0:02

Welcome to Good Intentions, the podcast

0:04

where we explore the world around us to find

0:07

meaning and intention in what we do. I'm

0:09

Kelly Harvard and I'm on a mission to spread positive

0:12

stories that will inspire you to live a more meaningful

0:14

and connected life. Jo

0:18

Jewel is a therapist, educator and

0:20

speaker born in the uk.

0:23

She became an expat at just 12 years old

0:25

when her family moved to South Africa for her father's

0:27

job. She says she spent

0:29

most of her adolescent years trying to fit in or

0:32

to avoid fitting in, not appreciating

0:34

then the theory behind the need to belong and

0:36

to feel securely attached. Joe

0:39

lived the life that was expected of her by her family

0:41

and society until she was 30, but

0:43

she always knew that there was something missing, that

0:46

despite her constant efforts, the answer to happiness

0:48

was not in the world around her, but instead in

0:50

the world inside her. Something that I

0:52

think will stand familiar to so many of my listeners, watching

0:55

her three boys grow and fearing that she would not be

0:57

the mom that they deserved was a catalyst to

0:59

starting her mindfulness journey. And this

1:02

combined with a family loss gave way to a

1:04

new phase of her life. Joe

1:06

entered into therapy, started training as

1:08

a counselor and read everything she could find out about

1:10

healing ourselves from within. Joe

1:13

says, my greatest learning has been that through

1:15

mindfulness I can change my blueprint. Whatever

1:17

I was taught and no longer want to use can be changed.

1:20

And this is true for all of us. This

1:23

optimistic thinking gives me hope that we can all change

1:25

and is something that I explored in our conversation.

1:28

We also talked mindful parenting and its power

1:30

when it comes to raising resilient, optimistic children.

1:33

How it isn't our job to make children happy. And

1:36

we also discuss the genocide in Palestine and

1:38

how to talk about this with children. Joe

1:40

is so wise and brilliant and every time I talk

1:43

to her I learn something and feel uplifted. I

1:45

know you will too. Please enjoy the conversation.

1:49

Morning Joe , thanks so much for joining me on the

1:51

podcast.

1:51

Morning Kelly. Lovely to be here.

1:53

So happy to see you and to hear you. It feels like you're

1:56

sitting next to me in Dubai, which is just such a great

1:58

feeling.

1:58

Yeah, yeah, that , that would be quite nice as

2:00

well at the moment 'cause it's getting a bit cold here. I

2:03

Know, right? Of course. Yeah,

2:05

The sun is shining today. Next

2:06

Time you're here we'll do it in person. We'll do another one maybe.

2:09

Yes, that would be lovely. Yes. So

2:11

I've been dying to have this conversation with you for ages,

2:13

so I really appreciate you finding the time and I

2:15

wanna kind of go back to the beginning 'cause I met you sort

2:17

of when you were this sort of maybe more

2:19

fully formed , what could we say? But I

2:22

wanted to go back to the beginning and what sort of made you start your

2:24

career in therapy and you said that parenting

2:26

your three boys really played a role in your

2:28

journey to becoming a therapist. Could you tell

2:30

us a bit more about what started you on that journey

2:33

and how the boys played that part in it as well?

2:35

Yeah, I mean definitely I don't think

2:37

I probably would ever have done this if I

2:39

hadn't become a mother. I didn't start

2:42

until, so my, I have three sons

2:45

and I think the eldest was probably

2:47

about two when

2:50

I had this very clear

2:53

realization that I had absolutely

2:55

no clue how to be the mother

2:57

that I wanted to be. I

2:59

was very clear on the mother. I didn't want to

3:01

be. And I even remember from the age

3:04

of maybe five or six having conversations with

3:06

myself about all the things I wasn't

3:09

gonna do as a parent. So when

3:11

I was very young I used to have those conversations

3:13

myself. And as I got older I

3:15

was more, I'm just not gonna be apparent

3:17

because it feels like hard

3:21

and I'm really not really sure how I'd

3:23

do it. And definitely I

3:25

was very much reliant on the

3:28

coping strategies of a perfectionist when

3:30

I was younger. That was a big part of

3:32

the way that I lived my life was if

3:35

I'm perfect at something then I

3:37

can avoid pain and judgment and

3:39

shame and all of those things. Of

3:42

course that never actually really works.

3:44

But I tried really hard at it. So

3:47

becoming a a mom , I think particularly

3:50

if the way you've cope with the world is to try and be perfect

3:53

when you become a parent, I mean it's

3:55

virtually impossible. Whatever you try to sell perfectly,

3:58

a child will come in and probably trash it,

4:01

right? Because that's what children are meant to do. They're

4:03

not meant to be to fit into that

4:05

mold. They're there to teach you what it

4:07

is to be free and joyful

4:10

and chaotic and all these amazing things

4:13

the kids before . So my

4:16

eldest son is probably,

4:18

I mean they've all taught me something, but I think because

4:20

he was my first real teacher

4:22

in that way, he was quite brutal to

4:25

be honest. He wasn't taking any prisoners, you

4:27

know, he was like, I'm here. I

4:30

will not fit into your like

4:32

well organized life. I'm

4:35

going to throw chaos wherever I can and

4:38

I won't be quiet about it. I'm

4:40

thank goodness for that, thank goodness.

4:43

So I have a vivid recollection of him

4:45

being about two and me sitting on

4:47

the stairs in my house with my

4:49

head in my hands just thinking, I just

4:52

have no clue how to do this. Like

4:54

my body wants to go into fights

4:57

or slights , you know, it wants to shout or

4:59

it wants to get away and

5:01

I really don't wanna do that. So

5:04

I better figure something out. Really I

5:06

need to, I think for me the , the

5:09

first sort of focus was how do I deal with this anger?

5:11

I don't think I'd ever felt anger like

5:14

I did as a mother. And I

5:16

really didn't want it to be propelled

5:18

towards my son. I had,

5:20

my second son was already more , he was like

5:23

a baby at that age. So toddlers

5:25

are great teachers and

5:28

the only issue around that is whether we

5:30

are open to learning or not. I

5:32

think with him, whether I'd

5:34

been open to learning or not, I was gonna learn. Right.

5:37

'cause he was such a force of nature

5:39

really. Which is interesting 'cause he's turned

5:41

into the most calm, compassionate

5:46

like ol So

5:48

I would say actually often reminds me of you Kelly . 'cause

5:51

he's always taken in stray animals. <laugh>

5:53

. Oh no God help him

5:56

stray lot . I think we taught him that a

5:58

little bit actually. So he is always taken

6:00

, always wants to take care of

6:03

somebody or something. Right.

6:05

That's wonderful. I love him already. Yeah,

6:08

He is. He is wonderful. He has his own

6:10

challenges in the world because the world is really made for

6:12

people like that. Right,

6:15

Right . Painful. When you have that caring, empathetic,

6:18

very open mind and

6:20

heart, it's very easy for it to get crushed.

6:23

Yeah. Uh ,

6:24

Yeah , squeezed quite hard. I definitely know that experience.

6:27

So you had two under two Joe and

6:29

you're thinking, okay, I dunno that I can do this and

6:32

you had a job, you had a life, you had a

6:34

career . So you just kind of left that

6:36

behind and then moved over into doing

6:38

this. I mean how did that work?

6:39

Well what happened was my father-in-law

6:42

died very suddenly. He

6:44

was only 49 actually when he

6:46

died. And as

6:49

a result of that he was , he had a , his

6:51

a a business that was quite a

6:53

new business and there

6:56

wasn't really anyone to manage

6:58

that. And just letting it go

7:00

wasn't really an option because he invested

7:03

a lot of his retirement

7:05

pot into it. So at the time

7:07

I was working in finance which

7:10

fitted well into my perfectionist,

7:13

you know, overachieving lifestyle.

7:15

Right. And I was starting

7:17

to just become aware this job doesn't fit

7:19

with being a mum . It just does not

7:21

work. I was traveling quite a lot for work and

7:24

it just started to feel really painful to

7:26

be away so much. Even though I

7:28

had great support, like really amazing

7:31

support, not from family but

7:33

from my husband and, and we

7:35

had a nanny, this is when I was living, this

7:37

is , I was about living in the UK at this time. So

7:40

when my father-in-Law died, I

7:42

was like okay, realistically

7:45

I'm probably the best position in in the

7:47

whole family to step in and try

7:49

and help sort this out. You know, my husband

7:52

had a very big job at the

7:54

time and he wanted

7:56

to support but with there not needed

7:58

someone to be like on the ground really to

8:00

do it. So I

8:03

took redundancy from

8:05

my work and that was

8:07

really the thing that started it. So I

8:09

did that for about 10 months

8:11

to 11 months and just got the business into a

8:14

position where it could be sold , which

8:16

is what we did. And then I was left

8:19

with no job and no income and

8:21

no, and by now I had three children. I

8:23

was

8:23

Gonna ask you where the third one came in

8:25

. Oh my goodness. There's a lot going

8:27

on. Yeah,

8:28

So we , in that year, my third son

8:31

was born as well. So

8:33

I was like okay, I don't, I don't really know

8:35

what I'm gonna do. It's like, you know, when you get

8:37

a a space in your life, I'd never really had a

8:39

space. I'd gone from school to uni

8:42

to work the getting married

8:44

to having children and working and didn't

8:47

really take much maternity leave and,

8:49

and then I just had this space and

8:52

I was a bit like, okay, this is slightly

8:54

scary really. I think I'd

8:57

always wanted space but when it came I didn't

8:59

really know what to do with it. And I got a

9:01

part-time job working for an

9:03

adult education center in

9:05

the UK and one of the bonuses

9:08

of having that job is that you can attend

9:10

some of their courses for free and you don't

9:12

have to pay . And one of the courses was

9:14

introductions, counseling. And I was like, oh

9:16

that really interests me. Part of my job

9:19

had been people management. I'd done a

9:21

lot of people management particularly later in my

9:23

job, quite a lot of supporting

9:25

people through change. We , I worked

9:27

for a company where there was a lot of change so I did

9:29

a lot of change management work and

9:32

I really enjoyed listening to people

9:34

and found, I recognized that when

9:36

you connect with people it's actually much

9:39

easier to build a

9:41

really good working relationship with them.

9:44

So I really enjoyed that part of my job.

9:46

And so this counseling thing

9:49

as I called it then seemed like oh

9:51

let me check it out and see what it's about. But

9:53

that was really the beginning of my journey

9:55

and when , and my studying was in the evenings

9:58

so I was doing some part-time

10:00

work from home and literally my husband would come

10:02

home from work, leave the car running in the drive, I'd

10:04

hand a baby get in the car and

10:07

go to college and

10:09

do my studying. Your

10:11

Second job of the day

10:12

<laugh>. Yeah, I do vividly

10:15

remember at times thinking like what am I doing?

10:17

This feels really overwhelming 'cause it's

10:19

quite a , there's a lot of when you study

10:21

in that way or when you study counseling

10:23

rather than, I didn't study psychology, I

10:25

studied to be a counselor and

10:27

when you do that there's you,

10:30

part of it is a requirement to do personal

10:32

therapy. So this was really the

10:34

first time that I'd really engaged

10:36

in personal therapy and it

10:38

brought up a lot of stuff. So

10:41

I'm parenting, studying

10:43

and on my own personal journey

10:46

as well.

10:47

And then everything that you're doing with the studying and

10:49

the personal journey is obviously then gonna be impacting you

10:51

so much in the daytime as well when you're just living

10:53

your life and you've got three children.

10:56

Yeah, more children. Yeah . So my goodness.

10:58

Yeah. So it was really, when you look

11:00

at it, it was how it was meant to be. It was always meant to be

11:02

that way. I'd also taken on

11:04

a little child minding job as

11:07

well, <laugh> as well. Well

11:09

you know, the thing is I gave up a very well-paid

11:11

job and we had

11:13

three children. I have a mortgage and so

11:16

I took on this little, which was really just a

11:18

friend of mine was a teacher. So she dropped her kids

11:20

at my house before she went to

11:22

work. I'd taken school with my children and

11:24

I'd pick them up and have them about an hour and she would

11:27

come and pick them up. But it

11:29

was the first time I'd ever really taken care

11:31

of anybody else's children. So

11:34

it also makes you realize that children are

11:37

, have lots of things that are the same and

11:39

also the way that they respond

11:42

is quite different. And so I learned a

11:44

lot and I think I sort of started

11:46

to really become aware that

11:49

you can't respond to every child

11:52

Exactly you're saying because they are little people

11:54

in their own right. And of course in

11:56

a way I already knew that about my own children. But

11:59

when you're getting on with the business of parenting, there's not

12:01

a lot of time for self-reflection to be honest with

12:03

you. And I think that's one of the hardest things about

12:05

parenting's. Like you're on the treadmill all the

12:07

time. There's not a lot of time to

12:10

actually sit and think, okay,

12:13

what happened today? How do

12:15

I feel about what happened today? When

12:18

I think we do reflect on when

12:20

we've had a really bad day and

12:22

when I say reflect, I mean probably just go , well

12:24

that was a hell of a day and that's probably as much as we

12:26

do. Right? Or we may be go into a bit of

12:28

self-criticism or self blame or

12:31

you know, I'm , oh there must be something wrong with

12:33

me. Everybody else seems to be enjoying

12:35

being a mother and everybody else

12:37

seems to be coping well and you know, so we tend to

12:39

be quite tough on ourselves as moms

12:41

as well. But we rarely sit down and

12:43

go, well actually today went really well. So

12:46

what happened today? But

12:48

there seems to be more cooperation in the house.

12:51

The kids actually listened the

12:53

, the third time I said something, you

12:55

know what , what's all that about? This

12:57

Is such a good point Joe . It's like maybe if I could just parent

12:59

like every other day, it would be so great, wouldn't it? 'cause

13:01

I need to have all this like reflection time in between <laugh>

13:04

In between. You could take some reflection

13:06

One day on, one day off. I could really, I

13:09

think I'd be a much better parent anyway. Obviously I

13:11

joking love very much love having my daughter with

13:13

me every day . But my goodness, you make such a good point. There

13:15

is no time to sort of, and you, so you were

13:17

plunged into almost like a science experiment because

13:20

you're learning all this great stuff and then you've got this

13:22

laboratory which is your house with your children,

13:24

other people's children. Wow, what

13:26

a baptism of fire. But what a great way, what

13:28

a great opportunity, what a great way to learn.

13:30

Yeah because my boys were getting involved

13:32

in lots of activities and you have to take

13:34

them to all these things. My

13:36

husband became like a , a football coach. So

13:39

I there with all the competitiveness

13:41

and children and parents, I mean just standing on

13:43

the side of a football pitch watching parents is

13:45

a learning experience on its own. And

13:48

I also became a beaver Linda . So

13:50

beavers is like the bit before Cubs

13:53

Brownies,

13:53

Yeah that brownies. Yeah. We had

13:55

boys and girls and it wasn't all boys.

13:58

You could have boys and girls. So I did that as well. I

14:01

didn't know really while

14:03

I was doing all of these things. 'cause I will say

14:05

that was probably quite out of character for

14:07

who I was then. But people

14:09

might meet me now and go, of course she was a beaver

14:11

leader. Of course she was a tar mine . But bear

14:14

in mind that's not really who I was then.

14:16

Well you were fresh from your corporate job. You were still dusting

14:19

off your work shoes and hanging up your

14:21

suit from coming in from work

14:23

every day . Yeah, I can totally relate to that. That must be

14:25

so strange.

14:26

Yeah and it was definitely a

14:29

big learning curve for me that was such

14:31

a privilege. Like what a privilege to get

14:33

to spend time with children in

14:36

a role that isn't like as a mom but also

14:38

in a different type of role. 'cause you

14:41

really get to experience that. So

14:43

when I got to a point in and I'm doing, I'm

14:46

still doing my training, my counseling training in the

14:48

background and going to therapy and you

14:50

have to do a lot of self-reflection as

14:52

well, like written self-reflection. And

14:55

I always used to do that on a Monday and

14:58

it would literally almost take me the whole day. Like I'd

15:00

drop the kids at school and go home and it just, it

15:02

was so difficult to do that 'cause it wasn't a

15:04

skill I had at that time in my life. So

15:06

I'm always really feel so much

15:09

compassion for people when

15:11

they're starting to learn to self reflect because

15:14

it can be a really painful process.

15:16

Yeah . Painful and difficult. Yeah , definitely. Yeah.

15:18

And it's , so you have this focus as with

15:21

all your sort of therapy and training you , you now have

15:23

this focus on mindful parenting, which I think is

15:25

so interesting that we talk about this a lot. I think, you know, most

15:27

parents trying to somehow incorporate

15:29

this sort of into their life into the way they

15:31

are with their children. But sort of can you kind

15:33

of summarize what mindful parenting is to you

15:35

sort of like in a nutshell and how does it differ from

15:37

other approaches, you know, other parenting approaches

15:40

that we might hear or know about?

15:41

I think for me it really comes from what I

15:43

shared a bit before, which is children

15:46

are not like machines and

15:48

no child is the same and no child

15:50

is the same on any given day because

15:52

they are bundles of emotions, particularly

15:55

when they're small. They're just bundles of emotions

15:57

basically with no filter

15:59

and no way to manage those emotions. So

16:02

if you can be present

16:05

in your own body and I know that people

16:07

are like present in your own body, what on the earth does that mean?

16:10

That just basically means like I

16:12

have some awareness of

16:14

what's going on inside of me, how I'm

16:16

feeling, how my body is feeling. Maybe

16:19

I'm aware that my shoulders are a

16:21

bit tense though maybe I'm aware that I'm being a

16:23

bit sick in my stomach today. Maybe I'm

16:26

aware that I'm tired or if I

16:28

can have some awareness of myself and

16:30

have some ability to be able

16:33

to soothe myself, right?

16:35

So that I'm not behaving

16:37

based purely on my emotions, but

16:41

that's what it is. 'cause if we don't have the

16:43

ability to soothe ourselves

16:45

in some way, then our

16:48

behavior's just gonna be based on whatever it is

16:50

that we happen to be feeling in that moment.

16:52

Yeah, reacting. Yeah,

16:53

That's great. If you live on a , there's an island and

16:55

you don't have anything to do all day long and you're

16:57

super chill, then there's no responsibilities and nobody's

17:00

asking, then probably you'll be naturally

17:02

fair in a calm , in a regulate

17:05

state, right? But the reality is, most of

17:07

us, that's not the life that we lead. So

17:10

if I can be more aware then,

17:12

then what that means is I'm able to

17:14

be present for what's happening to my children. So

17:16

I can see that they're

17:19

, you know, having a a , a

17:21

difficult day. That they're struggling a little bit, that maybe

17:23

they're having a big feeling or maybe

17:25

they are wanting

17:27

to experiment with something. It means

17:30

that I'm looking at them in

17:32

a more compassionate, aware

17:35

way because that's how I look at myself. Because

17:37

I look at myself in that way. I look at them in

17:39

that way. And I'm not trying to change

17:41

everything. I'm not trying to be in control. I

17:44

don't want people to think that I'm saying you have to be in control

17:46

of your emotions. That's not what I'm saying. I

17:49

can be feel really tired, I can feel frustrated

17:52

and because I'm an adult I can still choose

17:54

how I speak. But if I'm not aware

17:57

that I'm tired and frustrated, I

17:59

won't even think about choosing how I speak. It's

18:01

just gonna come out. And all that means is effectively

18:04

your parenting like a child, right?

18:07

It's like having two children in

18:09

the room just acting based on how they

18:11

feel in that moment. And

18:14

that's a problem because our children need

18:16

to learn from somebody whose brain's

18:19

more mature than theirs. That's the

18:21

way we learn as human beings. We learn in a hierarchical

18:24

way. So we need to learn from

18:26

people who are more than more

18:29

mature, you know, have a brain that is more mature

18:31

and wiser than ours. So for

18:33

me, mindful parenting, I mean I

18:35

could give you the definition of it, but

18:39

it's just about being in my life,

18:41

like actually being present in my own life. And

18:44

one of the things that's really important is, and I'm not judging,

18:47

I'm not spending my time, I'm not saying, oh

18:50

you're tired today. Well that's really bad. You should have

18:52

gone to bed early last night. It's your own fault that you're

18:54

tired and you know, you don't need

18:56

to do all of that. I'm tired today.

18:59

Okay, so what could I do to help myself if

19:01

I'm tired today? Is there anything I could

19:03

do that would help me right

19:06

now? Not, oh

19:08

I'll make sure I'll go to bed earlier tonight. Well that's great,

19:11

but it doesn't change the fact that I'm tired right

19:13

now. So can I do something

19:15

to help myself? Can I maybe, I don't know, go

19:18

and stand outside for two minutes if , especially

19:20

if it's that if there's day like that could help a

19:22

little bit. Can I put

19:24

a piece of music on that helps me when

19:26

I feel tired? Can I just have

19:28

a glass of water? You know, is

19:30

there something I can do that will support

19:33

me in my tiredness?

19:36

And you see, when we do that for ourselves, it means

19:38

that when we see our children are tired, we're

19:41

more able to be supportive of

19:43

them or more compassionate to them. And

19:46

you can use that for any feeling. It

19:49

could be, I'm feeling, I dunno

19:51

, angry today, I'm feeling

19:54

frustrated today. I just want to not be

19:56

in the world . I just want stay in my house and and

19:59

not leave today. It can

20:01

apply to any feeling that we're having and

20:04

it shifts from judging myself for having that

20:06

feeling and needing to fix

20:08

it, change it, ignore it,

20:11

any of those things that we do and shifts

20:13

us more into, okay, so

20:16

how can I support myself? How can

20:18

I help myself right now? And

20:20

sometimes just even taking a breath just

20:24

oh okay, right, we

20:28

can do, you know, we can do this. Like

20:30

I know it's hard today Joe , but come on, like we'll

20:32

be okay. We can do this. I'm

20:35

just supporting myself rather than like

20:38

going into a rant. Yeah,

20:39

No I really like that asking, you know, what can I

20:41

do to help myself rather than going straight

20:43

to judgment, which I think is where a

20:45

lot of us tend to go to .

20:47

Yeah.

20:48

And when parents are coming to you, I'm really curious, are

20:50

there sort of certain themes that you see? Like why, what

20:52

are the most common reasons PE people come to see you when

20:54

it comes to parenting and sort of how do

20:56

you sort of address, address these

20:59

issues that they're coming to you with?

21:00

I would say the , the most common

21:03

question I probably ever get is

21:05

how do I get my children to listen to me? That's

21:08

probably the most common question, how

21:11

pa parents come for all sorts of different reasons. But

21:13

I think the thing that we struggle with

21:15

the most is this

21:19

idea that somehow

21:22

when we speak a child should respond

21:25

right in the way that we

21:27

want them to. So one

21:30

of the things I talk to parents about is, and

21:33

they'll come and say, oh my children don't listen, I

21:36

have to shout or I have to bribe

21:38

them or I just give up and I walk away

21:41

or, and it's so frustrating and

21:43

now me and my husband are arguing about it

21:46

and it leads to a lot of conflict

21:48

and it's all because we live busy

21:51

lives, most of the three busy lives we

21:53

are generally probably realistically

21:55

trying to put too much into a

21:57

day and we're often rushing for one thing

21:59

to another and we feel

22:02

overwhelmed. I would say most

22:04

people feel overwhelmed and

22:06

that then puts us into a

22:09

higher gear and we want to get things

22:11

done more quickly because

22:13

we're all got trying to get to this place

22:16

where we feel calm. Have

22:18

you ever noticed that you go through a day and we

22:20

want to do is to get to the place at

22:22

the end of the day where

22:24

you can just be calm?

22:27

Oh my goodness. Honestly, Joe , sometimes I've recently,

22:30

because with everything that's, you know, happening in the world, I'm

22:32

almost rushing bedtime, which is like one

22:34

of the most, like it should be for me it's like sacrosanct,

22:36

right ? You know, my daughter's at school, I'm at work, but

22:38

bedtime I can feel myself getting a bit agitated

22:41

because I wanna rush through it a bit more just because

22:43

it's eating into my time. So yeah, I

22:45

am always trying to sort of rush. There's this halian

22:48

period of time, it's about like eight 30 each evening

22:50

where I have like one hour to myself. So

22:52

yeah, I totally identify with that. Trying to get to that

22:54

magic window of time. That's for

22:57

me really hard.

22:59

In that hour you have for yourself, what is

23:01

your aim for that hour? Like what is it that you

23:03

are trying to get to

23:05

in that hour? Is it job study around the house

23:07

or is it No,

23:08

No, no. Just to be with me. To be still

23:11

usually with a book, usually with a cat, maybe

23:13

with a cup of tea. But it's just to be still,

23:16

just to be just a bit , I really like being

23:18

on my own. My husband is around, but

23:20

often with the weather being so nice I just, I go and sit in

23:22

the garden now. So yeah, for me it's always been

23:24

really important. I'm an only child not

23:26

making listen to a session about me, but I'm an only child so I'm

23:29

very used to my own time. For me, I like

23:31

to be alone time whether

23:34

and I could be alone with other people if that makes

23:36

sense as well. But something for me. Yeah,

23:38

Yeah. But I'm interested in that word still.

23:40

You know, you use that word stillness.

23:43

Yeah ,

23:43

Because we're all rushing around, right? I , I leave the house

23:45

very early in the morning, you know, school start

23:47

here very early, we leave at seven, I go

23:49

to school, I go straight onto Shaxi , I drive

23:51

to work, I get into the car park , I go to the office, I

23:53

go from meeting to meeting to event to event blah . Then I

23:56

do it all the way in the reverse and come home and

23:58

it's just non, it's like being on, you know, a house to wheel

24:00

or a treadmill or whatever other image

24:02

you wanna use and there is no stillness.

24:05

So for me still, and I do try to create

24:07

stillness in the way in

24:09

myself, I think I'm pretty, I'm

24:11

a pretty calm person, but still nothing compares to being

24:14

on your own on a sofa in the garden, in your pajamas with

24:16

a book <laugh>, nothing. You

24:18

can't beat that feeling. Yeah,

24:20

Parents might describe that word differently. They

24:22

might use a different word . Like

24:25

I want to be, yeah, on my own I

24:27

want to be quiet, I want not no one

24:29

to be demanding anything from me. We

24:32

describe it in different ways, but what's what

24:34

I've discovered over the years and it's actually all the

24:36

same thing pretty much that we're

24:38

trying to get to that place where

24:41

we feel in our, and it's actually an embodied

24:44

feeling, although we don't usually describe it like

24:46

that. But you said still, which

24:48

is an embodied feeling, right ? I wanna be,

24:50

I want my body to feel inside. I

24:52

want it to feel still. I want my head to feel

24:55

still. I want the thinking to

24:57

stop. You know? I just want everything

25:00

to feel still . And

25:02

you notice how when we get up in the morning, we're

25:04

already trying to get to that at

25:06

the end of the day. And

25:08

we might try to create little spaces

25:11

of it during the day, but as you've said, nothing beats

25:13

that feeling of I've done all my jobs and

25:15

now I can rest. You

25:18

know, this concept that we have to work before

25:20

we can rest like that rest can

25:23

only rest, can only follow work.

25:25

Yeah ,

25:26

I know I , I hate this whole culture that we've got of

25:28

this whole hustling, grinding. Like I've never subscribed

25:30

to that . It's massively odds with my

25:33

integral values and I dunno quite how I've

25:35

ended up in the corporate

25:37

world to be honest. I should be living on the side of a mountain

25:39

somewhere or on a beach. I , this is not,

25:41

yeah, with some chickens and some cats, I'm not really sure how

25:44

all been terrible this state show as this

25:46

is the case for many people, right? Um, you kind of end

25:48

up where you are and then you're like, well you know, I'm

25:50

here so how can I try and make the best

25:52

? It's kind of why I started the podcast, right? Because it's like there's

25:55

loads of people. So the vast majority of people, we

25:57

are not gonna give up day-to-day jobs or you

25:59

know, we can modify them and change them so they suit

26:01

us more. But you know, we can't all go and live on

26:03

a desert island, you know , like you referenced, it would be

26:05

great if we could, but most of us can't. So how

26:07

can we try and find meaning and purpose and

26:10

all that great stuff can't

26:12

And bring some of that into our lives. So

26:15

I think what most parents struggle with is

26:18

that if we can get all of these things done, if

26:20

the kids would just listen to me, if everyone would just do

26:22

what I asked, we'd get to that place a

26:25

lot quicker. And so the

26:27

problem with that is we rushed through the day

26:29

to get to a point at the end of the day that we've

26:31

all been craving, anybody

26:34

gets in the way of that. Like if a child

26:37

suddenly decides that there's a dress

26:39

update tomorrow and they tell me 10 minutes before

26:41

bed or I suddenly realize there's

26:44

something I haven't, you know, it's almost like grief comes,

26:46

it's like panic, right? Because I was

26:48

almost there and then you're just taking it away

26:50

from me. So we

26:53

were on this, on this path of trying to

26:55

get somewhere all the time and we have such an

26:57

attachment, like an emotional attachment

26:59

to this thing. And I think we believe

27:02

we have this belief if my children would

27:04

just listen to me and do what I said when

27:07

I asked them to, we'd all get to that

27:09

place a lot quicker and everybody would be okay.

27:12

But the problem with that is, is that's

27:14

not how children are, are wire children

27:17

aren't trying to get to that place. For

27:20

them. Bedtime is a separation. They

27:22

may want to get through school, but actually

27:25

children are naturally way more present than

27:27

we are. They're not always thinking of

27:29

the next thing, the next thing you know, we train

27:31

them to do that. As parents,

27:33

we train children to start thinking

27:36

about the next thing, the next thing, the next thing that

27:38

, but children are actually naturally

27:41

very mindful and the way

27:43

that they practice mindfulness is play.

27:46

That's when their most mindfulness play.

27:48

And if you think about all the ways we've stripped

27:50

play out of children's lives, so

27:53

we strip all the play out of their lives and

27:56

then we want to take them to mindfulness workshops

27:58

and yoga classes and things to teach

28:00

them the skills that they actually

28:03

naturally learn through play.

28:05

All we need to do is just put, play more, play back

28:08

in. There's loads of research,

28:11

Peter Gray has done a massive amount of research around

28:13

the increase in mental

28:16

health issues in children and

28:18

how that directly correlates to the decrease

28:21

in play in children in schools

28:23

and the world. And there's some really excellent

28:26

research around that. But one of the things I

28:28

often talk to parents about is how much time does

28:30

your child have to play each day and

28:33

what does what actually is play? And

28:35

it isn't going to a structured after school activity

28:39

that isn't play. I'm

28:41

not saying those things don't have value, I

28:43

, I wanna be clear, I'm not saying that

28:45

some of these things don't have value, but

28:47

if there's no time for play, if they're being done

28:49

instead of play, then that is

28:52

a problem. So, you

28:54

know, when we talk about children not listening, what

28:57

I actually discover when you talk to parents, what

29:00

they really mean is my child isn't

29:02

doing what I asked 'em to do when I , when I asked them

29:04

to do it. Because it doesn't mean the child

29:06

isn't listening. They may be listening, they just

29:08

don't. They either don't want to do what you've asked

29:10

them to do and frankly I don't really blame

29:13

them. 'cause lots of things we ask kids to do are

29:15

really boring and repetitive or

29:18

they're busy doing something that they want to

29:20

be doing , which is often play

29:23

and they don't want to come and do the thing that we

29:25

are asking them to do, which is put their shoes

29:27

on, pack their school bag , come and have dinner . You

29:30

know, all of these.

29:31

I do your bedroom, put your clothes away,

29:33

put your Lego away. Yeah . Boring

29:36

<laugh>. Yeah.

29:38

So our job is actually to develop

29:40

cooperation. It's not

29:42

about listening. I think that's

29:45

really important when you help parents understand it's

29:47

not getting your child to hear you

29:50

Ha what's the best way to get them to do that? Cooperation.

29:52

So cooperation. If you look at the science

29:54

of cooperation, it comes from

29:56

relationship. It exists

29:59

where there is a relationship where people

30:02

trust each other and are interested

30:04

in the relationship and want the relationship

30:06

to be successful. And you

30:09

know the great thing about children when they're young, do you know

30:11

they actually want to please us? It's

30:14

part of their DNA is to keep their parents happy.

30:17

It's not always a good thing for the child

30:20

by the way, but they want to keep us happy

30:22

so they naturally want to

30:24

help us and we sort of

30:27

get rid of some of those things because we bring

30:29

in things like we were

30:31

, we start rewarding them for doing things. It's one

30:33

of the worst things that you can do because you

30:36

actually remove their natural desire

30:38

to help you. Or we, we

30:41

bring in punishment, you

30:43

know, we love to use that word consequences, but most of

30:45

the time it's really a punishment. And

30:47

so we start to undermine some of these

30:49

natural things. But what

30:51

I always work on with parents first is, right, let's

30:54

work on the relationship that

30:56

you have with your child. I know you love them . That

30:59

isn't in question. I know they love you,

31:01

but it's not, that isn't itself

31:03

isn't enough. They also need, there

31:06

needs to be a sense of that this

31:08

person sees me. They're

31:10

not just focused on what I'm doing or not doing,

31:13

that my parents actually see who I am. They

31:15

see my feelings, they have

31:18

empathy and compassion for me.

31:20

And when I'm not immediately

31:22

jumping to the thing they've asked me to do, they

31:25

can show interest and come to me and

31:28

go, are you okay? Did you, do

31:30

you want some help with that? I

31:32

get a feeling that maybe you didn't hear me when I said

31:34

back 'cause I could see that you were busy with something. Is

31:37

that I know you don't really wanna do that. You

31:39

know, of course. Like who does want to pack

31:42

their school bag at six 30 in the morning, right?

31:44

And cooperation requires two people. So

31:47

it often means us also cooperating

31:49

with them. So parenting

31:51

is a relationship above all.

31:54

That's what it is. And when

31:56

we start to shift away from

31:58

it being a relationship and

32:00

more into like a management

32:03

management employee type of

32:05

thing. And I understand that I've

32:07

had three children, right? I , I like and

32:10

sometimes my kids would laugh at me and go, oh, mum's

32:12

going into sergeant major mode. And

32:14

then they'd laugh at that. They

32:17

were right because I'd, I'd start to get stressed

32:19

and , and then I'd start, you know, barking out

32:21

orders and they'd only have to say that

32:24

and we'd all laugh and I'd be like, I'm so sorry

32:26

guys . Like I'm really sorry.

32:28

Yeah but come on . I mean look , sometimes the sergeant major

32:30

are the right, you've got three kids. That's a lot of logistics

32:32

to get people out the door in the morning. You can't

32:34

be examining everyone's Lego creation at

32:37

6:30 AM when you've gotta be out in the house at seven.

32:39

I mean come on guys. No.

32:42

So it's not about, and actually

32:44

they're much better at coping in those

32:46

times of stress if most of the time

32:49

we are focused on building a relationship,

32:51

right? So don't do always

32:54

say to parents, the one thing I'd

32:56

really encourage you is don't do something

32:59

consistently that damages your relationship.

33:02

Because what will happen

33:05

is at some point you're gonna have

33:07

to come back and rebuild all of that. So do

33:09

your best to maintain the relationship as

33:12

much as you can prioritize that above

33:14

everything apps because,

33:17

because there will

33:19

come a point when they're not as interested

33:21

in the relationship as you are. And

33:23

when that happens, it becomes much harder.

33:26

When they're Niall , they crave

33:28

the relationship, they want it , it's the most important

33:30

thing in their life. It's to have a relationship

33:33

with you. But that isn't

33:35

always gonna be the case. So

33:38

once they get to 12,

33:42

13, 14, their relationship with you is not the most

33:44

important in to 'em anymore. Now

33:47

it's their relationship with their peers. And

33:50

in order for you to maintain your parental

33:52

influence, which is really

33:55

important for them and Ian

33:57

, you need to have a relationship

34:00

that allows you to have that influence. Because

34:02

otherwise the

34:04

only influence they're gonna have is their peers.

34:07

And that's a really risk in place for

34:09

them to be.

34:11

Yeah, very tap actually quite terrifying.

34:14

Also, I mean I'm talking about like what our job

34:16

is as parents. You once said to me something which

34:18

like totally blew my mind but did make perfect sense

34:20

when I reflected on it. You said to me, but Kelly,

34:22

our job isn't to make our

34:24

children happy. Which I just thought , what?

34:27

That's my only job is

34:30

to make her happy. It really

34:32

hit me like a ton of bricks when he said it to me. But

34:34

it did make perfect sense. Can you explain what you meant

34:36

by that? I mean, if that isn't our job as parents to

34:39

make our kids happy, what is our job?

34:41

I mean, happiness is impermanent, right? It

34:44

comes and goes. We know that we'd love

34:46

more of it, but it something that

34:48

comes in and out of our lives and can come

34:51

in big ways and small ways. So

34:53

I think our job is to create

34:56

a life for ourselves that

34:59

is our responsibility to

35:01

live and create a life for ourselves where

35:05

we have the opportunity

35:07

to experience happiness and

35:10

to see the happiness when it's here. I mean I

35:12

could look out the window right now and there's seagulls

35:14

flying around. I'm right up very high in

35:16

my house and there's , I can see seagulls

35:19

flying around. I could choose

35:21

to look at that and go, that's amazing.

35:23

Look at , look at those seagulls and

35:26

that's an opportunity for happiness,

35:29

right? Or I could go, those

35:32

seagulls make such a mess of the roofs 'cause

35:34

they poo all over them and then have to clean

35:36

it all off. So in that moment I sort of

35:38

have a choice. Do you get that? As to what I focus

35:41

on? So our job is to

35:43

do that for ourselves, to

35:46

create a life which has meaning if

35:48

, if you look at all the research

35:50

that's been done on happiness and a lot has

35:52

been done, one of the three sort

35:55

of key areas is a life of engagement.

35:57

So that's relationships. A

36:00

life where there is where we

36:02

get to experience lots of

36:04

different feelings and a sense of purpose.

36:07

So those are the three ingredients that bring happiness

36:10

into our lives. And that's been studied for

36:12

decades. Millions

36:14

of pa of pounds of dollars have been spent

36:17

studying happiness. Martin Seligman

36:19

has done some really interesting work on

36:21

happiness and in fact he did some consultancy

36:23

work for the Minister of Happiness in Dubai.

36:26

He come , he often comes to Dubai and to

36:28

support them around happiness. So our

36:31

job, definitely our responsibility to

36:33

create a life for ourselves like that. And

36:36

then role model to our children what

36:39

it is to live in this world, what

36:41

it is to create engagements.

36:44

And we show them that by, they learn

36:46

about relationships through their relationship

36:48

with us, but the only way

36:50

they will learn about relationships. But it's

36:52

a very important way that they

36:54

learn about relationships. So we show

36:56

them this is what relationships look

36:59

like and we either show them a

37:01

relationship that has compassion

37:04

in it and safe emotional safety and

37:07

security and emotional availability.

37:10

We are to show them that or we show them something

37:12

different. But whatever we show them, that's

37:15

what we're teaching them . So

37:17

I would say our job as a parent is

37:19

that we have a big responsibility to

37:22

live the best life that we can.

37:25

And it's all out there. You can learn what

37:27

that, how to do that more for

37:29

yourself and then show

37:32

that to your children through your daily

37:35

interactions with them and

37:37

show them how to be able to

37:39

support themselves as they

37:42

get older, to take care of themselves,

37:45

to find meaning in life.

37:47

Do

37:48

You think that by doing this, that's how you create that

37:50

kind of stronger emotional connection

37:52

between yourself and your child or all the

37:54

things you were talking about, about listening to them, appreciating

37:57

them, responding to them. That's

37:59

what helps. That's kind of one the at the center of

38:02

mindful parenting, right?

38:03

It is. I mean I think we

38:05

only have to, if you could think of one of one

38:07

relationship in your life, the one that has the most

38:09

meaning for you, or the one

38:12

that feels the safest, the most secure.

38:14

You know, it's so interesting. We think we have to

38:16

learn what a good relationship looks like. But

38:20

actually we already know inside

38:23

ourselves, we know what love

38:25

really feels like. Even if

38:28

we've never fully experienced a relationship

38:30

like that, we still have a knowingness

38:32

in our body what it feels like to love

38:35

and be loved without

38:37

conditions, without judgment. Where

38:40

we actually know that. And if

38:42

we've had the privilege of experiencing that relationship,

38:46

then we are probably more likely to be

38:48

able to repeat it. You're probably not listening to this podcast

38:50

to be honest. 'cause you're probably out there living your life

38:52

for the full and that's awesome, right?

38:55

If you didn't experience that as a child,

38:58

then your life's journey is really

39:00

relearning that you're not, it's not actually

39:02

something completely new. You're like relearning

39:06

what love really is.

39:09

So I think our job as a parent is

39:11

really to throw and teach our children about

39:14

love so that they

39:16

can love and be loved.

39:19

Yeah. So beautiful. And how hard is it

39:21

to do that when you weren't parented in

39:23

that way yourself? I mean, I

39:25

kind of feel like for our generation, you know, it was kind of that

39:28

it's , I mean, very different parenting approaches,

39:30

right? I'm not saying it was right or wrong, it

39:32

was just very different. You know how I

39:35

feel like we're the kind of generation that I've had of trying to relearn

39:37

all these different things and you know, even the

39:39

fact we're having conversations about this and this black , an

39:41

area that you specialize in is, I mean, you

39:44

know, my parents would just be baffled by the whole thing.

39:46

You know, no offense to them. They're great people. How

39:48

can we do it? Are we always gonna need

39:50

to have help to do that? 'cause it's, it seems like it's

39:52

quite a challenge.

39:53

I don't know that we always need help, but

39:56

I also think like supporting

39:59

ourselves and seeking support from others is

40:02

actually one of the ways we love ourselves. Right?

40:05

Do I, I have to do it all

40:07

on my own . I mean, I

40:09

don't really like to throw in, I'm

40:12

trying to stay away from jargon here, right?

40:14

Because I don't think it's that always that helpful. But

40:17

a lot of children develop independence

40:20

too young as a way of protecting

40:22

themselves. Because being dependent

40:25

on somebody doesn't feel safe, it doesn't

40:27

feel loving, it comes with a cost or

40:29

it feels painful because I get let down

40:31

or I get hurt. So I actually

40:34

dev , you know, I start to develop this idea

40:36

that I'll , oh , I'll take care of me. It's

40:39

like called ultra independence

40:41

or is another similar word

40:44

where I actually start

40:46

to parent myself, try

40:48

to parent myself when I'm young. But of course children don't

40:51

know how to parent themself . So

40:53

then we grow up into this world, we're like, well I've gotta be

40:55

able to do all of this on my own. And

40:57

if I need to ask for help, that means there's a , that's

41:00

there's something wrong with me and

41:02

I don't need to tell people and I need , and

41:05

even if I am struggling, don't

41:07

let people know. Pretend you're not. So

41:09

I would say I have

41:11

a much better relationship with help and

41:14

support than I used to. And

41:17

I'm much better at going, I

41:20

could do this on my own, but I

41:22

don't actually have to. So

41:25

why would I? And it's a privilege

41:27

to be able to get support.

41:29

It's a huge privilege. A lot of

41:31

people don't have that privilege.

41:34

So I'm going to

41:36

use it. And that help comes in all sorts

41:38

of falls . Could be a person, could

41:41

be an animal, it could be a

41:43

book, it could be a therapist,

41:45

it could be a really good friend, it could be

41:47

nature. But why do I

41:49

have to struggle? I mean, there are times

41:52

in our lives when we, when we struggle and

41:54

it's really hard. So struggling

41:57

is not a sign of , um, doesn't

42:00

mean I'm better because I've struggled.

42:02

Great point Joe . No it doesn't. And yet we

42:04

did it to ourselves, don't we?

42:05

Yeah. Because we learn often that actually

42:07

asking for help wasn't safe or

42:10

we wouldn't get the help we really needed.

42:12

Or we'd feel judged through the help or

42:14

something. And what I say to people is, if

42:17

you ask for help and the help you say isn't

42:19

the help you needed, that isn't about

42:21

you. That's not a sign

42:23

that there's something wrong with you. It

42:26

just means that wasn't the right type of help to

42:28

you at that time . So keep looking for

42:31

it.

42:31

Yeah. Find another source. No, definitely. Yeah.

42:34

I wanted to ask you about talking

42:37

and communicating to children about really big

42:39

issues. Like I think today

42:41

we're on, I think I wanna say day

42:43

49 or day 50 of the genocide

42:46

in Palestine. And we've

42:48

had conversations with our daughter about it. She's 10

42:51

and we , we found a great book, we read the book to her then

42:53

we've had lots of conversations about it. What

42:55

do you think is an age appropriate time to talk

42:57

to children about this and how

43:00

should we approach these kind of discussions?

43:02

You know, they're very big, frightening,

43:06

traumatic, inconceivable for us

43:08

as adults. So how do we approach this with kids?

43:11

Yeah, I feel like the

43:13

sadness when we talk about

43:15

this, that is something that we even should have to

43:18

talk to children about or that children should

43:20

be experiencing it, right? So I

43:22

just wanna presence that in the room. Like,

43:24

I wish we didn't have to talk about this. And

43:27

I think there's always a part of us that's like, we're

43:30

talking about having to talk to our children

43:32

about these things and

43:34

at the same time there are thousands

43:36

of children experiencing this . So

43:39

I wanted presence it by saying we're not ignoring that,

43:41

right? We are well aware that even

43:45

the fact that it's something that we talk about

43:47

rather than experience is

43:50

just heartbreaking. And I know that you

43:52

feel the same about that as well.

43:54

Yeah, 100% .

43:55

And yet we still live in a world where we have to

43:58

talk about some of these things. And that's

44:00

true. I mean, I definitely would

44:02

really ser if you are a parent living

44:04

in a house with children, you really

44:07

wanna seriously think about their exposure

44:10

to the news and social

44:12

media and TikTok , you

44:14

know, this is everywhere. And like that is,

44:17

I'm so grateful that people are talking

44:19

about this on social media and

44:21

also even an adult brain is

44:23

struggling with it at the moment. So children's

44:26

brains would be super overwhelmed by

44:28

it. So I would say really,

44:31

especially with children, certainly up

44:33

to adolescent years and

44:35

even early adolescents, you

44:38

wanna really think about other

44:40

than you, you know, you

44:42

wanna filter anything that they're receiving from

44:44

the external world, okay? Because you have

44:46

no control over what

44:49

might appear on this screen next. And

44:52

all of these social media things have a way

44:54

of giving you more of what you've seen. So

44:56

it can feel very overwhelming. So

44:59

I would say don't use those outlets

45:02

to give information because receiving

45:04

a piece of information from somebody that

45:07

you love and you know

45:09

that cares about you and is in person there

45:11

talking to you about it, is very

45:13

different to seeing it on

45:16

the screen or reading it has

45:18

a very different feel about it. So

45:21

, you know, he talks about reading a book. Yes. If

45:23

you're a parent who, I personally can't

45:26

give you a specific book recommendation,

45:28

there are lots of resources out there

45:31

that would give you those. But I think

45:33

if your parent feels like I need some support

45:35

with communicating this, yeah

45:38

, find a book that will help you talk

45:40

about it and then read the book with your child.

45:42

So however you're giving the information, do

45:44

it in person. Do it through conversation.

45:47

Don't overwhelm them, share

45:49

something, but think of it as like,

45:51

I'm just giving them a little drop. Just

45:54

a little drop. And if

45:56

they have questions, you know, say

45:58

to them, look, you can answer me a question anytime you might

46:00

hear something from somebody else that worries you,

46:03

that you don't understand, that doesn't make sense

46:05

to you, come and ask me.

46:08

There's no question that you cannot ask

46:10

me. Because if they don't, they can ask

46:12

you. They'll either ask somebody else or

46:15

they'll probably more likely just keep

46:17

it in their heads and worry about it. They

46:20

may or there might be children at school who

46:22

have more access to information and

46:25

they might share something with them. So,

46:27

you know, I'd very clearly say to them, if

46:30

you see something or you hear something that

46:34

you don't understand or upsets you,

46:37

you can come and ask me. You're not gonna be in trouble. I'm

46:39

not gonna tell you off for watching

46:42

something that you weren't meant to watch. Right?

46:44

Children are na naturally curious and

46:47

as much as we like to control what they receive

46:49

, we can't control it all . So

46:52

I think that's really important, letting them know they can ask

46:54

any questions and also

46:56

know you don't have to answer all their questions. They

46:59

might ask you a question and you might think,

47:01

well, if I answer that question, I'm gonna be giving you more

47:03

information than I might want to . So

47:06

you can say, you know, sweetheart, I

47:08

know that's a really difficult question, I know

47:10

that's important to you. I'm gonna answer some

47:12

of that . I'm not gonna answer all of it

47:15

. I would encourage you not to lie

47:17

to them because lying is

47:19

not great in a relationship. But

47:21

you can be honest and say, I feel

47:24

like right now that I can tell you a

47:26

little bit about that. But I'm not gonna tell you about

47:28

all of it because that's not something that

47:30

you need to know yet. And the yet

47:32

word is vital in every parent

47:35

for vocabulary. It's really useful

47:37

to use in lots of situations. This is not

47:39

something that I'm gonna share with you yet, or

47:42

this is not something that you're ready to do yet. Because

47:44

it gives the brain the information that this

47:47

will change at some point in the future. So

47:50

it's not a no, it's not

47:52

a like a hard no, it is just not,

47:54

this isn't the right time yet.

47:56

Yeah , that's a great point. But I think, 'cause I'm, I'm

47:59

in a kind of a sweet spot because my daughter is 10,

48:01

so we don't have a connected tv, she

48:03

doesn't have a phone. So we have

48:05

been able to kind of , we have been able to

48:07

control it to all intents and purposes. But you make

48:09

such a good point about going to school and Ming and I

48:11

know they're having conversations about it at school, which I really

48:13

welcome. You know, I want 'em to be able to talk about it. You

48:16

know , my daughter came home the other day and said to me, told me, without

48:18

me asking all the brands that we need to boycott, I

48:21

was like, okay. And she's 10. I was like, okay, this is

48:23

a great conversation. We're gonna have a conversation

48:25

now about our values and how we live them and

48:28

standing up for what you believe in. So it's actually triggered,

48:30

you know, some really powerful conversations in our

48:32

house. And I also wondered how, I

48:35

mean my daughter, and I'm sure you'll, you'll understand

48:37

this, you've probably been the same. My daughter has seen me be quite sad

48:39

recently. She doesn't normally see me be sad. I

48:42

couldn't even tell you the last time she told me cry, she saw

48:44

me cry. But I have been feeling sad. I've

48:47

gone through everything. Like everyone has sad anger , good . I

48:49

mean, I'm really quite irritable. And the other day

48:51

I said to her it was bedtime. And I said, look, I'm really

48:53

sorry but I'm really tired and I'm

48:55

really sad tonight. So can we

48:58

just have a cuddle and we'll read our book and then like,

49:00

let's, let's try and have a really relaxed bedtime, you

49:02

know, not jumping all over the bed like we do sometimes because

49:04

it has to feel so heavy. And, and she said, why? 'cause

49:07

she doesn't , why? And I just said, I'm just, I

49:09

can't stop thinking about all the children in Palestine. So

49:12

I'm being a little more open with her than I might have been.

49:14

And she's seeing more than she might have seen before. And I,

49:17

I'm hoping that that's okay because I'm

49:19

showing her vulnerability.

49:20

Yeah. Does she also see you come out of

49:22

the sadness?

49:23

She does. I'm not always in it, but I mean, goodness

49:25

at the , at the end of some days it's worse , worse than others,

49:27

but yeah.

49:28

Yeah, it's really hard. I would say it's

49:31

absolutely okay for them to see our emotions.

49:34

I think what we need to be mindful is , is they see that

49:36

the emotions shift as well. It's

49:38

like if they witness an argument, you

49:41

also want them to witness the making up that

49:43

we made up, right? Because

49:45

otherwise there's no ending to

49:48

it, there's no movement, we're just in

49:50

it. And now everybody seems to be okay, but I don't

49:52

really know why. I dunno how that happened. So

49:55

remember, they only get the information

49:57

that you show them. So if you're only showing them

50:00

limited information about your feelings,

50:02

that's actually all they see . And they don't

50:04

have the ability to think about what might

50:06

be happening behind closed doors

50:09

or they'll just make something up in their mind. And

50:11

that's, you know, children making things up

50:13

in their mind in a non play-based

50:16

way isn't great for them . It can be quite stressful.

50:19

So of course it's okay for

50:21

you to show that you are sad and if you

50:23

know, if you're a bit irritable and you are aware, like

50:26

I know you didn't do this, but say for example

50:28

you shouted at one of your children 'cause you just

50:30

see something on Instagram and your

50:32

body went into fight without

50:34

you even knowing. And the next thing you know you are shouting

50:37

right. Well you're human and that's

50:39

going to happen. The important thing is that

50:41

afterwards that you acknowledge that

50:43

and you say, I'm so sorry, I

50:45

was upset and I shouting that wasn't okay.

50:48

And I'm really sorry that that happened because

50:50

otherwise children don't know why you shouted.

50:53

All they know is that you shouted,

50:55

Yeah, we can't expect 'em to join the dots all the time, can

50:57

we ?

50:57

No, they can't join the , and if they do join the

51:00

dots, they're gonna join them in the way that a child does.

51:02

Okay? So who knows what dots they're gonna

51:05

join up together and

51:07

children are more likely to blame themselves than

51:10

anything else. So I

51:12

think sadly, you know, our children are

51:14

gonna see a lot of adults having emotions

51:16

right now. And I think that's

51:19

life. And that's true and that's real. And

51:22

the important thing is that we show them there

51:25

is, they are still allowed to

51:27

live and we are still living our lives as

51:29

hard as that is. And that I'm

51:31

sad. And maybe talk about what the things I

51:33

do to help myself when I'm sad. Start

51:36

to share some of your resources that you

51:38

have to support yourself. Talk

51:41

about the things that might help you when you feel

51:44

a bit sad or that you might,

51:46

ways that you take care of yourself when you

51:48

feel sad or angry. 'cause that's also

51:50

really good learning for them to

51:53

see. These are things that we can do

51:55

to help ourselves when we

51:57

feel sad. Oh ,

51:58

That's a great idea. I love that. Thank

52:00

you . I will do some of that . I've been doing quite so

52:02

much of it to be honest. Joe , I know you're

52:04

a huge reader and you're sat in front of a bookshelf,

52:07

which makes me terribly excited. Can you

52:09

tell me about some books, a couple of books

52:11

that maybe have made a real difference in your life? I

52:13

mean , are there some that you give as gifts to people? Could

52:15

you , you have to pick a couple and I know you , you read a lot,

52:18

but if you could just pick a couple for me, what would they be?

52:20

Oh yeah, that's such a lovely question . I have

52:22

another massive bookcase over on one

52:25

five that you can't, or that you can't see. I

52:27

mean there's a couple of books probably on this bookshelf

52:29

behind me that would definitely come into

52:31

that era. There's a book at the top there.

52:33

I dunno if you could see. It's the Purple book and

52:36

it's called Why Love Matters by

52:38

Sue Gerhart . It's

52:40

a really beautiful, and this is one that

52:43

I often give as a gift. This

52:45

actually isn't my original copy 'cause

52:47

I often give away Marianne and then I like have

52:49

to go and buy it again. If I've ever

52:51

been invited to a baby shower, this is the book that

52:53

I would take along. Or

52:56

new parents or even

52:58

somebody who's had a baby. I mean, I wouldn't

53:00

give it to them in that first crazy weeks

53:03

where they're beside them. But

53:05

it could be a book that you could read while you were feeding or

53:07

something like that. It's a really beautiful

53:09

book because it's all about love

53:12

really. And it's all about the

53:14

way we love children and how

53:16

we show love and the importance of

53:19

love and how love shapes

53:21

a baby's brain. So there's quite

53:23

a bit of neuroscience in

53:25

there and it talks about, it's that , there's a quote

53:27

from this book actually that I often use when I'm

53:29

talking about mindful parenting, which

53:32

is, you know that our job as parents

53:34

is to teach our children how

53:37

to feel and what

53:39

to do with their feelings, which is really what we've been talking about

53:41

all the way through this, right? To

53:43

teach them what feelings are we

53:45

give them language for feelings, we show

53:47

them how we behave

53:50

when we have feelings, we show them that feelings

53:52

come and go. We show them how

53:54

to support ourselves and we're having feelings.

53:56

So we teach them how to feel and

53:59

what to do with their feelings. And

54:01

I think that is such a, an

54:03

amazing thing , gift to give

54:06

to our children. Like these things you're having all

54:08

day long, you know, everybody has them and, and

54:10

sometimes they're amazing and sometimes they

54:13

feel really hard, but there isn't

54:15

any such thing as a good feeling or a bad feeling,

54:18

but it's language that isn't true,

54:20

right? It's made up language

54:23

and there's quite a bit of sciencey

54:26

stuck in here . You know , I'm a bit of a neuroscience geek

54:28

as well. So there is some science stuff in

54:30

here for those of you that love the science,

54:32

but it's written in a really beautiful way. And

54:36

it sort of came out at the time when

54:38

parenting really started to shift away

54:40

from behavior management more

54:42

into relationship. I'm

54:44

just looking at when it was published 2004,

54:47

God , it sounds like a fantastic book. That's not what I've

54:49

heard of before. So I'll dig it out. Super.

54:51

Yeah, it's a beautiful book. So that's one that

54:54

I often recommend and give.

54:57

I mean, I would say anything by

54:59

Gal Mattai and I've got all of

55:01

his books. I would say

55:04

if you really, you know, for people who maybe

55:06

want to do a little bit, want

55:08

to start to learn how to support

55:10

themselves, there is a

55:12

more recent book, which I think

55:15

has some really beautiful work

55:18

around . We talked about it earlier. What if you didn't

55:20

grow up in that way? What if you weren't parented

55:22

in that way? And I think I

55:24

really like this book.

55:27

It's called How to Do the Work by

55:30

Dr . Nicole Lapper . What

55:32

a great title. It says Recognize your

55:34

pattern , heal from your Past and Create Yourself.

55:37

One of the things I really like about it is she

55:39

talks quite a bit about her own journey in

55:41

this and her own pain of

55:43

having to remove herself

55:46

from some of the relationships in her life that

55:48

really hurt her and how difficult

55:50

that was for her and I . The other

55:52

thing I really love about it is she talks

55:54

about the fact that look for people to

55:56

support you on your journey, but nobody's journey is

55:59

the same. Everybody's journey is different. There

56:01

isn't like a manual that

56:03

will work for everyone. So

56:06

really start to discover what

56:08

helps you and who helps you

56:10

and and I would say that very much, I

56:13

mean this is a recent book. I think this only came out

56:15

maybe a year ago. Yeah, 2021.

56:17

When I read there , I could definitely see

56:19

a lot of parallels of in her life, of

56:22

my own life, of

56:24

the way that I came to this work.

56:26

Sounds

56:26

Fantastic.

56:27

I would say if you want to start to do

56:30

a bit of work on yourself and

56:32

it's set out really good chapters and

56:35

like you can really get into it quite practical.

56:37

Yeah, it is practical, but it's,

56:40

I feel like it's very authentic. I , I feel like

56:42

she's authentic as well.

56:45

I like her stuff. That's

56:46

Fantastic. That's two super recommendations.

56:49

Thank you so much. They sound great. Yeah,

56:51

So those, those two are

56:54

, can I suggest one relationship

56:56

book? Like if you want to work on your

56:59

marriage or your relationship or

57:01

something like that,

57:02

Please. Yeah, of course. Because

57:04

I have a whole shelf of those as well. I'm

57:07

gonna give you a modern one and it's

57:09

written by a man <laugh> . Okay. So

57:12

I offer , recommend this to

57:14

clients when I work with couples. I offer

57:16

, recommend this for the husbands

57:18

or the men in the relationship to ring . 'cause

57:21

for some reason they seem to think if it's written by

57:23

a man, it's more ,

57:24

Of course,

57:25

I think maybe they just like the tone of it. Okay.

57:27

And this is called The New Rules of Marriage

57:30

by Terrence Real . I haven't heard this , but

57:32

you don't have to be married. Okay. You might just be

57:34

in a relationship. Yeah , it's very,

57:37

very interesting.

57:39

What makes it different? Jake ? What's so great about it?

57:42

I think he's really caught the

57:44

way that relationships have changed and the pressure

57:46

on relationships today. I mean I could easily recommend

57:48

you any book by Esther Perel . He

57:51

has a very similar outlook to her.

57:53

I mean I've hired , I've underlined the

57:56

line on the very first page that says

57:59

the roles of men and women have dramatically

58:01

shifted and so have our expectations

58:03

about relationships. We have never wanted

58:06

more from one another, more passion,

58:09

more support, more connection. But

58:11

our new desires have not been matched

58:13

by a corresponding new set of

58:15

skills. And I think that's really true. And

58:18

she talks about, Esra talks about that

58:20

a lot, that we are

58:22

looking for more and more and more from

58:24

one person than we've ever

58:26

looked for before. And

58:29

is that realistic? Is it even possible? And

58:32

most of us probably don't even have those skills to

58:34

be able to give those things. So

58:37

there's a lot of pressure on relationships

58:40

Of course.

58:41

So yeah, I'll throw that one in because it's a bit

58:43

different.

58:44

No, it sounds fantastic and nice to have something by a man

58:46

as you say, you know, good to include someone

58:48

in there . Um, I mean we're

58:50

coming to the end now , Joe and I do like to ask a couple of big

58:52

questions as we get to the end of my conversations. Why

58:56

do you think we're here on earth? What's our purpose?

58:59

I mean, I suppose one of the word that comes into my

59:01

mind is that , is caretakers. Our

59:03

job is to take care. I

59:06

feel like most of the time we're just focusing

59:08

what we can take from the world. And

59:11

I know you've got cop coming up

59:14

soon in Dubai. What can

59:16

I take? What can I get? What can I give to my,

59:18

you know, I feel like we've moved way

59:20

too far away from a community

59:23

based into a very individualistic society.

59:26

And I think we are not meant to live on

59:28

this earth alone . We're meant

59:30

to live together and support

59:33

each other. And now I think our

59:35

role is to take care of the earth and to

59:37

hope and to leave it better than

59:40

it was before we were here. So in

59:42

some, how do we do that in some way? And it won't

59:44

look the same for each of us. I

59:47

want to be clear, I'm not trying to say never

59:49

take anything for yourself. I , that's not what

59:51

I mean. But I think it is important that we,

59:54

for me, one of my se a

59:57

sense of purpose is that

59:59

I haven't lived a life that is

1:00:01

just individualistic,

1:00:04

that is only focused on myself. That

1:00:07

there is something, some sense

1:00:09

of community that I've

1:00:12

created somewhere sense

1:00:13

Of care, some sense of service .

1:00:15

Yeah, some sense of service. And

1:00:17

I've taken care of . And I think for me, honestly, that's

1:00:20

where mindfulness comes back in again for

1:00:22

me. Like be conscious

1:00:24

of the choices you make. Think

1:00:26

about how you live your life, not

1:00:29

in a critical judgey

1:00:31

way. Because actually the less judgmental we

1:00:33

are, the more compassionate we

1:00:36

are . So I can be compassionate

1:00:38

to myself and others. I'm

1:00:41

a vegan, I have been for about eight years

1:00:43

and that came about very much through

1:00:46

mindfulness actually. When you

1:00:48

really start to think about the way you are living your

1:00:50

life, it just doesn't

1:00:53

feel right to me to

1:00:57

eat other living creatures. And

1:00:59

I'm sure there's people that will hate me saying that and will

1:01:01

super uncomfortable and won't

1:01:04

agree at all.

1:01:04

It's one of those things I can't

1:01:06

believe when I tell people I'm kinda like 99%

1:01:09

vegan. And when I tell people like, I just don't tell people

1:01:11

anymore. Or I use the words plant-based. 'cause

1:01:13

it seems to be less inflammatory that there's

1:01:15

so , like , it's just something that I , you could tell people about

1:01:17

the way you live your life and people wanna attack you for

1:01:19

it. It's just the bizarrest thing.

1:01:21

But I love that you said about being mindful because what

1:01:24

brought me to that point, I've been vegetarian for

1:01:26

a long time. It was one of Oprah's podcasts

1:01:28

and it was called Mindful Eating. And I thought

1:01:30

it was all gonna be about, you know, thinking about

1:01:32

what you eat like on , you know, not gorging.

1:01:34

And actually no , it wasn't, it was a woman who

1:01:36

was talking about exactly what you said. She said, if you

1:01:39

actually think about the effect you are

1:01:41

having on another living being

1:01:43

and the feelings that it has and

1:01:45

the fear that it has as it goes and

1:01:47

it's sentient and it knows, and then

1:01:50

you're gonna take that energy and you're

1:01:52

gonna eat it. So it was just like a completely

1:01:54

different way of thinking of mindfulness to me. And I was just like

1:01:56

, that was like the final push that I needed. I was like, wow, okay.

1:01:59

Yeah. Got it. Oprah's mind was

1:02:01

blown as well . 'cause Oprah's like, you know, she's trying to

1:02:03

live a, she's trying to live a life of service and, but

1:02:05

she loves meat and she was kind of a bit horrified

1:02:08

by all and she was kind of joking, saying,

1:02:10

well what about if I eat Turkey? And all was like, you're

1:02:12

missing the point. And it's not about the health benefits, no,

1:02:15

it's about the energy and the

1:02:17

,

1:02:17

It's the energy that you are putting into

1:02:19

your body and where that

1:02:21

that's come that where that's coming from.

1:02:23

And I find myself more and more drawn to

1:02:26

that, to being more connected

1:02:28

around energy. I think particularly living

1:02:31

back in a place where we have seasons again

1:02:34

and that you really see

1:02:36

how energy shifts throughout the year. And

1:02:38

I'd sort of forgotten that. I think. So

1:02:41

I think we have a responsibility to take

1:02:43

care of this world. And

1:02:46

I was reading an article this morning about the use

1:02:48

of private jets in

1:02:50

one year and it's just horrific.

1:02:53

They, it was the something like 11

1:02:56

people used up, you

1:02:58

know, the , the allowance of 40,000,

1:03:00

the equivalent of 40,000 people by

1:03:03

using private jets . I mean, at what

1:03:05

point are we gonna go? It's

1:03:07

not necessary.

1:03:08

Well isn't it , we're here trying to, you know,

1:03:10

not eat any meat and do a little bit of recycling at

1:03:13

my bin <laugh> . Well , Jeff , Jeff

1:03:16

gets on another, sorry to call out Jeff. You

1:03:18

know, obviously I do order from Amazon, but you know, Jeff,

1:03:20

come on. <laugh> .

1:03:22

Yeah.

1:03:23

Drop in the ocean, isn't it? Yeah . <inaudible>

1:03:25

A big push towards eating,

1:03:28

you know, shopping locally, buying things.

1:03:30

And I know that's so difficult when you live somewhere

1:03:32

like Dubai where it's very hard to

1:03:35

access things that are local. But

1:03:37

I, I think we just, we do the best we can and

1:03:40

we do it consciously. I

1:03:42

think often we become unconscious as

1:03:44

a way of removing ourselves from the pain

1:03:46

of being conscious. And yes, being

1:03:48

conscious ca does bring pain at times, but

1:03:51

it also means I'm actually in my body living

1:03:53

my life in this world, making

1:03:56

choices for myself.

1:03:58

God , what a great way of putting it. I love it . And

1:04:00

if you had to look back on your career and your

1:04:02

life and your , your sort of personal journey that you've

1:04:04

been been on, what's your greatest achievement?

1:04:07

I would say probably

1:04:09

one of the things I'm proud of and

1:04:11

I'm , I'm , I'm proud of lots of things. Okay.

1:04:14

But, and it's hard to look at it. I

1:04:16

could talk until the cows came home about

1:04:18

all the people I'm proud of in my life. It's

1:04:21

much harder to direct that lens towards

1:04:23

myself. I think one of the things I'm proud of

1:04:25

was, you know, leaving the

1:04:28

workplace and saying on my own business,

1:04:31

like I'm proud of that because it was something

1:04:33

that I thought about doing for a prolonged

1:04:35

time when I did it. When I left,

1:04:38

I worked as a school counselor for many years

1:04:41

and I left that environment and set up

1:04:43

the business that was called Mindful Parenting.

1:04:46

And at that time, parenting

1:04:48

wasn't something that, it wasn't being

1:04:50

talked about. There weren't parents and coaches.

1:04:52

And I'm so grateful all those people have

1:04:55

come, right? I think it's great, but

1:04:57

those things didn't exist then. And

1:05:00

I remember talking about it and people like, parents

1:05:03

aren't gonna want to come and talk to you about

1:05:06

parenting. Like, like nobody's

1:05:09

gonna want to do that. And, and what's this

1:05:11

mindful parenting thing anyway,

1:05:13

what even is that? And I really

1:05:16

felt so strongly from all the work I'd

1:05:18

done with children, that

1:05:21

if you really want to improve a child's

1:05:23

life, don't work with the child, work with the

1:05:25

parent that has the biggest impact

1:05:27

on that child's life. So

1:05:29

I really felt strongly having spent 10 years working

1:05:32

with children and adolescents, the

1:05:34

the greatest service I

1:05:36

could do for them was

1:05:38

to support parents and

1:05:41

to do it in a way that wasn't clinical

1:05:43

right? That wasn't medical, that

1:05:45

wasn't like, I'm better than

1:05:47

you. I know more than you let come

1:05:49

here and let me rescue you and let me tell you how

1:05:51

to be a good parent. I didn't want to do it

1:05:54

from that. Wanted to do it from a perspective of,

1:05:56

hey listen, there's some things I've learned and

1:05:58

they've really helped me and they

1:06:00

might help you so if you are interested, come

1:06:03

and we'll share and we'll sit together. And in those

1:06:05

times it was mainly group-based learning

1:06:08

that we did. And I still love that. I love group-based

1:06:10

learning. So I really want to do it from

1:06:12

that perspective. I'll share some stuff with you and

1:06:15

you may take something from it that might help you

1:06:17

and that's great. So I think it

1:06:20

was pretty scary to work, to move from

1:06:22

having a salary every month

1:06:24

and knowing what you working hours were. And I

1:06:27

still miss all the school holidays that I used to

1:06:29

get off and then going

1:06:32

into basically having a new baby.

1:06:34

'cause starting a business is like having a new baby. It's

1:06:37

like having a newborn. And I

1:06:39

look back now and I think I'm

1:06:41

not even really sure what pushed me ultimately

1:06:44

to do that, but I'm probably the

1:06:46

most proud of that. Gosh,

1:06:47

What is in so incredible, if thank goodness

1:06:49

you did, Joe , my goodness, we'd all be lost without

1:06:51

you. And yeah, what a powerful, powerful

1:06:53

achievement to end on. I love it. Thank you

1:06:55

so much.

1:06:56

Thank you. Thanks Kelly . And

1:06:58

Thank you for the conversation. Joe , it's been amazing to chat

1:07:00

to you. We've , I think we've covered so much and it

1:07:02

was just such a fantastic conversation. I really enjoyed

1:07:04

it.

1:07:04

Thanks. Your great questions.

1:07:07

Thanks so much for listening to the Good Intentions

1:07:09

podcast. You can find links

1:07:12

to issues and to books that we discussed in the

1:07:14

show notes. And you can look for the podcast on

1:07:16

Instagram. It's good intentions, UAE.

1:07:19

Please do make sure you subscribe to the podcast and

1:07:21

if you enjoyed this conversation, I'd so appreciate a

1:07:23

review on whatever platform you're using. It

1:07:25

helps more people find out about the podcast. See

1:07:28

you next time.