ShambalaKids Meditation Cds for Kids, Tools for self-esteem and spiritual growth!

 Children can experience stress in a variety of different ways. From tummy aches before school, to being bullied, to difficult family relationships, stress is manifested in a variety of ways. How can we truly get to the core of this problem  and truly help our children?

Before we get into tools for dealing with childrens' stress, let's discuss how to avoid stress in the first place. What can you do as a parent to help children avoid stress? We can help heighten our childrens' self-esteem. We can do this in a variety of ways:

1.  Let our children know and feel we love them unconditionally.

2. Understand and let your child know on a continual basis that  "mistakes" are part of growing up and in fact part of life-long learning.

3.  Make sure your child understands that grades and anything 'special' that he or she does will not make you love him or her more. Your love is unconditional upon things or actions.

4. Spend true quality time with your child. Read together cuddled up, play together. Forgot adult life and responsibilities for a while and let your inner child come through.

5. When difficult things happen, let your child know that it is just an experience and something to learn by. Discuss what lessons they and you could take away from the situation.

6. Work on enforcing your child's healthy self-concept. This is ongoing, throughout life. Children need to feel they are valuable just because they are alive! 

7. Take time for hugs and kisses no matter what age of your child or teen. These moments are vital for the well-bieng of your child, and for feeling that love connection.

8.  Involve your child in your life. Allow them to participate in your everyday responsibilities. Allowing them to help you helps your child feel valuable and that you trust and believe in them.

9. If your child doesn't feel confident in a situation or is resisting, don't force them into it. Be patient, talk about it openly and when they are ready, let them do it.  Forcing a child to do something when they are not really ready makes a child feel he or she has no control over their life and that they will always have to turn to you for approval and permission.

10. Allow and encourage your child to make decisions. The decisions should be small at first, but by allowing your growing child to make decisions, confidence builds and slowly a child realizes that their opinion is important and that they do affect their life. They become empowered and strong and will not look to others to make decisions for them or constantly give their power over to someone else in their life as they become adults. Too often adults let other make decisions for them (think media, doctors, financial advisors) because they lack the self-confidence to make the decisions. They think others know more then they do and will make the right decisions for them. The truth is that in life, we have to seek our own answers. Even though a doctor or financial advisor may have a good answer, the question is, it is the RIGHT answer for YOUR life?

11. Don't always give your child the answers. Allow them to use thier critical mind and develop thier self-esteem by thinking through a situation and coming up with thier own solution. It may or may not work out, but your child will have gained useful information and will have gained a load of confidence knowing that they can make deciisons. They will see the consequences as well and learn from that. Additionally, life is not about having all the answers, life is about knowing where to look for answers!  

Guided Imagery & Kids Meditation is a wonderful way to help children deal with stress.  With a CD or even with your own voice, you can help your child relax into a vivid story and  give them tools to deal with stress and difficulties.

Let's take for example a tool taught on the One with the Universe CD. It's called the Balloon Breath. The Balloon Breath is really a basic yoga breath taught to children in a way that makes it simple and easy to understand. Try the Balloon Breath now. Relax your body. Take in a slow, deep breath, filling up your tummy as if it were a big balloon. Keep your chest still, as you allow the air to go right down to your stomach and fill up your big balloon. Give your balloon a color, feel and watch as your tummy gets really big! Blow it up big and slowly... filling it all up. And now, exhale slowly and calmly. Feel your entire body relax as as you exhale......

This is the basic balloon breath. Breath in to a count of 4 or 5 to begin with. Work up so your big balloon breaths become larger and larger. This will develop and train your body for correct breathing. Newborn babies breath like this. If you watch them while they sleep, you will see that it is their bellies that go up and down, not their chests. They are breathing correctly and this is very calming and natural to the body.  It decreases stress in the body and helps release endorphins so you feel good! Try this sevral times a day. Ask your child to practice the balloon breath with you and get into the habit of using it when with your child right before and after school or other activities. It's fun to do and very relaxing for everyone.    

 

Another relaxation technique you can use is to do a guided meditation with your child. It gets easier the more you practice doing them. Simply start out with a short kids' meditation script like the example that follows. Also you might like our new ShambalaKids Meditation Scripts E-Book to be out soon!

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Kids Stress Meditation Script:  You have permission to copy the following kids guided imagery and meditation script to print out for your own personal use:

(Once your child is lying down and comfortable, simply repeat the following, speak slowly and deliberately. Pause or exaggerate the underlined words or when it feels comfortable)

"Let's learn how to relax our bodies and minds tonight. Are you comfortable? OK, now let's start with something called a Balloon Breath. Let's breath in very deeply and fill up our tummy like we're filling up a big balloon. Doesn't that fill good? Give your balloon a color. What color is your balloon? Make it really big and beautiful, as you fill it up completely. Breathing in from your nose, fill up your balloon completely and when it's full, exhale the air out and watch your ballon completely deflat! Isn't that amazing? Again a very deep breath, and now, exhale... very good.

Now imagine that you are floating on a huge, white cloud. Feel how this fluffy light cloud totally supports your body and makes you feel so peaceful and light. The cloud seems to wrap itself around you so comfortably so you feel safe and warm. You have a feeling of being loved and cared for. It feels so great.  Feel yourself floating on this soft whispy cloud, enjoying the gentle motion of this loving cloud as it glides and softly sways. There is a feeling of total peace and easyness.... it feels so wonderful to just relax here.

Now in just a moment, there is a large balloon that is going to float up near your float. This balloon is your blow away worry balloon. It's going to take away any worry you have,  far far away. See that balloon coming up, floating close to your cloud. Picture the balloon any color you want. Now, put any worry of fear you have up into the balloon..... just watch that worry go into the balloon and see how tightly and nicely the big balloon holds onto that worry for you. Whatever it is that you are worried about, just see that going into the big balloon. Feel it lifting up out of your body and going straight into that balloon. The balloon is helping you and loves to take away that worry for you. Now, the balloon is quickly floating far far away. In the distance now, you see that balloon just pops a HUGE pop! And your worry is completely gone! How wonderful that feels! Now you see another balloon floating up to you on your nice fluffy cloud. This balloon is a different color. What color is this balloon? Now this is another blow away worry balloon and it's here to help! So put another worry into this balloon and watch it do the same as the first did.... it quickly floats far far away and then POPS! Wow... this is really amazing!  (Continue with new balloons coming until you ask...) Do you need anymore balloons or are all your worries gone? (Proceed according to your child's answer, if there are more worries, use more balloons, if not continue with script).  If you look below you now, you will see that in fact there is someone down there sending up these beautiful helpful big balloons to you. It's someone you love very much and who loves you very much! How wonderful it is to know you are so loved and cared for! Wave to that person and send love back as a Thank You! Just by imagining you are sending love to that person, you are. So send love now.

Now that all your worries are gone, you start to feel the sun shining it's beautiful warm rays done on you. You start to feel a very warm, loving feeling in your heart. You feel so wonderful and so loved! You are such a wonderful and special child! You are unique and amazing. Always remember that and keep that special feeling in your heart all the time. There is no one else like you. You are a very important part of the Universe and no one can do exactly what you do in the way you do it.  

Now when you are ready, you can float back down on your soft cloud and back to this room. It was a wonderful journey!"

Now it's time for hugs and kisses goodnight! Wasn't that EASY? Guiding a meditation with your child IS truly easy to do and a lot of fun. You'll find that you will develop a very strong emotional bond and your child will truly be amazed at your ability to take them on magical journies and help them alleviate their worries! In a child's mind,  the journey has been very real. I like to close my eyes and get into the scene with my children. Your creativity is sparked and you can do whatever you want in your story! Magic happens here!