What went well today? Kids and teens can explore this eight-minute guided meditation for noticing the positive.
Summary
- Children often focus on scary or unpleasant thoughts, which can effect their mental health.
- This short kids’ meditation uses conscious breathing and happy thoughts to help them notice the good and feel more positive.
Our brains are hardwired to notice the negative. It’s part of how our ancient ancestors were able to survive in constantly threatening environments.
But this negativity bias can also make it difficult for us and our kids, even in our comparatively less threatening environments, to navigate other daily stressors, like big tests, arguments, or disappointments.
In this practice specifically designed for younger meditators, Dr. Mark Bertin shows kids how to gently guide their attention back to the positive things they might have missed, in order to help soothe the nervous system.
A Meditation for Kids: Coming Back to the Positive
- Lie down somewhere comfortable. Let your arms and legs fall to the ground. Close your eyes gently.
- Start to notice how your body changes with each breath you take. Each time you breathe, your belly moves up, and your belly moves down. If it is easier, put a hand on your belly. Or if you want, put a stuffed animal there.
- Each time you breathe, your belly moves. Your hand, or your toy, rises, and then falls. See if you can count ten breaths that way. Breathing in, one, breathing out, one. (Repeat for nine more inhales, and nine more exhales.)
- When you lose count, don’t worry about it. That’s normal, and happens to everyone. Come back to whatever number you last remember.
- Now, shift your attention to your day. Breathing in, focus on your breath as your belly goes up. Breathing out, focus on something that went well today.
- With each breath: breathing in, noticing your belly move, and with each breath out, noticing something that went well today.
- Now, picture something about yourself that makes you proud. Breathing in, focus on your belly moving. Breathing out, picture something that makes you proud about yourself. If nothing comes to mind, that sometimes happens. If that’s how you feel, picture what you’d wish for yourself instead.
- Finally, bring someone to mind who makes you happy. Before we end, try one more practice. Breathing in, notice your belly move. And now, breathing out picture someone who makes you happy.
- As you come to the end of this practice, take a few deep breaths, and start to wiggle your arms and legs. Pause and decide what you’d like to do next.
- It’s normal to have thoughts that make us feel scared or bad. We should never ignore anything important, but it’s useful to focus on the rest of our lives too. Take a few minutes every day to notice what has gone well, and see what happens next.
