Being playful is a great way to break through a child’s bubble of high emotion, so you can then help him gain control of himself.

You don’t have to get stuck in a negative experience. You don’t have to be a victim to external events, or internal emotions. You can use your mind to take charge of how you feel, and how you act.

The point of an exercise like this isn’t to tell your daughter not to worry about her basketball game. Not at all. We want to encourage our kids to feel their feelings, and to share them with us. The sensing mode that lets us experience directly is an important mode of processing. But along the way, we want to give them perspective and help them

basic functions like breathing, regulating sleep and wake cycles, and

Usually validation is pretty simple. The main thing you need to do is simply identify the feeling at hand: “That really made you sad, didn’t it?” or “I can see you feel left out,” or even a more general “You’re having a hard time.”

If repeated experiences actually change the physical architecture of the brain, then it becomes paramount that we be intentional about the experiences we give our children.

compromise isn’t a sign of weakness; it’s evidence of respect for your child and his desires.

We have to override our primitive reactive brain when this happens. Not easy. (By the way, this gets much harder to do if we’re sleep deprived, hungry, overwhelmed, or not prioritizing self-care.)

Want your kids to listen to you better? Be brief. Once you address the behavior and the feelings behind the behavior, move on.