Today, I’d like to talk to you about labelling our children & an educator’s view on it.

Over 37 years of my life were spent as a Middle School teacher watching kids unable to focus, concentrate, control their bodies and their mouths. They were good kids and while most of them were diagnosed and labeled with ADD or ADHD and put into inclusion classes, these kids didn’t really suffer from any particular condition. They lacked education & awareness in knowing how to focus and concentrate.

Our children are told to focus and concentrate, but when was the last time anyone showed them what it looks like to focus and concentrate? I don’t know about you, but I only learned focused concentration in my 20’s through transcendental meditation.

Were you ever taught how to focus or concentrate? Were you ever taught how to still your mind or made aware of all the monkey chatter happening in your mind all the time?

The bad news is, the majority of people on the planet still don’t have the awareness that their minds are constantly chattering nor that they have control over the contents of the chatter. Our culture is quick to prescribe medication for this. If adults don’t possess the ability to sit still and focus their awareness on one task and control where their awareness goes, how will they teach it to their children? If educators do not possess this skill how will they teach it?

When kids lack the ability to control themselves they are all over the place. Historically, what we have done to stop this behavior in school is to reprimand, discipline, raise our voices, send kids to detention, and ultimately medicate.

you can begin to practice this with your child? You can begin to practice focused awareness and controlling the body as early as age 3.

What if you do this through candle focus? Practice “tucking away your body” and looking at the candle. Watch it flicker and do not move your body. See how long you can do this and what results with continued practice.

Why would you want to sit down with your children and stare at a candle flickering? To learn to focus and concentrate, to train your mind and your body that You are its Master and that you can control where you focus, attention and awareness go.

This technique over time can lead to heightened emotional intelligence and conscious awareness, even at a very young age!