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I was fortunate to attend Dr. Daniel Siegel‘s (neuropsychiatrist) excellent evening presentation on Parenting in the 21st Century: Promoting the Growth of Neural Circuits in Children’s brains to Support Well-Being, Kindness and Resilience.  Based on scientific research, he explained how the brain works and how one develops new pathways to shape the brain.  In essence, it all comes down to: Attunement and Experiences

What is Attunement?

If a child feels heard and seen by an adult who can tune into their subjective experience, this is attunement and this builds resilience.

We attach to one another through our vulnerability.  As adults we need to be our children’s safety-zone.  It is a fact of life that children are going to go through challenging experiences, and feel rejected, embarrassed, sad, disappointed, isolated and so forth.

Therefore, it is important that they have secure and trusting relationships with caring adults with whom they can share these difficult feelings.

By talking about the events of the experience (left brain), as well as their internal feelings (right brain), they can process the event, calm down and heal.

Telling our stories through words or journal writing is scientifically proven to be therapeutic because it integrates the logical, details of the experience with the raw, internal emotions and bodily sensations.

However, one does not have to have a problem present for attunement to take place.  A child may be working quietly on some art work,  when a caring adult goes over and attunes using descriptive phrases.

Eg.  “I noticed that you’ve added lots of different colours of glitter to your art.  You seem to be really enjoying using your imagination.”  

(*It is important not to praise or make comments about what you think the child is creating).

The goal is to “put yourself in the child’s shoes”, imagine how they are feeling and use observable facts to comment on what they are doing.  Don’t worry if you get it wrong, they will soon correct you and that’s okay.  The child will feel good, knowing that you are trying to connect and attune.

Parents can feel overwhelmed by the demands of family life and the need for more quality time, but the important message from Dan Siegel is to use all interactions as an opportunity to connect and attune.

Driving to school, picking up from school, making dinner, eating dinner, even confrontations – all the daily routines and interactions offer opportunities for connection.

Ask your child about the best part of their day and the worst part – encourage them to reflect outward and inward.  As adults, we can think of every interaction as an opportunity to be conscious of attuning and shaping our children’s brains.

What is Integration?

If a parent honors and supports their child’s emotions and subjective experience, the child will be able to integrate the logical, linear, left-side of the brain with the raw bodily emotions which are more readily received in the right side of the brain.

The connecting of the outward experience with the inward experience leads to integration.  Chaos (the flooding of raw emotions) or rigidity (too much control leading to lack of flexibility) is one extreme away from integration.  Integration is the goal.

We want to integrate the left and right hemispheres of the brain as well as the higher level, thinking part of the brain (Pre-frontal Cortex) with the reptile, instinctual part of the brain (Amygdala).

When the Amygdala is alarmed, the higher level thinking and rational part of the brain is shut down.

Trying to talk logically and problem-solve is not effective at this point.  Instead, one needs to focus on the feelings.  Give a hug, validate their feelings, and/or give time for the person to breathe deeply.  

“CONNECT BEFORE YOU RE-DIRECT”.   This is proven by science, yet it is still habit to go straight into problem-solving mode and this is not helpful.

According to Dan Seigel: “There is nothing that a left-brain response can do to soothe a raw right brain emotion.  A right brain response such as a hug, or a comment about how it’s tough to be a child, will help the child connect.”

Parenting is an incredibly, rewarding journey that gives us the opportunity to grow alongside our children.  If we model kindness, empathy and compassion, these are the neural pathways that will develop in our children.  

“Neurons that fire together, wire together.” ~ Dr. Daniel Siegel, M.D.

Your child’s brain is still growing rapidly until the mid-twenties and then scientists have discovered that the brain continues to develop new neural pathways all through our adult lives.  Thus, it’s never too late, every interaction counts!  Stay tuned, next week, for a summary of Dan Siegel’s book Parenting from the Inside Out.

“A safe and secure home = an inoculation of resilience“

~ Dr. Daniel Siegel, M.D.

Have a wonderful week of attuning and connecting,

Warmly,