ARTZILLA

Today our kids have more pressure on them than ever before. To list a few:

1. Busy schedules
2. Pressure to do well and perform well
3. Increased input from screens and devices
4. Lack of face-to-face relationships, replaced by social media and online schooling
5. Isolation
6. Masking in schools
7. Reduced family time and less interaction with extended family
8. Their brains are in constant fight or flight causing increased anxiety and depression.

Mindfulness

Mindfulness is the mental process of bringing attention to different experiences happening in the present moment. It involves all of the senses through non-judgement. This means that there is no correct or incorrect way of thinking.

Being in the flow is thought to be the key to happiness. This is known as moment to moment awareness of our thoughts, body sensations and our environment, where our nervous system shifts from stress, worry and anxiety into positive emotions.

It is actively repeating the process of rebalancing your mind to come back to the moment while it constantly wants to pull you away from it into other thoughts.

Stressing Out? STOP!

1. S- STOP what you are doing
2. T- TAKE a few deep breaths
3. 0- OBSERVE your experience as it is.Thoughts are not facts or permanent
4. P- PROCEED with something that supports you

Loving Kindness

Practicing loving-kindness daily increases love, joy, contentment, pride, hope, interest, amusement, gratitude and awe. This loving-kindness guided mediation is geared for elementary-aged kids. Insight Timer has many guided meditations and you can use the unpaid subscription with lots of benefits. There’s also an app for your phone.

Sarah Blondin is of my favourite meditation guides. Some of her guided meditations are also great for older kids, she’s a Mom herself. If you feel like your heart could use some uplifting, or your kids are a bit older than elementary-aged, here’s a link to her guided meditation “To Uplift Your Heart”

Here is her guided meditation for “An Open Heart”

Mindfulness for Kids

Stop by my shop. I created this Mindfulness for Kids book that I’m really excited to share with you. It’s full of simple and fun exercises that I can assure you your kids will enjoy and be able to incorporate into your daily lives.

Please also keep checking back, I have lots of plans to create more materials and blog posts on this subject.

One last thing. If you sign up for my newsletter (I promise I won’t spam you) I’ll send you an opt-in gift that I’m confident you and your kids will enjoy.

Thanks for stopping by and taking the time to read my post, I hope you found it useful.