One of the many wondrous things about children is their ability to open us up to new ways of thinking and being. They invite us as parents to be fully present, letting go of egoic patterns and beliefs that do not serve. This episode of Life is the Practice responds to questions frequently asked by clients who have little ones: Are there tools I can use to embody The Practice and share the power of mindfulness with them? In this episode, we are looking at ways to bring awareness, detach from negative emotions, and model as parents what it looks like to be fully conscious. You will also learn how to minimize projections and give your children the space to be themselves fully. It is possible to teach those we love – at any age – what it is to nurture our essential identities and bring a deep authenticity to our relationships and the world. Tools readily available to all of us can bring a profound and a lasting sense of purpose and peace to even the most mundane, everyday tasks of ordinary life. And that, my friends, is a healing way of being in the world that will echo through our children into our communities and the world.
Are you longing to live in a place of inner peace, abundance, and confidence? Had enough of self-doubt, fear, and a nagging scarcity mindset? Then I invite you to explore my online course. It integrates all the teachings I use in my 1:1 coaching practice and the wisdom I’ve acquired over 25 years of mindfulness and research. Welcome!
You might also enjoy visiting my website, where you can sign up for my free newsletter, find complimentary guided meditations, and listen to all my podcast episodes.
KEY TAKEAWAYS:
- Why “Cultivating Presence” (a topic covered in Episode 3) is foundational to conscious parenting.
- What it means to bring full attention to witnessing our children’s experiences – a palpable demonstration of our love for them.
- How our children’s development is served when we free our minds of extraneous thoughts, minimizing projection and egoic preoccupations.
- A look at common examples of how ego can creep into – and derail – our relationships. (More about this can also be found in Episode 5, “Ego and Taming the Inner Critic.”)
- About the impacts of parenting from scarcity and fear, classic egoic defaults that can manifest in:
- Ruminative, counter-productive thoughts.
- Attaching ourselves to or defining ourselves through our children or their behaviors.
- How conscious parents yield conscious children by:
- Freeing them from pressure and negative thought patterns.
- Reducing ego projection.
- Giving them the space they need to explore themselves without conditioning.
- Inviting them to emulate their parents in living authentic, fully present lives.
- Why paying attention to damaging mindsets brings us closer together through deeper understanding and empathy about the traps that ensnare us all as humans.
- About how The Practice improves our inner experience and enables us to stay more present to our children by:
- Dissolving egoic patterns.
- Managing emotions.
- Reducing reactivity.
- Helping us recognize and process emotions.
- More about practices that support us in becoming conscious parents:
- Regular meditation.
- Bringing awareness to thoughts in our everyday lives.
- Infusing even the most mundane of tasks with a sense of peace.
- Utilizing simple daily tools taught in this digital course devoted to living a more present, peaceful, and purposeful life.
- See it be it: Children who regularly witness mindfulness tend to grow into mindful adults.
- How The Practice fosters interconnection and fulfillment in adults – and by extension promotes the same in our children, communities, and humanity at large.
QUOTABLE:
- “Being present with our kids is a way of giving ourselves to them, of investing ourselves completely in them. I think it is the greatest gift we can give them – very simply because being present with our children is loving them.”
- “Mental defaults to scarcity, insecurity, and fear are classic expressions of the ego. If we are not aware of them, these patterns condition our thoughts and emotions, our decision making, and how we relate to life and others.”
- “Conscious parents contribute to the growth of more conscious and free human beings.”
- “Paying attention to the damaging mindsets that can impact us all can in fact bring us closer together. However unique we are as individuals, we are all subject to similar traps of the mind.”
- “I have coached hundreds of entrepreneurs, and a question I am frequently asked is: How do I teach this stuff to my children? My answer is always the same: The best way to teach mindfulness is to be mindful.”
- “At the end of the day, The Practice leads us home. It helps us to rediscover our essential identity, our purest and most intimate inner workings.”
- “When we bring (a) deeply authentic self to our relationships, we find ourselves naturally, organically relating to others with love, compassion, and trust.”
FURTHER RESOURCES:
- Juan’s guided meditations can be found here.
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