Review: Just Breathe: Meditation, Mindfulness, Movement, and More

Just Breathe: Meditation, Mindfulness, Movement, and More by Mallika Chopra
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

As an only child I can sing the praises of quiet, quiet time and stillness, but these days, even for many singleton children quiet, stillness, and time to recenter can be a challenge. Modern life is filled with so much stimulatory information for children. For an anxious child, this can spell overstimulation and thus greater stress. Just Breathe provides kids (and their parents!) with an arsenal of methods to learn to slow down, take time to breathe and move and think mindfully. While the publisher designates this as targeting middle-grade kids (and indeed this is a perfect age to present children with the idea of mindfulness and taking time), the book is equally appropriate for high school students who face just as much stress as they forge a path toward adulthood and college.

Divided into sections titled Breathe, Move, Be Silent, Notice, Ask Questions and Create, Just Breathe gives the young reader many ways to achieve more inner peace and mindfulness. Sitting still is often quite hard for children in this age range, so the ideas of moving meditation are invaluable to help children learn to find internal focus even when they have to move. Chopra offers a prompt and instructions for each meditative activity and suggestions about where and how you should engage in that process. She also talks in a general way about the link between your mind and your body. Finding inner peace can only do a body good.

This is a useful book for parents of children with anxiety, but I can also see its benefit for parents of children with developmental issues, sensory integration problems, and other physical challenges. Sometimes reminding a child to s l o w down and breathe is one of the best ways to achieve a happier life with relaxation.

I received a Digital Review Copy of this book from Running Press Kids/Hachette and NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review.



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