In this week's episode of the podcast, I sat down with special guest, Sarah R. Moore, who is the author of Peaceful Discipline: Story Teaching, Brain Science & Better Behavior and founder of Dandelion Seeds Positive Parenting. Sarah is a certified Master Trainer in conscious parenting and a Board Member of the American Society for the Positive Care of Children, she’s also a public speaker, armchair neuroscientist, and most importantly, a Mum/Mom. With training in child development, trauma recovery, interpersonal neurobiology, improv comedy, and play, her work supports parents and caregivers around the globe.
In this episode, Sarah and I discuss:
Episode Links:
In this week's episode of the podcast, I sat down with special guest, Sarah R. Moore, who is the author of Peaceful Discipline: Story Teaching, Brain Science & Better Behavior and founder of Dandelion Seeds Positive Parenting. Sarah is a certified Master Trainer in conscious parenting and a Board Member of the American Society for the Positive Care of Children, she’s also a public speaker, armchair neuroscientist, and most importantly, a Mum/Mom. With training in child development, trauma recovery, interpersonal neurobiology, improv comedy, and play, her work supports parents and caregivers around the globe.
In this episode, Sarah and I discuss:
Episode Links:
Welcome to the Natural Super Kids podcast, where you will discover practical strategies to inspire you to boost the health and nutrition of your kids. I'm Jessica Donovan, a qualified naturopath specialising in kids health, and I want to make it as easy as possible for you to raise healthy and happy kids. Let's get into it. Hello and welcome back to the Natural Super Kids podcast, our first episode for 2024. I hope you've all had the most amazing Christmas and new year and you know you've had the opportunity to spend some really good quality time with your family and hopefully there's been a little bit of downtime in there for you as well, although I know for us parents, you know the holiday season can be as busy as ever. So, to start off the podcast this year, I thought we could dive into some parenting topics. I think at this time of the year it's a really good opportunity to you know, look at our parenting, some of the challenges we might be having and, most importantly, get some tips from some experts. Now, I am certainly not an expert in parenting, so today on the podcast, I'm thrilled to be talking to Sarah Moore, who is the author of the amazing book Peaceful Discipline and the founder of Dandelion Seeds Positive Parenting. So Sarah is a certified master trainer in conscious parenting and board member for the American Society of the Positive Care of Children. She's also a public speaker, an armchair neuroscientist and, most importantly, a mum with training in child development, trauma recovery, interpersonal neurobiology, improv, comedy and play. Her work supports parents and caregivers around the globe. So it was a pleasure to talk to Sarah. She is a beautiful lady and we talk about. You know what exactly is this idea of peaceful discipline. She talks about it from a brain science perspective and you know we dive into why punishments within parenting end up failing or even backfiring. She talks about where peaceful discipline is applicable. Like what kinds of kids this works for? Hint, it's all kids, it's not just the sensitive ones. We talk about why we need to be parent centric in the way we approach behavior rather than trying to modify our children's behavior and what exactly that looks like. So we dive into all of this and more into this episode. I hope you enjoy it and I hope it gives you some inspiration to start off this year. Here's Sarah. Hello, sarah, welcome to the NaturalSoviet Kids podcast.
Speaker 2:Thank you for having me. I'm so excited to be here.
Speaker 1:I'm very excited to dive into this conversation all about peaceful discipline. So can you start by telling our listeners a little bit about you and a bit of, I guess, an introduction to peaceful discipline? What is it and, I guess, why have you decided to delve into this topic and write a book about it?
Speaker 2:I would be happy to so. As you mentioned, I'm the author of the book called Peaceful Discipline. I am the founder of Dandelion Seeds Pathet of Parenting and a board member for the American Society for the Positive Care of Children. I am a certified master trainer of conscious parenting and, most importantly, I am a real live parent. So it's not just theory, it's definitely practice in real life as well. And essentially what called me to write the book Peaceful Discipline is that and I even have it in the intro of the book. But shortly after my daughter was born it was four month. Well, check Her pediatrician at the time. I'll do a spoiler alert and say we immediately switched pediatricians after this particular incident. But at that time he essentially told me don't ever pick her up day or night when she cries, she's manipulating you. If you want to get serious about parenting, let me know, because he was upset that I told him that I was still responding to her at night. Well, of course I was. She was a teeny, tiny baby, so he was dealing with some very antiquated information. But the good news is, when he told me to get serious about parenting, I said all righty, I will do that. So, I started researching everything I could research to help empower other parents and caregivers with evidence-based supportive information to help them lean into trusting the kind of nurturing and connection-based relationship that we all deeply want to have with our children, whether they are four months old or 400 years old or anywhere in between. It never expires. So discipline, as we know, is kind of a loaded word and a lot of people think it means punishment, but it actually means to teach. When we are a disciple of something, we are a student of something. So when we say peaceful discipline, I am coupling a reminder of not only are we supposed to be peaceful in how we are teaching our children, they also should perceive it as being peaceful from us, because we all know that emotional safety is the number one thing that has to be present in order for anybody to learn. So that is really the crux of everything I teach.
Speaker 1:Oh, I love that and I love that you turned that maybe a bit negative experience with that pediatrician into such a positive one and you know you are able to kind of really lean into this. I just love that and I love the fact that you said this is really relevant, no matter what age your child is as well. So tell us a bit more. I mean, a lot of us have been brought up with the punishments in terms of, maybe, how we were parented and we might be sort of trying to change that from our parenting standpoint. So can you tell us a bit more about why, from a brain science perspective, do so many punishments end up failing or even backfiring?
Speaker 2:Absolutely Well. First of all, I want to actually offer grace and compassion to anybody out there who came from a punitive family of origin and perhaps even perpetuated that in their own parenting for as long as they did. The thing is. A generation or two or five ago we didn't have access to the type of information that we have about child development now. People were doing the best they could with what they knew and the patterns that had been taught to them. Now, interestingly, brain science wise, we are born with a record of everything our family of origin has ever done.
Speaker 1:So at a sub-conscious level.
Speaker 2:We have scripts already in place saying essentially these are my triggers, this is how I respond this is safe versus this is unsafe. So there is no quote unquote wrong parenting if we are simply perpetuating what we learn without knowing better. All we're doing is repeating what we learned and it's really doing what our brain told us we're supposed to do. Now where we have the opportunity is when we can learn that there are other ways to support children. Then we have an opportunity to say oh, that whole thing that I learned actually doesn't make sense anymore. And what we know is that, as I mentioned a couple of minutes ago, children and adults need to feel. It's incredibly important. Children need to feel emotionally safe in order to learn and retain information, so, even as an adult, just to make it accessible for those of us who are adults and listening to this or watching this. If we get in trouble at work and a boss comes in yelling at us, we don't really necessarily want to keep doing well for that boss, thinking I can't go. I can't wait to go in and work for that person again because maybe they'll yell at me if I make another mistake. Instead, we think how can I get out of this job as quickly as possible and find a job that I like and I have a kind boss in the process. The same is true if I transfer that to children. If we are continually punitive with them, there might be behavioral change, but ultimately our children will be looking for the first out. They can find where they feel emotionally safer. And that isn't always a good idea, though, because peers aren't always the best choice. Social media, for them, is not always the best choice. We want to be that safe place so that when they say I'm struggling, they feel safe enough to come to us, so that we can teach them in a peaceful and emotionally accessible way, rather than feeling they need to run from us and hide their behavior and potentially end up in a worse scenario than if we had had a peaceful, connection-based relationship to start with.
Speaker 1:Yes, that's so true, and as a mum of teenagers like you, can see how quickly that can start to happen and peers become such a huge influence in their lives. So if they're not feeling safe with us, then that just makes total sense. And it also reminds me of I'm sure you've read it the Hold On to your Kids by Gabor Martes, how you say his name. That's such a brilliant book, isn't it? And it's all about that, like holding on to that connection that we have with our kids for as long as possible, so that they are less influenced by social media and their peers, and I don't think there's ever been a time that that's more important than now.
Speaker 2:You're absolutely right, yes, and I also recommend that book. So by all means pick up Peaceful Discipline, but get that one too. It's a fantastic one.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it is a really great book for you know, especially, I think, as kids are getting older and heading into those teenage years. Okay, so, thank you so much. Like you've done a really good job of explaining. You know what this sort of idea of Peaceful Discipline is. So is this sort of, I guess, style of parenting, if you like, good for all kids? Or, you know, are there some kids that do better with different approaches?
Speaker 2:Brilliant question and that there is a very common misconception that peaceful discipline is only for children who are either so incredibly sensitive they can't handle anything else, or perhaps they're already very obedient and compliant and all they need is just a little nudge to get them over the edge. Nothing could be farther from the truth. What we actually find out from the research is that a lot of the children who seem at the surface to have the biggest behavioral struggles are often acting that way because they feel the least emotionally safe. So it might take a little longer with these kids to build the level of trust where they think I don't have to be in fight or flight all the time anymore. I can actually relax my nervous system to the point where peaceful discipline is going to be accessible to me and long term I will actually thrive much more than a punitive style might be. So long story short. Yes, of course it's for the sensitive children. Yes, of course it's for the quote unquote easy children, but it's absolutely as much, if not even more, for the kids who seem to struggle the most, because they may deep down have the deepest need for that tenderness and softer approach that may not feel like the natural approach in the moment.
Speaker 1:Yes, yes, that's so true. Like, as you said, maybe even more important for those you know, stronger willed children. Yeah, I really love that, and so I know a lot you know of what you talk about is to do with being parent centric in the way that we approach behavior, rather than trying to always, you know, change and modify our children's behavior. So can you tell us a bit more about what that looks like?
Speaker 2:Sure. So I'll give an example and I spell this out in the book, literally and metaphorically, and that it's an acronym. But anytime we are triggered by something, it's almost invariably something that we either learned from our family of origin, for example. I wasn't allowed to do that and therefore it must be quote unquote bad behavior. Well, is that actually true? Or is my child actually developmentally normal and they're doing what they were supposed to do? So the acronym I'm going to talk about is what I call the hug process. So when we have a trigger, I recommend the hug H stands for hold your reaction and whenever it is, before you fly off the handle, know that statistically you have about six seconds between the input that your brain receives and how you respond. Where you have basically a fork in the road, either your brain will say this is not safe, I'm going to flip out and this is not going to end well for my child or for me, or I can redirect any big feelings that I might have, come up and say I want to do something healthy with this. So even if it's just a matter of saying to my child, this is really hard for me right now. I'm struggling, I need to go, take a breath. Whatever it is that we can do within those six seconds, that holding of our reaction can make us much more peaceful when we actually do interact with the child in front of us. The? U stands for understand their side of the story, understand their perspective, get curious. One of my favorite quotes by a woman named Kelly Matthews, who's not necessarily famous or an author or anything, but she's a child development expert. She learned it from her mentor. But it's don't get mad, get curious. And when we can work to understand what's driving my child's behavior because 99 times out of 100, it's not the obvious my child who acts out against the sibling or the family pet or you know the slamming the door, whatever it might be, it's not the surface behavior, that's the issue. What was the trigger for the child that made them do that thing, whatever that thing is? And then, finally, when we do that, usually compassion is what comes up for us rather than anger. And the G then stands for give them grace to be human. We all have tough days. We all have times when we're hungry or thirsty or not feeling well or have had sensory overload or whatever the case may be, and when we can remember the kids are human too and they're going to have struggles, just like we do. It's not their job to regulate our nervous system. That's our job. So if we use the hug process, we can really take almost anything that's happening externally to us, take a step back and say how do I want to handle this? What kind of a parent or caregiver do I want to be in this moment Almost as if we're holding a very compassionate mirror that we can look into and say who do I want to see right now? Because it's what my child is actually seeing. And it's not to create guilt or shame in our bodies, but it's just awareness and, if anything, self-compassion to say you know what? Maybe I'm the one who needs to go get a cup of water Before I interact with my child. Maybe I have some basic unmet need that's going to allow me to be more present and more peaceful in the moment, so that I can use nonviolent communication strategies to connect with my child and talk through whatever the problem is, or be playful or any of the other strategies in the strategy category of the book that I might want to use, instead of just whatever my trigger is telling me to do.
Speaker 1:Yes, and I love that, like just the six seconds when we think about it as that just you know, pausing for six seconds. Often when we do, when we are reactive to our kids, you know, and then they go to sleep and then, you know, we look at their beautiful little sleeping faces and that's when we, you know, might reflect and see it from their side. But if we can just take that moment to see it from their side, oh, that's so powerful. I love that hug. So hold, understand and grace was really you know the gist of that. I think that's going to be so helpful for me because I'm going to admit that I'm definitely struggling with my teenagers the moment. We had an incident on the weekend where my daughter I picked my daughter up from dance rehearsals and I was going for a bike ride. It was a beautiful sunny day and I said would you like to come with me? And initially she said no and I was like, ok, that's fine. And then she said actually I will come with you, just wait, can you just give me a minute? And then she was taking her time. I'm like, ok, she just needs a bit of time. She's just come back from, you know, dance rehearsals. She comes out 20 minutes later, you know, with her lip gloss on. She's 13. I'm like oh, you had to put your lip gloss on for the bike ride, did you, anyway? And then I'm like OK, just need, just need some sun cream on, because it was quite a warm day. She's like I'm not putting sun cream on, and I said well, you have to. Well, you can't go out unless you've got sun cream on. And she just refused, was like no, I'm not putting sun cream on. I said well, you can't come then, and she's like no, I really want to come, but I'm not, you know, just turned into this big thing and I definitely didn't have my best parenting moment. I'm like well, you know, you're 13, you know you have to wear sun cream. You either put it on or you're not coming. Anyway, she was kind of beside herself and looking back, I could see she was just really struggling with that decision. She'd had, you know, like you were saying, the sensory overload at the dance rehearsals. Anyway, I went for the ride and I actually did say look, I just need a minute, I'm going for my ride, I'll come back, because we were in an argument by this time. And then I came back and she was just sitting on the couch reading her book and then we just kind of connected again. So it just sometimes takes that you, like, definitely need that separation sometimes, don't you? You really?
Speaker 2:do yes, and all the grace to you as a mum, because you're trying to keep her safe and healthy. You have all the motivation in the world and you want to be able to go and do this nice thing for yourself on this beautiful day. So I have nothing but grace and compassion for you. So if there's any part of you that's being hard on yourself, just know I'm making a effort triple with seeing you and what you are needing at the time too, oh thank you.
Speaker 1:And I think there was this built up kind of you know, because she'd taken so long to get ready. I was keen to go out, so I was in this car, let's just go. So then her not putting the sun cream on was just this sort of trigger for me. But it's, you know, helpful to think about how this you know hug acronym maybe changed the way that I responded to her. So thank you for that. It's all these little moments, isn't it? And when you look back on them you think, oh, they're not such a big deal, but at the time they can just cause so much, you know, tension and frustration in both you and the child.
Speaker 2:They absolutely do, and we know statistically from places like the Gottman Institute that for every single negative interaction that we have with someone, it takes five positive interactions to emotionally make up that lost ground. So if we're holding on to something that felt rather again like we didn't enjoy that interaction we had with our child, give it time. You don't have to go out and buy five presents or do five amazing things, but just five distinct times of feeling connection together and that healing is accessible. It's just not instantaneous and that's the hard part sometimes.
Speaker 1:Yes, yes, definitely, and I think that's especially true with teenagers. I mean, you know that tend to maybe some teenagers hold grudges, or you know it can be hard to reconnect. So that's a really helpful thing to remember as well that you know five sort of positive interactions to reconnect. Ok, so what? Like? I guess this leads on to the next question in terms of some parents, you know really do find peaceful discipline quite difficult. So what would you say to those parents? And do we have to parent this way all of the time? And what if parenting this way doesn't come naturally to us? Have you got any tips?
Speaker 2:Yeah, first of all, again, you're going to hear me talking about compassion for you, the adult, all day, every day, because it is hard and especially if we did go up with the roadmap for it. We're learning things from scratch and it's challenging. So the good news is, no, you don't have to do this perfectly 100 percent of the time. It's kind of like your grade point average in school. You know you get to have days or parenting exams, if you will pardon the analogy where you totally vomit. It's horrible, it did not go at all as planned, but if, by and large, the average aggregate of your experiences together is positive, that's really all we're going for here. So you absolutely can be an imperfect parent. In fact, I hope that you are an imperfect parent, because imagine the pressure a child would feel growing up in a quote unquote perfect home. It would be horrible. So I want more than perfect parenting. I want children who model a brother. I want parents who model how to repair after they've made a mistake. I want to show children how to recover from those not so pretty moments, because we all have them. So lots of grace as you learn and honestly, take baby steps. We put incredible pressure on ourselves to do this perfectly all the time from day one. Well, of course, we're going to feel exasperated and end up giving up after a short amount of time. If I sought out to run a marathon today but I've never run before I would die within five miles. I would just feel over. It would not go well. My first step might literally be to go online and look at how much running shoes cost. That might be the very first thing I do. Same thing applies to peaceful discipline. If you can make a goal of, you know what my intention for today is to not pressure my child while they're having their breakfast, to just be present and let them eat there whatever it is they're having and just be with them for 20 minutes. Maybe that's my goal for today, and I'm not even going to pay attention to the rest of this. I'm not going to be able to do the day quite yet. Learn in tiny, tiny steps, and once you master part, you move on to the next. And here's the thing too. We also know about brain science that our brains love for doing what they've always done. So if you decide I want to be a more peaceful parent, I want to use the tools that Sarah suggests. I'm going to be more playful, I'm going to do the hug process, I'm going to do all of these other things that she outlines. I'm going to use them, all this good stuff, but my brain says no, I'm going to hold you in this pattern that has kept you alive and well all these years so far. It's going to be tougher before it gets easier, and I don't say that to discourage anyone, but instead to encourage you that the more you practice not only in real life, but also just through the power of visualizations what helps you strengthen your neural pathways as if it's actually happening in real life, it all counts. Every moment where you are peaceful with your child strengthens those little brain highways that say I can do this again. And that's really all we're going for.
Speaker 1:I love that. It really takes the pressure off and it really is in line with our approach when it comes to health and nutrition and making those healthy changes for our kids diet or lifestyle or within the home environment. We're always talking about just taking one step at a time and I feel like changes like that, if you take that step by step approach, they do hold longer. They turn into those more long-term habits. So, yeah, I really love that you've explained it in that way to us. So you talk a bit about story teaching as well. Can you tell us more about exactly what that is?
Speaker 2:I would be happy to so. Our brains are fascinating organs in that they contain something called the hippocampus and we are born with it. It's not something we need to work on necessarily. The hippocampus is essentially the brain's storyteller. It's what will remind me six months or a year from now that I met you over, zoom, and you are lovely. You have a gorgeous smile and this incredibly warm personality that comes right through. I will have an emotional story attached to our discussion. That's a story my hippocampus is going to hold on to that. Our brains are creating stories about everything we do all of the time. Some, of course, are more memorable than others. Our brain can't keep track of all of the stories every day. I don't know where I left my keys. That was not that interesting until I need to know. But how we can use this in parenting is again, one of the beautiful things about it is, as long as we have a brain, this approach works for all ages. With a little kid, you can tell them stories, either made up or through books that you have, or even from shows that you're watching. You can tell them stories or repeat stories to them that have some sort of emotional anchor, to make the lessons you want to teach memorable, and the good news is you can do it proactively for something that's coming up. Hey, young child, do you remember that show we watched where the child was going to go to school for the first time? Do you remember what they did to get ready? Do you remember how Daniel Tiger or whoever it was? Do you remember how they felt when they got to school? You create an emotional anchor so that the child feels a sense of familiarity before they're actually in the situation and that helps prepare them. Now I'm going to stick with the same. It works for the future. Analogy for the older child. You have teenagers. Your younger teenage child will probably be driving within a few years and don't mean to panic you there. Whatever grounding threats you need to do right now, but you know, someday, a hundred years from now, she'll be driving and you will be able to tell her stories to help prepare her. Or do you remember when your older sibling was learning to drive and this is what we did? And do you remember that time when I was driving and this happened? Whatever the story is to help create, be it safety measures in her brain or things to remember to practice, or do you're creating an emotional anchor about something she cares about, so that when she encounters it it's not so novel and overwhelming for her? So it's essentially living in the future without having access to the future. We can also teach in the moment. Maybe there's something that our child is going through and we can lean over and say hey, I remember seeing this happen when we went to this other scenario that was similar, and that way we don't have to embarrass them, shame them or anything. We can simply say hey, do you remember that other thing? Let's do it this way again or let's not do it this way again. We can use that story in the moment as opposed to yelling or whatever else we nagging or yes, yes, I love that, and I was just going to say I used to.
Speaker 1:We used to go to this beautiful Waldorf or Steiner playgroup when my kids were little and just the ladies that ran it were the best storytellers. And one of them, one of those ladies you know, told me I think I was struggling with my, I think one of my kids I think it was my daughter getting up constantly, you know, at night, when she was, when you know she was supposed to be going to sleep and you know she told me to sort of portray that in a story with little characters and what's going to happen and you know, and then they're going to stay in bed until you know the morning. I do remember all of the details, but I do remember using stories like that in that way of like you know, what I was kind of wanting to achieve or how I was wanting them to behave in those kind of scenarios that they might have been struggling with, with going to school as well. And I think I do do it, naturally, actually, with my teenagers, because my oldest teen is only a couple of weeks away from getting his license, he's learning his permit. I don't know if you do that in the US. But we'll have to be driving, we'll have to be in the car with him for the first year, which is, thank goodness but I have been sharing stories about, you know, when I was learning to drive and that sort of thing. So, you know, I think I'd never really thought about storytelling for older teens, but that totally does make sense.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it really does, and I love that you have had access to this and for what it's worth. I actually have some sample stories in the back of Peaceful Discipline where I talk about things like bedtime and you know other behavioral type things, and, granted, most of the stories I include in the sample stories are geared towards younger children, but you're 100% right, and that we can simply transfer some of the details and they never expire, no matter how old the child gets. And then, interestingly, you can finally use stories retroactively as well to help children process events that have to be tricky or traumatic, or perhaps didn't go as well as we hoped they would, or perhaps they went great and we want it to be repeatable, but we can help reinforce the message to help the child make sense of the story, to either help reduce trauma and stress or increase resilience or a skill set, or perhaps that's what we're going for. So it's really a beautiful way to access a part of the brain that we're using anyway, but really amped up to teach in a very peaceful way, even if we ourselves are not creative storytellers. It's just a different way to use everyday examples to help peacefully teach and lead the child.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so powerful, and I love that you've got examples in your book. You know, especially for parents who might not be creative or you know, know, you know that that sort of might not come naturally to them. So can you finish off by telling our listeners more about where they can find you, what you offer and more details of your book as well?
Speaker 2:Sure, I would be happy to. So the book Peaceful Discipline is available globally and really all of the major book selling platforms. So from Amazon to you know you name it. It's probably out there, and if you can't find it, let me know and I'll see if I can get it where you need it. My website is dandelionseedscom. There is a hyphen in there dandelionseedscom. You can find me on all of the social media channels under either my name, sarah, and the middle initial R last name more if you just look up Sarah more you'll get 10 billion of my best friends. So middle initial R is how you find me, and I'm either dandelion seeds positive parenting or dandelion seeds positive living on Instagram, because parenting wouldn't fit. Go figure. As far as things I have going on, if you go to my website, you can access one free mini course. Everything I do is evidence based. I also have some expert interviews out there and I'm partnering with the American SPCC to offer some parent coaching support groups, so I make those available to people who want to really level up their parenting, whether they are just starting the journey of respect based parenting or if they've been doing it for a long time and really want to take it to that next level. So I have all sorts of things that I can do to support you, and I always welcome feedback and suggestions as well.
Speaker 1:Amazing and I will make sure all of the links you know to your book and your website and your socials are in the show notes. So if anyone's struggling to find them, make sure you head on over to our show notes and we'll make sure there's a link there so that people in Australia can get access to your book. I actually found out about you through one of our Natural Super Kids Club members, who said that they followed you for parenting advice. So I then got in touch with you and said hey, do you want to come on the podcast? So I haven't even had a read of your book, but I will definitely be grabbing a copy. So thank you so much for joining me. I've gained a lot. Sometimes I feel like these parenting podcast topics that I do are like a bit selfish because I'm getting all of the tips for my own parenting, but I really appreciate you coming on and sharing your wisdom with us, sarah.
Speaker 2:Well, you are a joy, just and for the person who recommended me. Thank you, whoever you are, appreciate it, and it's just a joy to connect with you.
Speaker 1:Thank you so much. Thank you so much for joining me on the podcast today. Head on over to our website, naturalsuperkidscom for the show notes for this episode, as well as a whole heap of inspiration to help you raise healthy and happy kids. I'll see you next week.