 Many years ago, American novelist and college professor Toni Morrison was on the Oprah Winfrey Show to launch her book The Bluest Eye. During the conversation, Oprah asked her to talk about the messages we give our children.
Ms. Morrison explained that it’s interesting to watch what happens when a child walks into a room. She asked, “Does your face light up?” She went on to explain, “When my children used to walk in the room when they were little, I looked at them to see if they had buckled their trousers or if their hair was combed or if their socks were up. You think your affection and your deep love is on display because you’re caring for them. It’s not. When they see you, they see the critical face--What’s wrong now? Instead, let your face speak what’s in your heart. When they walk in the room, my face says I’m glad to see them. It’s just as small as that, you see?” Dr. Brené Brown said after many years of research, “I am sure of one thing: Connection is why we’re here; it is what gives purpose and meaning to our lives. . . . Connection is the energy that is created between people when they feel seen, heard and valued; when they can give and receive without judgement.” Intuitively, we already sense what we need in order to feel emotionally fulfilled and happy. We see evidence of it in the unifying theme of most literature, movies, songs, magazines, and even commercial advertisements. More than anything else, what we all need is love, relationship, and connection. Scientific studies have demonstrated that from early childhood, our brains are molded by love and connection. Without it, infants literally die, even though their basic needs are met. Later in life, those lacking connection experience higher rates of heart disease, diabetes, dementia, depression, accidents, addictions, and suicide. In fact, loss of connection is the cause of emotional wounding which can lead to anxiety, self-absorption, and loss of empathy. The lack of feeling connected to others is part of the core human problem resulting in mistrust, lack of empathy for others, conflict and more. As a Safe Conversations workshop facilitator, I help individuals, couples and families communicate and connect. We are all meant to be connecting as couples, families, social institutions, and communities. Connecting is how we find joy, satisfaction and happiness. The good news is that relationship skills can be taught—we can all learn to reconnect with those most important to us! If you would like to create greater connection in your relationships, consider joining the upcoming 7-week series Building Connection in Relationships. Beginning on Monday, June 20, I will be facilitating a small group using the tools of Love, Safe Conversations, Inner Child and more. To learn more: https://www.coachmyrna.org/buildconnection.html. If you are interested to discover what a coaching session involves, learn more here: https://www.coachmyrna.org/coaching.html
Imagine that your brain is a two-story house with an upstairs and downstairs brain. The downstairs brain is considered the more primitive part as it is responsible for basic functions like breathing and blinking your eyes, for reactions and impulses (including fight, flight, or freeze) and strong emotions such as anger or fear. The upstairs brain is more evolved and gives us a greater perspective on life. The upstairs brain, which includes the cerebral cortex and the prefrontal cortex, is our thinking brain. It is where we use our imagination, make plans and good decisions, have self-understanding, develop empathy and morality and gain control over our emotions and our body. And it is constantly learning and developing. Dr. Daniel Siegel, a clinical professor of psychiatry at the UCLA School of Medicine and author of several books, has spent years studying and researching how our brain works. He says that when a child's upstairs brain is functioning properly, they can regulate their emotions, consider the consequence of choices and how others feel as well as thinking before acting. Our brains work best when the upstairs brain and downstairs brain work together and are integrated. Our goal as a parent is to help build and reinforce the stairway that connects the two brains. This takes time, practice, and support. We now know that most people's brains are fully developed until the age of twenty-five. This explains a lot about! Young children, teenagers and even young adults make poor decisions because their upstairs brain is still developing. In addition, the downstairs brain--the amygdala--is always scanning the environment for safety. The amygdala's job is to quickly process and express emotions, especially anger and fear. Teaching our children and youth about how the two parts of the brain work together can help them understand what is happening with them and their emotions. Dr. Siegel has developed something he calls the Hand Model of the Brain. In this YouTube video, he demonstrates how the thumb folded in is the downstairs brain--the amygdala. And when the four fingers are folded over the thumb, the upstairs brain is integrating both parts. But when the downstairs brain reacts, the child is Flipping Their Lid. Learning to recognize when they are starting to get upset can allow the child to move away from a stressful situation, take a break, do some breathing, or go somewhere quick. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gm9CIJ74Oxw A great book to help kids understand how to be handling their emotions is, Some Days I Flip My Lid--Learning to be a Calm, Cool Kid. https://www.amazon.com/Some-Days-Flip-My-Lid/dp/1683732510 All this brain knowledge is good for us adults as well. 
Did you know that having healthy relationships helps us to have a healthy brain? Relationship is essential to our development and helps us learn to connect and regulate our emotions and our brain. To better understand our brain in relationships, let's look at the three important parts of the brain involved:
The diagram above of the Brain in Relationships is one I use during the Safe Conversations workshops that I facilitate. Safe Conversations Connecting is our deepest desire and losing connection is our greatest fear. Learning how to connect and communicate with each other without getting triggered is essential. The fact of the matter is that connection cannot occur when Fight, Flight or Freeze is engaged. Learning how to speak to each other calmly and taking a break when we get too upset are important steps in creating connection. One way to do this for ourselves and to model this to others, especially our children, is learning to recognize when we are getting upset or triggered. Recognizing the clues--body tensing up, butterflies in our stomach, heat rising in our face or head--means I can make a choice before I explode. We might say something like, "I am feeling really upset right now. I need to take a break but can we talk about this later?" Getting up and walking away takes us away from the situation and moving our bodies helps ground us and lessen the tension inside. Breathing is a wonderful way to calm down. Mindful breathing is a great way to calm our heart, body and mind. Basically, it means to breathe with intention. You can do it for yourself as well as with your children or your partner. Consider beginning the day with a moment of mindful breathing or before going to sleep at night as a helpful way to unwind. Make this a ritual with your family. Doing breathing practice helps us to tune into ourselves and practice a skill when we calm that we can use when the situation arises. One tool that I have discovered for myself is using the app Insight Timer. Having it on my phone means I can find a quiet place to restore calmness and connection with myself anytime of the day. A resource for teaching mindful breathing to children is: annakaharris.com/mindfulness-for-children/ Expressing our appreciation to those we love strengthens our relationship. It is one thing to feel grateful for our child, spouse or friend. But when we express it to them, it enhances our connection. It says, "I notice you, you are important to me." If you would want to strengthen your relationships with your spouse, children and friends, I invite you to join my 7-week series, Building Connection in Relationship, beginning on Monday, June 20. Do you want to learn to love more unconditionally and to have more fulfilling relationships? The truth is that this journey begins by learning to love and accept ourselves. Combining tools from Real Love, Safe Conversations, Inner Child and more, I will be facilitating a new small group by zoom that creates a safe, supportive environment for you to discover greater connection, belonging and unconditional love in your relationships. For more info: Build Connection Webinar  Being a parent gives us the chance to re-parent ourselves--we have the opportunity to continue to learn about ourselves in relationship with our child. This relationship can encourage us to deepen our connection with ourselves and with others.
One way this shows up is dealing with them when they are sad, upset or frustration. Suppose your child comes home from school or playing with friends and says that they did not let them play or excluded them from a game. For you as the parent to respond with the understanding and empathy, you will need to connect to them with your right brain. That means stopping what you are doing, being present, getting down to their level and touching or holding them, if they are open. You will also need to connect to the pain within of being rejected or excluded yourself. This gives you the opportunity to remember something from the past, to really understand the pain your child is experiencing. Of course, the focus still needs to be on our child—we need to be careful to not make it about us. We can start with something like, “Being a kid is hard, isn’t it?” If we respond first with our left brain, we want to fix the problem and get them to stop crying. We all know that this is not a wise move and usually will not solve the issue. Think for a minute how that worked out when someone (your spouse, a friend, or a co-worker) tried to give you advice about how to solve a problem that you were having! Once the child has calmed down, then we can move to talking about what to do. In the last ten years, there has been an incredible amount of research and discovery about how the brain works. Dr. Daniel J. Siegel is a neuropsychiatrist and has done years of research on the brain and authored numerous books including The Whole-Brain Child and Parenting from the Inside Out. He says that we can help our kids learn to use both the logical left brain and emotional right brain together. It starts with our modeling it for ourselves and for them. Two tools that he recommends are:
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