by managing crises and cleaning up mistakes.
Improve your relationships with your adult kids
Many parents are shocked to discover that their children have grown up and cannot just relax after guiding them into adulthood. There is no place for a relationship to stand still. Your ability to adapt to the changes and growth before role reversal is key to maintaining a healthy relationship with your children. Keep the lines of communication open with your children. They may be absorbed in work, love, or friendships at this point in their lives. Tell them how you feel and what you need.
You may need to amend your approach to your children if you have just raised your EQ. Are they avoiding you because of your demands or making their decisions? Are you bringing more disillusionment and judgment to the relationship than they can bear? Are you listening to your children’s feelings about their choices? Have you tried to discover their needs? Adult children may keep their distance from their parents because of past hurtful experiences. In these cases, the best way to improve relationships is to listen to them and admit that you were wrong. These are some ways to bridge the gap.
- Learn why it’s difficult to accept your children making different choices from yours. Do you feel in control? Why can’t you accept their independence?
- Use the power of apology. As long as you give the letter as a gift, there is no expectation of what it will bring back. You may only be able to say that you tried your best to correct past mistakes. It is possible to also ask for forgiveness.
- Discuss what you want from your ex-child. Make a list with no more than seven items. Compare your lists to see how close you are to each other’s needs.
You can do the exercise alone if your child is unable or unwilling to ask. You can fill out the list by yourself. Then, move to another chair or place and complete the list as your adult child would. Compare. Compare. Is it possible to fail to recognize the changes in your child?
Reclaiming your adult siblings
High-EQ families have siblings who share the responsibilities of aging parents. They look forward to opportunities to bring all generations together because they know their limits, their talents, and how to communicate them. This is unfortunately not a true representation of adult sibling relationships. Too often, history intervenes. Perhaps your parents weren’t able to provide the same love and support for your brother as they did for yours. Perhaps childhood memories can trigger jealousy, resentment and rivalry. Perhaps it was just too painful when your sister, who knows you well, doesn’t notice how much you have changed over time.
No matter the issue, any of these ideas can be used to revive your relationship. You can also reconnect if you have the time and go away together. Use your time to exchange many “I feel” messages. Be clear that you are not asking your sibling for change by expressing yourself. Listen with your body and not your head when your sibling responds.
You can reconnect with your sibling if he or she is difficult to reach and an outing doesn’t work. You can think of ways to make your sibling feel special.
Improve your relationships with extended family
What are your relationships with extended family members? Whether you have a marriage relationship or not? Struggling because you are trying to forge family bonds that don’t have the emotional history to hold them together? Smooth because they don’t have the emotional baggage your immediate family of origin carries? Both are possible in any relationship. How difficult one of these relationships can be will depend on how important you consider it to you and how long it has been going. It can be not easy to get along with a new mother-in-law and, therefore, a mother. It’s possible to be friendly to the cousin that you only see on holidays, on the other hand.
Your expectations of your extended family will determine how good or deep you can make them. Although we may feel guilty about resenting our parents, there is no reason not to love our inlaws. Many people don’t feel obliged to do so. You can show empathy to your extended family just as you would any other person. This means that you must accept the wide range of differences to find common ground.
You can be everyone’s favorite niece or uncle if you are willing to listen and show empathy. If you don’t have that ability yet, here are some tips to make extended family relationships more rewarding.
You don’t need to like everyone equally.
Even if you try your best, sometimes you find yourself disliking a family member or inlaw. Consider how much of your baggage prevents you from understanding this person. Accept your feelings and only interact with the person if you feel comfortable. You may find your heart opens up if you can remove the pressure of seeing them under this stress.
Don’t ask any loaded questions if you are unable to answer them.
Research shows that emotions account for 90% of communication. Therefore it’s important to be aware of your motives and take responsibility for the messages you send through gestures, expressions, and words. We often don’t communicate what we mean because we are afraid to accept responsibility for our emotions. We manipulate others by offering to accept them or saying that we don’t mind if they do. Then we resent the offender. Go somewhere else if you cannot be honest with your extended families.
