Many of us work hard to say the ‘right’ things to our loved ones, especially our children. Often however, our deeper feelings come out in the tone of voice we use or our facial expressions. This creates a problem for the receiver of our message: what is being said does not align with the emotions being communicated. This misalignment creates potential for miscommunication. It doesn’t matter how young your children
. . . or: “When you read this then you may have some new parenting ideas!” Does anyone else feel like parenting is an ongoing experience of what I imagine herding cats would feel like? I’ve been at it for 17 years now and it hasn’t really gotten any easier. I feel as though I have spent most of my time as a parent trying to convince my kids to
Most parents experience the anguish that comes with watching their child harm another little one. This is especially challenging as it can be an emotionally charged issue for any adults in attendance, let alone the child in harm’s way. Yet for the child who is demonstrating the aggression, it is most likely not charged with the emotion one would expect. As a matter of fact, “aggression” is defined as “hostile
I have a distinct memory of stepping into an elevator once to be greeted by an adorable toddler in a stroller with her parents. Her big beautiful smile filled my heart with warmth and I found myself smiling back and saying “Hello!” Our wonderful connective moment was suddenly disrupted by her mother who said “Can you say hi to the lady?”. The question was greeted by an awkward silence and
When I described my website content to my designer, he had a puzzle to solve: How do you cohesively represent a person who wishes to be promoted as a musician, early-childhood music specialist, song-writer, composer, piano teacher, music therapist and finally. . . FAMILY COACH??? This was an evocative question and I had to think about the answer: Once upon a time I was so immersed in a career as
