Читать книгу Emotional Confidence: Simple Steps to Build Your Confidence - Gael Lindenfield, Gael Lindenfield - Страница 37

Nowadays it is fairly generally accepted that our parents have a major impact on the development of our personality. Our emotional style is also significantly influenced by many other factors in our formative years. For example, the cultural habits of the country in which we live or the religion which we prac-tise will play their part in influencing the manner in which we express our feelings. Most countries and religions develop rituals, customs and ceremonies which they use for expressing emotion. Some stereotypical examples:

– the Irish will express some of their grief through singing and dancing at ‘wakes’ for the dead

– the people of Saudi Arabia express their collective disgust for serious crimes of theft by watching the offender’s limb being amputated in public

– in Italy one way mothers have historically learned to express their love for their families is through providing them with sumptuous, extended meals

– in Britain traditionally fathers often express their love to their sons by taking them to football matches.

So children learn to pick up a style of expressing emotion by watching the habits of the majority of people around them as well as through the role-models of important parent-figures. Even more importantly, they reinforce that learning by copying this behaviour and trying it out for themselves.

Of course, even with the same national culture each individual can have differing opportunities to practise their emotional skills, and this will also affect their style. For example:

– in many countries girls do not get as much encouragement to demonstrate anger or even to take part in situations (e.g. fighting, the stock exchange) where you would normally find triggers to this emotion. So, even if it is normal in their country to shout and bellow out frustration, women will be much less likely to do so than men

– although pride might be nationally regarded with disdain, in some families it will be considered more of a ‘sin’ than in others. The children of these families will be even less likely to share their pride in their successes

– in some school gangs where showing fear meets with disapproval, its members may not be as open as other children in expressing their anxieties about exams or punishments

– in some professions drinking alcohol is the normal way to deal with frustration, so its members are less likely to develop the skill of expressing anger openly but safely.