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Soul-Led
A devotional space for raw reflection, soulful inquiry, and the sacred unfolding of self. Here, we explore the mystery of being human through the lenses of spirituality, intimacy, creativity and the courage to be seen. This podcast is not about having all the answers, it's about honouring the questions, the pauses, the breakthroughs and the becoming.
Expect unscripted conversations, intuitive musing, and transmissions from the heart all grounded in truth, reverence, and the beauty of the present moment.
Come as you are, leave a little more you!
Soul-Led
5. The Power of Words in Your Childs Healing Journey: What if We Refuse to Accept Limitations
Words have the power to shape our reality—especially for children. This realization struck me profoundly during my daughter Navy's recent eye appointment, where I decided to experiment with the transformative potential of language.
After recalling Napoleon Hill's remarkable story about his son who was diagnosed as permanently deaf but ultimately learned to hear through unwavering belief, I wondered: could positive language influence my daughter's eye condition? This question led me to write a letter to her optician, requesting they use only empowering language during her examination.
The science behind this experiment is fascinating. Until around age seven or eight, children's brains primarily operate in theta and delta brainwave states—the same states accessed during deep meditation. This makes their minds extraordinarily impressionable, absorbing everything as truth without the filter of critical thinking. What medical professionals say in these moments becomes their reality.
When the optician embraced my request, using phrases like "your eyes are healing beautifully" instead of "you still need glasses," I watched Navy's entire demeanor transform. She sat taller, more confident. Even more surprisingly, her prescription had actually decreased—her eyes were genuinely improving. Whether coincidence or consequence, the experience reinforced the profound impact our words have on children's developing minds and possibly even their physical healing.
This experiment extends beyond eye appointments to every aspect of parenting. From how we speak about homework challenges to the way we discuss co-parenting dynamics, our language creates the foundation for our children's core beliefs about themselves and their capabilities. By consciously choosing empowering words, we provide our children with the strongest possible foundation for their journey ahead.
What language patterns might you shift to better support the children in your life? Share your thoughts and join our self-development book club where we explore these concepts further.
Thank you for being on this journey with me 🤍
Links!!
Hello and welcome back to the Soul Ed podcast with me, your host, emma Jones, and this week has just been so great for me. I am feeling so fresh and just so alive and we are on the last chapter of the book, the Artist's Way in the Book Club. Anyone wants to join the Book Club? I will leave the link in the show notes. It's a self-development book club and we read a new book every single month. I do a little podcast episode per chapter and we've come to the end of this book.
Speaker 1:It's been 12 weeks, this particular journey on this particular book, and I must say I feel so much clearer in my direction for my life, but in a way that is not attached. Life, but in a way that is not attached, so it doesn't come with that kind of like desperation of the ego where there's grasping or there's urgency or I want something. That's over there. It's more of a balanced, inspired way or feeling. It's quite hard to describe how I feel, but I definitely feel really different and I think it is because of the book. There's lots of things we do in the book, like the morning pages, which is a brain dump every single morning that allows you to put anything that comes to mind onto paper, without judgment, without criticizing, without making it make sense, you just dump whatever's in your brain and that alone, just that one thing. I mean there's a few other things that we're doing in the book that is incredible, but that one thing I think I'm going to take with me long after this book is finished, because it just is bringing so much clarity and I just feel so fresh and light that's the only way I can describe it. I just feel alive, I feel very, very connected at the moment and things are just feeling so balanced for me, like today. I have given myself a whole day of doing nothing, pretty much. I woke up this morning, I had a lovely lie-in. I left my phone on do not disturb, my kids are with their dad this weekend so I just had the most slowest, beautiful morning and I spent the whole day in my lovely apartment just doing not a lot. I've napped, I've watched a couple of episodes of the Kardashians, which I absolutely love it's my guilty pleasure and I've just really chilled out. It's been so, so nice. And what I want to share today on this episode is a change in approach that I am experimenting with through my consistent fascination and love for neuroscience and neuroplasticity and understanding the power of language, especially around our children.
Speaker 1:So my daughter had her yearly checkup with the opticians. We had a letter through, booked her appointment and about four years or so ago she had this really weird blink where she would blink and then roll her eyes, and so as soon as we noticed it we took her to the eye hospital and they confirmed that she was actually long-sighted. So whenever she was trying to focus on something that was a bit more in focus and short range, her eyes would do this blink and rolling to just almost like the focus and the lens, a bit like a camera, I guess. And they said that she would need glasses to rectify this. And as soon as they said glasses, I remember doubting and thinking is it, you know? Is it really the right thing to do to wear glasses so young? Will her eyes then rely on the glasses? And I had all of these thoughts and I spoke to their dad and the dad had a similar outlook to me. But I did a little bit of research and what I learned is that actually children's eyes grow rapidly in the first zero to eight years. So their first years are really, really important, and they do change quite a lot and they tend to mature around the age of eight.
Speaker 1:So I thought, okay, okay, we'll go with what the opticians have said. They of course, know a lot more than me, but I always have this element of doubt of is there a better way? So Navy wears her glasses now mostly for focused tasks like tv, and we take them to school. She has a couple of pairs. She takes one to her dad's and one to school, and her eye rolling hasened. We don't really see it as much as we used to.
Speaker 1:But as this appointment was approaching, I thought what if we experimented a little bit here? And as I thought about the experiment that I wanted to take on around language, I had a flashback to a book that I read a few years ago which is called Think and Grow Rich, and in chapter one few years ago which is called Think and Grow Rich. And in chapter one there's a story about Napoleon Hill's son, blair Hill, who was born without any ears and was diagnosed as permanently deaf, and doctor said we would never hear and never speak. But Napoleon had that glimmer of doubt. Is there a better way? Should we refuse to accept his diagnosis and not let this be the truth. So instead he planted beliefs in his son's subconscious from an early age, telling him that he could in fact hear and he would speak. And he wasn't limited and never really allowed his son Blair to feel disabled or pitied, or wouldn't allow him to be in a separate group in school, always wanted him to be completely included as he was, and then would repeat affirmations and encouraging words around him, consistently programming his mind for possibility. And I'm sure you guessed it. But Blair eventually did learn to hear faintly through bone conduction, which still fascinates me, but it's essentially hearing the vibrations through the bone in his jaw and his skull. So this was obviously a huge turning point and it showed that he was perceiving sound, but just in his own way at that time, and then over time he was able to speak clearly by watching others' lips and later in his life he got accepted for this new hearing piece that was actually being tested at the time and became a pioneer in helping other deaf children and other deaf adults with the same diagnosis that he had.
Speaker 1:So as I was thinking about this story, what I take is that whatever the mind can conceive and can believe, it can achieve. So it wasn't really about the hearing, it was about the belief and the refusal to accept the limitations, which then rewired his reality. And even when science said it couldn't, it did. So I was like, okay, with this example in mind, with the appointment coming up, I started to visualize the appointment and the way it normally goes is you go into this one room first of all. I started to visualize the appointment and the way it normally goes is you go into this one room first of all. They take pictures of the eyes, and then you go into another room with the optometrist or opticians, whatever they're called, and they will look through your results of the eye scan and they will also go through and put those glasses on. And you'd read the words from the board and they put little different slots in the glasses.
Speaker 1:So as I was visualising this, I was like maybe there is two opportunities here to use to our healing advantage, based on this theory that beliefs and the refusal to believe in the limitation could promote healing. And if we do take doctors and nurses and optometrists' words as truth and rightly so after all, they are way more informed than I am. I'm just someone who's always very curious. I have the ability of doubt, which does really serve in a lot of ways, especially with things like this, where I do question is there a better way? I do often question that. So I thought to myself okay, how am I going to get this across to the optometrist, that I want to experiment here with potential power of wording in front of her? And what if I maybe wrote her a letter and just handed it to her before the appointment to explain this experiment and that I wanted to help program her mind for healing, so to change the habit of thought from one where maybe her eyes have had something wrong with them, which is what the story she's been fed so far, to a more empowered story.
Speaker 1:And on top of this, as I was starting to think about it, I have been following Dr Jo Dispenza's work on epigenetics and neuroscience for well over four years, and so I knew that scientifically, from birth to about seven or eight, a child's brain primarily operates in theta and delta brainwave states, which are the same states that you could enter if, say, you were doing a hypnosis or a deep meditation, and in this state the mind is highly, highly impressionable, so it absorbs beliefs and patterns and emotional responses and world views from environments, without any question. You know, children don't question what they are absorbing. They are just absorbing right. And this is because their conscious, logical or analytical mind, which uses better and alpha brainwaves, isn't fully developed yet. So our children don't really filter, they just have access to everything and are like a sponge. That is exactly what they are.
Speaker 1:If you think to like Santa and the tooth fairy, you tell them that Santa's real. They are. If you think to like santa and the tooth fairy, you tell them that santa's real and they have no reason to question it. I mean, it's in their favor because they get loads of presents, but they have no reason to question it. Or the tooth fairy is only when your children get to the age of maybe six or seven or eight, when they start to ask questions like how does the tooth fairy even get in the house and how does the tooth fairy even lift up the pillow if they're a tiny fairy, and how do they carry the tooth? And that's the critical mind, the conscious mind, developing because it's starting to have this abstract thinking and abstract view and is able to see things very differently. So what this means is children download their reality through observation. They have mirror neurons. They copy their environments and copy what we do. They learn through repetition, like they learn to walk or learn to crawl, and they learn from the way we say things and the emotions around them and it forms their core beliefs.
Speaker 1:So if the optician holds authority to a child and to adults, to be honest I think a lot of adults still my mum being one of them takes what the doctors say as gospel, and I'm not saying that it isn't. But what I'm saying is that often she won't use her free will thinking and her own ability to question what they're saying and if it's right for her. But children, more so, hold doctors, nurses, opticians and anyone like that with authority, a medical professional like them are truth speakers. So why would they ever even question, especially being in the key development stages, that they are from zero to eight? And so what that optician says to Navy will hold far more weight than what I will say to her as a parent.
Speaker 1:So I was thinking what if I wrote this letter and I asked the optometrist to say really empowering words to her? So things like you're doing great, or your eyes are so strong, they're so clever, and let that become the seed of her identity. So I wrote a letter and I will read it to you, and I handed it to them so that they could read it just before the appointment started. And I wrote dear opticians, before we begin today's appointment, I'd like to make a small but important request. My daughter is at a key development stage where her subconscious mind is especially open and suggestible. Research in neuroscience shows that, until around age seven and eight, children predominantly operate in theta brainwaves, which means they absorb spoken language as truth, without the critical thinking abilities that come later in life. With this in mind, I kindly ask that you use only positive, empowering language when speaking in front of her, even when discussing observations or results. For example, framing things in a way like your eyes are really strong or they've improved and are doing really well would be really helpful. If there's anything more technical or concerning that needs to be discussed, I'd really appreciate it if you could share with me the information directly outside of a hearing range.
Speaker 1:I believe in the powerful role words play in shaping children's beliefs about their bodies and capabilities, and I'm experimenting with the idea that positive reinforcement can support healing and confidence. Thank you so much for your care and understanding Emma. So that was the letter I handed to her and she read the whole thing and the appointment went so well like I couldn't have even imagined it going as well as it did. She was so on board. She was absolutely incredible because there was a moment in time where I thought am I teaching them to suck an egg? Is that the saying? They clearly have studied for this. I am no expert in neuroscience, I'm just a mom that cares. But she really loved it and I noticed the more she started to say words like your eyes are really strong, they're healing beautifully. You're doing really well.
Speaker 1:Navy's body language completely changed. She went from slumping a little bit in the seat to sitting up really tall and putting her shoulders back and her head was higher. And it was just such a reminder to me the impact of how words really do create feelings which then lead to behaviors like standing tall or slumping. And I stayed for a few minutes to catch up with the opticians privately after and it did turn out that her eyes actually had got better and she wasn't actually just putting it on. Her eyes have got so much better and her prescription has gone down. Now. That may be just a coincidence, her eyes may have got better anyway, or it could be the intent that I put out to the universe the day before. Who knows? You know, we're never going to know.
Speaker 1:But the point is is that we are definitely heading in the right direction and I don't think that we should be too shy to interject when we want to have a more empowering environment for our children, because language does truly shape healing and belief, and you know, I've learned firsthand how powerful words are and how labels and limits can expand our experiences without us even knowing. And it's a reminder to me as a parent to steer conversations in a more empowered and positive way, whatever that might be, whether it's towards their homework, whether it's towards a challenge they've got, whether it's towards anything to do with school or their friends or even co-parenting. I've always been really hot on making sure I speak about their dad in an extremely positive way. I mean, he is a wonderful father, but when you go through a breakup, there's lots of emotions that are attached to that, and I had this one rule that I would never negatively speak about our experiences in front of the children, because I didn't want them to create core beliefs around their father based on an emotional moment in time that I'm going through. That isn't probably even a clear translation of actually what is going on. It's just because there is a lot of spike of emotion at the moment. So I have always been very aware of what the girls take in, what the girls hear, and it was just another layer of that for me of going to someone who is in authority, someone who would know more than me, but I ultimately have the say on how that experience is fed through them.
Speaker 1:They could have used language like you still need glasses, you're still going to need to wear them for a little while. Or they could have done what they did do and say your eyes are healing really beautifully. And actually we're going to do a lower prescription for this next set of glasses. It has a totally, totally different tone and my youngest daughter made me laugh the other day. I said to her the term which I think a lot of us parents have used. I said don't do that, because I've got the eyes in the back of my head. And it was another great piece of evidence to how quickly language can shape beliefs, because the following morning she starts waving to the back of my head and she says mummy, I wish I had eyes in the back of my head. It's just so symbolic for what we're learning and what I was understanding in that week.
Speaker 1:Kids are so gullible. They have no reason to question what they're hearing. They have no reason to question their environments. They just see that that's how you survive, that's how you get round, and they create their paradigm and the way they should live through that, through mirroring their environments. So don't be afraid, in hospital appointments or doctor appointments, or even just in schools, to ask for a more positive, empowering way of communicating around your child. We are here to be their guardians and their stewards for such a short amount of time. We are just here as guides of their becoming, and so if we can shape their reality in a way that provides them strong foundation of core beliefs, my purpose in that role would truly feel like it's fulfilled. So thank you for listening to my insights and my little experiments that I'm taking on this week, and I hope you all have the most incredible week. I hope that you have productivity, lots of rest, lots of downtime, lots of spaciousness, lots of clarity, and I will see you all for the next episode of the Soul Ed podcast. Bye.