Mark Bertin, MD and Your Child’s Resilience and Independence

I’m so excited about this year’s Change for Good Summit: Building Resilience in Anxious Times. In case you don't know about our summit--it's free and online so you can access it in your own time and space. This year it focuses on anxiety. Grace and I have been interviewing some really amazing people who have some really amazing information and insights to share and I can’t wait for you to get your hands on all of it!

My interview with Mark Bertin, MD has really been sticking in my mind and I’d like to tell you why. If you have kids, work with kids, or ever where a kid, you need to hear what this guy has to say.

I love hearing the stories of other physicians who, starting from a strong background in science and conventional medicine, have had the intellectual curiosity to explore ideas and modalities that are not generally included in the purview of conventional medicine and, finding them beneficial, have also had the courage to bring these ideas and modalities to their practices.

Dr. Bertin is a neurodevelopmental pediatrician (meaning he specializes in children’s developmental issues, such as learning problems, ADD/ADHD, and autism spectrum disorders) who has integrated mindfulness concepts into his practice, when families are open to them.

Dr. Bertin started studying and practicing mindfulness for himself. After personally experiencing its amazing benefits, and, as more and more studies proved its effectiveness, started offering mindfulness ideas and practices to his patients. He has written four books so far: How Children Thrive: The Practical Science of Raising Independent, Resilient, and Happy Kids; Mindful Parenting for ADHD; The Family ADHD Solution; and co-authored Teaching Mindfulness Skills to Kids and Teens.

I also really like ideas that simplify complex topics and/or bring together and show the commonality of seemingly disparate concepts, like how the Vedic model of a human integrates all the practices in body, mind, and energy medicines, or how consulting with your inner wisdom simplifies choosing the right way to eat, exercise, or treat your illness. Dr. Bertin points out another such idea that simplifies parenting and unifies many ideas in child behavior and development: Executive Function.

If you haven’t heard of executive function before or are not quite sure what it is, Dr. Bertin explains it very well:  “In essence, executive function’s job is to integrate what we encounter in life with what we know and then decide how to respond.” Excellent executive function has been correlated with improved health, wealth, happiness and success. And, just like you can do exercises to build your biceps, you can do exercises to build your (and your child’s) executive function.

Executive function can be thought of as your inner manager. It helps you manage your

·         Attention: focusing when needed, shifting when needed

·         Actions: self-control and learn from mistakes

·         Tasks: helping you organize, plan, prioritize, and manage your time

·         Information: your ability to organize, remember, and retrieve it

·         Emotions: your ability to experience them without necessarily acting on them and

·         Efforts: helping you persevere, sustain, and work efficiently.

I hope you can join us in the summit and hear what Dr. Bertin has to say about how to de-stress your parenting while improving your child’s resilience, independence…and chances for a happy, successful life. Invite your family, friends, teachers…anyone you know who has or works with children. The Summit airs in late November. Watch for the registration email in your inbox come mid-November.