How to control your own mind (child and parent workshop)

• Workshop is in 2 parts, both need to be attended:
  - Part 1: Saturday 11 May, 10am – 12.30pm
  - Part 2: Saturday 18 May, 10am – 12.30pm
• Length: 5 hours total over 2 workshops
• Location: Brandlesome, Bury, Greater Manchester
• Included: Refreshments – drinks, biscuits, fruit
• Who is it for: Children struggling with emotional regulation, anxiety and confidence.

If your child is struggling with their big emotions, this is the workshop for them. Big emotions can feel scary, overwhelming and shameful for our children. Often, they don’t understand the big emotion they’re experiencing, so they don’t have the words to communicate it to an adult in a way that can be heard and accepted.

Essentially, as adults we need to take a paradigm shift to understand that no child is ‘naughty’. That instead, all behaviour is a form of communication our children don’t yet have the words or understanding to explain to us. It’s our job to support them in naming, understanding and expressing these emotions, in a way that feels safe and empowering to child and adult alike.

A big part of this, is a change our behaviour and response as the adult. When we change, the child’s behaviour changes without question. For this reason, we would advise completing the ‘Become your child’s emotion coach’ before your child completes this. There is a multi-buy discount, for buying these workshops together.

Once we as the adult change, we can then support our child to deepen their knowledge, skills and tools around their big emotions. This is a two-part workshop, designed to empower your child to understand how their brain works and gain a range of tools tailored to them, to support them through their big emotions, and life’s constant curve balls.

Part 1 – Sat 11 May

Starting with helping them understand what happens in your brain when you ‘flip your lid’! Essentially building understanding of fight, flight and freeze, and how our bodies take over logical thinking.

We’ll expand on this by building their self-awareness and helping them learn to recognise when they’re feeling dysregulated and what their ‘usual’ response is (i.e. is it fight/ flight/ freeze). Only by building self-awareness, can we catch ourselves when dysregulated and begin the journey to regulation.

We’ll then spend time working together to discover sensory calming tools that work specifically for them. These tools can be used to help calm themselves in the heat of the moment, with the support of an adult. Whilst we’re hoping to support them to self-regulate over time, the reality is that our children will need support via co-regulation due to how their brain is developing.

This is an interactive workshop, designed to be completed with a safe and loving parent supporting them through it. There will be experientials, fun activities, and games designed to help them learn this information.

Part 2– Sat 18 May

In the second workshop, we build on what we’ve already learnt. Helping them to understand that in our lives there are things in our control, in our influence and out of our control. Helping them to see where they’re wasting energy and emotion trying to change things they can’t control, and how to let go of the stresses and worries surrounding this.

We then help them to re-focus their energy and thoughts on to what they can control – their thoughts, feelings and behaviour. We build their emotional literacy and ability to communicate their unmet needs, but most importantly we provide them with tools to learn the art of self-empathy.

We apply all we’ve learnt from the part 1 and part 2, to their biggest triggers, working collaboratively together to come up with solutions on helping them calm quicker around those triggers.

We also provide them with tools to work with their parent, teacher or friend to creatively problem solve, and find new ways forward to get their unmet need addressed.

Again, this is hands on, interactive and uses a range of games and tools to help the learning. It is designed to be completed with a loving and supportive parent.

• Learn the ‘flip the lid’ brain model.
• Be introduced to fight, flight, freeze.
• Learn the different ways they or others may be showing signs of fight/ flight/ freeze.
• Build their self-awareness of their behaviours and reactions to stress.
• Identify personalised sensory calming tools for themselves.
• Learn what is in their control/ influence and out of their control.
• Find ways to let go of worries for situations not in their control.
• Build emotional understanding and literacy around their big feelings/ unmet needs.
• Giving them a way of working collaboratively to problem solve an unmet need.

• Two-part workshop totaling 5hrs of learning, ‘in person’.
• Two places – one for the child and one for the adult.
• Refreshments – drinks, biscuits and fruit.
• Mind Warrior Toolkit packed with 10+ tools, techniques and frameworks based in the latest science.
• Pre-workshop intake form to understand yours and your child’s exact needs, so I can best support you inside and outside the workshop. This includes a conversation (if needed) to help build connection and to support social and emotional safety.
• 4 experiential exercises, 3 games, all designed to raise yours and your child’s self-awareness and increase the effectiveness of the workshop.
• Access to a network of other children facing similar challenges, and local parents with neurodiverse children.
• Access to a private Facebook community of parents with neurodiverse children.

Event Venue & Nearby Stays

Saint Francis House, 37 Throstle Grove, Bury, United Kingdom