This video was produced by Dr. Diana Coholic.

HERE’S HOW THE CREATORS DESCRIBE THIS VIDEO:

Mindfulness is often understood as activity that encourages awareness to emerge through paying attention – on purpose, in the present moment, and non-judgmentally – to the unfolding of experience, moment by moment. Despite the challenges that vulnerable young people can experience, they can benefit from learning about mindfulness if these methods are facilitated in engaging and strengths-based ways that meet their needs and promote and foster success.

While vulnerable youth are a diverse group, they often lack many of the characteristics of resilient youth, such as positive self-concept/esteem, self-awareness, hopefulness/optimism, emotional expression, emotional management in stressful situations, and interpersonal problem-solving skills. Accordingly, the Holistic Arts-Based Program aims to build various aspects of resilience, such as self-awareness, social and problem-solving skills, emotional understanding and regulation, self-compassion and empathy, and the ability to pay attention and focus, within a context that is strengths-based and responsive to the children’s needs.

In this short film, one of the participants in our arts-based mindfulness group program describes the group program and talks about her experiences.