Episodit
-
Welcome back to another episode in my series about Attachment Play, this time in conversation with Felicity Juhn. Felicity is mother to two boys, aged 6 and 8 and is an Aware Parenting Instructor. She runs an in-person parenting group called Wild Hearted Parents, which she co-facilitates with fellow Aware Parenting Instructor, Marisa Taylor and offers an in-person "Mums, Let's Chat" in her local playground.
In this beautiful conversation, Felicity shares her journey with Aware Parenting and Attachment Play. She explains how she has supported herself to reconnect with her playfulness and to build capacity for play in the many moments that she hasn't felt playful. We normalise that play can feel hard for us all at times. She shares lots of wonderful games that she has offered her family and all the ways that small moments of playful connection have been really powerful. We talk about how we find and reclaim play and fun for us.
To learn more about Felicity, please follow her on Instagram @felicitydinahjuhn
For support with this or any other aspect of Aware Parenting, I invite you to get in touch. If you would like to receive a free copy of my Introduction to Attachment Play eBook, please email me [email protected] -
Welcome back to another episode in my series about Attachment Play, this time in conversation with Britt Ortmann-Wold. Britt is a Certified Aware Parenting Instructor living in Minnesota, USA. She has two young daughters, Sophie and Athena and shares a passion for Aware Parenting with her partner Ryan. Britt has spent nearly 15 years in the self-awareness and spiritual healing space. Her work has included working in community mental health, with adults navigating addiction, in the prison setting and most recently, working as an end of life chaplain providing grief and spiritual care in the hospital.
In this episode Britt shares her journey with Aware Parenting and bringing Attachment Play to her family and learning to trust the power of laughter and tears for processing emotions. We talk about the need to be doing our own inner work and taking care of what needs to be tended to in us, in order to then be able to truly support our children. She shares some ways she has brought play to the challenges in her family, including the birth of her second child and difficult behaviour. We talk about the power of Attachment Play at bedtime to bring more connection, joy and ease to what is often a really tough part of the day. She talks about bringing small moments of play and connection in response to what our children are doing and gives lots of examples of play that has been really helpful in her family. We talk about Attachment Play with 2 children at once.
To learn more about Britt, please follow her on Instagram at Groundedwithbritt. Her course for Supporting Bedtime for children up to 6 years old is available from her Instagram site.
For support with this or any other aspect of Aware Parenting, I invite you to get in touch. -
Puuttuva jakso?
-
Welcome back to another episode in my series about Attachment Play in Aware Parenting. This episode explore power-reversal play, what it is and why it is so important for children to feel powerful. I talk about how it helps children to move out of hyper-arousal or dissociation into releasing and healing. I give lots of examples of when these games can be effective and helpful for our children and lots of examples of how to offer this kind of play. I talk about why our own feelings about powerlessness often come up for us when we are playing in these ways and the importance of us getting our own support in order to be able, safe and willing to play in these ways. I end with some words of compassion and support.
If you would like support with this or any other aspect of Aware parenting, I invite you to get in touch.
To learn more about Attachment Play I highly recommend reading the book by Aletha Solter on this topic. -
Welcome back to another episode in my series about Attachment Play, this time in conversations with Eliza Parker. Eliza is a certified Aware Parenting Instructor, Infant Developmental Movement Educator, Body-Mind Centering Practitioner, and trained Feldenkrais® practitioner. American sign language interpreter. She has special expertise in healing birth trauma, and parental attunement to non-verbal cues and crying.
In this episode we talk about how Aware Parenting and Attachment Play helps babies and toddlers to process their early experiences from conception, pregnancy, birth and the early post-partum period. She shares some of the ways that stress and trauma from early experiences present in babies and young children and describes how attachment play, specifically symbolic play and power-reversal play are so effective in the families she supports. We discuss the importance of giving information to babies and children to make sense of their experiences, as part of their healing. We talk about trusting the innate wisdom of babies and children to know and to communicate to us what they need in order to heal.
To learn more about Eliza, please visit www.consciousbaby.com or follow her on facebook or Instagram at Eliza Parker Conscious Baby.
For support with this or any other aspect of Aware Parenting, I invite you to get in touch at https://awareparenting.com.au/contact-me/ -
Welcome back to another episode in a series of conversations about Attachment Play. In this episode I am talking with Maru Rojas who is an aware parenting instructor in the UK with 2 children, aged 7 and 5 and she shares her journey with bringing the healing power of laughter and play to her family.
In this episode we talk about how to reconnect with our own innate playfulness and how to support ourselves at times when we are not feeling playful. Maru shares lots of games that she has enjoyed with her children over the years and still offers to bring joy to her family. We discuss how to bring play to some of the most common challenges in parenting, including toilet learning, food and sibling conflicts. She shares how she loves to bring playfulness and fun to herself and how to use play for non-punitive discipline.
To learn more about Maru, please follow her on Instagram at _maru.rojas_ and visit her website to find her course Attachment Play Magic https://parenttogether.co.uk
For support with this or any other aspect of Aware Parenting, I invite you to get in touch at https://awareparenting.com.au/contact-me/ -
This episode explores Symbolic Play, one of 9 forms of Attachment Play that are outlined by Aletha Solter in her book Attachment Play. I talk about how this type of play is helpful to support healing, connection, cooperation and non-punitive discipline. I describe how to offer Symbolic Play and share several examples of when it can be used to support our children with some of the most common sources of stress and trauma. I talk about why it can be hard to offer this type of play and share some words of compassion and support to help parents to build more capacity for play.
For support with this or any other aspect of Aware Parenting, I invite you to get in touch at https://awareparenting.com.au/contact-me/ -
Welcome back to another episode in a series of conversations about Attachment Play. In this episode I am talking with Rebecca Sheikh, who is a level 2 aware parenting instructor and the regional coordinator for aware parenting in UK, Ireland and Sub-Saharan Africa.
In this episode we talk about how to better understand children's behaviour so we can then use attachment play in order to support them to be their naturally cooperative selves. We share some of the ways we have used play in our families to support greater connection and healing. Rebecca shares a powerful activity to support our younger parts in relation to offering attachment play. She offers suggestions for how to find playfulness at times when we are feeling overwhelmed and not having capacity to play. We talk about the importance of laughter and fun for us as parents.
To learn more about Rebecca, please visit her website https://www.flourishingchildhood.com and follow her on social media at Flourishing childhood.
For support with this or any other aspect of Aware Parenting, I invite you to get in touch at https://awareparenting.com.au/contact-me/ -
This episode of my podcast is a beautiful conversation with Suzanne Thijs, from the Netherlands. Suzanne is an Aware Parenting Instructor and mother to two sons aged 4 and 7 and a stepdaughter aged 23. She offers training and courses for professionals working with children through her business Kinders Academie in Netherlands.
In this episode, Suzanne shares her journey with Aware Parenting and Attachment Play. She shares some of the many games she has found to be helpful with her boys for the challenges of parenting, for supporting them with fears and how to bring more connection through play. We talk about finding inspiration to play when we are feeling exhausted. She shares examples of how to support children through understanding their behaviour and then eliciting cooperation through play, in her home and her workplace. We talk about bringing play and fun to ourselves as parents.
To learn more about Suzanne, please visit https://kindersacademie.nl
For support with this or any other aspect of Aware Parenting, I invite you to get in touch at https://awareparenting.com.au/contact-me/ -
In this episode I speak with Hannah Mushit who is the mother of 4 children, a registered play therapist and an Aware Parenting Instructor in Fremantle in Western Australia. She shares her journey with Aware Parenting and offers some examples of using Attachment Play to support her family. We discuss how to help ourselves in the moments where we "should" ourselves about play and how to support ourselves when we don't have the capacity to play, with compassion and acceptance. We talk about how our own childhood experiences of play can come up in our parenting and make it hard to be playful with our children at times. Hannah talks about Play Therapy and Filial Therapy for healing stress and trauma. We explore how to use play to offer the Balance of Attention and how to cultivate trust.
To learn more about Hannah's work, please visit https://childhoodrising.com.au and follow her on social media at childhood.rising.
If you would like support with attachment play or any other aspect of Aware Parenting, I am here for you and I invite you to get in touch https://awareparenting.com.au/contact-me/ -
This episode of my podcast is all about non-directive child centred play, also often known as Special Time. I describe what this kind of play is and how it is so therapeutic and helpful for our children. I explore how we can offer it, when it's particularly helpful for our children, what can happen when we offer this type of play, as well as why this can be hard for us to do. I talk about how to support ourselves to be able to offer this play regularly. I end with some words of compassion to support ourselves in the moments when it feels really hard to play and to build capacity so that our children can enjoy these powerful moments of togetherness.
If you would like support with this or any other aspect of Aware Parenting, I invite you to get in touch.
To learn more about Attachment Play I highly recommend reading the book by Aletha Solter on this topic. -
This episode is the first in my new series of conversations about Attachment Play. I describe what Attachment Play is and the benefits of this for our children. I talk about how this type of play supports us in the practice of all the aspects and principles of Aware Parenting. and share how we offer it to our children. I explain the 9 different types of play and discuss why it can be hard for us as parents to be playful in these ways and how we can be more playful. I end by sharing some of my favourite attachment play games that I have played with my children over the years.
To learn more about attachment play or to get in touch for a session to support you with this aspect of aware parenting, please get in touch via my website www.awareparenting.com.au -
Welcome back to another episode of the Aware Parenting Stories podcast. After having a few weeks off, I am back with the final episode for this year and the last episode in the series of conversations I have been having about Embracing Imperfection.
In this episode I share some final reflections on where perfectionism comes from, the effect of our childhood experiences and the socio-cultural factors that play into this for many mothers. I share more about how to support ourselves with compassion, acknowledgement, finding safety for ourselves, bringing more play and laughter, meeting our own needs and offering ourselves reassurance, care and love.
To get support with this or any other aspect of aware parenting, I invite you to get in touch [email protected] -
This latest episode of my podcast about embracing imperfection is all about the journey of self-acceptance in fatherhood. I am really excited to be having a conversation with Mark Gee, who is a counsellor, a mental health first aid instructor, a Rites of Passage leader and an online Circle Work Facilitator. He is a father and supports other fathers through his 6 week online Dad's Journey Workshops.
In this conversation Mark shares his journey from tradesman to men's mental health specialist and counsellor. He shares how he has supported himself and other fathers to be more vulnerable and self-connected and to move from being isolated in parenting and instead find new powerful ways to role model what it is to be a man supporting himself and his family. Mark shares some of the most common struggles for fathers and describes some way that fathers can learn self-compassion, self-acceptance, presence and repair after rupture. We talk about unconditional love and cultivating resilience. Mark shares the relief and power that comes from connecting with other fathers in groups, to share and be vulnerable together.
To learn more about Mark's work or to sign up for his next 6 week workshop which starts on the 9th October 2025, please visit www.markgee.com.au or follow him on Instragram at markgeewellbeing.
To learn more about The Aware Parenting Retreat, please visit https://awareparenting.com.au/aware-parenting-retreat/ -
Welcome back to another episode and the next instalment in my series on embracing our imperfection in Aware Parenting, in conversation this time with Rebecca Sheikh who is a level 2 Aware Parenting Instructor and the regional coordinator for the UK, Ireland and Sub-Saharan Africa.
In this episode we talk about how parenting invites us to tend to the hurt places within us from our childhoods and how adversity in childhood shapes who we are. We talk about how normal it is for parents to need support and Rebecca shares some of the ways that she has found most effective in her own healing. She shares some resources and processes for parents to support themselves in parenting and her own journey of learning to embrace imperfection. She ends with a poem that she finds particularly touching called Everything is Beautiful by Mark Nepo.
To learn more about Rebecca and her offerings please visit www.flourishingchildhood.com/
To get support with this or any other aspect of aware parenting, I invite you to get in touch [email protected] -
Welcome back to another episode and the next instalment in my series on embracing our imperfection in Aware Parenting, in conversation this time with Katie Fusco who is an Aware Parenting Instructor and a specialist perinatal and infant mental health practitioner in the UK.
In this episode Katie shares with beautiful vulnerability her journey with embracing imperfection following a profoundly difficult and traumatic birth and post-partum period. She shares how she has moved from an internal dialogue that was scathing and excrutiatingly harsh, full of guilt and self-judgment, to an inner voice of compassion and care. We talk about the devastating impact of the rewards and praise she experienced in the education system in setting up perfectionistic pressure on herself. We talk about the huge benefit of finding support to be in the discomfort of our deeply painful but sacred feelings in order to be able to embrace our imperfection and re-find compassion for ourselves. Katie shares some of the hardest moments in her parenting and how she has found compassion and acceptance of herself.
To learn more about Katie, she will be sharing on Instragram at thecryingclinic.
To learn more about the Exploring Motherhood & Aware Parenting Community with Danni Willow and myself, please visit https://awareparenting.com.au/community-sign-up/
To get support with this or any other aspect of aware parenting, I invite you to get in touch [email protected] -
In this episode, Danni Willow joins me for a beautiful conversation about trust in parenting. We talk about how trust is such a central aspect of Aware Parenting and why it is hard for many of us to trust. We discuss what we need in order to cultivate trust and share the effect on our children and who they grow up to be of us getting support to be more trusting of them and of ourselves. We share the importance of connection and community with others in order to be able to come back to trusting the unfolding of our motherhood journey.
If you want to learn more about the Exploring Motherhood and Aware Parenting Community, where we explore this in depth, please visit https://awareparenting.com.au/parenting-coaching/community/ The doors for the next year of this community are open now and will close on 22nd September 2025. -
It was such a pleasure to invite Lael Stone back onto the podcast, this time to talk about her new book Own Your Story. Lael shared her journey coming to write this book about supporting adults to explore their imprints, understand where they have come from and then make shifts and changes to free themselves from limiting beliefs and heal past wounds.
In this conversation Lael talks about some of the common imprints, including perfectionism and how to bring ourselves more acceptance and compassion. We talk about trust, self-care, boundaries and anger and much more. Lael shares lots of wisdom on how to support ourselves in day to day life in the challenges of parenting to find more compassion and healing.
Own Your Story is available in all bookshops in Australia. If you not in Australia and want to buy this book, please visit https://www.readings.com.au/product/9781761269424/own-your-story--lael-stone--2025--9781761269424 The Audiobook version will be available at the end of August 2025. -
Welcome back to another episode and the next instalment in my series on embracing our imperfection in Aware Parenting, in conversation this time with Belinda Isbister. Belinda is an Aware Parenting Instructor from Western Australia with 2 boys aged 5 and 2.
In this episode Belinda shares more of her journey with Aware Parenting and with embracing imperfection in her parenting. She shares some of the ways that she brings herself compassion and we talk about the parallel journey of learning to offer ourselves unconditional love and acceptance, whilst offering that to our children too. She shares some examples of difficult times in her parenting journey and how she has come back to compassion, connection and trust.
To learn more about Belinda please follow her on Instagram at belinda_marie_parenting.
To get support with this or any other aspect of aware parenting, I invite you to get in touch [email protected] -
In this episode I talk with Kanika Vasudeva , who is a parenting coach, energy healer and Akashic Records reader from the Art of Life Center. She supports parents to explore the record of their soul's journey across lifetimes and to heal. She blends spiritual tools with grounded support to help parents feel more whole themselves, and raise empowered children.
Please note that Kanika is not an Aware Parenting Instructor. Aware parenting does not incorporate or endorse any particular spiritual beliefs, so today's conversation extends beyond aware parenting. In this episode we talk about pregnancy loss and grief so I invite you to check in with yourself to see if you want to listen if this has been part of your story too.
Kanika shares her awakening into conscious parenting and emotional healing that began after the stillbirth of her daughter at 31 weeks pregnant. She shares her experience with Akashic records and how she sees that exploring past lives and ancestral trauma can support parents through parenting, loss and healing. We talk about parenting as a spiritual practice and how we can support our children to stay connected to their unique soul and inherent wisdom by doing our own healing work. We talk about self-compassion, self care and embracing imperfection. Kanika shares some simple but powerful practices we can use to support ourselves in moments of stress and overwhelm.
To learn more about Kanika's work please visit her website www.artoflifecentre.com and follow her on Instragram at kanikaenergycoach.
If you want help with embracing imperfection or any other aspect of Aware Parenting, I invite you to get in touch with me [email protected] -
Welcome back to the Aware Parenting Stories podcast. In today's episode I’m thrilled to be joined once again by Dr. Aletha Solter, the founder of Aware Parenting, to talk about her inspiring and thought-provoking new book, Raising Joyful Lifelong Learners. Her latest book explores how we can best nurture children's intrinsic love of learning through connection, emotional safety, trust and play.
Dr Solter explores some of the main misunderstandings in our education systems about learning that are ineffective, stressful and harmful for children and shares how children learn, what motivates children to learn and how we can evaluate children's learning in ways that are not stressful for children. She shares some of the ways that school can be stressful and traumatic for children, and how stress and trauma affect children's behaviour and learning. We talk about the role of play in both learning and healing from stress and trauma and she shares ways to support children to heal. She shares why punishments and rewards have a detrimental impact on learning and what to do instead of praise and criticism. We discuss some of the ways that our own trauma is often triggered in parenting and how to support ourselves to heal so we are better able to support our children. She clarifies the aware parenting perspective on the term neurodiversity and explains some of the possible causes of behaviours that often lead to a diagnosis of ADHD. We talk about her 12 Principles of Learning and how we can trust our children in learning and support them to love learning throughout their life.
I highly recommend this book for parents, educators and anyone who cares about children and their future. I truly hope it helps inspire a shift in how we approach education and learning, so that parents, schools, education policy makers and those who choose to homeschool can all better meet the emotional and developmental needs of children, and truly support their natural joy, curiousity and love of learning.
To learn more about Aletha Solter and Aware Parenting, please visit www.awareparenting.com
If you would like support with this or any other aspect of Aware Parenting, I invite you to get in touch [email protected] - Näytä enemmän
