PPP241: Raising EQ Kids with The Musician’s Coach, Jodie Jensen

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Jodie Jensen is a life coach who has taught piano lessons for almost 20 years. After studying sociology, international development, and music at Brigham Young University, she worked in a non-profit in West Africa, teaching people skills for success and self-reliance. As a mother of five, she has brought her two passions together to create resources to help young musicians to find more success in their studies.

How often are you emotionally triggered by an emotional response from your child? On today’s show, Jodie Jensen will help us gain a greater understanding of our own emotional intelligence so we can help our piano kids mature their emotional intelligence.

Listen to the full episode here

What is EQ?

EQ refers to Emotional Intelligence. Here is a quote from the forward of “Emotional Intelligence 2.0” by Dr. Travis Bradberry and Jean Greaves

“Not education. Not experience. Not knowledge or intellectual horsepower. None of these serve as an adequate predictor as to why one person succeeds and another doesn’t. There is something else going on that society doesn’t seem to account for. … The answer almost always has to do with this concept called emotional intelligence.”

Emotional Intelligence was pioneered by Daniel Goleman in the 90’s and breaks down into four main quadrants: self-awareness, self-regulation, social awareness, social regulation.

Self-awareness has to do with our current mindset and how we got there.

Self-regulation or self-control interrupts your emotional response when things don’t go the way you want them to. With limited or immature self-regulation, we are easily derailed and guided by our emotions rather than reason and rationale. We experience things emotionally first before we experience them rationally. Children, especially so, because their emotions are fully developed well before their brain is.

Social awareness is the ability to empathize with other people and recognize their responses to situations.

Social regulation or relationship management is the ability to network and find common ground with others.

Why do you think it is important to help children cultivate a strong emotional intelligence, especially in piano lessons?

Without emotional intelligence, your child is not going to succeed at the piano. If your child is easily derailed by the frustration of learning to play a new piece of music, their emotional reaction will not let them get to the rational, thinking part of their brain.

Here are some tips to help: Notice when the upset happens. Help your child notice they are feeling overwhelmed by a tricky passage. Jodie says, “Name it to tame it.” Identify the feeling. This engages the prefrontal cortex and helps bypass the derailed emotion. Parents need to notice their own upset. View piano practice as your own home laboratory and approach it with curiosity. Rather than responding to an emotional outburst with our own emotions, recognize the physical changes that happen in your child’s body. That feeling of overwhelm is met with increased heart rate, less oxygen to the brain, and impulses of fight or flight. If we can take a step back and view the situation with this understanding, we will be able to respond to our child more rationally. “Intelligence and reason can come to nothing when the emotions hold sway.” Daniel Goleman. Blow out birthday candles – a short inhale and longer exhale activates the parasympathetic nervous system, which is in charge of calming us down. This action reassures your brain, and your body, that you are safe. Your emotions can ease up and you can then move to your rational brain to solve the real issue at hand. Dragon breath – make a dragon snout with an empty toilet paper roll with tissue googlie eyes and paper streamers on one end. Have your child blow in the other end enough to make the streamers move like a fire-breathing dragon. Breathing in Time – set your metronome to 100 pbm. You and your piano kid breathe in for 4 counts and breathe out for 4 counts a few times. You might alter the timing to 2 counts for each breath. The breath is at the center of self-regulation. Parents, remember step 1 – you don’t get triggered, step 2 – get your piano kid’s prefrontal cortex back online through one of the suggestions above and a multitude of others. Another important aspect is to give your child space. Allow them to feel the frustration and learn how to stop their own emotional reaction. Once the dust settles, you can both talk about how they’re feeling and find a better solution. “Helping people to learn how to figure things out on their own is one of the most powerful gifts you can give them. Give your children the gift of self-regulation.” Dr. Becky Bailey uses an acronym DNA for parents and teachers working with children in an emotional state:

D – Describe what you’re seeing

N – Name it

A – Acknowledge it

A parent or teacher might say, “I noticed that your hands tensed up and your fingers didn’t move the way you wanted them to. It seems like that might have made you a little frustrated. Is that right?” You’re not labeling the child with a negative emotion or as being bad for feeling what they are feeling. You’re identifying the emotion – naming it, so you can tame it and move on. Another tip can be borrowed from the U.S. Navy SEALS called boxed breathing. Imagine a box with four equal sides. Each side of the box is for breathing in or out or holding your breath. Breathe in for four counts. Hold it for four counts. Exhale for four counts. Hold it for four counts. Repeat the cycle until you feel yourself calming down. Cognitive reframing – turn something, like practicing piano or doing homework, into a game or a joke. Make the “job” feel good. If it doesn’t feel good, kids don’t want to do it.

Would you tell us more about your book and how we can get it?

The working title is, “Everything I Need to Know in Life I Learned in Piano Lessons”. If you would like to be part of Jodie’s beta testing team for her new book, please complete this online application.

Click here to join Jodie’s beta team.

Jodie created a poster just for PiPaPod listeners with “My Piano KEYS to Success”.

Click here for the free poster.

Connect with Jodie

Raising EQ Kids website

On Instagram @raising_eq_kids and @the_musicians_coach

Jodie’s first book, “Teach Your Kids Emotional Intelligence (without losing your own)” is available here.