Self-Regulation with Dr. Stuart Shanker

Dr. Dan welcomes international parenting expert and guest Dr. Stuart Shanker.  This is an encouraging discussion about the concept of self-regulation, stress, and Dr. Shanker’s paradigm-shifting new book, SELF-REG: How to Help Your Child (and You) Break the Stress Cycle and Successfully Engage with Life.  Dr. Shanker knows all children are good and reveals to Dr. Dan his revolutionary new understanding of stress and how it affects children’s emotions and behavior, hidden stressors, as well as practical advice for parents to help their kids engage calmly and successfully in learning and life with 5 steps.

Dr. Dan and Dr. Shanker discuss how Self-regulation is the nervous system’s way of managing stress and the fact that before parents can teach their children self-regulation they must master it themselves. The moving discussion highlights the fact that there are no bad kids and that when you see a child differently you see a different child.

Dr. Stuart Shanker is a distinguished research professor of psychology and philosophy at York University and the creator of The MEHRIT Centre. He attended the University of Toronto, where he received his bachelor’s and master’s degrees. At the University of Oxford, he obtained his D. Phil. with distinction in philosophy and his work is used globally.

At the end of the episode Dr. Dan asks Dr. Shanker about his own Parent Footprint moment.  Dr. Shanker tells a moving and personal tale about his own stress as a Dad during a difficult time and reveals how in that moment he realized all parents must learn to forgive themselves and accept their own humanity.