I’m Emma and I support children, young people, adults and families to develop healthier mindsets with support, guidance and encouragement.

I know first-hand how isolating it can feel when you or anyone in your family are struggling. It can feel as though there’s no way through and we can become disempowered and despondent. As humans, our brains have a natural negative bias – so in simple words we’re hard wired to think the worst. Nobody tells us that we can do something about this and that we don’t need to stay feeling stuck.

And this is where and how I can help. With empathy, experience, knowledge and a whole lot of heart (I am a self-confessed softie) I can share ways to create new healthier habits. I can provide you with the know-how to see situations differently and the skills to become unstuck.

Looking back to around 16 years ago, my first real interest in the impact of our mindset on our approach to the way our lives are shaped began. At this time, I was working as a post-16 teacher which led me to teach in a variety of settings including Community ESOL, Community Family Learning and Community Adult learning. I also delivered Functional Skills courses in English and Maths and started to become aware of the significant link between mindset and feelings of success. Many of the adult learners I was lucky to work with hadn’t had positive experiences of education and this at times seemed to be like a heavy load to bring in to each lesson. I admired that in spite of this that they had chosen to return to education, this time on their terms and with the aim of raising their aspirations. Over time with commitment on their part, they experienced feelings of success. Their loads became lighter with each of these wins and learning became less of a battle for them.

I then went on to teach in both Primary and Secondary schools, and I became more aware of the challenges so many children and young people were facing. The negative self-talk and limiting self-belief were like mountain-sized barriers to them being happy and relaxed in their learning environment.

At around the same time, my eldest Son started Primary School and he soon started to experience difficulties within the school system. School didn’t feel ‘safe’ to him and he would become distressed on mornings knowing he had to attend and then would return at the end of the day exhausted, defeated and low in mood. I looked for ways to support his mental health and we began to listen to guided meditations from Relax Kids. He responded to these and would visibly calm and relax and they soon became part of our everyday life.

My second Son then started school and also showed signs of struggling. He too responded well to the calming meditations, and I started to explore ways for both boys to self-soothe and self-regulate.

Because of my experiences with my own children, who by this time were diagnosed as Neurodiverse, and from my teaching and observations of other children, I realised how interlinked a feeling of being calm and safe is with progress and attainment in a learning environment. I decided to train to become a Relax Kids Coach to run alongside my teaching business and to help me to better support my own children and those I was working with.

When I started to deliver emotional well-being classes to children in school as a Relax Kids Coach, I witnessed first-hand how responsive even the hardest to reach children were to learning calming techniques to shrink overwhelming feelings. Through discussions in sessions, I taught the children about how their brain responds to feeling scared and gave them tools to help them to self-soothe. The children began to improve their emotional literacy from talking and sharing and developed greater emotional intelligence and self-compassion from the activities in sessions.

I continued to study and broaden my knowledge and became a Mindfulness Practitioner as well as undertaking many other training courses around the topic of mental health and emotional well-being. I used my experience from teaching in the community and began to deliver Just Relax courses designed for adults. The sessions were designed to share techniques to improve the knowledge and self-awareness of those attending, to have open conversations, to unwind and relax away from the stresses of everyday life.

My work in emotional well-being became my absolute passion and I decided to step away from teaching and concentrate fully on emotional well-being coaching. I worked in many schools delivering weekly wellbeing sessions and continued to hear from staff and from the children how they used the strategies to help them manage their ‘big feelings’, helping them to make better choices and to ultimately feel happier more often. I also delivered (and still do) training to staff in schools to help them to understand the link between emotional well-being and learning and shared ways to incorporate techniques into their classrooms. Staff soon wanted sessions for themselves, and I delivered staff well-being courses which enabled them to learn skills to deal with the stress and pressure of their jobs and of course of their everyday lives too.

Since this time, I’ve continued to broaden my knowledge and work within schools, organisations and within the community too – delivering emotional well-being sessions. I also work closely with children, young adults and their families in their homes and online, delivering bespoke sessions to support issues such as emotional based school anxiety, sleep issues, lack of confidence, angry outbursts etc.

I believe that my own experiences with my boys, my teaching background and my community work have all led me down the very bumpy and extremely unpredictable path to where I am today. My boys are my biggest teachers – their challenges (which I wish they never have to face) and our family’s tricky times allow me to put the tools, techniques and tips I share in to practice. It isn’t always pretty or easy. However, I have two emotionally intelligent children who are self-aware enough to be able to take action whenever they’re feeling wobbly.

So in essence, I’m a big softie, or perhaps the better description would be empath. My husband says I have a sixth sense and seem

able to tune in to other’s feelings. I’m the one who is the listener of problems and the giver of advice. My friends always say ‘What Would Emma Do?’ when there’s a problem to solve! I do need to point out here, that this does not mean I have my own life all figured out, I am not Zen-like and I am not permanently ‘living my best life’ (I really dislike that phrase) and I definitely don’t have a bluebird tweeting on my shoulder as I go about my day!

I am me, I’m a great listener and work hard to be non-judgemental and open. 

 I’m not a fan of heaping unrealistic expectations on to people – none of us need added pressure – my pace is your pace. 

I’m all about championing the people I work with and helping them see their strengths.

I love my family, my dog and my friends. I enjoy cooking and eating. I love being outdoors too. I’m at a bit of a pivotal point in my life where I’m looking forward to rediscovering things I used to enjoy (before life became so hectic) and open to new possibilities too. 

 As I said before, I’m not the finished article, I believe we’re all works in progress.

Emma x

From working with families in their homes, to delivering well being days in local schools to buying one of my courses there are lots of ways to get my advice and support.

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