Family Meeting: Getting Back on Track

It's no secret to anyone that the end of summer vacation usually results in a frazzled, short tempered, and ready-for-routine ME. It almost always takes me a few weeks of feeling crazy before I have to remind myself that feeling this way around this time of year is usually the way it goes.  Then add in a huge life change and a move across the country and these feelings are magnified, by um, a lot. It can make for one bag of feeling guilty for all the things I'm not doing, critical of myself and my kids, and a web of negative thinking.   One of the things that has always worked to help me reset and get back to focusing on what really matters and what I want most in life is to slow down with reflection.

Just the simple act of stopping myself in my tracks, taking a deep breath, clearing my head  and listing the things I AM doing well allows me to then focus on the small steps I can take to move forward and improve. This is especially true when I'm feeling out of control or especially critical of myself and my family.  Bad moods and negative energy are contagious--a domino effect--and if I don't put the breaks on and RESET, the whole family picks up on my energy.

Last night was our first night back from a long weekend away in Portland for Hood to Coast.  We were also making time for final good byes to my husband's work friends in Portland, saying hello to old neighbors and school friends, and visiting with family.  As much as I loved our weekend away, it was incredibly nice to be HOME!

Before bedtime, I called all the kids into my son's room for a last minute family meeting.  I have been meaning to implement this family meeting routine at least once a week but so far it has remained on my parenting wish list.  Last night was the night.  Forget planning or knowing what the meeting would be about.  I just needed to do it.  Once we were all sitting around Sam's bed, I knew we all needed a RESET.  It wasn't just me being grouchy and short tempered.  The kids had been fighting and having attitudes.  There was constant complaining and whining about having to do chores.  We were all just tired from our move and unraveling in a sea of BLAH and lack of direction and focus.

I remembered the cards I had placed on the wall a few days ago:

I grabbed two legos from Sam's lego bin and asked the family to take turns holding the legos and contributing to the conversation.  With the blue lego, I asked them to list something they were doing well and that they were proud of.  Then with the yellow lego, I asked them to list something they wanted to bet better at.

At first the kids came up with some funny things like:

Sam:  
Positives:  I'm good at being a Ninja.
Something I want to be better at:  My pull over on the ninja bars!

After a little bit of modeling and redirecting, all of us came up with things that related to our behavior and interaction with the family.  In the end, I think we all felt a new sense of focus and calm.  At least I did.  And I'm pretty sure they did too because today has been GREAT!  I could tell that all of us were conscious of our intentions and working on treating each other with love and respect.

I'm determined to have a family meeting at least once a week!  And for the first few meetings, I think this Lego Positives and Small Steps Forward exercise will be a great exercise.  Eventually we will add other things like compliments, sharing fears, highlights of our days, etc.  No matter what we do, I know this time together will be nothing but valuable in helping us grow as a family and as individuals.

Here's to more family meetings!

Have you tried family meetings?  
Do you set a time aside for the whole family to be together?  Dinner?  Family Movie Nights?  

Amanda

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Letting Go of Guilt, Replacing it With Positive Self Talk and Love, and Helping Our Kids Learn the Same

A lot has changed since I first started this blog in late 2010.  Lots. Races trained for. Travel. Motherhood milestones. Lessons learned. Love gained. And so much more. As I look back, I see a very different ME. A version of myself that carried a much heavier bag of everything: expectations, fear, fearlessness, immediate goals for improvement, invincibility, and that big ugly G word: GUILT. 

Gosh, I had a lot of motherhood guilt back then. Wooo wee, I'm so glad I've let some of that go! Amazing what a difference three years can make. Don't get me wrong, I still have high expectations. I still have goals and dreams.  And I still have a fair dose of guilt that creeps in and clouds my vision of all the really great and positive things I'm doing as mother, friend, wife... that voice that comes out at the end of the day to remind me of all the things I forgot to do or messed up with, leaving me feeling like I'm not enough. The voice that says things like:

• You yelled too much.
• You could have reacted to that meltdown differently.  Or not reacted at all.
• You forgot to read with your middle child.
• Did you remember to do that project with _______ like you promised?  
• You didn't say YES to anything today.  
• You forgot to....
• Gosh, I think you nagged more than talked normally today. 

When I look back on the self I was just a few years ago, I'm mixed with feelings of wanting to hug myself and take away the pressure and hurt I was filled with and wanting to slap myself around and tell myself to stop being so overly sensitive and dramatic. What a process we go through in life as we learn and change.  Thank goodness we get to learn and move on, right?!  But, no matter where we are in life, we are where we need to be. 

I'll always have things I'd like to improve upon. Setting goals and making reflection part of my life habits are here to stay. However, I no longer let guilt linger for too long. I don't go to bed every single night beating myself over the head with a long list of all the ways I feel like I failed.  Instead of swimming in a muck of guilt and feeling of failure, I take note of the things I'd like to improve on for the next day and I make a point to do just that. I'm easier on myself: more love and grace. With every thought of something I feel like I kind of messed up with, I tell myself something I did well that day.  I give myself lots of positives and acknowledge the GOOD STUFF that I AM DOING RIGHT!  This is perhaps one of the greatest lessons I've learned since starting this blog.  I'm finally able to do so much more of the stuff that I've written about in regards to helping our children do for themselves: positive self talk and self love.

As much as I see a very different person when I read back over some of my past posts, I I've also been reminded of some pretty important lessons or ideas that I find helpful now.  One particular post on Helping Our Children Love Themselves written in December 2011 was written after what was then a very difficult experience for me as a young mother. It was the first time I had to deal with something and I was extra sensitive (as mothers often are with their first borns). I was definitely harder on myself than I would be now but it led to some good family lessons. I forgot that we even used to do family meetings with compliments and "bucket filling"...this was a long time ago!  But I'm thankful for the reminder and I hope to try some of these things again in working to help my children (and myself) with positive self talk and love.  

Reading this post again made me aware that in addition to going easier on ourselves and, there are so many things that we can be doing for our kids that can help them do the same for themselves. Self love and positive talk is perhaps one of the greatest things we can teach them. Some highlights from this post:

"After doing some repairing of feelings by assuring my daughter that she is wonderful and great despite the mistakes she makes, we had a brief talk about the power of self talk.  I used the bucket metaphor which isn't anything new and certainly not all my idea.  Lots of teachers and therapists use it.  Basically, I explained:

• When you say bad things about yourself like "I can't.  I'm no good.  I hate myself.  Nobody likes me.  I'm stupid...." you are filling your heart bucket up with gross, smelly black stuff that you don't want to be around.  Nobody else wants to be around it either and before you know it, it is so stinky and heavy and black that your heart is heavy and sad and you feel awful about yourself. And when you say these things to others, you are taking away from their buckets or filling them with YUCK. 
• When you love yourself and fill your brain with positive thoughts like "I love me.  I am beautiful.  I am smart.  People love me.  I CAN DO THIS!  I am kind.  I am loving.  I am a good friend." these things will BE!  You are filling your heart bucket up with brilliant color and love and beauty.  You want more of it and you will feel good.  Others can sense this positive self worth too and when you think thought of love and positivity, you are a person that others feel good around.  
• You ARE WORTHY of LOVE.  Even when you make bad choices. We all make bad choices sometimes.  WE need to love ourselves and others and just keep picking ourselves back up and trying to improve on the things we can control.

Some things I learned from this experience:

• Kids need to feel safe sharing things with us or they will bottle things up and this will cause them stress.  It depends on the kid of course.  Some, like my oldest daughter, are more private than others.
• I'm definitely harder on my oldest than I think I will be on my younger two.  I think this is normal.  My standards are pretty high and I can sometimes be too hard on  her.  If I'm not careful, I'm just one big nag of a mom and she can end up feeling like she can do nothing right. These feelings can stay for a long time.  
• Every difficult situation we work through with our children is a learning opportunity.  I'm thankful for some conflict and difficult times NOW because it will only help make them stronger for LATER.  
• You can never overdo it when telling your kids that you love them.  
• It is so important to find moments to praise our children and catch them in their efforts and hard work.  I try not to praise them as a person but more so their choices and actions.  Instead of saying "You're such a good girl or a good boy", I say things like "I really love the way you folded your clothes! Thank you".  I don't want them to judge their self worth off of how good they are.  I want them to always feel worthy of love and feel self confident even when they do make bad choices.  This is tricky. I'm probably not making sense here as I am typing rather quickly and my time is running out.  
• Positive self talk is SO IMPORTANT for all of us.  Athletes, mothers, children, self.  So much power in how we talk about our self.  I am smart, I am beautiful, I am a good friend, I am worthy of love, I am a child of God, I am funny, I am fast....these things are so POWERFUL in BEING what we want to be.  I can't stress this enough for my children.  We've really been working on saying these things before we go to sleep at night." 

Last night when I went to bed, I did my usual reflection of the day.  But unlike the ME from the past, I was able to simply look at the things I did well and think of the things I wanted to be better at the next day.  So much more self love and grace these days!  And because of that, I'm not quite as hard on my kids. I'm better at modeling love and positive talk for them since I'm better at doing it for myself.  We've all benefited from this.  However, I think this is always something to keep working on. I think tonight we will have a family meeting with compliments and imaginary bucket filling!  

Here's to growing!  

Amanda

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