“I just wanna to talk to her about fun stuff in my life. I am tired of heavy!”
“Can we just seek for peace when I come home to visit?”
“I just wanna put her house and life in order because my mom is just a MESS!”
Adult Children Who Need to Speak Words of Encouragement to Their Parents
Speaking Love in Every Language…
Never having loved studying the temperaments, I entered into the study called “I Said This, You Heard That” by Kathleen Edelman with much caution. Only because a well respected friend and teacher recommended AND GAVE ME THE WORKBOOK did I begin the reading. (Note to self: If I REALLY want someone to read a book I should buy it for her!)
SPOILER ALERT: I AM ONLY THREE WEEKS INTO THE SIX WEEK STUDY SO IT COULD STILL GO SOUTH… HOWEVER,
Living examples through the video (on the free app downloaded with the study) make the material SO ACCESSIBLE for me to apply to my adult children it is impossible to call it a wash. Although I have read about the temperaments before I have never studied them in the context of the words I hear and speak. This has made all the difference.
Although the study is not specifically written to parents and their adult children, each session does talk about how to apply that lesson to parenting,,
The in-take assessment of course, focuses on the parent and what OUR temperaments include. However, as a career parent (I just made up that term meaning I have been a parent for 40 years so that has to equal at least one career!) reading through the material brought to mind all the thousands of times I “misheard” something one of my children said.
my melancholy daughter
“I didn’t say I wanted to move out! I said I wanted a house with less chaos and more organization!”
No joke. My 16-year old melancholic just wanted to organize my life for me. I wish I could have heard that and allowed her to do that (Lord knows I could have used the organization with five other humans in the house!).
Instead, through my choleric ears I heard a condemnation of the way I could never keep the laundry and schoolwork done at the same time!
the phlegmatic son
“Can we please just try to get along and not argue when we don’t get our way?”
This statement, from a 17-year old phlegmatic who had graduated from high school and was pursuing a career in academics and politics, really irritated me. At this young age his “super-smarts” caused me to become alert to everything that sounded like criticism from his mouth. Now, almost 20 years later I hear him “sue for peace” on the daily. It is his nature, the way God wired him as a phlegmatic who seeks calm and harmony in all the words he speaks and hears.
the sanguine twins
“Dad and I wanna go to Disney for graduation instead of a cap and gown.”
No kidding. After 30 years of home schooling instead of a steak dinner I got Mickey Mouse ears and a parade.
It was incredible and NOTHING I would have ever planned.
The two Sanguine males in our family (my Sanguine daughter, Nikki we have always called “a party in a pants suit!”) decided that what we needed after all that Latin, mythology, calculus, and British lit was some well deserved scary rides and musical shows.
They weren’t wrong.
For a week we rode rides, played games, danced with larger than life Princesses (thank you Ariel and Snow White) and remembered all the “good ole days” of home schooling. Every family needs a Sanguine to remind the others to live a little and enjoy life–especially when it does not seem appropriate.
our choleric members
“I am not demanding that you do it my way, I am just saying that is the BEST way to do it.”
“I am coming up after you! You are the Mother and you have to take responsibility for me!” (Choleric daughter to the Choleric mother the day before daughter’s wedding!)
Admittedly, that day makes me smile today, but at the moment we weren’t smiling we were MAD and crying. My choleric “mini-me” needed to control that situation. She and I were both very task oriented and we needed to “get stuff done.” We just had differing views of what that “stuff” needed to be on that very important day. And… we didn’t want to lose each other. Choleric gals need power and control. But their need for loyalty is even fiercer so beware if they are threatened to lose a relationship they love. Their words can bite.
The temperaments are not right or wrong–they just ARE. Like our eye color they can describe who we are and how we will react in a situation. Loving our adult children means learning to speak in words and phrases they understand.
I might be saying, “I love you,” and they might be hearing, “I want to control you,” or “I love you but I don’t respect you.”
Taking the time to learn the temperaments of our adult children means they have a better chance of actually hearing what I am saying.
Practice Parenting 