THE greatest gift EVER

I received the greatest gift ever yesterday for Mother's Day from my children. It surpassed anything that could be found on my amazon wish list. 

If you are ever stuck for a gift idea I highly recommend you give this to your loved ones. 

The gift is time.

I don't know whether it's getting older or having a well established mindfulness practice but I appreciate every second of life in a way that I never used to. It is cliched to say "life is short, make the most of it", but developing a chronic health condition in my 30's really bought this home to me. Things that I used to take for granted I now look upon with awe and wonder.

Human beings are amazingly resilient as we navigate our way though our wonderfully unpredictable lives. It is phenomenal what we can achieve with positive thinking and gratitude.

I hope I have instilled in my children to cherish life and to never put off the things they want to do for a later date. Seeing their mum become a wheelchair user bought it home to them there is not always a later.

Happiness is a choice, and one I consciously choose every day. We had much laughter yesterday and created some special memories. Now you can't gift wrap that.

I share the poem below from J.R.R. Tolkien. Time, make the most of it, when it's gone you can never get it back.

“I sit beside the fire and think

Of all that I have seen

Of meadow flowers and butterflies

In summers that have been

Of yellow leaves and gossamer
In autumns that there were
With morning mist and silver sun
And wind upon my hair

I sit beside the fire and think
Of how the world will be
When winter comes without a spring 
That I shall ever see

For still there are so many things
That I have never seen
In every wood in every spring
There is a different green

I sit beside the fire and think
Of people long ago
And people that will see a world
That I shall never know

But all the while I sit and think
Of times there were before
I listen for returning feet 
And voices at the door.” 

Philosophy on the farm

"Beautiful paths cannot be discovered without getting lost".

The teachers at my youngest son's school were on strike today so we made the most of our unexpected day together with a trip to the farm.

There was a maze which my son dashed into joyfully without any hesitation. By the time I had reached the entrance I could see his hands triumphantly waving at me above the hedges from the middle.

When he made his way back to me I asked him if he had been scared on his own not knowing the way. "Of course not" he explained, "I knew that even if I took the wrong path I would still end up where I was meant to be".

Simple.

In life we can sometimes get too caught up in where we think we should be heading and how we think we should get there. Then, if we don't get to where we wanted to be we can feel regretful and look back wondering what we could have done differently. This can be a great source of sadness.

There are no wrong paths. Opportunities are always present, even if they are not the ones we are looking for, and we can sometimes be so focused on what we think we want we don't see them.

The next time I feel I have gone astray I will remember today and the trust of a young child that he would end up where he needed to be, after all beautiful paths cannot be discovered without getting lost. 

Positive parenting through language

For the past few weeks my 6 year old son has been having trouble getting to, and staying, asleep.  It is rare I sleep all the way through the night with my pain levels, so consequently this last month has passed in a blur of exhaustion.

Despite gently probing Finley the only explanation I have managed to secure is “Mummy I have worries that stop me sleeping, not big ones, just normal worries”.  I cannot dismiss any concerns at age 6 as being unimportant, I knew he had been worried about sports day but that had now passed and I feared getting up in the night had become a habit.

Last night at bed time I produced with flourish a bag of Gatamalan worry dolls.  I explained to Finley that these dolls were the answer to his sleeping problem and once they were under his pillow they would take all his worries away from him and he would sleep through the night.  After going through the bag and naming them all he promptly fell asleep for ten hours!

The language we use is critical.  The subconscious mind has difficulty processing negatives and they cause us distress and fear.  Consequently, had I said to Finley “These dolls will help because you can’t sleep” he would have picked out the wordscan’t and sleep which would have reinforced the belief he had formed that he no longer slept through the night.  Using the sentence “The dolls will take your worries away and you will sleep through the night” he subconsciously picked out will take worries away will sleep.  Clever old English language eh?

It is during our formative years that we develop many of our negative beliefs which many of us carry into adulthood;  I can’t, I’m not good enough, It’s too hard ….  Inadvertently we pick up these ideas from the language of our primary care-givers, parents, teachers, child minders etc. and the more we hear them the more we believe the words to be true.

If you begin using words affirmative in nature they will integrate naturally into your vocabulary.  If we can use language to eradicate limiting beliefs in a child’s head we can help them lead more empowering lives which will impact into adulthood.  Awesome how powerful words can be isn’t it, and such a simple thing to practice.

So next time your child asks you for something they can’t do, i.e. I want to go skating.  Keep the reply positive.  Rather than “you don’t know how to skate” you could try, yes “you can learn how to skate”.  Keep commands simple, replace “don’t run” with "walk" (the brain will respond to run).  Start to notice how differently your children respond to you and how much easier it is to parent.

In the wise words of Mahatma Ghandhi: -
Keep your thoughts positive, because your thoughts become your words.
Keep your words positive, because your words become your behaviour.
Keep your behaviour positive, because your behaviour becomes your habits.
Keep your habits positive, because your habits become your values.
Keep your values positive, because your values become your destiny.
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Spreading the love, 

Louise xx