Available Courses

Health Professionals

Organisations Business

Parents Educators

General Public

Meditators

Professional Training

You may also be interested in:

• Introduction to Mindful Parenting extended workshop. This 5 hour workshop provides an introduction to Mindful Parenting and forms part of the 7 week Mindfulness-Based Parenting Program.
• Article on Mindful Parenting
• Free Parenting Resources Page

Do you have clients who struggle with the demands of being a parent? Would you like to help those clients build positive family relationships? Are you working directly with children as an educator, counsellor, or support worker? Would you like to gain skills that assist you in building positive and engaging relationships while also nourishing and taking care of yourself, avoiding burn-out?

This 3 day intensive workshop is designed for professionals and educators who work with parents, caregivers and children and who are interested in exploring how living ‘mindfully’ in the present moment can assist in creating nourishing relationships and giving children the structure and love they need to reach their potential.

Participants attending this course find the content of this workshop of value in both their work and personal lives, developing the skill to use Mindfulness tools and perspective in one to one and family situations.

Register for the Mindful Approaches to Families & Children course

Mindfulness provides tools and techniques that really help savour and honour the rich and beautiful moments of caring for families and children, and also manage the challenging moments more wisely. Mindfulness skills allow us to identify the reality in those challenging situations, gain some perspective, and then ‘respond’ in ways that follow what is important to us, rather than ‘react’ in ways that we don’t really want to have reacted. Rather than getting stuck in, or caught up by emotions, preconceptions and expectations that might be restrictive or unhelpful, we find new ways to live in a way we feel good about.

When we are challenged, sometimes we lose touch with our adult self and become reactive, dealing with situations in ways that leave us feeling stressed, guilty or helpless. The overall mindfulness approach gives us as adults more techniques to stay in our adult role, rather than reacting automatically to the emotion of a situation or behaviour. Through learning additional ways to help us remain present and loving parents, caregivers and adults, we become more open to experiencing the fullness of our lives with our children and transforming moments of despair and struggle to ones of communication and positive connection.

Mindful Parenting looks at the relationship with children and at changing the behaviour of both the adult and the child in a way that is honouring. It differs from many parenting approaches in that the focus moves from the ‘naughty corner’ and other artificial consequences for children, and begins with reflection of the inner experience of the parent, caregiver, professional or educator. With greater present moment awareness we can then tackle the “how to” of parenting: setting boundaries, resolving conflict or interacting with children with clarity, wisdom, consistency and compassion, in greater accordance with our goals and values.

Grounded in Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy (MBCT), this workshop presents tools that combine contemplative (Mindfulness) practice with psychological theory (Cognitive Behavioural Therapy), relationship-based parenting (Attachment) theory and research. Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy (MBCT) is a state-of-the-art approach for dealing with challenging emotions in a range of situations. It is both recommended as a treatment of choice for depression by UK National Health and being taught in some USA medical schools as part of the curriculum.

Empirical evidence suggests that mindfulness-based intervention can reduce the impact of stress, improve psychological well-being, increase positive affect, alleviate anxiety and depression, prevent relapse or recurrence of major mental health disorders and offer a greater sense of health and wellbeing to adult populations.

The application of mindfulness to parenting is a relatively new development, and preliminary research is showing that parent-child relationships can be improved by promoting a parent’s or caregiver’s ability to bring a present moment awareness to their parenting. Furthermore, that parents who adopt a mindfulness orientation for their parenting and regularly engage in mindful parenting practices will undergo a fundamental shift in their ability and willingness to truly be present with the constantly growing and changing nature of their child and their relationship with their child (Duncan, Coatsworth, and Greenberg, 2009).

This cutting edge 3 day intensive workshop teaches the professional application of Mindfulness and key relevant research.

Register for the Mindful Approaches to working with Families & Children course

You will learn:

• The principles of Mindfulness and how to apply these to parenting
• How to assist parents and caregivers to consider their own and their child’s behaviour with kindness, non-judgementally, to relate differently from negative emotions, and to develop parenting goals that are accompanied by motivated action plans.
• How to assist parents to respond to their child’s behaviour with clarity, wisdom, compassion and love.
• How the concepts of mindfulness relate to attachment theory and other parenting programs.
• Tools for reflection, self-care, nourishment and softening the negative effects of guilt, reactivity and stress.
• Skills for both cultivating eagerness, confidence and joy in children and renewing the inner lives of professionals.

Course includes a range of reflective practices, exercises and opportunities for implementation and feedback. Participants will receive a CD with meditations, a course workbook (including handouts and relevant articles and digital copies of handouts suitable to use with those they work with).

Attend this workshop to learn new ways to help your clients and yourself too!

The course is facilitated by Fiona Glover (BA, BSW, M. Mental Health Sc) an accredited mental health social worker, meditator, and mother, with over 12 years experience in the field of mental health, and over 5 years experience running MBCT courses.

Next Course

• Adelaide: 27 – 29 May, 9am – 4.30pm, NADA, 1 Mary Street, Hindmarsh SA.
• Melbourne: 7 – 9 October, 9am – 4.30pm, South Melbourne Town Hall, 210 Bank Street, South Melbourne VIC.
• Adelaide: 20 - 22 November, 1pm - 4.30pm (20 November), 9am - 4.30pm (21 and 22 November). Belair Park Country Club, Upper Sturt Road, Adelaide.

Cost: AUD$790, $750 early bird price

Register for one of our courses

Ongoing Supervision for Professionals is also available.

Please contact us at to express your interest.