sister in the world.”
As Jill told Dan this story, she explained that this last verbal
torpedo had hit its mark and produced the dramatic tears from
Gracie that Grant had hoped for. Still, Jill was glad that she had
been there, or her son likely would have caused physical, not just
emotional, pain. The question she asked Dan is one that parents ask
us frequently: I can’t be with my kids every second of the day. How do
I teach them to do the right thing and control themselves even when I’m
not around?
One of the most important skills we can teach our kids is to
make good decisions in high-emotion situations like the one Grant
faced here. We want them to pause before acting, to consider
consequences, to think about the feelings of others, to make ethical
and moral judgments. Sometimes they come through with the kind
of behavior that makes us proud. And sometimes they don’t.
What is it that makes our kids choose their actions so wisely in
certain moments and so poorly in others? Why do certain situations
leave us patting our children on the back, and others leave us
throwing our hands in the air? Well, there are some pretty good
reasons based on what’s going on in the higher and lower parts of a
child’s brain.
THE MENTAL STAIRCASE: INTEGRATING THE UPSTAIRS AND DOWNSTAIRS BRAIN
We can talk about the brain in many ways. In chapter 2, we
focused on its two hemispheres, the left and the right. Now we
want to look at it from top to bottom, or actually from bottom to
top.
Imagine that your brain is a house, with both a downstairs and
an upstairs. The downstairs brain includes the brain stem and the
limbic region, which are located in the lower parts of the brain,