The Power of Your Child's Imagination: How to Transform Stress and Anxiety into Joy and Success

Outstanding!

Adults often forget that children experience tremendous anxiety. They are beginning to absorb everything going on around them and starting to understand that loss and death are part of life. They're also developing expectations for themselves, personally or academically, and worrying that they don't measure up. The Power of Your Child's Imagination offers strategies for helping kids use their own inner strength to cope with stress. I think other parents, especially those who - like me - have sensitive, intense kids, will find this book to be a gem.

Dr. Reznick points out that each of us, including young children, has an internal compass that seems to know more than we do. She offers imagination techniques we can teach our children to help them tap into that internal wisdom.

In the first section, she starts by suggesting simple ways we can encourage our children to use their imagination to "see" things in their minds and envision their lives changing for the better. She offers tips for setting goals with our kids. Sometimes they don't share our goals for them, so it's important to find common ground. Then she describes nine guided imagery tools to use with children. Some of these strategies draw on the power of archetypes, like a wise wizard, that have deep roots in our psyche. For each tool, she provides a script, possible variations, a real-life example of the technique in action, and troubleshooting tips. She corroborates these techniques with evidence from neurological and physiological research. She also explores ways to incorporate art and music, and she encourages parents to mix and match these methods to fit our children's individual needs.

In the second section, she discusses how to apply the nine tools in more depth, using brief case studies. She offers guidance on molding these tools to address specific issues, such helping a child with low self esteem, building an appropriate sense of responsibility, and coping with fear of abandonment or death. She delves into sleep problems and bed wetting. She addresses aggressive behavior, sibling rivalry, and peer issues. She also looks at helping kids with academic problems, whether they stem from learning disabilities or an environment that does fit a child's developmental needs and learning style.

As an educator-type, I appreciated her thoughts on learning issues. Some of you know that I'm a bit of an evangelist for delayed academics and honoring children's developmental needs and learning styles. This is one of the reasons we homeschool. Dr. Reznick touches on the fact that many children are academically pushed much too early and that traditional classroom methods don't fit some students.

One of the things I appreciated most about this book was Dr. Reznick's warm, empathetic attitude toward parents and her acknowledgment that no "expert" can offer a "perfect" way to parent. "Caring parents . want to get it "right" But there is no such animal. Not here." She also acknowledges that we have regrets as parents, and urges us to have compassion for ourselves.

This fits well with her articulate, approachable writing style. While there is some scholarly information woven into this book, it flows smoothly and is easy to read. It's like sitting down with a compassionate friend - the type of person who has a lot of positive energy and intuitive wisdom - and having a chat over coffee.

I recommend this book to parents, teachers, counselors, and other caregivers and to any a

An Essential Book for Every Parent!

Dr. Reznick provides a great easy reference to help parents empower their kids by helping them to tap into their own internal resources. As a mom of two and an advocate for the holistic health of children, I can't say enough about the wealth of information that is shared in "The Power of Your Child's Imagination from two decades of Dr. Resnick's research and work with children. Parents can find easy reference to help their children with stress, anger, sleep problems, anxiety or fears in this step-by-step guide. This is a must for every parent's book shelf!

Mindy Kubrin, LCSW

I thoroughly enjoyed Dr. Reznick's book. As a mother of four young children, and a Clinical Social Worker, I would highly recommend this book to both my peers and colleagues. I especially found the book to be user friendly, and easy to identify techniques that are child/teen specific. I found Dr. Reznick's writing style to be very personable and captivating, and this made the book both informative and enjoyable to read.

Power in the Mind

Remember when you use to lay out on the grass and guess what the clouds looked like?
Or that any ol' stick would become a rifle for a wild game of cowboys and Indians?
And how about what fantastic food we were making while doing mud pies?

Yes, a child's imagination can be a wondrous place. There dwells the closet monster and the space heroes of this world. But in a child's imagination lies a great tool. One that can help transform stress and anxiety into joy and success. That is what Charlotte Reznick, PhD is showing us how to do with her book "The Power of Your Child's Imagination".

Here we learn what tools to use and how to use them to help guide our children into a world without phobias, social anxiety and how to cope with losses and hurt, frustration and anger. I know that College Girl had many sleepless nights when she could not stop bed-wetting. The worry and fear would become overwhelming to her. Here Charlotte gives us tools to help our child with this all too common issue.

I am glad to see more and more literature coming out to help today's parents. Life is becoming more stressful and going faster every day. That means our children are dealing with life's lil problems at earlier ages. How we help them cope during these times form their skills as adults. I would suggest that you might also want to read "The Power of Your Child's Imagination" as a guide for your family.

Helpful and Easy-to-Apply Methods

Dr. Reznick's book is much easier to utilize and much more likely to work with our children than most other books on the topic. That's because she explains and demonstrates each tool in a way that parents can try it with their kids and with themselves during stressful moments. This approach works wonders with kids who are intense, creative, moody, or impulsive and as I found with my son it also gives them a sense of control and self-mastery that most other methods fail to do.

This book is a must for parents!

Dr. Charlotte Reznick's book, The Power of Your Child's Imagination is a must-have for parents.

Dr. Reznick presents 9 tools for tapping into your child's imagination, an innate internal resource so easily accessible to children to help them solve common problems such as bed-wetting, school and social troubles, separation anxiety, difficulties with sleeping and with negative feelings, among others. She presents cases illustrating the application of these tools and then provides a step-by-step "how-to" outline for applicaton of these tools to manage that specific type of problem

It is useful and FUN!

I look forward to using them preventatively with my daughter. I aim to have them available for my younger clients in my psychotherapy practices as well.

Guided imagery and play have been long-standing therapeutic tools to promote healthy mindedness. Here is an opportunity to teach and empower your children, promoting a lifetime of healthier means of coping with problems life brings.

No text was provided for this review.

No text was provided for this review.

No text was provided for this review.