In this workshop, we will describe a community-led parent education program, called “ Safe, Secure and Loved”, which introduces mindfulness and self-compassion practices as ways to promote habits of resilience. Habits of resilience are nurturing behavioral strategies to manage parenting stress, clarify parenting goals and strengthen children’s trajectories of resilience.
Recent discoveries from developmental neurobiology, child development, and trauma science had shown that harsh and unresponsive caregiving during early childhood resulted in disrupted stress regulation systems in the developing brain. In addition, stressful family and community environments had been linked to specific pre-academic, social and health challenges in preschoolers. In response to these findings, new approaches to child abuse prevention started to focus on the need to mitigate young children’s adversities through parent education. The science of resilience has effectively provided the blueprints for a “behavioral therapeutic vaccine” that could buffer the negative impacts of early childhood adversity.
This list helps strengthen emotional literacy in adults and children alike; it includes synonyms for feelings, physical sensations, and sources of stress.
This practice, also known as Loving Kindness, promotes compassion and self-compassion, led by Diane Hetrick.
This practice, also known as Loving Kindness, promotes compassion and self-compassion, led by Robyn Long.
This meditation promotes a deep sense of appreciation by focusing on aspects of life that are supportive to our well-being, led by Ann Hollar.
