Prologue What Makes a Child Strong?

Part 1: The Conditions of a Happy Person: Raising Children with Strong Souls

What kind of children become happy adults?
The power of the soul begins with attachment.
Let them follow the guidance of autonomy and passion.
Teach them the ability to interpret failure.
Understand, regulate, and utilize your emotions.

Part 2: Developing Social Skills: Relationships with Others Are Half the Battle for Happiness

Parents are the first strangers a child meets.
There is no need to make everything understandable.
People are all different from me
There is no relationship without conflict.

Part 3: Building Frustration Resilience: Don't Let Failure Overtake You

Teach the ways of the world
There is no life without frustration.
Allow yourself to soothe your emotions
Let them go through trials step by step

Part 4: Expanding Your Problem-Solving Skills: Plan, Act, and Solve

Teach them how to control their environment
Don't be the child's hands and feet
Teach the power of repetition and practice
Self-examination and self-evaluation are important.

Part 5: Developing Adaptability and Flexibility: Teach The Ways of the World

The rules of the home are different from the rules of the world.
You must be able to read the world's expectations.
Understand the logic of power and authority
A child who grows up with wounds

Epilogue: A child with a strong soul designs his or her own life.

“The more you love, the more frustrated you become.”
Professor Cho Sun-mi's must-read book on childcare: A paradigm-shifting guide to parenting.
A beloved children's education bestseller for 10 years, now in a revised edition!

“Wounds do not knock a child down, but rather, by overcoming them, they become the driving force for growth.
“The greatest gift a parent can give is not being afraid of getting hurt, being able to embrace it, and ultimately giving their souls a chance to grow through it.”
_From the text

What kind of child will grow into a happy adult? Every parent wants their child to live a happy life.
"Raise a Child with a Strong Soul" is a representative child education book by Professor Cho Sun-mi, a "parent mentor" in Korea who presents a new parenting paradigm. It is a book written based on solid psychological and scientific research results and decades of clinical psychology experience.
This is a must-read parenting book that emphasizes the fact that fostering pain tolerance in children will increase the absolute level of happiness they experience throughout their lives, and it is a textbook on child education that presents the core principles of parenting.


Going to a good university, getting a good job, or having a lot and enjoying a lot does not make you a happy person.
According to Harvard University's Grant Study, which began with the question, "Is there a formula for a happy life?", the following seven factors determine happiness.
Ability to cope with pain, education, stable marriage, quitting smoking, abstaining from alcohol, exercise, and maintaining a healthy weight.
Among them, the most important factor was the ‘ability to respond to pain.’
How maturely you respond to pain and how well you can endure hardships are very important to leading a happy life.
This paradoxically suggests that a lack of pain tolerance can make life more difficult.


We've raised our children with utmost care, treating them like gold and jade. But what if they're afraid of the world, struggling to adapt to society, and unable to do anything because it's too difficult? Could it be that our parenting approach is headed in the wrong direction? "Raising a Child with a Strong Soul" is the book that answers this very question.


In this book, the author persuasively argues that pain and wounds are the driving force of growth, while clearly presenting essential and core parenting principles that will help children grow into happy individuals.
The book is filled with advice that will help your child grow into an independent and proactive person, such as “Recognize and follow your authority,” “Don’t be your child’s head, hands, and feet,” “Let them experience the pain of mistakes,” and “Let them know that their own feelings and the feelings of others are both valuable.”
This book, based on the deep insight of an expert, clearly explains how to develop children's social skills, frustration tolerance, problem-solving skills, adaptability, and flexibility, and how to help them grow into children with inner strength.


The author repeatedly emphasizes that it is important for parents to help their children develop frustration tolerance, learn the ways of the world, and learn how to soothe themselves, saying, “Pain is essential in life, so the ability to endure it is more important than reducing it.”
It is important to realize that there are things in this world that must be done even if you don't want to, things that must be endured even if you want to, that no one is perfect, that no parent can give everything to their child, and that the world does not revolve around 'me'.


If parents endlessly indulge their child's desires in the name of 'love' and 'respect', eliminate any discomfort the child may feel in advance, and take the initiative to do things the child should do on their own, the child will become increasingly self-centered, and their frustration tolerance will inevitably become weaker.
A parent's desire to make their child happy can actually increase the child's suffering and deprive the child of the opportunity to grow on his or her own.


Children who are trained to deal well with frustration and failure from an early age will shine even brighter as they grow.
Compared to children with low frustration tolerance, they have better interpersonal relationships and better academic achievement.
As adults, they are more socially adaptable and have higher happiness indices.


Wounds are the driving force of growth for a child.
Children who endure trials and setbacks, gain confidence through self-control, and experience joy through healthy social relationships ultimately experience the joy of growth.
Children who can bounce back from setbacks and failures, children who can build good relationships with others, children who have developed problem-solving skills through repeated training and practice, and children who are flexible enough to understand that the rules of the world and the rules of the home are different ultimately grow into happy adults.
If parents maintain the parenting attitudes suggested in this book, such as “The more you love, the more frustrated you should be,” and “Let your child know that he or she is not the center of the world,” they will be able to help their children grow up feeling much less pain from the things they experience in life, even if they go through the same things.


◎ Ten Key Parenting Principles to Build Frustration Resilience

1.
Teach them that there are things in this world that must be done even if they don't want to, and things that must be endured even if they want to.

2.
Don't be the child's head, hands, and feet.

3.
Before deciding what to allow, decide what rules you need first.

4.
Recognize and obey your parents' authority.

5.
Let them suffer the pain of their mistakes.
6.
Let them know that I am not the center of the world.

7.
Let them know that the rules of the world are different from those of home.

8.
Let them know that both their own feelings and the feelings of others are valuable.

9.
When you give freedom and autonomy, give an equal amount of duty and responsibility.

10.
If you want to make them think for themselves, make them nervous.