Diki

I became a bronze donator yesterday. Do I need to email Mike about changing my forum access or will it come in time?

Sorry, I've just seen this now. I sent you a PM a couple of hours ago regarding those points. Let me know if you want to chat about it sometime!

Great post and great idea. I don't know whether I'd be of any use to you, but feel free to hit me up if you think I could be. I am a business owner in Japan. I'm from the UK originally so I have experience setting up a business in a foreign country. My company is a private English learning centre catering to students of all ages from babies to retirees. It's a small business, I employ 2 foreign teachers (excluding myself) and 2 Japanese staff. I have built the business from the ground up and we now have over 250 students per week. We are set to celebrate our 8th anniversary in December.

Great topic! Brucethecollie - be sure to keep us posted on how it's going! When my mother was visiting last year she told me off in front of my kids becuase my 4-year-old son and I were trying to figure out who had farted. "We don't use that word" she said, "We say 'pop off'"

Thanks. I think what I've noticed is the callers sometimes not being able to grasp certain principals universally. They're ok with them to a certain point, but then once they are applied to the caller's personal circumstance or opinion Stef encouters push back. Watching your video, something suddenly clicked for me - that the callers are focusing on the conclusions and not the principals. I hope that makes sense.

I'm pretty new around here and that's the first content of yours I've ever seen. Well done, sir. It was a great watch and you make an excellent point that I have often noticed during Stefan's call in show, but had never been able to put my finger on before!

Just to leap in a little bit late on this, I'm also an ESL teacher and I often notice kids focusing their gaze on my mouth as I speak to them. Maybe I have a weird mouth..... Anyway with regards to learning a second language, I agree with J-William. Immersion is the key. Get yourself speaking with native speakers as often as you can. And if you're speaking with them in an informal setting make sure you ask them not to be shy about recognising that you're trying to learn the language and that you'd appreciate them helping you out and offering corrections and feedback when necessary. It can be frustrating for me even now when I'm struggling to find a certain word in Japanese and the person I'm speaking to is too shy/polite to help me out.

Has anyone ever done therapy over skype? If so, I'd love some feedback on how it compares to face to face and how to spot the genuine therapists from the chancers. I live in Japan - in a small town in the countryside in Japan. There is no chance I'm finding an English speaking therapist close to me and although I have been to a few sessions in Japanese, I really need to deal with this in English.

Done. Thank you!!

Hi, welome to the forum. I'm an ex-pat now, but I doubt there is an FDR Japan group so do you guys think it would be a problem if I joined the UK facebook group above?

A spontaneous game developed between me and my son recently where we try to name all the animals that must have been on Noah's ark (I'm not sure why, but he talks about that story a lot). It starts off with my son coming to me and saying "Noah must have had 2 Rhinos" (for example) and we then take turns to name pairs of animals, every so often I ask him to guess how big the ark must be at this point - this is the part he really likes because he gets to use his imagination - "The size of my school", "The size of a jumbo jet", "The size of the moon" etc.

GA_Freeman - What a powerful story. I'm glad you were able to work through it and have a stronger relationship with your sons. I'd like to share a little story about the first time I saw peaceful parenting really take effect in our house. This was all before I had ever heard of FDR and the term peaceful parenting. My son was 3 (perhaps 4) and my wife and I had been discussing our parenting approach as we weren't convinced we were doing well. Our son was stubborn, easy to anger and seemed unresponsive to negotiations. One day I took him to the toilet and after he finished he took a lot of toilet paper off the roll to wipe with (He'd only done a pee). I remember quashing my initial anger and instead asked him why he had used so much paper. He said he didn't know why. We ended up having a long chat about how toilet paper is made from wood, which comes from trees and they spend many years growing etc. He was genuinly interested and seemed to have a good grasp (for a 3 year old) of the concept that wasting paper was also wasting trees. After the chat, I asked him how much toilet paper he thinks he needs to use after doing a pee and he decided that one sheet would probably be enough. A couple of days later he was in there on his own and I snuck up to check on him. He pulled off loads of toilet paper and then I heard him say quietly to himself "ah, it's (inaudible)" - he then proceeded to wind all the toilet paper back up onto the roll and neatly took off one little sheet. I had this surge of pride run through me. It was such a small event, such a miniscule moment in his life, but for me it was huge. This was the moment that I knew if I put the work in and explained things to him calmly and clearly and in an engaging way that he would respond with interest and maturity. From then on, I've tried to remember that story when parenting poses challenges and when I finally got introduced to FDR and started listening to the Peaceful Parenting discussions it all clicked into place.

Hi Luxfelix, I originally came over to teach English with the intention of staying for a year and then returning home.... 9 years later, I'm still here and this is my home now! Give me a shout if you do decide to apply for jobs in Japan and want to discuss it with someone who lives here. I'd be happy to help in anyway I can.

Thank you for the warm welcome. I own an English conversation school and international preschool over here. Where abouts in Japan have you traveled to? I certainly find living in Japan to be preferable and am happy to raise my kids here. Although, as you say, there are pros and cons to the social and cultural norms over here. Was there a particular aspect of Japanese society you wanted to discuss?

Hello, I'm Diki. I'm a Brit, now residing in Japan. I'm a peaceful father of 2 small children, devoted husband and a small business owner. I was introduced to FDR by a friend about a year ago and have been hooked to the podcasts ever since. I finally decided to give the forum a try. I find I have limited opportunity to discuss some of the show's content in my real life so am hoping to get involved here as much as time permits. I can't wait to get started!!