No shoes for me please

Three years ago I brought my first pair of barefoot shoes after much research and shopping around. I've never been keen on shoes, always happy to have them off and feel the ground on my feet. Even before I learnt about spiritual connection and grounding with the earth I just knew it fel nicer to be barefoot!

I now wear nothing else if I do have shoes on they are barefoot shoes and the same for our children who love them. Our youngest was always taking her shoes off at any opportunity now if we are out all day her shoes actually stay on!

Now the science behind this is rapidly growing and more and more people are making the shift to barefoot footwear. Whether running, working in the office or socialising with friends there is a style to fit. We only buy from the vegan range but there are plenty of other options available to suit all lifestyles.

So get researching, fill your mind with barefoot knowledge and see what the fuss is all about, I promise you it is well worth it.

Who is with me?

The world of Pinterest brought this to me today and it sat so well with me and related beautifully with how I feel so I wanted to share it with you. I know I cannot be alone in this! 

Creativity - Are you in there?

It has taken me to my thirties to really embrace my creativity, really dig deep and try new things. When I look at the results I am a little proud of myself instead of overly critical. It took me 15 years since I left school to do something creative because I enjoyed it, found it relaxing and just wanted to do it, no pressure just for the fun of being creative. The girl who dropped art at 13 years of age because in my mind I was clearly no good at it (my grades were terrible) actually enjoys being creative. It feels nice, relaxes me and bring me enjoyment. I wanted to do art in school, my work never got the grades though and unless I got the high grades what was the point in doing it - this was the mindset at school. Grades, grades, grades, enjoyment does not come in to it. 

Why can't children be creative just for the fun, its amazing for mental health and confidence but the opposite occurs when you starts grading children on the results of their creativity. 

Confidence is a big issue for many adults and I have lost count how many times I hear it linked to school experiences and grading. Instead of grading our children at such a young, vulnerable age why can't we encourage them for their focus, trying time and time again until it finally clicks and for helping one another get their heads around new, exciting topics. Encouraging team work instead of separating children based on their grades and praising the higher graded children more so than those with lower grades would surely have a positive impact on self esteem, community and teach these much needed life skills. 

Grades can be important later in life but lets not forget the person underneath the grades. 

Now in my thirties I am going to enjoy my creative side, allow my creative confidence to grow knowing there is no mark sheet in sight and you know that feels really great!  

Meditation for Children

I regularly do light breathing meditations with our girls, I have had no training I am guided by our needs and we just do them when we need them. Not always the three of us, sometimes only one of the girls wants do some and that is always respected in our household. Never is anything forced including meditation.

I just wanted to share with you what we do, we are more connected afterwards, calmer and quite often asleep!

Firstly we discuss a colour, we sometimes have more than one, sometimes we have glitter - we just go on how we are feeling. We get comfortable (usually lying down) and check in that we are all comfortable, warm/cool enough then settle down and close our eyes. Then I begin talking them through some basic light work...

"Now with our eyes closed and our bodies comfortable we are going to take some big deep breathes in and then out, in, out, in and then out. We feel relaxed now and ready to breathe in some beautiful energising/relaxing/healing (change lights properties dependent on needs) light.
Starting at your toes visualise the beautiful energising/relaxing/healing purple light coming into your toes, it feels warm and safe. As the light comes into your toes you relax and feel the warmth coming up across your feet and into your ankles. Now all of your feet are full of the most beautiful purple light. As the light slowly moves up your legs the warmth spreads up your legs also, reaching your knees the purple light wraps around the front and back of your lower legs, knees and now upper legs up into your hips. Now all your legs are heavy, warm and relaxed, sinking into the bed/floor. With your legs and hips as full as they can be with purple light it now flows on up into your stomach and up around your back. Slowly the warm light reaches higher up your back and across your shoulders. You can feel the warmth as your shoulders relax. From your stomach the light works up across your chest and over your shoulders, meeting with the light that has covered your back. As the two warm flows of light meet at the top of your shoulders, they begin to flow down your arms. Your arms relax as the light flows down past your elbow, down into your wrists and into your hands right up to the tips of each of your fingers. Your whole body is heavy now, sinking into the bed/floor and your breathe is deep and slow. You feel safe, comfortable and truly blessed to be receiving the amazing gift of light.
Finally the purple light works up your neck, over the back of your head and right up over your face. Feel each muscle as it relaxes, your eyes still closed feel even heavier than before and your jaw opens slightly as it relaxes. The purple light is flowing around your whole body now, recharging/relaxing you with the energy/relaxation/healing you need. As you take some more long, deep breathes you feel the light filling you with energy/calm/healing and your body accepts it all with thanks. You are blessed and you are grateful for this beautiful gift. Keep breathing in long, slow breathes and take in all the energy/calm/healing you need right now and give thanks for this blessing."

If we are doing this meditation for sleep/relaxation this is where I end it, whereas if we are using it for energy/healing after a pause I add "Slowly when you feel ready open your eyes, refreshed and ready to have a positive day full of love, lighter and light."

Doing this regularly helps us all, works well when big emotions arise or when an event coming up is causing anxiety. I believe these meditations will grow and develop as our girls do and as with everything they will guide us as to when the time is ready and which direction to move in.

The benefits of meditation have been documented in many areas of health and well being so why not teach our children the basics when they are young? As they grow older if they wish these skills can be developed but if not at least they know the basics which can still have positive impacts on their health and well being. Don't we all want that for our children? 

Take a moment

Take a moment to read the below page and sit and think about it for a while, really think about it and maybe take those thoughts with you today and everyday, spread the word and spread happiness! 

Social Media - Friend or Foe?

I did pretty well at school grade wise, I got top grades at college and have graduated from university. I moved out of home at 17 to work away for 12 months before working in care, bar work and becoming self employed. All of these experiences aid my belief that I am not totally daft, some have even called me intelligent. To add to this I am also a mother in my 30's, teaching my children to have pride in their achievements, feel comfortable in their skin and to focus on all the blessings we have in our lives - after all we have a home where we are safe and loved!
So how did I get caught up in the social media trap?
Well everyone is on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and whatever other options we can join in on right? I myself am a Facebook user, anything past that is lost on me and to be honest when something changes on Facebook my husband usually ends up explaining it to me (we cannot be smart at everything right!).

Until about 18 months ago I used Facebook a fair bit - checked it a few times daily, uploaded photos, did regular status updates but the more I used Facebook the more my moods would drop, the higher my anxiety levels would be and the lower my self confidence would become. Now some people 'get it', they can switch off to the social pressure and comparisons - my husband is one of these people and for him that is great. It took me a long time to see this link, that within a hour of reading about some old friends weight loss I was looking in the mirror wondering how I could loose weight or feeling fatter than I had when I awoke that morning. Putting it like it I am shocked it took me so long to realise but I just didn't connect what I had read or seen earlier that day to how my mood had changed. What a hypocrite - telling my children to be grateful for what we have but feeling envy towards an acquaintance who had just brought a brand new car. 

I thought for months about leaving social media, purely for my mental health but good old fear of missing out, that social animal kept creeping up but really what is social about talking through a screen, looking at what an old school friend ate for lunch?! As a home educating family, pretty much every group or event is advertised or organised through Facebook, this was something we really couldn't miss out on. I suspended my account though and my mind felt better, oddly I missed it for a while especially when my husband would tell me something he had seen but soon enough that passed as my brain became full of more positive thoughts. True friends have my phone number, we can message one another, talk on the phone, actually meet in person to catch up and you know what when we see each other we actually have loads to talk about because we haven't been having daily updates of our lives trickling through to one another through statuses and photos.

Two other experiences helped change my outlook on social media. Firstly we attended a party which was nice enough all be it a rather calm and a slightly quiet affair. On our return home photos by the organiser had been posted and I asked my husband if we had even been at the same event?! Wow those photos made the afternoon look much more energetic and full of laughter than it had been. This was someone who I had previously looked at their photos and felt boring, felt they had a funner life than me, that they were so social with a fantastic funny social circle, something I felt I was missing. I had been at this event and it was nothing like the photographs, how many more social gatherings were like this for them?

Secondly, we have all had the weight loss status updates come up on our news feed, now these truly got to me and to be honest I am not too sure why. Id see people saying how many pounds they had lost in the week and think I was lazy I needed to do something despite my husband saying they were overweight and you are not it just really bothered me. Someone on my news feed lost 5lbs in a week and I was taken back by their achievement, full of guilt and self loathing. I bumped into a relative of this person a fortnight later and passed comment on how well they were doing with working towards a healthy weight. The response I received was unexpected 'Yes I suppose so but I don't know why she puts it it on Facebook especially when she put most of that back on the following week'. Now I am in no way happy this lady gained her lost weight again as it is negative for both her physical and mental health. I understand why she did not post this update the following week but I wonder what if she had done. What response would she have got? Is she even aware of how her weight loss status made me and possibly others feel? Of course not, in the same way that we were unaware she had gained the weight again.

There is always more behind the status, the photos and the selfies, I wont even start on the photo filters and angles that can make someone look totally different but I will say my daughter didn't recognise anyone in a group of four girls on a night out when shown a picture by me and my husband despite the centre girl being my niece, her own cousin who had been to our house that very week and to me that says a great deal!

So should we be more honest online, show people both the ups and downs of our lives, if you wish to then yes go for it but if that isn't for you maybe we shouldn't share the positive even slightly over exaggerated or distorted stories or photos of our daily lives either. Are these 'friends' really friends if we cannot share both sides of our lives with them? Why are we trying to impress them with our successes? Why do we need these 'friends' to comment on how great we look, how fab our new sofa is when we could just be happy with ourselves and focus on how we feel about ourselves and our possessions?

Now I've done the smug statuses and I have felt the negative thoughts of reading others so I stopped it for myself and others. With mental health problems becoming more common is there something that can be done to improve this by how we approach social media? I don't know but I know that I for sure feel better avoiding it!

Just think about it next time you post or read a post online!

Oh and that person with the brand new car, brought it on credit and is now anxious about whether she will manage the repayments each month but you know she is smiling in the photograph and the car is super shiny! Stop and think about it for a moment!

******************************************************************************* Do not panic our girls are not missing out on home education events and groups due to me leaving Facebook. We set up a profile just to access these groups to ensure they do not miss out! They now have a more happier mother to take them to the fantastic groups and events made available to them thanks to social media - it isn't all bad I remind
myself!

Home Education - Why we love it!

Firstly I want to make it clear I do not preach home education, it is very much personal choice and what is right for one child or family is not right for another. Simply put there is not just one way of parenting, educating, living in general. This is just what works for us and we are open to change as we grow and develop as individuals and a family unit.

What do I love about our children not going to school:

• We spend every day together! Each milestone I witness - reading, writing, swimming as well as their social developments are all witnessed by me first hand. Those moments will stay with us forever and I don't want to miss them. I cannot imagine reading about how well my daughters are doing in swimming class or that they read their first book in full in their school diaries, I don't want to miss those moments. There are times when I want some time to be me, some quiet time after all I am human but when those moments arise I am blessed enough to have a husband and children who (most of the time) listen and get that and we arrange it. I have plenty of time to read with a cuppa, have a long soak in the bath or craft when they are older too!
• If we have a disagreement it is sorted out quickly, no going our separate ways to brew over it for the day or worry about how things will be when we are reunited. This helps keep everyone's stress levels low. 
• Our lives are slower, more relaxed and we can listen to our bodies. Most days we can eat when hungry, rest when tired and work when we feel mentally ready to absorb the information. I truly believe if more people lived slowly, less stressed lives our society would be a happier, healthier place.
• We learn on the go! Our eldest learnt the basics of addition and subtraction on the local village bus. We would count the passengers then add those getting on and subtract those getting off. This made sense for her she could see it in real life not on a piece of paper with no meaning.  A girl who attended the local Rainbow group with our eldest daughter was confused how she could be learning without going to school as in her words 'You have to go to school to learn', my daughter told her all the places we learn before coming home confused by this belief. 
• We learn together, I am learning all the time with our daughters. As adults we never know it all, we are continuously learning in life. Learning doesn't stop when you leave school! I am learning so much now with my children and enjoying every moment of it.
• Aquariums, museums, libraries and pretty much everywhere is so much quieter for us. We can go to the aquarium and stop and read every sign we wish, speak to the passionate staff who are happy to answer questions and have lengthy discussions with us within the children's interests. We truly gain so much from these days out. Our children find it strange to see school visitors be rushed through to the sections needed and unable to ask questions or look at things outside the days learning criteria. To be honest I remember those school trips, I left with the few basic facts needed to tick the curriculum but not much more. 
• Learning never stops for us, every waking moment is an opportunity to learn and explore which is what life is all about right?  
• Most importantly for me is our children learn in their own way at their own pace. No pressure, no rules they learn in a way that suits them when they feel ready. In our home there is no pressure to read, it comes naturally. A baby isn't taught how to crawl, chew etc it comes naturally as humans are naturally curious and want to explore the world around them. Children soon want to understand the signs around them, the menu in the cafe and research answers to their questions independently and to do so they need to figure out the words and sentence formation. I truly believe they teach themselves if you give them space and time. 

I am happy when people question home education, I am unhappy when people want to negatively judge it, as I said in the beginning it is about doing what is right for your family and that is not the same for every family. Accepting we are not all the same and that is perfectly ok helps relationships within society a great deal so lets all try and do it a little bit more!