You may want to share and discuss those rights with your children. Here is a
modified version you can share with younger kids:
• You can think your own thoughts. You don’t have to agree with others or have them agree with you. You don’t have to share your thoughts if you don’t want to.
• You can feel your own feelings. Feelings are an important part of being alive. Feelings are not bad or good; they just are.
You don’t have to act on your feelings, but you can if you think it matters. You don’t have to feel what others feel or share your feelings if you don’t want to.
• Someone else’s feelings and actions are their own, and you are not responsible for them. You are responsible for your own feelings and actions, not anyone else’s. You can’t make someone feel or do things.
• You have the right to love or not love. Love is a feeling that can’t be forced. Love is a good thing, and how you show it is up to you. Everyone shows their love in different ways.
• If people love you, they do not ask you to change who you are. You are lovable as you are. You don’t have to change or be a certain way for anyone.
• It’s okay to be different. Your job is to be yourself. Do your own best.
• Love is what we do, not just what we say. If someone says one thing but does something different, which thing matters more?
• You are allowed to say what you think and feel. You have the right to express yourself. You should try not to hurt people, but you can’t control how other people feel or what they think about your feelings.
• Each person is important in her or his own way. We all have a place. We all matter. We all have strengths and weaknesses. No one is better or worse than anyone else, just different.
• It’s what’s inside that counts. Sometimes people focus on outside appearances, but what is inside each of us matters much more.