Eating Family Dinner Together = Smarter, Happier Kids, and More!

A few weeks ago, I had the pleasure of learning some valuable lessons from Dr Lisa Damour! Author of Entangled, to be released in February, 2016!

The lasting impressions I got from her engaging presentation about resilience were:

*SLEEP is immensely important. She says that we should protect and prioritize our children's (and surely our own) hours of sleep each night because of the lengthy list of benefits of sleep wrapped into one pill would be a billion dollar drug with only beneficial side effects. I think so too!

*Family MEALS, at least 4 nights per week, powerfully results in significantly smarter kids with a better sense of well being, regardless of the pleasantness of the meals! Grandma was right!

*Meaningful friendships are important, and this is not too surprising. The surprise to me, is that it's best to just have ONE OR TWO CLOSE FRIENDS, rather than more. The reasoning made sense; we can get pulled in too many directions, unintentionally hurt feelings when spending time with one friend, rather than another, and maintaining too many relationships expends lots of energy.

*A growth mindset, rather than a fixed one, refers to the "If I WORK HARD enough, I can do anything!" way of thinking, resulting in much more SUCCESSFUL children and adults, than those who rely on how they were born / their "talents" / their genetics. She included various comparisons of how each mindset would act/feel in various situations, such as getting a disappointing grade, striking out, asking for help from a teacher, etc.

Joan Borysenko is another fabulous resource for RESILIENCE; here is a post I wrote after taking a class from her which provides methods of increasing our resilience.

Lisa also stressed the importance of children spending time with adults, and this matches advice I have been trying to follow from Amy McCready of Positive Parenting Solutions. At my house, we call it "Mommy and Me Time". Check out my post about Positive Parenting Solutions.

Also, here's a post with some other great parenting books!

Look for more posts soon - I have so much fun and exciting stuff to share :)

A Happy Parent is a HEALTHY Parent!

While this isn't a parenting website, it IS about being healthy and happy.  When my kids behave, I feel HEALTHIER and HAPPIER!!

Remember my post about a parenting webinar?  Since it also included some great parenting books, here is the link: FREE HELP WITH PARENTING!  Amy McCready of Positive Parenting Solutions presented, and it was hosted by the amazing 100 Days of Real Food.  I hope some of you took the opportunity to watch and participate!

While there are certainly other factors involved (more sleep on my part for example), my kids have been behaving beautifully!  Amy McCready had a lot of advice, and more than that, she discussed the WHYS of children's misbehavior.  Everything is based on Adlerian Psychology.

In this post, I'll simply discuss the CAUSE of children's behavior AND one SOLUTION (Positive Parenting Solutions has many).

The cause is simple, and consistent!  The cause of ALL misbehavior is a child's need for BELONGING and SIGNIFICANCE.  Amy says that if a child misbehaves, you should imagine that he or she has a BIG SIGN on his or her chest that says "I want to belong and feel significant, but I don't know how!"

She says this is the root of every tantrum, argument between siblings, and other misbehavior.

Amy's first SOLUTION is called "Mind, Body, and Soul" Time.  The prescription is 10 minutes per session, 2 sessions per day, per child.  There are only a few stipulations:

a) you must spend the time one-on-one with each child

b) you need to give this child your complete attention, be "emotionally available", available to them in "mind, body, and soul"

c) do whatever they want - play, color, walk, build, talk,...

d) label the time as your "special time" for example, with a start and finish

In my ways of moderation, I would say you could try to do this for one session a day, or even in moments whenever you can, or once a week!  The MORE the BETTER, but the main idea is that giving your kids simple ONE-ON-ONE time gives them the sense of belonging and significance that they NEED, and CRAVE.

If you give them that, your payback will be GREAT!  You won't believe the CHANGES!

I've only just learned specifically about this "MIND, BODY, AND SOUL" TOOL this afternoon as I was completing "Session 1" offered for a free trial at this link: VIDEOS, ARTICLES, AND OTHER INTERACTIVES FREE for 14-DAYS.

The positive changes in my kids I think have been happening gradually, and in some ways immediately, after participating in the webinar last month.

Currently, she is offering a FREE ON-DEMAND WEBINAR (I think like the one I watched, but probably without live Q&A), so you can hear first hand all of her well spoken explanations.

Even if it's been a while, I bet she is offering another webinar -- so still check it out if you're interested!

I'll end with a quick quote from Amy that may entice you:

"We’ll talk a lot about behavior in the course – good and bad.  We’ll teach you how to get more of the positive behaviors you want – cooperation, listening the first time, independence, sibling harmony, self-sufficiency and more.  And – we’ll teach you how to get less of the annoying, frustrating, maddening behaviors you don’t want!"

COMMENTS: Do you get sick of repeating?  What helpful techniques and tricks have you found that work?