How does Mindfulness relate to parenting?
This is part 2 of a 3 part series on what to expect in this course. Did you miss part 1? Find it here.
How does Mindfulness relate to parenting?
Our children are not born with an ability to self soothe. They need all sorts of assistance as infants. I can remember feeling like a circus act, trying to get our screaming infants settled. First, my husband and I would swaddle our babies tightly, then hold them in the crook of our arm while we walked and bounced endlessly. My husband even had his own patented “speed skater” move that helped settle our babies. The point is, babies have no idea how to self soothe.
If you think of self-soothing (or emotional self-regulation) as a loop, this loop is left open for babies and growing children. We, as their parents (often times unbeknownst to us) help them close this loop by modeling how to react to situations. As our children grow, they mirror the way the adults around them are responding to the stress in their own lives. The environment we provide and many of the skills we model become our children’s skills. Our kids are working on developing the ability to self soothe (or self regulate) from the time they are infants through their teen years. Big responsibility, huh?
This is why research shows that the best way to teach mindfulness to kids, is to surround them with mindful adults. They will start to use mindfulness without needing to be explicitly taught…. simply because the adults around them are approaching and responding to situations mindfully.
By the way, I am not suggesting that we need to somehow be perfect all the time around our kids. Rather, by simply increasing our awareness, we can intentionally choose our responses instead of having knee-jerk reactions all the time. And the times that we do have those knee-jerk reactions (because we ALL do.), we can circle back and talk to our kids about what happened.
Learn more in my Online Mindfulness and Parenting Course. Registration opens March 15th. Class begins March 29th from 12:00-1:00 (EST)
Your investment in this 6 week course is $247. This includes:
- 6 live sessions, with time for Q & A
- Access to an exclusive online community of course graduates
- Monthly live Mindfulness practice and Q & A in the online community
- First 5 registrants receive a free 1 hour consult ($125 value) with me
Want to sample it first? Have questions? Register here for my 1 hour free mini class. Meant for parents of kids of all ages, babies through teen.
Part 3 of What to Expect, coming soon!
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