These four key traits will help you to teach your children how to manage their conflicts.
Having teens in the home is an adventure. There are certainly varying points of view and plenty of opportunities for disagreements and for siblings fighting. In fact, being a parent navigating personality and opinion differences within the family is a transforming and oftentimes exhausting adventure, especially when your kids start fighting.
Recently, my son and daughter were mowing lawns together, and my son came up to me and said, “Man, dad, it’s been so hard to deal with Lexi today!”
Then Lexi said to me, “Dad, Alex wasn’t nice to me!”
Both gave me their point of view from very different angles. I’m sure you’ve never been in that position as a parent. I picture God listening to our sides of the story when we’re upset at each other as brothers and sisters in Christ.
There are so many things that can blind us, and kids lack the overall life experiences and tools to effectively handle the many things leading to their frustrations and disagreements.
How many times have you heard an argument break out and, moments later, your kids are fighting? More often than not, it’s one of many disputes between them that you’ve had to referee during the day. As a parent, I’m sure you are asking how to calm down the sibling rivalry and get your kids to stop fighting.
Researchers report there is at least one sibling conflict in families with young children every ten minutes. That’s a lot of refereeing from parents every day! Conflicts between siblings can be biting, impassioned, and difficult to navigate because of many complexities.
Sibling Fights are Nothing New
Sibling fights are nothing new, but God calls us into a different story. The story of Cain and Abel in Genesis is the earliest account we have of a sibling conflict. We read their story, which takes place when they are adults. I wonder what their relationship was like as children and how their conflicts at a young age impacted their interactions as grownups.
God calls us to have a different relationship with our siblings than Cain and Abel’s relationship. Jesus calls us to be imitators of Him and to seek unity with those around us. As a parent, you have the privilege of teaching this in your home to your children. Teaching our kids how to imitate Christ in loving others in our family will help them in relationships for the rest of their lives.
Reasons Why Siblings Fight
Why do siblings fight with each other? Possible reasons include:
- Insecurities
- Selfishness
- Jealousy
- A desire for power and control
- Feeling that things are unfair
- Being tired or hungry
- Feeling left out
- Boredom
- Impulsiveness
- Competitiveness
- Difficult-to-manage emotions such as frustration, anxiety, stress, or sadness
Sometimes it’s not just one reason that causes kids to fight. There can be many combinations and possibilities at play when your children choose to argue with one another. But just as they engage in conflict, they can also participate in the solution.
What happens when your children have a conflict in your home? Do you scream? Do you ignore it and then explode? Or do you ignore it and let your kids hash it out in the hopes that they’ll “figure it out?” Without maturity, this last tactic leaves one child in power and the others powerless. A power and control structure naturally develops, especially if one or more of your children have a peacemaker personality.