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Mental Health Corner
B A LT I M O R E J E W I S H H O M E . C O M
THE BALTIMORE JEWISH HOME
APRIL 8, 2021
Modeling Emotional Honesty By Rabbi Azriel Hauptman
Emotional honesty is the awareness of the essence of one’s emotions and the ability to communicate them to others. As a parent, there is no real way to teach emotional honesty other than by modeling. Children are around their parents often enough to have plenty of opportunities to see how they manage their emotions and
this will likely be their template for their management of their own emotions throughout their lives. Here is an example. Shimon had a very hard day, and when he came home he was completely depleted of his energy. As he walked through the door, he tripped on his six-yearold daughter’s shoes. Before he had
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a chance to think, he immediately screamed out in an angry voice, “Rivka, why did you leave your shoes in the middle of the floor?” Here is where one’s actions will diverge based on the level of emotional honesty. If Shimon is emotionally dishonest with himself, he will stick to his knee-jerk reaction that Rivka committed a terrible offense by leaving her shoes in middle of the floor. His anger may escalate, as he projects his own personal negativity onto everyone around him. If Shimon reacts this way on a regular basis, it can have severe lifelong repercussions as Rivka develops negative feelings about herself. The path of emotional honesty would result in an entirely different response. Shimon will immediately realize that he overreacted and that his angry reaction is not a reflection of Rivka’s behavior, but rather a result of the negative emotional state that he was in after having a very hard day. He will calm himself down, approach Rivka, and try to explain to her what happened. He would tell her, “Rivka, you did nothing wrong by leaving your shoes in the middle of the floor and I am sorry for snapping at you. Tatty acted angry because Tatty had a very hard day, and people sometimes make mistakes and act angry at someone else when they are feeling bad about themselves.” Look at the number of lifelong lessons that Rivka has learned from her father modeling emotional honesty! She learned that when you feel angry at someone else, it is often just
a reflection of your own negative emotional state. She also learned that when one gets angry, there are ways to calm yourself down. Additionally, she learned how to be honest with your feelings both towards yourself and towards others. Another application of emotional honesty in parenting is how one talks to a child when a child sees a parent in a negative emotional state. For example, if a parent is sad due to a personal loss, and tells the children that everything is fine, this communicates to the child that we should suppress our emotions. A parent can instead model emotional honesty by saying, “Mommy is feeling sad today because Mommy misses Bubby. It is okay and normal to sometimes feel sad.” The child can now feel more comfortable about his or her own emotions, and also learns the skill of how to be honest and communicative about one’s emotions. One can only give what one has. Parents who are blessed with emotional honesty have the ability to impart this invaluable trait to their children, and then can then pass it on to their children. Work on your own emotional honesty and the ripples of your modeling will be enjoyed for generations to come. This is a service of Relief Resources. Relief is an organization that provides mental health referrals, education, and support to the frum community. Rabbi Yisrael Slansky is director of the Baltimore branch of Relief. He can be contacted at 410-448-8356 or at yslansky@reliefhelp.org
