Your Parenting Mojo - Respectful, research-based parenting ideas to help kids thrive

I hear from a lot of parents who are worried about their children’s learning. They tell me things like:“I want to encourage my child’s learning and creativity and confidence as a learner without solely focusing on literacy and numeracy.”   “We’ve been in lockdown here in Melbourne for a very long time, with my older kids learning remotely, and I feel that a lot of the tasks they are given by their school are a bit … uninspiring. It’s so cool when there is something that really engages them and I’m trying to find more things like that.”   “I am wary about the school system squashing the natural instinct to learn, as I feel it did with me. But I'm hoping we can provide the attitude and environment at home to mitigate this.”   “What we have read about traditional schooling is a bit disheartening but something we have to embrace for now. So it is important that with the time we have outside of school we do the best we can to encourage his spark for exploration and learning.”   “My children are already in school. Even though they (and I) are happy with their school and learning so far, I would love to learn how I can support them better and help them being more motivated and stay curious. The challenges of distant-learning that we experienced during the lockdowns have highlighted that I find it difficult to be a good teacher for them and I would like to change that.”   If you could have said (or have already said!) one or more of these things yourself, then I want to introduce you to Madeline.She describes all three of her children as ‘spirited’ (you can kind of see it in their eyes, right?!)   When I first met her, she wanted to know that she was doing everything she could to support their intrinsic love of learning in the preschool years - and she wasn’t sure whether or not they would go to school. In this episode we discuss some of the Learning Explorations she’s done with them, how she became confident that she really was meeting each child’s learning needs, and what decision she ultimately made about school!   Ready to Support Your Child's Natural Learning Whether this episode has you considering unschooling, reinforced your commitment to traditional schooling, or left you somewhere in between, one thing is clear: every child deserves to have their natural curiosity and love of learning nurtured.   The challenge for parents isn't choosing the "right" educational path, but knowing how to support meaningful learning wherever your child is.   The Learning Membership gives you the tools to nurture your child's development whether they're in traditional school, homeschooled, or unschooled.   Inside the membership, you'll find research-backed strategies that work alongside any educational setting, helping you become the parent who nurtures learning rather than forcing it.   Your child's curiosity is precious - don't let it get lost in debates about educational methods.   Click the banner to learn more.     Jump to highlights 00:02 Introduction to the episode 05:08 Kids’ creativity encouraged through Kid Kitchen Creations 06:38 What Madeline values as a parent: Autonomy and skills 08:23 How being a perfectionist affected Madeline’s parenting 12:30 Finding balance between allowing her child to make mistakes and providing guidance 14:19 The effectiveness of workbooks in supporting children’s love of learning 16:26 Madeline discusses her middle child’s interests and learning style 18:47 Madeline discusses how joining the joining the Supporting Your Child’s Learning Membership supported her 23:04 Madeline shares a specific example of how she applied the learning framework she gained from joining the membership 27:59 Madeline reflects on the importance of keeping the balance between her children’s learning and their emotional, social and psychological wellbeing 29:40 Madeline shares the importance of documenting her children’s learning 38:08 Madeline shares how being a member of both Parenting Membership and Supporting Your Child’s Learning Membership supported her 42:05 Madeline’s advice for parents

Is your child gifted?   Do you wonder if they're gifted but aren't quite sure?   Do you want to know how to support your gifted child's learning in a way that doesn't pressure them or make them resist working with you?   If so, this episode will help.   I have to say, I wasn't sure where this one was going to end up. I was really uneasy about the concept of giftedness from the outset, perhaps because the way I had previously come into contact with it was through our conversation with Dr. Allison Roda, from whom we learned how some parents manipulate the Gifted & Talented program in New York City to perpetuate segregated education.   But even so, I tried to go into the research with an open mind. What if it's just the G&T programs as they're set up in New York City that are the problem, not the entire concept of giftedness itself?   The good news is that there's a good deal of evidence on what kinds of programs benefit gifted children. And in this episode I end up arguing that we shouldn't just put gifted children in them, but that all children would benefit from learning using these methods.   Ready to transform how you support your child's curiosity? While we're all trying to figure out what's really behind rising teen anxiety and whether phones are the problem, there's something we can do right now that helps nurture our children's natural curiosity and intrinsic motivation to learn.   The You Are Your Child's Best Teacher masterclass shows you how to do exactly that without adding pressure or creating elaborate activities that exhaust you.   When children feel competent and engaged in learning that matters to them, they develop resilience that serves them well, whether they're facing social media pressures, academic stress, or the general challenges of growing up in today's world.   Click the banner to learn more!     Learning Membership Do you want to turn your child’s interests into learning opportunities? The Learning Membership is here to help you. Make learning a fun adventure that not only strengthens your bond, but also nurtures your child’s intrinsic love of learning—an essential foundation for success in an AI-driven world.   Get tools and strategies to support your child’s love of learning and future-proof their success in navigating whatever comes their way. No special skills needed—just a willingness to explore alongside them.   Click the banner to learn more!     References Adair, J.K., Colegrove, K. S-S., & McManus, M.E. (2017). How the word gap argument negatively impacts young children of Latinx immigrants’ conceptualizations of learning. Harvard Educational Review 87(3), 309-334. Aiegler, A., Balestrini, D.P., & Stoeger, H. (2018). An international view on gifted education: incorporating the macro-systemic perspective. In Pfeiffer, S.I. (Ed.), Handbook of giftedness in children: Psychoeducational theory, research, and best practices (p.15-28). Cham, Switizerland. Begay, H. & Maker, CJ. (2007). When geniuses fail: Na8Dene’ (Navajo) conception of giftedness in the eyes of the holy deities. In S.N. Phillipson & M. McCann (Eds.), Conceptions of giftedness. Sociocultural perspectives (pp. 1278168). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. Berry, K. S. (2004). Multiple intelligences are not what they seem to be. In J. L. Kincheloe (Ed.), Multiple intelligences reconsidered. (pp. 236-250). New York, NY: Peter Lang. Carrillo, J.F. (2013). I always knew I was gifted: Latino males and the Mestiz@ Theory of Intelligences (MTI). Berkeley Review of Education 4(1), 69-95. Chandler, P. (2011). Prodigy or problem child? Challenges with identifying Aboriginal giftedness. In Vialle, W. (Ed.), Giftedness from an Indigenous perspective (p.1-9). Australian Association for the Education of the Gifted and Talented Ltd. Retrieved from https://ro.uow.edu.au/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1016&context=uowbooks Christie, M. (n.d.). Some Aboriginal perspectives on gifted and talented children and their schooling. Charles Darwin University. Retrieved from https://www.cdu.edu.au/centres/yaci/docs/Aboriginal-Perspectives-On-Gifted-Children%20190910.pdf Ford, D. Y., Orantham T. C. & Whiting, G. W. (2008). Culturally and linguistically diverse students in gifted education: Recruitment and retention issues. Exceptional Children, 74, 3, 289Q306. Jiuliani, A.J. (2013, June 25). Why “20% time” is good for schools. Edutopia. Retrieved from https://www.edutopia.org/blog/20-percent-time-a-j-juliani Kanevsky, L., & Keighley, T. (2003). To produce or not to produce? Understanding boredom and the honor in underachievement. Roeper Review, 26, 20–28. Mayes, R.D., & Moore III, J.L. (2016). The intersection of race, disability, and giftedness: Understanding the education needs of twice-exceptional African American students. Gifted Child Today 39(2), 98-104. Miller, E.M., & Cohen, L.M. (2012). Engendering talent in

We don’t just think with our brains.   What?!   How can that possibly be true?   I struggled to understand it if myself for quite a while, until I read the fabulous English philosopher Andy Clark’s description of what happens when someone writes, which essentially involves ideas flowing down the arm and hand, through the pen and ink, across the paper, up to your eyes, and back to your brain.   The ideas don’t literally flow, of course, but the process of writing alters the process of thinking - which is why research has shown that processing traumatic memories through journaling about them is more useful just thinking about them - the act of writing about them changes our interpretation of them in a way that just thinking about them doesn’t.   The challenge with school-based learning, of course, is that it’s primarily concerned with the brain. Our task is to remember facts and ideas so we can recount them when asked about them at a later time. Children who fidget are told to sit still, when the research that Annie Murphy Paul cites in her new book The Extended Mind indicates that this instruction is entirely misplaced - fidgeting can be a way of managing excess energy, and movement can actually help us to remember things more effectively than we otherwise would.   In this episode we learn many of the different ways that we our brains interact with the outside world to learn in ways that we might never have considered up to now.   Ready to transform how you support your child's curiosity? While we're all trying to figure out what's really behind rising teen anxiety and whether phones are the problem, there's something we can do right now that helps nurture our children's natural curiosity and intrinsic motivation to learn.   The You Are Your Child's Best Teacher masterclass shows you how to do exactly that without adding pressure or creating elaborate activities that exhaust you.   When children feel competent and engaged in learning that matters to them, they develop resilience that serves them well, whether they're facing social media pressures, academic stress, or the general challenges of growing up in today's world.   Click the banner to learn more!     Learning Membership Do you want to turn your child’s interests into learning opportunities? The Learning Membership is here to help you. Make learning a fun adventure that not only strengthens your bond, but also nurtures your child’s intrinsic love of learning—an essential foundation for success in an AI-driven world.   Get tools and strategies to support your child’s love of learning and future-proof their success in navigating whatever comes their way. No special skills needed—just a willingness to explore alongside them.   Click the banner to learn more!     Annie Murphy Paul's Book The Extended Mind: The Power of Thinking Outside the Brain (Affiliate link).   Jump to highlights 01:00 Looking at the idea that our mind isn't actually only located inside of our brains 01:46 An open invitation to join the free You Are Your Child’s Best Teacher Workshop 05:30 Learning does not just happen within the brain, but with things and people that are outside of it 06:44 The metaphor of how our brains are like magpies nest: we draw raw material available to us as resources for our thinking process just like how magpies incorporate materials available in their environment when building their nests 09:22 The movements and gestures of our bodies, the internal sensations of our bodies are part of the thinking process 10:34 Interoceptive sensitivity 13:07 The gut feeling is your body tugging at your sleeve saying that you’ve encountered this situation before and this is how you should respond 14:53 Moving the body is a way to stimulate mental processes in specific ways and you can use different kinds of movements to produce different kinds of thoughts 16:53 Recess - the great invention that allows students to move and break the monotony of sitting down all day in school 17:49 Fidgeting is a very subtle way to calibrate our arousal level so that we're in this optimal state of alertness 19:00 We're creatures who are good at moving our bodies and navigating through space and interacting with other people 20:23 We rely on our surroundings to shape our sense of ourselves 26:48 We can interact with our environment in a way that supports our learning 28:33 What are some ways that we can support children in using the space around them in their learning 31:49 Journaling and sketching as a tool to process learning deeper 36:47 Thinking with relationships; encouraging children to learn from and with other people 45:25 Allowing your children to genuinely work together so that parents don’t need to support their learning individually 46:29 We tend to think of learning as when a person sits down at a desk but in fact there are all these cognitive processes that get activated in social interactions 4

Do you worry that your child isn't eating enough...or is eating too much? Do you wish they would eat a more balanced diet...but don't want to be the Vegetable Police? Do you find yourself in constant negotiations over your child's favorite snacks? You're not alone! Join me for a conversation with Ellyn Satter MS, MSSW, author of many books including Child of Mine: Feeding With Love and Good Sense. Ms. Satter developed the approach to feeding children that's known as Division of Responsibility, which means that the parent is responsible for the what, when, and where of eating, and the child is responsible for whether and how much. It all sounds pretty simple, but when you're actually navigating eating with your child it can seem a whole lot more complicated: Should we worry about our child's eating in the long term if they won't eat vegetables now? Should we restrict access to children's food? What should we do about picky eating? Ms. Satter helps us to understand her ideas on these important questions and much more. In the conversation we discussed some questions that you can answer to identify whether you are what Ms. Satter defines as Eating Competent: Do you agree or disagree with these statements? I enjoy food and I am comfortable with my enjoyment of food and I take an interest in unfamiliar food. I eat as much as I am hungry for. I plan for feeding myself. Agreeing with these statements indicates you are likely Eating Competent. Disagreeing means you are missing out on eating as one of life’s great pleasures and putting up with a lot of unnecessary misery. Do you have to be miserable to eat well and be healthy? Not at all. People who are Eating Competent eat better and are healthier: they weigh less, have better medical tests, and function better, emotionally and socially.   Ellyn Satter's Books: Child of Mine: Feeding with Love and Good Sense Secrets of Feeding a Healthy Family: How to Eat, How to Raise Good Eaters, How to Cook How to Get Your Kid to Eat: But Not Too Much (Affiliate links).   References Chang, S. (2019, December 4). Back to basics: All about MyPlate food groups. U.S. Department of Agriculture. Retrieved from https://www.usda.gov/media/blog/2017/09/26/back-basics-all-about-myplate-food-groups Cooke, L.J., Wardle, J., Gibson, E.L., Sapochnik, M., Sheiham, A., & Lawson, M. (2003). Demographic, familial and trait predictors of fruit and vegetable consumption by pre-school children. Public Health Nutrition 7(2), 295-302. Curtin, S.C. (2019). Trends in cancer and heart disease death rates among adults aged 45-64: United States 1999-2017. National Vital Statistics Reports 68(5), 1-9. Retrieved from https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr68/nvsr68_05-508.pdf Fayet-Moore, F., McConnell, A., Cassettari, T., Tuck, K., Petocz, P., & Kim, J. (2019). Vegetable intake in Australian children and adolescents: The importance of consumption frequency, eating occasion and its association with dietary and sociodemographic factors. Public Health Nutrition 23(3), 474-487. Fryar, C.D., Carroll, M.D., & Attful, J. (2020). Prevalence of overweight, obesity, and severe obesity among adults aged 20 and over: United States, 1960-1962 through 2017-2018. National Center for Health Statistics https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/hestat/obesity-adult-17-18/overweight-obesity-adults-H.pdf Jones, B.L. (2018). Making time for family meals: Parental influences, home eating environments, barriers and protective factors. Physiology & Behavior 193, 248-251. Larson, N., & Story, M. (2013). A review of snacking patterns among children and adolescents: What are the implications of snacking for weight status? Childhood obesity 9(2), 104-115. Satter, E. (2007). Hierarchy of food needs. Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior 39(5), S187-S188. Satter, E. (2007). Eating competence: Definition and evidence for the Satter Eating Competence Model. Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior 39(5), S142-S153. Satter, E.M. (1986). The feeding relationship. Journal of the American Dietetic Association 86, 352-356.

When you’re learning a new skill, information is critical. Without that, it’s very difficult to make any kind of meaningful change.   But I see a parallel between learning new skills and respectful parenting: I like to say that love between parent and child is necessary but not sufficient - and that respect is the missing ingredient. With learning a new skill, knowledge is necessary - but not sufficient.   And support is the missing ingredient.   You might remember from our conversation with Dr. Chris Niebauer a while ago that our overactive left brains tend to make up stories about our experiences to integrate these experiences into the narratives we tell about ourselves.   If we’re “the kind of person who triumphs through adversity,” a setback will be taken in stride. If we’re “the kind of person who has been hurt,” each new individual hurt makes much more of a mark. The new experiences have to be made to fit with the framework that’s already in place.   Especially when you’re learning a skill related to difficult experiences you’ve had, your left brain wants to keep itself safe. It might tell you: “I don’t need to do this. Things aren’t that bad. I’ll just wait until later / tomorrow / next week.”   And when that happens, you need support. That support can be from a great friend, although sometimes you don’t want even your closest friends to know that you shout at or smack your child.   Therapy can be really helpful - but it’s also really expensive.   Sometimes the thing that’s most helpful is someone who’s learning the tools alongside you (so they aren’t trying to look back and remember what it was like to be in your situation; theirs is different, but they are struggling too…) who isn’t a regular presence in your life.   There’s no danger you’re going to run into them at the supermarket, or a kid’s birthday party.   You can actually be really honest with them and know it won’t come and bite you in the butt.   That’s what today’s guests, Marci and Elizabeth, discovered when they started working together. Separated by cultural differences, fourteen(!) time zones, and very different lives, they found common ground in their struggles and have developed a deep and lasting friendship.   If you’d like to work on taming your triggered feelings - and get help from your own Accountabuddy in the process - the Taming Your Triggers workshop is for you.   Click the banner to learn more!  

How does trauma affect us?   Yes, we feel it in our brains - we get scared, frustrated, and angry - often for reasons we don’t fully understand.   But even if our brains have managed to cover up the trauma; to paper a veneer over it so everything seems fine, that doesn’t mean everything actually is fine - because as our guest in this episode, Dr. Bessel van der Kolk says: The Body Keeps The Score.   What he means is that the effects of the trauma you’ve experienced don’t just go away, and can’t just be papered over. Your body will still hold the evidence in tension, headaches, irritability (of minds and bowels), insomnia...and all of this may come out when your child does something you wish they wouldn’t.   Perhaps it’s something your parent always used to resent doing, and made it super clear to you every time they did it for you.   Perhaps it was something you did as a child and were punished for doing (maybe you were even hit for it...your body is literally remembering this trauma when your child reproduces the behavior).   Lack of manners, talking back, making a mess, not doing as you were told, being silly...even if logically you now know that these are relatively small things, when your child does them it brings back your body’s memories of what happened to you.   Dr. van der Kolk helps us to understand more about how this shows up for us. Sometimes understanding can be really helpful. But sometimes you also need new tools, and support as you learn them, and accountability.   If you’re struggling with your reactions to your child’s difficult behavior - whether you’re going into fight, flight, freeze, or fawn mode, the Taming Your Triggers wokrshop can help.   Click the banner to learn more!     Dr. Van der Kolk's Book: The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma (Affiliate link).   Jump to highlights: 01:00 Introducing Dr. van der Kolk 01:58 Invitation to the Taming Your Triggers Workshop 02:56 A note on some technical difficulties we had while recording this episode 03:14 People often want easy answers: Talking about why we feel like we need pills and alcohol to deal with trauma and not make use of other methods which seem more beneficial 08:16 "We become who we are based on the experiences we had and these early experiences really set your expectations" 11:53 Dr. van der Kolk’s ongoing research on touch and trauma that looks into the virtually unstudied field of touch 14:42 To effectively deal with trauma, people need to discover who they are and find the words for their internal experiences 16:10 On mindfulness and yoga: the physical focus on movement in yoga may open up some space for mindfulness 20:45 Rolfing : opening up the body so that it is released from the configuration it adopted to deal with trauma 23:07 The importance of words and finding somebody who can helps you to find words as cautiously as they can, without inflicting too much of their own value system on you 25:31 Dr. van der Kolk’s current agenda for kids to be taught to have a language for their internal experience 28:27 Two of the most important scientifically proven predictors of adult function 31:26 Dr. van der Kolk talks about Developmental Trauma Disorder 38:31 The power of peer and community support in healing trauma 41:32 Wrapping up   Links: The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of TraumaMy Grandmother's Hands: Racialized Trauma and the Pathway to Mending Our Hearts and BodiesNo Self, No Problem: How Neuropsychology Is Catching Up to BuddhismTaming Your Triggers Workshop   References D’Andrea, W., Ford, J., Stolbach, B., Spinazzola, J., & van der Kolk, B. (2012). Understanding interperonsal trauma in children: Why we need a developmentally appropriate trauma diagnosis. American Journal of Orthopsyhchiatry 82(2), 187-200. Goessl, V.C., Curtiss, J.E., & Hofman, S.G. (2017). The effect of heart rate variability biofeedback training on stress and anxiety: A meta-analysis. Psychological Medicine 47, 2578-2586. Haines, S.K. (2019).The politics of trauma: Somatics, healing, and social justice. Berkeley: North Atlantic. Menachem, R. (2017). My grandmother’s hand: Racialized trauma and the pathway to mending our hearts and bodies. Las Vegas: Central Recovery Press. Miller, A. (2006). The body never lies: The lingering effects of hurtful parenting. New York: Norton. National Institute for the Clinical Application of Behavioral Medicine (n.d.). Frontiers in the treatment of trauma: how to target treatment to help patients reclaim their lives after trauma. The Main Session with Bessel van der Kolk, MD and Ruth Buczynski, PhD. NICABM. Tippet, K. (2019, December 26). Bessel van der Kolk: How trauma lodges in the body. On Being. Retrieved from: https://onbeing.org/programs/bessel-van-der-kolk-how-trauma-lodges-in-the-body/ van der Kolk, B. (2017). Developmental trauma disorder: Toward a rational diagnosis

When we're having a hard time interacting with our family members, it's pretty common for our first reaction to be: "I need this person (or these people!) to change their behavior" - especially when this person (or these people!) are children. After all, we've been around for longer and we know what we're doing and we were fine before our children started misbehaving, right?   My guest today, parent-of-three Chrystal, had encountered this mentality not just about her children, but also about her husband. In fact, when she went to couple's therapy with her husband it was with a sense of relief: "Finally, I'm going to find out what's wrong with him, because there's nothing wrong with me!"   She always figured: "If that person didn't act like that then I wouldn't need to react the way I'm reacting...and I legitimately thought that everyone else was responsible for my behavior."   Then she realized that her husband wasn't responsible for how she was feeling...she was.   Now she was ready to make the same leap related to her relationship with her spirited children, but needed new tools. They would melt down over every tiny issue (not enough honey on the oatmeal! Now not enough cream! I don't WANT to get dressed!), and Chrystal found herself constantly scrambling to placate them.   Join us for a conversation about the new ideas she's learned, and how her children now don't cooperate blindly because she's forcing them, but express their agency while finding ways to collaborate that also meet their needs. They have real agency in her family (they know she'll hear them and respect their ideas) and because of this, the little issues that used to provoke regular meltdowns are easily solved. And Chrystal is learning how to set boundaries so she doesn't get walked all over - by her children, or by other members of her family.   Want to make a similar shift in your own interactions with your children? The Taming Your Triggers workshop will help.   Click the banner to learn more!   Jump to highlights: 01:00 Inviting listeners to join the Taming Your Triggers workshop 04:43 A little bit about Chrystal 11:06 Chrystal’s journey as a parent 13:58 How Chrystal found it difficult to build lasting relationships with parents who were raising their children the same way they were raised and how she found her people in the Taming Your Triggers community. 16:32 The fight, flight, freeze, and fawn responses and how Chrystal resonated to the fawn response. 18:22 The first time Chrystal was able to connect what she’s feeling in her body with her belief systems 20:36 As the eldest of eight children, Chrystal felt that it was her responsibility to make sure everyone is happy when her mother couldn’t cope due to severe postnatal depression, and this has continued on with her character now that they’ve grown up 24:51 When Chrystal decided to set boundaries and have it respected, she found out that her family’s issues can resolve themselves without her getting involved 28:14 The profound shift with for Chrystal in terms of what changed in her family after going through the Taming Your Triggers workshop is that she is now able to see situations as more than a win-lose situation 32:20 With two strong-willed daughters and a son who is also energetic, breakfast has been a challenge in Chrystal’s home. She’s learned to apply problem solving to find solutions, but the biggest revelation for her has been that it is okay for her children to have these big feelings 38:15 Chrystal explores the question, “Why should our children listen to us?” as she discovers extrinsic and intrinsic motivation 38:55 A beautiful moment when Chrystal was having a hard time getting her daughter ready for school, and another instance when she was having some friend over their house 47:08 Having the tools is great but it is just better to have a framework to implement it and really being intentional 51:20 Wrapping up with a sense of compassion.   Resources mentioned in this episode: Taming Your Triggers workshopUpbringingwith Hannah & KeltyNonviolent Communication Podcast EpisodeThe Whole-Brain Child: 12 Revolutionary Strategies to Nurture Your Child's Developing Mind, by Daniel Siegel

This episode kicks off a series on the intersection of parenting and food. We begin today with a conversation with Dr. Lindo Bacon, where we bust a LOT of myths about the obesity epidemic that is said to be plaguing people in the United States and other countries that follow a similar diet.   The messaging we get from government entities seems pretty simple: being fat is bad for you. It causes increased risk for a host of diseases as well as early death. If you're fat, you should lose weight because then your risk of getting these diseases and dying early will be reduced.   But what if this wasn't true?   What if this messaging had been established by people who own companies that manufacture weight loss products who sit on panels that advise international governmental entities like the World Health Organization?   What if body fat was actually protective for your health?   We dig into all these questions and more in this provocative interview.   We'll continue this series with episodes looking specifically at sugar, as well as supporting parents who have or continue to struggle with disordered eating, and how to support children in developing eating habits that will serve them for a lifetime, not just get the vegetables into them today.   Jump to highlights: (01:00) Introducing Dr. Lindo Bacon and starting our series of episodes on the intersection of parenting and food (02:22) Stripping the word ‘fat’ of it’s pejorative meaning and reclaiming the term while acknowledging that it may be jarring for some people (03:09) Kicking off the conversation with how we measure health using BMI and how it might not be accurate (05:03) The resistance to Katherine Flegal’s seminal research in weight and longevity (05:49) The development of the Body Mass Index was with scientific bias to fit the bell curve (07:30) Higher body weight does not necessarily mean a person has greater risk of poor health (10:59) We actually know that the research is highly exaggerated in terms on the role that it plays on health (13:16) Dr. Bacon’s turning point: When they found out that BMI recommendations were created by an organization funded by pharmaceutical companies who produce weight loss drugs and products (17:35) Taking the issue one step further with the American Medical Association’s recommendation whether to categorize obesity as a disease or not (19:19) The Obesity Paradox is an observation in the research that people who are obese who get the same diseases as those with ‘normal’ weight are living longer (21:15) The concept of dieting just doesn’t work according to the data (30:33) A story of Dr. Bacon’s and their father’s knee problems (34:40) Individual factors only accounts to 25% to somebody’s total health outcomes and social determinants account to about 60% (42:05) It is cool right now to be your authentic self but not everyone can so easily be their authentic self when their authentic selves are not valued by society at large (45:48) Improving the health of individuals is more communal than individual   Resource Links: Health at Every Size, by Lindo Bacon Body Respect: What Conventional Health Books Get Wrong, Leave Out, and Just Plain Fail to Understand about Weight, by Lindo Bacon and Lucy Aphramor Radical Belonging: How to Survive and Thrive in an Unjust World (While Transforming it for the Better), by Lindo Bacon Association For Size Diversity and Health   [accordion] [accordion-item title="Click here to read the full transcript"] Jen Lumanlan 00:02 Hi, I'm Jen and I host the Your Parenting Mojo Podcast. We all want her children to lead fulfilling lives, but it can be so hard to keep up with the latest scientific research on child development and figure out whether and how to incorporate it into our own approach to parenting. Here at Your Parenting Mojo, I do the work for you by critically examining strategies and tools related to parenting and child development that are grounded in scientific research and principles of respectful parenting.   Jen Lumanlan 00:29 If you'd like to be notified when new episodes are released, and get a free guide called 13 Reasons Why Your Child Won't Listen To You and What to Do About Each One, just head over to YourParentingMojo.com/SUBSCRIBE. You can also continue the conversation about the show with other listeners in the Your Parenting Mojo Facebook group. I do hope you'll join us.   Jen Lumanlan 01:00 Hello, and welcome to the Your Parenting Mojo Podcast. I'm very excited about our episode today because we're at the very beginning of what I hope is going to be quite an extended series of episodes at the intersection of parenting and food. And I'm hoping to look at ideas like eating disorders and intuitive eating and how sugar impacts our children and what we should do about that, if anything, how we should approach eating issues with our children more broadly and how we can all be a little bit happier in our bodies. And today we'

Many of us haven't been in each other's homes for a while now, but pretty soon we'll be getting together inside again. And our children will be heading inside, in their friends' houses.   People store guns inside.   Are you certain that nobody owns a gun in any of the places your child plays?   If they do own a gun, are you certain they store it safely?   If not, you need to ask.   That's one issue we discuss in this interview with Dr. Nina Agrawal, a board-certified pediatrician who has expertise in violence against children. She co-founded the Gun Safety Committee for the American Academy of Pediatrics in New York State, and is leading the Gun Violence Prevention Task Force for the American Medical Women’s Association.   Another issue is the gun violence that is primarily faced by children of color, which turns out to affect a far greater number of children.   And how is this all linked to the Peloton recall? You'll have to listen in to find out...   Jump to highlights here: (01:00) Indoor playdates are ramping up...will your child be safe? (02:29) Introducing Dr. Nina Agrawal, pediatrician and co-founder of the American Academy of Pediatrics' Gun Safety Committee in New York State (02:58) Understanding how big is the scope of gun violence against children (06:15) The Dickey Amendment: Explaining the massive lack of data and research on gun violence and safety (11:24) The ways that gun violence affects children that we might not expect (12:32) “I get woken up at night to the sound of gunshots.” (17:09) The racial disparity in how children are affected by gun violence (20:46) More people purchased guns in 2020, and there are more first-time owners too (23:39) The statistical likelihood of children coming to harm if they live with a firearm in their household (27:00) Just telling kids not to touch guns doesn't work (even if you think of your child as one who is 'sensible,' and you've talked with them about gun safety) (30:45) The Asking Saves Kids Campaign helps to keep kids safer (33:06) The surprising link between children involved in gun violence and the Peloton treadmill recall (36:07) In American culture, banning all guns can't be the answer (40:52) Effective Child Access Laws (41:45) How to create safer environments for children through building communities [accordion] [accordion-item title="Click here to read the full transcript"] Jen Lumanlan 00:02 Hi, I'm Jen and I host the Your Parenting Mojo Podcast.   Jen Lumanlan 00:06 We all want her children to lead fulfilling lives, but it can be so hard to keep up with the latest scientific research on child development and figure out whether and how to incorporate it into our own approach to parenting. Here at Your Parenting Mojo, I do the work for you by critically examining strategies and tools related to parenting and child development that are grounded in scientific research on principles of respectful parenting. If you'd like to be notified when new episodes are released, and get a free guide called 13 Reasons Why Your Child Won't Listen To You & What To Do About Each One, just head over to YourParentingMojo.com/SUBSCRIBE. You can also continue the conversation about the show with other listeners in the Your Parenting Mojo Facebook group. I do hope you'll join us.   Jen Lumanlan 01:00 Hello, and welcome to the Your Parenting Mojo Podcast. And today we're going to discuss a topic that I think is about to come into parents' consciousness in a way that it really hasn't as much over the last year. And for some of us, that's a result of our privilege. And I was reflecting that as vaccinations for children become more available, we're probably going to start moving towards indoor play dates without parents being around because when my daughter went into when we went into sort of lockdown, she was young enough that she wasn't really doing playdates indoors with other people in anyone else's houses. And so I never really felt as though I needed to ask, "Are there guns in your house?" because I was always there to supervise. And so of course, over the last year, she's played with a lot of kids on our street, and they're always outside and I can always hear them. And so the danger doesn't seem to be there in the same way for me in those outdoor playdates scenarios. But of course, as vaccinations become available, and these things start to move inside, I don't know which of my friends has guns in their houses. And if I'm kind of uncomfortable asking about this, I'm guessing that a lot of parents haven't even thought about it and don't have it on their collective radar yet. So I wanted to bring that up into our consciousness before we actually need it. And then, of course, there's another issue here as well, that we're going to delve into fairly deeply today, which is that gun violence is becoming increasingly common in a wide variety of settings that children live in and are exposed to, and that this can have

New parents often worry about attachment to their baby - will I be able to build it? My baby cries a lot - does that mean that we aren't attached? If I put my baby in daycare, will they get attached to the daycare staff rather than to me?   Based on the ideas about attachment that have been circulated over the years, these are entirely valid concerns. But it turns out that not only should we not worry about these things, but the the research that these ideas were based in was highly flawed.   It's often forgotten that attachment theory was developed in the period after World War II, when policymakers were trying to get women out of the jobs they had held during the war, and back into their 'natural' place in the home.   In one of his earliest papers Dr. John Bowlby - the so-called Father of Attachment Theory - described 44 children who had been referred to his clinic for stealing, and compared these with children who had not stolen anything. He reported that the thieves had been separated from their parents during childhood, which led them to have a low sense of self-worth and capacity for empathy. He went on to say that “to deprive a small child of his mother’s companionship is as bad as depriving him of vitamins.”   But much later in his life, Bowlby revealed that he had conflated a whole lot of kinds of separation into that one category – everything between sleeping in a different room to being abandoned in an orphanage. And in addition to being separated, many of the thieves had also experienced physical or sexual abuse. The fear that spending time apart from your baby will damage them in some way is just not supported by the evidence.   What other common beliefs do we hold about attachment relationships that aren't supported by evidence? Well, quite a lot, as it turns out! Listen in for more.   Link to the book mentioned: Cornerstones of Attachment Research (Affiliate link).   Jump to highlights: 03:30 Download the free Right From The Start Roadmap 06:11 Dr. John Bowlby, who is known as the founder of attachment theory 06:40 A brief overview of attachment theory 08:06 What is attachment theory 09:44 A closer look at the word attachment 12:55 Five aspects out of Freud's psychoanalytic theory 14:32 44 Juvenile Thieves - One of the major ideas about separation from parents 17:50 What is the word monotrophy 18:49 The four dimensions that distinguish African-American views of motherhood from American views by Dr. Patricia Hill Collins 20:49 Aka Pygmy tribe in Africa 21:37 What is PIC or Parental Investment in the child Questionnaire by Dr. Robert Bradley 24:19 The Strange Situation Procedure developed by Dr. Mary Ainsworth 30:30 White middle class mothers in Baltimore stand for what attachment should look like in families of all types around the world 33:36 Two main cross cultural studies 40:13 The cognitive thinking component of the attachment relationship 47:29 What is Outcomes 01:01:25 Summary   References Ainsworth, M.D.S. (1985). Patterns of infant-mother attachments: Antecedents and effects on development. Bulletin of The New York Academy of Medicine 61(9), 771-791. Attached at the Heart (n.d.). Talking points/frequently asked questions. Author. Retrieved from http:// attachedattheheart.attachmentparenting.org/faq/ Birns, B. (1999). I. Attachment Theory revisited: Challenging conceptual and methodological sacred cows. Feminism & Psychology 9(1), 10-21. Bliwise, N.G. (1999). Securing Attachment Theory’s potential. Feminism & Psychology 9(1), 43-52. Bradley, R.H. (1998). In defense of parental investment. Journal of Marriage and Family 60(3), 791-795. Bradley, R.H., Whiteside-Mansell, L., Brisby, J.A., & Caldwell, B.M. Parents’ socioemotional investment in children. Journal of Marriage and Family 59(1), 77-90. Buchanan, F. (2013). A critical analysis of the use of attachment theory in cases of domestic violence. Critical Social Work 14(2), 19-31 Callaghan, J., Andenaes, A., & Macleod, C. (2015). Deconstructing Developmental Psychology 20 years on: Reflections, implications, and empirical work. Feminism & Psychology 25(3), 255-265. Cleary, R.J. (1999). III. Bowlby’s theory of attachment and loss: A feminist reconsideration. Feminism & Psychology 9(1), 32-42. Duschinsky, R. (2020). Cornerstones of attachment research. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Duschinsky, R., Greco, M., & Solomon, J. (2015). The politics of attachment: Lines of flight with Bowlby, Deleuze and Guattari. Theory, Culture & Society 32(7-8), 173-195. Duchinsky, R., Greco, M., & Solomon, J. (2015). Wait up!: Attachment and sovereign power. International Journal of Politics, Culture, and Society 28, 223-242. Franzblau, S.H. (1999). II. Historicizing Attachment Theory: Binding the ties that bind. Feminism & Psychology 9(1), 22-31. Gov.uk (2019). Elitism in Britain, 2019. Author. Retrieved from https://www.gov.uk/government/news/elitism-in-britain-2019#:~:text=O

"Psychological Flexibility" sounds amazing. Shouldn't we all want that? After all, psychological flexibility has been significantly positively associated with wellness during the COVID-19 pandemic, and negatively associated with anxiety, depression, and COVID-29-related distress and worry. (But what is it, anyway?!) Psychological Flexibility is about being fully in touch with the present moment and, based on the situation, either continuing or changing your behavior to live in better alignment with your values. Let's break that down a bit: Being fully in touch with the present moment: We spend a good chunk of our lives not fully present. And there are times when it makes sense - we don't necessarily need to be fully present for every moment of a long drive. As long as we're present enough to drive safely, we don't need to observe the exact quality of red in the tail light of the driver in front of you. But when we spend most of our lives zoned out on our phones, or rushing from one activity to the next (probably partly so we don't have to sit down and just be), we aren't truly present. Better alignment with your values: We all have values, although perhaps some of us haven't fully articulated them. We might value raising an independent child, but then step in every time they struggle. We might value emotional closeness but struggle to actually do it because our parents didn't model it for us. When we articulate our values, we define what we're working toward. Based on the situation, either continuing or changing your behavior: One of my favorite parts of ACT is the Choice Point: the point at which something doesn't feel right to you. At this point you get to decide: Am I going to keep doing the same thing I've always done? Or am I going to do something that brings me into better alignment with my values?   Want to know more? Dr. Diana Hill, co-author with Dr. Debbie Sorensen, joins me on this episode to discuss their new book ACT Daily Journal: Get Unstuck and Live Fully with Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (this is an affiliate link, so I will earn a small commission through your purchase which does not affect the price you pay). The book walks readers through a series of exercises to help them become more psychologically flexible, through the practice of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT). The concepts in ACT are ones that I've found to be enormously useful both personally and in working with clients, so I'm excited to tell you about them here!   Dr. Diana Hill's Book: ACT Daily Journal: Get Unstuck and Live Fully with Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (Affiliate link).   Jump to highlights: (01:26) What is ACT or acceptance and Commitment Therapy (02:07) What is this thing psychological flexibility? (03:48) What are the components of psychological flexibility? (08:07) Cognitive diffusion (11:38) The idea that we could believe that our thoughts are not true is mind boggling to a lot of people (16:36) Values and parenting in particular is such a good one to discuss (18:20) Values are something that are deep within you, that you can pull upon, when you've got nothing left (19:10:) The idea of the choice point (23:36) Perspective taking is probably one of the most important skills we can do for ourselves (27:01) How do we live out committed action (33:55) Our children are naturally beginner's mind (35:18:) One of the things that actually sets humans apart from robots, is our ability to think outside the box (39:58) We can start to teach our children, that it's not about the answer. That there's many ways to solve problems (41:51) The IKEA effect (45:33) Another thing that's really important with embodiment is modeling   [accordion] [accordion-item title="Click here to read the full transcript"] Jen Lumanlan 00:03 Hi, I'm Jen and I host the Your Parenting Mojo podcast. We all want our children to lead fulfilling lives. But it can be so hard to keep up with the latest scientific research on child development and figure out whether and how to incorporate it into our own approach to parenting. Here at Your Parenting Mojo, I do the work for you by critically examining strategies and tools related to parenting and child development that are grounded in scientific research on principles of respectful parenting. If you'd like to be notified when new episodes are released, and get a FREE Guide called 13 Reasons Why Your Child Won't listen To You and What To Do About Each One, just head on over to your YourParentingMojo.com/SUBSCRIBE. You can also continue the conversation about the show with other listeners in the Your Parenting Mojo Facebook group. I do hope you'll join us   Jen Lumanlan 00:48 Hello, and welcome to the Your Parenting Mojo podcast. We have a guest here today to talk with us about a tool that I actually discovered through her show and I found it to be incredibly helpful both personally and professionally. So our guest is Dr. Diana Hill, and she's co host with three of h

We've been in a liminal space for the last 15 months or so, since COVID shutdowns. (The word 'liminal' comes from the Latin root limen, meaning threshold). It’s a place where a certain part of our lives has come to an end but the next thing hasn’t yet begun, so we’re in a transitional state.   We're finally starting to see the end of this liminal state but before we can fully emerge into the new world, we need to ask ourselves: what do we want that world to be like?   Do we want to go back to what it was before?   Because the world we had before wasn't working for a lot of parents. We were constantly rushing our children around from one activity to the next, maybe also trying to balance a career at the same time, attending thirty kids' birthday parties a year and just feeling completely spent, most of the time.   If we don't take the time to think about what we want life to be like when we reopen, chances are it'll look pretty much like it used to. And that can seem safe! It's always safer and easier to go back to what we know, rather than forward to what is unknown and scary.   What would something different even look like?   Maybe we would have fewer friends, whom we know much better.   Maybe we would do fewer activities, and spend a bit more time being, rather than always doing.   Maybe we would actually support families financially instead of having a 'families are the bedrock of our society...but you're on your own to provide for it' approach.   In this Mother's Day Momifesto, I explore all of these issues, and encourage you to think about how YOU want to be in this new world.   And if you need help figuring it out, the Parenting Membership is here to help. We'll support you through the challenges of today (how to prevent tantrums! raising healthy eaters! navigating screen time!) while keeping an eye on where we want to go. Because you need both.   The Parenting Membership is now open for immediate enrollment. Sign up now!   Jump to highlights: 01:27 The Mother's Day Momifesto 02:04 COVID shutdown 04:28 School reopenings 07:04 18% of women in the US have taken antidepressants 09:29 We try to control our bodies in a variety of ways 12:27 Success is defined for men 19:38 Women working communities 20:25 Plenty of parents and children's needs are not met by the school system 22:47 Intersectionality - the idea that different parts of our identities intersect 25:10 Public transit systems are geared around men 26:17 Contribution of scientific research on COVID 19- women scientists have published 19% fewer papers as lead author 29:26 Standard Body Mass Index calculations are based on the weight of White people 31:41 Nonviolent Communication 34:06 How we can begin to make a difference 44:55 Learning how to meet our own needs is a great place to start 46:44 Reopening of your Parenting Membership will close on the midnight of May 12   References Andersen, J.P., Nielsen, M.W., Simone, N.L., Lewiss, R.E., & Jagsi, R. (2020). COVID-19 medical papers have fewer women first authors than expected. Elife 9 (2020): e58807. Belsha, K., Rubinkam, M., LeMee, G.L., & Fenn, L. (2020, September 11). A nationwide divide: Hispanic and Black students more likely than White students to start the year online. Chalkbeat. Retrieved from https://www.chalkbeat.org/2020/9/11/21431146/hispanic-and-black-students-more-likely-than-white-students-to-start-the-school-year-online Brody, D.J., & Gu, Q. (2020, September). Antidepressant use among adults: United States, 2015-2018. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Retrieved from: https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/products/databriefs/db377.htm#:~:text=During%202015%E2%80%932018%2C%2013.2%25%20of%20adults%20used%20antidepressants%20in,those%20aged%2060%20and%20over. Brody, D.J., Pratt, L.A., & Hughes, J.P. (2018 February). Prevalence of depression among adults aged 20 and over: United States, 2013-2016. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Retrieved from https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/products/databriefs/db303.htm Cevic, M., Haque, S.A., Manne-Goehler, J., Sax, P., Majumder, M.S., & Orkin, C. (2021). Gender disparities in coronavirus disease 2019 clinical trial leadership. Clinical Microbiology and Infection (in press). Retrieved from https://www.clinicalmicrobiologyandinfection.com/article/S1198-743X(20)30785-0/fulltext Coaston, J. (2019, May 28). The intersectionality wars. Vox. Retrieved from https://www.vox.com/the-highlight/2019/5/20/18542843/intersectionality-conservatism-law-race-gender-discrimination Crenshaw, K. (1989). Demarginalizing the intersection of race and sex: A Black feminist critique of antidiscrimination doctrine, feminist theory and antiracist policies. University of Chicago Legal Forum Vol. 1989, Iss. 1, Article 8. Retrieved from https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/5780707-Demarginalizing-the-Intersection-of-Race-and-Sex Gurrieri, L., Previte, J., & Brace-Govan, J. (2012). Women’s

This episode grew out of a post that long-time friend of the podcast, Dr. Laura Froyen, published in a respectful parenting group that we both work in as admins. In the post she asked people to share how they felt before and after they discovered respectful parenting, and then she created a word cloud of the results.   The words in the 'before' cloud were perhaps predictable - things like 'worried,' 'overwhelmed,' 'resentful,' and 'guilty.'   And the most common word in the 'after respectful parenting' word cloud?   Exhausted.   What on earth is going on here?   In this episode I explore five important reasons why respectful parenting is so hard - and what to do about each of them.   Setting Loving (& Effective!) Limits If you want to make your own transformation from a relationship where your child JUST DOESN’T LISTEN to one where you have mutual care and respect for each other’s needs, then the Setting Loving (& Effective!) Limits workshop is for you. Go from constant struggles and nagging to a new sense of calm & collaboration. I will teach you how to set limits, but we'll also go waaaay beyond that to learn how to set fewer limits than you ever thought possible. Sign up for the Setting Loving (& Effective!) Limits workshop.   Click the banner to learn more.   Jump to highlights: 01:00 Why we find parenting so hard 01:18 Most prominent words before parents discovered respectful parenting 01:58 Five reasons respectful parenting can be hard 03:03 1st reason: Our needs that our parents just didn’t see despite doing the best they could 05:22 The trauma of unmet needs 06:09 2nd reason: The long game that is respectful parenting 08:54 Our culture trains us to want results 09:56 3rd reason: Our values and what we want to do in an ideal world 10:39 Alfie Kohn’s Unconditional Parenting 13:38 Our child's behavior brings up old trauma 14:10 Shifting the way we see our children 15:12 4th reason: When we see these values that we want to live 16:37 The tendency to engage in negative self-talk 17:58 Self-compassion and mindfulness 19:11 The last (and perhaps not the last) reason 24:47 Super short summary information.

"You're doing it wrong! You're not asking for consent before changing the diaper!" In this Sharing Your Parenting Mojo episode we meet parent Nicole, who has core values related to being empathic, constantly learning, and upholding justice in the world. These awesome values came together in a difficult way when Nicole became a parent: she had a deep fear of not getting parenting right, so she was constantly reading and trying to find that one piece of information that would close the gap between her struggles and the kind of parent she wanted to be.   The stress of parenting an infant brought out a controlling side of her where she attempted to script every aspect of her (and her husband's) interactions with her child, thinking they had already screwed up parenting because he hadn't asked their child's consent before changing her diaper.   Nicole was raised by a single parent who had had a traumatic upbringing, and Nicole grew up sometimes feeling scared by her mother's oversized reactions to normal childhood behavior. She knew she wanted more for her children - but didn't know what to do. Over the last year she's been working on 'reparenting' herself so she doesn't have to parent from a place of fear any more, and can relax into understanding her children's feelings - and her own and her partner's feelings as well.   Setting Loving (& Effective!) Limits If you want to make your own transformation from a relationship where your child JUST DOESN’T LISTEN to one where you have mutual care and respect for each other’s needs, then the Setting Loving (& Effective!) Limits workshop is for you. Go from constant struggles and nagging to a new sense of calm & collaboration. I will teach you how to set limits, but we'll also go waaaay beyond that to learn how to set fewer limits than you ever thought possible. Sign up for the Setting Loving (& Effective!) Limits workshop.   Click the banner to learn more.     Jump to highlights: 03:19 Nicole's background 04:36 Nicole's parenting beliefs and values 06:31 Teaching respect by giving respect 08:07 Fear and anxiety of not getting parenting right 09:32 How inter generational trauma show up in your family 11:37 The unexpected reparenting piece 13:35 How talking about death with children led Nicole to my work 15:13 Nicole's experience with the Parenting Membership 18:32 What shifted in Nicole's that made her decide to take the Membership 19:17 Realizing the most unconditional thing you can do for your kids 20:12 Relationships our complex yet we don't think that way when it comes to our relationship with our children 21:08 Nicole's incredible example of how she shows up for her children and handles things differently now compared to before 24:45 Becoming more confident in parenting 26:09 Having the language to talk about our needs 28:39 How Nicole and her husband wants to model conflict to their children 34:44 Wrapping up   Resource links: Setting Loving (& Effective) Limits WorkshopThe Parenting Membership

"Do you know what happens to your body when you get older?"   "Um...you get hairy in some places?"   "Yeah...other things happen too. We'll get you some books."   That was what I learned about sex education when I was seven - I was always grateful that I learned it from my parents (who were pretty terrified to talk about it, I think) rather than from the other kids at school. But then the topic wasn't mentioned again until I was about 18, with a vague reference to "being careful" with my first boyfriend, whom I wasn't even sleeping with yet.   Friends: we have to do more than this if we want our children to be able to show up in relationships as fulfilled human beings who understand what pleasure is, how to ask for it, and how to give it.   We need our children to know that sex does not have to equal intercourse, and that there are a whole host of ways to enjoy our (and each other's) bodies without doing this if we don't want to do it (when they're ready for it!).   And we need to help our children understand boundaries so they can protect themselves when they need to - without getting so caught up in the shame that pervades our thinking about sex. (Since the sex = shame narrative is deeply pervasive in our culture I don't think we can overcome it completely, but we can make a start...).   In this episode we build on our conversation with Charlotte Rose about sex for us parents to go (far) Beyond Sex Ed with sex educator Dr. Nadine Thornhill, whose direct, fun, engaging style will help you to see that you, too, can have conversations about sex and pleasure with your own children. You can find more information on Dr. Thornhill's work on her YouTube channel where she addresses topics from what happens if the kid walk in on parents having sex to whether first time sex always hurts, as well as on Instagram.   Setting Loving (& Effective!) Limits If you want to make your own transformation from a relationship where your child JUST DOESN’T LISTEN to one where you have mutual care and respect for each other’s needs, then the Setting Loving (& Effective!) Limits workshop is for you.   Go from constant struggles and nagging to a new sense of calm & collaboration. I will teach you how to set limits, but we'll also go waaaay beyond that to learn how to set fewer limits than you ever thought possible. Sign up for the Setting Loving (& Effective!) Limits workshop.   Click the banner to learn more.     Jump to highlights: 00:01 Setting Loving and Effective Limits Workshop 02:18 Where we’re at with our mini-series on issues related to sex 03:34 Introducing our guest, Dr. Nadine Thornhill 04:54 The importance of continuing the conversation about sex beyond the basic topics 09:17 Figuring out what kinds of things I need to teach my children and how 12:22 The value of showing our vulnerability to our children 14:45 Talking about the traditional ways we talk about sex and how can we change that narrative 19:03 Having conversations around pleasure of the non-sexual kind 23:27 Modelling intimacy to our children without overdoing it 25:41 Helping our children set boundaries even when we’re having trouble setting boundaries ourselves 31:53 Dr. Thornhill’s son’s case of the “hangry” and how he came to develop recognizing physical signs before he gets hangry 33:41 Talking about shame associated with the White, Christian view of sex 40:34 Talking about bodies and nudity that doesn’t rely on shame 43:07 Going a little deeper into consent and the Authentic Consent Framework 50:48 The House and the Superintendent Metaphor 53:23 How parents can leave more space and be supportive of the potential suite of options about a child’s sexuality 57:46 Should we wait to teach our children about aspects of sex and sexuality until they ask? 01:02:11 Wrapping up   Guest links: Nadine’s websiteNadine’s e-booksNadine’s InstagramNadine’s YouTube Channel   Episodes mentioned: 021: Talk Sex Today!096: How to prevent sexual abuse097: How to support gender-creative children   Resource links: FREE Setting Loving (& Effective) Limits Workshop Sex Is A Funny Word, by Cory SilverbergThe Nap MinistryOutspoken Sex Ed

After dinner a few days ago, Carys randomly started telling us that if we want to understand some of the things she's feeling, we should cast our minds back to when we were children and remember how we would have felt about it at the time. The conversation continued as we explored more of her feelings when she's having difficult moments, and at some point someone (recollections differ on exactly who it was!) suggested we record a podcast episode about it.   Carys was immediately on board and wanted to do it right away, but we came back to it the next afternoon. She thinks that parents often don't understand how their children are feeling and she'd like suggest ways to help your children when they're behaving in a way that may seem 'difficult' to you.   Setting Loving (& Effective!) Limits If you want to make your own transformation from a relationship where your child JUST DOESN’T LISTEN to one where you have mutual care and respect for each other’s needs, then the Setting Loving (& Effective!) Limits workshop is for you.   Go from constant struggles and nagging to a new sense of calm & collaboration. I will teach you how to set limits, but we'll also go waaaay beyond that to learn how to set fewer limits than you ever thought possible. Sign up now for the self-guided Setting Loving (& Effective!) Limits. Click the banner to learn more.   Jump to highlights: 01:00 My special guest in her podcasting debut 02:18 What helps to understand your kid's feelings 03:18 Feeling the physical sensations of frustration 03:42 What Carys feels when she get 'that feeling' 04:19 Parents don't really understand that children sometimes want to be alone 06:07 Different kids deal with things in different ways 07:34 Our new method for when we disagree on things 10:37 We have rewards now 11:46 Carys's thoughts on problem solving   Links: Setting Limits Workshop

Today we build on episodes that we've done in the past on talking with children about the basics of sex (so when you listen to this episode we're assuming you've got the basics covered - things like using anatomically correct names for body parts and taking basic steps to prevent sexual abuse).   This is the first in a mini-series of episodes that digs deeper into topics related to sex. Here we talk with Charlotte Rose, co-host of the Speaking of Sex podcast by the Pleasure Mechanics, about what and how we adults learned about sex. We talk about the shame that pretty much all of us learned to associate with sex (and how to overcome that), and what we can do to improve the chances of having sex with our partner - even if we're feeling so tired that this currently seems out of the question.   We're setting the stage here to approach sex from a less pressured, more fun perspective - which will help us in an upcoming episode to figure out what we want to discuss with our children about sex, sexuality, and pleasure.   Jump to highlights: (01:00) Today's topic and Parenting Membership reopening announcement (02:20) Setting Loving and Effective Limits workshop announcement (03:55) Chris and Charlotte Rose the Pleasure Mechanics (05:16) The primary focus of today's episode (06:09) Sex isn't what it used to be before we became parents (08:39) Responsive desire and spontaneous desire (09:17) Erotic simulation and how there is nothing wrong with your sexual relationship (11:54) Creating a culture of pleasure within your relationship (14:42) Continual consent - it doesn't always need to lead to sex (15:34) Sex is adults at play (17:37) Sex educations centered around abstinence, secrecy, and shame and how we move forward from that (20:39) A parenting opportunity to create a different culture for our children, so that they have to unlearn so much less with regards to sex (22:35) How does shame show up in parents' sexual relationship? (25:21) So much judgment about sexuality and how it gets in the way of our connection with our partner (29:04) A culture of community care to have these conversations (29:49) Initiation and refusal/rejection (34:36) Mindful sex: How to enjoy sex more (39:27) Finding that balance when having the sex conversation with our children (42:23) Giving kids the building blocks so that they can have an experience to healthy sexuality when it is time for them (45:39) Experiencing self massage in a non sexual way (50:16) Body neutrality (51:36) Wrapping up   Here are the resources we discussed on the show:   Pleasure Mechanics Resources Charlotte & Chris' free online course The Erotic Essentials Conversation starters about sex Podcast episode on spontaneous vs. responsive desire Podcast episode on mindful sex (making sex better through focusing on the present) Podcast episode on body image     Other Resources AASECT therapist referral directory Peer-reviewed article on the 237 reasons people have sex Guy Winch's TED Talk on How to Practice Emotional First Aid, as well as more explicit resources on why rejection hurts so much - and in peer-reviewed form too Research on mindful sex Outspoken Sex Ed     Made for you by Jen: The Parenting Membership FREE Setting Loving and Effective Limits Workshop   [accordion] [accordion-item title="Click here to read the full transcript"] Jen 00:02 Hi, I’m Jen and I host the Your Parenting Mojo podcast. We all want her children to lead fulfilling lives, but it can be so hard to keep up with the latest scientific research on child development and figure out whether and how to incorporate it into our own approach to parenting. Here at Your Parenting Mojo, I do the work for you by critically examining strategies and tools related to parenting and child development that are grounded in scientific research on principles of Respectful Parenting. if you'd like to be notified when new episodes are released, and get a FREE Guide called 13 Reasons Why Your Child Won't Listen to You, and What to Do About Each One, just head over to...

Do we really know what implicit bias is, and whether we have it? This is the second episode on our two-part series on implicit bias; the first part was an interview with Dr. Mahzarin Banaji, former Dean of the Department of Psychology at Harvard University, and co-creator of the Implicit Association Test. But the body of research on this topic is large and quite complicated, and I couldn't possibly do it justice in one episode. There are a number of criticisms of the test which are worth examining, so we can get a better sense for whether implicit bias is really something we should be spending our time thinking about - or if our problems with explicit bias are big enough that we would do better to focus there first. Jump to highlights: (03:38) Is implicit bias baked into our bodies? (06:27) About the Implicit Association Test (IAT) (08:13) Criticism of the IAT and Dr. Banaji’s response (12:48) Blindspot and the inception of the IAT (13:41) We make judgements about individuals based on how they look (14:12) We often say things that aren't true, even if we think we are truthful (16:01) The premise of the IAT and how it works (18:13) Conflicting definition of what implicit bias is (19:40) Meta-analysis of implicit bias (33:16) Implicit bias on the decline in recent years (35:37) The persistent problem with IAT (42:59) From macro-issues to the micro-issues of IAT (53:54) My takeways Resources: Implicit Association Test [accordion] [accordion-item title="Click here to read the full transcript"] Jen 00:02 Hi, I'm Jen and I host the Your Parenting Mojo podcast. We all want her children to lead fulfilling lives but it can be so hard to keep up with the latest scientific research on child development and figure out whether and how to incorporate it into our own approach to parenting. Here at Your Parenting Mojo, I do the work for you by critically examining strategies and tools related to parenting and child development that are grounded in scientific research and principles of Respectful Parenting. If you'd like to be notified when new episodes are released, and get a FREE Guide called 13 Reasons Why Your Child Won't Listen To You and What To Do About Each One, just head over to YourParentingMojo.com/SUBSCRIBE. You can also continue the conversation about the show with other listeners in the Your Parenting Mojo Facebook group. I do hope you'll join us.   Jen 00:59 Hello, and welcome to the Your Parenting Mojo podcast. Before we start this week's episode, I wanted to take a minute to thank you for being a part of this parenting journey with me and to share a quick update on where things stand with the podcast after four and a half years now. What is that saying? The days are long and the years are short? It certainly seems to be the case here. And well for some of you listening, this may be the very first episode that you're listening to, there are many others who have been with me for the entire 132 plus episodes that I've created to date. We're close to surpassing a million and a half downloads from all around the world, and my goodness, it's a bit strange to even say those words aloud given that I started the show with basically no idea whether anyone would be interested in listening. And it's such an honor to me when you recommend the show to your friends and to other parents at your daycare or preschool. When you share specific episodes that have helped you to find the answers that work with your family and your online communities. And I'm not exaggerating when I say that developing Your Parenting Mojo, which is now the podcast episodes, blog posts, courses, workshops, membership content is more than a full-time job. I have a very small team that helps me to keep my own sanity and my husband is now involved as well. Maybe one day he'll even listen to as many episodes as some of my most dedicated listeners have. Even my daughter now signs off on her videos at home with the brought to you by YourParentingMojo.com. And as the word continues to spread, more and more parents are making transformative lasting change using the methods that we talked about here on the show. We are big cohort in the current Taming Your Triggers workshop who are supporting each other and understanding the sources of their triggered feelings. And just a week or two in they were already reporting the ability to create space for responses to their children that fit with their values, where that just hadn't seemed possible before. And I'm very happy to share that the Parenting Membership open enrollment is just around the corner and will run from May 2 through May 12 in time for celebrating Mother's Day, while the learning membership is going to reopen later in the summer. The community of parents that have already enrolled in the Parenting Membership continues to grow and it's a great resource of knowledge and support and community to help anyone who's looking to apply the ideas and strategies that you hear on the podcast in your own f

Explicitly, nobody really believes in gender stereotypes anymore, but when we look at the world, and who's where and how much money people make, and so on, it still seems to be there. And the answer to that is yeah, because it's there. It's just not something we say. It’s more of something we do. -Dr. Mahzarin Banaji   What is implicit bias? Do I have it (and do you?)? Does my (and your?) child have it? And if we do have implicit bias, what, if anything, can we do about it? Join me in a conversation with Dr. Mahzarin Banaji, former Dean of the Department of Psychology at Harvard University and co-creator of the Implicit Association Test, for an overview of implicit bias and how we can know if we (and our children) have it. This episode will be followed by a second part in this mini-series where we dig deeply into the research, where results are complex and often contradictory. Stay tuned!   Jump to highlights: (01:00) An intro of Dr. Mahzarin Banaji (02:58) What is implicit bias? (07:48) Differentiating bias that you are aware of and bias that you aren’t aware of (08:56) Describing the Implicit Association test (18:11) What the research says about where implicit bias comes from (24:50) Development of group preference from implicit association (32:18) Group bias and its implications towards individual psychological health (40:44) What can be done to potentially prevent implicit biases from developing? (46:56) Some good progress with society’s bias in general and areas that need working on   Resources: Blindspot: Hidden Biases of Good People   [accordion] [accordion-item title="Click here to read the full transcript"] Jen 00:02 Hi, I'm Jen and I host the Your Parenting Mojo podcast.   Jen 00:06 We all want our children to lead fulfilling lives but it can be so hard to keep up with the latest scientific research on child development and figure out whether and how to incorporate it into our own approach to parenting. Here at Your Parenting Mojo, I do the work for you by critically examining strategies and tools related to parenting and child development that are grounded in scientific research and principles of respectful parenting.   Jen 00:29 If you'd like to be notified when new episodes are released, and get a FREE Guide called 13 Reasons Why Your Child Won't Listen To You and What To Do About Each One, just head over to YourParentingMojo.com/SUBSCRIBE.   Jen 00:42 You can also continue the conversation about the show with other listeners in the Your Parenting Mojo Facebook group. I do hope you'll join us.   Jen 01:00 Hello, and welcome to the Your Parenting Mojo podcast. Today we're going to look at the topic of implicit bias. Now I've been thinking for a while about running a series of episodes on the connection between our brains and our bodies because I've been learning about that and the wisdom that our bodies can hold and wondering, well how can we learn how to pay more attention to our bodies? And then I started thinking about intuition. And I wondered, well, how can we know if we can trust our intuition? What if our intuition is biased? So I started looking at the concept of implicit bias and it became immediately clear who I should ask to interview Dr. Mahzarin Banaji. Dr. Banaji studies thinking and feeling as they unfold in a social context with a focus on mental systems that operate in implicit or unconscious mode. Since 2002, she has been Richard Clarke Cabot professor of social ethics in the Department of Psychology at Harvard University, where she was also the Chair of the Department of Psychology for four years while holding two other concurrent appointments. She has been elected fellow of a whole host of extremely impressive societies and was named William James Fellow for a lifetime of significant intellectual contributions to the basic science of psychology by the Association of Psychological Science, an organization of which she also served as president. Along with her colleague, Dr. Anthony Greenwald. She's conducted decades of research on implicit bias and co-authored the book Blindspot: Hidden Biases of Good People.   Jen 02:21 I should also say that there are a lot of issues that we only got a chance to skim over at a fairly high level in this conversation, which I'm recording this introduction afterwards, because Dr. Banaji was quite pressed for time. And I'm planning to release an episode that follows up into these issues and dives into them at a much deeper level soon. So please consider this part one of a two-part conversation with you.   Jen 02:42 Alright, let's go ahead and get started with the interview.   Jen 02:45 Welcome Dr. Banaji. Thanks so much for being here.   Dr. Mahzarin Banaji 02:48 Hi there.   Jen 02:49 So I wonder if we can start out by understanding a bit more about what implicit bias is. I hear it all over the place, and can you help us to just define what that is, please?   Dr. Mahzarin Banaj

"When she was younger, she wasn't that into reading and that was like a huge deal for me. I thought: "I'm such a reader. My daughter doesn't love to read." She's still not a big reader, but it's not hampering her in any way. She's blossoming in fifty other ways, but when I get caught in that story, "She's not like me. She's not..." - that's when I'm suffering. So I settle back into trusting, and think: "Oh, she's becoming who she is. Let her be that." -Diana Winston   Meditation is touted as being a cure-all for everything from anxiety to depression to addictions. But is it possible that all this is too good to be true?   In this episode, meditation teacher - and former Buddhist nun! - Diana Winston guides us through what we know of the research on meditation that's relevant to parents. It turns out that the quality of much of this research isn't amazing, but this may not matter to you if you're thinking of starting a meditation practice because the opportunity cost (a few minutes a day) is so low and the potential benefits are so high.   We walk through a basic meditation that you can do anywhere, and no - it doesn't involve sitting cross-legged with your thumb and first finger held in a circle and saying 'ommmmmm....'.   I was skeptical about meditation too - until I tried it. Perhaps it might help you as well?   Ready to break free from the cycle of triggered reactions and conflict in your parenting journey? If you want to: 😟 Be triggered less often by your child’s behavior, 😐 React from a place of compassion and empathy instead of anger and frustration, 😊 Respond to your child from a place that’s aligned with your values rather than reacting in the heat of the moment,   the Taming Your Triggers workshop will help you make this shift.   Join us to transform conflict into connection and reclaim peace in your parenting journey.   Click the banner to learn more!   Jump to highlights 02:36 Introducing Diana Winston 03:39 Defining Mindfulness 05:25 Distinguishing between mindfulness and meditation 06:26 How can mindfulness benefit me? 08:05 Self-hatred as a Western concept 12:27 The practice of mindfulness rooted in religion and cultural appropriation 13:57 The research on mindfulness 17:27 Why is it so hard to study mindfulness? 19:33 Mindfulness vs science as tools of observation 21:26 The benefits of mindfulness to parents and children 28:04 Improving parent-child relationships through mindfulness 30:27 Working in mindfulness practices in the context of communities 35:52 Practice mindfulness now with this quick walkthrough 42:46 Sit Still and It Will Hurt Eventually   Useful links: Taming Your Triggers Masterclass   Books and other resources: The Little Book of Being: Practices and Guidance for Uncovering Your Natural AwarenessWaking Up App by Sam HarrisUCLA Mindful AppTen Percent Happier AppWide Awake: A Buddhist Guide for Teens   Facebook Group: Your Parenting Mojo Facebook Group   References D’Andrea, W., Ford, J., Stolbach, B., Spinazzola, J., & van der Kolk, B. (2012). Understanding inter-personal trauma in children: Why we need a developmentally appropriate trauma diagnosis. American Journal of Orthopsyhchiatry 82(2), 187-200. Goessl, V.C., Curtiss, J.E., & Hofman, S.G. (2017). The effect of heart rate variability biofeedback training on stress and anxiety: A meta-analysis. Psychological Medicine 47, 2578-2586. Miller, A. (2006). The body never lies: The lingering effects of hurtful parenting. New York: Norton. Tippet, K. (2019, December 26). Bessel van der Kolk: How trauma lodges in the body. On Being. Retrieved from:https://onbeing.org/programs/bessel-van-der-kolk-how-trauma-lodges-in-the-body/van der Kolk, B. (2017). Developmental trauma disorder: Toward a rational diagnosis for children with complex trauma histories. Psychiatric Annals 35(5), 401-408.van der Kolk, B. (2016). The devastating effects of ignoring child maltreatment in psychiatry: Commentary on “The enduring neurobiological effects of abuse and neglect.” Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry 57(3), 267-270.van der Kolk, B.A., Stone, L., West, J., Rhodes, A., Emerson, D., Suvak, M., & Spinazzola, J. (2014). Yoga as an adjunctive treatment for Posttraumatic Stress Disorder: A randomized controlled trial. Journal of Clinical Psychiatry 75(6), e559-e565.van der Kolk, B. (2014). The body keeps the score: Brain, mind, and body in the healing of trauma. New York: Penguin.van der Kolk, B., Stone, L., West, J., Rhodes, A., Emerson, D., Suvak, M., & Spinazzola, J. (2014). Yoga as an adjunctive treatment for Posttraumatic Stress Disorder: A randomized controlled trial. Journal of Clinical Psychiatry 75(6), e559-e565.van der Kolk, B. (2006). Clinical implications of neuroscience research in PTSD.Annals – New York Academy of Sciences 1071(1), 277.van der Kolk, B., & van der Hart, O. (1989). Pierre Janet & the breakdown of adaptation in psychological t

Why do we yell at our children - even when we know we shouldn't? Why isn't just knowing what to do enough to actually interact with our children in a way that aligns with our values? For many of us, the reason we struggle to actually implement the ideas we know we want to use is because we've experienced trauma in our lives. This may be the overt kind that we can objectively say was traumatic (divorce, abuse, death among close family members...), or it may simply be the additive effect of having our needs disregarded over and over again by the people who were supposed to protect us. These experiences cause us to feel 'triggered' by our children's behavior - because their mess and lack of manners and resistance remind us subconsciously of the ways that we were punished as children for doing very similar things. These feelings don't just show up in our brains, they also have deep connections to our bodies (in spite of the Western idea that the body and brain are essentially separate!). If we don't decide to take a different path and learn new tools to enable us to respond effectively to our child rather than reacting in the heat of the moment, and because our physical experience is so central to how this trauma shows up in our daily lives, we also need to understand and process this trauma through our bodies. Click the banner to learn more!   Jump to highlights: 01:00 This episode’s rationale 03:12 The two ways trauma shows up in broader family relationships 05:27 The separateness of the brain and the body has a long history in Western culture 06:05 Rene Descartes on the schism of mind and body 07:12 The held belief of the mind as superior to the rest of the body 08:09 The inherent bias of data 09:42 The lies our brain tells us 12:54 The so-called 4 ‘truths’ of the physical experience of trauma 16:22 When we are not attuned to the signals that our body is giving us 19:01 Difficulty in identifying feelings for people who experienced trauma 22:16 Saying OK when you aren’t really OK 26:19 The difference between reacting and responding 27:10 Using physical experience to bring order to the chaos in our minds 31:15 The first step to creating a safe environment for your child 33:26 The root of our inability to create meaningful relationships 34:18 Equipping ourselves with the tools to regulate our arousal   Other episodes mentioned: 113: No Self, No Problem069: Reducing the impact of intergenerational traumaResponding to the U.S. Capitol SiegeDismantling White Supremacy and Patriarchy on MLK Day   Links: Taming Your Triggers Workshop   Facebook group: Your Parenting Mojo Facebook Group   References Boscarino, J.A., (2004). Posttraumatic stress disorder and physical illness: Results from clinical and epidemiologic studies. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 1032, 141-153. Fuchs, T. (2018). Ecology of the brain: The phenomenology and biology of the embodied mind. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Hull, A.M. (2002). Neuroimaging findings in post-traumatic stress disorder: Systematic review. British Journal of Psychiatry 181,102-110. Sledjeski, E.M., Speisman, B., & Dierker, L.C. (2008). Does number of lifetime traumas explain the relationship between PTSD and chronic medical conditions? Answers from the National Comorbidity Survey-Replication (NCS-R). Journal of Behavioral Medicine 31(4), 341-349. Wolfe, J., Schnurr, P.P., Brown, P.J., & Furey, J. (1994). Posttraumatic stress disorder and war-zone exposure as correlates of perceived health in female Vietnam war veterans. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology 62(6), 1235-1240. Zoellner, L.A., Goodwin, M.L., & Foa, E.B. (2005). PTSD severity and health perceptions in female victims of sexual assault. Journal of Traumatic Stress 13(4), 635-649.

In this episode we talk with Iris Chen about her new book, Untigering: Peaceful Parenting for the Deconstructing Tiger Parent.   Iris admits to being a parent who engaged in "yelling, spanking, and threatening with unreasonable consequences" - but far from becoming a well-behaved, obedient child, her son fought back. The harder she punished, the more he resisted. Their home became a battleground of endless power struggles, uncontrollable tantrums, and constant frustration.   But Iris didn't know what else to do: she had learned this over-controlling style from her own parents: watching TV without permission, talking back to her father, and having a boyfriend before college were simply out of the question when she was growing up.   In her parents' eyes, they had done all the right things: Iris got good grades, graduated from an elite university, and married another successful Chinese-American.   But through interacting with her son, Iris realized that all of these achievements had come at a great cost: a cost that her son was trying to show her through his resistance. Eventually Iris saw that her son's behavior wasn't the problem; he was simply reacting to her attempts to control him, and that it was her own approach that needed to change.   Now Iris is well along her own Untigering path: basing her relationship with her children on finding win-win solutions to problems, being flexible, and respecting each other's boundaries.   As I do too, Iris sees this path as a journey toward creating a society where everyone belongs.   If you see yourself in Iris' descriptions of her early days as a parent, and especially if you find yourself routinely overreacting to your child's age-appropriate behavior, I invite you to join my Taming Your Triggers, which will help you to understand the true source of your triggered feelings (hint: it isn't your child's behavior!), feel triggered less often, and respond more effectively to your child on the fewer occasions when it does still happen.   Click the banner to learn more!   Jump to highlights: 01:34 Children’s dilemma between being seen/heard and being accepted 02:50 The trauma we pass on to our children 04:04 How to tame your triggers 04:59 Confidence in parenting that gives parents a sense of calm 06:39 Iris as a Deconstructing Tiger Parent 08:13 “I thought my responsibility as a parent was to push harder when my child resisted” 09:26 “I saw in my children a freedom to express their resentment in ways that I was never free to” 11:05 The walls that are created between parent and child because children’s authentic selves are not accepted 11:24 Our parents have their own traumas as well 13:18 The Idea of Untigering 14:19 Permissive parenting 16:06 Viewing children as full human beings 18:43 Adultism and Childism 20:05 Is respect something a child needs to earn from their parents? 21:26 Redefining our ideas for success as parents 27:29 Navigating the needs that drive behavior 31:30 Chinese somatization 33:57 The internalization of injustice and suffering 36:50 Holding space for one another and the greater community 41:19 The cascading effect of changing the way we relate to our children   Books and Resources: Untigering: Peaceful Parenting for the Deconstructing Tiger ParentThe Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma   Links: Taming Your Triggers WorkshopUpbringing PodcastUntigering Website   Join the YPM Facebook Community Your Parenting Mojo Facebook Group   Reference Mauner, R.G., Hunter, J.J., Atkinson, L., Steiner, M., Wazana, A., Fleming, A.S., Moss, E., Gaudreau, H., Meaney, M.J., & Levitan, R.D. (2017). An attachment-based model of the relationship between childhood adversity and somatization in children and adults. Psychosomatic Medicine79(5), 506-513.

Parents - worried about their child's lack of maturity or ability to 'fit in' in a classroom environment - often ask me whether they should hold their child back a year before entering kindergarten or first grade. In this episode I review the origins of the redshirting phenomenon (which lie in Malcolm Gladwell's book Outliers, and which statisticians say contained some seriously dodgy math), what it means for your individual child, as well as for the rest of the children in the class so you can make an informed decision.   Jump to highlights: (01:00) Malcolm Gladwell's anecdote about the Junior League Medicine Hat Tigers and Vancouver Giants ice hockey teams that initiated the redshirting craze (02:56) Ability grouping is done in early childhood, just like in sports (03:59) Parents holding their children back from kindergarten came to be referred to as redshirting (10:20) How common is redshirting? (11:04) Boys are redshirted at a ratio of 2:1 compared to girls (12:18) The maturationist approach of why to redshirt (13:05) State support and agenda for redshirting (15:10) Teachers tendency to view a maturationist view of development. (17:16) The Maturation Hypothesis (17:36) Parents redshirt their children to give their child an advantage (20:34) Redshirting as a way to give boys age and size advantage and avoid getting bullied (27:28) Making a judgement call into what benefits mean with regards to the body of research on redshirting (29:24) The evidence of whether redshirting is beneficial (35:19) Misdiagnosis of ADHD caused by relative maturity (37:56) A year outside of school reduces the likelihood that children receive timely identifications of learning difficulties (38:35) Students with speech impairments may actually benefit from redshirting (39:22) Redshirted students may have more behavioral problems in high school (46:04) Children from higher socioeconomic status are more likely to perform well in tests in kindergarten (48:19) It’s possible that the way the teacher sees the child is what helps the child because of Labelling Theory (49:46) Opportunity hoarding associated with middle-class, White parents. (52:01) Is kindergarten truly the new first grade? (56:06) Advocating for Developmentally Appropriate Practice or DAP (57:35) Almost everyone agrees that retention has negative impacts on children (58:55) Accumulative Advantage (01:00:07) Malcolm Gladwell’s proposed solution to homogenize and my thoughts on it (01:02:32) Summary (01:04:56) Why I think asking "should I redshirt my child" is the wrong question   Books and Resources: Outliers: The Story of Success, by Malcolm Gladwell 13 Reasons Why Your Child Won’t Listen to You and What to do About Each One School Can Wait, by Raymond S. Moore and Dorothy N. Moore   Links: 085: White privilege in schools 086: Playing to Win: How does playing sports impact children? 117: Socialization and Pandemic Pods   Join our the YPM Facebook Community: Your Parenting Mojo Facebook Group   [accordion] [accordion-item title="Click here to read the full transcript"] Jen 00:02 Hi, I'm Jen and I host the Your Parenting Mojo Podcast. We all want our children to lead fulfilling lives, but it can be so hard to keep up with the latest scientific research on child development and figure out whether and how to incorporate it into our own approach to parenting. Here at Your Parenting Mojo, I do the work for you by critically examining strategies and tools related to parenting and child development that are grounded in scientific research and principles of respectful parenting.   Jen 00:29 If you'd like to be notified when new episodes are released, and get a FREE guide called 13 Reasons Why Your Child Won't Listen to You and What to do About Each One, just head over to YourParentingMojo.com/SUBSCRIBE. You can also continue the conversation about the show with other listeners and the Your Parenting Mojo Facebook group.   Jen 00:48 I do hope you'll join us.   Jen 01:00 Hello and welcome to the Your Parenting Mojo podcast. We have an odd person to thank for what has turned into a bit of an epic episode, and that’s Malcolm Gladwell. His 2011 book Outliers: The story of success opens with an anecdote about the junior league Medicine Hat Tigers and Vancouver Giants ice hockey teams. The point of the book is to demonstrate that personal explanations of success that draw on a narrative of self-made brilliance have a lot more to them – that successful people are the beneficiaries of hidden advantages and opportunities that help to give them a leg up in a way that isn’t open to most of us. In the example of the ice hockey teams in the book (which we’re calling ice hockey for my English listeners, to distinguish it from actual hockey, which is played on a grass field), Paula Barnsley, who is the wife of psychologist Dr. Roger Barnsley, noticed during a game that the majority of the players on teams just like the Medicine Hat Tigers and Vancouver Gi

In this short ad hoc episode that was originally recorded as a Facebook Live, I discuss ways that my family is working on dismantling both White supremacy and patriarchy (and having a go at capitalism while we're at it!) this Martin Luther King Jr. Day holiday weekend. The best part is that this doesn't have to be heavy work that brings with it a huge sense of guilt. It's about building community that lifts all of us up, and gets us out of the 'stay in my lane' mindset that White supremacy uses to keep us in line. And it also doesn't have to happen only on the holiday itself - this work is just as relevant and important the rest of the year. Prefer to watch rather than listen? Click here to join the free YPM Facebook group and watch the video recording of the episode   [accordion] [accordion-item title="Click here to read the full transcript"] Jen Lumanlan 00:01 Hello, everyone, it's Jen. And I just wanted to do another live episode as it were in the free Your Parenting Mojo Facebook group because I did one recently for the events after the US Capitol siege. And responding to that, and actually looked at the analytics on it and found that it was one of my most recently downloaded episodes. So, this is sort of just another informal episode. And we'll be back to regular programming next week, but wanted to share some thoughts on Martin Luther King Jr. Day, which is today here in the US. And I think this is actually the special—the first holiday recorded an episode that I've done ever. So it feels kind of cool to be doing it for this particular day for Martin Luther King, Jr. Day. And I wanted to share some thoughts that actually I concepted on a bike ride, which tends to be how these things come about when I have some time to think. And I'm really sort of thinking, “Okay, what is it that parents need to know in this right now? What's important about continuing Dr. King's legacy?” And I talked in the episode from last week about the events in the US Capitol, about the anti-racist work that we're doing, and that is so necessary that has to continue, yes, we have to keep doing that. We also need to do things like learning about the achievements of Black people, both in history and today. And at all that I really enjoy for that is, if you're not watching on Facebook Live, I'm holding up these Black history flashcards. They're published by an organization called Urban intellectuals, which I believe is a Black-owned company. And we've actually been storing them in a little teacup on our dining room table, and my daughter will request that we go through at least one and up to three of them, I draw the line at three because then I don't get to eat dinner at the dinner table every day. And we talk through not just sort of the what are the bullet points on the back of the card that each of these individuals on the cards did.   Jen Lumanlan 01:55 But what does it mean? What does it mean that to say that they were entrepreneurs, trappers, and traders in the 1700s is one of the people that we read about last night was what kind of circumstances came into place to even make that possible when the vast majority of Black people in that period who were over in the Americas were enslaved. What kind of circumstances and personality and situation were involved in this? And so I think that that is really helping us to put some kind of context around. It's not just that there were millions of Black people here in the US, and they were all enslaved, and they were sort of this monolithic entity. But these were individual people who had individual lives and individual concerns, and they made incredibly valued and undervalued contributions to our culture, you know, inventing things and setting up one of the people we read about last night set up the city of Chicago, he founded a settlement that turned into the city of Chicago, the leaders, former leader of Kenya and Ghana, who negotiated independence from the UK. And so obviously, that focus is very much on history. And we also need to be talking about the work that Black people and other people of color are doing on an ongoing basis today. But it's just sort of an additional way that we are making this because of sort of baking these ideas into the fabric of our everyday lives.   Jen Lumanlan 03:18 And then, yes, we need to do our overtly anti-racist work, we need to be talking with our children about these ideas that don't just leave them with the impression that Black people were victimized and victims of their circumstances that they had agency in their lives and continue to have agency in their lives. And don't need rescuing. They don't need us to come and save them, they can tell us what they need and we should be listening to that. But I think it goes even deeper than that because I'm not sure that many of us myself absolutely included, fully understand the ways that White supremacy and patriarchy, and even capitalism show up in our lives. And so we've discussed

In this ad hoc episode, I outline a response to the U.S. Capitol siege. I provide some suggestions for ways to talk with your child about the events, but also ask that you take two more steps: (1) examine your own role in these events, even if you condemn them yourself (as I do); (2) take action based on your own position and role in the world to work toward equality. You can find my resources on the intersection of parenting and race here. There's a specific blog post suggesting a script for talking with children about the Black Lives Matter movement (which could be adapted for this situation) here. Showing Up for Racial Justice's Action Hours are here   [accordion] [accordion-item title="Click here to read the full transcript"] Jen Lumanlan 00:01 Hello, everybody! I am recording live in our Facebook group. And I'm also recording this separately on the camera and on audio only as a way to share this information more broadly across a variety of platforms. I thought it was actually sharing in the group a minute ago, and I am not sure that it was working so I'm just trying to give this another go around. And I think actually, I just got the same message pop up saying that I was not sharing and now I am sharing, so hopefully this is going through to everywhere that it's supposed to be going. So the content of what I want to talk about today is about what has happened at the US Capitol. And it's been a couple of days, it's Friday, today, January 8, and two days after the events happened at the Capitol. And I wasn't really sure what to say and so I didn't want to say anything, I didn't want to say the wrong thing. And I went out for a bike ride this morning and it sort of clarified for me what it was that I wanted to say. And so that's why if you're watching this on video, you're probably seeing a bit of a stripe across my forehead and I'm freshly showered because I kind of came back and was on fire about what it was that I wanted to say. And so you're sort of hearing my relatively raw unedited thoughts. And I'm a little nervous about sharing those with you which is why you probably hear this in my voice. So I want to start with talking with our children about the events that have happened at the Capitol, because I'm hearing questions in Facebook groups and other places online if parents want to have these kinds of conversations with their children, but they don't know how to do it or they're thinking, okay, maybe my children are too young to understand what's going on and I don't want to scare them, and I'm not sure if I'm going to have a conversation with them at all.   Jen Lumanlan 01:57 And so, I have published resources on this before I actually have a post on how to talk with your child about Black Lives Matter. And I think that a lot of the principles that are discussed in there are very similar. And we want to do it in an age-appropriate way, we want to lead with their questions, and so I think ideally, this will come from them being out in the world, and they'll see things that they're curious about, and they'll ask about them, and that will lead into a conversation on these topics. But if we are not out so much lately, as many of us are not and maybe we don't have the news on all the time, and so their exposure to it may be much less than it otherwise would have been. And so well, what can we do when that's the case? And we're not sure how to bring the conversation up? Well, I would say the first thing we can do is to talk about it with a spouse or significant other or another adult over dinner, or over some other period of time where it's natural for you to have a conversation. And to just talk about what's on your mind—what's been in the news today? how is today's developments casting new light on? what we're thinking about what happened at the US Capitol? And pretty soon your child is probably going to say, “What are you talking about?” Or something that indicates that they're interested in this topic and I think that that can be a jumping-off point for you to try and give some background and ideally, that this won't be the first conversation that you will have had on current events like this, and you'll be able to talk about in context, Donald Trump and the policies that he has been enacting, and the ways that he talks to people, and whom he talks to. And so, that will provide you with the context that you need to then describe what has happened.     Jen Lumanlan 03:46 When they have questions, we can answer their questions clearly and directly. And also not be afraid to say when we don't know, because there's a lot that we don't know. And we don't have to put across the impression that we do know everything to our children all the time. I think it's also fine to share how we feel about the events with our children. It's important for them to see that our words and what we're saying match our demeanor, if we are clearly afraid about something, but we're sort of saying, “Oh, don'

When parents first hear about interest-led learning (also known as self-directed education), they may wonder: why on earth would we do that? And how would my child learn without anyone teaching them?   Many parents start down this path with only an inkling of where it may end up taking them and I think this is true of our guest, Akilah Richards. Akilah grew up in a typical Jamaican family where children were not allowed to have an opinion about anything - even their own bodies and feelings. In her book Raising Free People, she writes that:   "Respect, the way [Jamaican parents] define it, is non-negotiable, and the spectrum of things a child can do to disrespect an adult, especially a parent, is miles wide and deep. Reverence for adults, not just respect, is expected, normalized, and deeply ingrained. Somebody else's mama could slap you for not showing reverence to any adult.   Physical punishment for the wrong displays of emotion, even silent ones like frowns or subtle ones like deep sighs, were commonplace, expected, celebrated as one of the reasons children "turned out right." Not only did you, as a child, dismiss any attitudes or anything adults might perceive as rudeness, your general countenance should reflect a constant respect - no space at all for showing actual emotion, if that emotion was contrary to what was reverent and pleasant for the adults in your life - again, especially your parents."   While we may not have grown up with parents who were as overtly strict as this, chances are our parents and teachers used more subtle ways of keeping us in line with behavior management charts, grades (and praise for grades) and the withdrawal of approval if we were to express 'negative' emotions like frustration or anger.   And of course this is linked to learning because compulsory schooling does not allow space for our children to be respected as individuals. There may be dedicated, talented teachers within that system that respect our children and who are doing the very best they can to provide support, but they too are working within a system that does not respect them.   So how could we use interest-led learning/self-directed education to support our child's intrinsic love of learning - as well as our relationship with them? This is the central idea that we discuss in this episode. It's a deep, enriching conversation that cuts to the heart of the relationship we want to have with our children, and I hope you enjoy it.   Ready to Support Your Child's Natural Learning Whether this episode has you considering unschooling, reinforced your commitment to traditional schooling, or left you somewhere in between, one thing is clear: every child deserves to have their natural curiosity and love of learning nurtured.   The challenge for parents isn't choosing the "right" educational path, but knowing how to support meaningful learning wherever your child is.   The Learning Membership gives you the tools to nurture your child's development whether they're in traditional school, homeschooled, or unschooled.   You'll discover how to: Turn everyday moments into rich learning opportunities (just like Laura does with her daughter)Support your child's interests and curiosity without becoming the "teacher" parentCreate a home environment that enhances rather than competes with whatever educational approach you choose   Inside the membership, you'll find research-backed strategies that work alongside any educational setting, helping you become the parent who nurtures learning rather than forcing it.   Your child's curiosity is precious - don't let it get lost in debates about educational methods.   Click the banner to learn more.     Resources discussed during the conversation: Maleka Diggs' Eclectic Learning Network Developing a Disruptor's Ear, by Akilah Richards and Maleka Diggs Toward Radical Social Change (TRUE) community Akilah's website, Raising Free People Akilah's book, Raising Free People

In this Sharing Your Parenting Mojo episode we hear from listener Anne, who has been in my Parenting Membership for a year now. In our conversation we discussed the anxiety she used to feel about every aspect of parenting, including the things she wanted to teach her son to do (Spanish! Coding!) and how she interacted with both him and with her husband.   She actually joined the Parenting Membership to learn how to become the perfect parent, and I'm sorry to say that I failed as her teacher/guide in that regard. She is not a perfect parent (and neither am I), but she is now a perfectly good enough parent, and has been able to relax into her relationship with her son because of that.   I hope you enjoy this raw, vulnerable conversation where Anne reflects on the changes she has made in her life over the last year.     [accordion] [accordion-item title="Click here to read the full transcript"] Jen 00:03 Hi, I’m Jen and I host the Your Parenting Mojo podcast where I critically examine strategies and tools related to parenting and child development that are grounded in scientific research and principles of respectful parenting. In this series of episodes called Sharing Your Parenting Mojo, we turn the tables and hear from listeners. What have they learned from the show that’s helped their parenting? Where are they still struggling? And what tools can we find in the research that will help? If you’d like to be notified when new episodes are released and get a FREE Guide to 7 Parenting Myths We Can Safely Leave Behind, seven fewer things to worry about, subscribe to the show at YourParentingMojo.com. You can also continue the conversation about the show with other listeners in the Your Parenting Mojo Facebook group. I do hope you’ll join us.   Jen 00:59 Hello, and welcome to the Your Parenting Mojo podcast. Today we're going to hear from a special guest Anne, who is a parent whom I work with on a regular basis. She's going to tell us about the anxiety that she used to feel to be the perfect parent to her son, which threatened to overwhelm her and potentially even her marriage. She actually joined my membership a couple of years ago hoping it would teach her how to become the perfect parent. And in some ways, she didn't get what she paid for at all. And another she got so much more.   Jen 01:28 Unfortunately, she didn't learn how to become the perfect parent. Instead, she realized there's no such thing as a perfect parent and that trying to be the perfect parent was tearing her apart. She learns new communication tools which we teach as a way of helping parents to get on the same page about the parenting decisions they're making, But of course, they're applicable to other kinds of conversations as well. So now she's able to talk with her husband in a way that doesn't get his back up, that helps him to understand her needs, and she's able to hear and understand his needs, and they can work together to find solutions to all kinds of problems, not just those related to parenting.   Jen 02:02 She's become deeply involved in anti-racist work, and if you join the membership, you'll actually find her leading our anti-racist group activities. When she's learned how to stand up to family members, when they say something that she finds deeply offensive. She used to just be offended and let it slide and be seething on the inside, but she doesn't do that anymore, and she knows how to decide which of these kinds of issues that families disagree on are okay to let go, and which are worth taking a stand on. And she's become increasingly confident over the last few months to take a stand on those things that she knows are important to her. So, she's learning how to set boundaries with people that she's never felt able to set boundaries with before, which is setting a great example for her son who's watching and learning from her.   Jen 02:45 So, in some ways, she's become more rigid where she used to be so flexible that her needs weren't being met. And in other ways, she's become much more flexible, where she used to be very rigid. She doesn't worry anymore about teaching her son coding, or Spanish, or any of the other skills that she wants thought were critical to his success and to her role as a good parent. Instead, she sees her son for who he is, and she's able to meet his needs rather than imposing on him what she used to feel she had to deliver to him in her role as the perfect parent.   Jen 03:17 Anne it's just one of the amazing parents that I've had the honor to work with in my memberships over the last couple of years. Some of them are former perfect parents, other parents who were just about holding it together and have found a similar sense of calm and clarity as they connect with their child's needs and have let all the unimportant stuff go. I'd love to work with you as well, no matter where you are in your parenting journey.   Jen 03:38 To learn more about the member

Let's talk problem solving! Many of us have tried it, but it's so common to get stuck...and to think that the method doesn't work, and then return in exasperation to the methods we'd been using all along. These often involve coercion, or forcing the child to do something they don't want to do - but what's the alternative?   In this episode we talk with Dr. Ross Greene, who developed the Collaborative & Proactive Solutions (formerly Collaborative Problem Solving) approach in his books The Explosive Child and Raising Human Beings. I really enjoyed digging into the research for this episode (why do all the papers describing CPS compare its effectiveness to behaviorist-based approaches?) but I ended up really taking one for the team: we didn't have time for all of my questions on the research because I wanted to make sure to address the challenges with problem solving that parents in the free Your Parenting Mojo Facebook group described when I asked them about this topic.   These challenges included: How to problem solve with very young childrenWhat to do when the same issue recurs over and over and the solutions we decide on together don't seem to helpHow to navigate a child not wanting to leave the park when it's time to goHow to approach a child who doesn't seem to be able to or refuses to communicate their feelings   Dr. Greene's books Raising Human Beings(Affiliate link)The Explosive Child(Affiliate link)   Setting Loving (& Effective!) Limits Do you have a child aged 1 - 10? Are they resisting, ignoring you, and talking back at every request you make? Do you often feel frustrated, annoyed, and even angry with them? Are you desperate for their cooperation - but don't know how to get it? If your children are constantly testing limits, the Setting Loving (& Effective!) Limits workshop is for you.   Go from constant struggles and nagging to a new sense of calm & collaboration. I will teach you how to set limits, but we'll also go waaaay beyond that to learn how to set fewer limits than you ever thought possible. Sign up for the Setting Loving (& Effective!) Limits workshop.   Click the banner to learn more.     References Note: Direct links to presentations from conferences can be found on Dr. Greene’s Lives in the Balance website: https://livesinthebalance.org/research Booker, J., & Ollendick, T.H. (2019). Patterns in the parent-child relationship and clinical outcomes in a randomized control trial. Presented at symposium, Collaborative and Proactive Solutions as an alternative to Parent Management Training for youth with oppositional defiant disorder: A comparison of therapeutic models. World Congress of Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies, Berlin, Germany. Booker, J.A., Capriola-Hall, N.N., Dunsmore, J.C., Greene, R.W., & Ollendick, T.H. (2018). Change in maternal stress for families in treatment for their children with Oppositional Defiant Disorder. Journal of Child and Family Studies 27, 2552-2561. Booker, J.A., Ollendick, T.H., Dunsmore, J.C., & Greene, R.W. (2016). Perceived parent-child relations, conduct problems, and clinical improvement following the treatment of Oppositional Defiant Disorder. Journal of Child & Family Studies 25, 1623-1633. Calam, R. M. (2016). Broadening the focus of parenting interventions with mindfulness and compassion. Clinical Psychology: Science and Practice , 23(2), 161–164. Dedousis-Wallace, A., Drysdale, S., Murrihy, R.C., Remond, L., McAloon, J., Greene, R.W., & Ollendick, T.H. (2019). Predictors and moderators of Parent Management Training and Collaborative & Proactive Solutions in the treatment of oppositional defiant disorder in youth. Presented at symposium, Collaborative and Proactive Solutions as an alternative to Parent Management Training for youth with oppositional defiant disorder: A comparison of therapeutic models. World Congress of Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies, Berlin, Germany. Dunsmore, J.C., Booker, J.A., Ollendick, T.H., & Greene, R.W. (2016). Emotion socialization in the context of risk and psychopathology: Maternal emotion coaching predicts better treatment outcomes for emotionally labile children with Oppositional Defiant Disorder. Social Development 25(1), 8-26. Fitzgerald, M., London-Johnson, A., & Gallus, K.L. (2020). Intergenerational transmission of trauma and family systems theory: An empirical investigation. Family Therapy 42(3), 406-424. Greene, R., & Winkler, J. (2019). Collaborative & Proactive Solutions (CPS): A review of findings in families, schools, and treatment facilities. Clinical Child and Family Psychology Review 22, 549-561. Greene, R.W. (2016). Raising Human Beings: Creating a collaborative partnership with your child. New York, NY: Scribner. Greene, R.W. (2014). The explosive child: A new approach for understanding and parenting easily frustrated, chronically inflexible children. New York, NY: Harper Paperbacks Greene, R.W., &

My guest for this episode is life coach and reparenting expert Xavier Dagba, who is here to discuss the topic of boundaries in parenting.   We don't tend to learn much about having boundaries when we're young, because our culture teaches that children shouldn't really need or have them (and those of us who are using respectful parenting approaches are working against the tide here). This then translates to us not knowing how to set boundaries as adults, and feeling 'walked all over' - without fully understanding why, or what to do about it.   We also talk about the limit between boundaries and limits, an important distinction as we interact with our children.   If you need more support in setting limits that your child will respect (and using far fewer of them than you might ever have thought possible - while still having your boundaries respected!), sign up for the Setting Loving (& Effective!) Limits workshop.   Click the banner to learn more.     Other resources from this episode: The Body Keeps the Score by Bessel van der Kolk, M.D.Xavier's websiteFollow Xavier on Instagram

I often hear two related ideas about adults' screen usage around children. Sometimes the parent asking the question guiltily confesses to using screens around their children more than they would like, and to using screens as a momentary escape from the demands of parenting. Or the parent asking the question feels that they have found a sense of balance in their own screen usage, but worries about their partner who frequently ignores their child because they're so focused on a screen. In this episode we interview a luminary in the field of research related to children and screen usage: Dr. Jenny Radesky, who is a Developmental Behavioral Pediatrician and Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Michigan Medical School. Her research interests include the use of mobile technology by parents and young children, and how this relates to child self-regulation and parent-child interaction, and she was the lead author of the 2016 American Academy of Pediatrics policy statement on digital media use in early childhood. We'll learn whether you should be worried about Technoference, and some judgement-free steps you can take to navigate your (or your partner's) screen usage around your child.   Parenting Membership If parenting feels really hard, and it seems like you’ve read all the books and you’ve asked for advice in free communities and you’re tired of having to weed through all the stuff that isn’t aligned with your values to get to the few good nuggets, then the Parenting Membership will help you out. Click the banner to learn more. Join the waitlist to get notified when doors reopen in May 2025.       [accordion] [accordion-item title="Click here to read the full transcript"] Jen 00:03 Hi, I’m Jen and I host the Your Parenting Mojo Podcast. We all want our children to lead fulfilling lives, but it can be so hard to keep up with the latest scientific research on child development and figure out whether and how to incorporate it into our own approach to parenting. Here at Your Parenting Mojo, I do the work for you by critically examining strategies and tools related to parenting and child development that are grounded in scientific research and principles of respectful parenting. If you’d like to be notified when new episodes are released and get a FREE Guide to 7 Parenting Myths That We Can Safely Leave Behind, seven fewer things to worry about, subscribe to the show at YourParentingMojo.com. You can also continue the conversation about the show with other listeners in the Your Parenting Mojo Facebook group. I do hope you’ll join us. Jen 01:00 Hello, everyone. Before we get into the topic of today's new episode, I wanted to let you know about my special Black Friday promotion that I have running now through midnight, Pacific time on Friday, November 27th. For this limited time, I'm offering access to my parenting membership for only $25 a month, and to my supporting your child's learning membership for only $35 a month. Now those of you who know me, and the show might be kind of surprised to hear me running a Black Friday promotion. After all, I get complaints about my left-leaning, anti-capitalist stance all the time. And I thought it would be doubly amusing to talk about this before an episode on technoference, which is when technology like our smartphones interferes with our relationships, because I imagine a number of you are planning technology related purchases for the holidays. Jen 01:43 But I decided to do this for two reasons. Firstly, I know these memberships can help you. I've seen so many parents transform their approach to parenting and get confident in supporting their child's love of learning through the memberships. And secondly, we're in a year when people are looking for holiday gifts that just don't involve bringing more stuff into our homes, and that also can't involve going out to museums and other places that may well be closed. And the parenting membership can really help you go from just hanging on to actually thriving in parenting. And the learning membership will help you make the best use of your time that you're already spending with your children to support their intrinsic love of learning. And third, things are completely aligned with my values. If you miss the Black Friday promotion, they will still be time to enroll at the regular rate starting on December 1st and we'll dive into the content as a group on January 1st. Just go to YourParentingMojo.com to learn more and enroll today. Jen 02:42 Now, whether you take advantage of the Black Friday promotion, or you enroll in December, I believe in helping as many families as possible, and I've tried to make even the regular rates accessible to everyone. I'm confident that anyone who joins and learns the material that I'll make easily accessible for you will support learning and development in their children, find parenting easier, and lay the groundwork for transformational change at home. I want to read

Sibling relationships can be SO HARD! Sometimes it might seem that we can't leave them alone for even a second before they're at each other's throats, and on top of this we see their struggles and are reminded of the struggles that we had with our own siblings so many years ago. This can cause us to overreact in the moment, even when we know it's not helping the situation. I discussed some of the reasons behind sibling squabbles a couple of years ago in a conversation with Dr. Susan McHale of Penn State University. In today's episode we build on this knowledge by discussing some super practical tools to help parents foster positive sibling relationships. In this Sharing Your Parenting Mojo episode I talk with Kira Dorrian and Deana Thayer of Future Focused Parenting, who host the Raising Adults podcast. The parents of seven children between them, including a set of twins and five in a blended family, Kira and Deana know their way around sibling squabbles.   We discuss ways to stop being the person who always has to moderate every disagreement and instead equip our children with the skills they need to find solutions to their own problems.   Jump to highlights: 02:37 Laying the foundation of possible sibling relationships by Daena Thayer. 04:35 Sibling relationship is the first peer relationship by Kira Dorrian. 05:53 How to prepare your kids for sibling rivalry? 12:02 Problem solving with children. 15:28 Teaching your child active listening. 20:01 Doing what’s best, not the easiest. 23:23 Problem solving in school. 25:55 How to deal with conflict as children grow older. 30:52 Social exclusion in schools and the calendar of character traits.

If you’ve been a parent for a while, or maybe even if you haven’t, you probably saw an article on Holding Space making the rounds of online communities a few years ago. In the article the author, Heather Plett, describes how she and her siblings were able to hold space for their dying mother in her final days because a palliative care nurse held space for them. The article outlined some principles of holding space, and I think it really resonated with a lot of people – possibly because so many of us wish we had been held in that way, and we find ourselves trying to hold space for others in that way without a lot of guidance or support. I kept that article in the back of my mind, and last year I took Heather’s 9-month in-depth course on holding space, and she’s just released a book called The art of holding space: A practice of love, liberation, and leadership. In this episode we discuss what it means to hold space for others as parents, and how to raise our children to be able to hold space for others.   Links mentioned in the episode The Art of Holding Space: A Practice of Love, Liberation, and Leadership (Affiliate link). The Centre for Holding Space Website [accordion] [accordion-item title="Click here to read the full transcript"] Jen 00:03 Hi, I'm Jen and I host the Your Parenting Mojo Podcast. We all want our children to lead fulfilling lives, but it can be so hard to keep up with the latest scientific research on child development and figure out whether and how to incorporate it into our own approach to parenting. Here at Your Parenting Mojo, I do the work for you by critically examining strategies and tools related to parenting and child development that are grounded in scientific research and principles of respectful parenting. If you'd like to be notified when new episodes are released and get a FREE Guide to 7 Parenting Myths That We Can Safely Leave Behind, seven fewer things to worry about, subscribe to the show at YourParentingMojo.com. You can also continue the conversation about the show with other listeners in the Your Parenting Mojo Facebook group. I do hope you'll join us.   Jen 00:59 Hello, and welcome to the Your Parenting Mojo podcast. If you've been a parent for a while, or maybe even if you haven't, you probably saw an article on holding space making the rounds of online communities a few years ago. In the article the author Heather Plett describes the death of her mother and how she and her siblings were able to hold space for her mother, because a palliative care nurse was holding space for them. The article outlines some principles of holding space. And I think it really resonated with a lot of people possibly because so many of us wish that we had been held in the way that in that way. And we find ourselves trying to hold space for others in that way without a lot of guidance and support.   Jen 01:38 And so, I kept that article in the back of my mind. And then last year, I took Heather's nine-month in depth course on holding space. And she's just released a book called The Art of Holding Space: A Practice of Love, Liberation and Leadership that she's here with us to discuss today. Welcome, Heather.   Heather 01:52 Thank you, Jen. It's good to be here.   Jen 01:55 And we should mention we were just chatting beforehand. Heather was mentioning her voice is a little raspy today because she's in the middle of recording the book for the audio edition. So that should hopefully be available very soon. And I also just want to mention before we get started that we may mentioned today, some topics that might be difficult for some people to listen to. These could include the topics of suicide and stillbirth. And so, we're not going to delve deeply into them. But if you're in a place where you would find hearing about these topics, any more than I just mentioned them any disturbing to you in any way, you might want to consider listening at a time when you feel well resourced, or perhaps with a friend.   Jen 02:29 So that said, Heather, I wonder if you could start by getting us on the same page, and maybe just helping us to understand what does it mean to hold space for someone?     Heather 02:38 Well, holding space is really what we do when we show up for somebody without trying to control the outcome of whatever they're going through, without placing our judgement on them or projecting our own narrative on them. It's really trying to hold them in a way that is fully supportive of the journey that they're going on and giving them the autonomy to be going through their own journey.   Jen 03:01 Okay, and so you describe that as structure, kind of three nested bowls, right? Can you help us to picture those bowls and what that's made of?   Heather 03:10 Sure. So, I've been evolving this concept of being the bowl for people and being the bowl is really about supporting somebody through their liminal space, I talk a lot about liminal space as the jo

  Parenting brings unconditional love and fulfillment, but what happens when those feelings mix with frustration, exhaustion, and even regret?   In this episode, I speak with Dr. Sarah LaChance Adams, expert in feminist philosophy and maternal ethics, to explore maternal ambivalence - those complex, conflicting emotions many parents experience but rarely discuss openly. Dr. Adams is the author of Mad mothers, bad mothers, and what a "Good" mother would do: The ethics of ambivalence.   What Is Maternal Ambivalence?   As Dr. LaChance Adams explains, drawing from Adrienne Rich's heartbreaking and beautiful description: "Maternal ambivalence is having extreme emotional conflict in one's feelings towards one's children - dealing with intense love and sometimes intense hate, the needs to be very intimate and close to one's children, but also to have a sense that one needs distance."   This complex experience involves both wanting to be near your child and sometimes feeling an urgent need to "get as far as one can from one's child." What makes maternal ambivalence particularly complicated is that it's not just about feelings toward a separate being. There's also a profound sense of self-estrangement because mothers often feel their children are integral to their own identity. As Dr. LaChance Adams notes, "In this sense of struggle, she's also in a struggle with herself and who she feels she is most intimately and deeply."   This episode builds on our recent conversations with Dr. Moira Mikolajczak on Parental Burnout and with Dr. Susan Pollak on Self-Compassion, exploring how we can love our children dearly while feeling torn between that love and our parental role that often requires putting our own needs aside.   Questions this episode will answer Is it normal to feel love and resentment toward my child at the same time? The podcast breaks down what maternal ambivalence means. It's a back-and-forth feeling between deep love and occasional resentment that many mothers feel but rarely talk about. Dr. LaChance Adams explains why these opposite feelings happen together and why they're a normal part of being a parent. You'll also learn how accepting these feelings might make your relationship with your child stronger.   How do gender, race, and socioeconomic status shape the experience of maternal ambivalence? The episode looks at how maternal ambivalence might be different based on your background. It questions whether this is mainly "a middle-class, white phenomenon." We explore Bell Hooks' view that motherhood wasn't seen as the main obstacle for Black women historically. These mixed feelings may show up differently across racial and economic groups.   How does societal pressure shape maternal ambivalence? The episode explains why our society makes these mixed feelings seem shameful instead of normal. Speaking up about them could change how you parent.   What role do cultural expectations and intensive parenting play in shaping parental guilt?We discuss how society's view of total motherly devotion can become "twisted" and hurt both mothers and children. Modern parenting culture expects mothers to always put their children first, at the cost of their own identity. Listen to understand why you might feel guilty and what you can do about it.   How can parents navigate these conflicting emotions in a healthy way? The episode provides both big-picture and personal strategies for dealing with maternal ambivalence. We build on earlier episodes about parental burnout and self-compassion. Discover practical ways to accept all your parenting feelings without shame. These mixed feelings don't have to create guilt and shame. They can form the foundation of a close connection with your child. What you’ll learn in this episode Discover why maternal ambivalence creates an emotional tug-of-war that goes beyond occasional frustration Maternal ambivalence isn't just feeling tired or annoyed sometimes—it's that deep emotional conflict where you love your child intensely while simultaneously feeling overwhelmed or even resentful. Dr. LaChance Adams explains this powerful contradiction many mothers experience, where you might desperately want your child's bedtime to arrive while also missing them terribly once they're asleep. The podcast dives into why these opposing feelings create such inner turmoil for parents and how understanding this tension is the first step toward parenting with greater peace and authenticity.   We unpack the impact of impossible standards on parental identity and self-worth When society expects perfect motherhood—always patient, always present, always fulfilled by caregiving—it creates a crushing weight on parents' mental health. The episode explores how these unrealistic expectations force many mothers to put their needs "on the back burner," leading to a gradual loss of identity. You'll learn how intensive parenting culture undermines parents' con

In this episode, Dr. Susan Pollak helps us to apply mindfulness skills to our relationships with our children so we can parent in line with our values, rather than just reacting when our children push our buttons. You'll learn: What's the point of mindfulness, and does it matter if we bring our full attention and presence to diaper changes? Why we're so hard on ourselves, even when we always try to be kind to others Some concrete tools to use when you interact with your children TODAY in those moments when it seems like everything is falling apart. Dr. Pollak is a psychologist in private practice in Cambridge, Massachusetts. She is a long-time student of meditation and yoga who has been integrating the practices of meditation into psychotherapy since the 1980s. Dr. Pollak is cofounder and teacher at the Center for mindfulness and Compassion at Harvard Medical School and the Cambridge Health Alliance, and has just stepped down as President of the Institute for Meditation and Psychotherapy, a position which she held since 2010. She also writes regularly for Psychology today on the topic of integrating mindfulness into daily life.   Book mentioned in the episode: Self-Compassion for Parents: Nurture Your Child by Caring for Yourself (Affiliate link). Other episodes related to this topic: Parental Burn-Out No Self, No Problem Helping children to develop compassion Patriarchy is perpetuated through parenting Mindfulness tools with Mindful Mama Hunter Clarke-Fields   Some key points from the interview: (04:08) Many of us, present company included, we're not raised to be kind to ourselves. (10:47) Mindful self-compassion acknowledges that we need to start with mindfulness. (I've been teaching this course for over a decade, and I've seen that) a lot of people just can't start with compassion because it's foreign for most of us to treat ourselves kindly. (53:59) Allow yourself to rest for a moment feeling that you have distance from the storm, some space from the turbulence to recognize that you are not the storm. (paraphrased) (59:03) It's such a common misconception about mindfulness that you have to sit still and not think about anything. And, you know, people are relieved to know that [mindfulness] is not about stopping our thoughts. It's really about finding a different relationship with our thoughts. [accordion] [accordion-item title="Click here to read the full transcript"] Jen 00:03 Hi, I'm Jen and I host the Your Parenting Mojo Podcast. We all want our children to lead fulfilling lives, but it can be so hard to keep up with the latest scientific research on child development and figure out whether and how to incorporate it into our own approach to parenting. Here at Your Parenting Mojo, I do the work for you by critically examining strategies and tools related to parenting and child development that are grounded in scientific research and principles of respectful parenting. If you'd like to be notified when new episodes are released and get a FREE Guide to 7 Parenting Myths That We Can Safely Leave Behind, seven fewer things to worry about, subscribe to the show at YourParentingMojo.com. You can also continue the conversation about the show with other listeners in the Your Parenting Mojo Facebook group. I do hope you'll join us. Jen 01:00 Hello, and welcome to the Your Parenting Mojo Podcast. In this episode, we're going to draw threads together from across a number of recent episodes. Most obviously it picks up on our interview with Dr. Moira Mikolajczak where we discuss parental burnout. After that episode concluded Dr. Mikolajczak and I emailed a bit about tools that could potentially help parents, and the primary one that she found useful was the idea of self-compassion. And that's what we're going to discuss today. This topic also picks up on our conversation with Dr. Chris Niebauer about the stories that our left brain tells us by giving us some concrete strategies on how to do that. And it builds on a conversation we had about three years ago with Dr. Brendan Ozawa-de Silva on the topic of compassion. We also touch on issues related to patriarchy and go deeper into some of the mindfulness tools that Hunter Clark-Fields shared with us recently. Jen 01:50 And here to do all of this with us is Dr. Susan Pollak, who is a psychologist in private practice in Cambridge, Massachusetts. She is a longtime student of meditation and yoga and has been integrating the practices of meditation into psychotherapy since the 1980s. Dr. Pollack is cofounder and teacher at the Center for Mindfulness and Compassion at Harvard Medical School and Cambridge Health Alliance, and has just stepped down as President of the Institute for Meditation and Psychotherapy, a position that she held since 2010. She also writes regularly for Psychology Today on the topic of integrating mindfulness into daily life. Welcome, Dr. Pollack. Dr. Pollak 02:24 Thanks, Jen. It's a pleasure to be with you. Jen 02:28 So, we're going to tal

Parents often reach out to me to ask how they can support their perfectionist children, who can't seem to cope with failure. I've been on the lookout for someone to talk with us for a while, but just as with our episode on anxiety, it took quite some searching to find an expert who doesn't take a behaviorist-based approach - meaning that if the behavior is fixed, the problem is fixed too. I was really glad to find today's guest, Dr. Paul Hewitt, who is a Professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of British Columbia. Dr. Hewitt has spent decades researching perfectionism and recently received the Donald O. Hebb award for his distinguished contributions to psychology as a science by the Canadian Psychological Association. He is currently doing research on the treatment of perfectionism, and trains clinicians in the treatments of perfectionistic behavior. In this interview, he tells us what we know about perfectionism, what we still don't know, and how to help our children who have perfectionist tendencies.   Books mentioned in the episode: Perfectionism: A Relational Approach to Conceptualization, Assessment, and Treatment Perfectionism in Childhood and Adolescence: A Developmental Approach (Affiliate links).   [accordion] [accordion-item title="Click here to read the full transcript"] Jen 00:03 Hi, I'm Jen and I host the Your Parenting Mojo Podcast. We all want our children to lead fulfilling lives. But it can be so hard to keep up with the latest scientific research on child development and figure out whether and how to incorporate it into our own approach to parenting. Here at Your Parenting Mojo, I do the work for you by critically examining strategies and tools related to parenting and child development that are grounded in scientific research and principles of respectful parenting. If you'd like to be notified when new episodes are released and get a FREE Guide to 7 Parenting Myths That We Can Safely Leave Behind, seven fewer things to worry about. Subscribe to the show at YourParentingMojo.com. You can also continue the conversation about the show with other listeners in the Your Parenting Mojo Facebook group. I do hope you'll join us.   Jen 01:01 Hello, and welcome to the Your Parenting Mojo Podcast. Today we're going to look at a topic that bubbles up fairly often in online parenting groups, and that's related to perfectionism. The typical post goes something like this, my child starts an activity but as soon as something doesn't go exactly the way they hope to maybe a crayon wasn't the color they wanted, or they extended a mark too far on the paper. Or they got an answer wrong on a quiz for school. They screw up the paper in a ball and throw it away. And when this happens on a regular basis, it just seems debilitating. How can I help my child to overcome this now while they're still young, so it doesn't have a big impact on their life?   Jen 01:39 And I was actually in the library a while ago looking for books on another topic for another podcast episode and right next to the one I was there to get was an edited volume on perfectionism. And inside was an essay by our guest today Dr. Paul Hewitt. And when I read that essay, and I delved into his body of work, I knew he was exactly the right guest to speak with us.   Jen 01:59 Dr. Hewitt works mostly with adults. But just as we learned when we covered anxiety a few months ago, it can be really difficult to find someone to interview who doesn't just focus on treating the symptoms of the problem, and instead goes beneath the symptoms to understand the real causes, which is what Dr. Hewitt's work does so effectively. Dr. Hewitt is a professor of psychology, and a registered clinical psychologist who has conducted extensive research on the construct of perfectionism, which is the idea of what perfectionism actually is, and whether it's harmful to people. He's currently doing research on the treatment of perfectionism and trains clinicians in the treatment of perfectionistic behavior. Dr. Hewitt received his BA from the University of Manitoba, his M.A., and his PhD from the University of Saskatchewan, and he currently leads the Perfectionism and Psychopathology Lab at the University of British Columbia. In 2019, Dr. Hewitt received the Donald O. Hebb Award for Distinguished Contributions to Psychology as a Science for his work on perfectionism.   Jen 02:56 Welcome, Dr. Hewitt.   Dr. Hewitt 02:58 Thank you very much.   Jen 02:59 All right. So let's start with definitions because it seems as though this should be kind of an easy thing to do, right to define what perfectionism is, but the more you start poking at it, the more you realize it's a pretty nebulous concept. So, can you please tell us how you define perfectionism?   Dr. Hewitt 03:15 You're right it on first blush, it feels like something that should be fairly straightforward. And indeed, a lot of people in the literature, treat it as so

I've heard from listeners that what they call "The Dark Horse Episode," the interview with Dr. Todd Rose, that this is one of their favorite conversations on the podcast, and for this reason I'm doing something I've never done before: reissuing that episode. Dr. Rose and I discussed ways to personalize children's learning to help them truly discover and live their full potential - both academically and personally (and even getting rid of that distinction entirely...).   Check out what listeners who subsequently joined the Learning Membership said in our private community before the membership had even officially started:     Click the banner to learn more!     References Cantor, P., Osher, D., Berg, J., Steyer, L., & Rose, T. (2019). Malleability, plasticity, and individuality: How children learn and develop in context. Applied Developmental Science 23(4), 307-337. Mischel, W. (2004). Toward an integrative science of the person. Annual Review of Psychology 55, 1-22. Osher, D., Cantor, P., Berg, J., Steyer, L., & Rose, T. (2018). Drivers of human development: How relationships and context shape learning and development. Applied Developmental Science, 1-31. Osher, D., Cantor, P., Berg, J., Steyer, L., & Rose, T. (January 2017). Science of learning and development: A synthesis. American Institutes for Research. Downloaded from: https://www.air.org/sites/default/files/downloads/report/Science-of-Learning-and-Development-Synthesis-Osher-January-2017.pdf Rose, T., & Ogas, O. (2018). Dark Horse: Achieving success through the pursuit of fulfillment. New York, NY: HarperCollins. Rose, T., McMahon, G.T., Saxberg, B., & Christensen, U.J. (2018). Learning in the 21st Century: Concepts and tools. Clinical Chemistry 64(10), 1423-1429. Rose, T. (2015). The end of average: How we succeed in a world that values sameness. New York, NY: HarperCollins. Rose, L.T., Rouhani, P., & Fischer, K.W. (2013). The science of the individual. Mind, Brain, and Education 7(3), 152-158.

Ever have a vague sense that your interactions with your child aren't quite aligned with your values...but aren't quite sure what to do about it?   Have you been to a protest and shouted "Black Lives Matter! Fight the Power!"...and then gone home and forced your child to brush their teeth?   Have you chastised Grandma for 'stealing' kisses from your child because it disrespects their body autonomy...and then pinned them down for a haircut?   You're not alone. We're in this weird place where we know we want to do things differently than the way we were raised. But cultural norms are still telling us: we need to be in charge. (Because if we aren't in charge, who is?)   A conversation with the hosts of Upbringing My guests today, Hannah and Kelty of the Upbringing podcast, see this dissonance more clearly than almost anyone I've met. In their podcast they explore how we live one way as people (who believe in freedom! respect! consent! empathy!) and another way as parents (timeouts, shame, control, consequences), and how we're unwittingly undermining the very skills and values we hope to promote.   But blaming and shaming helps nobody (not us...and certainly not our children). By instead approaching the topic with compassion and optimism, we can get out of an us vs. them relationship with our children, and take back our parenting practices from our cultural conditioning, and parent in relationship with our children in a way that's deeply aligned with our values.   Hannah and Kelty describe their RESIST approach (Respect, Empathy, Sync up, Innovate, Summarize, Trust) and also have a new guide to navigating sibling conflict (use discount code MOJO at checkout for 15% off!) on their beautiful website. If our conversation strikes a chord, I'd definitely encourage you to check out their podcast and weekly Q&As on Instagram.   Parenting Membership If parenting feels really hard, and it seems like you’ve read all the books and you’ve asked for advice in free communities and you’re tired of having to weed through all the stuff that isn’t aligned with your values to get to the few good nuggets, then the Parenting Membership will help you out.   The Parenting Membership is now open for immediate enrollment. Sign up now!    

In this episode we hear from Denise, who claims to have listened to every Your Parenting Mojo episode... Denise is a Filipina living in Madrid, and the intentional, respectful parenting style she's chosen to use is somewhat out of place in both cultures. She wanted to chat about what to do when her daughter is having some big feelings out in public, and a well-meaning senior citizen approaches and says directly to her daughter: "You shouldn't cry, because you look ugly when you cry." We talk through the immediate issue, as well as all the layers underneath that question, on this episode. And Denise's children make a surprise guest appearance at the end! You can find Denise on Facebook at facebook.com/DeniseSuarezConCarino [accordion] [accordion-item title="Click here to read the full transcript"] Jen 00:02 Hi, I'm Jen and I host the Your Parenting Mojo podcast where I critically examine strategies and tools related to parenting and child development that are grounded in scientific research and principles of respectful parenting. In this series of episodes called Sharing Your Parenting Mojo, we turn the tables and hear from listeners. What have they learned from the show that's helped their parenting? Where are they still struggling? And what tools can we find in the research that will help? If you'd like to be notified when new episodes are released and get a FREE Guide to 7 Parenting Myths We Can Safely Leave Behind, seven fewer things to worry about, subscribe to the show at YourParentingMojo.com. You can also continue the conversation about the show with other listeners in the Your Parenting Mojo Facebook group. I do hope you'll join us. Hello and welcome to the Your Parenting Mojo podcast and to today's episode of Sharing Your Parenting Mojo. And today I'm here with Denise. And Denise, do you want to say hi and tell us a bit about you and your family?   Denise 01:09 Hi, hi, Jen. I'm Denise. I'm from the Philippines. But I live in Madrid. I have two kids age two and four. And I am also a parenting coach and certified how to talk so kids will listen workshop facilitator.   Jen 01:24 Yeah, so it always feels like we're old friends at this point. And they're never met we've been working together for it's got to be almost two years by now. It was   Denise 01:32 I would say, well for you. You've known me for almost two years. I would say I've known you much longer.   Jen 01:41 Isn't that weird?   Denise 01:44 Yeah, because I started listening to your podcast, I think my daughter must have been like four months old, and she's four now.   Jen 01:57 Okay, now now this is getting really weird. There are a few listeners out there, I know of a few of them by name, who have listened to every podcast episode and I believe you're one of those, aren't you?   Denise 02:08 Yeah.   Jen 02:10 Awesome. So um, so you were curious about coming on to Sharing Your Parenting Mojo to talk about kind of, I guess, an interconnected issue around big feelings and cultural issues and, kinds of stuff related to that, right? I guess that probably comes up a lot for you, because you are raising children in a culture that is not the one that you were raised in yourself.   Denise 02:31 Yep. And all of this really started with you.   Jen 02:34 Oh, my goodness, I'm sorry.   Denise 02:38 It all started with that guide on, I didn't even remember what the name of the guide was.   Jen 02:44 Holding values in the Finding Your Parenting Major Membership. Yeah.   Denise 02:49 Yeah. It all started from there. And there were and the questions that you asked which were just like, what are the cultures that you identify with? How do you want to raise your children in line with these cultures, in what ways are you going to be working against them? For me just really made me realise like, oh, there are really these two different cultures that are at play right now. And even though we are living in Madrid, we are living in Spain, and we have that Spanish culture, it doesn't negate the fact that I'm from the Philippines, and that I have my own, like history and my own culture that I also want to pass on to my children in some way. Maybe not in oh, and that's how I realised just how different it is like, you know, parenting in itself has its own difficulties, but when you kind of like, add in that like extra mix, it just makes it all the more interesting. Yeah.   Jen 03:49 So what kind of situations does it play out in for you them?   Denise 03:52 So this is actually one of the things that I wanted to talk about with you Jen was about. So one of the things that like I'm working against. And this comes from both Filipino and Spanish cultures is the denial of feelings, right? It's the you're not allowed to cry. And so sometimes this happens in the middle of the street and I have my daughter crying and you know, she is all out and I'm there kind of holding that space for her. When an ol

This episode on the topic of materialism concludes our series on the intersection of parenting and money. Here we talk with Dr. Susanna Opree of Erasmus University Rotterdam, who studies the effect of advertising and commercial media on use, materialism, and well-being. We discuss how children's understanding of materialism shifts as they age, the extent to which advertising contributes to materialism, and the specific role that parents play in passing on this value. Other episodes in this series: This episode is the second in a series on the intersection of parenting and money. You can find other episodes in this series: 038: The Opposite of Spoiled 105: How to pass on mental wealth to your child 107: The impact of consumerism on children 112: How to Set up a Play Room 115: Reducing the Impact of Advertising to Children     [accordion] [accordion-item title="Click here to read the full transcript"] Dr. Opree 00:00 Basically, if you want to reduce materialism, you need to make sure that's those human connections. And those other values such as generosity, that they are amplified. And so I think what works best if Why do you see young kids to invest in their self-esteem a little bit as well also for adolescence, but I think also teaching young people to be grateful to be grateful ourselves as well for all the things that we have. And really just focus on making those connections. And the tricky thing is that sometimes possessions enable these connections. But I think if we're more focused on what's intrinsic to us, what makes us happy, outside of possessions that then basically the emphasis will shift.   Jen 00:52 Hi, I'm Jen and I host the Your Parenting Mojo podcast. We all want our children to lead fulfilling lives, but it can be so hard to keep up with the latest scientific research on child development and figure out whether and how to incorporate it into our own approach to parenting. Here at Your Parenting Mojo, I do the work for you by critically examining strategies and tools related to parenting and child development that are grounded in scientific research and principles of respectful parenting. If you'd like to be notified when new episodes are released and get a FREE Guide to 7 Parenting Myths That We Can Safely Leave Behind, seven fewer things to worry about, subscribe to the show at yourparentingmojo.com. You can also continue the conversation about the show with other listeners in the Your Parenting Mojo Facebook group. I do hope you'll join us Hello, and welcome to the Your Parenting Mojo podcast. And today's episode we're going to bring our series on the intersection of children and money to a conclusion we started out so long ago by talking with New York Times money columnist Ron Lieber about his book The Opposite of Spoiled. More recently we heard from Dr. Brad Klontz, about how we pass on money scripts to our children. And then we talked with Dr. Allison Pugh about the meaning children make out of the messages they receive about material goods. And then Dr. Esther Rozendaal on how children's brains process advertising. And in between we looked at what research there is on how to set up a playroom, which has of course many links with the items that we buy and use. And so finally, we're here today with Dr. Suzanna Opree to bring the discussion up to a level that kind of draws all this together as we try and understand what materialism is, and how we pass it on to our children and what we can do if we don't want our children to be very materialistic. Dr. Opree is Senior Assistant Professor of quantitative methods in the department of Media and Communication at Erasmus University Rotterdam. Her research focuses on the effect of advertising and commercial media on use, materialism, and well-being. Welcome Dr. Opree!   Dr. Opree 03:00 Thank you for having me.   Jen 03:01 Okay, so I wonder if we could start with something that seems as though it should be kind of simple. And then it turned out that it wasn't. Can you define materialism for us? Because I would, as I was reading through the literature, I found at least six different definitions of it.   Dr. Opree 03:15 Yeah, there are indeed many definitions. Luckily, though, some scholars have already tried to make sense of all those different definitions. And so I myself always go by the work of Richins and Dawson, and they say that materialism is basically three things. So first, it's finding possessions important and just wanting to collect as many possessions as you can. That's the first thing. The second thing is that you actually think that these possessions will make you happier, and not only in the short term, but also in the long run. And so that's basically one of the motivators for actually collecting possessions. And then the third one has to do more with impression management, so to say. So it's that you want to have possessions for adults to basically impress all the others around you. So think of havi

One of the questions I see asked most often in parenting forums these days is some variation on: "I’m worried about my child’s socialization now that it looks like daycares, preschools and schools have been closed for several months and will likely remain closed for several more months. Can someone please tell me if I really do need to worry about what the complete lack of socialization with other children will do to my [only] child?” So we'll take a look at that, and then we'll go on to take a look at the other kinds of socialization that happen in school that you may not have even realized happens until we dig into the research on it.   I also let you know about a new Pandemic Pods 'in a box' course. A lot of parents are thinking of forming what are being called Pandemic Pods - a small group of children who are working together either in some kind of parent care exchange or with a hired teacher/tutor. As I'm sure you can imagine, there are a host of ways to set up these pods in a way that exacerbate existing inequalities that pervade the public school system. And there are also ways to set them up that might actually help us to begin to overcome some of these issues. Listen in to learn how! Click here to learn more about the Pandemic Pods 'in a box' course   [accordion] [accordion-item title="Click here to read the full transcript"] Hello, and welcome to the Your Parenting Mojo podcast. Today’s podcast episode is on the topic of socialization, because one of the questions I’m seeing most often in parenting forums these days runs along the lines of "I’m worried about my child’s socialization now that it looks like daycares, preschools and schools have been closed for several months and will likely remain closed for several more months. Can someone please tell me if I really do need to worry about what the complete lack of socialization with other children will do to my only child?” So that’s the main topic for our conversation today. But I also wanted to let you know about some other resources I’ve been putting together for parents who are struggling to cope right now, and this episode is related to those as well. You might have already seen that I have a course called The Confident Homeschooler, which gives you all the information you need to decide whether homeschooling could be right for your child and your family. It’s based on scientific research, as everything I do is, but it’s not huge and indigestible. It’s a series of short videos that you could binge-watch in an evening or two, and it gives you everything you need to make a decision about whether homeschooling can really work for you whether you’ll need a curriculum, and if so, how to choose one; how to use your child’s interests to develop their intrinsic love of learning, the social and emotional learning that will enable your child’s success when they return to school, overcoming problems like working with children of different ages, and ways to assess your children’s learning so you can feel confident they are keeping up with academic standards, if you decide that’s important to you. If you want to find out more about The Confident Homeschooler you can do that at yourparentingmojo.com/confidenthomeschooler.     But with many districts announcing that they are moving to remote-only learning for at least the first part of the fall semester, many parents are no longer in a position where they’re choosing whether homeschooling is right for them, they’re doing some form of it whether they want to or not. And parents are panicking. They’re panicking about their children’s learning, and whether their children are somehow going to ‘fall behind’ if they can’t make attending school two days a week work, or if they already know from what happened in Spring that their child just isn’t going to be able to sit in front of Zoom calls for even an hour each day. Parents who are in this position are starting to form what are being called Pandemic Pods, and if you haven’t heard of these yet then you will most likely be hearing more about them soon. They pretty much exploded over social media just last weekend here in the Bay Area, and I expect they’ll move outward from there to other places where schools are closed. So a Pandemic Pod is a small group of families that are getting together to support their child’s development and learning in some way. Exactly how that will be done depends on the age of the children; for younger children this might essentially be a nanny share arrangement. For older ones there would be some aspect of supporting the children’s learning, and this can vary from learning about things the children are interested in to making sure the children complete every assignment sent home by the school district and ensuring readiness for the next grade of learning when school reopens. On the first day people were talking about Pandemic Pods there was a huge rush to form them. And then the very next day, it seemed like people r

We're delving a little deeper into the topic of mindfulness with none other than the Mindful Mama, Hunter Clarke-Fields! We discuss Hunter's journey from being triggered just as often as the rest of us, to using mindfulness techniques to center herself so she can parent more effectively. She even walks me through an impromptu mini-meditation! You can buy Hunter's book, Raising good humans: A mindful guide to breaking the cycle of reactive parenting and raising kind, confident kids on Amazon or at your local bookstore.

Work-family conflict can seem unavoidable - especially in the era of COVID when we're either working from home with children underfoot all day, or we're an essential worker who has to leave the house and can't find childcare. In this conversation with licensed psychologist Dr. Yael Schonbrun, Assistant Professor of Psychology at Brown University, and co-host of the Psychologists Off The Clock podcast, we acknowledge that we must enact policies that provide more of a safety net for families. But even in the absence of these policies, we can make choices that allow us to live in greater alignment with our values, and also find a sense of peace. If you enjoyed episode 113 on Dr. Chris Niebauer's book No Self, No Problem, then you'll find that the tools we discuss in this episode flow directly from that one.   Here's a link to the Choice Point tool that we discuss Here are some Psychologists Off The Clock episodes that discuss Acceptance and Commitment Therapy in greater depth: https://www.offtheclockpsych.com/podcast/acceptance-commitment-therapy https://www.offtheclockpsych.com/podcast/the-heart-of-act https://www.offtheclockpsych.com/podcast/take-committed-action   [accordion] [accordion-item title="Click here to read the full transcript"] Jen 00:02 Hi, I am Jen and I host the Your Parenting Mojo podcast where I critically examine strategies and tools related to parenting and child development that are grounded in scientific research and principles of respectful parenting. In this series of episodes called Sharing Your Parenting Mojo, we turn the tables and hear from listeners. What have they learned from the show that is helped their parenting? Where are they still struggling? And what tools can we find in the research that will help? If you'd like to be notified when new episodes are released and get a FREE Guide To 7 Parenting Myths We Can Safely Leave Behind 7 Fewer Things To Worry About, subscribe to the show at yourparentingmojo.com. You can also continue the conversation about the show with other listeners in the Your Parenting Mojo Facebook group. I do hope you will join us.   Jen 00:59 Hello and welcome to the Your Parenting Mojo podcast. Regular listeners might remember that a few months ago we talked with listener Kelly and Dr. Moira Mikolajczak on the topic of parental burnout. And we discussed how parental burnout is a constellation of symptoms that can include mental and physical exhaustion and emotional distancing from children, loss of feelings of being effective as a parent. And it can lead to an assortment of risks for both the parent and the child including shame and loneliness and the risk of neglect of the child or violence towards the child. And the feeling that the situation can only be escaped through divorce or abandonment or suicide. And we talked about how one of the big causes of parental burnout is the unrealistic expectations that we put on mothers to somehow sacrifice everything for their child, and also lead a fulfilling life for themselves. In the show notes, I gave a link to an assessment the Dr. Mikolajczak and her colleagues developed to help you figure out whether you might have burnout because it might not be as obvious as you think. And after the interview, I emailed with her and we discussed how powerful self-compassion can be as a tool to deal with burnout.   More recently, I was listening to a podcast that I really enjoy called Psychologists Off the Clock which features four psychologists discussing the principles that they use in their clinical work, and how they can help the rest of us to flourish in our work and our parenting and our relationships as well. And one of the hosts is Dr. Yael Schonbrun, and she is here with us today. Dr. Schonbrun Brown is a licensed clinical psychologist with a private practice. She is also an assistant professor at Brown University. And she is writing a book on the topic of work-family conflict, which can be an important precursor to parental burnout, which is how these topics are connected. So I got to chatting with her about this by email and I realized that not only are a large proportion of my listeners, working parents, but the ideas that she's thinking about are actually applicable to anyone who feels tension between their family and some other aspect of their life. So, she is going to talk us through this and also give us some new tools to deal with the days when our lives just seem a little bit out of control. So welcome, Dr. Schonbrun.   Dr. Schonbrun 03:00 Thank you so much Jen for having me. And I just want to take a quick moment to compliment your podcast, which is awesome. I love that you integrate data and compassion for parents and the work that you put out there is amazing. I am really honored to be a part of it.   Jen 03:11 Oh, thank you. It is great to have you here. So, I am always the first to admit, as far as working parenthood goes, I have it pretty easy. Even when I had a day job,

We're almost (but not quite!) at the end of our lengthy series on the intersection of money and parenting. Most recently, we talked with Dr. Allison Pugh to try to understand the answer to the question "Given that advertising is happening, how do parents and children respond?" In this episode we take a step back by asking "what about that advertising?" with Dr. Esther Rozendaal of Radboud University in the Netherlands whose research focuses on children's understanding of advertising messages. Can children understand that advertising is different from regular TV programming? At what age do they realize an advertisement is an attempt to sell them something? And what should parents do to reduce the impact of advertising on children? It's all here in this episode.   Other episodes in this series This episode is the first in a series on the intersection of parenting and money. You can find other episodes in this series: 038: The Opposite of Spoiled 105: How to pass on mental wealth to your child 107: The impact of consumerism on children 112: How to Set up a Play Room 118: Are You Raising Materialistic Kids?   [accordion] [accordion-item title="Click here to read the full transcript"] Jen 00:03 Hi, I'm Jen and I host the Your Parenting Mojo podcast. We all want our children to lead fulfilling lives. But it can be so hard to keep up with the latest scientific research on child development and figure out whether and how to incorporate it into our own approach to parenting. Here at Your Parenting Mojo, I do the work for you by critically examining strategies and tools related to parenting and child development that are grounded in scientific research and principles of respectful parenting. If you'd like to be notified when new episodes are released, and get a FREE Guide to 7 Parenting Myths That We Can Safely Leave Behind 7 Fewer Things to Worry About, subscribe to the show at yourparentingmojo.com. You can also continue the conversation about the show with other listeners in the Your Parenting Mojo Facebook group. I do hope you'll join us Hello and welcome to the Your Parenting Mojo podcast.   Today's episode is a continuation of a series that I'm doing on the intersection of childhood and money. We started by talking with New York Times money columnist Ron Lieber, on his book The Opposite of Spoiled and then continue the conversation with Dr. Brad Klontz about the money scripts that we pass on to our children. Next, we heard from Dr. Allison Pugh who studies the way that parents and children manage in our consumerist culture. Dr. Pugh is a sociologist who is more interested in how people interact with each other than the ways their brains work. And she also takes advertising as a given and says, since advertising and commercialization is happening, how do parents and children respond? But of course, there's another side to the story. And that's the perspective that yes, advertising is happening and what does this mean for our children? How do our children perceive advertisements? Can they understand when a company is trying to sell them something and can we teach them to be more aware about this or is it a lost cause?   Our guest today is Dr. Esther Rozendaal. She's an associate professor At the behavioral Science Institute, as well as an associate professor in communication science at Radford University in the Netherlands. Dr. Rozendaal is an expert on young people's media and consumer behavior and Her research focuses in large part on children and advertising. She obtained a master's in Business Economics from Erasmus University Rotterdam followed immediately by an MSc in social psychology from the University of Tilburg in the Netherlands, followed by a PhD from the University of Amsterdam, for which she wrote her dissertation on the topic of advertising literacy and children's susceptibility to advertising. Welcome Dr. Rozendaal. Thank you. Thanks so much for being here with us. So I wonder if we can sort of start at the beginning and just say, Okay, why do companies advertise? It seems as though companies advertise products because they want us to buy the products. But how does this actually happen? What kind of changes does advertising bring about in I guess all people, children and adults?   Dr. Rozendaal 02:57 Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, of course. First of all, for companies and for their brands, it's really important that we are aware of them, right? So if they want to make money, so if it's of course the core business, we need to be aware of all the products that they are creating that they're selling. So that's actually the fact that we can recognize all those products when we are in shops, or even that we can free recall those products that we can say okay, so I'm in need for a new type of mascara, for example. And now suddenly, this brand pops up in my mind, I'd like to have it so that's actually the first thing they like to create in our minds. And then of course, they wan

I had originally approached today's topic of Othering through a financial lens, as part of the series of episodes on the intersection of parenting and money (previous episodes have been on NYT Money colunist Ron Lieberman's book The Opposite of Spoiled, How to Pass on Mental Wealth to your Child, The Impact of Consumerism on Parenting, and How to Set Up A Play Room. The series will conclude in the coming weeks with episodes on advertising and materialism).   I kept seeing questions in parenting groups: How can I teach my child about volunteering? How can I donate the stuff we don't need without making the recipient feel less than us?   And, of course, after the Black Lives Matter movement began its recent up-swing of activity, the topic took on a new life that's more closely related to my guest's work: viewing othering through the lens of race.   My guest, Dr. John A. Powell, is an internationally recognized expert in the areas of civil rights and civil liberties and a wide range of issues including race, structural racism, ethnicity, housing, poverty, and democracy. He is the Director of the Othering & Belonging Institute (formerly Haas Institute for a Fair and Inclusive Society), which supports research to generate specific prescriptions for changes in policy and practice that address disparities related to race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, disability, and socioeconomics in California and nationwide. In addition to being a Professor of Law and Professor of African American Studies and Ethnic Studies at the University of California, Berkeley, Professor powell holds the Robert D. Haas Chancellor’s Chair in Equity and Inclusion.   Our conversation was wide-ranging and touched on a host of topics and thinkers, which I promised to track down if I could. These include: Martha Minow's book Making All The Difference Aristotle's theory of Arithmetic and Geometric Equality Judith Butler's book Gender Trouble Amartya Sen's idea that poverty is not a lack of stuff, but a lack of belonging Dr. Susan Fiske's work on the connection between liking and competence Lisa Delpit's book Other People's Children Dr. Gordon Allport's book The Nature of Prejudice Max Weber's idea of methodological individualism The movie Trading Places (I still haven't seen it!) This blog post touches on Dr. powell's idea of the danger of allyship John Rawls' idea that citizens are reasonable and rational Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs Richard Bernstein's concept of the regulative ideal   Dr. John Powell's Book Racing to Justice: Transforming Our Conceptions of Self and Other to Build an Inclusive Society (Affiliate link).   [accordion] [accordion-item title="Click here to read the full transcript"] Jen 01:11 Hello and welcome to the Your Parenting Mojo podcast. In today's episode, we're going to draw together themes from a couple of different series that we've been working on over the last few months. One of these was on the intersection of Whiteness and parenting, and the other more recent one has been on the intersection of money and parenting. And one common theme across both of these topics is the idea of seeing someone who's different from you as somehow other than you. And so I'm deeply honored today to welcome Dr. John Powell, who is an internationally recognized expert in the areas of civil rights and civil liberties. Dr. Powell is the director of the Othering and Belonging Institute at the University of California Berkeley, which supports research to generate specific prescriptions for changes in policy and practice that address disparities related to race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, disability and socio economics in California and nationwide. Dr. Powell is Professor of Law and also Professor of African American Studies and Ethnic Studies at UC Berkeley. And is the author of the book Racing to Justice: Transforming Our Concepts of Self and Other to Build an Inclusive Society. Welcome, Dr. Powell.   Dr. Powell 02:17 Nice to be here, Jen.   Jen 02:19 And so I should also add that we scheduled this interview way back in February, right? Because your calendar is absolutely bananas. And we're just now talking here at the beginning of May. And so to put this in context, when we scheduled this in February, COVID-19 was something that was happening in China and really didn't seem to affect us very much or like it was going to affect us very much. And here in May, obviously, we are in a very different situation. And so I think our conversation today is going to be even more powerful with this additional context of othering that we're seeing related to things like attacks on Asian Americans here in the US, as well as under counting the number of Native Americans who have the virus, and how the whole world is basically shut down for an illness that's killed a small fraction of the number of people that diarrheal diseases and tuberculosis kill every year. Although, obviously the people

  School districts are starting to make plans to reopen - some with sneeze guards between desks; some on reduced schedules to accommodate the amount of space needed for social distancing, while some are going online-only for the Fall semester. How will your child cope with this? Did your child adapt well to online learning when schools closed? Will they find it relatively easy to see their friends but not be close to them? There are some children for whom these arrangements work well, but for others parents see big trouble ahead. What are the options? Even if you've never considered homeschooling as a realistic option in the past, it might now be the tool that gets you through the next few months. But are you terrified that you don't know everything your child needs to know? And how could it possibly work for your family? Join me for a conversation with Dr. Laura Froyen, who is considering homeschooling her two children next semester - even though she has a Ph.D. in Human Development and Family Studies and wrote a dissertation on supporting young children in learning to read, she's nervous that she doesn't know everything she needs to know - so if you're worried about this you're certainly not alone! We look at what we know about how long children actually spend learning in school (the answer is going to shock you!), how you can work AND homeschool, and how you can get confident that you really can support your child's love of learning - even if you know your child will eventually go back to school.   Click the banner to learn more about The Confident Homeschooler:       [accordion] [accordion-item title="Click here to read the full transcript"]   Jen Hi, I'm Jen and I host the Your Parenting Mojo Podcast where I critically examine strategies and tools related to parenting and child development that are grounded in scientific research and principles of respectful parenting. In this series of episodes called Sharing Your Parenting Mojo, we turn the tables and hear from listeners. What have they learned from the show that's helped their parenting? Where are they still struggling? And what tools can we find in the research that will help? If you'd like to be notified when new episodes are released and get a FREE guide to 7 Parenting Myths We Can Safely Leave Behind, 7 Fewer Things to Worry About subscribe to the show at yourparentingmojo.com. You can also continue the conversation about the show with other listeners in the Your Parenting Mojo Facebook group. I do hope you'll join us   Jen Hello, and welcome to Sharing Your Parenting Mojo. We are here with Dr. Laura Froyen today to discuss the topic of homeschooling. She's thinking about whether and how to do it over the next few months. And as we were chatting about it, we figured that some of the things that she's thinking about right now are probably similar to some of the things that other parents are thinking about too. And so we thought, why not just get on a call and discuss them live and share what we're thinking and what we're learning with other people as well. So that's kind of what we're going to do today. So welcome, Laura, do you want to tell us a bit about yourself and your background first?   Laura Absolutely. Thanks for having me and agreeing to answer my questions Jen. So so I'm Dr. Laura Froyen and I have my PhD in Human Development and Family Studies with a specialization in couples and family therapy. I am currently a peaceful parenting and respectful relationship coach and course creator, but I started right out of grad school in an academic job. And so I did my dissertation on how family processes influenced the home learning environment and children's early literacy skills. I'm a big believer in delaying, reading, teaching, active reading, teaching until in a developmentally appropriate age. I've always been deeply curious and, you know, interested in the prospect of homeschooling, but then also not sure if I could ever handle doing it. I have a very strong willed personality, I tend towards control. It's something that being in the respectful parenting world as a constant exercise and letting go for me. My oldest daughter is my best teacher in that way. So I guess I just I'm so glad that I get the chance to learn from such an expert on this, as I'm trying to make a really conscious and informed decision for my family.   Jen And I think the thing that stuck out to me when you were saying that you wanted to talk about this was that you have a PhD in a related topic and you've studied reading, and you still feel unsure about how to best support your child in learning to read. And so when parents are thinking, oh my goodness, I don't know how I'm going to even do this. How do we even support my child? They're not alone, right? Even you're struggling with this.   Laura No, I literally am an expert in how parents support their kids and learning to be at home. And it's still like I my youngest

If you heard the recent episode on Parental Burnout, you'll know that our identities can become really confusing when we become parents, especially for women. On one hand, society tells us that we have to work hard and do well so we can Achieve The Dream. And on the other hand, we're told that a Good Mother sacrifices everything for her child - including her career. So what is a parent to do?   This episode brings together a couple of strands of my life that have been existing in parallel for a few months now. A friend of mine introduced me to meditation as a tool that I might find useful to explore when I was struggling with some personal issues. Not only did I find it interesting, but I also found elements of it that helped me to make sense of the situation I was in in a way that I had not been able to do until that point.   Like a lot of people, I had the common perception that meditation consists of sitting quietly on the floor cross-legged with thumb and pointing finger touching, saying ‘ommmm’ but when I looked into the research on mindfulness stress reduction that perception went away pretty fast. It had been shown in the scientific literature to be enormously helpful to people not just in reducing stress but also in reducing the severity of physical symptoms in the body that accompany stress.   But I was still having a hard time reconciling the thousands of scientific research papers I’ve read over the years on how children’s brains develop and some of these new ideas I was learning related mindfulness. And so that is kind of how I discovered Dr. Chris Niebauer and his book No Self, No Problem. After reading it I was able to reconcile those two strands - the psychological research and mindfulness - and I want to share that with you. Along the way, we'll gain an understanding of the mind that may help us to overcome some of the challenges associated with Parental Burnout - so even if you're not officially (clinically) suffering from burnout, this episode could still help you to better reconcile the different aspects of your life and identity.     Ready to break free from the cycle of triggered reactions and conflict in your parenting journey? If you want to: 😟 Be triggered less often by your child’s behavior, 😐 React from a place of compassion and empathy instead of anger and frustration, 😊 Respond to your child from a place that’s aligned with your values rather than reacting in the heat of the moment,   the Taming Your Triggers workshop will help you make this shift.   Join us to transform conflict into connection and reclaim peace in your parenting journey.   Click the banner to learn more!     Dr. Chris Niebauer's book No self, no problem - Affiliate link   References Dienstbier, R.A. (1979). Attraction increases and decreases as a function of emotion-attribution and appropriate social cues. Motivation and Emotion 3(2), 201-218. Dutton, D.G., & Aron, A.P. (1974). Some evidence for heightened sexual attraction under conditions of high anxiety. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 30(4), 510-517. Kabat-Zinn, J. (2011). Some reflections on the origins of MBSR, skillful means, and the trouble with maps. Contemporaty Buddhism 12(1), 281-306. Mays, J.C., & Newman, A. (2020, April 8) Virus is twice as deadly for Black and Latino people than Whites in N.C.Y. The New York Times. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/08/nyregion/coronavirus-race-deaths.html?searchResultPosition=3 Meston, C.M., & Frohlich, P.F. (2003). Love at first fright: Partner salience moderates roller-coaster-induced excitation transfer. Archives of Sexual Behavior 32(6). Niebauer, C. (2019). No self, no problem: How neuropsychology is catching up to Buddhism. San Antonio, TX: Heirophant

One of the things people email me wanting to know about most often is "what does the research say about how to set up a play room? What toys should I buy that will have the greatest benefit for my child's learning and development?" I'd actually been putting off doing this episode for a while, in part because the research base on this topic is thin on the ground - but also because the idea just made me kind of uncomfortable. I mean, we've survived for tens of thousands of years without play rooms - or even dedicated toys, never mind the incredibly beautiful and expensive ones that are available now! - what could I really say about this? Well, now's the time. Perhaps it shouldn't surprise you that this episode is coming in the middle of our series on the intersection of money and parenting. I hope it offers you some reassurance about how to set up your own play room - if you choose to and are able to. And even more reassurance if you choose not to or can't. Other episodes on this series This episode is the second in a series on the intersection of parenting and money. You can find other episodes in this series: 038: The Opposite of Spoiled 105: How to pass on mental wealth to your child 107: The impact of consumerism on children 115: Reducing the Impact of Advertising to Children 118: Are You Raising Materialistic Kids? [accordion] [accordion-item title="Click here to read the full transcript"] Hello, and welcome to the Your Parenting Mojo podcast. Today we’re covering a topic that listeners have been asking for for ages, which is How to Set Up a Play Room. And if you hear some trepidation in my voice, it’s because there’s a lot of it in me. And if you think it’s an incredible coincidence that this episode is coming hot on the heels of a couple of episodes exploring children and consumerism then…I’m sorry to say that this is not a coincidence. I was uncomfortable enough with the topic that I felt I really couldn’t do this episode without covering those other topics as well as a counterpoint. The main reason I’m uncomfortable is, of course, even having the wherewithal to ask the question “how do I set up a child’s play room” represents an absolutely enormous amount of privilege. It says that the person asking the question has so many resources that they can devote an entire room in their house to nothing but a child’s play, and on top of this, they have enough resources to equip the room with a sizeable proportion of whatever toys I suggest that the scientific literature says are necessary to bring about a positive outcome for their child. But when my listeners ask for something I do try my best to deliver. So here we go! While we’ve discussed the benefits of play on the show before in an interview with Dr. Stuart Brown, who is the Director of the National Institute for Play, we haven’t specifically looked at toys and play, or the role of parents in play. And it turns out that the concept of parents getting involved in children’s play, or directing children’s play, or providing materials for children’s play is something that’s pretty much unique to Western, Educated, Industrial, Rich, Democratic (or WEIRD) countries – plus Japan as well, and possibly China is heading in this direction too. For ethnographic evidence on this topic we look to our old friend Dr. David Lancy, who gathered hundreds of ethnographic studies on child development in his book The Anthropology of Childhood. Dr. Lancy reports that Sisala parents in Ghana regard an interest in children’s play as beneath their dignity. Even the face-to-face position where the baby is held facing the mother that is so common in Western cultures is very rare elsewhere. Western scholars consider talking to and playing with the infant essential to promote the bond between mother and infant, but this activity is rare in many cultures as well – the !Kung people who live on the western edge of the Kalahari Desert not only don’t play with their children but believe the practice may be harmful to the child’s development because children learn best without adult intervention. Gusii children in Kenya may try to get their mother to play or talk but will be ignored, because the mother believes that responding would be simply pointless, as the child is not a valid human being until it reaches the age of ‘sense,’ at around six or seven. A little closer to home, interaction between Mexican children tends to take place through shared work activity, rather than child-centered play. All of these approaches are in stark contrast to the recommendations provided to parents in Western countries - the American Academy of Pediatrics’ clinical report on this topic is called The Importance of Play in Promoting Healthy Child Development and Maintaining Strong Parent-Child Bonds – implying that play has some kind of unique qualities in promoting these parent-child bonds that can’t be replaced by other activities, when anthropological evidence shows that this bonding can occur through ot

Do you often feel anxious or irritated, especially when you're around your child? Do you often feel like you might snap, perhaps even threatening violence if they don't do what you say? Are you so disconnected from them that you sometimes consider walking out and never coming back? If you have, it's possible that you're suffering from parental burnout.   Listener Kelly reached out to me recently because she has been diagnosed with parental burnout and wanted to know what research is available on this topic, and on how to protect her two-year-old from its impacts. We did some searching around in the literature and it actually didn't take long to turn up the preeminent researchers in the field who actually work as a team and one of whom - Dr. Moira Mikolajczak, kindly agreed to talk with us.   We learned about the warning signs to watch out for that indicate that you might be suffering from parental burnout, and what to do about it if you are. We ran a bit over time at the end of the episode and I wasn't able to ask about whether self-compassion might be a useful tool for coping with parental burnout but Dr. Mikolajczak and I emailed afterward and she agreed that it is - I'm hoping to do an episode on self-compassion in the future. More information on Dr. Mikolajczak's work on parental burnout can be found at https://www.burnoutparental.com/   The Parental Burnout Assessment, available in French and English, can be found here: https://en.burnoutparental.com/suis-je-en-burnout   Taming Your Triggers If you need help with your own big feelings about your child’s behavior, register for the Taming Your Triggers workshop. We’ll help you to: Understand the real causes of your triggered feelings, and begin to heal the hurts that cause themUse new tools like the ones Katie describes to find ways to meet both her and her children’s needsEffectively repair with your children on the fewer instances when you are still triggered   Click the banner to learn more!   References Brianda, M. E., Roskam, I., Gross, J. J., Franssen, A., Kapala, F., Gérard, F., & Mikolajczak, M. (2020). Treating parental burnout: Impact of two treatment modalities on burnout symptoms, emotions, hair cortisol, and parental neglect and violence. Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics, 89(5), 330-332. https://doi.org/10.1159/000506354 Cesar, F., Costa, P., Oliveira, A., & Fontaine, A. M. (2018). "To suffer in paradise": Feelings mothers share on Portuguese Facebook sites. Frontiers in Psychology, 9, 1797. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.01797 Hubert, S., & Aujoulat, I. (2018). Parental burnout: When exhausted mothers open up. Frontiers in Psychology, 9, 1021. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.01021 Lebert-Charron, A., Dorard, G., Boujut, E., & Wendland, J. (2018). Maternal burnout syndrome: Contextual and psychological associated factors. Frontiers in Psychology, 9, 885. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.00885 Le Vigouroux, S., Scola, C., Raes, M.-E., Mikolajczak, M., & Roskam, I. (2017). The big five personality traits and parental burnout: Protective and risk factors. Personality and Individual Differences, 119, 216-219. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2017.07.023 Le Vigouroux, S., & Scola, C. (2018). Differences in parental burnout: Influence of demographic factors and personality of parents and children. Frontiers in Psychology, 9, 887. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.00887 Meeussen, L., & Van Laar, C. (2018). Feeling pressure to be a perfect mother relates to parental burnout and career ambitions. Frontiers in Psychology, 9, 2113. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.02113 Mikolajczak, M., Raes, M.-E., Avalosse, H., & Roskam, I. (2018). Exhausted parents: Sociodemographic, child-related, parent-related, parenting and family-functioning correlates of parental burnout. Journal of Child and Family Studies, 27(2), 602-614. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10826-017-0892-4 Mikolajczak, M., & Roskam, I. (2018). A theoretical and clinical framework for parental burnout: The balance between risks and resources (BR²). Frontiers in Psychology, 9, 886. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.00886 Mikolajczak, M., Brianda, M. E., Avalosse, H., & Roskam, I. (2018). Consequences of parental burnout: Its specific effect on child neglect and violence. Child Abuse & Neglect, 80, 134-145. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chiabu.2018.03.025 Mikolajczak, M., Gross, J. J., Stinglhamber, F., Norberg, A. L., & Roskam, I. (2020). Is parental burnout distinct from job burnout and depressive symptomatology? Clinical Psychological Science, 8(4), 673-689. https://doi.org/10.1177/2167702620917447 Mikolajczak, M., Gross, J. J., & Roskam, I. (2019). Parental burnout: What is it, and why does it matter? Clinical Psychological Science, 7(6), 1319-1329. https://doi.org/10.1177/2167702619858430 Roskam, I., & Mikolajczak, M. (2020). Gender differences in the nature, antecedents and consequences of parental burnout.

We began this mini-series a few weeks ago as listener Brian Stout and I co-interviewed Dr. Carol Gilligan as an introduction to the topic of patriarchy, how it is present in every aspect of raising our children, and the negative impacts it has on our children's lives - both on boys and girls. &nbsp; The interview with Dr. Gilligan laid the groundwork for us, and in this episode Brian and I are back for a conversation about what we learned and what implications this has for the way we will raise our children. We discuss: Why Brian, a cisgendered, heterosexual White male - an apparent beneficiary of patriarchal systems - is so interested in dismantling it Some of the specific ways we parents perpetuate patriarchy through our parenting, even if we don't realize we're doing it! Why 'masculine' qualities like logic are prized over 'feminine' qualities like understanding the physical experience of the body and recognizing emotions (and why it's ridiculous that these qualities are gendered in the first place) How patriarchy hurts men (mentally, emotionally, and physically) as well as women Brian's top four conclusions and actions to take to begin the work of dismantling patriarchy in our own families (and, by extension, in society more broadly) &nbsp; Resources mentioned in this episode (as well as additional resources that Brian and/or I recommend): Brian's newsletters on why patriarchy persists: Part 1, Part 2 (Subscribe to receive parts 3 and 4 when they're released!); here's the "two heads" masculine and feminine energies image Brian's blog post on Raising Thriving Children: Parenting Beyond Power List of Gottman-trained therapists Trabian Shorters: Asset-Based Framing Liz Plank's book For the Love of Men The Scene on Radio series on Men Dr. Edward Tronick's Still Face Experiment Rotten Tomatoes reviews of The Warrior movie Dr. Brene Brown's TED talk on The Power of Vulnerability Dr. Vivek Murthy talking about the Loneliness Epidemic This piece from APA gets at the masculinity/deaths of despair link (Ron Levant is great) This piece from Esther Perel is a good starting point for raising boys in patriarchy. Here's a pretty good "syllabus on Undoing patriarchy" (put together by a White guy on his own journey) &nbsp; Groups that are addressing patriarchy: Organizing White Men for Collective Liberation - a national network mobilizing White men to learn, grow and take action against White supremacy and patriarchy Miki Kashtan overcoming patriarchy call (all are welcome) Gibran Rivera, men relinquishing patriarchy (men/masculine identified space) National networks like ManKind Project, and online resources like the <a href="https://goodmenproject.com/" target="_blank"...

It seems pretty clear that we are in a societal 'liminal space' right now, which is a threshold between what we have known until now and what we will know in the future. We are also in a liminal space related to learning and education, as schools hastily try to move learning online (despite disparities in access to online learning systems), and we have an incredible opportunity to think through what we think children's learning should look like in the future. In today's episode we hear from Dr. Zak Stein, who has spent many years thinking about ways in which the education system in the United States could be reimagined to take advantage of virtual learning opportunities and 'learning labs,' which gather resources around learners instead of having learning take place in classrooms isolated from real-world experience. Dr. Stein is a big-picture thinker, and it was really exciting to sit with him and envision the future of learning. To learn more about the memberships I mention in this episode, please visit yourparentingmojo.com/together &nbsp; Dr. Zak Stein's book Education in a time between worlds - Affiliate link &nbsp; [accordion] [accordion-item title="Click here to read the full transcript"] Jen 1:46 Hello, and welcome to the Your Parenting Mojo podcast. To put the show into context before we get going, I wrote the questions for this episode on the night of Friday, March 20, 2020. And we recorded it on Sunday, March 22, which is coincidentally my birthday and I took at least half a day off. Here in the California Bay Area, we’ve been ordered to stay home for everything except non-essential errands for five days now. And the shutdown has now been extended to cover one in five Americans, including the entire states of California, New York and Illinois. &nbsp; Now, I plan to reach out to our guests for the show in a few months’ time. But all of a sudden, on Friday night, I realized that I needed to talk with him now and that we need to hear from him today. And so our guest today is Dr. Zach Stein, whose book title tells you something of the breadth of scope of what we’re going to discuss, it is called Education in a Time Between Worlds: Essays on the Future of Schools, Technology and Society. &nbsp; We will lay some groundwork so we have a common understanding of how some of our global systems work, and then we’ll start to look at the role that education plays in the system. I think it’s become really clear to us in the last couple of weeks that many of the systems that we’ve built are unsustainable, and for a long time, that word has been used to mean that they’re bad for the environment. But I think that now we’re seeing that they’re actually not that good for us either. And so what will it take for us to do things differently? &nbsp; Well, first, we need to start imagining what kinds of systems we might want to see instead and how we and our children can both live within those and also shape those. So that’s what we’re going to think about in this episode. And we wrap up the show by thinking about some of the steps that we ourselves can take in the coming days and weeks to start to put this in motion. And it was really great to hear Dr. Stein share some surprising and very doable advice on this topic. &nbsp; One of the things that’s become most clear to me over the years that I’ve been doing this work is that the way we raise our children may be the single thing that we do that will have the most impact on the world. We talked about it a bit in the episode on Patriarchy a few weeks ago with listener Brian Stout and Dr. Carol Gilligan. The idea that systems that privilege men’s voices over women’s voices seems so huge and so deeply ingrained in our culture and they just seem impossible to change. But if we personally see the role that we are playing in the current system, and we accept that with grace and humility, but at the same time, take steps to do things differently with our own children, then we can actually make change happen. And I really feel like we’re on the cusp of some kind of big shift in our society right now. &nbsp; Even a month ago, the conversation that we’re about to hear would have been mostly academic, I think, because it’s so easy to keep following the grooves in the system that we’re in, rather than get out of that groove and create a new system. But we’ve all been thrown out of our groove right now. We don’t have a choice but to do things differently. And we might miss the groove for sure it was comfortable, and it was comforting after all, and it seemed like we knew what was going on, and we could function within it. But the opportunity that I see is that the level of effort between the way that we’re currently existing and the future systems we can imagine, has never been smaller and may never be smaller again in my lifetime. And if today’s conversation sort of maybe helps us similar light bulb to go off in your head as it has in mine, even if it’s only a very nimble but you can