S5E91: Empowering Families with Yolonda Coles Jones

Yolonda Coles Jones, also known as "The Bringer of Calm" and the "Teacher of Thrive", is a Healing, Wellness & Empowerment-Centered Coach and Education Consultant who specializes in coming alongside households--families and individuals--as well as teachers and school systems to support them in deepening into conscious connection with themselves and with those around them. From that place she guides and supports in building confidence, developing clarity, realizing calm and implementing strategies for success. Her trademarked Empowered People formula utilizes a powerfully effective combination of mindful breathing & meditation, conscious communication, somatic (body) awareness, boundary awareness, forgiveness, gratitude, joy and deep self-care all as authentic-to-you and accessible ongoing practices. The scope of her work covers parenting relationships, parent-child/teacher-child dynamics, self-awareness, marriage and long-term partnerships, infidelity, home-based education and self-actualization. Yolonda's Journey Into Life and Learning Yolonda has always been a helper and learner. Supporting people has been her constant path. Yolonda's 4 children have never attended school as of yet. Self directed education is a mainstay for their family. Their goal is to give their kids space to explore and be who they are. Empowering Families- In This Episode In this episode Yolonda shares her journey into being who she is. We also examine what their family life looks like as self-directed learners. Our exploration goes into; Life skills and what that looks like for each child Learning together Having a teenager- Yolonda reminds us to ask the important question as parents- "How much of this is about me and how much of this is about her"? Living into her children's interests Bearing witness to emotions and how to be present with sensitive and highly feeling individuals What Yolonda thought homeschool had to look like Learning how children learn Letting life became the lessons. Changing the ways we see how children learn The partnership of motherhood Support of community and deep self care This is one of my favourite quotes from Yolonda- "Home is the base for education and education happens everywhere. If the script is not working, you can through it out...We can take what relates, what's relevant, what gets us to our goals, what lights this child up, what lights us all up together and we can also learn in our living." This interview with Yolonda is extremely empowering for the parent that may be facing doubts or challenges and for veteran homeschooling parents that just need a few reminders to pause, get back to our why and surrender into re-imagining. Resources If you would like to connect with Yolonda and learn more about the work she does supporting families you can find her: https://www.yolondajonescreative.com/ Yolonda Coles Jones Instagram Empowered Families Life As We Design It- Yolonda's Book Yolonda mentioned Outschool as a platform that her children use. Find out more about Outschool here. I first learned of Yolonda through Fare of The Free Child Podcast. I also had the opportunity to interview Akilah S Richards, creator and host of Fare Of The Free Child http://imhomeschooling.com/educational-freedom-akilah-richards Other ways to help support the podcast? Become a patron~ https://www.patreon.com/honeyimhomeschoolingthekids See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.