A High-Level Guide to Ethical Fitness (Part 4 of 5)
Today I cover how to do conscious role modeling to cultivate your children’s ethical reasoning.
Try something when you get home tonight: ask your kids if they’d like to play a little game. Sit down facing each other and tell your kids to follow you. Put your finger on your cheek and, as you move it slowly towards your chin, say the sentence “Move your finger to your ear.”
See which one — ear or chin — your kids end up touching on their own faces. Most kids end up touching their chins. What has happened here? You’ve just witnessed the dominance of unconscious mimicry over verbal instruction.
Actions speak louder than words: the old adage rings true — not only for this little game, but also of everyday ethical behavior (or lack of it).
In light of this fact, today we’re talking about conscious role-modeling as a second ethical fitness technique (following upon last week’s technique: building emotional vocabulary).
Let’s take a look first at what the purpose of role modeling is. Most of us probably jump to the obvious answer: it’s to show my kids the right thing to do or the right way to treat people (or something along these lines). That’s an okay answer, but we can do better. Let’s take it one step further: it’s to safely expose my children to the kinds of real life questions and dilemmas that they will face some day on their own. That’s an improvement.
But there’s still room for a cherry on top:
Role modeling is to safely expose my children to the kinds of real life questions and dilemmas they’ll face on their own by allowing them to practice deliberating alongside me.
There’s our winner. Let’s call that last definition conscious role modeling (to differentiate it from the kind of role modeling that happens when your kids see you doing something but you are unconscious of their observation).
What is conscious role modeling?
Here are the key concepts behind conscious role modeling:
- Real life dilemmas: We often think role modeling is only for when we do things right or are successful at things. But if you only let your kids see your success cases, you simplify the natural complexity of reality and don’t allow your kids to learn how mistakes are processed via reflection and inner-dialogues. Make sure you role model to them across a range of failures and successes to build resilience.
- Safely exposes: When you role model, think of your child as an apprentice. Apprentices learn by watching you do, then trying their own hand at it. In ethical reasoning, this means bringing your kid into the role modeling itself by giving them a measure of responsibility to reflect on and offer potential solutions for the ethical dilemmas. This is like letting them put a gentle hand on the car wheel while you drive — it’s a safe way to help them learn what it feels like to steer in a simulated space; or like teaching them to swim by letting them swim “on their own” (but with you as a support) so that they get to experience a safe-measure of uncertainty with you present.
- Deliberating: This is the key verb for good role modeling. When faced with any ethical dilemma, you should reflect on the situation by talking to yourself aloud alongside your child about (1) the facts of the situation; (2) what the potential conflicts are; and (3) potential courses of action that could be taken. Eventually start bringing them into the deliberation by asking them “What do you think we could do? What do you think is the right thing to do?” and listening respectfully to their response.
Finally, always remember to think about your child’s maturity level and what level of ethical dilemma is appropriate for them to be exposed to before doing conscious role modeling with them. For instance, while topics like ‘how to be kind to rude people,’ ‘how to apologise,’ and ‘how to learn to walk away from conflict’ may be relevant for younger kids, topics like your own marital problems with their other parent are likely not necessary for them to hear.
Most importantly, remember to end any discussion with your child with a big hug, an unconditional “I love you” and verbal affirmation for their effort. Participating in this level of introspection takes bravery and honesty!
(Here’s a sample affirmation: Thank you for sharing your thoughts with me today, I think we did a great job thinking together. I liked how you explained what you were feeling and really appreciated how you tried to help me figure out what I should do / what I should have done.)
