Lisa Roberts - Teach Your Child Meditation: 70 Fun & Easy Ways to Help Kids De-Stress and Chill Out

Overloaded with schoolwork, extracurricular activities, responsibilities, and expectations, todays children are busy and stressed out. Buzzing around in go mode is physically and mentally exhausting; its not a healthy state for anybody, and kids especially need to rest their developing minds and bodies. Yet many children do not know how to slow things down or simply relax.

Wouldnt it be beneficial to equip our children with the skills to help them cope with stress? Imagine the value of teaching your kids how to meditateproviding them with the tools, knowledge, and ability to self-regulate, concentrate, and respond to stressful or difficult situations in a healthy and positive manner. Its not as challenging as you may think.

Teach Your Child Meditation features seventy fun and effective activities to engage kids in meditation practice. No, your child may not sit in lotus position, quietly chanting Om for thirty minutesnot many children wouldbut he or she may happily play a focus-based game with a partner for ten minutes and not think about anything else the entire time. In yoga, this is called single-pointed focus, or meditation.

I developed the creative games and activities presented in this book to appeal to kids of all ages, regardless of yoga or meditation experience. Working as a pediatric yoga specialist at a major childrens hospital teaching critically ill, disabled, and hospitalized children ages two to twenty-one, I quickly learned to adapt traditional yoga and meditation techniques to make them accessible and appealing to children.

We have so much fun playing and exploring that many of my patients have no idea they are doing something good for them! Its at the end of our sessions (or during, if they blurt out This feels great! or I feel so relaxed!), when we reflect on how they feel, that they begin to realize breathing and meditation is something they can practice on their ownto aid in pain control and anxiety during their hospital stay and in their daily lives, to help prepare for an important class or exam at school, or to center themselves before an important game or event.

Once, after a progressive relaxation session with a teenage patient experiencing extreme pain, the patients father told the hospital pain-management team I was the magic pill that made his son feel better. I am not a magic pill. I did nothing more than guide this young man to something that was there all along. The ability to slow down the breath and progressively relax his body, to mindfully respond to pain in a reflective rather than a reflexive way, existed within him. I merely showed him how to find it.

Grateful parents have quietly whispered to me, How did you do that? as their child, previously inconsolable and uncomfortable, finally relaxed into a restful sleep. One teenage boy, recovering from hip surgery, claimed the guided meditation I offered him was stupid awesome! I agree. Meditation is stupid awesome. But its also very simple. So simple, in fact, its childs play.

This book is divided into five sections, based on each activitys focus area, allowing you to quickly navigate to techniques that meet your childs needs, be it pain control, letting off steam, deep relaxation, focusing before a test, or energizing when bogged down by a midafternoon slump. The parts include:

IM THE BOSS OF MY BREATH. Techniques that use the breath as a tool to self-regulate and meditate.

HOCUS POCUS, I CAN FOCUS. Activities to clear the mind and focus on the present moment and task at hand.

STRESS BUSTERS AND ENERGY EQUALIZERS. Activities to develop kids self-awareness and teach them how to recognize and manage states of excess energy, depleted energy, or stress within the body.

THE CHILL ZONE. Techniques to disconnect, chill out, and relax.

CONNECT. Games to play with friends or classmates that deliver the benefits of breath control and meditation along with a whole lot of fun!

Many techniques cross over between sections and serve double or triple dutyfor example, an exercise that appears in the mind-focused part Hocus Pocus, I Can Focus may very well be an effective tool to unplug and relax or access the breath to calm and center oneself. This book features active and passive meditation exercises. Active meditations usually involve movement and/or play; such exercises are helpful for kids and beginners learning to meditate as well as those who may find sitting still especially challenging. Passive meditations tend to require a little more stillness and inner reflection and may be incrementally introduced as your childs skills strengthen.