Wouldn’t it be great if we could just rewind our lives and have a do over whenever we wanted?  That’s one thing I appreciate about spending time with kids.  Children are almost always up for granting us a do over.  Most haven’t yet developed the ability to hold a grudge.  And even if they have, they’re often incredibly forgiving. It’s just one more lesson we can learn from the kids in our lives.

Yesterday I accidentally bonked my daughter in the nose as I was climbing into bed with her.  She started to cry and said “Bonk” through her tears. But then she reached out to me for comfort.  I apologized, we hugged, and it was as if the incident never happened.  In a way, she let me rewind and have a do over.  I was so grateful.

My husband and I sometimes give one another do-overs too.  I’ve been known to say, “Oops, that’s not what I meant to say, can I rewind please?”  He is often amazingly willing to forget the first statement and listen to the second.  This is a skill that requires a conscious effort to develop.

At least for me, it is often much easier to latch on to the thing my husband said that upsets me, rather than paying attention to the five things he said that were uplifting.  Do you do the same thing?

Luckily, he points it out to me when I’m overly focused on the negative.  And usually I’m able to let things go.  But it wasn’t always this way for me.  I’ve held my share of grudges, that’s for sure.  And when I think back to how it felt to hold that anger and frustration in my body, it felt really crappy.  I really do think it’s true that holding a grudge hurts us more than it hurts the person we’re angry with.

So I’m curious, are there any grudges that you’re willing to let go of this week?  Can you give your friend or loved one a do-over?  And if you’re not ready yet, what will it take for you to be able to let it go?

Watch out for the tendency to require that the other person do something differently in order to earn your forgiveness. The reality is that we can only change ourselves and our thoughts, never another person.

However, when I’ve been able to let go of my grudges and forgive my loved ones, I’ve been amazed at how differently they showed up afterward. The very person I thought was incapable of deep emotional connection actually invited ME to go deeper.  And the one I thought was cold and uncaring became so soft and sweet.

Somehow by accepting people just as they are, we activate such a pure state of love that the other person naturally gravitates toward our ideal vision of them.  Or maybe not, but that’s how I like to look at it.

Are there things you can love and accept about your children that will allow them to show up differently for you?  Let’s all give our kids, spouses, friends and family a do over this week.  Together we can change a sucky day into a lovely one.

Thanks for sharing the journey with me, Shelly

The bad news is it’s completely up to you to set the tone of your household and to maintain your commitment to having a peaceful and loving home life.  The good news is, your children WILL follow your lead easily and naturally.

I have a whole curriculum on this topic which is under development and it’s way too much to go into today, but I wanted share the tip that has made the  biggest difference for the parents I’ve worked with.

Conspiring with your family to lavish one another with acts of kindness. 

This one activity can completely change the energy of your home from competition and animosity to collaboration and kindness.   So how do you begin?

First, consider each member of your family and come up with a nice thing you and your child or children can do for them.  At first it’s helpful to make a list so that you can keep track of the kind acts you plan to infuse into your home.  After you’ve gotten some momentum going, these kinds of acts will become second nature and will happen spontaneously and often in your home, even without your direct participation.  Your list might look something like this:

• Attack Dad with hugs, kisses, and “I love you’s” on Sunday morning
• Make a crown and magic wand for Rachel and then do her bidding for 15min.
• Tell Jason 3 things we appreciate about him
• Cheer for Dad when he gets back from his run
• Let Connor choose his favorite dinner
• Pretend to be a magic genie and give Claire three wishes
• Take out the trash for Jason (or do another chore for him)
• Read a story to Claire
• Hide a surprise gift for Connor in his closet
• Pick flowers and arrange them for Mom
• Play basketball with Connor and Rachel
• Send a thank you note to Grandma

Once you have a good-sized list of acts of kindness, breathe and relax and remember that your family will help you do these things.  You are not alone and it’s not your job to DO all of these things.  Your work is to come up with some initial ideas and help your whole family implement them.

Next, choose an item on the list and go to one or more of your children to begin to conspire with them to offer this act of kindness.  This might sound something like this:

“Hey Jason, are you busy right now?  I have an idea of something sweet we can do for Claire.  Would you like to help me pamper her?”  If your child isn’t interested, that’s OK, just go to another family member and ask.

You may want to begin by lavishing the child who is in the most distress or who exhibits the most animosity toward others.  Remember that picking fights or lashing out is an indicator that your child is needing something.  So, by offering your love, kindness, and generosity to the child who seems to deserve it least, you’re doing a couple of things.

First, you’re modeling for your whole family how you’re committed to treating one another, no matter what THEY DO.  You are lavishing your child with love and affection for being his wonderful self even after he has lashed out at his sister because you know that he is innately good and kind, he has just temporarily lost his ability to show it.

Second, you’re nurturing a person who clearly needs your love and attention,  and you’re teaching your whole family to see unkind outbursts as a signal of need, rather than something to be punished for or retaliated against.

This sets up a positive cycle in your home in which negativity and hurtfulness are quickly bombarded with loving attention.  And amazingly, giving love to your reactive child can actually eradicate the underlying unmet needs and allow the child to regain his own sense of kindness and generosity.

I’m curious, have you ever tried anything like this before?  How did it go?  Do you have questions or concerns about implementing this?  Please leave me a comment below.

And have a fantastic day, Shelly

What other ways could you play this game?  Can you see how it can help kids learn colors, shapes, locations of things in your home, sizes, and so much more?!  I would love to hear how you would modify this game to best fit your child’s interests.  Please leave me a comment!

I don’t want my daughter to be afraid of me or of the punishment I might hand down.  So I’ve chosen the most peaceful parenting I can possibly muster.  But if punitive discipline is out, does that mean I’m a total softie and my kids walk all over me?  Definitely not.

In fact, setting clear and consistent boundaries is one of the best ways to help your child feel secure.  In the Montessori schools in which I worked, we practiced a logical or natural consequences approach to setting boundaries with kids.  And it really worked!  Children understood why we did things a certain way and they were usually happy to cooperate.

Somehow setting boundaries was easier when it was my job to be completely respectful of the child.  Now that I think about it, it was much easier not to swear when I was a preschool teacher and my job was on the line.   But now that I’m a parent, I slip up sometimes.  It’s a much different challenge to be respectful of a child 24 hours a day than it is for six or eight hours a day five times a week.

Today I’d like to explore a different kind of discipline, the kind of discipline that allows us to complete a difficult task or to master a new skill.  Lately I’ve been thinking that by developing interests and practicing one or several disciplines myself as well as encouraging my child to do the same, the need for any other kind of discipline could simply melt away.  Maybe I’m crazy and my daughter just hasn’t hit her “difficult” period yet, but this sure seems to be working for us so far.

By encouraging her to develop her own interests and explore them independently, my relationship with my daughter becomes more about facilitating and supporting her desires, rather than circumventing them or redirecting her.  Oh, trust me, there are plenty of opportunities to redirect her.  But the more I’m able to just go with her flow and allow her to explore what she’s interested in, the more confident she becomes and the more she enjoys learning.

We’re setting up a positive loop.  She seeks out something interesting and explores it, she enjoys what she learns and then she seeks out something new and interesting again.  And we’re also building our connection because she understands that I deeply care about her and want her to explore her interests and fulfill her purpose in life.  So really, she’s developing self-discipline!

That way, in the times when I do need to set a firm boundary for safety or for some other reason, she knows that I’m not just trying to punish her.  I’m actually making choices based on what will give her the most freedom she can safely have.

So what do you think?  Can we reduce the need for “discipline” by supporting our children to develop their interests and practice self-discipline?  I would love to hear your take on my idea.  Please leave me a comment!

And have a fantastic week, Shelly

One study in particular stands out in my mind. It was conducted on a playground where researchers observed boys playing a tackling game. Researchers thought that they would find the game to be violent and detrimental to kids, but they actually found just the opposite. The observed that in playing this seemingly violent game, rarely did anyone get hurt, and when someone did get hurt, the other boys reacted with caring and compassion toward their fallen playmate.

And, after failing to find what they were looking for, the researchers changed their tack and began to look for behaviors that showed kindness and caring, such as a pat on the back, a hug, or helping one another get up. They quickly realized that the vast majority of the interactions between the kids on the playground were those kind and caring gestures!

In fact, they further realized that it was because of the seemingly violent nature of the tackling game that kids were given more opportunities to offer a helping hand or a hug than they would have otherwise. So that’s when I realized, that with some clear ground rules, wrestling between kids or between kids and adults could actually be a really joyful and beneficial activity for everyone involved.

So the next time your child runs to you crying, “My brother hurt me!” you can see it as an opportunity to nurture and comfort your child (which builds your connection) AND as an opportunity to show an older child how to take even better care of his younger sibling (which will build their connection).

Now, I’m not recommending that you force your older child to offer disingenuous nurturing, rather, that you model for your children how to care for one another. I also think it’s useful to keep in mind that there have likely been lots of other moments when the older sibling did take care of the younger one, that you might not have seen. Of course, the opposite can also be true.

So, if you’re not sure what’s really going on between your kids, take some time to observe them together and keep a tally for yourself. How many times did they touch or hug in a loving way? How many times did they touch in a hurtful way? What was your favorite moment? Why? What kinds of things did they say to each other? Ideally, you would tuck yourself away in a corner and seem to ignore them, so that they can play normally, forgetting that you’re even in the room.

But do be careful not to allow your preconceived notions or biases to show up in your observations. An observation should be completely neutral and without judgment, such as “Carl jumped on the bed and Henrietta fell off,” rather than “Carl viciously knocked Henrietta off the bed.”

I mentioned ground rules earlier and here are the ones I like for wrestling and rough housing at my house:

1) We stop if someone gets hurt and help them

2) We stop when someone says stop

3) We only use our bodies and pillows (no hard objects)

4) We stay on the carpet or bed

I’m so curious, have you found rough housing to be a connecting activity at your house? What are you ground rules? Please share your wisdom with us!

And have a wonderful week, Shelly

None of these acknowledge the child’s feelings or provide an open, loving environment in which a child can fully feel and express his emotions. I know, it’s an unconscious reaction we have all had at one time or another, but this week it’s time to shine the light of awareness on the way we speak to an upset child.

So, if we could choose exactly how to respond, how would we? We might say something like, “I see you’re upset, do you need a hug?” or “Wow, that was really scary, wasn’t it?” or one of my personal favorites, “It’s OK to cry.”  We might even choose just to sit with them and witness their emotional expression.

I especially wish more boys were told that it’s OK to cry, because after all, it really is OK! In fact, people who are in touch with and at peace with their emotions will fare better in life than those who deny or stuff their emotions.

Studies have shown that holding in emotions like anger, frustration, and resentment, can have long term negative effects on heart health. So, by encouraging kids to acknowledge and express their emotions, we’re helping to ensure a long and healthy life for them both physically and emotionally.

On the other hand, it can be uncomfortable for us to listen to a child who’s crying, wailing, or raging. But I think that’s because we all have our own withheld emotions that we’re fighting to keep hidden. If we felt free to express our emotions as they came up in the moment, we might not feel quite so uncomfortable when our children cry or scream. I’ve certainly found this to be the case in my own life.

For a long time I was uncomfortable with sadness. I didn’t acknowledge my own, and I definitely didn’t want to be around others who were upset. I did everything I could to soothe, redirect, or even ignore any sadness that I came into contact with. And then something shifted for me.

I was hanging out with some close friends of mine, and one of our friends just started to cry. I was a little bit uncomfortable, but I was more fascinated with how unashamed she seemed about her sadness. Pretty soon the crying turned into wailing and I realized that except in movies, I had never actually seen anyone wail! I was moved to tears myself and I came away from the experience realizing that expressing sadness could be deeply moving and beautiful.

I’ll never forget how my friend looked afterward. She was so open, beautiful, free, and light. I had never seen her look so gorgeous and so at peace. So I decided that sadness wasn’t actually something to be avoided at all costs. I realized that in fact, crying could be a relief and a release. And I began to allow my own tears to flow more freely.

I like to imagine my emotions like a big pipeline. When I was holding them in, my pipe was clogged and just a trickle of emotions was getting through. But after practicing to express and celebrate my emotions as they arise, I’ve opened up my pipeline and now all my emotions can travel through it with ease. Now I feel everything with more intensity and I love it!

I am able to cry in an instant, if I’m moved to, but I can also laugh more authentically and have even experienced tears of joy (which I used to think was a bunch of hooey).

Wouldn’t it be amazing if our children never had to go through the process of suppressing their emotions and then rediscovering them? What if they could feel and express their feelings without interruption for their entire lives?  I sure hope for that for my daughter.

So this week, pay special attention to how you automatically respond when a child is upset. Then make a conscious choice about how you WANT to respond and practice it. I would love to hear your thoughts and experiences, so please leave me a comment below.

Have a wonderful week, Shelly

P.S. If this topic is dear to your heart, check out my audio program Perspectives on Feelings for a more in depth discussion of holding space for big emotions.

There are all sorts of dangers both seen and unseen in our world today and it can be overwhelming when we focus on what could go wrong.  A simple pool of water can become scary.  But sometimes we take the job of protecting our children too far.  By being honest with our kids, they may experience some pain, but they’re sure to fare better in life than they would otherwise.

When I talk with parents about being more honest with their children I hear all sorts of objections.  “Are you sure it’s appropriate to tell my child that?!” and “I don’t want to burden him with my feelings.”  But I think it’s a very slippery slope to withhold information from our children in order to “protect” them.  It actually seems to do just the opposite.  It hurts our kids when we don’t tell them the truth and they end up learning that they can’t count on us.

As a child, one of the things I admired most about my mom was how brutally, really, honest with me she was.  Granted, she didn’t offer a bunch of unsolicited information, but when I asked her a frank question, I knew I could count on her to answer honestly.

When I was five or six I asked my mom what the worst word in the world was.  And, after asking me to promise never to use it, she leaned down and whispered the “f word” into my ear.  I was shocked and in awe of my moms commitment to honesty.  And until I was a teenager, I never used it.  I was just curious, and I wanted to be prepared in case someone else used “bad words” in my presence.  Obviously it was a pivotal moment for me, considering I still remember it so vividly.

My mom was also very honest about sex, even when I was very young.  By the time I was 4 years old, I knew exactly where babies came from and I knew the scientific names of both male and female body parts.  As a teenager, talking to my mom about sex was easy because we’d already been talking about it for 10 years!  We had built a foundation of truth and trust that I knew I could rely on.

I’m so grateful for that foundation now, because as I got to know other girls and young women in my teens and twenties, I realized that my mom’s honesty was really quite rare.  Most of my friends’ moms had never talked with them about contraception or their monthly moon time, and as a result many of my friends were confused about the facts, unprepared to protect themselves from STDs and pregnancy, and several of them ended up with unwanted pregnancies.

I want my daughter to be informed and well prepared for life on her own.  So I think I’ll take my mom’s approach and be truthful with my child about her body, sex, and even my own feelings.  I want her to have that same foundation of trust and a deeply ingrained knowledge that no matter what, she can count on me to be honest with her.

I can only hope that by talking with her about challenging topics now, when she’s young, it will make it that much easier for us to talk about the tough stuff when she’s a teenager and young adult.

I’m curious, what’s your experience with being brutally honest with your children.  Have you seen benefits from being committed to the truth?  Have you experienced the pain of disconnection when you weren’t honest?  Please leave me a comment and share your story below.

Have a fantastic and vulnerably revealing week, Shelly

But attunement is not simply empathy for another person’s emotional experience.  It’s an energetic matching game.  We may feel the sadness, but we’re not really attuning unless we’re matching the physical and non-physical energy of the person we’re with.  Attunement is the ultimate connection.  It’s a joining and sharing of an experience, an experience of oneness.

I often feel this oneness while nursing my daughter or in playful moments when she’s on the changing table or when we’re rocking in the rocking chair and she relaxes, resting her whole body against mine.  Connection through attunement is incredibly important for secure attachment to happen.  And, the oneness can’t happen all the time.  In fact, it would feel awfully strange to even attempt to experience attunement for an entire day.

We need connection, and we need separation too.  In fact, it’s the dance between connection and separation that makes our human experience so rich and dynamic.  We may experience a beautiful moment of attunement and later we’ll each go off by ourselves to have some solitude.  It’s an ebb and flow like so many other things in life.  And each part is just as important as the other.

Right now I’m reading a really interesting novel told from a five-year-old boy’s point of view.  The thing I find so fascinating about it is how accurate the author is about the details of the thoughts and emotions the little boy experiences.  The boy has a favorite spoon he calls “meltedy spoon” and when I read the words “meltedy spoon” I am instantly transported back into the classroom with 3-5 year olds.  What a perfect example of really attuning to the mind of a five year old.

This week, pay special attention to the moments of attunement that you share with your child and then consciously allow your child to separate from you when he’s ready.

Instead of hovering over him at the park, intruding on his playtime, bring a book and let him have his own experience.  Then, after an especially fun moment, he might just run over to you and excitedly share what happened.  That’s your opportunity to put the book down, make eye contact, feel the excitement in your own body and attune with him.  Maybe you’ll even be inspired to jump up and run around with him for a while.

But again, as soon as you notice him going off on his own, resist any urge you might have to follow, and go back to your book instead.  By allowing your child to determine the length of the cycle between attunement and separation, you’re reassuring him that you’re available when he needs you, but you’re not going to interrupt his flow.

If, on the other hand, your tendency is to encourage your child to play on her own more often so that you can do your adult activities, then your challenge this week is to really stop, drop what you’re doing, and attune to your child when she reaches out for connection.  Remember, that means matching her energy.  So, if she’s slow and methodical, you’ll practice slowing down too.  And if she’s giggling and gasping for breath, see how much you can feel what that must feel like.  Pay attention to any sensations in your body as you practice attuning with your children.  Often, we can find new levels of empathy when we’re willing to try to step into our children’s shoes more fully.

I would love to hear about your own experiences of attunement and separation.  Is the natural ebb and flow easy or difficult for you?  Does your timing match up with your child’s?  And how do you feel when you notice your child coming toward you or moving away from you?

I hope you’ll all have a fantastic week, Shelly

This week the concept that keeps popping up is that the ability to tell a cohesive narrative about our lives makes all the difference in attachment and parenting.  I first read the idea in “Parenting from the Inside Out” by Siegel and Hartzell and then just moments ago, I saw a video on facebook about the exact same concept.  Coincidence?  I think not.

OK, so the idea is that our own ability to tell a cohesive narrative about our childhood events and experiences positively impacts our ability to connect with our children.  I’m not exactly sure why this is the case, but apparently researchers at UC Berkeley are actually able to predict the attachment styles of children who aren’t even born yet based on their parents narratives.  Whoa!

I have always thought that personal growth and the ability to make sense of our lives through self reflection were important, but now I have hard evidence that this ability directly impacts how safe and secure my child will feel in her connection to me.

So I guess that means it’s time to take a hard look at anyplace where my personal narrative is incoherent.  Well, that sounds like a great way to spend a Saturday afternoon.  Just kidding.  A better way to find out if your narrative is complete and coherent is to start telling it.  Ask your spouse, friends, or family members if they’d be willing to listen to the story of your childhood.  And, as you share, pay attention to the times when the story flows naturally and the times when it doesn’t.  Are there long silences in which you’re frantically trying to come up with the next part?  Are their pieces that don’t make logical or chronological sense?

When you discover areas of your personal narrative that still need work, just think of yourself as a master storyteller ironing out the details of the story to make it as flowing, interesting, and clearly resolved as possible.  If telling your story is quite difficult for you, you may want to start by typing it out or journaling about it.

If you have no experience writing stories, that’s OK, just take a lesson from one of your child’s favorite storybooks.  Every coherent story has a clear beginning, middle, and end.  And there’s usually some sort of obstacle or challenge to overcome that gives the story some interest and propels the storyline forward.  My favorite stories also have a lesson or moral to be gleaned.

Luckily for all of us, we can edit our narrative at any time and we then become more available for secure attachment!  So let’s all work to create those cohesive narratives so that we’re even more available to connect with the young people in our lives.

If you want to take things a step further, then help your children to create a narrative of their own childhood.  Ask them to tell you stories from their lives.  And don’t stop asking.  Often, it isn’t until they are college aged that they can fully process some of the experiences of their childhood and go on to construct a narrative about it.  But one thing seems clear from the current research.  Helping your children to have a cohesive narrative of their childhood experiences will make them better able to connect with their own children.

But if grandkids seem a very long way off, remember that storytelling and the ability to construct a narrative will help you and your children in more ways than one.  Storytelling can help the two hemispheres of the brain work together and helps us make sense of our lives.

In “Parenting from the Inside Out” there’s a sweet story of a young girl who moves to the US from abroad and begins preschool in an English speaking preschool.  The little girl only knew a few words of English and one day when she fell and hurt her knee she quickly became very upset and didn’t seem to understand where her mother was.

Luckily, the preschool teacher was aware of the power of narratives to help children understand new concepts and so she got a doll and acted out the injury.  Then she acted out calling the doll’s mommy on the telephone, and finally she brought a “mommy” doll to pick up the injured doll from school.  The little girl relaxed and wanted to act out the story with her teacher again and again.  And when her mom arrived to pick her up, she acted out the story once again, showing her mother what had happened.

So, whether you’re introducing a new concept to your child, or just want to connect more deeply, storytelling is a magical way to help create a secure attachment.  I would love to hear all about it!  Please share your stories in the comment box below.

Have a great week, Shelly

In humans, as in other animals, play is crucial to learning.  When children engage in imaginary play they are acting out possible real life scenarios, practicing skills they’ll need as they mature, and processing experiences they’ve had.  So, if we want to support our children’s learning and growth, it’s absolutely necessary that we play with them.  I want to repeat that, because it’s not just that we ought to allow our children to play or invite their friends over to play with them.  We actually need to get down on the floor and play with them.

Since parents, grandparents, and caregivers are a child’s greatest influence for the first three years of life, it’s critical that we help young people learn how to play.  Until they’re three years old, most children will engage in more parallel play with their peers than real, engaged cooperative play.  And since our neural pathways are forming beginning in utero, it is our ability to play with our babies and young children that informs their ability to play throughout their lives.  And like it or not, their ability to play dramatically impacts their ability to learn other skills.

If you’re gasping for breath right now and thinking about how hard it is for you to play, don’t worry.  There are lots of great ways to play that don’t require you to be an expert at comedy improv.  Singing songs, reading books, acting out stories from books, rhyming, and dressing up in costumes are a few ideas to get you started.

My husband just created a fun game to play with our daughter last week.  He noticed that she laughs when our dog makes a funny coughing sound so he imitated the sound and she laughed.  By the next day SHE was making the sound and HE was laughing.  Now we all take turns saying “Kack!” and we all giggle.  Our daughter has already learned her first joke!

Many of the parents I’ve worked with are concerned about the “violent” play that their young boys engage in.  So, I checked in with our resident expert and research psychologist, Amy Howell PhD.  She says that children’s so called violent play is often not actually about violence.  In imaginary play, killing and death can simply be a way to change the focus or begin a new scene.

She recommends asking your child direct questions about the game or imaginary play if you’re feeling concerned about the content but warns that parents are often too quick to interrupt. You may find that by waiting, it’ll soon become apparent that there’s no cause for concern.

If you’re still worried, try checking in, and you’ll likely learn that a magic potion will bring the character back to life, or that a new theme is about to emerge.  She also stresses that we adults far too often see children’s imaginary play through our own adult perspective, and that’s just far too literal and with too little imagination.

You may find that by checking in, you’ll learn that a magic potion will bring the character back to life, or that a new theme is about to emerge.  She also stresses that we adults far too often see children’s imaginary play through our own adult perspective.

I’ve found that young people often play at “killing” when they’re working through their feelings about their own power or the lack thereof.  So, this week, as you support your child’s imaginary play, try either checking in, or waiting to see, rather than assuming you know what happens next in the story.  And for extra credit, let your child be the director and play a part in his story to his exact specifications.

Have a wonderful week, Shelly