I had the most amazing experience this week with one of my daughters.
She has always been fairly quiet and an internal thinker.
And like many kids, she is often engrossed in and focused on the present moment so conversations about school never tend to be that long.
I’m always amazed by the parents who tell me their kids tell them every single thing that happened at school… gotta love those kiddos too!
Well, this week my beautiful quiet, internal thinker talked and talked about some things that happened at school for 45 minutes!!!
And yes, it was waaay past bedtime but there was no way I was going to remind her of that while she was letting it all out.
I want to share how we got to that point...
Right before bed she was doing her Hatch Brighter journal and she was prompted to reflect on emotions she felt that day. She drew her own emoji that day and wrote "hurt."
I asked if she wanted to talk about it and she said “not right now.”
I respected that.
She hugged her sister and daddy goodnight. We went into her room, turned the lights off and cuddled up for a bit.
Within a few seconds without being prompted, she began telling me what she meant by "hurt" when she wrote it in her journal. Someone had hurt her feelings at school.
She shared what happened, how it made her feel, the negative self-talk that was going on inside her mind, the questions she was wondering about... she was honest and vulnerable.
And I got to be right there with her to listen and hug her.
I couldn't help but wonder if she would have told me if she hadn't done her journal that night?
This incident reminded me of the importance of carving out time and space for your kids to:
Reflect - on their day, their emotions, things they are grateful for
Journal - learn to express through writing
Share & talk - with someone who is important to them & loves them
They may not always share but carving out that quiet and safe space for them in our daily routine can do wonders!
This is where I’m supposed to encourage you to buy our journal for your kids but more than anything, I want to encourage you to carve out that time and space for your kids. That's what matters the most!
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