Tools for a Spiritually Aware Family

I remember when I was pregnant for the first time I had this overwhelming feeling of wanting to offer my daughter the tools to shine as herself. Even though I was quite young, through my wanderings and studies I had scraped the surface of spirituality, energy, the law of attraction and following bliss. I was experimenting with listening to intuition and trusting my relationship to divine source. Suddenly, I on to my child and I felt like I had nine months to figure out how to bring that to life for her.

wanted to pass tools of awareness

I’ve learnt a lot since then. I soon realised my daughter was spirit, and knew how spirit worked. I soon found that fun and play was the language of the soul and the journey of being a parent was a continuation of my own spiritual path, not a destination which I needed to prepare for.

However, as our daughters grew, by the time they were 3-4,  I had the pull to start sharing spirituality with them. They asked questions which needed metaphysical answers, I saw the opening for them to become aware of their emotions as messages from their spirit, and I knew that they needed to know how to radiate at the energy of what they wanted rather than focusing on what they don’t want. (It stopped whining so quickly!) Therefore, I started to piece together stories and activities to offer them tools for a happy life, to weave together a foundation of spiritual awareness for our family.

I was talking about teamwork with our youngest the other day, and our eldest daughter started talking about “the idea of the family as an orchestra, parents as a conductor” and how they had learnt about consideration and what feels good. I had to laugh at hearing words coming back to me, words and concepts that have been taken to heart by my children and philosophies that they are using day after day. I am so proud at how my children see spiritual concepts as every day, purposefully meditating before schoolwork and consciously choosing tv shows that resonate with what they want to feel.

I sigh in relief that my children know themselves and can find ways to tune into that when life gets too much.

But over the years, as my business as a parent coach and author has developed, that desire is more and more prevalent. Over this past month as the world has taken some strange dips and turns, parents are asking for this more and more.

We all want our children to be able to shine as Who They Really Are, to trust their heart and to know how to feel their way to their own deeper bliss. We want them to feel strong in their own individual journeys, not victims to what they think others think about them and not swaying in their own sense of self to please someone else. It is a powerful time for our children to shine, as themselves.

Perhaps that’s why it felt like the perfect time to finally put my first e-course together.

Spiritual Kids; building foundations for a spiritually aware family, comes out this Monday. The course is designed to empower you as a parent to shine as yourself, and offers you tools to offer your children through crafts, activities, and experiences. They get the games and fun, absorbing information about spirit, meditation, emotions and the law of attraction,  while you get to watch the video lessons and guided meditations. It is a combination that creates an organically rooted spiritual and emotional awareness in your home and family.

Feel free to check out the video below to get a greater sense of what I’m talking about.

But also make sure you check out the website to learn more. Once the course goes on sale it will be up for a promotional price for the first 50 courses sold (which includes lifetime access and a private facebook group) so, keep posted for sure! I can’t wait to share this information with you.

The Pursuit of Spiritually Aware Parenting

Someone asked me today what my “goal” is in the work I do, and an image flashed across my mind.

It was a pregnant mother to be walking into a spiritual bookstore in Glastonbury over in the UK.

The woman was me.

14 years ago, my husband and I were expecting our first daughter and like some excited school girl I danced into every bookstore I could find, looking for that tool, that golden compass which would help me find the spiritual path I knew pregnancy could be. Up until that point, I’d avidly gobbled up every spiritual book I could find. Before meeting my husband, I’d Marianne Williamson’d, Deepak’d and Dyer’d. I had gone old school with holy books and philosophy leaders and on the flip side, had watched Oprah until the sun went down. I’d even been a screenwriter for a spiritual television

program for children. Spirituality coursed through my veins and I’d met my husband through the most spiritual connection I’d ever experienced, using connection, the law of attraction and intuition.

It seemed like pregnancy should be the same. It felt like parenthood was a holy rite to be passed though and I wanted to meditate through labor and teach yoga to her before she could walk. She would be enlightened and know all the tools I’d been gathering for years, so her life would be golden.

But, I hadn’t counted on the fear, socially inflicted doubt and the fact that my life had sped up and I already felt I was running out of time!

I felt rushed as each trimester passed...I talked and read what I could find but I felt I would never have the quiet I craved and the more I craved it, the more I didn’t know how to savor it when I found it. I felt like a runaway train was behind me that hollered “She’s coming soon and you aren’t lined up yet. Line Up!”

My feeble attempts to have small rituals or make things sacred for our daughter, were done for my own outward show, trying to convince my fearful heart that I would “get it right”, while I really felt that  I really didn’t know what I was doing, or who she was, or who I was going to be as a mom. I wanted to enjoy that time... but it was flying by and tainted with morning sickness. I felt like I was having a shadow experience of something I wanted with all my heart.

I sometimes felt so guilty for feeling like I was failing her and she hadn’t even been born yet.

And so, I wandered into bookstores, looking for the book that hadn’t been written.

And I kept aimlessly looking for a couple of years.

2 daughters later I decided it was time to slow down and tap into the inner resources I’d known all along was within me, but I’d been too nervous to look before. I’d have to dig deeper than I ever had. I’d have to be vulnerable and push back the veil.

For some reason, I thought that parenting was something everyone had figured out already, and I should play by the rules. I might have found true love across the ocean by mere instinct and without any dating experience like everyone else. but parenting... surely I was safest following other people’s lead.

But I finally got it. I couldn’t play a role and feel authentic to myself. I couldn’t have the spiritual experience while pretending to be something else. Trying made no sense. My girls, my husband and I were going to have to live a different story. The veil had to be pulled back. The real me had to emerge.

And so it began... oh it was shaky for awhile I can tell you. The philosophy had to be invented as going, and with a daughter who had iron will, I fell back into old habits more than not. I screamed, I shouted, I guilted and I even shamefully spanked as my own reaction to the lack of control and dictatorship I had (I mean everyone else said I should be in control, was I really supposed to give that up?)

But little by little I remembered Who I was... and who I wanted to be. I remembered I was connected when I felt good, and if fighting felt bad, it wasn’t good.

So I started passing on tools to the girls as I practiced them again for myself. Exercises, games, stories, anything that could offer them emotional awareness. Homeschooling provided us with the best platform for emotional awareness lessons and life tools.

And then I got pregnant with our son.

I went back and redid pregnancy, the way I had wanted to in the first place.  I rewrote the experience and connected to the source within my son by 16 weeks. He was my eyes and ears to how the pregnancy was going. It was enlightened.

Everything rolled together and kept rolling. Our girls were learning how to feel, and to follow their hearts. They became sensitive to how the law of attraction brought in what they were feeling. They became in awe of the world around them, and integrated spirit and magic into near enough everything. The world made sense on a deeper level for them. They did yoga, and learnt how to meditate....

Scratch that... they’d always known how to be the incredible spirits that they are.

Along with our son, they taught me how to allow and move through stages rather than force them.

Behaviour became an indicator of how they were feeling about themselves not how “bad” they were and my stress was a sign that I needed to connect to ME, not to find fault in Them.

There wasn’t any pressure to pass on wisdom, I got to learn some. I got to play more, I got to laugh more.

Life finally slowed down and I could enjoy it feeling fulfilled and authentically me.

And that’s my goal for my work. I want for as many of you as possible to find ease in the chaos and speed of the day. I want you to feel so much deeper than the routine and daily chores. I want to empower children to look for the deeper route in life and to have emotional awareness, knowing themselves so they can navigate through it all. I want love, laughter and ease for everyone.

Is that too much to ask? Maybe. But not too much to try.

Its right around the corner, you know? Just pull aside the veil and see what’s there.

3 Steps to Trigger Mindfulness

Last week I was being interviewed on Katie Flores Get Happy Project and we were talking on the subject of mindfulness. An interesting point came up which I wanted to officially clear up here.

It’s not always easy... and once you get it.. you won’t always do it... and that’s alright.

As many of you know, I offer a free guide on my site, and here on this blog, called How to Push the Reset Button... it’s basically 4 (ok... spoilers... 5!) easy steps to find your connection in chaos.

It’s a simple process on paper. But not necessarily in practice. From a space of calm, logging off, letting go, listening, and loving.. it all sounds logical and natural.

However, throw yourself in the middle of a 2 year old tantrum when you are running late already.

It’s a bit like telling someone swimming is a breeze in the middle of a storm.

Our natural state is to be balanced, grounded and spiritually aware. But tempers rise when we are feeling unlike ourselves... when we are in an un-natural feeling space... so although the process of pushing the reset button is there to provide steps to get you back to yourself... You have to find the reminder to use them in the first place.

Imagine a gap between you as your greater version of you; The bigger than this body you.

And the physical experience as You.

The physical experience has the temper, the reactions, the “I’m going to panic” “I’m overwhelmed” “Can’t stop from flipping” experiences (as well as the good stuff... don’t forget the good stuff)

In a positive experience, positive emotion, the gap between the dual versions of you is really small, you experience the joy together.... as positive spirit, the greater version of you is happy to be by your side.

But then a stressful experience occurs... or your thoughts start chattering with a negative focus.

Spirit says... sorry... no can do. I can’t go there with you.

And the gap widens.

The trick is to remember the gap. (Mind the Gap... gives trips on the London Tube a very different meaning!)

For when you find yourself surrounded in chaos, and you remember the gap, that’s when you can find your way back to the fuller YOU, you push the reset button, you find new focus, you go to your inner room and you laugh. Does that make sense?

But how to remember the gap????

Here’s my top 3 big Flashing Red Lights you can put in place.

1)      A physical representation of yourself... something that every time you see or hear, or touch you feel connected to your fullest version of yourself. A piece of jewelry, a crystal in your pocket, a token from your children or from a spiritual journey... anything that upon sight you remember yourself and within that... remember the gap. I once knew someone who actually made a picture of what made her feel awesome and put it as the lock screen on her phone... Depending how much you use your cell... that’s awesome!

2)      The sky. Looking upward immediately reminds us to connect to something so much larger than our own experience... and in that larger universe we find the larger version of ourselves. Mountains, fields, trees can do the same. I have my moon. She has been kind and kept me connected even through my son’s birth.

3)      A mantra, or affirmational phrase... or tune. Om... humming... or something like “I am more than this experience” or “within me lies my own happiness and light.” When repeated often, or trained to be a regular focus, this can become a habitual state of being... so habitual, that when we disconnect, and get stressed, we can feel the shift more strongly, and then consciously guide ourselves back.

It may be a logical statement to ask how these reminders can remind us to connect, if we have to remember to do the reminders! But the thing is that these simple steps can easily be worked into life, even when you  are feeling wonderfully, exhilaratingly like yourself. When you find the little tokens of motions that symbolize you as everything you are, it feels amazing to practice them, sing them, play with them, focus on them. It raises life up to the point that when you aren’t in the space of doing them, you feel disconnection so intensely and that’s that little reset button push.

Awareness to how you feel is truly where it’s all at.. and the feeling of being mindful to Who You Really Are... ohhh... it’s a blissful state of infinite possibilities.

If you haven’t gotten your free copy of the guide, you can find it over here.

Mindfulness and Running on Empty

You want to know something really funny.

As someone who will be talking about mindfulness in parenting in the upcoming Get Happy Project (Which you should definitely sign up for!) ... as someone who coaches parents about mindful parenting and someone who writes, eats, sleeps, and parents... with mindfulness as a foundational philosophy....

I’ve rarely written about it on this blog. Sigh.

Life can be funny sometimes.

So, let’s talk about it here and now. What is mindfulness or does it go deeper than that?

There are so many ways I feel can describe a mindful living... or an aware living.

Living in awareness to Who We Really Are, allows us to bump our mindful practices up in the list of priorities. Being aware of who we are, is like knowing that there is this phenomenal room, a place of quiet, peace and a sense of everything we are, that when we enter it we know we will be refueled and refreshed.

It could also be described as the inner gas station.

If you are aware that there’s as gas station down the street, and you start to run out of petrol... you won’t hesitate in fueling up.

Self awareness, mindfulness is the process of filling up your tank or of retreating to your inner room so you can continue through your day as your truest self. It helps create patience, clarity, relief and joy.

But it also creates the space where you can feel the stress, acknowledge the tension and sense of overwhelment, and shift it around. Spiritual awareness and mindfulness don’t automatically create a happier existence rather it puts you back in the driver’s seat capable of putting focus on feeling better and finding calm, happiness and perspective.

So, what are some techniques for mindfulness? Well, first of all, finding the sense of awareness.

Awareness begins by simply observing yourself and learning who you are. What triggers your stress, what jumps you into appreciation, who are you when your eyes are closed and life quiets for a moment...

Meditation is about setting the stage for that observation.

Life is hectic, and fast and throw children and chores on top of it all and our heads can go, we spin out of control as we attempt to listen to everyone, play, organize, drive, and keep things flowing. We feel energies deplete and focus scatter... if we are aware enough to know how it feels.

Three simple steps to get started are;

Close your eyes.

 Breathe Deeply. 

Let the energy fall from your tense head, down through your body to your feet.

Repeat.

You become yourself... fully you. Mindful of you. Drawing yourself into the moment and becoming present.

And now, you can continue through the day. Simply by stopping like this, you are telling your true self “I know you are there. What would you do?” You are acknowledging your own mindfulness.

Mindful practice ranges in so many ways; from this sort of observation, to watching a sunset... or a sunrise, to a sitting meditation for a few moments, to a walking meditation, to dancing or singing, or shifting focus to a garden, music, or coloring... anything that achieves a space where you can be yourself and retreat to the inner room within your spiritual self. It is the key to your inner room, and from there, life flows more, solutions click into place and we perceive our children’s own inner workings with so much more clarity.

There is a golden moment when we drop into a space of ourselves. When we connect to our deeper source, our sense of divine and understand it to be a truer sense of ourselves and when that truer sense is driving the car of our family, we know we are all in safer hands and will go further...

Than if we hadn’t stopped to fuel up.

It’s not about having time or not. It’s not about bothering. Rather it’s about forming a habit like eating healthier to give your body energy, you are doing a spirit check to give your soul energy.

This is the foundational belief of mindful parenting... and Spiritual Aware Parenting.

And yes, sometimes we forget to fuel up. Sometimes we get stressed and run out of gas somewhere between overwhelmed and flipping out.

But if we’ve practiced the awareness of how we like to feel and how it feels to be Who We Really Are... we remember...

And we call ourselves back to ourselves, one breath at a time.

By the way... The Get Happy Project is going to be an incredible online summit, with guests specializing in a range of self care techniques and trainings. Definitely sign up and I'll see you there! :) 

Taking Care of Your Story

 Everyone... yes, everyone... will occasionally find life challenging and yes, that includes our children who have a hard time, through new experiences, growing pains, learning curves, lost toys, scrapped knees or  friends.

Sometimes, we can find ourselves overwhelmed, juggling too many balls in the air to count and wondering how to keep things afloat.

And sometimes, we all feel a good vent is a great and healthy thing.

Of course.

And it is. It really is. It’s good to put all the ducks in a row and really get through the cloud of what’s bothering us and state it loud and clear.

Name it well.

But the next step is often forgotten, because once the issue that’s troubling us is out in the open, two things happen.

First, it can easily become our story for ourselves. We’ve told it once, and now it keeps happening, and we see evidence that backs it up all over the place. We’ve complained that no one ever picks up after themselves... next morning, there are toys all over the living room... In becoming part of our story it is part of the fabric of our lives... the law of attraction takes hold, bringing in more of the feeling we carry, the focus we hold. unless we choose not to let it.

Second of all, it becomes our story for other people.

How often have we vented everything out to a friend or family member and then next week, when we’ve adjusted and felt better, they notice something in our experience...

“Oh yeah, they are messy, aren’t they? Just look at the mess.”

A lovely story reminder... our perspective has shifted and suddenly we see the mess again.

Or, when life is especially full of balls to juggle, subtle comments like..

“I don’t know how you do it?” can make us question ourselves.

“hmmm. I don’t know how I do it either.”

Comments which may come from a place of support actually ring out as something much different. The focus becomes about how well we deal in struggle... but the struggle is what is the basic theme.

It also happens with our children. When they feel unpopular at school, or feel like they can’t do well at something. When they lose things or go through a hard time. We can see their upset as their story and alter things to “support” them, only to hold them in a place of that painful moment. We want to validate how they feel, but in the meantime, can hold them in the space of that feeling, rather than helping them shift to something new.

There was an Abraham Hicks Quote about this on their facebook page today it read;

“The greatest gift you could give to anyone you love, is the gift of positive expectation.”

Imagine, if every complaint or vent, was a stop sign, a reset button. A sign that said;

This is how it’s been and because of that, I know another story.”

And the new story was what was supported and nurtured.

What if we had the capacity of holding space for others to the point of seeing what they have created from what they have experienced?

What if every messy house conversation bounced off to a place of appreciating and supporting each attempt at keeping clean? What if every one of our children’s disappointments bounced off to a place of looking for opportunities of wellbeing flowing in?

And what if each problem created a support system for the seeking of a solution.

We don’t want to push positive to the point of denial... pushing a happy face on our children to the point of burying their pain. That’s not going to create any happy journeys. Rather, the razor edge path is about gradually shifting from a place of upset, banging the drum of disappointment, and when it feels like it’s just hit that point of enough... shift to solution based, trust in wellbeing, gradually moving towards feeling good vibration. I call my process the At Least Game.

It’s not that difficult and I want to quickly offer a focus point to do it with your children. You might have heard me mention it before, but it’s a good reminder.

Simply start 5 sentences with the words At Least.

Try it. You can’t help but feel a shift in feeling space. The tension feels less tense. The juggling seems less overwhelming. Even the mess seems less messy (at least my room is clean. At least no one did any baking. At least I have a vaccum, at least I can play awesome music through the house. At least I have a family to make that mess.)

And, what a way to hold space for other people too; for friends, neighbors, anyone who is upset... for our children.

Take care of your story, which is created by the story you tell yourself. Every story has struggle, but only for character development. The stories are only happy when focused on the solution.

What Spiritually Aware Parenting can look like.

As I was sitting at the park yesterday, watching all three of our children playing in their own style )I love how my 13 year old still plays wildly at the park, in her 5’10” height and her fashionista manners... she resonates with herself, willingly leaping on top of any swinging bridge or seesaw. She’s not worried about other people’s opinions, and it’s that gift that gives me some comfort in seeing her grow up so quickly) another scene caught my eye... my people watching skills couldn’t help but notice, an older gentleman and his, what must have been, his twin grandsons. He was with two other people, but his focus was on the boys... not on them, rather WITH Them... his focus was with them, and I watched in wonder as he logged off from everything else and simply enjoyed their play.

It reminded me of the downloadable guide, called “4 simple steps to pushing the Reset Button.”I have over on my website. Broken down in 4 easy steps, memorable by being in 4 “L” letter words... the steps take you from chaos to connection and help you find your inner compass again. Well, the first “L” step in my guide is to LOG OFF, and whereas it can literally  mean to log off, to get off of Facebook and Twitter and draw your focus into what’s in your moment, this man reminded me of the spiritual focus that can come from logging off from your outer world and logging in to your children’s.

The second “L” is to Let Go... again, it means what you will it to. Let go of results, let go of stress... breathe and allow.

The third “L” is Listen... to yourself, to your children.

And the Fourth is to Love.

This Gentleman, in the 5 minutes that I watched him, seemed to capture the essence of all 4 steps and it was a beautiful thing to see.

He came into the playground, and called to the boys to try out the seesaw, he wasn’t scattered in his thoughts, scanning his phone or even the other children, he simply talked to them about how the seesaw worked and how wonderful it was that they were the same size, so it would all balance out.

One of his friends came up, and rather than engaging in some “grown up” talk, they both started discussing with the boys how gravity worked on their bodies if they swayed to the centre or pulled away. They talked about not getting off too quickly, but to talk to the person on the other end so no one got hurt. The talk was focused, not scattered, no one rushed for words or stressed out when one boy almost got off from the top, and both men felt free to talk with each other... not just scatteredly to each other. Everyone was engaged and focused.

The children both learnt so much in their time there and the gentleman was so grounded in Who He Really Is. He wasn’t hesitant, but joyful. He didn’t question himself or others rather he was within himself in the moment and his focus, his moment was being spent with his two grandsons. Mind chatter and ponderings were being put on hold for another time.

We all get stressed sometimes. All of us. We all get scattered and chattered. We all get in knots.

But awareness of how we feel is a burst of fresh air to the soul. It reminds us of the power of the moment, where life resides.

When I first started giving people the 4 “L” points, they felt horrible when they forgot them somewhere in their downloads as if reading it through a couple of times was a magic solution to stress. Rather it’s an on going process absorbing the steps and imputing them into our daily habits. Sometimes it takes the image of an older gentleman, patiently enjoying his two grandsons, controlling his focus and giving attention to his moment and not questioning where his focus should be to remind ourselves what Spiritual Aware Living really looks like.

We all get stressed sometimes, I’m sure even the gentleman in the park has his moments, but it’s with the awareness of how that feels that we can find that logged off focus, when we can let it go, listen and love. It’s an ebb and flow kind of growth... and one that thrives better when it’s down with support and community.
I appreciate that gentleman, wherever he is, so much. For he radiated a grounded peace throughout the playground that day and reminded me the power of focus, logging off, listening and most of all Love.

If you want to download the guide to Push the Reset Button, you can find it here

A Child Isn't a Joke

The situation would be frowned upon if it was about race or gender, but if it’s about children, society has no problem cracking a joke.

A seemingly harmless Facebook status about how hard it is to concentrate on work when surrounded by cute kids opens a gateway for generalized comments and jokes, such as “they’ll be doing something disgusting soon enough” or “Imagine them 10 years down the road stealing your car.” Somehow, even just the two word response “beat them” is considered funny. 

What? When did it become okay to make that sort of comment? 

Why is an age slur different than a race one and when are we as a society going to start treating our children as respected citizens?

2015 started off with many heated debates regarding free speech and what it meant. With the horrifying tragedies in Paris, some still questioned whether ridicule and criticism regarding any group was a fair representation of free speech. I have a problem with the statement “people should learn how to take a joke” especially since we are consistently battling bullying for our children in the schools. It feels like a mixed message.

We tell our children not to hurt others and to respect differences. We tell them to help others smaller than themselves, to see people as individuals and not stereotype groups. We encourage them to accept that others have different beliefs and cultures, but then, in grown up society, we can mock, sneer and jeer at whomever and whatever as long as it has a certain quality of wit. 

When I commented on the Facebook comment thread, simply saying that my kids were too incredible to be distracted from, I was told that “everyone loves their kids, but they like to laugh too.” I was being a killjoy. Because I was suggesting that children, individual human beings, who are at the beginning of learning about life, who are often struggling to adapt to adult surroundings and being expected to know how to be without being taught in simple steps, CHILDREN shouldn’t be laughed at, labelled as simply cute and stereotyped as people headed for trouble.

Is it social media that has us so cut off from basic consideration for others, both individually and as groups? Are we so desperately in search of that funny status that we’ll make fun of our loved ones or anyone standing too close?

I don’t even understand how it comes about. Why are children so often, generalized negatively when we were all young once? It’s not like different cultures where unless you live and breathe them it’s difficult to fully feel what they are. I remember being a child and my attempts at learning as I went along. Generalizing how I was going to behave based on my age often did me harm. In fact it left me isolated and confused. You remember, don’t you, that feeling of walking into a store and the staff watching you intently, and convinced you were going to sneak something into a pocket, all the while knowing it was usually the least suspecting that would shoplift.

In my mind any ridiculing of any stereotyped version of a group does one thing: it perpetuates more of that perspective. The power of words is that they create, they empower their message. The more we put focus on the mess children can create in their explorations, rather than on the excitement of their explorations themselves, the more it’s the mess we see. The more we comment on our children’s downfalls, even generalized downfalls which other people have made a joke of, the more we look to our children to back it up and the more we have a distorted view of who they are. It is like a projector goes up between us and them, and the image we watch of them is simply an image, no longer capable of personal connection.

My children and I laugh all the time. We joke about and have been known to raise passing people’s eyebrows with our giggles and goofy behaviour. However, they are being raised with the care not to make fun of things. If you make fun of something beautiful, even a fairytale, you will never see it the same way again. If you mock something then be prepared for your perspective to change forever. We’ve all occasionally watched a skit on a show like Saturday Night Live and repeat it in our minds with a laugh whenever we hear about the issue or person again. It’s the comic’s greatest legacy and responsibility to shift perspective to the humorous side. Do we want to change perspective of how we see our children?

We’re an ever evolving and developing human race. We are suppose to be forever moving forward, but we have to ask ourselves, can’t we learn that bullying is bullying, no matter the age or the cause, and that no victim should have to be told to “take a joke”. Verbal abuse is often in the form of ridicule and it is abuse, whether directed at one person or at a group, and generalization of children, like any group of people, simply creates walls against seeing people as individuals.

Our children, just like ourselves, are individuals. They sometimes make messes, make mistakes and occasionally act ridiculously cute, just like us. It’s all the process of this thing called life and all of us often need a helping hand of support not to be the butt of a Facebook joke.

The Art of Boredom

My boy isn’t impressed when I express pride every time he announces “I’m bored.” At five years old he’s reached a new plateau and its one that has him slightly confused. When he was a baby signs of restlessness were greeted with me singing with him, bouncing on my knee or introducing new sights or sounds. Toddlerhood had his own explorations, but sometimes I would come in to set up a new sensory table, a new activity. As he grew a little more, he looked to his sisters for amusement, getting involved in their games, getting them to play with him, trying to be twelve rather than four. He has played and played and played, frustratingly never learning or moving forward, but having quality time with his sisters. But now at five and a half, he’s wiser. He’s played great games with all of us and he wants to do more, but he’s developed preference on what he likes to play and simply joining in to other people’s stories, just isn’t cutting it. His old games and toys, don’t seem to offer amusement and so often we just won’t do what he wants us to do. So, the wail of “I’m bored” follows.

And his mother says, “I’m so glad”, and I am.

Our children aren’t bored enough now days. We as parents seem to feel it’s our job to amuse, to set up and distract. Sure, I play. I can often be found on a bed driving some imaginary bus and saving some stuffed toys from some horrible fate, but then I stop for a bit, or sit on the “bus” and read, while he rides, drives and saves. I’ll offer options, but he’s five now and my instincts have told me, it’s time to enable, but not to amuse.

Remember car trips?  Remember staring out the window for sometimes days, watching the world wiz by and imagining everything under the sun, even just swearing you’d never take your children on road trips?

Remember going shopping with our mothers, or waiting for them to get their hair done? Remember playing with our fingers, as they were the only amusement, literally, on hand?

Now, we seem to do everything in our power to make sure our children aren’t bored. We offer them toys or iphones, we offer them treats to distract them or simply get other people to take care of them while we shop, so it goes smoother and they don’t get bored, because that would be a disaster. But who is it a disaster for? Is it really that bad for them that they are bored, or is it the inconvenience for us that make us avoid it so frantically?

Boredom offers opportunity. It is our spirit’s way of saying I have room here. I have space where I can do something different. I want to try something new. I’m ready for the next adventure. Boredom says let’s try something crazy. Boredom is the imagination’s invitation to come out and play. That’s why our parents did well to offer us that tub of clay or simple blocks to compete with boredom; they are tools for the imagination, rather than amusement or distraction for it.

Our children are children at an important time. Some say that when 85% of them retire from their careers, those jobs haven’t even been invented yet. Their imaginations have to be razor sharp, yet we live in a world that can actually blunt it. Boredom invites them to find solutions to problems, even if it’s just jumping on their bed chanting I’m bored! Boredom asks them to ask themselves what they think, what they want to do, whereas computers, iphones and most toys of today tell them what to do and not to think about it.

Well my son hates being told what to do, and although he’s been allowed to experiment with a few computer games, he’s come to the conclusion that they don’t leave much room for him to make the rules. His sisters don’t like him to make the rules either. But his imagination does. His stuffed toys do.

He still might not be too impressed with my “Yay for boredom” attitude and he’s a little confused when I say, “Hey squint you eyes and watch the light dance”. But he’s getting there.

And I still will join in a game every once and awhile, as long as his amusement isn’t depending on me to play. I’ll join in for my own amusement knowing he is strong and smart enough to create his own.