As clinicians, introducing mindfulness to children can profoundly impact their emotional well-being. Below are some ways to begin the conversation on mindfulness with your patient.
- Educate. Explain the role of mindfulness in health and how it can be a factor in helping people manage their stress response. Review the physical and mental health benefits of mindfulness.
- Normalize. For patients who have experienced trauma, mindfulness might be challenging initially. Encourage your patients to be patient with themselves and seek guidance from a trauma-informed mindfulness practitioner for support
- Validate. Explain how practicing mindfulness every day is like slowly building their “mindfulness muscle,” they can begin to rely on it as a coping tool when experiencing stress.
- Teach. You can teach your patient several mindfulness practices in five minutes or less. For example: Diaphragmatic breathing, body scan, grounding with five senses.
- Learn. As a healthcare provider, practicing mindfulness can help you enter a calm state as you begin your day seeing patients. You are also modeling this type of stress management for your patients. Consider listening to one of these practices to help you learn and practice about mindfulness:
- Provide resources. See below for various resources to connect patients with.
- Mindfulness apps can include: CALM for kids, UCLA Mindful, Mindfulness Coach, Headspace, Cosmic Kids, or Insight Timer
- For more resources to help patients manage stress, visit acesaware.org/managestress
- For community resources, visit findhelp.org
