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Mindful Parenting is a contemplative practice through which we become more mindful of our children and, in doing so, experience a more joyful life.
The Mindful Parent is an organization devoted to sharing with parents and other child caregivers ways in which to enhance the many joys of parenting.  By mindfully attending to our children, both when we are physically present with them and when we are physically separated from them, we can enhance our sense of connection to them and, in turn, our connection to the cosmos.  This makes us a better parent, a happier person, and a more vital human being.
 
To facilitate a more mindful approach to parenting, The Mindful Parent publishes on its website, and in its bi-weekly newsletter, mindful parenting verses and commentaries.  The Mindful Parent website also serves as a community forum that encourages and supports a mindful parenting dialogue and the sharing of mindful parenting experiences.
 
In the spirit of developing a mindful parenting community, we encourage you to submit a mindful parenting experience through verse, commentary, and imagery to share with others.  We believe that through our collective experience, we can help each other develop a deeper and more meaningful mindful parenting practice.  Click here to learn more about making a submssion.  We thank everyone who has contributed or is considering making this very compassionate contribution.

Click here to learn what recent events are taking place and of changes to The Mindful Parent website.  Please contact us with your questions about mindful parenting or to share a mindful parenting experience.  We are devoted to working with you to enhance your ability to "be" with your children, and to experience the bliss that awaits you.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

 
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(c) 2003-2004 Zen Health.  All rights reserved.
The Mindful Parent is a servicemark of Zen Health.
From the Archives
Thursday July 15, 2004
       Today's Sip:  That Precious Breath
 
The heart of all mindfulness trainings centers on the breath.  Most of the mindful parenting practice tips that appear in this column incorporate breathing.
 
Breathing will be the centerpiece of today's tip.  And, as you may already know, when all eyes are on the breath, wonderful things happen -- if you remember to breathe, that is.
 
Recall the moment you first saw your beautiful child.  Was it yesterday? Was it fifty years ago?  Odds are that you were so taken with the wonder of the moment, that you were not mindful of your breath at the time.  (If you were, wonderful!  If you weren't, join the club).  This is, of course, in sharp contrast to the moment prior to the time you first saw your child which, if you were giving birth, or assisting, may have been very focused on the breath.
 
As wonderful as that moment was, had you been mindful of the breath, and mindful of your presence and aliveness on this Earth, that moment may have assumed an even greater bliss. And even if the bliss associated with that moment could not be surpassed, your reflection on that moment today likely would be fuller and would elicit a heightened sense of joy.
 
But it is never too late.  Today, when you see, hear, speak with, send or reply to a letter or e-mail from, or bring your thoughts to your child, open awareness to your breathing.  In the flicker of that instant, reflect on the moment you first saw your child and inhale a full breath, deep into your belly.  Relax your shoulders.  Exhale slowly and fully, emptying your lungs of stale air.  Your exhalation should take a second longer than your inhalation.  If during the breath, you lose awareness of the precious moment, reflect on it again with your next breath. 
 
You are not merely reliving a moment from the past.  You are bringing feelings that began, at that precious moment, to echo throughout the cosmos home again.  Your connection to your child, and those same feelings, are very much alive in the present.
 
          Breathing in
          I remember this breath