Sunshine Parenting

Show notes & links available here.

In this episode, I'm chatting with mindfulness expert Hunter Clarke-Fields, author of Raising Good Humans: A Mindful Guide to Breaking the Cycle of Reactive Parenting and Raising Kind, Confident Kids, is my guest on for Episode 117. We talk about the importance of modeling positive responses to difficult situations and using tools like mindfulness and meditation to be a less reactive parent. Hunter's blog, podcast, and other resources can be found at MindfulMamaMentor.com.

• Raising Good Humans is a book that offers tools and ideas for parents on:
  • how to regulate your stress response
  • how to become less reactive
  • how to respond in order to get more cooperation from your children
• There are 2 main parts of the book:
  • The Inner Work
    • mindfulness, unhooking from negative thoughts, meditation
    • learning about your own triggers
    • how to manage difficult feelings and model problem solving
    • self-compassion.
  • The Outer Work -- Skillful Communication
• Mindfulness is the intentional ability to stay in the present moment with a sense of kindness and curiosity.
• The benefits of a meditation practice are reduced anxiety and depression, better sleep, more feelings of wellbeing and being less reactive.
• Our own childhood impacts so much of who we are and how we parent our kids.
• Parents can acknowledge that most kids have a different pace. Being patient with them can help circumvent conflict.
• Use the "Friend Filter" by speaking to your child as respectfully as you would a friend or a friend's child.

Audrey: "In this day and age, with all the inputs we have, and how most parents are struggling with the overwhelm, anxiety rush and can't turn it off--this is why your message is so needed right now."

Hunter: "There are basically these two wings that you need to fly. One is this wonderful advice out there in the parenting world, what to say and how to communicate. But that goes out the window when you're losing it because you can't access it. You literally can't access that part of your brain, the prefrontal cortex where your verbal empathetic ability is, so there is also inner work that goes along with it."

Hunter: "There's a word in the mindfulness tradition called 'noble failure' because we all fail at being able to control our monkey mind. But that's okay. That's not how you judge your practice. You judge your practice and how it helps you by how it makes you feel and how you're able to be present in the other parts of your life."

Hunter: "We're at our worst in parenting when we're just reacting in anger. We have to have a way to calm it down. We have to build the muscle to calm or be able to be less reactive in peaceful times. This is a muscle you're building. Just like you're not going to read about tennis and then go out and play the world grand slam."

Audrey: "In our family, we talk about our highs and lows. Let's make sure we are not just sharing the good stuff, or sharing only the positive feelings, because we've got to get those bad things out, too. Even when you're a generally positive, upbeat person, there are always hard things."

Hunter: "We expect our kids to turn things around and have this awareness when we don't have it ourselves. The ability to look at and understand our feelings is so practical. If you only show your kids a veneer of perfection, 'I'm always positive' and 'I'm always calm' -- that's just not true. Nobody is like that. Even the Dalai Lama gets mad sometimes."

Hunter: "We can give lip service that 'It's okay for you to have these feelings,' but then we don't allow ourselves permission to be angry, frustrated, or sad. We hide that away rather than acknowledging that within ourselves. That piece of acknowledgment is really crucial to all this work."

Hunter: "If you go into a situation where you're feeling upset or when you're starting to get annoyed, when you can say these things out loud and just label those (emotions), it actually provides a lot of relief to the stress and tension of a moment."

Audrey: "I think its really important for us as parents to be real with each other and make sure that we all know that we have these moments. Just working on having fewer of the bad moments feels so good."

Hunter: "The second part of the book is about how to be helpful, how to speak in such a skillful way that your child wants to cooperate with you--from the inside out--because they care about you, rather than because you're using power over them and making them."

Hunter: "There is this idea we have that its the norm for adolescents to rebel. I really think that it's not true. Actually, adolescents rebel against the kind of destructive communication and parenting habits that we have. Culturally, we're not very skillful."

Hunter: "We are in the soup of a very unskillful culture where we are constantly ordering and threatening our kids. Some of these things feel like they work in the short term, but in the long term they actually make kids less likely to want to cooperate with you."

Hunter: "There are natural consequences to some things that happen and we definitely hold boundaries, but there are ways to speak and ways to communicate and interact that create a more loving, cooperative relationship."

Audrey: "Even as adults, we respond better to being told we get to do something fun or have some kind of privilege because we did our task or met a goal."

Hunter: "If you had a friend staying with you, or even if you were talking to one of your friend's children, someone who's a little more removed from you, how would you ask that person? How would you make the request to that person? Putting on this filter can help us look at our own language."

Audrey: "We are often frustrated that they're not immediately doing something, but that's more our problem. If you want your kids to be sitting down for dinner, tell them five minutes before you actually need to sit down."

Hunter: "That's why self-compassion is so important. We're not robots. We're not going to get it right. We're not going to be perfect all the time. We're going to be aware for a little while of what we're not doing right--and that doesn't feel good--but it's part of the learning process."

Audrey: "Not only do we need to think about how we talk to our kids, like we are talking to a friend, but also how we talk to ourselves. We get so disappointed in ourselves when we're trying to do new things. But any new habit or communication style is going to take time."

Audrey: "We don't need to get overwhelmed with all of it. Even if you apply just one of your ideas, it would move the needle on raising the connection and peacefulness in the home."

Calm App

ABOUT HUNTER

Hunter Clarke-Fields is a mindfulness mentor, host of the Mindful Mama podcast, creator of the Mindful Parenting membership, and author of the brand new book (12/19), Raising Good Humans: A Mindful Guide to Breaking the Cycle of Reactive Parenting and Raising Kind, Confident Kids. She helps parents bring more calm into their daily lives and cooperation in their families. Hunter has over twenty years of experience in meditation and yoga practices and has taught mindfulness to thousands worldwide. She is the mother of two active daughters, who challenge her every day to hone her craft! Learn more about Hunter at MindfulMamaMentor.com.

Contact Hunter: [email protected]

Raising Good Humans Book Page: Raising Good Humans Book.com

Facebook Page: Hunter Clarke-Fields, Mindful Mama Mentor

Instagram: Mindful Mama Mentor

Twitter: HClarkeFields

LinkedIn: Hunter Clarke-Fields

The Mindful Mama Podcast

If you enjoyed listening to this podcast, check out:

Learning to Breathe

Ep. 103: How to Stop Losing Your Sh*t with Kids

Ep. 80: The Emotionally Healthy Child with Maureen Healy

Ep. 97: Parenting the Challenging Child with Signe Whitson

Ep. 92: Creating Strong Relationships with Teens

How to Have a Closer Family in 5 Minutes a Day

Off the Clock: Feel Less Busy While Getting More Done by Laura Vanderkam My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I've been obsessively telling everyone about this quick read. If you, like me, feel a bit "at war" with time, feeling there's "never enough" and you "don't have time to relax," then you'll benefit from Vanderkam's wisdom, too. The book, true to its title, offers realistic ways to both feel less busy and get more done. More importantly, Vanderkam reminds us to focus on making the most of the moments and time we do have and always remember that "people are a good use of time."

View all my reviews

I have a vivid memory from ten years ago of my youngest child, then age four, asking me, "Mommy, are we in a rush?"

I stopped in my tracks and realized that, yes, in fact, we were in a rush. We seemed to always be in a rush to get somewhere, get one more thing done, or just get out the door. He knew that, because he was always with me and was learning about how life worked from me. I was not being a good role model in how I viewed and used my time.

I didn't want to always be in a rush, and I certainly didn't want my sweet boy thinking that life is always just a rush from one thing to the next.

In the past decade, I have not fulfilled my goal of stopping to watch the sunset every single night, but I have learned to savor moments a bit more, slow down once in a while, and listen well (sometimes) to my people as they share their stories.

I have had far more coffee and walk dates with friends, read more books, and gone to bed earlier. I even slowed down enough to write the book I've always dreamed of writing.

There is, in fact, enough time to do the things we want to do. We just need to learn to prioritize the things that are most important and make time for those things first rather than hoping we'll miraculously end up with time for them once our "to do" list is done. Off the Clock offers tips for making the most of the time we have.

Watch Vanderkam's TED Talk, "How to gain control of your free time":

Visit Vanderkam's Website (I've subscribed to her email list and am going to try out her time log!)

Get show notes from this post: https://sunshine-parenting.com/need-unplug-connect-families/

In this episode, Sara Kuljis is back to talk about giving kids meaningful compliments and focusing on our kids' strengths. We recently hosted our Raise Thriving Kids workshop in Newport Beach where we spent the day discussing positive parenting tools. Since then, we've received a lot of positive feedback, especially on the topic of Level 3 Affirmations.

• Part of camp staff training involves teaching them to more regularly and more deeply affirm real character traits that matter in the campers. The children are able to go home knowing that they have this "gold" within them. They divided the affirmations, or compliments, into 3 levels.
• Level 1 affirmations are words that convey worth, value, and importance in one's possessions or one's physical appearance. Examples: "You have beautiful hair." "That's a really cool new skateboard."
• These are compliments on things (physical traits or material possessions) that a child doesn't have a lot of control over and it can create a sense of insecurity.
• Level 2 affirmations are words that convey worth, value, and importance lies in one's performance or accomplishments. Examples: "You fixed your hair so cute today" and "You were amazing at the skate park today."
• Level 3 affirmations are words that convey worth, value, and importance in one's efforts, character, in one's very being. Examples: "I appreciate the time you took to do your friend's hair. I admire that about you" or "I admire how hard you've been working to improve your skating skills. You've been out there every day. I appreciate your grit and determination."
• Level 3 traits are more likely to develop and grow in our children when they are acknowledged and praised.

Audrey: "There's nothing wrong with level one affirmations and in fact, you feel good when someone comments. But there are levels up from that."

Sara: "Parents hover in level two a lot. At camp and at school, we often emphasize that skill they learned and it's awesome to affirm that in a child. But our kids are buried by the sense that they have to outperform and they have to accomplish way beyond what any reasonable expectation is."

Sara: "When affirmations get stuck at level two, where we value and shine a light on the importance--almost exclusively--of accomplishments and performance, we are doing our kids a great disservice."

Audrey: "This is probably how most of us were raised and often results in having really high expectations for ourselves that can get to a destructive level called 'perfectionism,' where we feel like no matter what we do, it's never enough."

Audrey: "We all have this fundamental need to be valued. We want people to notice us and value us and sometimes we think we are being valued for what we do, or what we accomplish."

Audrey: "It's not what we do or what we have that makes us a valuable, important person."

Sara: "Praise the process that your child went through to accomplish something. If I'm looking at the process, I'm looking at determination, perseverance, grit, inclusivity, kindness--all of the really deep character traits we're all hoping our kids have."

Audrey: "If our teachers and coaches focus on when they see someone demonstrating one of those traits that we want to build up in our kids, like kindness or generosity or patience, and point it out, that's going to grow it. It's really important for parents to do it. But when kids hear those kinds of affirmations from another adult, it's really powerful."

Audrey: "There's a lot of overlap here in mining for strengths and really taking the time to notice our kids and who they are and what makes them tick because kids right from the beginning show their stripes."

Sara: "For parents, it's loving the child you have, not wishing for the child you don't."

Audrey: "Bringing to the surface and naming some of those character traits for our kids is so helpful because they are the ones they are going to use to do great things. Whatever those great things are, they'll use those traits. They'll use their kindness, their energy, their gift for seeing what's going on or for organizing events or for including people. They're going use those skills everywhere in their lives, but not if they're not called out. We need to name them."

Audrey: "What better way to show our gratitude for another human being than by giving them a level three affirmation."

Ep. 63: Growing Gratitude with Sara Kuljis

Ep. 114: Precursors to Gratitude

A Grateful Family is a Happy Family: 5 Gratitude Practices

Ep. 77: Comparison is the Thief of (Parenting) Joy

Ep. 75: Begin with the (Parenting) End in Mind

What comes before gratitude in our children? In this episode, Sara and I discuss how we can prepare our kids to become grateful people. Sara and I talked about gratitude last year in this episode about Growing Gratitude.

• As the Thanksgiving holiday nears, it is important to remember that we can cultivate a heart of gratitude all year long.
• Good manners are important but employing these "precursors" to gratitude can help instill our family values in a deeper and more meaningful way.
• Precursors to growing gratitude:
  • Avoid over-giving, as it can lead to entitlement. When we earn what we have, we value it more.
  • Cultivate empathy. When kids realize that there is a cost (money, time, energy or thought) associated with everything they have, they are more grateful.
  • Model gratefulness. When kids hear their parents thanking each other, showing respect and demonstrating gratitude, they are more likely to adopt the same habit.
  • Be exposed to seeing how most of the world lives or not always having daily comforts. A vacation from things like big meals and hot showers, such as in camping situations or while traveling, can help us to realize a greater appreciation for all we have.

Audrey: "You can't just start saying thank you or start doing gratitude practices and suddenly become this grateful person. There are precursors to gratitude."

Sara: "When our kids are little, one of the first things we teach them is to say please and thank you. As my kids grew, I wanted their thank yous to come from inside them, not from me reminding them."

Sara: "It's my work to do as a parent to set these things up and to cultivate these habits in myself and in my home so that when it's time for our kids to build the muscle of gratitude, it fits in. It's kind of super-powered and more authentic."

Audrey: "Practicing kindness and practicing gratitude is good because you build the muscle."

Audrey: "The depth is what we're talking about. It's almost like a mindset, a way of thinking about things and remembering the impact of what we do."

Sara: "As parents, we so long to meet (our kids') needs well, but we also feel compelled to meet all their wants. By 'needs' I mean shelter, love, food, medical care, sleep, all the things we need to thrive. But then we get on this hamster wheel of, 'well, they better have the newest iPhone, or best kind of tennis shoes, or the tutor everyone else is going to,' and we can over-give. We can over-meet their wants to a place where they develop an entitlement."

Sara: "We've really got to guard our choices. We're developing grown-ups eventually who can work and earn something, who can long for something, who can have an appreciation because they had to wait or they had to grow into it."

Audrey: "The expression 'delayed gratification' has 'grateful' in it."

Audrey: "It's just kind of balancing. Are we giving in a good way? Are we overdoing it? It's the 'over-giving'. It's not to not-give to our kids, it's to give in a way that we're thinking through, is it the right amount?"

Audrey: "You have to do things. You have to gain competence to earn confidence. You can't make someone confident. It has to take some time. It comes from learning that it's okay to make mistakes, you're not going to be good at everything the first, second, third, even 20th time."

Sara: "When we help kids understand 'what did it cost that other human to provide this to me,' it naturally grows gratitude in them."

Audrey: "Young kids are made to be self-focused. That's normal developmentally. Anything we can do to get them out of their head helps. I do think empathy is such a key thing."

Sara: "I think sometimes our kids hear us being critical of things or dissatisfied with things more often than they hear us being grateful. Make thanking each other, thanking your spouse for something that he or she did, a really normal thing."

Sara: "If our kids never see us being grateful, how will they suddenly become grateful people?"

Audrey: "If you're only living in the bubble of your neighbor, which likely is safe, or you're own home, which likely has electricity and your kids have their own beds and running water, I think that we can get almost desensitized."

Audrey: "We can just set our kids up, get that soil ready to really build their gratitude muscles."

Sara: "Whenever we do something in the daily flow of life, it just becomes part of who we are as a family. Finding a habit or a ritual (not just around the Thanksgiving table--although that's awesome!) where we get to name something that we're grateful for, or practice thanking another person for something, done daily or weekly makes things stick."

Audrey: "When we adults practice this ourselves it goes a long way in setting our kids up to be more grateful."

Three Good Things

A Grateful Family is a Happy Family: 5 Gratitude Practices

Ep. 63: Growing Gratitude with Sara Kuljis

Gratitude Revisited

5 Ways to Create a Happy Thanksgiving

In this episode, I'm speaking with Suzanne Tucker of Generation Mindful, a website dedicated to helping kids learn how to regulate their emotions.

• While working as a physical therapist, Suzanne realized there was much more going on in people's wellbeing than just the physical body. The whole health approach to healing and wellness is what led her to start Generation Mindful.
• Parents and educators love the science of positive discipline but struggle to apply the science of connection practically in their everyday lives.
• Generation Mindful offers evidence-based tools and toys that make connection a habit in homes and schools. They nurture emotional intelligence via play and positive discipline.
• Generation Mindful helps people overcome perfectionism, feelings of inadequacy, and promote connection. Their mission is to raise an emotionally healthy world.
• Generation Mindful tools and toys can be found in 70 countries and their community is in nearly 100 countries around the world.

Suzanne: "If you're looking to get on the superhighway of spiritual growth, just jump on it because you're going to find it in Parenthood."

Suzanne: "Parenting makes life apparent."

Suzanne: "It was that love of whole health and learning about ourselves and being on a spiritual journey myself that brought me into doing empowerment-based education with families."

Suzanne: "We've got to make it easy. We've got to make it fun. We've got to get this evidence-based brain science into everyday life because people feel 'not enough' and it's not right."

Audrey: "Instead of punishing someone for being dysregulated and needing to calm down, making it a thing that 'hey--we all have these moments. Let's find a way to just create a space where we can just feel good.'"

Audrey: "Adults, we need this, too, the candle that smells good, the book we really like, that calms us down, and a cup of tea."

Suzanne: "It's not just about education and support (because we need both of those.) What I found in my work is that children are concrete learners and so are adults. We are very much supported when we open a box--it's concrete."

Suzanne: "It's really about embodying wisdom. It's about creating this community that inspires you and is there to hold your hand online. We've got all these online supports, the blog, a private community for anyone who goes through our six-week self-paced course."

Suzanne: "It really starts from the inside out. And we're about supporting and inspiring you into what we think of as a mind shift into self-awareness first, 'connect before you correct' and just seeing misbehavior as an unmet need, without the guilt, and training ourselves out of shame as a motivator and guilt as a filter."

Suzanne: "We are all about creating habits because habits lift us up. Habits just happen...We want to connect, but if it's not a habit, it's not happening."

Suzanne: "It's really about the brain science of honoring emotions as sacred and integrating."

Audrey: "Name it to tame it. We all talk about that."

Suzanne: "Just by labeling the things that happened in the day and which mood group would I associate them with, is like the middle brain doing pushups. The hippocampus, that really important part of the brain that helps with emotional regulation, is going down, doing the pushups and it's training that part of the brain that wants to react. It's actually laying the neural synapsis so it can learn to respond."

Suzanne: "Once we get over our fear we're empowered to show up powerfully with what is. Then we can source the tools and support to just be where we are and meet the child where they are."

Audrey: "You see the kids' behavior is just like the tip of the iceberg and all those things going on underneath; it's like the behavior is just kind of a clue. Be curious. They aren't trying to ruin your day or be terrible. They're communicating something that they're having difficulty articulating."

Suzanne: "Where is the source of emotional intelligence in relationships? It's in pausing to look in each other's eye, to listen, to share. It is so simple, yet how hard it is in everyday modern life to carve out a sweet little five minutes to talk about things that matter?"

Genmindful.com

Time-In ToolKit

Snuggle Buddies and My Feeling Calendar

Dr. Dan Siegel

Free Positive Parenting Class from Generation Mindful (ENTER PASSWORD: FreeAccessClassOne)

If you liked this episode of the podcast, listen to or read:

Ep. 110: Keep Calm & Parent On

10 Ways to Teach Kids to Calm Down

Ep. 103: How to Stop Losing Your Sh*t with Your Kids

Ep. 97: Parenting the Challenging Child

The Whole-Brain Child: Revolutionary Strategies to Nurture your Child's Developing Mind, Daniel Siegel and Tina Payne Bryson

Ep. 95: Raising a "Yes Brain" Child with Tina Payne Bryson

In this episode, I'm talking with Dr. Ruth Gerson, a child and adolescent psychiatrist at NYU's Langone Medical Center, about helping teens who have been exposed to trauma.

Trauma is, by definition, when an experience feels so threatening to one's safety and well-being that it overwhelms one's ability to cope. Human beings, especially children, are amazingly resilient. Not only can we humans survive terrible things, but often we commit incredible acts of strength and heroism in the face of adversity, such as the soldier who carries a wounded friend out of battle despite her own wounds, or a father who rescues his children from a raging fire. But just because we survive something does not mean we are not marked by the experience. -Ruth Gerson, M.D., Beyond PTSD

Ruth's book, which she co-authored with Patrick Hepple, is Beyond PTSD, Helping and Healing Teens Exposed to Trauma. Ruth is a colleague of Dr. Jess Shatkin, who I interviewed back in Episode 16 about his book, Born to be Wild: Why Teens Take Risks, and How We Can Help Keep Them Safe.

Both Ruth's book and our conversation have opened my eyes to the prevalence of trauma and the importance of helping teens who have been exposed to trauma. Trauma can manifest in many different and unexpected ways. In most cases, our kids aren't even aware that it is past trauma that is causing them to feel or behave in certain ways.

• Certain traumatic experiences are just too much for our brains and our bodies to take in.
• The structure of Dr. Gerson's book is set up so that you can read sections related to different behavioral issues, such as self-injury, risky behavior, substance use, school refusal, aggression, and many other topics.
• Trauma-informed care for kids is necessary for anyone who works with youth today. The goal of this book is to help people know how to look for, talk about, and find kids the right help following trauma.
• Some of the factors affecting kids response to trauma are:
  • their developmental and emotional age/maturity level
  • the context and support of their environment
  • their previous experiences
• Behavior is communication. Watch out for any significant changes in a child, such as:
  • temperament
  • sleep and eating patterns
  • showing an increased amount of anxiety or fear
• When a child discloses something that is difficult for them to share, make sure to give an appropriate response and not expressions of disbelief. Help the child to feel heard and safe.

Audrey: "Oftentimes, we're very focused on teens' problematic behaviors when really the underlying thing that really needs to be addressed is something else and that is just how they're coping with this trauma."

Ruth: "A kid who experiences trauma over and over is going to be much more sensitive to something happening. It's kind of counter-intuitive and it's actually something that kids often say is they feel like, well I should be used to this or it shouldn't affect me anymore. And so it's a real point of education that we try to give to kids that just because you've been going through something forever, it doesn't make it easier."

Ruth: "But traumatic experiences, or things that push us beyond that (comfort zone) line and having that happen over and over again, are really detrimental. Not something that you can learn to grow from without help."

Audrey: "Even in adults, trauma can manifest decades later which is why I think it's so important, the work you're doing to help earlier when kids are having these symptoms."

Ruth: "I really encourage parents to trust their instincts. Parents know their kids better than anyone. We know their ins and outs. We know their tiniest habits. We know the littlest ticks and their littlest, funny tells that let us know what kind of mood they're in or whatever. So I really encourage parents to trust their gut."

Ruth: "You have to be able to take that step back and try to think from the kid's perspective what might be going on that would make them behave in this way. And that's hard because it does require putting aside how difficult that behavior is for you, the parent, to be on the receiving end of it. Just like it's really hard to be with a baby who won't stop crying. But the only way to solve the underlying problem is to try to step back from our own emotional reactions and try to take the kid's perspective."

Ruth: "We can still encourage our kids to be able to do the things that they need to do to be successful socially and to be successful in school and then as professionals. But if we just tell them to do it without understanding why they're struggling, we're not going to be successful."

Ruth: "There's a lot of shame and a lot of silence around trauma. So kids don't know that it's not their fault. They don't know that it's something that happens unfortunately to a lot of people and that they can speak up about may, can get help for it. And so they don't talk about it and they don't ask for what they need because of that shame and that pain that keeps them silent."

Ruth: "Because trauma can be such trigger for shame, particularly with things like sexual trauma or suicide, kids are made to feel like it was their fault. Kids take that initial reaction of disbelief as disbelief, right? They don't believe me. They don't think it's really happening. I should never talk about this again. And it can be really damaging."

Audrey: "Kids can be very resilient and work through things and we can help them with that by just being supportive and being caring, regardless of how awful it is."

Audrey: "When you can stay calm and not let them get to you, you're more effective with them. And I think in a lot of ways I feel like it's easier to do with other people's children than with your own."

Dr. Gerson is board certified in both general and child and adolescent psychiatry. Dr. Gerson received her bachelor of arts in Biochemistry at Harvard University and received her medical degree at Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons. She completed her internship and general psychiatry training at the Cambridge Health Alliance-Harvard Medical School residency program where she served administrative chief resident. Dr. Gerson completed her child and adolescent psychiatry training at the Child Study Center at NYULMC and Bellevue Hospital Center. She also completed a public psychiatry fellowship at NYULMC. Contact Dr. Gerson.

Ep. 111: Raising an Exceptional Child in a Conventional World

Ep. 16: Born to be Wild with Dr. Jess Shatkin

7 Ways to Help Kids Through their Teen Years

Helping Kids Through Their Low Point

Ep. 97: Parenting the Challenging Child

Ep. 100: Teens' Advice for Raising Responsible, Independent Kids

Ep. 110: Keep Calm & Parent On

In Episode 54, I'm chatting once again with my long-time friend and camp colleague, Dr. Jim Sears. I've known him as Camp Doctor "Bones" for the past 14 years, but he is better known by his patients at his family's pediatric practice as "Dr. Jim." You might have caught our previous episode (Episode 51), where we talked about building kids' self esteem. In this episode, we talk about some of the benefits of camp and what we think parents can learn from summer camp to bring home some of the benefits of the experience. We touch on topics related to our kids' well-being, including positive behavior management, health tips, encouraging kids to be themselves, gain autonomy, and unplug!

Positive Behavior Management

Catch them doing the right thing

Attention seeking behavior

"Give the good attention to specific positive behaviors." Dr. Jim Sears

Health Tips

"Wow! What's different about my daily living up here at camp?"

Quite active - more walking

Incidental exercise- walking and chatting with friends from one activity to the next

Meal structure - specific times for meals - not much snacking. Stay busy not bored

"It's okay to be hungry." Dr. Jim Sears

"How do I get my kids to eat the chicken and broccoli for dinner?"

Healthy snacks available and the only option

Discovering new foods through experiences away from home (like camp)

Our kids need to be around other people besides us who are making healthy choices

"Sometimes another mentor or adult can make really big strides with your kids." Audrey

Being Themselves

Clothing choices

It's cool to be independent and do your hair a little bit differently

Cool to be wacky-be your own self

Get dirty

Developing Autonomy

"One of the best things about camp, for kids, is that, for the first time for many of them, they get to make their own choices and decisions about a lot of things, and they're not getting as micromanaged about all the details of their existence." Audrey

Opportunties for independence when children are young- give small practice opportunities

Being discerning about the world without being fearful

Learning how to deal with little discomforts

Unplugging/ Break from Technology

No phones at lunch in school

Meals at home unplugged

Screen addiction

"When you're on your phone, generally it's information going in, in, in...it doesn't allow stuff to come out." Dr. Jim

"Car rides are one of your best chances with teens for meaningful conversations." Dr. Jim

Navigating uncomfortable social situations without a phone is good

About "Dr. Jim"

Dr. Jim spent several years as a co-host on the Dr. Phil hit spin-off series called, The Doctors, a nationally syndicated hour-long daily talk show that is informative and entertaining!

Dr. Jim earned his medical degree at St. Louis University School of Medicine in 1996 and completed his pediatric residency at Northeastern Ohio University College of Medicine, Tod Children's Hospital in Youngstown, Ohio in 1999. During his residency, he received the honor of "Emergency Medicine Resident of the Year."

Dr. Jim has been featured on Parenting.com's "Ask the Experts," and has written for "Parenting" and "BabyTalk" magazine. Dr Sears' medical advice has been featured on "Dr. Phil" and the PBS parenting series, "Help Me Grow." He is an active contributor to the content of AskDrSears.com, and is a co-author of The Healthiest Kid in the Neighborhood (Little, Brown 2006), Father's First Steps – Twenty-Five Things Every New Father Should Know, (Harvard Common Press 2006). The Premature Baby Book (Little, Brown 2004), The Baby Sleep Book (Little, Brown 2006) and the best selling The Baby Book – Updated and Revised Edition (Little, Brown 2013).

Dr. Jim's personal passions include endurance cycling, triathlons, sailboat racing and musical theater with his daughter, Lea. His favorite role has been Harold Hill in "The Music Man." Other recent favorite productions include "Joseph and the Technicolor Dream Coat" (French brother), "The Wizard of Oz" (Cowardly Lion), "Annie" (Rooster), "Fiddler on the Roof" (Lazar Wolf) "Oliver! (Mr. Bumble) and Big River (King). In his free time, Dr. Jim enjoys snow skiing, hiking, and mountain biking (especially during a beautiful sunrise!).

Links

Ask Dr. Sears

In Episode 56, I'm chatting with Laura Vanderkam about her book Off the Clock: Feel Less Busy While Getting More Done. Laura is the best-selling author of several time management and productivity books including 168 Hours: You Have More Time Than You Think, I Know How She Does It: How Successful Women Make the Most of Their Time, and What the Most Successful People do Before Breakfast. Laura also co-hosts the Best of Both Worlds podcast with Sarah Hart-Unger. They discuss work/life balance, career development, parenting, time management, productivity, and making time for fun.Laura lives outside Philadelphia with her husband and four children, and blogs at LauraVanderkam.com.

When I read Off the Clock in August, I shared my thoughts about it here. I am thrilled that I also had the opportunity to interview Laura for my podcast and ask her questions including her advice for how to overcome the hurdles I faced trying to track my time.

Time and how we perceive it

We all have the same amount of time but spend it differently.

How we think about time changes how we perceive it.

When we walk around saying "I'm so busy", are we?

Which moments become your story?

Data study on time perception

900 people tracked their time and reported how they felt about it.

What things are a good use of time?

Evaluating your time

How to effectively track your time? Doesn't have to be exact!

Getting a general sense of where time goes.

Data helps us see where our time goes.

Looking at time in weeks versus days.

Effortful versus effortless fun

Effortless fun is easy and ends up being the bulk of our leisure time.

Effortful fun is more memorable.

Putting in work to have fun.

" You find people who are doing amazing things professionally as well as personally but they all have the same amount of time we do". -Audrey Monke

"Time is all about how we perceive it. We all have the same amount of time. It all moves at the same rate. But that's not really the way we think about". -Laura Vanderkam

"When we walk around with the story "I'm so busy" we will constantly look for moments that show that". - Laura Vanderkam

"You want more time doing stuff you enjoy. Nobody wants more time in a traffic jam or boring meeting". - Laura Vanderkam

"Your fun can take some work but you will be so happy you did it" - Laura Vanderkam

Laura's TED Talk, How to Gain Control of Your Free Time:

Laura Vanderkam's Website

Best of Both World Podcast

Laura's Other Books:

LEARN MORE

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LEARN MORE

I've had such an incredible time this fall meeting with parents, teachers, and kids in person to talk about some of the strategies I write about in my book, Happy Campers.

One topic that comes up regularly is the importance of learning to keep ourselves calm and model calm down strategies for our kids, as well as helping our kids figure out their own calm down strategies.

In this episode, I am sharing my ideas and tips on

• Synonyms & Antonyms for Calm
• For most of us, our level of calm seems to depend on our personality.
• Learning to self-regulate and manage anger can really have lasting positive effects.

• Hand Brain Model - Daniel Siegel

Learning to Breathe

Deep Breathing (Web MD)

Most people take short, shallow breaths into their chest. It can make you feel anxious and zap your energy. With this technique, you'll learn how to take bigger breaths, all the way into your belly.

• Get comfortable. You can lie on your back in bed or on the floor with a pillow under your head and knees. Or you can sit in a chair with your shoulders, head, and neck supported against the back of the chair. • Breathe in through your nose. Let your belly fill with air. • Breathe out through your nose. • Place one hand on your belly. Place the other hand on your chest. • As you breathe in, feel your belly rise. As you breathe out, feel your belly lower. The hand on your belly should move more than the one that's on your chest. • Take three more full, deep breaths. Breathe fully into your belly as it rises and falls with your breath.

Box Breathing (Medical News Today)

Box breathing is a simple technique that a person can do anywhere, including at a work desk or in a cafe. Before starting, people should sit with their back supported in a comfortable chair and their feet on the floor.

Close your eyes. Breathe in through your nose while counting to four slowly. Feel the air enter your lungs. Hold your breath inside while counting slowly to four. Try not to clamp your mouth or nose shut. Simply avoid inhaling or exhaling for 4 seconds. Begin to slowly exhale for 4 seconds. Repeat steps 1 to 3 at least three times. Ideally, repeat the three steps for 4 minutes, or until calm returns. If someone finds the technique challenging to begin with, they can try counting to three instead of four. Once someone is used to the technique, they may choose to count to five or six.

Breathing Beads

Five Finger Breathing

5 Tips to Start Running Run Happy

Some items you might want in your calm-down space:

Coloring or drawing supplies Craft supplies (beading, knitting, crocheting, needle point, etc.) A puzzle Meditation or Prayer Book Journal or journaling paper Candle Music (with or without headphones) Musical Instrument (if you play)

Take some deep breaths Learning to BreatheGood Things Come to Those Who Breathe

Piano Relaxation (Spotify) Relaxing Classical (Spotify)

Gratitude

Laugh/Humor

My "Funny Stuff" Board on Pinterest (Warning: My kids say this stuff is only funny to me.)

Audrey: "It's important to be self-aware and know what our personality and setpoint is ... 8.m4a

Audrey: "When our kids see us ...9.m4a