Young people are INUNDATED with really big and hard information about the future of our planet, chaos in the world, violence and so many really tough and new to all of us things. Let face it it is hard for us as adults to understand and take into our brains and nervous systems and we aren't dealing with a brain that is undergoing a pruning process, hormones pulsing around in huge waves, social media, peer groups and all the other “normal” kid stuff.

It is really challenging being a kid right now.

I hear it from THEM ALL THE TIME. As someone who is around many different groups of kids ages 9-15 every week, I hear a few thing pulsing through. One is that these kids are scared! They are learning about all these problems that we are facing as a human race and that they are inheriting but they aren’t hearing much talk of solutions or possibilities. They are laying awake at night unable to sleep because of it. They are taking in so much “bad” and doom without a brain that can fully comprehend and it is putting them in overload. In fact many of them aren’t even talking about it, they are holding a lot of it in and feeling all the pressure of that.

I have heard many of them speak of the anger and confusion that bubbles inside of them. Why isn’t any adult out there “making it better”. Others speak to the anxiety and stress from the normal “kid stuff” social dynamics, changing body, struggles with school and even this “normal” stuff is being amplified with social media and technology that frankly is damaging to their social nervous systems, self esteem and even their hormones.

There is an epidemic of kids with anxiety, stress and mental health imbalance. It is a reflection of the imbalance that they see and feel all around them.

I am not going to pretend that I have all the answers or maybe even any answers. Sometimes I too as an adult feel confusion, anger, stress, overwhelm and even occasionally fall into lack of hope.

Here is what I can offer. Help them….DREAM. IMAGINE. SEE POSSIBILITY AND HOPE.

What I know about feeling more safe is that we have to calm the nervous system. There are many ways to do this from intentional breathing or finding our still quiet place, to regular long hugs, playing with a pet, exercising etc. What I also know is that teaching kids about big things in the world is just a piece of the puzzle and when we only give them a piece it feels fractured. We must help them see, dream and imagine possibilities and show them that people out there are creating solutions.

What I know about coming up with solutions to problems big and small is that they don’t come from worrying, stressing or anxiety attacks. When our nervous systems are in FULL engagement and flight/fight is activated it just creates a soup of emotions and very little possibility for clarity. In actual fact most times solutions don’t come from “the head”, ask so many of the great inventors or thinkers as they talk about it “falling from the sky”. It doesn’t come from just being informed, in fact…

Being informed without a bridge to possibility and hope can feel really fracturing and so very hard!

Solutions and creating a new way of being, relating and even solving problems comes from identifying the problem and then daring to dream. Our kids need to be connected to that dreaming space (and really so do we)!

To enter a space of “void”, a space of imagination, a space of knowing that there is a solution somewhere out there and if we “shoot our arrow” into the dream space of what we would like our world to look like, then we can begin to come up with ideas and from that place we can even take inspired action. When we are in that dreaming space things seem possible, things seem brighter, there is hope.

Physiologically the nervous system begins to unwind, safety returns to the body, balance returns to the body and yes that includes the hormones!

One of the best things that I know how to do is to help my own kids dream and for me to do the same. When they are feeling really afraid of something they learn about the world we acknowledge it and then we can dream how we would like it to be.

What would it look like if the world was more balanced, or kind?

What would it feel and look like for them to feel more hopeful?

When we invite kids to dream we allow them to connect with the world beyond this world, with their imagination and with the possibility of solutions.

There are solutions! Martin Luther King dared to dream and allow his arrow to seek out actions and change. There are SO MANY other people in this world right now who are daring to dream, are coming up with solutions that are creating more balance in our world, let’s show our kids these examples! People who are inventing ways to clean up the ocean, discovering how fungi that can recycle plastic, people who are teaching balance, who are working towards things rather than fighting against.

Let’s help our kids through their fears about our world, through their anxieties, and connect them to the dreaming of a new world.

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Helping kids navigate anxiety about all the BIG things in the world