Your child begins observing how you manage emotions even before they experience the emotions themselves. So remember, they will most likely pick up a skill or two from you. Kids are not going to successfully learn to do something that you yourself cannot do.
"We are hardwired to perceive and interpret subtle variations in vocal tone, facial expressions, and body posture," said Christina Lansdown, a licenced marriage and family therapist who has been working with children and families for over 15 years. "When the words that you are saying don't line up with this encoded information, it actually exacerbates the problem because your child's nervous system is perceiving that incongruence and will sense it as a threat." Therefore, she explained, the "do as I say and not as I do" approach will not work. We, as caregivers, need to model and embody the ways we expect our children to behave.