The Mindful Parent

Experience the Joy of Connecting with our Children

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Mindful Parenting is a contemplative practice through which our connection to our child, and awareness of our child’s presence, helps us become better grounded in the present moment

Your mindful parenting practice

tip of the day.

Sip slowly.

The Mindful Parent is an organization devoted to sharing with parents and other child caregivers ways in which to enhance the many joys of parenting.  By mindfully attending to our children, both when we are physically present with them and when we are physically separated from them, we can enhance our sense of connection to them and, in turn, our connection to the cosmos.  This makes us a better parent, a happier person, and a more vital human being.

 

To facilitate a more mindful approach to parenting, The Mindful Parent publishes on its website, and in its newsletter, mindful  parenting  verses and commentaries.  The Mindful Parent website also serves as a community forum that encourages and supports a mindful parenting dialogue and the sharing of mindful parenting experiences.

 

In the spirit of developing a mindful parenting community, we encourage you to submit a mindful parenting verse, commentary, and imagery to share with others.  We believe that through our collective experience, we can help each other develop a deeper and more meaningful mindful parenting practice.  Click here to learn more about making a submission.  We thank everyone who has made a contribution.


Please contact us with your questions about mindful parenting or to share a mindful parenting experience.  The Mindful Parent conducts mindful parenting  workshops and seminars

 

The Morning   Cup

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The Daily Sip: Connecting in the New Year


As parents (and as human beings) the feeling of connection is a powerful one.  As we connect more deeply to others, we feel a joy and aliveness that moves and inspires us.  While this feeling is a natural one to surface in relation to our children, it is also one that can be easily disrupted.  One of the gifts we can offer our children is how to maintain connection amid challenging situations.


In today’s Morning Cup we explore one small piece of this process.  As we begin, ask yourself whether feelings of connection that you experience between you and your child arise naturally, or whether you make an effort to bring them about.  While we may rejoice in the spontaneity of connection, today, we explore the intentional quality we can bring to our connectedness with our children (and others).

 

Mindfulness practice is robust amid challenging situations.  For our purposes, a challenging situation can be one that you perceive as subtle or extreme.  And indeed, we all differ in our perceptions of these challenges.  So, the next challenge that arises may involve anything ranging from your child’s eating, homework, computer use, friends, mood, etc.  The list goes on -- truly.


In many ways feelings of connection arise naturally, and become disrupted when we get entangled in ego -- judgmental about something not going the way we want it to.  At these moments, we lose touch with the present moment as our bodies tense and our minds contract, all in an effort to make things flow the way we want them to.  This can become quite challenging in interpersonal situations as it is often the case that the other person is doing the same thing.  hence, the perennial tug of war we experience with our child -- arising when we least expect it, and often draining us and leading to less than fulfilling exchanges.


Bringing into this conversation “intention,” we recognize the powerful role we can play in catching ourselves as we begin to fall into reactivity.  They key is to catch ourselves early enough in the process to be able to to do something about it in the moment.  Key to this is appreciating how the thoughts, feelings, and actions of our child can pull us into their inner experience.  If we are unaware of this phenomena, then we will find ourselves getting caught in our child’s drama, and then becoming one of its scripted actors, rather than bring able to maintain a sense of presence, to help guide our child through this tricky terrain while remaining stable and grounded ourselves.


 

Wishing you all the best,


Scott Rogers


Founder, The Mindful Parent Community and Website

Author, Mindful Parenting: Meditations, Verses & Visualizations for a More Joyful Life