Summer vacation is here! For the most part, many families returned to travelling and taking trips post-pandemic which is really great news.

Today, I want to suggest 10 ideas to connect with your children in your “regular” daily life this summer; when you are home (not travelling) and your kids are home with you. Keep an open mind, as some of these ideas are conceptual, and not necessarily summer activities.

1. Keep the schedule open and flexible. Children accumulate overwhelming stress into their nervous system from the long academic year filled with deadlines, homework, tests, and a strict schedule. Do not overschedule your children with camps, sports, tutoring and other heavily-structured activities.
2. Be a playful parent. Most tension can be resolved with play, laughter and the parent taking the less powerful/less knowledgeable role. Read Playful Parenting, book by Dr. Larry Cohen to dive deeper into this concept.
3. Take a leap of faith into your child’s world, with enthusiasm. If they like to play video games, play with them. Take on the student’s role and let them teach you. If they like to do videos for TikTok or YouTube Shorts, help them, guide them, dance with them.
4. If age appropriate, allow them to have a say in their schedule. Allow them to choose who to play with, when and where.
5. Offer Special Time at least 1-2 times a week.
6. Maintain limits around screen time.
7. Ensure ample sleep time (8 hours or more) every night.
8. Listen, listen, listen. Welcome difficult conversations or emotional episodes with an open mind and an open heart. Our job as conscious parents is to be the safe container in these hard moments. Read my book to dive deeper.
9. Take care of YOURSELF. Make sure you sleep enough, eat well and exercise. Keep your adult relations active and healthy. Maintain a good support system around you.
10. Stay in the Present Moment. Practice Presence. Everytime you “lose yourself” in the past or the future, offer yourself self-compassion and come back to Here & Now. Many small moments of presence matter more than one big (and rare) splashy event of “togetherness”.

Testimonials from parents in the Conscious Parent Accelerator Program:

“After one and a half years practicing what I have been learning from the program, I can say I feel like a better person as a whole, a better mother, a better wife, a better woman and human being.I know I still have a lot to learn and heal but I feel so different in a good way. Thanks again and again Mihaela Plugarasu for having this vision and sharing your knowledge with us. 🙏🙏🙏” ( W.)

“Hi Mihaela Plugarasu! Last week I finally had a meeting with my son’s new teacher. She couldn’t understand why I insisted on meeting her until she read my son’s file. She told me that when she met him for the first time this year, he was a completely normal boy, connected in class, totally integrated with his classmates, a fast writer, playing with everyone during the breaks, and even showing emotion if he was not included in some game. That’s the exact opposite of what I would get from school for at least the past 4 years. She said if she hadn’t read the file, she would have never imagined my son used to have all those symptoms and even medication. I explained what a difference it made to now have evidence that this was the result of narcissistic abuse and not ADHD or learning disabilities. I cannot thank you enough for showing me how to support my son all this time in our journey from hell into normal life.” ( G.)