Ep #88: The Power of Energy and Body Language in Your Child’s Communication with Siris Raquel Rivas-Verdejo

How do we help children build language skills and improve their communication, including with themselves and their own bodies in a way that improves their quality of life? My guest today, Siris Raquel Rivas-Verdejo is the owner of Empowering Light Language. She works with busy individuals and families to improve their communication and self-care, facilitated by a greater connection with our bodies, empowered greater awareness of how their language impacts their lives.

She’s a life coach, a family child coach, speech language pathologist, learning behavioral specialist, feeding therapist and therapeutic energy worker based out of North Carolina. And one of the things I loved about this conversation is, she talks about this three pronged approach to language. She talks about energy being our first language, which I thought was so interesting because of its connection to listening to ourselves and our communication with ourselves. So, energy is the first language and then non-verbal and verbal communication.

She took me through an exercise live that you can do as well, and it was just a really incredible conversation. I think you’ll find some value in it. It’s coming up right after this.

Welcome to the Raising Healthy Kid Brains podcast where moms and teachers come to learn all about kids’ brains, how they work, how they learn, how they grow and simple tips and tricks for raising the most resilient, kind, smart, compassionate kids we can. All while having lots of grace and compassion for ourselves because you know what? We all really need and deserve that too. I am your host, Amy Nielson. Let’s get ready to start the show.

Amy: Alright, welcome to the show, I’m so happy to have you on today to get to talk about speech and this connection between bodies and our language. I’m so excited about this conversation.

Siris: Thank you for having me, I really appreciate it.

Amy: This is so exciting. So, before I get in and ask you all my questions and we get chatty, chatty about all the things, can you tell me, how did you get into speech language? How did you become passionate about this and end up where you are today?

Siris: Gosh, the shorter version is basically, I feel I was born for this. My siblings both have special abilities and they both needed speech and I’m the oldest of the three of us. And so, this has been my world since I was two years old when my sister was born. My sister was born two years, two months, two days and two hours after me. So, I think that’s kind of cool. And she was born, because of the hydrocephaly that she had, which is excess liquid around her brain, it created some pressure on her brain, which maybe led to her needing some more support for learning.

And then stuttering runs on my mom’s side of the family and so she inherited that and so, she had very severe stuttering that she needed speech for. And then my brother was born with a diaphragmatic hernia, so a hole in his diaphragm. And after multiple surgeries, we discovered that he was hard of hearing and so he needed speech for that.

And then we also, both my parents were bilingual educators, so we were also very much aware of multicultural components and considerations around language and how it impacts not just your learning, but also how you acclimate to a new world, a new culture, a new country. I was born in Puerto Rico, but then I grew up in Chicago.

We moved there when I was three and so our very experience we had to toggle and do the code switching and navigate what people were thinking about us and how we spoke. And how you could use that to either create connection or maybe they would use their words to create separation from us, which also happened. I mean how do you navigate that?

Amy: That’s so fascinating. And I just feel, yeah, you’re born for this. You come from so many aspects with siblings that needed help with speech but also that, I just feel it gives you so much more richness and awareness around language when you speak multiple languages. And I want to be a multi-language speaker.

I’ve learned quite a bit of Spanish and I’ve been trying to teach myself Korean and whatever. And I just feel it builds your appreciation of your own language and it’s really beautiful to come from that perspective. And challenging, it sounds as well with some of the things that you experienced, so that’s so neat. So, this is something you’ve cared about and been aware of from the very beginning.

Siris: Yeah, in my own way, I definitely was very much aware of the language piece. I love hearing languages. Each of the languages are like a different music to me. So I’m like, okay, is it like reggae? Okay, is it like, this one has this ba-ba-ba-ba, but this 1 is very fast here, and this 1 has the lilt up and down.

It is so beautiful to me. And so, I first when I’m just playing with languages, that’s what I think of. And then I’m like, “Okay, now, which one is it actually? What are they trying to say?” I go into the content, but first it’s about the energy of it and the vibrations of it, then melodies, those rhythms. And then it goes into, let’s get into the grammar or the vocabulary, what’s going on here?

Amy: That’s so beautiful and so fascinating. I love that. So, talk to me about this idea of speech, body connection or language body connection because I find that such a fascinating idea, why does this matter so much for our kids to have language and to grow their ability to use language?

Siris: To address your first question first. I think that it’s really important for all of us to be really connected with our bodies because language, most of it is non-verbal, first, it’s energetic. Energy is our first language, and then we get into the non-verbal, and then we get into the verbal, maybe, maybe not. A lot of my kiddos don’t actually ever speak verbally, but then we give them different other strategies, augmentative communication devices and things like that.

But I find that when my parents will work with the energy in the body first, it reduces the frustration. It gives them a lot more clarity. They can be better advocates for their kids. They know what their needs and wants are. And then they can empower the kids to then communicate in their own way with other people as well. So, what I mean by that is I teach my parents what is the yes and what is the no for them and for their family. So, I actually invite them to close their eyes and we can do this together if you’d like.

Amy: Okay.

Siris: So, I close my eyes and I usually invite people who are doing it for the first time to do it standing because it’s easier to perceive what the yes and no is if this is their first couple of times, standing. And for each of us, we receive the yes and no differently. Sometimes it’s just a knowing. Sometimes it’s a movement, which is why I have them stand up so they can actually sense that movement or shift, forward, back, side to side, maybe a little shimmy. Maybe it’ll be a smell, a sound, a taste, a color, a texture or pattern.

And it’s really interesting because a lot of people, because they’re not taught this, they’re like, “Oh, wow, I’ve always gotten this but I didn’t think anything of it. No one ever talked to me about it. So, I didn’t realize I was getting these yeses and no’s.” So, you basically have your eyes closed and your knees soft and not locked and nothing really tight in your body, so, everything, shake it out and make it really loose. And then you ask your body, if you’re the parent or caregiver, you can say, “Okay, what’s my yes, today?”

Or you can ask, “What’s our family’s yes today?” Which is my preference because it includes you and your entire family. You don’t have to go one by one by one. It’s just, “What’s going to work for all of us?” Not what some of us, that eclipses the needs of the others, which is often a very common theme in my families. It’s, “What’s going to work for all of us? So, what’s our yes?” And see what movements, what sensation, what smell, taste, sound comes up, when knowing and then just acknowledge that. That’s our yes for today.

And then soften it up, shake, shake, shake, close eyes and soft knees. What’s our family’s no, today? And see what happens. So, for me my family’s no is my head kind of goes backwards. And my neck is full back, no, just scrunching up. And a yes let’s say truth was my family’s yes today. It’s just kind of this bubbly shoulder sensation. It just feels really light, effervescent, a little bit and that’s today, which is very different than the last time I asked that about my family.

Amy: How interesting. So, it changes. Because I feel like my yes, I don’t know if I’m doing this right. I don’t know if I did it right, but I felt my yes felt kind of almost a nod for, but almost I felt I was leaning. And I’m kind of leaning back in my chair, but I still felt myself leaning forward as my yes. And then my no, was kind of almost pressure in my chest or hold it, I don’t know, something pushing me.

Siris: And I don’t know if you realize you also are moving backwards as you’re having that pressure. So, it’s the pressure that’s in the front and the back. So, it can be a combo. And as you practice this, it gets stronger and faster and clearer so you can make decisions for your whole family that will benefit the whole family and not just one person. Because a lot of times, I just have to think about this kiddo, that has special abilities and special needs or I’d have to think about the one that’s tantruming the most right now or the one that’s not getting the sleep or not eating well. What is the thing?

And so then, since you start focusing on that and you get a tunnel vision and then you maybe as a caregiver, forget of your own needs. And so then how this connects to communication is then how, when you’re wondering, what do they want? Before they’re verbal you can be saying, “Do they want to sleep, yes or no? Do they want food, yes or no?” And just go through the most likely things and you’ll be certain your body will tell you with their body because that’s what you’re doing when you’re saying, “Our, yes and no.” You’re including their body, their energy, their needs and yours into it.

And so, it makes it a lot faster. I taught my Goddaughter’s parents this when she was an infant because you’re expecting kids to talk as they get older, but you’re not expecting them to talk as an infant, but they’re absolutely communicating with you. And they were both therapists, but they were used to working with adults, so they were like, “What are we doing with this little thing?” They were freaking out. And I was like, “It’s okay, you’ve got this.” And they were like, “Oh my gosh, this has been a game changer, this was really helpful.”

They were able to find out what soothed her whilst having the hair dryer going. There’s so many different types of white noise. You go through the 20 zillion, but they were able to be, whatever one was the one that popped into their head for her got faster. That was the one that they chose. And they were able to meet her needs easier without all the stress. There’s not as much freakout. There’s definitely still stress, it’s just less. I’m not going to lie, everything’s rainbows and unicorns.

Amy: Right, we wish.

Siris: But it does make it easier for sure. And then when it comes to schools, I have a lot of parents that they’re like, “Okay, which is my child’s school that’s going to support their communication, their development?” Because they do have a different way of learning or communicating. And out of the contenders, bring the kid to the school and say, “Okay, is this a yes for our family?” Because even if you’re thinking about that one child’s needs, it’s going to affect the commute, the pick-up, the energy level, all of that for the entire family. And so, the yes for the whole family will help with too.

Amy: That is so interesting. And I think, I don’t know, I get very fascinated by speech and I teach teachers and reading coaches how to teach children to read. And so, I’m very fascinated by this speech, connection with the visual part of the brain. Yeah, so, I find it all very interesting language. But when we talk about so much of communication being non-verbal, I don’t think I got this first piece, which is that your energy is your first language. I’m taking notes over here. I just thought that was so interesting, but I think it’s really true.

As I’m teaching people how to do reading, coaching and certifying reading coaches, it’s funny because they’ll say, “I need to see a video of how you do it.” And I’m like, “Okay, but I told you, here’s the things I showed, I told you exactly how to do it.” And they’re like, “But the way you do, it’s just the energy or whatever you bring.” There’s much to it that’s beyond just words coming out of our mouth. And so, I love that you address that and paying attention to energy and the non-verbal part and then getting to the verbal part. We’re starting way early.

And then you mentioned, we can start with babies on this and we do and that’s a huge part of their proper brain development is that talking and communicating with them before they can communicate. And paying attention to their signals and meeting their needs as they’re trying to communicate with us and can’t do it verbally yet.

Siris: I love that because you then can leverage this expert hack that you’re getting from them. You’re getting this information energetically in your inner knowing with your body and then you use that to then narrate what they’re asking you for. Even if they sent the picture to your head, even if you got it in your inner knowing, okay, you want milk. You can say, “I want milk, mama.” You’re narrating it because you got it and then you’ll see them light up because you’re like, “Oh my God, you got what I meant.”

And they also are getting that model, which is then more likely for them to start saying that over time, because they’re hearing it and it’s exactly matching what they were trying to communicate to you.

Amy: Yes. And I just have to say, so I’ve had five kids and then I have three more now that I got through marriage so, I have eight. But with my fifth of my original five kids, I noticed as I kind of learned more about this stuff with her is, I would kind of vocalize things for her that I was feeling I was getting and maybe partially from her energy or partially from her non-verbal cues or whatever. And just try to express things she didn’t have language for yet, when she was really upset or throwing a tantrum.

And I’d be like, “I feel like you’re so frustrated right now because you can’t, and is this what you’re feeling?” And she would like, “Yes.” This huge, just release of energy, she felt so much better, it let it all out almost and was able to recover so much faster because I had been able to verbalize what she was feeling, even though she couldn’t do that yet. And then now she’s of course getting so much better at being able to verbalize on our own. So, I don’t know, I love that piece of being able to help them progress through speaking it out if they can.

Siris: And I think you’re making two really good points, Amy, that I love is that one, all parents are doing it. It’s a matter of doing it more consciously and more consistently. I think it’s really acknowledging this isn’t just you’re throwing darts in the air and seeing what lands. If you could really do it in a way that is super effective and really empowering and build up your self-esteem, builds up. You’re like, “I got this. I’m not as messed up as a parent as I think.” Because a lot of parents are really judgmental of themselves and harsh on themselves.

And then the other piece is the implication of behavior, so behavior is communication. I’m a learning behavioral specialist as well. And so, a lot of times parents will be focused on, they’re tantruming and that’s the problem. Well, that’s communicating something to us. Are they frustrated? Are they tired? Are they having a hard time with this transition right now? Do they not like your smell on your clothes? The person that just walked in the door, They’re like, “No, wrong energy. No, that’s not the person I want to be around, right now.”

All of these different things are informative, and then you’d be like, “Something happened when this just changed, when this new addition happened or when we removed this and now they’re behaving this way in an undesired way or an inappropriate way. What’s going on here?” And we can use these yes and no’s, is it this, yes or no? Is it this, yes or no? As a parent to then guide them for maybe a more appropriate behavior that would replace that versus this is wrong, they’re tantruming and go into more of a punitive punishment state of mind.

Or they’re acting this way and now that means that I’m a horrible parent because I can’t control my child. No, it’s not about the control, it’s about the communication, their behavior with their body. They are communicating something to you in that moment as well.

Amy: Yeah. I love that. And I think this idea of behavior being a form of communication is something new to me in the last couple of years. And I just think it’s the most powerful concept ever. What are they telling you? And not in a permissive necessarily way, but just as information to you to know how to support them properly and say, “Okay, that doesn’t mean that this behavior’s acceptable, but what are you trying to explain to me? What do I need to know? And then how do we help you find a way?”

Like you said, to find maybe a different way to express that, that is really helpful to them and something that’s manageable and something that they can get what they need more effectively, which is so good.

Siris: Yeah, I find that a lot of parents when they’re having a lot of behaviors, I mean, this is every area of my life. I also work with adults. So, when your husband is being passive aggressive and huffy, puffy or when your teenager, even as they’re older, when your teenager is not replying back to your text when they’re out with their friends and things like that. That’s a communication thing. That’s a communication issue as it is a behavior thing consideration as well.

So, what I find is that the more behaviors that are undesired that are showing up, there’s usually less communication. So, we have to, if we increase the communication, especially the effectiveness of the communication, then the behaviors, the undesired behaviors usually go down.

Amy: That is the medicine that all of us need. It’s so good. Oh, my gosh, if we just realized that. So, I come from a family of 12 kids. I got to watch my big sister parent and that has just been so impactful to me. My mom was an amazing mom but watching my big sister parent was a very different style than my mom and it was very impactful for me. And I just remember her saying, I’d be on the phone with her like sisters do and trying to talk through things. And she would have a child that was needing something and she was so good.

I’d kind of seen a lot of parents say, “Hey, you have to wait. I’m on the phone, you need to wait,” or whatever. And she wouldn’t do that, she’d be like, “Give me just a second.” And she would take just a few seconds to talk to her child about whatever it was and then come back to me. And she said, “I have found that if I just take a very small portion of time to communicate with them and make sure that they feel heard or that they get what they need or whatever, then just I am able to do what else I need.” It was such a time saver for her. Anyway, that was so impactful for me.

And I think when we communicate well with kids and for me it’s a form of respect, when I respect them by communicating with them and if they disagree with me, they’re allowed to disagree, we just do it respectfully. And just modeling that behavior of communication when we’re unhappy, when we’re happy, when all the feelings that we’re having. And then they’re allowed to do that back, and it’s safe to do so. It’s just been game changing. And I feel we don’t have a lot of really big behaviors most of the time because they know they can just tell me whatever they’re feeling before we get to that point.

Siris: Yeah. And I think that you hit the nail on the head with respect. I think that a lot of the parents I work with, they didn’t necessarily have the best models of them being respected as kids. And so, then they mimic that and duplicate that with their own kids. So then just like we were talking about earlier about then adults when there’s an undesired or an old behavior, not that it’s undesired, it’s maybe unconsciously done. And if you don’t have another replacement behavior for it, you’re going to keep defaulting to what you’ve seen, to what you’ve known.

So, one of the things that I often do is, I point out another possible thing that they can do that they maybe have heard of or seen, but they haven’t integrated it into their repertoire yet. And then with practice, they like, “This is what I can say in those situations. This is what I can do in those situations.” And the example with your sister, I really love because it also is this great opportunity for her to teach them about how to appropriately and respectfully interrupt because if there’s an emergency or even there’s something important, you really want to share it.

There are ways to interrupt or to get your mom’s attention when she’s busy that are better than others. And for them to model that and for her to then reinforce it and give them the attention when they do it appropriately, or in that moment be like, “Next time, could you say it this way?” And we practice it. “Okay, now I got you. What did you need?” And then going from there. It’s not about how much time. The quality is really, really important more than the quantity when it comes to these little planting seed moments that then can start flourishing and grow over the course of their lifetime.

Amy: So good. And I think one of the things I’ve noticed from having small children up to adult children now is that the patterns I feel that you start when they’re very, very young, just serve you all the way through those rough teenage years. And then young adult years where you’re trying to figure out your new normal between these kids that still need a little bit of your help as a parent. But they’re also trying to be independent on their own and all that. So, those patterns and not that you have to get it all right when they’re two years old.

But as you just kind of try to learn and figure a way out and just be respectful and kind all the way through. Anyway, it’s just really amazing. So, I want to go to, we kind of talked about energy, the non-verbal part, is that kind of what we’ve been talking about as well or is that a little bit of a different piece?

Siris: There’s so much. Remember, 85% of communication is the non-verbal so there’s so much. But one of the things I really love to incorporate is, I look at for, again, I’m a learning behavioral specialist in addition to being a speech language pathologist. So, I look at how each person in the home learns, if somebody’s a visual learner, if somebody’s more movement kinesthetically based, if somebody is maybe a combo of the visual and kinesthetic or they are more auditory. And everything that they hear, they basically got it right away just by hearing it.

It might be a different combination depending on the different people in the home. I had a situation where I was working with three different households. There was a young girl that was around nine and she would go from her grandparents’ house with the mom and dad of her dad. And then she would have dad with his new wife and two step-kids or two half siblings. And then she would have mom with her new husband and she would be moving between these three households. So, I needed to learn how each pairing and/or each individual adults were learning and these other kids that were interacting with her.

So, when I was creating a personalized plan for them on how to co-parent more effectively, I had to tailor my information differently depending on who I was talking to so they could really get what I was saying. And then they would create supports in the home because she was very much a movement and visual based learner and that’s how she really processed directions better and communicated better.

So, we would put signs up on different doors. Instead of speaking, interrupting with your sister, she would be one of those kiddos that would just run right into a room and enter even if it was somebody’s office, they were in the middle of a meeting, it would be really inappropriate or unprofessional of them to be interrupted. So we had a big stop sign, but not just that. We had directions of what she needed to do. So, after stopping it’s, take a deep breath, check in. Is this really urgent? Can it wait?

These different questions that she could ask herself that she would run through, how many times to knock, wait a couple of seconds, but to see if someone said, “Look, come in,” these different things. And then over time we were able to fade that away because she internalized it, but she got to role play it and move through it and see it written and she was a reader, so that helped. But for kids that are younger, I have used pictures then instead to describe the different steps.

I had kiddos, where depending on their routines that they’re having a hard time with, I would make little picture schedules for that routine. If it’s morning routine, we would do the different steps of morning routine. If it’s night time, which is also the other big one, how to wind them down so they can go to sleep fitfully and not be fighting sleep or having to constantly be reminded to go back to bed and all these different things. What are the things that help soothe them? That’s the body connection there as well.

All of those things that influence their communication. If they’re not sleeping properly, they’re going to be more irritable and it might affect their memory, their retention of the information that they’re exposed to by you as a parent or by their educators and their teachers at the school. So, all these little non-verbal supports really help.

And then depending on what’s going on with the family, I’ve also introduced, and the age of the kids involved, I also introduced American sign language, different basic signs that they can use that way. A lot of people will avoid those non-verbal supports, sign language or devices thinking, I don’t want my child to use that and rely on it so I’m not going to introduce it at all. When it’s actually very, very powerful because we talked about the behavior, communication, relationship. So, if they don’t have a way to communicate, you’re going to see more of those behaviors.

So as a transitional step, providing them with sign language or picture communication devices, things like that, there’s so many, there’s so many, low tech, high tech, there’s so many. That gives them a way to express themselves, to have a voice, especially for people who aren’t as psychic with them and don’t have the yes and no’s with them as easily, the people out and about, out of the family.

Then you’ll see the reduction of those problematic behaviors that will have them be more open to those beautiful models of language that you provide. But if you’re having to have the obstacle of behavior, it’ll make it more challenging for them to really benefit and receive and then integrate all of this talking that you’re doing, hopefully, to them.

Amy: So, what I feel I’m hearing is that basically we’re just giving them additional tools to communicate. Because when they don’t feel they have language necessarily yet or the ability, they’re using whatever they have to communicate with us. And early on that might mostly be behaviors and then more tools we give them, if we’re giving them something like sign language or giving them just other ways to express and communicate with us then we’re giving them options.

And that increases the chances they’re going to choose something that we would prefer, maybe over behaviors that were less comfortable than the better options where they can be more intentional about what they’re saying.

Siris: Yeah. And then you also, at that moment you model as you’re still using the sign language, the pictures, the gesturing, then when they’re yanking you to the fridge, all those different things. Don’t just be like, “Okay, I got it, you want me to get you milk and that’s it.” Okay, mama, I want milk.” And model what you’d like them to say. What they could say instead in that moment, really taking advantage of, I know what they want instead of just giving it to them and they don’t have to say anything.

Really, making sure that you use that as an opportunity for them to hear what they could say or how they could request that. That’s more and more age appropriate.

Amy: I love that so much. So, we’re kind of combining taking them from one to the next one by kind of helping them see next step and modeling it for them as we’re going from the levels of that and modeling. I like it so much. It’s just so good. So going from that then to working on actual speech and language development. I think a lot of us don’t think about that until we maybe have a child in speech. And I had a child in speech for a little bit. She was having a hard time pronouncing her R’s and so she was in speech for a little bit.

Siris: That’s a very common one, yeah.

Amy: She loved it so much, by the way. She misses her speech teacher because her speech teacher was the best ever. But she’s graduated now and moved on from speech and she’s a little sad and it’s okay.

Siris: For her and you, yes.

Amy: She’s so cute. She’s so much fun. Other than just what we would normally do with just having our kids in our house, I mean, should we all be paying attention to that? Or should we only be paying attention to it if we have a kid that’s getting behind and what does that look like? And maybe why does that matter, the speech part because once they can talk, they can just talk, so maybe walk me through a little bit of that.

Siris: Well, the last question, well, once they can talk, they can talk. Think of the adults that you interact with. They’re talking, they’re not all very effective communicators. So, right? Like, everyone has a couple of someones that just came to mind. And so, I love that earlier you mentioned this kind of long view and I very much agree with you on that. Whatever age the kid is that I’m working with, I’m not just thinking of them at that age. I’m thinking of them a couple of years later and then five years and then ten years later, how are they going to be as an adult?

And so, what are the things that they can do now that they’ll need a couple of years from now or five years or as an adult? And so yes, I personally and again, I come from educators. My parents were very much about, let’s have a lot of enrichment, let’s bombard you with a lot of activities and stimuli and experiences. And they were talking to us about it the whole time. I got into journaling because my mom was like, “Go ahead. We’re waiting.” I’m waiting constantly for my siblings’ appointments. We were basically living in the hospitals with all of their therapies and surgery follow-ups and things like that.

And so, she was like, “Well, write about your day.” I would write about everything we did. My sister went here and I wore this dress. And then we went and ate here and I had this for lunch. And we drove to this place with these people. But first I was talking it out and then when I was in the writing stage, I started writing it out. So, these are just encouraging things, not really letting the teachers be the only people that are educating and teaching your kids. The parents are the first teachers and it does start at infancy.

And to see how much the more you’re talking to your kids, the better early on and even if you only have a slight inkling where you’re like, “I wonder if something’s off.” There’s so many stressors as a parent and a caregiver, it’s best to just get a screening and have that peace of mind than be wondering. And you can get them as many times as you want, there’s no cap, there’s no limit. And that’s one of the things that I think a lot of parents would be like, “Well, I don’t want to bother anybody if it’s not really valid or I’m really concerned. I don’t want the stigma, or all these different things.”

Or, “What is my aunt going to say or my mom going to say?” And worrying about having to explain it to these other people. First and foremost, it’s about you and your family and your child and what you know. I think a lot of parents, they know so much more than they give themselves credit for and they start to doubt it or question it instead of going off of that yes. Yes, I think this would be really beneficial for my family to have more information about this.

Yes, I would like more recommendations on how I can support these certain things, even if it’s not a diagnosable level. It doesn’t have to be there for you to maybe get some tailored recommendations where you can simulate things given how your child uniquely learns, and how you uniquely learn and show up with your child. Those dyads, those different pairings, are different. And so how I would interact with a child would be very different than their parent not only because we have different roles in their lives, but because my style of showing up and how I communicate and how I learn is different than their parent would.

So, I have to really watch them together and then empower them to know what’s going to work for them, what’s true for them. Versus what a lot of families are doing unfortunately, which is part of the stress that I hear about is, they are on these forums. And there’s so much inundation of information. And they’re saying, “Well, this works for this parent and this works for this family, so it should work for me.” And then when it doesn’t, sometimes it does. Great, I love it when it does, but when it doesn’t, what’s the first thing they do? Oh, I suck. Oh my God, I’m a horrible parent. Oh my God.

Or, this wasn’t the thing that was going to work for you and your child. And then what is that thing? And it’s okay, if it doesn’t work, that’s just like, oh, it was the, that’s going to click, that is going to work for your child and that’s alright. You have to just find that thing. So, I think that that’s really important.

Amy: I love that. That’s so good. Yeah, that just reminds me of a phrase I’ve been using lately, that is good information. Every time something doesn’t go well, I have teenage daughters who are trying to date now. And they just really think they like this person. And then it didn’t quite go the way they thought or something or whatever, all the drama. And I’ll be like, “Oh my goodness, that is such good information because now you know this doesn’t work for you, or you really don’t like it when this person doesn’t communicate and you need someone who actually responds to you,” or whatever, whatever it is.

And that’s such good information instead of broken hearts, this is so sad, everything’s the worst. Anyway, so I love that, when something feels like it’s failing, it doesn’t mean that we did everything wrong, or that the world is over, it’s never going to work or anything. That’s just really good information, because now we know a thing that didn’t work. We can go shift our energy to something else, try something else and get more information.

Siris: And that’s the thing. What we put our energy and attention to grows and so I love that. And so, moving into the older kids, I love that example. Think about how empowering having your yes and your no as a young person would be, especially in those teenage years when there’s a lot of peer pressure, when there’s a lot of things where you’re figuring out, who am I right now. It’s having that yes and no with you, I found it to be very helpful with people who are dealing with bullies, when they’re dealing with, am I going to join this club or not, which is the one that’s really going to resonate with me, that’s going to really create more.

And it might be that there’s multiple that are yes and then which one is the biggest yes. And then choose the one that’s the biggest, loudest yes then. So, it’s not that it’s always very clear, yes or no. There’s maybe multiple, but then you can be like, “What’s the volume? What’s the intensity?” What’s the one that really lights you up and lights your body up? That’s the one that’s going to create more for you to choose. And that’s why it’s so powerful about having the yes and the no, because what you choose more of what’s a yes for you and your family, you get more of what brings that yes.

And when you choose a no, even though you got the no, you’re like, “Let’s just try it out anyway.” You’re going to feel it. You’re going to notice, wow, ow at the moments when this, I mean we all have those moments. I work with a lot of teenagers too where they knew, I’m going to go on this date with somebody and even not so teenagers too. I’m going to go on this date with somebody, but I’m not really feeling it but my friends say I have to stay open. And I’m like, “You can stay open while still listening to your inner knowing.”

If it’s really that yes and no versus just you’re maybe projecting fear or past experiences onto this date, that’s very different than this very clear yes and no that gets stronger and stronger with practice.

Amy: Is so interesting. This idea just popped into my head while you were talking, that’s just feeling all the things for me. So, I talk to my girls about the most important love relationship they’ll ever have in their lives is the one they have with themselves. Because you’re going to be with yourself always, forever and always in your head 24/7. So, loving yourself, that relationship is such an important one because you’re the one in your head all the time, and it’s always with you no matter what. So, I love that.

But what I just got from you as you were speaking was, we talk all the time about learning to communicate and using our speech and things to communicate with others. But this idea of the energy, communication is almost starting with your communication with yourself, that relationship being so valuable with yourself. And you’re communicating with yourself first, listening to your body, communicating with yourself. Then we can go to begin to learn to communicate outside of that with others, so that was the imagery that came into my head.

I’m like, “Oh my gosh, I love that so much.” Because what if we could communicate better with ourselves, do some better listening, some better, all of that, yes. And then we can take that to all of our other relationships in our life.

Siris: It really does have a rippling out effect and it can influence our self-esteem, our mood, all of it, our professional prospects as well. The things that we might choose to pursue because of our self-esteem, because of how we’re talking to ourselves is really impactful. So that’s what I invite a lot of the parents to do as well. A lot of times depending on what the concern is, they’ll work on verbs and nouns and things like that, but it’s about you also working on that inner dialogue, how are you talking about yourself?

I’m strong, I’m powerful. I’m magic, these types of things that are just as important, if not more important, because if you feel like you suck and you’re a horrible person, that’s this small. Even if you know your ABC’s, even if you’re writing and reading, how are your relationships going to be? The quality of life that you’re going to have, what’s that going to look like?

Amy: This is so good. I feel I just got all the feels today and learned things about myself. I love it so much. We are out of time. I just want to keep chatting forever. This was so, so good. And I want to let people know where they can go to find you and learn more from you and hear more about what you do. So how do I send our listeners to you?

Siris: I think that I gave you, there’s a really cool nine page ready reference that I provide for families that they can actually use. There’s five tools in there that they can use to empower their kids so that their kids can be happier and more successful. Emphasis on the happy because a lot of parents just focus on the success part and it’s success in multiple ways. And that’s for all ages. So that’s a nice, really, really cool thing. Don’t worry, it’s not a textbook pack. There’s a lot of images in there as well. So, I definitely would recommend for people to check that out.

And then you can go to my website empoweringlightlanguage.com. I made my business Empowering Light Language because I wanted to empower the light that we all have to shine brighter using language. And making sure that people are actually using their language and how they’re supposed to communicate versus how other people are trying to communicate and then do that duplication piece. And yeah, I’m on most social media platforms. I’m pretty responsive to email as well, so if people email me, even if it’s just little quick questions about, is this something to be concerned about? What do you think about this? I reply within 24 hours usually, so feel free, the door is open.

Amy: That’s amazing. What a gift, thank you. And to our listeners, we will include all those links for you in the show notes. So, you can just click and go right to them so you don’t have to remember any of that, make it easy as possible for you to get this help and this uplift and oh my gosh, it’s been amazing. Thank you so much for coming on and sharing your knowledge and your wisdom and your light with us today.

Siris: I appreciate that so much. Thank you, Amy.

I’m popping back in just for a second after the end of this recording with Siris, because she had the most incredible offer that she wanted me to give you after we got off the recording. And that is that she is offering our audience, our listeners right here for listening on the Raising Healthy Kid Brains podcast, a free consultation with her, which is amazing. You get to book a whole session with her, a consultation and she’s going to do that for free just for you.

In order to get that, you can say my name, Amy Nielson, or the name of our podcast the Raising Healthy Kid Brains podcast to qualify for that free consultation. We’ll drop the link below for you to book that consultation and then just remember to use my name, Amy Nielson, and the name of our podcast to get that free consultation with her. I hope that it’s super helpful and thanks for listening.

Don’t you just love all the fun things we’re learning on the show together? Well, we wanted to give you a chance to practice a little bit of it at home. And so, we made you a special freebie just for being a listener here and you can grab it at planningplaytime.com\special-freebie. That is planningplaytime.com\special-freebie. So, what this freebie is, I’ll tell you, is an amazing alphabet activity that you can start using with your kiddos and it is based in play and is so fun.

You can use dot markers with it, you can use Q-tip painting, you could use circle cereal. There’s all kinds of options, but you can print it out today and get started. Just head over to planningplaytime.com\special-freebie and we’ll send that to you right away.

Thank you for hanging out with me today for this fun chat on Raising Healthy Kid Brains. If you want to see more of what we’re doing to support kiddos and their amazing brains, come visit us on our website planningplaytime.com. See you next week.