Anisa Lewis - Positive Parenting Coach

Anisa Lewis - Positive Parenting Coach Anisa is a Positive Parenting Coach who empowers parents by giving them skills and know how to raise happy and confident kids no matter what the challenge.

Serving Parents the world over. Passionate about parenting, education and life. Mum, wife and all round positive person. Helping parents make sense of it all via Parent Coaching and Mentoring. You are welcome to visit my blog at www.anisalewis.com where I muse about parenting, ideas to make your parenting life easier and how what I do can help you and your family.

What do you want to be known for?It's a question I've been thinking about a lot recently, because being good at what you...
16/09/2026

What do you want to be known for?

It's a question I've been thinking about a lot recently, because being good at what you do and being known for what you do aren't necessarily the same thing.

You can have years of experience, brilliant ideas and something genuinely valuable to contribute, but if nobody really knows that's what you do, what you think or what you stand for, it can be very difficult for the right opportunities to find you.

And I'm not just talking about posting more on social media or building a personal brand.

I'm talking about becoming clearer about what you want to be known for and then thinking about how you communicate that. In conversations, in meetings, within your organisation, through the work you put out into the world and, yes, sometimes on social media too.

This is what we'll be exploring at Be The Leader on 22nd October.

I'll be joined by Lisa Bean, and I'm really pleased that Sophie Ozbek, Social Media Executive & Community Manager, and Chris Howard, Content and Media Manager, will be joining us for our panel conversation. Between us, we'll be looking at what it actually takes to communicate your ideas, expertise and experience so that other people understand the value you bring.

Be The Leader isn't just for business owners, and you don't need to have 'leader' written anywhere in your job title. It's for people who want to have more impact in their career, their business or the work they do every day.

If you've been quietly thinking, I know I have more to contribute, this might be the morning you need.

Be The Leader
Thursday 22nd October, 9.30am to 12.30pm
The Devonshire Arms, Bolton Abbey, North Yorkshire
£65

Book your place here: https://anisalewis.as.me/betheleader

I'd love to see you there.

15/09/2026

It's very easy to see a child not doing what we've asked and assume they are choosing not to cooperate. That assumption matters because it affects what we do next. If I think my child won't do something, I'm much more likely to push harder, repeat myself or become frustrated.
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Curiosity opens up other possibilities. What is getting in the way? What might be making this harder than I expected? Does my child need something different from me in order to move forward?
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The expectation doesn't necessarily need to disappear. We are simply responding to the child in front of us rather than reacting to the behaviour we can see. Sometimes that small shift is enough to stop an everyday request becoming another battle.

What are you looking for?It's a question I've been thinking about in relation to parenting, because so much of how we ex...
13/09/2026

What are you looking for?

It's a question I've been thinking about in relation to parenting, because so much of how we experience family life is influenced by what we're expecting to find.

If I'm expecting my child to be difficult, I'll notice every refusal. If I've decided they never listen, I'll clock every instruction that gets ignored. If I'm convinced mornings are always a nightmare, I'll probably arrive at breakfast already braced for battle.

None of that means the difficult bits aren't real. They are.

But they might not be the whole story.

The child who ignored you three times may also have got dressed without being asked. The sibling who spent ten minutes winding their brother up might have played beautifully with him earlier. The morning that felt chaotic may actually have contained three things that went more smoothly than they did last week.

Our brains are very good at finding evidence for the stories we're already telling ourselves.

So for today's Sunday Reflection, here are a few questions to sit with:

What am I currently expecting from my child?

What am I noticing most?

Am I looking for evidence that something isn't working, or am I noticing what's changing too?

What has gone well recently that I've barely acknowledged?

Is there a story I've started telling myself about my child, or about myself as a parent, that I need to get curious about?

And what might I notice this week if I looked through a slightly different lens?

This isn't about positive thinking our way out of the hard bits or pretending everything is lovely when it isn't.

It's about remembering that what we look for matters.

Sometimes a change in family life begins before anybody actually does anything differently. It begins when we start noticing something differently.

For many families, this has been the first full week back at school. Even if it has gone brilliantly, everyone may be ca...
11/09/2026

For many families, this has been the first full week back at school. Even if it has gone brilliantly, everyone may be carrying a little more tiredness than usual by Friday.

So rather than giving you three more things to do this weekend, here are three things you have my permission to take off the list.

1. Catching up on everything.

The washing can wait. The bedroom doesn't have to be sorted. You don't need to spend Saturday getting on top of every job that slipped during the week. Decide what genuinely needs doing and let some of the rest roll over.

2. Creating compulsory family fun.

You don't have to fill the weekend with activities because you haven't seen much of each other all week. Connection might look like a day out, but it might equally look like watching something together, kicking a ball around, getting a takeaway or everybody doing their own thing in the same room.

3. Expecting everyone to be delightful.

Your child has spent the week listening, learning, navigating friendships, following instructions and adjusting to being back in their routine. You may have spent the week holding everything together around them.

By Friday, everyone's bandwidth might be a little thinner.

Not everything that happens is a teachable moment. It might just mean this weekend needs a bit more breathing room.

You don't have to make the weekend count.

Sometimes the thing a family needs most is fewer plans, fewer expectations and somewhere soft to land.

Save this for Friday afternoon when you're tempted to make a list of seventeen things everybody needs to accomplish before Monday!

Ten years of working with families has taught me a lot about parenting.Actually, add the years I spent in education befo...
10/09/2026

Ten years of working with families has taught me a lot about parenting.

Actually, add the years I spent in education before that and the years I've spent being a parent myself, and I've had a very long time to watch, listen, learn and occasionally change my mind!

But there are some things I come back to again and again.

Behaviour makes far more sense when we get curious about what's underneath it.

Connection changes conversations. A child who feels understood is much more able to hear what comes next, although that doesn't mean boundaries disappear.

The strategy that works for somebody else's family isn't necessarily the strategy your family needs. Sometimes the easiest system really is the calmest system.

Children don't need us to get everything right. They need adults who can notice when something isn't working, repair when things go off track and be willing to try something differently.

Progress is often much quieter than we expect. It's the meltdown that lasts ten minutes instead of forty, the morning where you only asked twice, or the moment you noticed yourself responding differently.

And one of the biggest things I've learnt is that parenting gives us an opportunity to decide what we want to carry forward.

You don't have to parent the way you were parented. You can keep the things that felt wonderful and gave you what you needed, while also deciding that some things stop with you.

That matters because when we change the conversation in one family, the impact doesn't necessarily end with one child.

It can travel through generations.

Ten years into this business, I still don't believe there is one right way to parent a child.

I believe in getting curious about the child in front of you, building connection and finding ways to communicate that work for your family.

Curiosity. Connection. Communication.

Those three have stood the test of time rather well.

10/09/2026

It can be hard to hold a boundary when our child is clearly unhappy about it, particularly when changing our answer would make the immediate situation much calmer.

Their disappointment doesn't necessarily mean we've made the wrong decision. They can be cross, frustrated or wish we'd said yes, while we acknowledge how they feel and still calmly hold the boundary we've set.

Sometimes the work isn't about finding a boundary our child is happy with. It's about learning how to stay connected when they aren't.

“Shoes on, please.”Nothing.“Shoes on, please.”Still nothing.“Come on, we need to go. SHOES!”By the twelfth time, you're ...
09/09/2026

“Shoes on, please.”

Nothing.

“Shoes on, please.”

Still nothing.

“Come on, we need to go. SHOES!”

By the twelfth time, you're shouting, they're upset or shouting back, you're late, and you're wondering why nobody in this house ever listens to you.

So, what would Anisa do?

I'd start by asking whether my child actually registered the instruction the first time.

If they're watching something, building Lego, drawing or simply absorbed in their own thoughts, shouting “shoes on” from another room may genuinely not have landed. And repeating the same instruction from increasingly further up the rage scale doesn't necessarily make it any easier for their brain to act on it.

I'd go to them. Get close enough to know I have their attention, connect with what they're doing for a moment and then give one clear instruction.

“We need to leave now. Shoes on, please.”

Then I'd give them time to process it.

If nothing happens, rather than simply repeating myself, I'd get curious. Do they need help moving away from what they're doing? Have I given them six instructions in the last five minutes? Have they forgotten where their shoes are? Is there something about leaving the house that's making this transition difficult?

The expectation hasn't disappeared. We still need shoes on and we still need to leave.

I'm just changing how I help them get there.

Because sometimes “my child never listens” is actually a child who needs us to communicate differently.

And, hopefully, a parent who doesn't have to ask twelve times before losing their rag.

Save this for the next time you hear yourself saying, “HOW MANY TIMES DO I HAVE TO ASK?”

How many parenting tabs are currently open in your head?PE kit tomorrow. Need to reply to that email from school. We're ...
08/09/2026

How many parenting tabs are currently open in your head?

PE kit tomorrow. Need to reply to that email from school. We're nearly out of toothpaste. Something seemed off when they came home yesterday. Must remember to ask about that. What's for dinner? Need to book the dentist. Those shoes are getting too small. We need to talk about screens. Why has bedtime suddenly become difficult again?

And that's before anybody actually asks you for anything.

I've been talking a lot recently about mental loops. All those pieces of information we're holding in our heads because we haven't quite decided what to do with them yet, or because we're the person who needs to remember.

Individually, most of them are tiny. Collectively, they're exhausting.

And parenting creates an extraordinary number of them because we're not simply remembering appointments and PE kits. We're holding emotional information too. Who needs a bit more connection, which friendship we're keeping an eye on, what might trigger a difficult transition and whether that comment at bedtime three nights ago meant something.

One of the most useful things we can do is stop asking our brains to hold all of it.

Write it down. Decide whether it actually needs your attention. Do it, diary it, delegate it or deliberately park it.

Not every open tab needs dealing with today.

This is also part of why I created The Harvest. On 17 September, we're stepping away from everyday family life for a morning at the Devonshire Arms. There will be space to get some of those thoughts out of your head, work out what actually needs your attention and decide what you want this next season to look like.

If your brain currently feels as though it has 47 tabs open, I'd love you to join us. Comment HARVEST, and I will send you the booking link.

08/09/2026

“How many times do I have to ask you?”

Probably one of those sentences most parents have heard themselves say at some point.

But rather than starting with the assumption that our child isn't listening, it can be much more useful to get curious about the pattern that has developed around our requests.

What happens after the first ask? What happens after the second? And at what point has your child learned that you really mean it?

Sometimes a small change in the pattern can make a surprisingly big difference.

Happy 10th business birthday to me!Ten years ago, in September 2016, I started this business.After years working in educ...
07/09/2026

Happy 10th business birthday to me!

Ten years ago, in September 2016, I started this business.

After years working in education, I could see there was a space between the support schools could provide and the support some families really needed. Not because schools weren't willing to help, but because that simply isn't what the education system is there to do.

I wanted to work in that space.

I wanted to help parents understand their children, change the conversations happening at home and make family life feel different. Not just for the child in front of me, but potentially for the generations that come afterwards too.

Ten years later, I can genuinely say I LOVE what I do.

Running a business can be tough, and there have certainly been times when I've wondered what on earth I was doing. But it has also given me something incredibly precious. I get to work in my zone of genius, doing work that matters enormously to me, while building a life that gives me freedom and allows me to be there for my own family.

And yes, it supports my family and pays our bills (mostly!). I'm proud of that too. Building a business that does meaningful work and creates an income isn't something I think we need to be embarrassed about saying out loud.

But perhaps the thing I hadn't anticipated ten years ago was how much building a business would ask me to discover about myself.

I've learnt to trust my gut, lead with my intuition and become much clearer about what I believe. I've learnt that we can question the things we've inherited rather than automatically repeat them.

You don't have to parent the way you were parented. Although, obviously, if you had an amazing experience, crack on!

We can change the conversation. We can understand behaviour differently. We can create something different for our children, and those changes can travel through families for generations.

I'm incredibly proud of the business I've built, but I'm not finished building it. There are more families I want to reach, more conversations I want to have, more rooms I want to speak in and plenty more ideas rattling around in my head.

I'm building an empire. I'm not there yet, but give me time.

So, happy 10th birthday to my business, and thank you to every family, school, organisation, colleague, friend and person who has been part of these ten years.

Here's to the next chapter.

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