The Mindful Parent: Nurturing Resilience in Troubled Times
We are all facing unprecedented changes in the way we live — in work, play, and school, and in our sense of community and connection to others.
As parents, our intention is to both protect our children and prepare them for life’s crises and challenges. While our intentions are good, we sometimes find that change and uncertainty lead to high intensity emotions in the family, preventing us from responding in a skilful way.
In this brief online course on mindful parenting, we explore how we can best foster qualities of self-regulation, compassion, and resilience, both in ourselves and in our children. Drawing on research-based disciplines including evolutionary psychology, positive psychology, developmental psychology, cognitive neuroscience, and mindfulness interventions, we identify practical methods for thriving in this difficult time.
Week One
How We Flourish in Good Times and Bad
•Stress versus eu-stress (flow)
•The mind changes the brain
•Minding the mind: the social imperative
•Minding the body
Healthy Perspectives on Parenting
•Reducing parenting shame
•Identifying sources of parenting stress
•Viewing our struggles through an evolutionary lens
Week Two
The Mindful Parent – Creating Safety and Equanimity
•Attention: centering awareness in the present
•Attitude: kindness, curiosity, willingness to experience
•Intention: Being in skilful relationship with ourselves, others, and whatever life throws our way
•Understanding attachment theory for improving our relationships
Week Three
Nurturing Resilience – the Power of ‘Approach Mode’
•Making space for anxiety and other uncomfortable emotions
•Identifying, managing, and normalizing internal experience
•ACT – accept, center, take constructive action
•Understanding developmental stages and needs
•Educating our kids on the biology and neuroscience of how mindfulness helps
Week Four
Compassion and Effective Communication
•Compassion as the source of resilience, growth, and emotional intelligence
•Approaching problems, conflict, crises, and stress with skilful communication
•Messages that develop self-compassion and self-motivation in children
Discussion and Questions
Your hosts:
Carolyn Rathjen and Pamela Powers, both originally from New England, are colleagues in the Rome therapeutic community. Carolyn has two daughters in elementary school, and Pamela has a son, now 24.
Pamela Powers has thirty years of personal practice in meditation and mindfulness disciplines, and has been training individuals, schools, and organisations in mindfulness for the past fifteen years. Her professional qualifications include BA Psychology, Smith College, MA; THP, NSHAP London; certified MBSR instructor, Centro Italiano Studi di Mindfulness, Rome; certified .B teacher, Mindfulness in Schools Project, UK; and annual insight meditation retreats.
Carolyn Rathjen is a Licensed Independent Clinical Social Worker (LICSW). She provides counseling services to children, adolescents, adults, and families, and collaborates with international schools and universities in Rome. Carolyn received her Master of Social Work at Simmons College Graduate School of Social Work (Boston, MA) and became independently licensed to practice psychotherapy in 2009.
www.carolynrathjen.wordpress.com
