Practicing yoga and meditation is beneficial for your kids and for you. Children learn by watching what their parents do. They sense if their parents are at peace and happy.
Yoga teaches that you are body, energy, emotions, mind and spirit. It aligns and balances these levels of your being. Learning practices from a very young age that incorporate all levels greatly benefits the well-being of children now and in the future.
Yoga teaches a complete set of practices: for a healthy and strong body physical exercise and diet, for balanced energy breath work that detoxifies and calms the body, for calm emotions awareness and control of emotions, for a clear mind meditation, concentration, right thinking, thought control, emptying the mind and for a clear connection to spirit and receiving its guidance meditation, prayer and right attitudes such as trust, faith and surrender.
The benefits for kids are the same as for grown-ups:
- feeling healthy and flexible, with a strong body,
- feeling balanced and experiencing positive emotions,
- feeling authentic and being able to express your feelings and ideas with love for others,
- feeling in touch with yourself,
- feeling and experiencing the connection between all living beings with a sense of belonging,
- feeling capable of engaging in the world whole-heartedly, with a sense of healthy detachment.
Children, who feel good in their bodies and are taught and shown attitudes of love will probably develop good self-esteem, help other kids in school and be less prone to bullying. By learning yoga and meditation early in their lives, children will have some useful tools already at hand that other people have to start learning when they are overworked or even depressed later in life.
Some healthy habits for your kids are:
- Establish a routine of doing yoga postures and meditate regularly together or find a good yoga class for them when they are older.
- Do breathing exercises from yoga with them and adjust them for your kids or get a good book about breathing exercises for children.
- Give them their alone-time every day, for instance half an hour. Let this time be without an iPad, computer and on their own. Have your own alone-time, too. Show them that it is valuable to spend time on their own for them, and for you, too. If they see, that you are calm, happy and relaxed after your alone-time and maybe you were stressed out before, they know that this is a good thing.
- Be an example of having a regular practice, right diet, a loving perspective on situations and people, self-reflection, embodying qualities like non-judgment, non-violence, forgiveness, peace of mind and serenity as best as you can in any given moment.
Yoga for the whole family: Please check out the next family yoga classes and workshops here on my event page or email me for the next dates or private yoga classes at your home. You are welcome! My email is: simplyloveyoga@gmail.com.