What would it feel like to feel completely empowered regardless of whatever is going on around you? So clear and confident in you’re choices that you never doubt yourself at all? Well how about feeling that way most of the time? Whether you had a child weeks months or even years ago you have a vast library of parenting resources and wisdom lying within you just waiting to be tapped. Here’s the secret: your parenting mojo flows strongly when you’re calm and centered but slows to a trickle when you are stressed. When saying ‘calm and centered’ I don’t mean the fake calm that comes from pretending everything is always OK. This isn’t really calm but rather denial and suppression, which causes – you guessed it – stress. How do you go about managing your energy? By getting out of your head and into your body, feeling your feelings instead of avoiding them. It really is that simple. When you take responsibility for managing your energy rather than allowing your thoughts, emotions, other people or life circumstances manage you, you then share your best self with everyone around.
“Choosing to embrace your experience rather than resisting it allows you to be exactly who and what you are”
Its not about pretending to feel thrilled that your baby is up again at night or happy when you’re experiencing sadness as a new Mom or a new situation; on the contrary its about acknowledging that you’re frustrated, sad or anxious and then allowing those feelings to express. Choosing to embrace your experience rather than resisting it allows you to be exactly who and what you are: happy and sad, ugly and beautiful, kind and bitchy, loving life and hating it, adoring your child and also wishing, at times, that the stork would take them back to the big baby nest in the sky for a few hours so you could finally get some rest. It’s really okay to feel all these things and you may sometimes feel them all within a span of ten minutes!
When you welcome and accept whatever you are experiencing you feel calm, balanced and much better equipped to make clear decisions. Who you are affects your baby much more powerfully than what you do; babies are like a tuning fork, vibrating at the same tone that you are offering.
You can empower yourself at any moment by making a choice: to avoid what’s going on inside you, which causes stress, or to welcome the truth of your experience and the sense of calm that results. When we live in our center we teach our children how to live in their center too.
Love, Love, Love
Derek
Greater insights on the CALM method and many other practical support tools are offered in ‘Calm Mama Happy Baby’. Allowing parents to feel more empowered to trust their intuition and respond to their child with confidence and clarity.
Cancel negative thoughts and clear away distracting mind chatter;
Allow your feelings and manage your emotions so that your perspective on your baby’s needs is accurate and realistic;
Link up and listen by tuning into the subtle aspects of your baby’s communication, so you can problem solve and attend to them more effectively; and
Mirror and empathize appropriately with your baby so they feel safe and loved no matter what they are experiencing.