The Spiritual Parent: Mindful Tools for Raising Spiritual and Conscious Kids

How to Teach Kids to Feel Energy: Spiritual Parenting Tips for Empaths and Neurodiverse Children

• Carrie Lingenfelter, CCC-SLP • Season 1 • Episode 89

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Have you ever noticed your child suddenly reflecting emotions you've been quietly harboring? There's a profound energetic connection between parents and children that goes beyond words—one that can teach us as much as we teach them.

In this eye-opening episode, I share a recent experience with my son who expressed heartache about attending a concert because he missed his old friends. This moment revealed the fascinating way children can sometimes mirror our unspoken feelings, while other times they're processing their own authentic emotions. The challenge for spiritual parents lies in helping our children discern between the two.

I introduce a powerful tool I use with my kids: teaching them to ask, "Is this your energy or someone else's?" By placing a hand on their hearts and tuning inward, children can develop the extraordinary skill of energetic discernment—something many of us didn't learn until adulthood, if at all. This practice has transformed how my family communicates about emotions and helps my children build healthy energetic boundaries.

The episode explores how energy works in our interactions with others, from the magnetic pull we feel toward certain people to the way others are drawn to us when our hearts are open. I share practical activities, like intuitive watercolor painting, that parents can use to help children recognize their mind-body-spirit connection in playful, accessible ways. Imagine where our children will be at 41 if they're learning these spiritual tools at 7 and 10!

Ready to bring more spiritual awareness into your parenting journey? Visit hearttoheartlife.com to take our new Woo quiz and connect with our community of conscious parents. Share your experiences or questions by emailing info@hearttoheartlife.com—I'd love to hear how you're helping your children navigate their energetic awareness.

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**Please remember that the information shared on this podcast is educational in nature and does not constitute licensed mental health advice. If you need such advice, you should speak with a licensed professional about your unique situation. Thanks so much happy listeners.

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Carrie Lingenfelter:

But we can teach our kids these pieces right. We can teach our kids to find the tools for knowing energetically where we're at. We can teach our kids the tools for understanding. When we have enough capacity to connect with people, when we have enough heart, when our energy is full and we are ready to connect with other people, we can teach our kids we model everything as energy we model. Learn to feel our own energy, learn to flow with our energy. Okay, that's a huge piece of spiritual parenting and a huge piece of raising a spiritual family. Hi, conscious Parents, it's Keri here and I am here with a little info about raising our spiritual family. Hi, conscious Parents, it's Keri here, and I am here with a little info about raising our mindful kids. I've got some tips and tricks about breaking free of the box and becoming who you are and teaching your kids how to do that along the way. Join us. Hi Spiritual Parents, welcome back. I'm so excited you're here today.

Carrie Lingenfelter:

We're going to have a little mini episode and we're going to be talking about kids feeling energy before they can even name it or understand it with words. I'm going to start right off with a story about what happened to us recently. Yesterday my kiddos and I we were going to go to a concert a little outdoor band with our whole family and as we were getting ready to go my son was like I can't go to this. My heart really hurts. I remember going to these in the past with my friends and I don't have those same group of friends since we changed schools and now everything feels different and I just don't feel good about this and it breaks my heart because I miss what we used to have. And it was interesting because I had a moment where I pulled my husband aside and I said I have these exact emotions Like he is. Is he reflecting exactly what I'm feeling in my heart right now? And I was pushing myself to go because I thought the kids were happy and doing good with it and it was so interesting. My husband was like no, this time he's actually feeling it himself because he's described specific scenarios. He's named specific pieces and friends and things in that scenario. But there have been other times where he has picked up and reflected my direct emotions. So it's really interesting in those moments to really tune in and say is this my emotion he's feeling? Is he reflecting me, carrie, or is he my son saying his own energy and his own emotions, because they can pick up that energy and they may not understand it. They may not know that it's not their emotions, it's somebody else's emotions. So, when we're looking at this, one thing that somebody recently taught me and I love this for my kids and I do it for myself now too, it's really powerful is I am teaching my kids is that your energy or someone else's? Are those your feelings or someone else's? So there'll be a moment like yesterday I could have said to my son is that your energy? Is that your feelings, or does it feel like this is coming from mom? Because I'm having those same feelings right now. Dude, who do you think? Where do you think that's coming from? Let's feel in our heart. Let's sit with our hand on our heart for a minute, close our eyes and think inside. Does this feel like me or is this somebody else's emotions? It sounds a little wonky, right, but I will tell you.

Carrie Lingenfelter:

I once was in a setting and I was doing a presentation and it was really interesting because I opened the door and I asked for reflection back from the group and somebody said something that did not feel positive. And it was really interesting because in that moment I felt in my heart, okay, the thing that person said. It really hit me at first right, because I'm a highly sensitive person. And then, later on, when it was quiet and everybody was gone and I was reflecting back on everything, I sat there and I said this isn't my energy. I feel it in my heart. This person that said this thing it's something that they're feeling in their life and they brought in here. Maybe they felt a little bit about it with me and the scenario and everything but the energy that I felt that I got hit with this wave of energy as a really sensitive person. That wasn't. That wasn't how that feeling, how that person was feeling about me as I took it on oh my God, she hates me. Oh my God, she feels like my whole situation was enough.

Carrie Lingenfelter:

Really, it was that that person was feeling like they were not enough in that moment and I took that on as I'm not enough. I suddenly picked up their exact emotions I am not enough. And then I sent that person love, because anytime somebody is feeling like not enough, I want to send you all the love because you are enough, you were born enough and the universe isn't going to send you things that you can't handle. It's sending you what you can handle. So back to what we're talking about, with kids feeling energy and not being able to express it in words. One thing I would love for you guys to think about is I have always been told by people you're magical. People are drawn to you and you guys it's really nuts because I was telling my husband lately I go to different things and all of a sudden I feel like people are popping out from the corners like hey, carrie, carrie, you're here. Oh, carrie, I wanted to talk to you about this one thing, and there was a point in my life where I had a large group of friends and it all just imploded and everything changed.

Carrie Lingenfelter:

And I changed to the spiritual person. I changed my conscious level, everything changed in my life and I changed my kids' schools, everything went nuts in our lives and I just kind of like took a break. I wasn't looking to gain friendships, I was just looking to heal myself, heal my kids, heal my partner and we. We turned within for us, we turned into our family, we turned into our spirituality, we turned into our self-growth. And then, all of a sudden, I started to go back into the world and I opened my heart again. I'm ready to start talking to people, I'm ready to start meeting people.

Carrie Lingenfelter:

And it was nuts because as soon as I put that energy into the world, like, okay, maybe I'll start to talk to people, maybe I'll start going for walks with other moms, maybe I'll start to go to the spiritual group, maybe I'll do these things. It just went bonkers and they were like coming out of the woodwork, you guys like peeking around the corners like hey, carrie, I'm like whoa, ok, so think about that energy. Huh, if I had this closed off energy during my transitions and during all these spiritual awakening pieces that I was going through in my heart, where everything that was cut and I was like, nope, I had this X across my heart. I don't have energy for anything else. I'm looking inward right now and then, all of a sudden, everything healed and I started to blossom into myself again.

Carrie Lingenfelter:

Think of that energy that I'm putting out, that people are now feeling like they're drawn to it and yet also, I'm putting out this healing energy of I want to connect with other parents, I want to help other parents going through this raising neurodiverse kids and having all these labels and all these things that everybody tells us we need to do. Okay, sorry, that's another soapbox, right? But as I'm putting out this energy of I want to connect with other people, they're picking it up, they cannot name it, but they are feeling it and they're coming in like magnets. So then also, I'm gonna watch my energy. I'm gonna have to learn to draw boundaries here and there as people are flooding in the floodgates like okay, yes, yes, I do want to help you, I do want to connect, but I have to do it in my own time. I have to do it when I am energetically capable, when my bucket is not completely full of demands. I'm going to do it when I am energetically capable when my bucket is not completely full of demands. I'm going to do it in a healthy version, which I did not learn until I was 41 years old. Guys doing this in a healthy version.

Carrie Lingenfelter:

But we can teach our kids these pieces right. We can teach our kids to find the tools for knowing energetically where we're at. We can teach our kids the tools for understanding when we have enough capacity to connect with people, when we have enough heart, when our energy is full and we are ready to connect with other people. We can teach our kids. We model everything as energy. We model, learn to feel our own energy, learn to flow with our energy. Okay, that's a huge piece of spiritual parenting and a huge piece of raising a spiritual family. So also, it's interesting.

Carrie Lingenfelter:

I love to teach my kids. Sometimes you feel like there's a connection with somebody in your life and you don't know why you're just connected to them. That's how I was when I first met my husband. We were like this magnetic pull toward each other and I was like, whoa, that's too intense, and so my brain would shut it off and then my heart would pull it back in. It's really crazy. So I love to teach my kids about feeling these things in our hearts. I feel like I'm going to have a friendship with this person and here's why. Well, maybe I don't know why, maybe I just feel like I'm meant to have a friendship with that person. So teaching them about that connection and what they can look like is teaching our kids about mind-body-spirit connection, right, Teaching our kids how to tune in. And there's so much learning for us as adults. Even when we're 41 years old, we're still learning all these things.

Carrie Lingenfelter:

So an activity that you could do with your kids would be when you're painting. You could do like a watercolor. I love watercolor because I feel like all the colors flow and blend and it's not as structured as finger paints or such or other types of medias. So what I would do is, if I was painting with my kids, I would say let's close our eyes, let's you could even put your hand over the paints and say what color does my hand feel drawn toward, what color does my heart want me to use? And your hand is drawn toward the purple. So I would model it for my kids. Mom's gonna paint too. Get in there, paint with them. Guys, I'm gonna paint too. I'm drawn toward the purple, oh, but you know what? My heart doesn't want dark purple. My heart wants light purple. I'm gonna get some water'm going to get some water. I'm going to get some water in there. I'm going to make a light violet color. Ooh, I'm spreading it around. Light violet makes me feel light and airy and flowy.

Carrie Lingenfelter:

I feel bright and patient right now in my heart and really talking about what you're drawn to with your heart, connecting with your mind and your body and your spirit. That is so important. Can you imagine where these guys are going to be when they're 41 if we're teaching them this right now at 7 and 10? I'm doing it with my 7 and 10 year olds guys and you can do it in any activity. If you're outside doing chalk, you can do it. If you're outside playing water balloons, you could do it. Which balloon color am I drawn to? Ooh, I want the big one, because my heart is feeling full of water. You can model all of these pieces.

Carrie Lingenfelter:

So let's give our kids the tools to name it right, to name that energy, to name that mind, body, spirit connection. As always, I love an affirmation and a prayer to help us through any challenges that we're going through, because maybe you're like overwhelmed in all of this, carrie, this is a lot. I'm working on this, but geez, louise, you gave me 85 stories and a tool and I'm feeling overwhelmed. So let's end with a affirmation and prayer. So I'm gonna put my hand over my heart and I'm going to say thank you, universe, for helping me to connect to myself, to understand my energy levels, to understand my energy capacities. Thank you for helping me to connect with the universe so that I can understand my mind, body, spirit connection. Thank you for helping me to have the tools to feel energy, understand energy and to name it. Thank you for helping me to understand how to feel and flow with energy, because energy is everything and so it is, as always.

Carrie Lingenfelter:

Thanks so much for tuning in and don't forget to check out our new Woo quiz. It's really fun. Thanks so much, happy listeners. Well, that's a wrap. Thanks so much for tuning in. Changemakers. This is Keri, and if you haven't done a review for us five stars and a little few words about what you've enjoyed in our podcast episodes we would really appreciate it. If you guys would like to ever message me, I would love any questions you have or any feedback at info at hearttoheartlifecom. We also have a brand new website which we're super excited to share. It's hearttoheartlifecom. Thanks so much for tuning in and happy life, happy times, changemaker families. Bye.