Interplay Mentoring

10/08/2020

This is great!

You know that feeling, when there’s a storm brewing. Tempers feel fragile, like they’re wafer thin and ready to shatter with a wrong look from you or a word or when you take take a deep breath out instead of a deep breath in.
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When the shattering happens and the emotion is big, there is little you can do until they’re ready. Your gentle words might inflame. Your attempts to walk away might so the same thing. And all the while, your own anger, sadness or confusion might be lighting up. There’s a reason for this.
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Teens read emotion from the amygdala - and amygdalae have a way of recruiting other amygdalae to the battle. It happens this way for all of us. The amygdala is the fight or flight response part of the brain and when it’s on, it will tend to interpret neutral emotion more often as negative. When it reads a threat, it will organise to fight it (argue, yell) or flee it (ignore, be silent or sullen). It’s why your gentle words might be read as something different - that you’re angry, you don’t care, you don’t get it, or that you’re not taking them seriously.

In that space, there will be little to do but wait until they’re ready to step out of the ring. Geez this can be tough though. To do this, let them know you’re there, without trying to change them in that moment, ‘I know you’re really angry at me/sad/scared. I want to understand what’s happening for you but I can’t do that while you’re yelling at me. I’m here for you when you’re ready to talk.’

When we respond with empathy - when children feel ‘felt’ - they get the sense that we’re there with them, which helps big emotions become more manageable and safer to let go of. When our empathy systems are on, we are open, engaged and often without realising it, we have one hand on the amygdala, soothing it gently to calm. Children experience us as a solid, safe and available presence - eventually.

Neither joining in the fight nor waiting it out is easy. Both will take the strength of a warrior. Some days we might cycle through both by breakfast (hand goes up), but that’s the thing about adolescence - it’s a time of learning and growth for all of us.

13/07/2020

This is such a great post to break our Facebook absence.
Connection is vital! Hope you have been/are able to stay connected where ever you are and whatever your lockdown situation has been.

According to neuroscientists, blokes have three distinct needs for connection. Firstly, you need mates who you can have a laugh with.⁠ Friendship is actually a physiological need!⁠
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Second, you need connection to a group with a common sense of purpose⁠. Maybe you get that at the gym, or at your thursday night jam session, or maybe you get it at work. Either way, it's handy to know that your body and mind really need it.⁠
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Third, men actually need deep emotional connection.⁠ People you can turn to when s**t hits the fan and people who know you have their back. This is often the tricky one for blokes because many of us have been scammed into thinking that deeper emotional connection is just for the womenfolk. Turns out blokes need it too. ⁠
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Now you might be a bloke who has plenty of mates who regularly have a laugh, share a common vision and know how to talk about the real stuff. Lucky you!⁠ But there's plenty of blokes out there who don't.⁠
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You need it. Your mates need it. Other blokes in your community need it. And plenty of them aren't getting it. So, if you want to explore how you can build that deeper sense of connection for men in your community, get on board. This is what Good Blokes Co is all about.⁠
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**t⁠
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31/05/2020

Fantastic advice that could also be applied outside of a parenting relationship.

Our emotions give us an opportunity to find out more about ourselves.

Nicole Schwarz, Imperfect Families writes, “Staying calm and serene 100% of the time is not how we’re wired as people. We’re made to experience a wide variety of emotions. Plus, we are created to be in community with others, so when our kids feel a big feeling, guess what? We feel emotional too!

Positive parenting is not about some zenned-out parents who refuse to accept their emotions.

It’s about parents who are willing to see emotions as a part of life. And who are willing to learn from those less-than-calm experiences.”

Tired of responding to your kids with anger? You're not alone. Use these tips to learn from your anger and move forward in a positive direction.

18/05/2020

I love Bluey!! Whenever I watch a new episode I declare that this is my new favourite!

Magically the creators of the show manage to connect the audience, both adults and children, to incredibly deep and rich ideas!

‘Bike’ is a flippen awesome episode. If you’ve got 7min take a look.

This episode highlights the importance of not interrupting or rescuing our kids. It’s hard when we see our kids struggle or not achieve a goal. I spoke with Daniel from Educated by Nature about this topic a few years ago (you’ll see the link on my page). In a world where we can get what we want when we want it, it’s a beautiful gift to create safe spaces where we can struggle with the process of learning something new.

Parents
1. Let your kids struggle, let them figure it out. At the end regardless of ‘success’ or not, celebrate what they have done. “I really like how you kept on trying, you just didn’t give up!!”
2. Notice how you are feeling. Before you step in, ask yourself why? Are you stepping in because you have been invited or because you are feeling uncomfortable?
3. Nothing spurs a kid on more than saying, “you might not be old enough to do that yet, your legs/arms might need to be a bit longer”. If they can, they’ll figure it out. If they can’t, they may need support or they may need to develop some skill before they can do that.

Celebrate the struggle! Both the frustration of our kids and the uncomfortable feeling for us!! If you need a little encouragement, refer back to Bluey. It is a treasure trove for kids and adults!

Watching Bluey Bike in iview

At the park, Bluey is struggling to learn how to ride her bike. But as she and Dad watch her friends' determination with their own tasks, Bluey is inspired to give it another try.

15/05/2020

I have 3 boys!! My eldest is in year 7 and we have been having some really BIG conversations lately.

Heading back to school wasn’t as great as what he thought it was going to be!

The community has changed, the atmosphere has changed, the goalposts have been shifted.

Covid has definitely bought quite a few challenges but it’s also bought the opportunity for a lot of deep and fluffy conversations. Both of which are really important.

This was the topic of one of our conversations this week:
If I am not what I have, what I do or what people say, then what am I???

How would you answer?

24/04/2020

I’ve been lucky enough to work with Daniel and Trudi at Educated by Nature for nearly 4 years!!! They are brilliant at creating beautiful spaces and opportunities for children (and adults) to grow and connect, with themselves and nature!

This was a great conversation we had about ‘celebrating the friction not just the fire’.

I watched it again today and it spoke to my heart as a really tired and frustrated mum! I took a deep breath, re-postured myself and kept on going!

Hope you’re all travelling well!!

In this episode of Campfire Conversations – entitled ‘Celebrating the Friction’ Daniel Burton (Co-founder of Educated by Nature) and Nadia Robinson (Nature P...

19/04/2020

Life is always interesting at mine! What’s it like at yours?

10/04/2020

Hope you’re enjoying your Easter long weekend. Be safe!

22/03/2020

22/03/2020

I speak a lot about how grateful I am for my community. My life has held a few challenges over the last couple of years and I wouldn’t have been able to keep going without my tribe.

Now for something random, fractions!!

When you have a fraction, you have a numerator (top number) and a denominator (bottom number). The top number is how many parts of the whole are represented, the bottom number represents the total number of parts created from the whole.

If I have a cake and cut it into 12 pieces and eat one piece. I would have eaten one twelfth of the cake.

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I hope you are still with me, cause this is the best bit!!

The numerator can never be bigger than the denominator.

Meaning, I can’t eat 13 pieces of a cake that has been cut into 12 pieces. The denominator tells us the limit.

Now think of fractions as an analogy for our ability to HOLD.

When I say hold I mean the archaic, picture Mel Gibson yelling in the Braveheart movie, hold!!

Hold:- It’s our ability to keep or sustain a specific position, to weather the storm, to withstand discomfort, to bear the weight of a person or thing.

HOLD is our numerator, the top number. It represents the parts.
The denominator, the bottom number is our ability to be HELD.

We can never hold (sustain)
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more that we are held (cared for).

Who is holding you?
Who are your community?
Who are your tribe?

The people who we are held by aren’t always family. They are friends, parents from school, work, mates from the gym. There the people that are checking in on you, supporting you, encouraging you! They are your community, your tribe, your kindred.

How you are HELD, supported by your community gives you capacity to HOLD, to withstand whatever storm you are in.

I hope in this season you are remaining connected, that you are slowing your pace and walking lightly. There is some heavy stuff going on. If you are not conected, there are support centres in place. I've posted a list of numbers on the page. We don't have to journey alone.

I'm finishing off writing another post about 'The Art of Being Held", so keep an eye on this page.

16/12/2019

Returning to basics, pare back our Christmas present lists and focus on the moments of joy surrounding the act of giving that special gift to our loved ones