If it's not Strengths - What is it?
When I’m sitting across the table interviewing people from Executives to front line employees, and I ask the question – “What are your Strengths?”, it never ceases to amaze me that most people sit and shuffle in their seats, they are uncomfortable and they find it hard to answer. Is that you?
It can be a hard question for people to answer. With the right line of questioning, we get there. In this situation, the thing I appreciate most are the moments when the lightbulb flashes on, and the interviewee begins to realise what their strengths are and how they have helped them in the past. Their eyes light up, the colour returns to their face and there is almost always a shift in the pace in which they talk and the energy they convey. Whether they get the role or not, I feel the interaction was of benefit for them.
What does that say about our well-being?
What astounds me is; how we can get through so much of life without consciously knowing and using our strengths? What does that mean for our well-being? What about our children? Is it important for them to know their strengths?
Are we flourishing or languishing?
I believe that more than ever before, our children are going to need to understand their strengths and how they can use them to adapt to their environments, build relationships quickly, be creative and bounce back from adversity. Our world is changing at an unprecedented rate. We aren’t even aware of the types of jobs our children will be doing when they leave school.
Can we help our kids shine?
The reason I started with “It Starts with Strengths” is that Character Strengths is central to all five pillars of Martin Seligman’s PERMA model for well-being (Seligman, 2011). Martin Seligman is one of the founders of positive psychology. His model of PERMA stands for:
Positive Emotions
Engagement
Relationships
Meaning and
Achievement
The link between PERMA and strengths include:
Positive Emotions: Using our strengths helps us cultivate positive emotions and habitual positive emotions can build character – e.g. gratitude is a positive emotion and when practiced regularly it can build the character strength of gratitude.
Engagement: This is core to strength usage. When we are using our strengths and talents, we are more likely to be engaged, as in, enter flow state (where we loose track of time) and grow as a result. Children enter engaged states all the time when they are playing – this is a really healthy state for them!
Relationships: When we use our strengths, see others and help others use theirs we build connectedness and enhance relationships.
Meaning: When we use our strengths (particularly our character strengths) we are contributing to others (above) and the greater good, it guides achievement (below) and helps us be our authentic selves, all which enable us to lead meaningful and purposeful lives. My personal purpose is to help others bring out their best selves. What’s yours?
Achievement/Accomplishment: When we aim our strengths toward achieving our goals in life, it is more energizing, we learn quicker, and we are more likely to achieve and experience the sense of accomplishment. Achievement is also part of building hope, confidence and self-esteem within our children’s lives.
So, “It Starts with Strengths”
Our strengths are core to who we are, and crucially, can act as a beacon of light for our kids across their lives.
Our strengths are what gives us energy, they are what help us shine in the good times and bounce back in the hard times. They are the things we pick up quickly and the things we yearn to apply all the time. We loose track of time and find great joy and satisfaction when using them.
When you’re trying to identify the strengths of your children you can ask yourselves these questions:
- Is your child draw to the same activity or environment?
- Do they show certain traits often?
- Do they have a sense of energy/joy/satisfaction when behaving in a particular way, seeing things through a particular lens, doing a certain activity?
- Do they lose track of time?
- Do they learn a certain skill or knowledge in an area quickly?
- Do they show glimpses of excellence when completing it?
Adapted from (Reckmayer, 2016 and Waters, 2017)
Strengths Usage
Once we identify our children's strengths, the next step is all about how you can help you them develop their strengths and nurture their usage. Choosing activities to help them really build their strengths. Our book “It Starts with Strengths” helps with this.
What to be aware of....
Our strengths are also the things that can get us into trouble. We can over and under use them. Say we have the strength of kindness. We are caring, nurturing, compassionate and altruistic. However, if you overuse the strength you might come across as being intrusive into someone else’s life. You need to know how much kindness is the right amount for the different people you encounter?
Then there is under-use, although the strength might be there, I may not use it enough. That could come from not being self-aware or listening to inappropriate feedback and withholding the usage. If I have a strength of kindness and don’t use it, I might come across as indifferent. I’m not being true to myself. I’m sure we’ve all experienced that at different stages of life. (Neimiec, 2018)
Balanced usage comes through modelling, reflection and feedback. As parents and teachers, we can model the usage and we can help our children reflect on:
- How they use the strength
- How it made the other person/people feel
- How it made them feel both, in the moment and after
Feedback is helpful in letting children know what worked and what they do differently next time. It’s all about spotting the strength usage and helping them consciously use it.
Spotting when it was used well and sharing what you thought the impact was. Spotting when it wasn’t used so well or was underused and discussing with them what they might do different next time. In the next couple of weeks, I’ll share a great model for strengths-based feedback. In the meantime, to help with this, click here to download our strengths spotting sheet.
Focus on what’s working…
One activity I like is spotting when the girls are using their strengths well and sharing it with them. Where possible, I do it in the moment. If they are playing with friends and ‘in the moment of flow’ I will leave it for when we are alone, and I can connect eye-to-eye with them and share what I saw. Other times I write a little note, leave it on their pillow or put it in their lunch box. If they don’t mention that they received it, I will ask and either way we’ll have a little conversation about it.
Nothing beats the face-to-face conversation with your kids.
You could also have a strengths wall or moment in your day where you share this feedback with each other. It is wonderful for building connectedness within your family.
VIA Character Strengths
If you’re focusing on the VIA Character Strengths, each character strength has a wellbeing benefit attached and is morally good - as in, when used effectively it can help make the world a better place.
For instance, kindness “helps buffer against the negative effects of stress and trauma” and “Kindness toward oneself can have numerous benefits including optimism, social connectedness, and goal mastery, and less anxiety, self-criticism, and perfectionism.” (Niemiec, 2018). Who knew the power of kindness? It’s pretty amazing!
If you’re interested in understanding what your character strengths are, click here to take the survey. It is a validated survey. I highly recommend doing it. You can then do some self-reflection as well, about how you use your strengths in life. When we’re looking to help our kids learn something, I find it helps to do it myself, model it, and then they will try it too.
Starting with Strengths is so very important for the well-being of our children. “It Starts with Strengths” is our foundation book. The next book to go live in November is Mindfulness Matters. Altogether, there are ten books. Each book will build on the knowledge kids develop in the previous activity books. It will help them grow a range of new resources that can enhance their well-being. The beauty is your kids can adopt the one’s that feel right for them, right now and still have the others in their back pocket!
** Side note - all this works just as well in the workplace as it does in families. Insert team instead of family and team members instead of kids!
References
Fredrickson, B. (2009) Positivity: Groundbreaking Research to Release Your Inner Optimist and Thirve. Oneworld publications.
Gillham, J., Adams-Deutsch, Z., Werner, J., Reivich, K., Coulter-Heindl, V., Linkins, M., Seligman, M. (2011). Character strengths predict subjective well-being during adolescence. The Journal of Positive Psychology, 6(1), 31-44.
Niemiec, R (2018). Character Strengths Interventions: A Field Guide for Practitioners. Hogrefe Publishing Corporation.
Park, N., & Peterson, C. (2006, a). Character strengths and happiness among young children: Content analysis of parental descriptions. Journal of Happiness Studies, 7(3), 323-341.
Peterson, C., & Seligman, M. (2004). Character strengths and virtues a handbook and classification. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association. Simmel, G. (1950). The sociology of Georg Simmel. Glencoe, IL: Free Press.
Reckmayer, M., & Robinson, J. (2016). Strengths Based Parenting: Developing Your Children’s Innate Talents. Gallup Press.
Seligman, M. (2011). Flourish, A Visionary New Understanding of Happiness and Well-being. Random House Australian.
Waters, L. (2017) The Strength Switch. Penguin Random House Australia.