How to be a Happy Mom
If you are thinking of buying the mother in your life gobs of stuff this Mother's Day, consider this: stuff won't make her lastingly happy, but there are other things that you can do that can. And if you are a mother, consider taking the matter into your own hands rather than waiting for a present to make your Mother's Day a good one. Here are some things you can do to that are more likely to bring you real joy:
1. Go out with your friends and have a few laughs.
The most persistent finding we have from 50 years happiness research tells us that our well-being is best predicted by how connected we feel to other people. Do we have lots of friends? Know our neighbors? Are we close to our extended family? Care about our co-workers? People with a lot of social connections are less likely to experience sadness, loneliness, low self-esteem, and problems with eating and sleeping.
So to bring on some lasting happiness, we need to nurture our social connections. But a girls' night out can bring us instant happiness as well, and I'm not talking about the kind you imbibe. The laughter we share with our buddies literally changes our body chemistry by retarding that pesky fight-or-flight stress system. A good guffaw-or even little giggle-causes our heart rate and blood pressure to drop and our muscles to relax.
2. Have your kids or partner give you a massage or pedicure.
There really is such thing as a magic touch. Like laughter, being touched in a positive way can also trigger biochemical reactions that make us feel good. Getting a massage or being touched-even just briefly-by a loved one can increase activation in the orbitofrontal cortex, the part of the brain where we feel the pleasure in a reward, as when we eat a piece of chocolate or win a pile of money. It also reduces the cardiovascular stress response and decreases our levels of stress hormones like cortisol. Touch is essential to our physical and mental well-being-without it we wither and perish.
3. Take some quiet time for yourself.
The appeal of spa time doesn't just come from the positive effects of touch-it comes from the possibility of some quiet time for reflection or meditation. Want to turn your brainwaves that signal stress into those that indicate bliss? Start meditating. Do it enough and research suggests that you will increase activity in the area of your brain that is active when you feel happiness (the left prefrontal cortex).
Neuroscience of yester yore held that our brains were pretty much done growing when we reached full height. Now we know that our brain is more like a muscle-use a particular area a lot and it will grow. As science writer Sharon Begley describes in her book Train Your Mind, Change Your Brain, studies of Tibetan monks show that meditation is a particularly effective way to grow the part of your brain that registers positive emotions. We Westerners freely accept that if we want to excel at something like music, or athletics, or learning a new language, we will need to train and practice hard. However, we rarely think that we can also train and practice to be happier-something Buddhists have long known. Meditation is concentrated happiness training. If you don't know how to meditate but are interested in learning, Martha Beck outlines a whole chapter of different techniques in her book The Joy Diet.
If you just read that part on meditation and thought, "Huh. I'm sticking to the pedicure," don't give up on taking some quiet time altogether. Take some time to yourself to begin a gratitude journal. Writing about things you feel grateful for is a simple way to bring more joy into your life. People who "practice gratitude" feel considerably happier (25%) than those in a control group-they are more joyful, enthusiastic, interested, and determined. In one study, researchers had people list five things they felt thankful for once a week for 10 weeks. At the end of the study, participants "felt better about their lives as a whole and were more optimistic about the future."
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These benefits are all the evidence you need to have a guilt-free pass to nurture your own happiness-whether it is by meditating or practicing gratitude, spending a little more time with your friends, or by indulging yourself with the nurturing touch of another person. Do these things this year in celebration of Mother's Day with the intention that they will become a regular part of your activities. For the sake of your kids.
From "How to be a Happy Mom" by Christine Carter, Ph.D., mother of two and Executive Director of the Greater Good Science Center.
Family Paths Program Spotlight: Early Childhood Mental Health Consultation
Family Paths' Early Childhood Mental Health Consultation is a program through which three Family Paths staff members work as consultants in our community. As member of the TIPS team, Suzanne Lapidus, April Netzer and Mari Barnes are consulting with preschool teachers, directors and childcare providers in various school district, Had Start and private childcare settings. Consultants help early childcare staff identify, understand and manage social, emotional and behavioral issues that arise in the early care setting. This team knows that early intervention is an important step in treating and resolving these behavioral issues.
Family Paths has been providing early childhood consultation for over six years. Some of the most important characteristics of this program are its relationship-based model and its focus on collaboration between consultant and teacher/childcare provider. Family Paths consultants work to become part of the childcare team by building trusting relationships with staff. "Through genuine respect and curiosity, flexibility and openness and a willingness to see everyone's perspectives, consultants can help to transform relationships, leading to a richer experience for young children in their childcare setting" says Nancy Morosohk, LCSW, who supervises the consultation program. Enriching young children's childcare experience is definitely an investment in our future.
Thank You!
Family Paths, together with the Friends of Family Paths, wants to send a big thanks to everyone who came to Periscope Cellars on April 24th for our first annual Blue Ribbon Fundraising Event in honor of National Child Abuse Prevention Month! This event raised $8,000 to help build stronger families in the Bay Area.
The Friends of Family Paths worked hard to put on a successful event, and we were thrilled to see so many familiar faces. It was also exciting to meet a number of new friends and supporters of the work that we do to treat and prevent child abuse and build stronger families.
At the event, we unveiled our new promotional video, and a former client spoke about the services that Family Paths provided to help her through difficult times for her family.
We want to send out a big thanks to our generous community partners who donated goods and services to our silent auction! It was very successful, with a variety of items: from delicious cakes to art materials to spa services and excellent bottles of wine!
Our thanks go out, too, to the folks at Periscope Cellars in Emeryville. Their excellent selection of wines and their hospitality were much appreciated by all throughout the event.
Thanks, everyone, for a fun evening honoring the treatment and prevention of child abuse. Together, we can build stronger families in our community.