• Practice not Perfect

    It’s great to have goals and to reach for things – but in our culture we often do that from a place of not being “good enough.” Daily we are given the message that we are not thin enough, fit enough, happy enough, rich enough or smart enough with all sorts of media messages about how to get thinner, fitter or happier or how we can buy more things so we can have the experience of “enough.” Is there another way to approach the New Year without slipping into the trap of “not enoughness?” 


  • Tips and Resources for Talking to Children/Students About Awful Things

    What makes events like the shootings in Newtown so terrifying is that is impossible to make sense of them. It is even worse when it seems like it should be preventable. It is hard for all of us. It is harder for children and adults who have been exposed to trauma.


  • Curiosity Questions Start Brains Thinking

    You know how adults sound on those old Charlie Brown cartoons? Wah, wah, wah, wah, waaaaaahhhhh…” Yes, I am guilty as well. We just want to get our kids moving and we want them to just listen and do what we say. Then we feel irritated and challenged when it seems as though they are ignoring us or dragging their feet… Are they feeling respected? No. Are they feeling capable? No. Are they invited to cooperate? More like invited to a power struggle…


  • Ghosts in our Closets

    As we enter the time of year when the days get shorter and nights get longer one of the traditions that many of us share in the United States is Halloween. Ghosts, goblins, witches (and now zombies) are part of the ambience and excitement of the tradition. This is the night when goblins roam the streets, we go out to look for scary things and explore “haunted” places as part of the ritual. We dress up, look fearful things in the eye and make it fun. (Yes, candy is part of the routine too.) The following day we figure out…


  • Bullying and Our Culture

    Adults sometimes use power to change someone’s behavior by humiliating them or scaring them. There is an implicit assumption that the person is not already doing the best they can at the moment, that somehow they don’t care and that fear and shame will be helpful motivators. This is craziness. We know from brain science that when we are threatened our ability to learn new things shuts down. Athletes and talented technology workers are there because they want to be there. They dream of being on the “A” team, and are working hard to improve performance. Is the bullying really…


  • Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep – Or Not

    Falling asleep (and getting enough sleep) would seem to be a normal, simple part of everyday family life—especially for children. But it turns out that it’s not so simple after all. Recent studies tell us that children today are getting an average of one hour less sleep each night than they did 30 years ago. That may not sound like much, but it turns out that that lost hour is having quite an impact.


  • Parents: Trapped by Our Fears

    The real question for all of us is: What invites us to respond in drastic ways to our childrens’ misbehavior and mistakes? My hunch is that is fear. Many of the parents I work with are afraid when their children lie, steal, are mean to their siblings, swear, wear sexually provocative clothing, investigate pornography online, start cutting, text or sext at all hours of day or night, smoke pot…etc.


  • What is your Request?

    When I first started teaching parenting classes, I had a couple who came up with the idea of asking their daughters, “What is your request?” They were parents of preschoolers and I’m sure their days were filled with hearing what their children didn’t want to do, or didn’t want to eat. It was such a simple solution and once again, I, as the parent educator, got to learn something from the parents in my class. I brought this new parenting tool home with me and found that it was a wonderful way to communicate with my two children.


  • Peaceful Parenting in a Fast-Paced World

    Peace is a community affair. Sure we can create a semblance of peace by building big walls around ourselves– blocking the wind from our little corners of the lake, but it isn’t real peace. Peace is about the agreements we make with each other, about how we fasten ourselves together and become whole. It is about how we learn to live with each other so that we can appreciate the moments of being in between the moments of doing. Is there some internal work that helps this process? Yes. And as parents we need to teach our children skills to…


  • What Kind of Bystander are You?

    Imagine that your daughter and her friends are sitting hanging out in the family room – talking and texting and you hear, “Oh that is so gay!” Do you feel uncomfortable but remain silent because you don’t want to embarrass your daughter? Do you wait and talk about it in private afterwards? What do you do when you hear Uncle Alfred make a derogatory comment about women or children or people of a different race or sexual orientation? Do you just say to yourself or your children, “That’s Alfred, he is a little off color?” What do you think that…