I'm Jill Stansbury.

An Educator and Lifelong Student

I have worked as a classroom teacher and school administrator in programs serving preschool to high school students for over twenty-five years. For the last thirteen, I have been a trainer for the Positive Discipline Association, sharing tools with parents and teachers to teach young people lifelong skills for use in homes and classrooms.

I have been studying in spiritual traditions centered around meditation for the last 25 years, with Hindu and Buddhist teachers, as well as at the non-religious Mindfulness Center at Brown University. There I have earned recognition as a Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction Program facilitator and learned about scientifically-based ways to teach others to skillfully relate to their lives in order to transform the way they relate with discomfort, difficulty, despair, and joy.

For most of my career, I have worked in American and Chinese schools as a teacher, school administrator, and most recently an Early Childhood Social and Emotional Learning Specialist. In that work, I have always sought to help young people and their families look at their strengths and learn additional tools to increase their wellness. I want to continue to share that perspective with as many people, educators and parents as possible so that the world becomes a healthier place that welcomes and cares for us all.

You may wonder...

"Why this work?"

I grew up in a time where many people were not conscious about their emotional lives and the impact that had on their social lives. Anytime I met someone who was able to talk about these things on the conscious level, I wanted to know everything they could teach me. I have been lucky to have had many teachers in this area in my life.

 As I progressed down this learning path, I became fascinated with the ways that people do and do not communicate and how that is influenced by the human brain. Positive Discipline and Mindfulness together have provided me with what I consider to be the owner’s manual to my brain, and I love sharing that with others because it has provided me with so much freedom in the face of the challenges and difficulty that life sometimes sends my way. Mental freedom, what some teachers refer to as liberation, is something I hold in great esteem in this life. I feel like it is one of my greatest treasures, and I want to share it with others.

Liberation in Families, Schools and Other Work Places

The World is Changing...

...the way that it always does. This particular moment calls for us to come together and shift our mindsets to create communities that have the communication skills and capacity to really look at the structures societies have created that cause and sustain harm. These structures are learned in our homes and reinforced in schools and workplaces. Practicing openness, honesty and heartfelt communication in these spaces and places has the capacity to move us in the direction of a world that works for all. There is enough for everyone to get their needs met and thrive.