 Is it hard to believe we are at the end of another year? It seems like we get to this point every year and look back surprised at the fact another year has “flown by” but when we stop and reflect on our year, we see a lot has actually happened.
My kids are always the biggest indication of time passing. This year we had our first experience with literal growing pains. My son often complained about how much his feet hurt, along with other aches and pains. I didn’t think there was much we could do to help him with his discomfort, aside from the occasional ice pack or massage. However, when I went to get him new shoes, he had grown almost two sizes! No wonder his feet hurt! Both of my kids also got their braces off this year. They walked into their appointments looking like typical kids and over the course of an hour emerged as more mature young adults with radiant smiles. I was always amazed at how quickly babies changed from month to month and felt like those changes slow down as our kids get older, but this year felt like they continued to change at a staggering rate……Side note: I picked the word “staggering”, but I could have easily chosen overwhelming, rapid, confounding, astonishing or bewildering. They all fit. This year I tried to appreciate these incredible changes more from the perspective of my kids. I figured if I was feeling all these emotions simply watching them go through changes, how complex, confusing and uncomfortable must it be from their point of view? I reminded myself of this when they forgot to do a chore the first time I asked or when they would snip at me in frustration. It was tempting to slip into “How many times do I have to remind you…..” but when I was able to resist, they were more likely to open up and share what was going on. Speaking of sharing, on a personal level, 2018 took me in a different direction than I was expecting. For years I have had the feeling I needed to write a book for working moms, but I’ve resisted because it’s always been more comfortable to keep writing the blog and stick with what I know. At the beginning of the year, I couldn’t ignore it any longer, I put my parent coaching practice on hold and spent most of my free time writing the book. Along the way, I met new friends I didn’t know were missing in my life, but now I couldn’t imagine not being on this journey with them. I still have a long way to go before the book is complete, but I’ve learned a lot and look forward to sharing more with you in the upcoming months. I also became a lot more aware of the food I was eating. I made small changes – less processed food, more vegetables and even started drinking celery juice (still not sure about that one). I started learning more about gut health and the microbiome. Scientists have proven that “listening to you gut” is more than just a convenient phrase and there may be more truth to that phrase than we ever gave it credit for. It’s a huge topic and I’ve barely scratched the surface but have learned even the smallest of changes can make a difference. I’ve spent more time outside. I’ve logged more miles walking up and down our neighborhood greenbelt than ever before. And though the exercise part of the walks was important to me, I also slowed down to notice the varieties of trees, the shades of green in the grass and the distinctive chirp of the hummingbirds announcing their presence even if I couldn’t see them. Taking the time to recognize and acknowledge the natural beauty around us is calming. It sometimes seems like our natural tendency is to run around constantly reaching for the next thing. I’m still busy, but these quiet times when I walk and observe what is around me, reminds me of the abundance always surrounding me. Lastly, 2018 was a year of travel for us. Over the years, it has been hard to coordinate all our schedules, to go away on a family vacation. This year the four of us were able to do that not once, but twice. The difference this year was we didn’t let our work schedules dictate our ability to go on vacation. We planned months ahead of time and then conformed our work schedules to our scheduled time off. This is nothing revolutionary, but it was a great reminder about priorities and spending time together. If you wait too long to plan, like we did many times before, the time will just pass by and we’ll miss our opportunity. Who knows what 2019 will bring? Tomorrow is really just another day, no different than the 1st of August or the 30th of April. We choose to give the New Year significance, time for a fresh start, of hope and possibility and it’s as good a day as any to commit to something new. I love this quote from an interview Oprah did recently with Michelle Obama. Oprah asked her to explain the backstory to naming her memoir “Becoming”, she replied “My journey is the journey of always continually, evolving, there is never a point when you arrive at a thing……… And I don’t know what the next step will be……each decade has uncovered something amazing that I would have never imagined and if I had stopped looking, I would have missed out on so much. So, I’m still becoming, and I hope all of us know that we are constantly evolving.” Cheers to 2019, to new experiences and to what we are yet to become. JOY-FULLy yours, Kacey Don’t miss a post – sign up to receive the blog in your inbox every week. Scroll to the top of the page and you’ll see a box to enter your email in the upper right side of the page.
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 Are you ready for Christmas? I’ve been asked this question multiple times over the last few days and the answer is no. It seems to be on everyone’s mind, from the barista at Starbucks to close family and friends. Of course, part of it is just an easy conversation starter during this time of year. The other part is that everyone is looking for others that are in the same boat of feeling like there is a lot to be done in a short amount of time. They don’t want to feel like they are the only ones not ready and with a week to go before the big days, many are wondering, will I have enough time to get it all done?
The holidays are filled with memories, memories that lay dormant in our minds for most of the year. I love to think of it in terms of the movie Inside Out with shelves in our brain filled with different colored memories. They sit, filed away, until we call upon it and watch it replay in our mind. The memories are colored rich with emotion, often we can recall them like it was yesterday. One of those memories for me is making sugar cookies with my Grandma. It reminds me of Christmas’s in Kansas, surrounded by family, sweet smelling treats and if we were lucky a little snow. We have continued this tradition with my own kids and this year will be including our cousins in the cookie baking fun. But, like everything, it requires preplanning and coordination of time. A list of ingredients must be made, the pantry checked and restocked so we don’t have to run out mid-bake to grab something we forgot. Add it to the list, it’s just one more thing to do before the holidays, but we do it because we love our traditions, they remind us of happy memories of childhood and of people who aren’t with us anymore. If you think about it, we memorialize the past, by rushing around in the present, to prepare for these holiday events in the future. It reminds me of a video where young kids were interviewed without their parents. When the parents watched the interviews, their kid’s answers surprised them. When responding to questions about what they liked to do the most with their parents, they didn’t talk about vacations or days at the amusement part, they recalled simple moments like reading together at night or playing a game. We often overcomplicate things, trying to do too much in too short an amount of time. We stress ourselves out, leaving little or no space to enjoy why we are doing all of this in the first place. When you look back on your memories, what is it you remember? The people, the feelings and the time you spent together outweigh the gifts and the decorations. So, as we rush around during this last week before Christmas, It will be easy to feel stressed. It will be easy to think it’s not going to get done. It will be easy to think something (or someone) will be late. It will be easy to think we are letting someone down. It will be easy to be overwhelmed by the way things used to be. It will be easy for the tears to wash over you when you are missing a loved one. It will be easy to get angry at someone in front of you for not moving fast enough. It will be easy to get frustrated with your child over something minor. It will be harder to remind yourself it is all okay, prepare what you can and not worry about the rest. It will be harder to let go of your expectations of how things should be. It will be harder to remember your presence is the perfect present. JOY-FULLy yours, Kacey Don’t miss a post – sign up to receive the blog in your inbox every week. Scroll to the top of the page and you’ll see a box to enter your email in the upper right side of the page.  “I can have it all….” the heroine of the TV show “I Feel Bad” boldly proclaimed as if she is trying to convince both herself and her husband the statement is true. Then she added under her breath “I’ve read that…. in books.”
Isn’t that the truth? Having “it all” is something all women believe is possible, but not because we’ve seen examples of it in real life. “Everyone”, including books, tell us it can be done, but when we think about it, are we clear on who or what gave us that idea in the first place? There are also books on making kale taste good, but none of us are putting our blind faith in that message, are we? This message of having “it all” has been coming up a lot for me this week. First, I saw the quote from Michelle Obama’s book tour where she was quoted as saying “I tell women, that whole ‘you can have it all’ – nope, not at the same time; that’s a lie,”. (I wrote more detailed blog post on this quote that I hope to be able to share with you soon.) Next, I had a friend reach out to me and ask if I had been watching the show “I Feel Bad”. I hadn’t, but then watched the episode I quoted above, aptly named “I Miss Important Moments”. In the episode the working mom of three is running between helping her daughter prepare for a big dance recital while at the same time prepping for a pitch to the CEO of her company. Being a thirty-minute sitcom, you can imagine the antics are extreme, from hiring the receptionist to act as a stand-in in the dark rehearsal theater, to pulling the fire alarm to buy herself more time while rushing to the next event. At one point she says, “For once I felt like I was doing it all and not disappointing everyone, including myself.” And that’s what we all really feel don’t we – that we are disappointing everyone. The character in the show had a supportive husband and mother who were both offering help, so she didn’t have to do it all, but she shrugged off their offers, wanting and believing she could do it all herself. On some level she was not disappointing anyone, they were all around her ready to help, but she had built up so many expectations within her own head she was most afraid of disappointing herself. How did those expectations get built up in the first place? Like the character said earlier, she thought she had read it in a book. Having ‘it all’ seems to be folklore bred into the DNA of working moms. None of us know how it got there, but we all have it. Michelle Obama’s quote, “not at the same time” made me feel like some of the weight was lifted off my shoulders. To me her words meant, you don’t have to be the best at everything all at the same time. This is where I think we get tripped up. We keep pushing, striving and adding more things to our to-do list thinking “if only I can get all this done, I will be able to sit back and take a deep breath”. The challenge is that day never comes. More gets added to the list, new responsibilities appear, and you are on the never-ending hamster wheel of activity. What would happen if you stopped for a minute and asked yourself one question, “Is today enough?” Do you have enough food, enough responsibility, enough satisfaction, enough love? It doesn’t mean you have to stay in this place forever, but for today, is it enough? Too often we are so busy looking at how it will be in the future that we overlook treasures we already have in front of us. At the end of the episode, the daughter says to the mom “When you really care about something you figure out a way to make it happen.” I would agree this is true for many and often it is in these moments of making it happen that moms earn their Super Mom title for pulling off the impossible. Unfortunately, there are many times when no matter how much you care about something, you just can’t do it all. In those moments, we must make a choice. This is where things get tough for so many moms, like the mom in the show, we don’t want to disappoint anyone and feel that by making a choice that is exactly what we will do. We need to let ourselves off the hook. My cousin sent me a text this morning with the quote “We are in charge of our joy.” Yes, choices are hard, but we need to make our decisions based on what is best in the moment from our heart. We shouldn’t downplay the joy our choice brings. After all, there is plenty of time to have ‘it all’. JOY-FULLy yours, Kacey Don’t miss a post – sign up to receive the blog in your inbox every week. Scroll to the top of the page and you’ll see a box to enter your email in the upper right side of the page.  Photo by Monica Silvestre from Pexels ‘Tis the season for school performances and concerts where our student will showcase what they’ve learned in the last few months by singing, playing instruments and sharing their talents. In our house this means attending our very first band concert made up of 5th graders (10 and 11-year-olds) most of whom started playing their instrument in August. My son, coming off a stellar year learning the recorder, chose the clarinet as his instrument for the next step for his musical career. Other members of his band class play the saxophone, flute, trombone, trumpet, baritone or percussion and have been rehearsing for their first big concert coming up next week. The anticipation has been mounting as he’s been practicing the songs they will perform, eager to share the progress he has made.
A couple days ago, as we were starting to wind down for the night my son was bouncing around with an added amount of nervous energy. “What’s going on?” I asked. “My band teacher is going to be gone tomorrow and he asked me to lead the class.” His smile was a mixture of pride and insecurity as he fidgeted from one foot to the other. “I’m so nervous, I have butterflies in my stomach!” “You’re going to be fine, besides, there will be a teacher in the room, so it’s not like you will be all alone.” “He chose one boy, me, and one girl too.” “See, you’ll be okay. And it’s not until tomorrow so it does you no good to worry about it now.” “But I’m so nervous!” He hopped and wiggled around the room, his anticipatory energy needing to be released. I could tell he was not sure how to react to all the feelings that were bouncing around inside of him. Even though part of me wanted him to stop messing around and get on with it, I took a deep breath, we chatted for a little while longer on what exactly he was going to have to do and he finally made his way to the shower. (Side note: A few months ago, I realized my son’s favorite time to share his day is right before he gets in the shower. It was challenging at first, because it extended the time it took to get the routine completed, but on the other hand I recognized this was when he felt most comfortable sharing the details of his day. Once I recognized this, I started our routine a few minutes earlier, so he still got to bed on time and I didn’t feel like I had to rush him through the routine.) After his shower, he was brushing his teeth and said again, “I’m just so nervous!” “Buddy, trust me, it’s going to be just fine, but let’s just think for a minute - what do you think is the worst thing that could happen?” “The other boys will make fun of me.” “You are right, they will definitely make fun of you, that’s what boys do. Who do you think is going to say something and what do you think they are going to say?” “They’re going to think that I want to be the boss and tell them what to do and they are just going to want to goof around.” “But you didn’t ask your teacher to do this, he assigned it to you, right?” “Well, ya.” “Okay, then it’s not like you asked to be the boss, he just chose you. So, what do you think you can say to the boys when they say that to you?” “I could just ignore them ‘cuz it’s not true.” “I think that sounds like a great idea. I know it’s hard and kind of scary to think about standing in front of your class, but I know you will do an awesome job. But for right now we are not even at school, so let’s not worry about it until tomorrow, deal?” I know it’s always easier said than done, but he was content for the moment and thankfully able to fall asleep. I was surprised to see him the next morning without me having to coax him out of bed. The nerves and butterflies were back, today was the big day. I asked him what time the class was, 10:20, and I told him I would be sending him a big hug. He went off to school ready to face the challenge of the day. I sat at my desk a couple hours later and sent him words of encouragement through the air waves, knowing he was nervous but hoping the kids wouldn’t be too hard on him. When I got home later that night, I couldn’t wait to ask him how it went. “I didn’t have to do it! We didn’t have a sub, so we just went to recess instead!” “Oh my gosh, I bet you were so relieved! See you spent all that time worrying and it didn’t even happen. How were you feeling before class?” He jumped out of his seat. “I was SO nervous. My heart was beating so hard. It was like this.” He clasped his fingers together and outstretched his arms to show his heart beating out of his chest. “And then the teachers were talking, and the other teacher couldn’t be the sub, so we just got to have recess. I ran out there so fast, I was SO happy.” My son had survived, as I knew he would, but I hoped I had planted a little seed for the next time this type of situation comes around. It’s hard for us to watch our kids go through these stages. We empathize with them because we remember those nervous feelings and now with our experience, we also know the only way to conquer the fear is to face it head on. My original instinct was to downplay the situation, to gloss over it and make it seem like not a big deal, but I know that is not always the best way to help. He was having big feelings about this and instead of me sweeping them under the rug like it wasn’t a big deal, it was better for me to get him to talk through his feelings. Kids won’t always know the right words to attribute to the feelings, but the more we talk about them and talk through them, the bigger their vocabulary will get. Also acknowledging his physical feelings and letting him wiggle them all out vs. trying to get him to stay still to have a discussion was an important part of the process. Role playing the worst-case scenario and how he would deal with it, helped identify and debunk the ideas in your head may not be that big of a deal after all. This does not guarantee I’ll handle the next emotional outburst with the same ease. It’s all practice. I firmly believe we all do the best we can do in any given moment. I realized it’s not always going to be this easy, the social dynamics are going to get harder, the stakes for success are going to get higher, but it’s in these small moments we can begin creating the foundation by talking about feelings, before they get bottled up and tucked away. JOY-FULLy yours, Kacey Don’t miss a post – sign up to receive the blog in your inbox every week. Scroll to the top of the page and you’ll see a box to enter your email in the upper right side of the page. |
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AuthorI started writing this blog because I wanted to have deeper conversations beyond "How are you?", "Busy", with other parents. Over the years I've shared personal stories, articles, authors and topics to facilitate conversations with parents about the joys and the challenges of parenting. |
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© 2021 Balanced Heart Coaching
Disclaimer: I may receive affiliate compensation from the resources and websites mentioned on this website.
© 2021 Balanced Heart Coaching