Hello everyone and welcome back to the Postcard.
Today we're diving into the heart of mindful parenting and we are exploring how one simple yet profound technique can completely transform your family dynamic.
We talk about mindful parenting as an attitude and an approach,
A way we choose to truly present with our children.
It's not rigid or set of rules,
It's an invitation to bring mindfulness to ourselves and to our kids and more of that to our connection.
The core of this approach is the ability to stay in the present moment,
Spot our automatic reflection and hit that pause button before we respond.
But how do you actually do that?
What's the practical tool that helps to forge this deep connection?
Today we're focusing on one crucial technique,
Emotional reflection or validation.
Emotional reflection is often called validation or mirroring and this is our way to hold up verbal mirroring to our child.
It is our ability to see,
Identify and name what the child is expressing or feeling without judging,
Dismissing or trying to fix the emotion.
Our children,
Especially the young ones,
Don't always have the words to describe their feelings.
They express it through behavior,
Tantrum,
Crying,
Throwing things or withdrawing.
So what this reflection is?
Reflection is recognition and it doesn't come in state of boundaries or show what good or bad is.
For example,
Instead of saying stop crying,
Stop,
It's not a big deal.
You can throw that,
Which is an automatic reaction that basically invalidates the child's experience.
We can say,
I can see you're very frustrated now,
Right?
Because the tower you built fell down.
It's really upsetting when you put so much effort and something doesn't work out.
Notice we haven't changed the fact that the tower fell and we haven't given up on setting limits in the behavior,
Which is out of line,
But first we met the emotion.
And this simple tool has three major benefits.
The first one is building emotional regulation.
When we reflect the emotion back to the child,
We are mediating their inner world to them.
We're telling them there is a feeling in your heart called anger and it is valid.
We ask the child to internalize this emotional language and learn to self-regulate over time.
They learn that the connection between feelings and the world.
The second benefit is strengthening connection and trust.
When a child feels that we truly see them and understand the depth of their pain or joy,
Deep trust is created.
They feel they are not alone in their storm.
This is a fundamental experience that builds their basic security in the world and in the relationship.
The third benefit is separating emotion from behavior.
Reflection helps both us and the child differences between the emotion,
Which is always okay,
And the behavior,
Which sometimes needs limits.
You are allowed to be very angry and you are not allowed to throw your toys,
But separating them,
The child accepts,
Understands the expected behavior.
How do we practice reflection?
Well,
That's easy.
Not so much,
But let's see what you think.
It requires self-awareness from us,
The parents,
And link to mindful parenting.
First stop,
Stop,
And breathe.
Before reacting,
Automatically pause.
Feel where the child's frustration meets your own.
Curious listening.
Observe your child.
Pay attention to the body language,
To their tone.
Try to guess what emotion is driving them.
Anger,
Sadness,
Jealousy,
Disappointment,
Joy.
Clean reflection.
Use simple words and a calm tone.
It sounds like you're really scared right now.
I got it.
You're jealous that your sister got the first.
Emotional reflection is one of the most powerful tools we have to move from reaction parenting to mindful parenting.
It doesn't make the difficult disappear,
But it makes the shared journey much more respectful,
Secure,
And connected.
Thank you for joining me and see you next episode.
Bye.
