by Dr. Gina Madrigrano | Sep 20, 2014 | Conscious Parenting, Parenting
Your children are wonderful gifts, precious gifts. You need to cherish them as such. SEE them for who they are, not for what you want them to be! Watch, listen, observe. Hear what they are trying to tell you. Don’t assume, ask. When a child has a tantrum, let go of that feeling of hopelessness born from the desire of wanting to fix this. Instead, step away in your mind, detach from your agenda of wanting to make it go away, come down to his level, hug him gently and ask “what are you trying to tell me? I’m here for you.”… and watch the tantrum pass. The tantrum is not about you, it’s about your child desperately trying to connect, overwhelmed with emotions he can’t sort, he’s asking for your help, he is not doing this to you. Be present.
Become a conscious parent and see your children thrive. Co-create with your child. It is a dance. Be open to learn from your children. They will grow you up.
by Dr. Gina Madrigrano | Aug 26, 2014 | Parenting
“Your beliefs become your thoughts,
Your thoughts become your words,
Your words become your actions,
Your actions become your habits,
Your habits become your values,
Your values become your destiny.”
― Mahatma Gandhi
by Dr. Gina Madrigrano | May 28, 2014 | Parenting
As I walked out of my office into the waiting room to get my next client, I noticed it was full of clients. A few years back I would have seen parents interacting with their kids, talking or playing quietly in their own little space, touching, hugging, arguing, or at least some minimal eye contact. I was amazed to see what looked like rows of robots, sitting side by side, totally disconnected from each other, head bowed over their cell phones, tablets or, rarer now, their lap top. No eye contact, no physical connection, not even a whisper shared between two people discretely involved in a discussion, any discussion. They, whoever they are, say that the new technology brings people closer together. To some degree it is true. We get instant access to Facebook, tweets, emails, texts, or calls… calls??… I now wonder who calls anymore. The kids I see don’t even call each other, they text.
Social Media has allowed connections but also anonymity, which in turns allows people to bully, pretend they are someone they are not, and even post lies or half truths. But I digress… I witness people who are unable to connect except from their iPods, phones or tablets. They speak in code, and forget the art of writing… soon grammar will be outdated as well. And letters? Who writes letters!
I see kids in my office crying they wished their parents would pay attention and get off their phones. It has been rampant. Not only children and teens have become addicted to these wonderful tools,so have their parents. These electronic wonders have also become a curse and a source of many headaches and arguments…. and I believe that people feel even more disconnected than they have ever been, at some level.
The scene in my office waiting room was actually a sad scene… a picture, even one can say a caricature, of total disconnect. It is no surprise that they would end up in our office. All I want to comment when I see them is “Where has the love gone?”. Children, people, are in desperate need for validation, for touch, for love, for connection and no amount of smart technology can do that. I see it with couples, children, and adults. In the end, they all want the same thing: to be seen and to be loved. These are common needs, basic needs, why are they now not first on people”s priority list.
Sometimes, the simple things in life are still the best things in life. There is a time and a place for the new technology, and people need to remember that. Pay attention to your kids, to your wives, your husbands, your friends. Stop for a moment, breathe, put down your phone or your tablet, how long can you survive without it? It is time to reconnect people, and schedule your tech time, don’t let it run your life.
Here are my tips for the day:
1) Check your emails or texts at designated times (e.g., three times a day: morning, lunch, after supper). People can wait. Teach them to wait. Unlike Pavlov’s dog. you don’t need to jump at the command of a beep or a ding warning you that you’ve just received a text or email. Obviously this excludes if it is part of your work or part of an emergency plan with your children or parents.
2) Don’t allow technology to interfere at the dinner table. Have people check out their devices at the entrance.
3) Designate and limit “screen time”. You’ll survive. There are so many other things you can do with your friends, kids, or spouse.
4) As much as possible, don’t allow kids under 12 to have a phone or tablet. Teach them social skills, teach them to play, teach them to use their imaginations to snap out of their boredom. Boredom is the gateway to imagination… allow it to happen. You will be amazed at the beauty that hides inside your child’s mind. Screens don’t allow kids or anyone to develop imagination. Its consumers passively wait to be entertained and stimulated. No wonder we have developed a society of bored, ADD, hyperactive kids. They are constantly stimulated. There lies many gifts in boredom, calm, and silence. Wait and watch…
5) Instead of pulling out your phones or tablets while waiting, why don’t you use the opportunity to have a wonderful conversation with the person you are with, tell a joke, share ideas, recall great memories, etc. There are so many things you can share about.
5) Take the time to stop, look at people in the eye, touch them, smile at them, acknowledge them, validate them, listen to what they say or don’t say, notice their body language, simply pay attention, see them, love them! People have become invisible. Children and adults alike complain “why don’t they see ME”.
6) If you really can’t stay away from your phone or tablet, and you are with your child, friend or spouse… well make it an interactive activity! At least you are connecting.
So remember, that sometimes the “normal” thing to do is not necessarily the “healthy” thing to do. Put down that phone, and connect with that human being standing right next to you! LOL !!!
by Dr. Gina Madrigrano | Mar 21, 2014 | Parenting
Failure’s pain subsides faster than the ache of regret.”
– Anon
“The fastest way to succeed is to double your rate of failure.”
– Thomas Watson
“We pay a heavy price for our fear of failure. It is a powerful obstacle to growth. It assures the progressive narrowing of the personality and prevents exploration and experimentation. There is no learning without some difficulty and fumbling. If you want to keep on learning, you must keep on risking failure – all your life.”
– John W. Gardner
“Our desires presage the capacities within us; they are harbingers of what we shall be able to accomplish. What we can do and want to do is projected in our imagination, quite outside ourselves, and into the future. We are attracted to what is already ours in secret. Thus passionate anticipation transforms what is indeed possible into dreamt-for reality.”
– Ralph Waldo Emerson
by Dr. Gina Madrigrano | Mar 21, 2014 | Parenting
“Fears are nothing more than a state of mind. Most great people have attained their greatest success just one step beyond their greatest failure.”
– Napoleon Hill
“You cannot hate, argue, reason, fight, complain or yell at a dark room enough to illuminate it – only by shining a Light is darkness overcome. Be that Light.”
– Anon
“What anyone else has or does not have has nothing to do with you. The only thing that affects your experience is the way you utilize the Non-Physical Energy with your thought. Your abundance or lack of it in your experience has nothing to do with what anybody else is doing or having. It has only to do with your perspective. It has only to do with your offering of thought. If you want your fortunes to shift, you have to begin telling a different story.”
– Esther Abraham-Hicks
Your children are wonderful gifts, precious gifts. You need to cherish them as such. SEE them for who they are, not for what you want them to be! Watch, listen, observe. Hear what they are trying to tell you. Don’t assume, ask. When a child has a tantrum, let go of that feeling of hopelessness born from the desire of wanting to fix this. Instead, step away in your mind, detach from your agenda of wanting to make it go away, come down to his level, hug him gently and ask “what are you trying to tell me? I’m here for you.”… and watch the tantrum pass. The tantrum is not about you, it’s about your child desperately trying to connect, overwhelmed with emotions he can’t sort, he’s asking for your help, he is not doing this to you. Be present.
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