Parenting Tips: Foreshadowing for Your Child

I wrote my 8 Tips for Parents piece a while ago, and I just wanted to share one of those 8 tips today called, “Foreshadowing”. I borrowed this literary term to describe the exercise of narrating the future for your child. This is basically a technique that gives your child something to shoot for. In other words, it gives them a direction or a pathway to follow, and the advantageous part of this is that you are the one leading the way.

There is no doubt that parental expectations can be a powerful motivator especially in the early years. In the energy medicine system, this foreshadowing is happening all the time, and can be very useful if it is harnessed and used correctly.

Let’s take an example of preparing for school. This is a significant milestone around age 5. It includes the novelty of school with its rules, order, and social scene. At the same time it involves the necessary
absence of you as the parent, as your child enters the long process of becoming educated through the school system. By foreshadowing what will happen when your child enters school for the first time, you can essentially prepare them in advance. This can take the form of statements directly to your child or to others. It can take the form of actions, like visiting the school itself, going to the playground, or maybe meeting teachers or the principal. These preparatory steps are basically foreshadowing for your child what school will be like.

I often recommend that parents make statements like, “I wonder what you’re going to learn in kindergarten?” or “How many friends do you think you’ll make in your first month of school?” These types of statements foreshadow the positive aspects of the upcoming scenario and they can make it much easier for your child to make this important adjustment.

Here are three things I want you to remember about this topic called foreshadowing:

1. Foreshadowing allows your child to get in sync with your expectations of the future.

2. This means they have something to shoot for, or a pathway to follow.

3. Foreshadowing is best used with open ended, nonchalant, “I wonder” type of statements and questions.

Another very important tip is to use what I call “gossiping”. If your child hears you talking to someone else about them, their ears are sure to perk up. In the energy medicine way of looking at your child, this can happen even if your child is too young to understand what you’re saying. The typical scenario would be if you are talking on the phone to grandma, and you mention something about your child by name. Something like “Guess how well Bobby is doing in school?”, or “You should see how fast Bobby is learning to read!”. These statements directed at other people but particularly extended family members can be like gold.

If you make use of this technique, I am optimistic that you will see your child responding to new situations or previously stress provoking ones in a more calm and confident manner. So keep foreshadowing in mind as a technique you can use whenever you see an opportunity to prepare your child for the near or the distant future. Give it a try, and let me know what kind of results you get.

If you liked this tip, you may want to know the other seven included in my 8 Tips for Parents  here.

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Energy Medicine Principles for Parents Ebook Released

My new ebook called Energy Medicine Principles for Parents was just released this week. I am very grateful to all those who contributed to the completion of this project. Even though it took me a little over a year, I feel very satisfied with the outcome and the final product. I want to say a special thank you to Dr John Veltheim, the founder of the BodyTalk System, who graciously wrote the foreward to the book, and who has paved the way for many people to understand and utilize energy medicine in new and exciting ways.

My goal with this book is to provide parents with an introduction and a working understanding of what I define as energy medicine and why I think it is so important. As a pediatrician and holistic physician, I have spent the better part of the last 10 years devoting myself to learning and putting into practice the energy medicine modalities I mention in the book. They are: The BodyTalk System, acupuncture point stimulation techniques (with and without needles), essential oils used mostly topically, and other supplementation strategies.

Many people wonder why a board certified pediatrician like me would choose to change his practice into one of holistic or alternative methods only. My response is that I do not reject the western medical model or its utility, I simply prefer to practice in such a way that I am able to provide what I think is the best, most comprehensive approach for my patients and families. My opinion is that ideally, all families have access and an openness to all modalities which may be of benefit to them. I generally see my role as an adjunct or a complement to a person’s healthcare team, not as a stand alone substitute.

I believe that the energy medicine paradigm provides an extremely useful framework to discuss and manage those aspects of pediatric symptoms and conditions that are outside of the diagnostic parameters available today. When I practiced primary care pediatrics in the past, there were many times when no diagnosis could be given, and no treatment offered, simply because the child’s condition or presentation was outside of what conventional medicine could categorize and differentiate. This does not mean that conventional approaches are all bad or all wrong, it just means they are incomplete.

With energy as our common currency and as a way to describe and interpret what’s going on with a child and their family, a whole new vista is opened and made accessible and workable to me as a doctor, and to the families I am working with to try and help.

Getting back to the book, there are 4 parts and a final section where parents can get into action right away.
Part 1: Energy Medicine Principles – ten energy medicine principles I think all parents should know about
Part 2: The treatment process and the BodyTalk system
Part 3: Pediatric applications discussed by age range
Part 4: Energy Medicine Synthesis – 3 case studies of different conditions and age groups
The last section is called “What you can do for your child right now!”

If you would like to read a short excerpt from the book, you may download it from my homepage on PrinciplesForParents.com.

If you would like more details about the contents of the book itself and the bonus materials, you may read more about my Energy Medicine Principles for Parents Ebook here.

As always, I welcome your questions or comments on the book or any other topics.