This week, I talk with Ashley Graber and Maria Evans, psychotherapists from Los Angeles about mindfulness and work-life balance for parents. We discuss how parents are the nerve center for the family and how our behavior can impact those around us. They are also both dog moms and understand how dogs with a range of personalities can impact the parenting experience and can influence children.
About Ashley and Maria
Ashley Graber and Maria Evans are psychotherapists, speakers, and parent coaches based in Los Angeles, California. Co-Founders of Accessing the Digital Child and the Corporate Mindfulness Method, the duo is booked internationally at conferences and corporate events for mindfulness and work-life integration training for parents. Ashley and Maria teach empirically-backed psychotherapeutic exercises and tools that are effective and easy to implement at work and at home.
- Ashley and Maria’s Book: Find Calm: Simple Tools to Help Children Cope in an Unpredictable World. After purchase, simply download the free Kindle app on your phone to read it (I’ll earn a few pennies if you use this link, at no extra cost to you.)
- For parent coaching, visit: www.corporatemindfulnessmethod.com or email hello@corporatemindfulnessmthod.com
- For parents on Clubhouse, join Ashley and Maria’s club called “Children”
- Trainings for therapists, social workers, counselors and psychologists: www.accessingthedigitalchild.com
Summary
Parents are the nervous system of the home. If we are calm, we can influence all of our family members (dogs included) to also feel calm, safe, and supported.
Quick tip to help anyone who is starting to feel overwhelmed: tap into your senses and get out of your head. Thinking about sensations, such as how soft the dog feels, the warmth of the sun, the fragrance of a flower, the tickle of water dripping from the sink are all simple strategies to ground you and bring you back to the present. These work for children and for adults.
Ask a Question
If you’ve got a question about your kids and dogs, go to www.speakpipe.com/PoochParenting and record it there just like a voicemail. And I will include it in a future episode.
If you’re looking for ongoing support for your family with dogs, be sure to get on the waiting list for my Thriving Parents of Kids and Dogs Membership.
If you enjoy these episodes or feel like they have made your family safer and less chaotic, feel free to buy me a coffee as a way of saying “Thanks!”
