"Selling" mindfulness to teenagers?

[MiM]

Anybody here have any experience in getting teenagers interested in mindfulness? I have two kids that age, that I would like to try to "sell this idea" to. I have found a couple of links on the net (below), that could give a decent starting point, but I still would be much interested in any personal experience (or other additional knowledge) on the subject.

As a parent of two teenagers, I know this is a task to be handled with quite a lot of delicacy. Something your dad has recently started and is very much in to just has to be uncool, doesn't it? Especially if he comes busting in, telling "what a good thing this is, and everybody in the family should..."

http://mindfulnessforteens.com/
http://leftbrainbuddha.com/teaching-min ... s-get-buy/

[JonW]

I'd include a copy of Finding Peace In A Frantic World in their Xmas stockings and leave it to them to get curious about the book.
If anyone had tried to "sell" me the idea of mindfulness when I was a teenager, I'd have run a mile, unfortunately. And so would my kids had I tried when they were teenagers.
Good luck with it!
Jon

[Gareth]

Luckily my boys are very young, so I'm just going to gently introduce them to the ideas as they get older.

I'm hoping that having a dad as a mindfulness geek/devotee will naturally arouse their interest.

The very best thing you can do is embody the practice. Surely they will see the effect that it has on you and your life.

[MiM]

Thank you Jon, if I haven't come any further by xmas, I might do just that.

Gareth, I am rather sure that they have at least felt a difference in me already. But on that path there are quite a few steps to:

- become cognitively aware of the difference
- connect it to my meditation practice
- see that the same thing could benefit them more directly too
- actually take steps to try mindfulness themselves
- find a good way to start
- stay with it long enough to evaluate the effects for themselves

All of those are steps, where a little nudge could be good, but too much of a nudge could work doubly against. So that's part of why I am asking, if anyone here has experience with this.

Your case, with smaller children will certainly be different.

[Mal_Smith]

Depends on the teenager. If they are going through a punk phase get a copy of "Dharma Punx" by Noah Levine, tut tut a lot while reading it, and leave it lying around where they might pick it up. As an appendix, it has the best one page description of meditation on the breath I've ever seen, and the coolest reason for using it. Might just get your teenage rebel started...

[MiM]

Here is a short list of do's and don'ts. Seems mostly like sound advice to me.

http://www.mindful.org/7-tips-for-talki ... -annoying/

[Mal_Smith]

Great item on "Mindfulness in schools" on the Today programme today:

http://mindfulnessinschools.org/