Coaching practices for Elevation the Emotion That Lifts You as a Parent

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Does this sound like the set of challenges you might be facing?

  • I feel guarded and shut down most of the time, like nothing really reaches me
  • My days have gone flat and cynical, and I miss that warm lift in my chest I used to get from seeing someone do something genuinely good
  • I’ll be genuinely moved by something kind I witness, and then it just evaporates by the next day
  • There’s a spot where I keep quietly cutting corners when no one’s really looking, and I want to live like the people I admire actually are watching
  • When my child gets upset my whole reflex is to make it stop as fast as possible

Practices that may help

  1. Elevation: The Emotion That Lifts You
    Elevation is the warm, expansive emotion triggered by witnessing acts of unusual moral beauty — exceptional kindness, courage, or self-transcending love. Proposed by Jonathan Haidt, it produces a distinctive physiological state (often a warm feeling in the chest) and reliably motivates prosocial action in the observer. The evidence base is experimental but smaller than classic emotions; the core findings are robust, though the mechanism remains partially debated.
  2. Support the physiology of elevation through vagal tone practices
    Build the physiological capacity for elevation through practices that strengthen vagal tone.
    Elevation: The Emotion That Lifts You
  3. Deliberately seek out acts of moral beauty
    Regularly expose yourself to accounts of extraordinary human goodness — in person, in narrative, or in news.
    Elevation: The Emotion That Lifts You
  4. Keep an elevation journal
    Record moments of moral beauty you witness — in others and in yourself — to train your attention toward virtue.
    Elevation: The Emotion That Lifts You
  5. Act in ways that might elevate others
    Make choices with the awareness that others may be watching and may be lifted by what they see.
    Elevation: The Emotion That Lifts You
  6. Treat the emotional moment as a teaching opportunity
    When your child is upset, slow down instead of speeding toward resolution.
    Emotion Coaching (John Gottman)
  7. Cultivate relationships with moral exemplars
    Deliberately build closeness with people whose character consistently elevates you.
    Elevation: The Emotion That Lifts You
  8. Become aware of your own emotional reactions first
    A parent who is flooded by their child’s distress cannot coach it — self-awareness is the prerequisite.
    Emotion Coaching (John Gottman)
  9. Listen empathically and validate the feeling
    Reflect the emotion you see accurately before you do anything else.
    Emotion Coaching (John Gottman)
  10. Help the child label the emotion with words
    Naming the feeling turns a body sensation into something the child can think about.
    Emotion Coaching (John Gottman)

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