Mindful Moments Blog

Sam struggled with impulse control and emotional processing when he didn't get what he wanted. Does this sound familiar in your home? I created an improv game to help nurture emotional intelligence and bolster flexibility. Get this game and more in our E-Book: 10 Minutes of Play For 10 Days!

Do you ever feel like a piece of you gets lost in Motherhood? By Leselle Theus It was only dinner, or so I thought. Don’t get me wrong, I was excited to go to dinner. I love going out to dinner. But, in the last four years, I could count on my fingers how many times I indulged in this sweet pleasure of mine, which was a bummer because going out to a new or old favorite restaurant was “my thing!” I loved it so much that it actually didn’t matter if the dinner was a one or five-star rating because, in my eyes, it was the experience that made my heart smile.  So sitting at the restaurant with my friend felt familiar, and it was lovely.  Actually, it turned out to be more than lovely.  This dinner CHANGED MY LIFE! It produced a feeling in me that I hadn’t felt in a while.  I got home and walked through the door … practically skipping … floating, even. “Hello, my boys!” I sang, with my chipper greeting being returned by strange looks from my husband and 4-year-old.  But I didn’t care. I. WAS. HAPPY. Why did this dinner produce such a high? Why? Because it was ME. It was 100% me! I realized that when I became a mom, I gave up on myself. I can’t tell you why, but somewhere in the last four years, I thought that I couldn’t be both me and mom. One had to head to the guillotine. And sadly and quietly, I did.   What followed next was joy in motherhood. Delight in pouring into this brilliant, tiny human. Yet, there was also a silent mourning for me which masked itself in my overwhelm; in my pensive states; in silent screams of “something is missing.” Despite this, I was quick to self-reprimand with the guilt for wanting more, yet having so much to be grateful for.  I love my family. But this fraction of a person longed to walk in wholeness again. It was a longing that felt like a shadow that I couldn’t make out, until now. The shadow was me, wanting to emerge from the background to its rightful place. So even though I couldn’t have foreseen it, going to dinner that afternoon was not just going to dinner. It was reintroducing me to what I love. To what fills me up. To what makes my heart smile. It reintroduced me to Me.  Here’s the reality. I didn’t have to choose. I just had to pivot. I just had to learn the balance. The balance of what makes me and the balance of filling up and pouring out. Now that I have, it feels great. I am feeling better than I have ever felt in four years.  What was I thinking? What are you thinking? Trying to mom on E(mpty)? Trying to mom without being 100% you? Your family benefits, somewhat. You benefit in no way. But everyone will benefit if you are 100% you. Monthly dinners are now on the calendar for me. I’ll get to late-night dinners again soon. But for now, reservation at five, please, so I can fill up and then head home to my family to pour out.  Welcome back, Leselle. I missed you. Reparent Yourself Intergenerational healing is about progress... not perfection.  By understanding and embracing your inner child with kindness, you become resilient, improve your emotional well-being, and form a deeper connection with yourself and others.  If you would like guidance and support in your reparenting journey, please take a moment to explore the Reparent Yourself Masterclass Bundle. Lifetime Access to 20 Interactive Courses, Guided Meditations, Healing Movement, and Other Transformative Resources. The Reparent Yourself Masterclass Bundle is available at 94% Off Savings for a limited time.

What is mindful parenting? Learn the benefits and practices of this positive parenting style and how you can integrate it into your child's life.

Helping children transition from diapers to using the toilet is a big milestone, one often surrounded by stress. Here are tools to guide our tots in toileting without the power struggle. 

Do you use toxic discipline when raising your child? Here are 5 signs that you may. Learn how your childhood influenced your parenting and gain tips for healing both the relationship you have with yourself and the one you share with your child.

We share tips on setting up your Calming Corner for more than one child so it doesn't become another thing on the list of things they argue over. 

We all want to raise kind and empathetic humans. And when our children fail to pick up their toys, do their homework, or listen to our requests, our instinct is to issue a consequence. But what type of consequences work?

Being a social worker has always had some ambiguity on how a day will unfold. Some days I breeze through the hall watching laughing children congregating near their lockers, and other days there is a crisis in a student’s home resulting in tears. But 2020 is a different kind of year.

“Just wait until the teen years,” they’d say. Now I am here, and I get what they were referring to. Teens' fluctuating moods can be hard to deal with, but it's not our fault. Blame it on the brain. 

As a mother and trauma therapist, I can sniff out social trauma from a mile away.

What is a trigger, why do we have them and why are we so dang triggered by our kids?!

I was starting to lose hope that my three-year-old was actually absorbing anything when I talked to him about emotions or attempted to elicit empathy after he hit or kicked another in a fit of rage. But then this happened, and I realized he had been listening after all. 

When we realize one truth - that we don’t have to do it all, all of the time, we buttress our child’s social and emotional development right alongside our own. 

Raising a strong-willed child? You're not alone. Gain access to tools that help you validate the emotions fueling their meltdown, plus tangible tips to redirect hitting, kicking, spitting, power struggles, and other challenging behaviors.

If we want our children to exercise the compassionate parts of themselves, it is important that we expose them to these 3 components of their experience. By Viki de Lieme We passed three kindergarten facilities on our way to school, and this morning there were noisy construction sounds coming from one of them. Ilay, my six-year-old, who was never a fan of loud noises, said he hated the drilling.  "I don't like the noise, either," I said to him. "Can you see why they are drilling?"   He stopped, looked inside, and said, "Looks like they are fixing something and replacing some stuff."  I then asked him what this meant for the kids in that kindergarten, and he replied that the kids would have a nicer kindergarten. And I then asked, "Do you still hate the noise?"   He said, "No."  The Automatic Reaction Looking at the world, we see what our eyes show us, and what we take from it is what our brain already knows. Ilay heard the noise and his brain said, "I don't like noise!" and that's what he took from the situation, but that's pretty narrow and limited, isn't it?  One of our most prominent roles as parents is to teach our children to think, examine, analyze, and eventually, live beyond the automatic reaction. To do that, we need to expose them to the components of their experience.  The Three Layers of Experience  No matter which experience we choose to look at, we can always break it into three layers: external, internal, and systemic. Teaching our children to do the same is KEY to compassion, analytical thinking, care, and a plethora of other traits.  Let's take this morning, for example. External is what actually happened (drilling at the facility). Internal is how Ilay's brain reacted to the happening (I don't like noise!). Finally, systemic is the bigger picture, which allows us to influence and adapt the internal.  Parents Living Beyond the Automatic Reaction To instill skills and values in our children, we must first embody them. From my experience as a parent and parent educator, I know firsthand how hard it is to part from the automatic reaction. But while indeed hard, this is the first step to a life of compassion and calm.  When we break things down into their components and bravely see the bigger picture, our feelings change. When our feelings change, so do reactions.  Say your child melts down at the store (external). Your internal screams, "Why does this have to happen every single time?" Feelings of anger, impatience, frustration, and confusion arise, and your reaction follows. But if you added the systemic and said to yourself, "He's crying for his lost autonomy," for example, you'd feel compassion and empathy towards your little one, and your reaction would follow.  Children Living Beyond the Automatic Reaction Teaching children the three layers of experience allows us to bring peace into every situation because anger, frustration, and other unpleasant feelings disappear miraculously when our eyes are open to the systemic layer. Say your younger child snatches the older one's toy, and the older one automatically gets upset. If we stick to the automated, a fight will follow. But what if we help the older one break it down? Mom: What happened? (external)  Child: He took my toy!  Mom: And what does it mean to you? (internal) Child: He always does it!  Mom: Why do you think he did it? (systemic)  Child: Because he wants to play. The feelings generated by "he always does it" are those of resentment and anger, while those generated by "he wants to play" are those of connection and understanding.  Goodbye Automatic Reactions  One of the activities we often practice during dinner is taking guesses. We analyze each other's behavior and guess WHY they did what they did. Not only does this teach kids how to analyze behaviors and open their hearts to those around them, but it also opens an incredible door into your child's soul.  Sometimes, taking the wrong guess serves you because your little one will immediately give you the answer that's right for them.  The Giraffe and the Tiger  A few weeks ago, when Jon returned from a work trip abroad, he brought back two plushies - a giraffe and a tiger, both super sweet. Ilay immediately chose the tiger and handed the giraffe to Lia. They were both happy at first. A few days later, Ilay started developing a desire for the giraffe. He tried to convince Lia to switch, and she wouldn't. He got upset, closed the door behind him, and cried for a long time.  After a while, Lia went to him and gave him the giraffe. "Present," she said. Then again, for a short little bit, they were both happy. But sure enough, at bedtime, Lia wanted the giraffe. At two years old, the word "present" is not as eternal as it is at six. Ilay got upset, again, this time with Lia.  "What happened"? I asked, aiming for the external.  "Lia took the giraffe back!"  "You're feeling sad because the giraffe is not yours?" I continued, trying to guess the internal.   "No, because she lied to me!"  Equipped with this knowledge, I could then use the systemic to influence the internal.  "You know you'd never take back something you gifted, and you're upset that Lia did. I get it. Why do you think she did it in the first place"?  "Because I was crying, and she wanted to make me happy," he said, looking at Lia again but this time with a soft gaze.  "Yea, I think so, too. And do you think that she understands the word "present" as you do?"  "No," he said and cuddled his tiger.  It's about the Need, Not the Want Ilay didn't eventually get what he wanted, but he fell asleep with a better understanding of himself and a deeper understanding of Lia. He could appreciate what she did for him in a moment of distress, and he understood why she took it back. And understanding is what one needs to open the door to empathy.  

Learn about your child's sensory system and how dysregulation leads to big emotions. Here are some tools to alert or calm your kiddo's nervous system to help regulate big feelings and behavior. 

Home visits can play an important role in alleviating the intergenerational transmission of trauma by helping parents and caregivers build positive and healthy attachments with their children. And, in using social stories for home visits, children can better navigate challenging situations. Here's how. Plus FREE Scripted Social Stories Printable.

A poem about savoring the little moments of parenting. "No one prepared me for the hardest part of parenting … letting go. Parenting is the longest, most gradual break-up. A story that grows in chapters, filled with firsts that turn into lasts."