The Adult Chair Podcast with Michelle Chalfant

Dr. James Wellborn is a clinical psychologist who specializes in individual, family, and group psychotherapy with children and adolescents addressing the range of challenges faced by families and teens during this period of development. In addition to his practice, he's served as a consultant in schools developing programs to support at risk youth, and he's a strong advocate on radio, TV and print in helping parents support their child's healthy development. Dr. Wellborn is author of "Raising Teens in the 21st Century: A Practical Guide to Effective Parenting" that serves as a reference for parents address a whole host of teenage issues, and he's here to talk to us today about the challenges teens face in learning to live in their own Adult Chair.

As our guest today, Jim joins to help us continue our conversation on conscious parenting, this time from the perspective of our teens. From anxiety and social pressures, to technology and networks, to access to porn and other adult material that we're still learning to counsel through, this conversation is for all parents learning to help their kids transition to healthy adulthood!

Links & Notes

• Raising Teens in the 21st Century: A Practical Guide to Effective Parenting
• @jamesgwellborn on Twitter
• jamesgwellbornphd.com

Becoming a conscious parent means getting to know yourself well enough that you don't let your own emotions get in the way of understanding who your kids are growing up to be. That's harder than it sounds, and requires you to sit firmly in your Adult Chair the older they get. This week on the show, I've got five strategies that will help you not only relate to your kids without judgment, but understand them and protect them, too!

Forgiveness is a deeply personal thing. But whether you label yourself as a "forgiving person" because you're afraid of conflict in the adolescent chair, or living in an authentically forgiving place in the adult chair is determined first and foremost by whether we're allowing ourselves to feel our feelings! So many of us are afraid of our feelings, afraid of the way our emotions move through us. This week on the show, we're talking about how to see inside ourselves from the adult chair, to move clearly into the truth, and move forward with strong relationships with the people you with whom you're seeking a forgiving relationship.

Some days, it just feels like the world is conspiring against you. These are the days that shake our confidence, our sense of peace, our ability to relate to others — they're the worst! The trick to living in The Adult Chair is not developing some magical skill to erase these days from your life. It's developing the skill to recognize when you've been knocked out of The Adult Chair, and to move yourself back into it to rediscover your Seat of Power! Today on the show, I'm sharing my own Day of Days and some key strategies I use to find my way back to my Adult Chair.

And as a special bonus, listen all the way to the end for a conversation with Nancy, a client who has so graciously allowed me to record her work in moving back into her own seat of Power. If you're interesting in the real, practical work that goes into living into the Adult Chair, you can't get any more real than this!

It's February! With all the talk of love in the air leading into this Valentine's Day weekend, we thought it just the right time to share our own spin on romance: learning to date yourself! This is such an important concept, and it challenges one of the fundamental marketing messages of romantic partnership: the truth is, we don't find a partner to complete us! That's a trap! Don't fall for it! This week, we'll tell you all about it, and give you the tools you need to date yourself first, so you'll be a better partner for someone else!

Envision Only Positive Outcomes

So says Tony Burroughs this week as we continue our conversation on intentionality. Tony's work is all around intentions; he's co-founder of The Intenders of the Highest Good and one of his greatest gifts to all of us is the practice of the Intender's Circles, now a global community of people joining together to envision a better world, and find greater personal alignment in it. We've put a bunch of links to Tony's work below, including his original — and inspirational — book, The Code. Check it out, and start your own Intender's Circle today!

Links & Notes

What you Need to Know Now: The Lee Ching Messages

The Code: Use the Laws of Manifestation to Achieve Your Highest Good

The Bridge

The Vision Alignment Project

Intenders

The Intenders of the Highest Good

Tony Burroughs

It's January! With the turn of the New Year come all sorts of promises we make to ourselves as we look to make change in our lives. From losing weight to desires of greater mindfulness, these resolutions are signposts that we've crossed another year off the calendar.

Painful truth: Resolutions don't work! After 30 days, 75% of our resolutions have been long forgotten. In this podcast we discuss what does work, INTENTION! More than they typically fly-by-night ideas of the mind, intentions come from deep within us and they stick. Join us this week as we discuss the difference the real power of intention, kicking off a series of great conversations to come!

Want to learn how to de-stress and find balance in the holiday season or anytime throughout the year? Meditation is a wonderful practice that can do this for you. So many of us shy away from meditation as we don't know how, don't have time, etc. Pete and I have a discussion on these obstacles and others as well as the benefits and "How To's" of meditation. Included in the next podcast is a guided meditation for de-stress, anxiety and overwhelm.

When we look outside of ourselves for validation for who we are, we become dependent on others for our sense of self and happiness. When we learn to self-validate, we become internally strong in knowing who we are. We easily access our faults, with little to no effort. When asked what's good about us or what our positive strengths are, we scramble and have to stretch our minds to muster up even one positive about ourselves. In this podcast Michelle touches on projection, self esteem and the power of self validation and how it can build a solid foundation for our lives.

"If I don't learn to take care of myself, who will?"

Boundaries and confrontations are two very different things. One teaches others how we want to be treated and the other is getting in someone's face to elicit change. Which one sounds better to you?

In this podcast, we discuss the difference between the two and what, how and why it's important to learn how to set effective boundaries. Unfortunately, most of us weren't taught how to set boundaries so when we are faced with upsets or hurt we typically do one of the following: "suck it up" (and pretend nothing has happened), shun the person that hurt us and disown them or get angry, yell and/or rage.

There is a healthier way! This episode explains how.