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Our Son-Rise Journey

The Power of Choice

16/02/23 at 12.16pm   /   by sdcarlson   /   0 Comment

blog feb 23

Realizing that we have the power to choose our emotions in response to events is pivotal in understanding our ability to create change in the way we navigate happiness or unhappiness in our lives.  Happiness comes from within and the choices we make create the experiences we have.

We can find peace in emotional pain because the emotions we feel are entirely our choice.  None of us are victims of our emotions.  No event or person can emotionally “make” us feel a certain way.  For example, I may tell someone that they made me upset because of something they said or didn’t say, but in reality that  person can’t make me be upset.  However, my belief that they did something that I felt was wrong can.  My belief gives power to how I choose to respond and feel.

We freely choose to assign an emotion to any given event.  We cannot control whatever stimuli is thrown in our direction, but we CAN control how we respond to it.   This is significant because in situations where one might decide to feel powerless, hurt, or defeated in response to an event or what they perceive as a negative stimuli in their life, one can instead reevaluate what is happening to them and pick an emotion that allows them to feel supported, comforted, and powerful.   The power of choice and reflection can bring about cognizance of how a particular stimulus makes you feel which in turn allows for self-awareness and self-evolvement.

Making a choice to respond differently takes a high degree of awareness, attention and persistence, but you CAN choose differently.   Emotions are often reactions.  WE give them power.  Begin to recognize your own emotions as choices, as things that you do.   And watch how you grow….

The choice to look at our son and choose emotions of awe and amazement instead of fear, dread, or doom has given us all the opportunity to discover a level of joy and happiness that only comes from an outlook of optimism and gratefulness.  I don’t know where we would be today if we had not been fortunate enough to realize the power in making this choice.  We have been able to cultivate an environment where there are no hidden agendas or a need to be successful in order to be loved and accepted.  This has given Lucas the support and complete freedom to reach for the stars without fear of failure or judgement.  As a result, amazing things have happened!

Lucas has evolved so much since we started this program.  He is now having simple 3 or 4 looped conversations with us, playing in and out of the playroom, feeling embarrassment (so huge!!!), and beginning to enjoy aspects of imaginary play.

I have so many videos to choose from.  I wish you all had the time to watch all of them.  I spend each week trying to decide which one to focus on.  I decided to focus on imaginary play this week.

A little history:

I remember scripting imaginary play with Lucas 5 years ago through ABA.  So for example we would model 5 or 6 actions/sentences to say with figurines/playhouse and for each action or vocalization  that he would copy, Lucas would receive an edible treat (his “reinforcer”).  I remember crying in response to seeing my son “play” this way the first time he did it.  It was the closest thing I had ever seen to actual play at that time.  Mind you there was never a light in his eye from enjoyment (other than the receipt of the treat of course) and he still never took to actually playing with toys as a result of this activity.

Through Son-Rise methods, we have found no need for scripting or reinforcers in our play because we create an environment where the imaginary play itself is the motivating part (reinforcer).  The amount of creativity, enthusiasm, excitement, and energy our team brings to the room in order to inspire Lucas to grow is immense.   Through joining and really tuning into his motivations in each individual session, we are given clues as to how to best relate to Lucas and make our play fun, engaging and enticing. The exciting part is that Lucas is now  creating his own imaginary play!  He will ask for dog and cat tickles.  He will ask for the same blanket to be a tent, a fort, a car, a train, a bus.  The light in his eyes is present and he is most definitely delighting in play!

These two videos are about 3 to 4 minutes in totality, but so worth watching. I’ve included both because I think it is important to see the transition our volunteer takes into imaginary play (from a tickle request, to counting down to the tickle, to creating a rocket ship experience!) and additionally so fun  to see Lucas actively engaged!  This is significant because a year ago, even a few months ago, Lucas would’ve watched for maybe a second and then went back to doing an ism (stim).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LxnAmFWK3yk

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eiJm8OzbI3M

 

 

 

 

 

Gratitude – The shortcut to happiness

16/02/16 at 10.28am   /   by sdcarlson   /   0 Comment

grateful

To be grateful means not only to delight, enjoy and appreciate, but also to recognize simultaneously the blessing and the wonder of an experience.  In such moments there is only happiness.

– Barry Neil Kaufman (excerpted from his book, Happiness is a Choice)

Gratitude means learning to live your life as if everything were a miracle, and being aware on a continuous basis of how much you’ve been given.  The benefits of practicing gratitude are endless.  People who regularly practice gratitude, by taking time to notice and reflect upon the things they are thankful for, experience more positive emotions, feel more alive, express more compassion and kindness, and even have longer, healthier lives.

It is important to be grateful for not only the momentous things, but for the little, insignificant trifles as well.  So instead of broadly saying, “I am grateful to be alive today,” which is a general overall statement, really and truly  focusing on small, specific things such as  waking up in a warm bed, enjoying the taste of a really good cup of coffee, the smile on your loved one’s face, etc.  The list goes on.  There is always SOMETHING to be grateful for.

“Whenever we think we have lost our way or have noticed joy to be absent from our daily endeavors, we can look around and find a host of things, events or people to appreciate.  If we make the items specific, we will never exhaust the resources with which to fuel our gratitude.  ” – Barry Neil Kaufman

The Son-Rise lesson of being grateful has a major impact on choosing happiness and creating beliefs and thoughts that fuel happiness in our lives.  When a parent is told their child has a disability, a mountain out of nowhere appears of what they are NOT currently doing.  All of sudden you feel like there is this gaping hole of things that your child does not do compared to their peers.  The point is not the list of can’t do’s, it is the focus that is put on it.  You have this tally of how far they are behind the typical peer and a list of steps that they need to check off to get there.  As each year passes, you get further behind and more desperate to “catch up.”  This focus on what’s missing fuels such unhappiness and you begin to feel like your happiness is dependent upon your child hitting these insignificant listed goals.

Son-Rise taught us differently.  By bringing gratitude to the forefront of our experiences, we no longer need to wait for a positive experience to happen in order to feel grateful.  We are able to feel joy and happiness in every moment with our child and can enjoy each and every challenge that our child meets without worrying if he’ll measure up to his peers.

I have personally become grateful for my son’s autism.  His disability has been my biggest inspiration to grow as a person and I feel more complete and intact because of it.  He has given me the opportunity to see life from an entirely different point of view and to appreciate the beauty of true humanness.  I have learned that each person is unique and of sacred value.   This has taught me to unconditionally love not only those around me but myself as well.  None of us measure up to something in our heads and taking that measurement out of the picture has opened up more opportunities for my son and our family to grow in ways that I never could’ve imagined.  The most important development has been that Lucas is truly happy.  He has a smile on his face most of the time.  He has also tremendously grown physically, cognitively, socially and emotionally.

We have also learned the value of seeing an opportunity in what may seem like a challenge.  Being especially grateful in these moments stretches, changes and allows us to grow.  For example, my thoughts have become something like the following:

-Lucas is throwing a fit….Great, I love that he’s trying to communicate with me!  What an opportunity to help him communicate more effectively!

-He keeps taking his coat off.  Wow!  Look at those self help skills.  A month ago he didn’t have the dexterity to undress himself!

-He is button-pushing.  Wow!  Look at how intelligent he is that he is testing ways on how to get what he wants!

It really is that simple…..when you practice gratitude in everything you encounter, you embrace happiness!

On the note of gratitude, I am grateful for all those who follow our journey with our sweet boy.  I am also so unbelievably grateful for all the beautiful people we have been blessed to get to know because of Lucas and Son-Rise, most importantly our volunteers.  Here is a sweet moment of Lucas asking our volunteer to sit with him.  A year ago, true communication was rare and infrequent.   He didn’t contribute much to any interaction physically or verbally.  Luke also rarely allowed someone to be near him.  We are thankful for our volunteers’ commitment to our son.  They have given us so many of the special moments I am now able to share with all of you.  So many moments to appreciate and in doing so, our volunteers have in an essence contributed very largely to our happiness!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v2IfWLC3qYo

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Unhappiness does not exist in the present

16/02/09 at 9.55am   /   by sdcarlson   /   0 Comment

Lucas Present

OUR KIDS DON’T NEED OUR WORRY

by Raun K. Kaufman
“A great many of us spend a lot of time and mental energy worrying about our kids with ‪autism‬. Certainly, given all the messages we receive about our children’s supposedly doomed or difficult future, no one could fault us for our apprehension.
In The ‪‎SonRiseProgram‬, we focus a lot on the emotions and attitudes of the parents because they bring something truly special and valuable to their children’s treatment. And because, over and over again, we see that when the parents change and grow, their kids change and grow.
One of the things many parents that I’ve worked with have told me is that they worry so much because it keeps them alert and motivated to do everything in their power to avoid a future they don’t want for their special children. In practice, though, I see worry distract us from helping our kids in the here and now – and make us far less appealing to the very children we are endeavoring to entice into our world.
If there is one thing (among many!) that I’ve learned from the parents I’ve worked with, it’s this:
If you want to take care of your child’s future, take care of your child’s present. (That requires actually BEING present.)”

 

Learning to be present, not just in the playroom, but in life has been a lesson from Lucas and this program that has opened me up to so much happiness and gratitude.  Unhappiness does not exist in the present.  It only exists when you are reflecting or regretting about something in the past or worrying about something in the future.  Bears Kaufman included a quote referencing a picture of an old man in his book, Happiness is a Choice,  that I will never forget.  The quote is, “I have worried about many things in my life….most of which never happened.”  I can totally relate to this quote, and still consistently have to remind myself to remain in the present.

Many times I will look up at the sky, take a deep breath and take in all that is around me.  This practice always thwarts me into the present and allows me to take in the beauty of the life around me and to be amazed.  We tend to be so scheduled these days that being present seems impossible and we also seem to have more unhappy people as a result.  Unhappiness cannot happen if we truly stay in the moment.

Really, truly being present with Lucas in the playroom has given so much insight as to who he is and to understand him.  I believe this is one of the reasons, he is relating to me and all of the beautiful people in our Son-Rise program.  There are so many exciting things happening right now for Lucas.  He is really engaging in imaginative play and his sense of humor is exploding.  He is loving making us laugh and the quality of his interactions with us is beyond what my imagination could even hold when I started this program a little over a year ago.

This video is seriously hilarious.  Lucas is instigating a reaction out of our volunteer but in such a playful manner.  He is showing that he wants to be funny and that he is relating to us as much as we are to him.  Enjoy!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BMotNUd2Xdw

 

 

Love and Acceptance is the Foundation

16/02/02 at 2.27pm   /   by sdcarlson   /   0 Comment

blog pic

 

The attitude of love and acceptance is the foundation upon which all interactions are built.

When Lucas was diagnosed with autism 4 years ago, we were inevitably set on a path for change.  I remember initially uttering the word recovery and being given the response, “You will never be able to change him, no matter what you do.”  I felt so unbelievably hurt by that remark.  After all I loved my son.  He was the same little boy to me before his diagnosis as he was after.  I just knew he was struggling and wanted to find a way to give him what he needed to grow, relate, love and yes, recover.  I would love him, as all parents do, no matter the outcome.  It was never about changing him.  It was about not limiting him.  It was as if after the diagnosis was given, he was looked at differently by anybody he knew and so came the  list of things I was told he would most likely never do.

Even though the idea of recovery seems silly and unrealistic to many, we believed that we had to give our son every chance to become who he is intended to be just as you would with any other child.  We had to try.  Through our journey with Lucas, he has taught us so many valuable lessons.  One of the biggest was to be open-heartedly accepting and loving of not only who he was,  but to also embrace his entire being.

My son’s behaviors are looked at by the outside as weird or many times inappropriate.  Through Son-Rise, we learned the value of joining him in these “behaviors” to show him our love, respect and acceptance of him as well as to understand him.  The amazing thing is that by jumping feet first into this world of his, we have found so much fun, exhilaration and ultimately we found so much in ourselves in the process.  We have in turn learned to love our own idiosyncrasies, bizarre tendancies and quirkyness, and it has allowed us to live a more fulfilling, happy life as a result.  So, it feels true to say that our son has taught us more about life than I think we will ever be able to teach him.

So we don’t just join Lucas in the playroom.   I have to share one story of the many escapades in joining Lucas out in public.  My husband, daughter, Lucas and I went to Staples to make copies one day. Brad is at the desk paying and picking the copies up.  My son began running back and forth aimlessly, shaking his chew tube (sensory toy for chewing) and saying “eeee”  very loudly, very much in his own world.  I turn around to find my daughter instinctively joining him.  So I think,” What the heck.”  I decide to join in.  So here are the three of us doing these bizarre behaviors together, having so much fun in our own “Lucas” world.  My husband just has this huge smile on his face and turns to the clerk, and says, “don’t worry, this is what we do for fun.”  Hah.  I can’t tell you how freeing it is to just let go and not let judgements effect you.  Because in that moment my son felt loved and accepted for who he was.  My daughter is also growing to be such a beautiful, accepting, nonjudgmental individual because of our family’s choice to embrace our children as they are.  And I have truly learned to love myself without fear of judgement.

Anyhow, they say  that it takes a special kind of person to care for a child with special needs.  This statement is completely inaccurate.

The truth is that a child with special needs inspires you to be that special kind of person!

Please enjoy the video below of our volunteer just stepping into Lucas’s world in such a loving, accepting manner.  If there is one thing I think our team can agree on, it’s that spending time with our son in this manner has opened us all up to being more loving and accepting of ourselves and those around us.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_lV4ZIUz59I

 

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