0:01

Hi, thanks for listening to the Tony

0:04

Robbins podcast. This is just a quick

0:06

note about this episode in case you'd

0:08

rather watch and see the video of

0:10

this conversation, which includes behind the scenes

0:13

footage with Tony, Sage, and me, Mary

0:15

B. And that's

0:17

found at youtube.com backslash Tony

0:19

Robbins live. You'd

0:22

like to listen, you're in the right place. Welcome

0:28

everybody to the Tony Robbins podcast. I'm Tony

0:30

Robbins and I'm actually running this podcast for

0:32

change, but I'm

0:34

joined by my amazing cohorts, Sage

0:37

Robbins and Mary Buckeye. And

0:39

we thought, you know, in honor of Mother's Day, it

0:42

might be nice to share some of the

0:44

principles, the strategies, the tools, some of our

0:46

successes, some of our failures. I don't think

0:48

they're really failures, but learnings that we've had

0:51

in raising our daughter who's now going to

0:53

be just turning three years old. And we're

0:55

so thrilled with the young human

0:57

she's become. And I'm sure most parents feel

0:59

that way. And you know, she's

1:01

special born that way. You think you need to come

1:04

in with a certain amount, but we've been very conscious

1:06

and we always say that the secret is conscious parenting.

1:09

And one of our friends, Jesse was saying the other

1:11

day, well, what's that look like? You know, what is

1:13

conscious parenting? What is that really? What does that really

1:15

look like? And so we thought it might be really

1:17

nice in honor of Mother's Day to actually

1:19

walk through some of those principles, some of

1:21

those distinctions, because whether you're already a parent

1:23

right now, or you're considering being a parent

1:25

someday, or you're the child of

1:27

a parent, meaning you're human, these

1:30

principles, I think can be really helpful

1:32

in any interaction with any human being,

1:34

but especially with little people as

1:37

we're learning because it's an art and

1:39

we don't pretend of all the answers, but

1:41

we're living in a different world also. I

1:43

think it's useful to contribute because, you

1:45

know, there's so many different forms of relationship, the

1:47

classic relationship of a husband and wife that are

1:50

together forever, or

1:52

good for bad for whatever is not really the

1:54

standard anymore. In fact, for the first time in

1:56

history in this country in the United States, there

1:58

are more single parents. and more blended

2:01

family, his, hers, and ours, than any

2:03

time in history. And then there are

2:05

all these new types of relationships, co-parenting,

2:07

obviously, same-sex relationships, and then there's our

2:09

modern family. What do you call this?

2:11

That's right, our constellation, our modern family,

2:13

which is always here. So we

2:16

just thought it'd be really interesting because

2:18

it also affects your intimate partner's relationships,

2:20

the people you love most when

2:23

you have a child, because it affects

2:25

everything. And I was having a

2:27

conversation with a dear friend of ours, he's

2:29

a doctor, and his name is

2:31

Dr. Stephen Cowan, and he's also a pediatrician,

2:35

and he's written, he's dealt with thousands of

2:37

children. He's really brilliant. He wrote a book

2:39

called Water Child, Fire Child, I believe it

2:41

is. And I was talking

2:43

to him about this, and he's saying, Tony, you

2:45

know, I see this happen in so many couples.

2:47

He goes, having a child's like throwing a grenade

2:50

into a relationship, because whatever you've established gets blown

2:52

apart as you start dealing with all these new

2:54

pieces. So we thought it might be nice to,

2:56

you know, bring you not the answers,

2:58

but a few of them. In fact, we even hesitated.

3:00

We've all talked about, you know, maybe we should wait

3:03

till we do an entire course and wait till she's

3:05

older. But you know, I've got five

3:07

kids and five grandkids. You've all lived your lives

3:09

with your family. And we have our daughter here

3:11

of coaching three. We thought, well, why wait? Let's

3:13

just share some of the principles. Not perfect. These

3:15

are not like exact, but we think

3:17

hopefully they'll be helpful for you. And in support

3:19

of this, I'm gonna play the role of interviewer

3:21

here since it's Mother's Day. It'll be Mother's Point

3:23

of View. I don't keep my mouth shut, because

3:25

I thought this would go for hours and hours.

3:28

You don't have a little too hard on that one. I

3:31

know. That is sick of me. Funny

3:33

because it's true. And it gets. True

3:36

is true. So ironically, I

3:38

went to both these and I said, okay, I'm gonna

3:40

be the interviewer. I'm not gonna do content here. You

3:42

guys do that component because of Mother's Point of View.

3:44

I know we obviously share it because we work together

3:46

on these principles. But I said, would you

3:48

guys please give me some questions that you'd like me to ask

3:50

that will set you up to answer what you want to share

3:52

with. And neither one of them did

3:54

any questions, but to be fair, this

3:56

is real life. You have all your principles. And

3:58

last night at midnight. We're having a blast. We're bouncing back

4:01

and forth. What do you want to share? There's so much you want

4:03

to share. And then

4:05

the monitor goes off and our daughter was throwing

4:07

up. And so two moms went in

4:09

a full year and went up there

4:12

and I just got to be the witness to it

4:14

at all. And they just did their magic with her.

4:16

And of course she's great today. Everything's wonderful, but it's

4:19

certainly created for an interesting night right before we went

4:21

to do the series, but she was totally appropriate and

4:23

perfect. So having said that, welcome to

4:25

the podcast. Sage Robbins, my buddy Pearl.

4:27

Thank you, Tony Robbins. Welcome to the podcast. Hi

4:30

Sage, thank you, Tony. Love you guys. You're

4:33

the two best moms I know. So when you

4:35

think about conscious parenting, define

4:37

that for people the way you perceive it. And

4:39

also just give us some insight as to what's

4:41

the purpose of it? Why be a conscious parent?

4:44

What's the benefit? Why are we going about all

4:46

this? Why do we put so much time and

4:48

energy into this besides raising our child? Well,

4:50

you mentioned about a friend of ours, Jesse,

4:53

and we were having a conversation with him the

4:55

other day on Zoom. And

4:58

we had mentioned that we were gonna have

5:00

this conversation here today in this podcast. And

5:02

he's like, a conscious parent. He said, I

5:05

want to be a conscious parent. And

5:07

he said, I didn't even know what that means

5:09

or what does that look like? And that really

5:11

struck me. And the truth is,

5:13

in order to be conscious, we're

5:16

all unconscious in a moment. And I think that consciousness

5:20

is really being awake in

5:22

the moment to ourselves, because

5:25

it's really the willingness to

5:28

have self-awareness and self-reflection

5:30

and self-responsibility so that

5:32

we can bring our most present, connected

5:34

self to the table. And

5:36

so it's a privilege to be here. And

5:39

thank you for all of you who are

5:41

tuning in, Mary. Thank you for being here,

5:43

Joan. Thank you for being here. Because

5:45

I really believe that this is a way forward.

5:47

You know, if you look at the generation before

5:49

us, they had their

5:51

gifts, they had their strengths. Here

5:54

we are, human beings, making our

5:56

way in the world. And yet

5:58

there's always those iterations. And if

6:01

I really look at fundamentally the core

6:04

of conscious parenting, it's

6:06

moving from a fear-based

6:08

model to more of

6:10

an awareness-based model. And

6:13

so rather than, careful, watch out,

6:15

don't do that. Honey,

6:17

be mindful. And what's

6:20

so extraordinary is our daughter now reflects that

6:22

back to us. She always says, Mommy, be

6:24

mindful. And I

6:26

find that just fascinating. Or

6:29

the notion of

6:32

punishment or positive discipline,

6:34

holding a line. And so

6:36

we're going to discuss that further. But

6:38

really, the core of it, I really

6:40

look at it, is really moving from

6:42

a fear-based, I told you

6:44

to do this, listen to me. And

6:47

that's what that looks like. That's what that feels

6:49

like. And you realize right away that

6:51

what you say to her, Boomerang's right

6:53

back. Yes, it's true. In a hurry. So

6:56

if you use the language of like,

6:58

don't do this, don't do that.

7:01

It's not long before tomorrow she's saying, Mommy, don't

7:04

do that. And

7:07

it's like, okay, so you do, you really have

7:09

to be what you want them to be because

7:12

it'll come right back to bite you. It's

7:14

true. So the difference between

7:17

be careful versus be mindful.

7:20

Another way to think about it is the

7:22

level of stress is most people are in survival.

7:24

Because in the beginning, they're in a relationship with

7:26

someone else and they're trying to figure that out.

7:29

And it's brand new, it's easy when it's brand new. And

7:31

in the beginning, right, it's all chemistry. And then all of

7:33

a sudden, all your triggers come up, all of your past

7:35

histories, you have to work all that stuff out for those

7:37

who are willing to do that and make that happen. And

7:39

now you throw the grenade in of a child, and then

7:41

most people at work, and I got my relationship and this

7:43

child, and what am I supposed to do? And

7:46

honey, you have great language on this. We were talking the

7:48

other day, it's like, it's really about

7:50

creating a beautiful human being.

7:53

And I think that's the

7:56

ultimate outcome. You can

7:58

look at it from a buying. perspective of, you

8:01

know, a good human, raising a good

8:03

human, which that's a factor, but then

8:05

I'll also presuppose is that there's bad

8:07

children. And that hasn't

8:10

been my experience. They really

8:13

feel that a true awakening

8:15

is creating an atmosphere, creating

8:17

an environment that helps to foster children

8:21

to actually live from their nature,

8:24

which is beautiful. And so it's

8:26

creating a collective awakening

8:29

of or a collective movement

8:31

of raising beautiful human beings,

8:33

internally beautiful. It's

8:36

love, it's caring, it's good, it's kind of

8:38

autonomy at the same time feeling whether people

8:40

feel it's a desire to serve others. I

8:42

think this leads to what I'd like to

8:45

do, which is to, if you think about

8:47

this, is not being stress-based, not being fear-based,

8:49

not installing that in your child without meaning

8:51

to, because kids don't listen to what we

8:53

say, they do what we do, they demonstrate

8:56

it, to, okay, more conscious awareness and

8:58

it can be more enjoyable. And not everything's life

9:00

and death, there's certain things you gotta hold the

9:02

line on. But one of the things that's really

9:04

important in life is that most of us, who

9:07

anyone's achieved anything knows, you rarely just bump into

9:09

great ideas or great solutions, you've got to pursue

9:11

them. You have to decide, what do I want?

9:13

And we made decisions about what we wanted our

9:15

child to be like and what kind of human

9:17

we wanted to raise before we'd ever met her,

9:19

before she was born. You remember, you want to

9:21

share a little bit on our list, maybe both

9:24

of you, but maybe you, Mary, remember? Yeah,

9:26

I think it, and I think that that

9:28

will benefit our listening audience too, if you

9:30

say, I don't have a child yet. If

9:32

you're even thinking that someday you might become

9:34

a parent or you might become partnered with

9:36

someone who already has children, however you might

9:38

come into it, I don't think I necessarily

9:40

knew that I was going to be a

9:43

parent someday. But, yeah, you

9:45

all had other plans, God had other

9:47

plans. So here we are. But I

9:50

remember this was like years ago, like over

9:53

10 years ago. So before I

9:55

was ever, this is before I was ever even pregnant,

9:57

you guys had conversations and we sat around and we

9:59

made lists of what do

10:01

we want, like what's the best, what do we

10:03

want for this child, almost like a values assessment

10:06

of like what we want this child to be

10:08

and it's, you know, there's

10:10

so much science to it too

10:12

of, you know, that first kind

10:14

of emotional stamp in your child's

10:16

passport through genomics and things is

10:18

the imprinting of the parents. And

10:21

so whatever state the parents are in before

10:24

conception, that's kind of, that funnels in.

10:26

And of course it would, it stands

10:28

to reason because your environmental factors and

10:30

the emotions that you need, you

10:33

want to outfit your child with that so that they

10:36

have those same survival skills that you do. So I

10:39

guess that's a long way of saying if you're

10:41

even thinking about doing this, there's preparation to it

10:43

of what do you want from your child and

10:45

because your state is their first stamp,

10:48

who do I have to be then to become

10:50

that parent that's fit to do

10:53

this important job, perhaps the most important of

10:55

all. And even if you already have

10:57

a child, it's like deciding what do we really

10:59

want this child to be, not just making it

11:01

through the day because it's so hard for people,

11:03

we get caught up in making a living instead

11:05

of designing our lives and helping, not designing our

11:07

child's life, she's going to become this singer or

11:09

dancer or writer. And we're not talking about that,

11:11

we're talking about the qualities, the core qualities of

11:14

a human being, this human being that is kind, that

11:16

is loving. We wanted to raise it, we made our

11:18

long list 10 years ago and we just kept adding

11:20

to it. It's like we really want to make sure

11:22

that she has an appreciation of God and the universe

11:24

and that she can be guided,

11:27

she can have some intuition. We want to make sure

11:29

that she feels like she's here to serve something more

11:31

than herself. We don't want some kid who's like demanding,

11:33

I'm supposed to have this, because we have a world

11:35

of great abundance and it'd be very easy for that

11:37

to happen. I didn't grow up with that and I'm

11:40

grateful I didn't grow up with that. So what

11:42

other some of the pieces do you remember that we made of

11:44

our list for just off the top of your head because the

11:46

other day we were talking about this and she's so much of

11:49

almost everything we wrote down. I

11:51

just wish that she'd

11:53

have a passion for learning, curiosity

11:56

and once again I just, This

12:00

was an intention. Yes, and

12:03

and I also just want to create just one

12:05

one pre-frame for those of you are listening and

12:07

possibly Haven't listened to our earlier Podcasts

12:10

I wasn't able to carry

12:13

and had quite a 20-year journey

12:15

to conceiving our daughter and

12:18

So Mary ended up carrying

12:20

our daughter and then in turn became

12:23

an adoptive parent So those of you

12:25

are listening and wondering about this unique

12:27

constellation Mary Baby

12:35

And so, you know So

12:38

Tony you were asking about you

12:40

know her intention or our intention or

12:42

if you know the attributes The

12:46

attributes of kindness the attributes

12:48

of thoughtfulness That

12:51

she would be in tune with her own

12:53

joy really if I think about it all

12:55

sums up to Her

12:58

being in touch with her own nature because

13:00

as we're aligned with our highest self and

13:02

our true nature all these attributes

13:04

flow out and it's very Organic

13:07

for us to live from that place Coherent,

13:11

you know one who brings harmony

13:14

to life with a blessing to life I

13:16

think that that's really the definition of being a

13:18

beautiful human being one who by

13:20

their isness their state of beingness That

13:23

they are a blessing and

13:25

she is everything and more and

13:28

it's so and I say more Because

13:33

just watching this little one walk into

13:35

this existence Being

13:37

all that she is It's

13:40

just it's really humbling and it really

13:42

schooled me. I think you

13:44

know, I probably had the same Innocent

13:49

or ignorance I suppose that believing

13:51

I Don't

13:54

know that we were here to teach them everything

13:56

and what I really recognize is we're a puzzle piece

13:59

I think our greatest capacity to

14:01

impact a child is by

14:03

our own living that truth

14:05

ourselves. She's our mirror. She is our

14:07

spiritual teacher beyond. So

14:11

I think that brings up the next question, which

14:13

is language, right? Another principle of

14:15

conscious parenting is being conscious of the impact of

14:17

language. And you brought up earlier one of my

14:19

favorite examples, which is instead of saying, watch out,

14:22

be careful, be careful, be careful, which teaches a

14:24

kid, oh my God, the world's a

14:26

fearful place, to let's be mindful here, honey. We're

14:28

going down the stairs. Let's be mindful. You want

14:30

to be mindful. And like you said, she tells

14:33

us that now, which is even better. She tells

14:35

neighbors that now. She's like, you need to be

14:37

mindful here a little bit, but not careful and

14:39

fearful. So let's talk about the power of language

14:42

just for a moment. This

14:44

idea of experiencing versus judging because

14:47

language plays a huge role in that. And

14:49

so many people are trying good, bad, right,

14:51

wrong. And then their whole life is they

14:53

constantly it's hard to stay happy

14:55

when everything is one or the other, right? When you play that

14:57

game, maybe you can share a little bit

14:59

of how you look at the language of that and maybe, you know, share a

15:01

little bit. We've talked about the other day at

15:03

the library. Oh my gosh, it was

15:05

just two days ago that Mary and I

15:08

went to the library and we went there

15:10

for story time. And why didn't you share your experience?

15:12

Because I found it to be quite remarkable. Well,

15:15

it was, I mean, it's it's we're

15:18

so lucky. It's this beautiful experience of a

15:20

gorgeous public library here. And

15:22

the librarians are fantastic. And

15:25

they read at this time. I don't know how many

15:27

children. There was a lot of children, parents and grandparents.

15:29

And everybody brings their little blanket.

15:31

It's just it's adorable. And the reading is

15:33

books. So everything's just this gorgeous experience. But

15:36

we noticed that some of the

15:38

language in so many children's books, this particular

15:40

one, the theme of all these six books

15:42

that were being read by the librarian that

15:44

day was a picnic. All

15:46

these children's books, each one had some sort of

15:49

picnic through line through them. And we

15:51

noticed that not only was picnic the through line, but so

15:53

was the weather. And,

15:56

you know, any universally when it

15:58

was sunny outside. All

16:01

the kids would say, okay, let's say it together. Hip hip

16:03

hooray, hip hip hooray, it's sunny outside. And

16:05

then, you know, the story progresses,

16:07

it's a raindrop. Oh no. And

16:10

we were sitting there like, is this really what, what

16:13

we want to be here. Especially living in Florida,

16:15

anywhere, but where the weather's gonna change. If

16:18

raining is bad and sunny is good, you

16:20

just took out, depending on where you live,

16:22

half your days, you know, of happiness. And

16:24

it's imprinted on a child and no one

16:26

has bad intent. But it's like, that's the

16:28

lack of awareness that happens when we're just

16:30

going with the flow. There's no such thing as

16:32

good weather and bad weather. There's just the weather. That's

16:35

the whole point of weather. But meanwhile, it just

16:37

feels like it was like driving and we were

16:39

kind of chuckling to ourselves because it wasn't like

16:41

once or twice. It was like a dozen times

16:43

of like, it's sunny, hooray. It's

16:45

raining. Oh, and like the physiology of it

16:47

too. Everyone was like, oh no. It's

16:50

windy, oh no. Is this the

16:52

message that empowers our children? And I'm not

16:55

being, like the stories are cute, I get

16:57

it. And just

16:59

the awareness of, and everything is

17:01

teachable. And everything in these little

17:03

sponges is just being taken in. It's

17:06

true. And you know that started-

17:08

And there are other books that you read all

17:10

the time. We both read, we'll edit the book

17:12

in our head sometimes when we're reading it out

17:14

loud to her because the message is

17:16

one that's disempowering and it's not meant to be, but it

17:18

is for kids. It's this zero

17:20

to the five years is the imprinting

17:22

time. That is gonna let the foundation

17:24

for most people's lives. And certainly you can change it

17:27

later on. We're in the business of helping people do

17:29

that. But it's certainly nice to not have that happen.

17:31

And if you just become aware of it, it's not

17:33

a negative judgment. It's just like, we don't

17:35

need to make the world be one or the other, because

17:37

it's not like that. And if you can enjoy the sun,

17:39

you can enjoy the rain. You go, that's the beauty. I

17:41

remember I went to Fiji one time and I was like,

17:44

these people are so happy. Why are they so happy all

17:46

the time? So I sat down with this one old Fijian

17:48

man. I said, how come Fijians are so happy?

17:50

He goes, I think Fijians are the happiest people in the world.

17:52

And he goes, of course I've never been anywhere else.

17:54

Ha ha ha. And he goes, well, what makes you

17:56

happy? He goes, oh, the sun makes us happier. I

17:58

thought, oh, he goes, and the rain. makes us happy.

18:01

The dark makes us happy. What do 50 things that

18:03

make me happy? It's basically everything that happens in life.

18:06

If we're going to have someone be a

18:08

beautiful human, we've got to learn to

18:10

appreciate whatever life brings us as opposed to judging it

18:12

all. You're beautiful to us, honey. You do this all

18:14

the time with money, and you do it with books.

18:17

Well, I mean a couple things. A

18:19

lot of parents are quite surprised that

18:22

when we put our daughter to bed that we don't

18:24

put a light on. Yet here's what has

18:26

amazed me and blown my mind about

18:29

being a parent is being

18:31

scared of the dark. I

18:33

don't believe it's an intrinsic thing. It's reflected.

18:37

It's modeled. So

18:39

many books talk about there's this

18:41

one rhymes that would

18:44

be like, I didn't even know

18:46

because it kind of sounds like it and I

18:48

don't want to necessarily call it out. But I'm

18:50

a child rhymers. I'm not even going to go

18:52

there. This is absolutely not working. All

18:55

children's books seem to talk about seem to instill

18:57

a fear of the dark. You know, and I'm

18:59

not, oh, wow, I'm scared without my mama and

19:02

you know, the dark's on and or the dark and

19:04

I don't want to be. It's like, what? I

19:07

did not come out exactly like the book

19:09

and I was trying to filter. So it

19:11

wasn't exactly the book, but it really has

19:14

schooled me the imprinting, the

19:16

imprinting of fear, the imprinting

19:19

of that helplessness, the

19:23

imprinting of labeling,

19:25

labeling emotions. Like how do we know what

19:28

what they're, I don't know what you're experiencing.

19:30

I don't know what you're experiencing. You don't

19:32

know what I'm experiencing unless we actually inquire.

19:34

So who are we to put

19:36

a label when you talk about the power of language?

19:39

If your child's having a wave or if they're

19:41

feeling an emotion of some sort, who am I

19:43

to say that that's anger, even if it might

19:46

look like anger? You know, Mary,

19:49

you're always so mindful and in tune

19:51

with our daughter, whether maybe she's having

19:53

a wave of hunger

19:55

or she's tired. And so if

19:57

she's what appears to be a temper tantrum.

20:00

to him, it's like, hey, Frick, you know what? She

20:03

didn't have a great snap. Or

20:05

she didn't have a nap. And so

20:07

I really feel like, as

20:10

a parent sometimes, it's stepping 100

20:12

feet above and observing

20:14

and including that information, because

20:16

that information helps us to

20:18

be more compassionate. Rather

20:20

than like, oh, wow, look at this child. They're just

20:23

on the ground and throwing a fit. Whatever

20:26

we would call that, it's like, gosh,

20:28

you know what? They

20:30

didn't have a nap today, and they haven't ate

20:33

or fueled. So what I use the language with

20:35

us once that was get curious, not furious. That's

20:37

what I like that. What's going

20:39

on with this kid instead of like, what the heck

20:42

are you doing? Yes. And

20:44

so being aware of what

20:46

we identify rather than,

20:48

honey, are you angry right now? Who am

20:50

I to say that? And when you ask

20:53

that, it becomes a natural go-to for them. And

20:55

then pretty soon, it's the habit, because language

20:57

becomes a pattern of thinking and a pattern of

21:00

emotion. And we just don't realize that. But if

21:02

you become conscious with your children or become

21:04

conscious with yourself, the first gift is you.

21:06

You being aware of it yourself, because so much

21:08

of what we haven't printed is right or good,

21:10

bad. I feel terrible versus I feel good.

21:13

So I think it's like we said earlier,

21:15

these principles work for any age. And they

21:18

really start with us, and then

21:20

they get reflected in our children. You're

21:22

bringing up another piece, because

21:25

a lot of the language kids pick up also

21:27

from the stimulus they receive. Our whole brains are

21:29

controlled by the stimulus. There's studies done at Harvard

21:31

where they take cats and put them in a

21:33

room with nothing but horizontal lines. And

21:35

their brains formulate a certain way, and they can't

21:37

see vertical lines. They'll bump right into something that's

21:39

vertical. And vice versa. Well, we've

21:42

all three decided and agreed that we don't

21:44

want overstimulation. And there are many other terms

21:46

you can run through them. But we don't

21:49

want our kid, she doesn't watch television. She

21:52

doesn't go through YouTube. She doesn't have

21:54

an iPad. And it's not trying

21:56

to limit her, but once a week, we might watch

21:58

something and we pick something was wholesome and

22:00

maybe has great music, Mary Poppins or Sound

22:02

of Music, that type of thing. And she

22:04

gets to have those pieces. But talk a

22:06

little bit, if you would, honey, about where

22:09

we are as a society and how that

22:11

affects kids and how that affects the behavior

22:13

of kids that many people misinterpret as bad

22:15

behavior. Yes, well,

22:18

we're all doing the best we can.

22:20

Yes, for sure. And I see the innocence of,

22:22

like, Frick, what am I

22:24

gonna do with this child? Okay, I'll put on a

22:26

movie or I'll give them an iPad or I'll give

22:28

them my phone because it entertains them.

22:32

It distracts them. But

22:34

another thing it does, and what I've

22:36

observed anyways, is I think there's a

22:38

tendency to almost overstimulation. For

22:41

a lot of parents, it's like it's a reality trying to deal

22:43

with their life and fulfill it. My kid's

22:45

busy for a moment. We all know what that feels like though,

22:47

too. But she's having a nap. It's like, she has a nap.

22:49

Okay, we can do this right now, right? One of my favorite

22:51

moments of the day. I mean, nobody speaks

22:53

about that. But when she goes to

22:56

bed, I'm like, wow. High five. High

22:58

five. High five. High five. High

23:00

five. And so you're looking for your- It's a big deal. So I

23:02

just want everybody to know, it's not like we're sitting around pontificating how

23:05

you should be. We have the reality

23:07

as well. And we've got the three of

23:09

us working on this project. But it's important

23:11

to understand that all this is a stimulus

23:13

and they pick it up. So

23:15

one example is there's a great, I

23:18

think Disney made this film, The

23:20

Elements, is it a Disney piece? Elemental, yeah. Elemental.

23:22

And I don't know if you've seen the film,

23:24

but it's cartoon. But it's so well done. Adults

23:27

can watch it and enjoy it. But for

23:29

example, there's a main character there, this

23:31

fire-sighing little girl, and she falls in

23:34

love with a water boy. But

23:36

in the beginning, she's like, I don't love you. I don't

23:38

this, I don't that. And kids want

23:40

to watch these things over and over and

23:42

over again, hundreds of times, the same thing.

23:44

And they take something from it. And our

23:46

daughter started saying, I don't love you. And

23:49

it was like, where did that come from? It

23:51

came from that film. It seemed to be- Like

23:53

verbatim from the scene. Even the tone of her

23:55

voice was the same tone. So I think it's

23:57

really critical not to be- over

24:00

controlling. But to understand at least in these

24:02

early stages, because you're also robbing them of

24:04

their creativity. She has an amazing imagination. She

24:06

loves to draw and write. She learns languages.

24:09

She's got three languages you're learning. She's learning

24:11

math. But she has creativity. She's able to

24:13

do things that when she

24:15

watches, nothing else is in the world. She's completely

24:17

there and that's the only world. And we all

24:19

know what that's like. It's a way, it's a

24:22

nice escape for a lot of people. But at

24:24

this stage of development, you don't want to lose

24:26

the muscle of creativity and the muscle of imagination

24:28

that actually produces joy and happiness. What's your view?

24:30

Well, I think it's from kind of the Riedelsteiner,

24:34

the Waldorf school

24:36

style. But the whole full lot, I think

24:38

this could be wrong, but it's the idea

24:40

that the more active the

24:42

toy, the more passive the child. And

24:44

the more passive the toy, the more

24:46

active the imagination of the child. So

24:48

like you give that, why does Montessori

24:50

or whatever, does Waldorf have these like

24:52

pieces, basically just wooden blocks of toys

24:54

because the child has to be more

24:56

active when it's just like scroll, glazed

25:00

trance. It's like, yeah, because there's so much

25:02

activity happening. All they have to do is

25:04

just like stare. And then they

25:07

need that also. They need that then it becomes

25:09

like an addiction, like anything else. Like you see

25:12

so many adults addicted to social media. It's like

25:14

scrolling becomes the way of being in it. And

25:16

it's really nothing wrong with it. But for a

25:18

child, it's brain dead because they haven't had the

25:20

time to develop or face challenges and things of

25:23

that nature. And it also, what

25:25

really has struck me as well watching

25:27

our daughter is because the toys

25:29

are very humble. Like you said, you

25:31

know, they're maybe wooden or just simple

25:33

painted faces or even none. Sometimes they're

25:36

faithless. But it

25:38

fosters a space where imagination

25:40

just becomes so extraordinary.

25:44

And so listening to

25:46

what she's perceiving, what she's imagining.

25:48

And sometimes I'm like, wow, I

25:51

mean, I'll look at what she's

25:53

playing with and the whole conversation

25:55

and where they're going and what

25:58

they're doing. And and And,

26:00

you know, she'll have cars and things

26:02

and it's just, it's so with no

26:04

cars, you know? And

26:07

so I really feel it creates

26:09

a space for one's

26:11

own innate curiosity, intelligence,

26:14

creativity becomes invited

26:17

to the experience and to what

26:19

they're doing. Suppose they're turned off by thinking

26:22

that it automatically just takes over. I'm

26:24

thinking about specifically the time just came to

26:26

mind when all there was were straws, like

26:29

aluminum straws or, you know, the reusable straws that

26:31

we have that she had found in a drawer

26:33

and the three of us were galloping. The

26:36

TV was off, there were no toys and

26:38

we had these straws that were worth it. Our daughter was quite a

26:40

little director, you have to point that out. And we were

26:43

galloping around on our straws, all three of

26:45

us. Her favorite thing is, guys, guys, here's what

26:47

we're going to do. And then she tells us what

26:49

to do and we're all galloping along the living room.

26:51

The fun was the straw. I said to her, I

26:53

said, what are you going to do? She goes, I'm

26:55

going to show you, I'm going to direct you what

26:58

to do. She said, I'm going to tell you

27:00

when to stop. Which

27:02

I love for her. But

27:05

her creativity and imagination is so alive and

27:08

it helps with learning because that's learning really

27:10

is making new connections, right? So it's not

27:12

a little thing. It's a big thing. And

27:14

I understand because it's like, boy, it's

27:16

an easy tool to say, I can buy some

27:18

time. My kids watching this, but especially the zero

27:20

to five time, all the studies show that it

27:23

is probably the worst time for

27:25

you to let that happen. And if you've done it, understand,

27:27

it's probably survival, but maybe it's something that considers think we

27:29

do it less than we eliminate. We do it like we

27:31

have a rule like only on the weekend and then we

27:33

watch a short little bit of a show. Let's

27:36

talk about autonomy. You know, one of

27:38

the most important things to me with adults,

27:40

with anybody is their sense of owning

27:42

themselves with who they are, not being just influenced

27:45

by the outside world. We're all concerned our kids

27:47

would be by others and they will be no

27:49

matter what we do to some extent. But as

27:51

human beings, to think critically, to think for yourself,

27:53

to make your own choices. This is

27:55

critical. Can you talk a little bit about the

27:58

offering of options and choices and how that. shapes

28:00

autonomy because I mean that's one of the things

28:02

I'm most happy about besides her loving kind nature

28:04

and wanting to give is that she's

28:06

decisive. I mean it's fine because I'm projecting. I

28:08

have a skill, it's my ability to make decisions.

28:10

Most people just can't do that because they want

28:12

to have the perfect decision or they want the

28:14

decision that they're guaranteed to be successful, they want

28:16

to fail. If you can't make decisions you can't

28:18

really have your own life. You're just gonna be

28:20

following everybody else. She is her

28:22

own self. Whoever she goes, she's herself. She's

28:25

loving but she's herself and that's one of

28:27

the most excited about her foundation. Can

28:30

you talk a little about the principle of offering options

28:32

and how you use that in a practical way? Yes

28:35

well if you think of walking

28:37

in and your partner's there or your family

28:39

members there and you're like do this. I'm

28:42

telling you go do this right now. Maybe

28:45

what does it does it create flow

28:48

or would that create resistance? It's the same

28:50

thing. Once

28:52

again the old way is

28:54

it's like a Putin style. Putin

28:58

style. Alright

29:01

and so it is which is

29:03

more of a dictating. Do this

29:05

because I told you so. You

29:08

go do that. These

29:11

little children they'll do it because they're being

29:13

told to do it and maybe even a

29:15

little bit of fear or not. True

29:17

both so you have the pushback of

29:20

the temper tantrum or let me be

29:22

obedient to you but there's another way

29:24

which is providing a choice and here's

29:26

the remarkable thing. You're

29:28

providing choices or options I suppose that help

29:30

to guide them in a certain direction. So

29:34

and providing context. So for any I'm trying to give

29:36

an example but maybe I got one. Okay great. One

29:38

of the first ones that we learned were do you

29:42

after it's usually come from a failure of like go

29:44

over there go eat dinner go to the dinner table

29:46

or and when that doesn't work when they don't

29:48

then it's like do you want to walk do you want to

29:50

skip do you want to hop or do you want me to carry

29:52

you over there. Yeah you pick. Yeah and then all

29:54

of a sudden it's like there she goes. Yeah but

29:57

if it's just get over there yeah you push over

29:59

there yeah. True. That's

30:01

a great one. Or if you're going to go

30:03

to bed at night and you know, I don't

30:05

want to go to bed. And it's like, okay,

30:07

honey, well, what would you

30:09

like to do for five minutes? Oh,

30:12

I want to play. Okay. And

30:14

so then if she's like, you know, I don't,

30:16

well, honey, how many minutes? So sometimes she'll say

30:19

this many minutes and I'll say, okay, how about

30:21

this many minutes? And then

30:23

after five minutes, we're going to

30:25

go up to bed. And so

30:27

you're providing choices that enables them

30:29

to choose to use their own

30:32

intelligence to be a part of

30:34

the process and the ecosystem and

30:36

the decision making. And it turns

30:38

down the volume of a lot

30:41

of resistance. And now, of course,

30:43

they're going to have their ways just like

30:45

we as adults have ways.

30:47

But choice provides independence. It

30:49

provides a space for them to use

30:52

their own mind, and to

30:54

be able to create their life. And

30:56

for them to be able to create their life

30:58

rather than old way is get up there,

31:00

we're going to brush our teeth. So say

31:02

if she doesn't want to brush her teeth in the

31:05

morning, it's like, okay, well, would you prefer, would you

31:07

like to get dressed or brush your

31:09

teeth first? Those two choices? Wow. I

31:11

you know what I mean? Whatever it looks

31:13

like. Well, I want to go, let's get

31:15

dressed. And so I'm doing a poor job

31:17

of laying out her clothes and saying, which

31:19

one do you want to choose? Every

31:21

day she takes two choices and

31:23

she picks one of them. And she owns it, you

31:26

know, she's I picked it,

31:28

you know, and you often say, Well, what should I do? You

31:30

have to let her pick for you too. There's

31:32

a body of work a woman by the name

31:34

of Magda Gerber, who's brilliant. She is a I

31:38

believe she was a Hungarian woman. And

31:41

her whole notion was respectful care.

31:43

And so just like I wouldn't walk by

31:46

and pick you up or,

31:48

you know, shake you up. Same

31:50

thing. It's like, okay, honey,

31:54

mom's gonna pick you up right now. And

31:56

so you're informing them along the way. response

32:00

it teaches. You guys are both really great at

32:02

it. We've all learned to do that, but you're both really great at

32:05

that. How do you deal with these big

32:07

waves of emotion because you're both extraordinarily good

32:09

at it? I think every parent

32:12

needs to understand those giant emotions happen. How do

32:14

you deal with them? We spoke

32:16

about it earlier. We're mindful not to

32:18

label it, not to assume. And pretty

32:20

much a lot of times, like say

32:22

if our daughter was on the

32:24

ground and she was sobbing or really crying, I'll

32:27

just put my hand on her back and I'll

32:29

say, mom's here. Let me know how

32:31

I can support you. And

32:33

sometimes, no, you know,

32:35

like maybe she, you know, and so then

32:37

you, once again, if you were having a

32:40

big wave, you understand you're creating space for

32:42

that for the moment. Sometimes you might say,

32:44

I want an ice pack. It's okay, great.

32:46

It's an ice pack. What is

32:49

really blows my mind is actually the very

32:51

practical things that she comes up with that

32:53

would actually support her in the moment. If

32:57

all else fails, just

32:59

the other night this happened, there

33:02

was a real acute wave and, you

33:04

know, she was just really not grounding

33:06

in the moment. And so I said to

33:08

her, I said, you know, rather than saying,

33:10

let's go outside, I said,

33:13

mom's considering to go outside and take

33:15

a big breath to the moon. Would

33:17

you like to join me? Okay.

33:20

She said, and so we went outside and

33:22

we sat on a chair and I said,

33:24

okay, let's take a breath. Mom's gonna, let's

33:27

breathe way up to the moon. And

33:29

so we took a big breath. And so I'm

33:32

joining in the regulation, which I

33:34

find very helpful, actually, though, small

33:36

man, the calm in her emotional

33:38

storm. Yes, exactly. Mary. And I

33:40

find that by offering

33:43

those choices, I'm

33:45

self regulating, I'm finding my breath

33:47

and to gamify it, Mary, I

33:49

have to really acknowledge you because

33:53

you come up with amazing

33:55

games and tools that you'll

33:57

connect. Whether my broccoli, my

33:59

broccoli, broccoli or mac and cheese games? Broccoli

34:02

or mac and cheese? Close your eyes. Close

34:05

your eyes and guess which one goes in your mouth. I mean

34:07

that was great, that was so creative. And

34:09

it works, she loves it. She eats more broccoli now.

34:11

She does. She does and the other day she

34:13

was like, I was feeding her and she was like, do

34:15

what mommy does and I'm like what the frick does mommy

34:17

do? And she was like telling

34:20

me to close my eyes but I didn't realize that

34:22

the game was she closed her eyes and then

34:24

putting a bite in and guess and I'm like damn

34:26

this is a great game. She's

34:29

like health and food and I'm like. She's very proud

34:31

that you got the right answer. Yes, but

34:33

once again and I just want to mention

34:35

this because you know a

34:37

lot of times in a family

34:40

we're parenting, I've noticed this, we're

34:43

parenting a lot from our own

34:45

conditioning and so being a parent

34:47

as we parent ourselves it's

34:49

an unlearning of well

34:53

it's two things, it's noticing what worked

34:55

and then it's noticing but possibly that

34:57

you can do kinder or maybe more efficiently

35:00

or more with more awareness or

35:02

more benevolence and so it's you

35:04

know sometimes I'll hear myself and I'm like oh

35:06

my gosh that was my mom or that was

35:08

my dad or I'll see myself in a circumstance

35:10

and I'll look at it and I'm like wow

35:12

isn't that beautiful? And then

35:14

there's things that it's like hey do you know what in

35:16

this moment in time I might do differently. And

35:19

so that's just and you

35:21

know the gift we were speaking

35:23

about how our children are our mirrors

35:26

but so is you know you're the

35:28

co-parent you know whether it be a

35:30

dad or a mom or whatever that

35:33

looks like in your family constellation or

35:35

a step-parent. If we're not

35:37

judging them you can learn from them.

35:40

And so I love to observe

35:42

both of you and I

35:45

learned so much of different ways of a through

35:47

line that I absolutely would have not considered. So

35:49

it's almost like going back in the back of

35:51

the book of what do you notice? Notice

35:54

from your partner notice from if you

35:57

know you're in the family or your

36:00

daughter or your son or your

36:02

grandparent or the step-parent, what are

36:04

they doing if they're getting a

36:06

different response than you? What

36:09

are they doing different? And I study

36:11

you both all the time. I study you both

36:14

all the time. Mary, I want

36:16

to find out how are you like your mother the

36:18

way she would have judged your mother before that you

36:20

told her. Oh, exactly like her. Tell

36:22

me, what are some things you thought as a child would

36:24

be there, but now you see them and it's almost humorous,

36:26

but you see how important they are with their perspective. It's

36:28

like in this also, this also is a

36:30

place where when we talk about like parenting

36:32

is really like it's, it's about you first.

36:34

Like it's not your kid. Like first you

36:36

have to do enough work on yourself because,

36:38

and even if you don't have a child,

36:40

it's like when

36:44

Esther Perel spoke at our relationship conference

36:46

and she has that kind of famous

36:50

opening line now, tell me how, tell

36:52

me how you were loved and I'll show you how

36:54

you love now, a present day as an adult. And

36:57

so we're watching each other's conditioning. Like you mentioned Sage,

36:59

like it's, we have so much conditioning from

37:02

our parents, caregivers, whoever that that's, it's

37:05

just eye opening to be like, why do

37:07

I do that? And then like Esther teaches

37:09

and it's, it's, um, she frames it as

37:11

intimacy and I, and I mean that as,

37:13

because of course this family dynamic or whatever

37:16

yours looks like, it's very,

37:18

it's a very intimate experience and

37:20

she simplifies it with the,

37:22

it's like five words that she used verbs. And it's

37:24

like ask, I'm going to get

37:26

this wrong, but maybe we could put it on after ask,

37:30

take, give, receive, refuse,

37:33

share play. I

37:35

think that's all of them. But even like, are

37:37

you giving your child a chance to ask for what

37:39

they want or are you like here's some water, here's

37:41

a snack. Make sure you got your jacket. Like, do

37:44

you even give them a chance to ask? Yeah,

37:46

yeah. Identify their own needs even that's what I thought of that. Right.

37:49

See how my mom loves me and

37:52

how I in turn smother our daughter. That's

37:55

the same way. So

37:57

it's, you know, I come by it honestly. But

38:00

when you become the awareness, I've watched, we

38:02

see some of the wisdom in the way we were

38:04

raised, that we couldn't have appreciated then. And

38:07

you also see there are new ways, there are

38:09

ways to update based on being aware and being

38:11

conscious. I just want to emphasize what you said,

38:14

honey, about the managing and I love

38:16

the term wave. You came up with

38:18

that, utilizing it with our daughter. It's not she's

38:20

being angry, not being sad, she's not being frustrated.

38:22

She's having a wave and you described that even

38:24

yourself sometimes. I'm just having a wave and the

38:26

great thing about having a wave is as the

38:28

beginning and it's over, it doesn't last forever, right?

38:31

And you know that, it presupposes that. But you

38:33

also are so good at what mindfulness really is.

38:35

Mindfulness is also bringing you back into this moment.

38:38

All the upset is usually people's fear of

38:40

losing something they want or losing what they

38:42

have or not getting what they want. And

38:44

that's true for children as much as it is for

38:46

adults. And the way you do that

38:48

is like you'll take her outside, it's like let's take

38:50

a breath, like you said, look at the moon. It's

38:52

like coming back to this moment is a huge part

38:54

of that. You both are brilliant at that. I want

38:56

to bring up the matching of energies

38:58

because this is a lesson for me because

39:00

I'm so quiet and gentle and I have a hard time expressing

39:02

my true emotions. So

39:05

our daughter is very energetic as both

39:07

of you are, but very energetic. And

39:09

so like when somebody comes to the room very often,

39:12

she will, she's so talkative and

39:14

talkative, you never know. She's like quiet and she

39:16

stares, but she really stares into people and she

39:18

feels them. She doesn't just, she takes in their

39:20

energy and so forth. And so early

39:23

on I had to come in and learn how

39:25

to just tone my energy down because like even

39:27

clapping, like I'm around an environment where everybody's clapping,

39:30

everything's very loud and everything goes like, no, don't

39:32

clap and all these things. So the other day

39:34

we had an experience, for example, in my case,

39:36

and I like to talk about the principle. So

39:40

we were in the theater room and

39:42

we built the fort, built the fort with

39:44

her and she loves to be a, she calls Boo

39:46

monster, pillow monster, and she likes to boo and surprise

39:48

and we're going back and forth and I'm reaching in

39:50

and teasing her and surprising her and we're having a

39:53

blast. And then we needed to go to the kitchen for something, what it

39:55

was. She got off to bed so fast,

39:57

I was looking all over the place that she go, this room, on

40:00

the hall, she wasn't there, but she just got there that fast.

40:03

So I finally got to the kitchen and she

40:05

wasn't looking, so I went and blew behind her. Same thing

40:07

I was doing just a few seconds ago. And

40:10

I was like, oh no, the minute I did, she just

40:13

froze first and

40:15

then her eyes started to weld up and then she went around

40:17

the corner and left and put over my view. And her

40:19

lips began to unfold and touch

40:21

her toes. Oh

40:24

my god, you know, I didn't match her energy,

40:26

you know, I wasn't conscious of matching her energy.

40:28

So I went around the corner and I got

40:31

on my knees down at her level and I

40:33

said, honey, I love you so much. Daddy apologized.

40:35

I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to

40:37

surprise you here because children, it's like that's

40:39

over. She's in a new context so fast.

40:41

It's a different energy so fast. And if

40:43

you're busy doing what you're doing, you'll have

40:45

an impact on your child sometimes not even

40:48

know what it is. So I

40:50

did have an apology. I want to talk about the importance

40:52

apology, but one other thing I talked to our friend, Dr.

40:55

Stephen Cowan about this and

40:57

he said, I said, how could I do that better? Because I'm always

40:59

trying to learn. And he said, what you

41:01

did was amazing. Most parents do not apologize. He said, that's wonderful.

41:03

He said, the only thing I changed is one thing. You did

41:05

nothing wrong. He said, it's okay

41:07

to apologize, but then come

41:10

back after she's reset. It won't take long, which I

41:12

did do. And, but when I

41:14

came back, I just ignored it. Right? And he

41:16

goes, come back and you can draw the connection

41:18

for her and you can say, honey, we're laughing

41:20

and everything else. Say, look how great we're feeling.

41:22

Just a few minutes ago, we're feeling that wave.

41:25

Look, we're already feeling good again. Isn't that amazing?

41:27

And it teaches her that she can self regulate.

41:29

It connects the two. So the next time it

41:31

doesn't seem like it's a big deal, but I'd

41:33

like you to talk about matching energies, both of

41:36

you, you're both phenomenal at it. And I'd like

41:38

to talk about apologies. And you're the master

41:40

of apologies in that area and why

41:42

that's so important. So

41:44

for matching energies, it's once again, it's

41:46

just awareness as we're entering a space,

41:48

say if I'm entering the kitchen and

41:51

maybe Mary, you're there with her and,

41:54

you know, rather than

41:56

just, which by the way, I've done both. So

42:00

once you become conscious

42:03

by learning by being unconscious

42:05

because of the information that life offers you

42:08

or your family offers you. But

42:10

I can think back to a moment in time where

42:12

maybe I just entered the kitchen

42:15

and I entered quickly and

42:18

maybe you guys were at the table and she's

42:21

like, mom, no, go

42:23

away. And so, and

42:26

by the way, there was a lot of that.

42:28

And so there was a lot of self-reflection. I

42:32

really reflected to take a

42:34

look at, okay, what

42:36

may I be contributing to this?

42:39

And part of that was just maybe

42:41

going into the kitchen and to go

42:44

grab making it up a cup of

42:46

coffee or to go eat something. And

42:48

so I walked in maybe in a

42:50

transition from work or something. And I

42:52

wasn't including this space. I wasn't

42:54

including what were they experiencing? What were

42:56

they already feeling? What were they already

42:58

experiencing? And so just

43:00

for parents that are out there and,

43:03

you know, if your husband or your

43:05

wife or your mother or the caregiver

43:07

or your step-parent or whatever, they're in

43:09

a space and having a moment with

43:11

your child and you're entering, just be

43:14

mindful. I really look to,

43:16

I can't say I count, but

43:18

I look to have a solid maybe

43:21

30 seconds. I don't even know how

43:23

long it is, maybe 10 seconds, 20

43:25

seconds before I will even speak at

43:27

this stage. Just

43:29

observe. And truthfully, a

43:31

lot of times I'll look now

43:33

for our daughter to say,

43:35

hi, mom, rather than me

43:37

being like, hey guys, what are you doing? Feel

43:41

the difference? If she's engaged in something. If she's

43:43

engaged in something. Because she

43:45

also gets totally engaged with what she is. It's

43:47

one of the great skills. She's like is there

43:49

completely. And it's a disruption otherwise. Yes.

43:52

And it's the same respect that you would give to

43:54

an adult. If you were in a space and really

43:57

prepping on something and I walked in, I might

43:59

see. that and be like, okay, I'll come back

44:01

or I might leave a glass of water there and

44:03

I might not even say anything. I might just look

44:05

to be thoughtful and I might exit the space until

44:07

you have a moment to catch your breath. So

44:10

it's really treating children like you

44:13

would want to be treated yourself

44:15

and having an awareness of that

44:18

which I've been both I've been

44:20

blind and have

44:23

really tuned myself to

44:26

be aware of the context, be aware

44:28

of what are they up to and

44:30

then just look to catch a glance

44:32

that it's like, hi,

44:35

where there's that intrinsic connection and

44:37

I find that that's less

44:40

interruptive, therefore less resistance

44:43

because there's a dynamic that we can

44:45

speak about at some point but it

44:47

kind of goes into no mom where

44:50

there's usually a parent in

44:52

the family from

44:54

their own conditioning or maybe from

44:56

their own nature where they'll hold a

44:59

line more naturally and

45:01

then maybe a parent that's more slept

45:04

slow or more playful or you could

45:06

call it and

45:10

so that or maybe it's a dad

45:12

that works late at night and he

45:14

comes home and so he's

45:16

bringing more of a playful energy and people even

45:19

have a label for it maybe it's like Disneyland

45:21

Dad or whatever and so

45:23

the child will relate to that parent

45:25

differently and and

45:28

so there's all these nuances and

45:30

and by the way those patterns are

45:33

a moment in time it's not a

45:35

permanent fixed reality because at a different

45:37

stage a different phase it

45:40

calls out different parts of us of

45:42

the parent and as well the child

45:44

but it has been such an extraordinary being

45:46

a parent is the most humbling thing I've

45:49

ever done it's the most

45:51

extraordinary most spiritual

45:53

growth oh my word like

45:55

it's going to meditate and pray your

45:57

heart wide Open

46:00

takes you to your knees, breaks

46:03

your heart into a million pieces in the

46:06

most beautiful and I don't mean break, I mean break

46:08

open. Break

46:10

open and so there's just

46:13

been, if I really

46:15

look at it, it's been an incredible amount

46:17

of self-reflection and something else that I really

46:19

look to do and I'm just inviting the

46:22

listeners if you know you're in

46:24

a relationship or in your family unit to

46:26

go and say, hey, is there anything that

46:29

you noticed? Because a

46:31

lot of times, you know, somebody else from

46:33

the outside will see what you don't see

46:36

and I really have a desire to be

46:38

the best version of myself and I certainly

46:40

don't have all the answers and

46:42

so I'll go and I'll say like, honey,

46:45

like what did I miss there? Mary, what

46:47

am I missing? Please help me, enlighten me

46:49

because I'm feeling stuck or I'm feeling blind

46:51

or I don't understand why I'm getting this

46:53

response and I want to serve her,

46:55

I want to serve you, I want to serve you and

46:59

so rather than being mad about

47:01

it, there's another choice, invite

47:04

the seat book because

47:06

that's how we grow and I

47:08

have found that to be, by the way, I'm asking all the time, I'm

47:11

asking all the time, hey, any

47:14

suggestions? What might you see

47:16

that I'm not seeing because I

47:18

can completely go blind in a moment

47:20

in time. It's beautiful that when we

47:22

come together and we discuss these things as

47:24

a family like a team, like what's going

47:26

on, what do we see, what's new and then having

47:28

like maybe talk about the card of the week, you

47:30

know, the focus that we have, you know, on something

47:33

we're going to improve so it doesn't think I'm overwhelming.

47:36

You have offered like,

47:38

it's also an art

47:41

to if your partner asks

47:44

or your co-parent or whoever it is asked like,

47:46

what am I missing? How you

47:48

deliver that in a way that they can hear

47:50

it and it doesn't feel so critical that I

47:52

walk away feeling like I'm the worst mother in

47:54

the world and I'm a terrible person and

47:59

so we They've come up with a way

48:01

of getting

48:03

through to each other, I think, because

48:06

this is a unique constellation. You

48:10

had this idea that we would have an index

48:12

card. There's so many

48:14

things to remember, it feels like, and the kid, it's

48:16

like, and you master it and it works one day

48:18

and then the next day it's like a different kid

48:20

because they grew right through that already. So it's like,

48:23

great, thanks. Thanks. I'm glad I figured

48:25

that out right before time expired. And

48:27

it's like, so with all these things floating around,

48:29

we've decided, okay, just one thing, one thing this

48:31

week I could get better at, I need to

48:34

focus on this one thing. I read it on

48:36

an index card and so, like for

48:38

one example, you had offered to me,

48:40

yeah, I noticed like

48:42

you're meeting many of her demands

48:46

rather than holding the line. And

48:49

so I might just write on my index card,

48:52

this week, the only thing that I'm really going

48:54

to try to catch myself and get so present

48:56

with is, am I meeting this two-year-old's demand for

48:59

everything that she asked for? And it's

49:01

like, oh, I hear it. I hear it

49:03

because that's, it's like, if I just had this one

49:05

thing, then that's

49:07

all I can take sometimes, you know, with

49:09

the world that we live in. And it's

49:11

been helpful. Well, you do that for a week,

49:13

you get a new habit and then you feel mastery

49:16

of it and then you can add another one. And

49:18

it's not overwhelming. It's like baby steps to some extent,

49:20

but it's like, there's so much to focus on this

49:22

conversation if you found it helpful, some of these principles

49:24

and strategies, like I'm, you can see, I take notes.

49:27

I take notes like when I was first starting a

49:29

relationship with you, remember you started a crazy, that's what

49:31

that means to you. That's what it means to women.

49:33

I didn't write it down and stuff, figuring it out.

49:36

But I've done that here with us as well. We

49:38

do it together. And I think it's so valuable to

49:40

be able to continue to find those insights and

49:42

also have the wins of what can happen when you focus on

49:44

one thing. We try to focus on it all. It can be

49:47

completely overwhelming. And may I just echo

49:49

that? It's one consideration. I don't

49:51

even know if it's better. Once again,

49:54

it's just, it's not necessarily about becoming

49:56

better. It's just this one card. Just

49:59

bring your awareness to the end. that just

50:01

bring your awareness to awareness life

50:04

changes so it's not

50:06

even so much that gosh I'm doing something

50:09

bad or I need to become a better

50:11

parent it's just okay I'm gonna you gave

50:13

me the reversal or not reversal

50:15

but the cue card that you offered me

50:18

was to be more kinesthetic or more

50:20

physical and you know

50:22

I had a couple injuries and never mind I had

50:24

this child at 50 hello I see why

50:27

people have children in their 20s and 30s what

50:29

the heck you put her in a crib and

50:31

I'm going to do my structural back break for...

50:34

What the heck! and

50:38

so it's like you know be more kinesthetic

50:40

more physical I'm like oh okay great easy

50:42

for you as I'm like hitting the gym

50:44

now lifting more weights to get stronger for

50:46

her but it was

50:48

really great because it's one thing Mary that you

50:50

really do is like you'll you know you're physical

50:52

you pick her up and twirl

50:55

her around and I had to you know

50:57

I have found that space

50:59

of relating and

51:02

it's been so beautiful for us and by

51:04

the way when I first did it she

51:07

was like mom what are you doing and

51:09

I'm like well great and so once again

51:11

I had to dial it yeah I had

51:13

to tune myself I had to find that

51:15

what that felt honest for

51:17

me what that felt

51:19

not over I

51:21

didn't feel cellophane because I did that too you

51:24

know like trying to sometimes I tried to

51:26

be more playful to be more playful like

51:28

you Mary and that felt insincere inside of

51:30

me and yet I'm a very playful person

51:33

and so it was finding

51:35

it's finding that space inside yourself or

51:37

you know it's like you know with

51:39

your card Mary like not meeting the

51:42

demand being aware of that and then

51:44

you know you might meet the

51:46

odd one there might be a touch of

51:48

flexibility to it but you're aware of it

51:50

and so you're not meeting everyone because if

51:53

you were meeting the demand if

51:55

you think about it we can't demand anything from

51:57

life it's not like hey God give me this

51:59

I'm gonna cry for a temper tantrum if I don't get

52:01

it, life doesn't work that way. Unfortunately, there are many kids that

52:03

have been raised that way that are not adults, right? And

52:06

I think this is one of the most important principles of

52:08

our culture. For

52:10

several decades, the culture changed and the

52:12

mindset is all about constantly complimenting your

52:14

kid, give him a trophy for participating

52:16

and so forth. But Dr. Dweck's work

52:18

at Stanford has shown why that has

52:20

not worked. What it does is when

52:22

you tell somebody they're great and they're beautiful and they're perfect

52:24

all the time, then eventually they get out in the

52:26

real world and they find out the rest of the world doesn't agree with

52:29

that. And when that's true, then

52:31

all of a sudden they lose confidence and those very

52:33

people are not willing to initiate anything new. And you

52:35

see kids today that have a hard time even communicating

52:37

unless it's through text, something they can control. They don't

52:39

know how to go to a job interview and have

52:41

it today. I'm not exaggerating. I'm sure you've read some

52:44

of the articles. I know we've shared some of them

52:46

back and forth. So I think it's critical that Dweck's

52:48

whole thing is reinforcing a child for effort. Because if

52:50

I keep efforting, if I keep going through, if I

52:52

keep making progress, I'm going to get to what I

52:55

want and I'm going to get the skills in it.

52:57

It's a growth mindset versus a fixed mindset. And I

52:59

think we've done a really good job with our daughter

53:01

in that area. But I think it's one of the

53:03

most important things is not meeting the needs or you

53:06

create a little terrorist. And I

53:08

think most parents, they get exhausted

53:10

and they just give in. And

53:12

that's true to me. I look at it as

53:15

daddy and father. Daddy

53:18

is more play, do all those things and father is

53:20

like, I mean, make tough choices even when she's not

53:22

going to be happy with it. And you've

53:25

said to me, I don't want you doing that just yet. Because

53:27

I don't want to – and I understand there's a time for

53:29

everything. But I've watched both of you and I really want to

53:31

compliment you. You've had more of the

53:33

– what I would call the mom role where it's

53:35

like holding the line initially and Mary was more of

53:38

like the playful one for it. And as a result,

53:41

the energy was going in one direction and that

53:43

felt difficult for Mary, difficult for you. Unbelievably

53:46

painful, difficult situation. Most people never deal

53:48

with consciously without blaming partners. And

53:50

none of that happened here. It was difficult,

53:52

but you pushed through. And now there's more mommy

53:54

in you and mom. And

53:57

there's more mom in you and mommy. Even

54:00

so, we usually use mom for you, mommy for

54:02

you. And I've been confused. I've actually, for the

54:04

first time, called you mom and called you mommy.

54:06

And it's a beautiful thing, because it's also you,

54:08

both of you, expressing all the parts of you

54:10

to our daughter, giving her all

54:13

those parts in a different way. And it's

54:15

made everything closer. I just can't thank you

54:17

enough and compliment you, both enough for it,

54:19

especially my pro stage, because it's an incredibly

54:21

difficult situation to be careful. And

54:24

isn't that why we come together,

54:26

is to claim the parts of

54:28

ourselves that we're not? That's right.

54:30

And yes, I mean, for

54:32

those of you who are on your path to desiring

54:35

to become a parent, my

54:37

own journey was, it was a long journey.

54:39

There was a lot of miscarriages. And then

54:41

I was told that I'd never be able

54:43

to carry. And I was told that

54:45

it would be like less than one in a

54:47

million chance that we would ever even, you know,

54:49

be able to have a child. And

54:52

so, being here now,

54:56

it's so different than I ever imagined it

54:58

would be. It's more beautiful than I ever

55:00

imagined it would be. And

55:03

as well, it was revealing of,

55:09

I don't know, it's like, I mean, there's

55:11

no fading. There's no hiding inside

55:13

yourself. There's no saccading. It's

55:15

just this stripped, wide,

55:17

open space of such

55:20

a level of honest

55:22

feedback. And so,

55:25

if our daughter was offering, mom,

55:28

no, you know, whatever,

55:31

I want mommy or whatever that dynamic

55:33

way, however that looked or expressed in

55:35

the moment, I could say,

55:37

I could look at our daughter, I

55:39

could look at you. I found

55:41

it easier to look at myself. And

55:44

that's really where the whole, because

55:46

of that opportunity or that disconnect

55:49

or that schism, and I'll say

55:51

inside myself, that's

55:53

what actually led us on this path. We are having this

55:55

conversation with you right now because

55:58

of that resistance. We

56:00

created the practice of coming together

56:02

to have team parenting meetings that

56:04

we get together maybe once every

56:06

two weeks, maybe once a month,

56:08

maybe once every six weeks. And

56:11

we discuss ideas

56:14

and we discuss what's working,

56:16

what isn't working and then

56:18

we'll utilize those practices. Because

56:20

a lot of times what I really recognized

56:22

is if I had a suggestion or a

56:24

consideration, it's

56:26

not heard if you wouldn't hear it

56:29

or you wouldn't hear it if I was in

56:31

the moment and feeling my

56:33

own wave of my stuff being hit,

56:35

of feeling her resistance with me. So

56:38

I recognized to have space and time

56:40

from there to be able to have a team

56:42

parenting meeting that we could come together in the name

56:44

of our daughter. And it's really about

56:46

us. It's really about our

56:49

own awareness. Once again, being

56:51

a conscious parent, I really believe

56:54

it begins with parenting ourselves. And

56:57

schooling ourselves and claiming responsibility

56:59

ourselves and then bringing that

57:01

awareness and bringing that love to

57:03

the table. And it's not a blame

57:05

game. It's not blaming yourself or blaming anybody

57:07

else. Responsibility is the ability

57:09

to respond. But you go, I do that if you become aware. Yes. And

57:12

honey, you've done that so incredibly well. We're on the other side

57:14

of it now. It feels like a different world. But

57:16

it required both of you and all three of

57:18

us to find different parts of ourselves to bring

57:20

to the table and continue to strive. And

57:23

I don't even know if it's accurate to say

57:25

we're on the other side of it. It

57:27

means something different today. Yes. And

57:30

we have different practices. And

57:33

the practices of the cue card I have

57:35

found. I'm curious what you're going to write to me. But

57:40

what's so beautiful, what else I recognize is

57:42

on our journey, whether it's our own spiritual

57:44

path or parenting, because really it's

57:46

one and the same, you can read a book

57:49

and have so many principles. But you know one

57:51

thing. Just notice, be

57:53

aware of this one thing. Because it's one, you

57:55

know, you talked to me about a two millimeter

57:57

shift. It is so slight shift.

58:00

that really shifts that space and that

58:02

dynamic. Remarkable.

58:07

I'd like to talk though, just as we

58:10

wrap up, about positive intent, as

58:12

in our relationship, meaning all of our relationships between

58:14

the three of us, and also the people that

58:16

are part of our chosen family. Business

58:18

relationships, one of the great gifts we have is we

58:21

don't question the intent. We know even

58:23

if something looks bad on the outside, or somebody's

58:25

acting stressed, or seeming upset or angry or sad,

58:27

or whatever it is, that behind it is a

58:29

positive intent, they're just trying to do something and

58:31

they're not getting what they need to be or

58:33

what it is. We know we're not trying to

58:35

ever hurt each other, and that's so important, because

58:37

that's where relationships get destroyed. You can question

58:40

a lot, but if you question the intent, you pretty much

58:42

destroy it, because if someone really does care, really does love, and

58:44

you question their intent, that's the way

58:46

things ever really do damage. But I think we must be

58:48

able to do it with adults, but also

58:51

with kids, it's different. And so

58:53

I think maybe we

58:55

can discuss a little bit about not deciding

58:57

what the intent of your child is.

59:01

Some people think of children, they're just trying to piss me off

59:03

or harass me. I don't know what parents do, they do

59:05

a lot of different things. But no, there's a positive intent

59:07

behind it. What strikes me about it is the other day,

59:10

I was with her teacher, one of

59:12

her teachers, and we were at

59:14

lunch, and her teacher said, let

59:16

me show you a little trick. And she did this thing with her

59:19

finger, and made her finger look like it was disappearing a little bit.

59:21

And I said, oh, I got a trick too. And I took my

59:23

thumb like this, and I put my hand like this, and I went,

59:25

what? And I went like this, and like

59:27

this. And she exploded into tears. And

59:30

I'm like, oh no, what happened? And

59:32

I thought, okay, I didn't understand why I was okay with her

59:34

with her. I thought, well, maybe my energy was too strong or

59:36

something else. But the next day I found out

59:39

what it was, I was worried that

59:41

daddy was hurt by that. She thought I was

59:43

hurt. It wasn't, the energy wasn't there. So

59:45

it's like, there's another intent. Like you

59:47

said earlier, is she hungry? Is she tired? Is

59:49

she not out of now? There's certain fundamentals that

59:51

are there. And those are the things you don't

59:53

even know. They're actually quite beautiful. So maybe you

59:55

can address a little bit about intent. And

59:57

let's come back to apology because we never completed that far. Yes. about

1:00:00

like how important it is to apologize and why you're willing

1:00:02

to do it because people don't do that with adults. I

1:00:04

have much less with their kids. Well, once again, Mary,

1:00:07

I actually feel like this is your superpower

1:00:10

and because you're so in tune

1:00:12

with her and you're

1:00:14

always, you notice what I don't notice and

1:00:17

you notice if she's having a wave and

1:00:19

you'll often share that or even say, if

1:00:21

I come in the room, you know, behind

1:00:23

our daughter, you'll be like, or

1:00:26

you know what I mean? Like it's saying, hey, warning.

1:00:28

I want to set you up to win. Yeah, but

1:00:32

what you just said is so profound. And

1:00:34

if you're out there and you're in a

1:00:36

family, what Mary just said, I want to

1:00:39

set you up to win. Another

1:00:41

way I call it like an assist because really

1:00:43

there's the relating, the

1:00:45

conscious relating to the child,

1:00:47

but the conscious relating in

1:00:50

the family constellation is so

1:00:52

powerful. And when there is

1:00:54

that positive intent to want to set each other

1:00:56

up to win, it

1:00:58

creates alignment, it creates harmony. There's

1:01:05

less resistance and it's kind.

1:01:08

It's kind. I'm curious how, because

1:01:10

you're so thoughtful with that, Mary, how

1:01:13

you see positive intent. I

1:01:16

see it. I'm not sure. Tell me if

1:01:18

I'm interpreting this right, but just as

1:01:20

it, let me give you an example that I think

1:01:23

this falls under, but again, this goes into a little

1:01:25

bit of the power of the language we use around

1:01:27

her. But

1:01:31

also it's like, rather than saying, if

1:01:34

she was doing something in her

1:01:37

year of the tooth, I'm resisting calling it

1:01:39

the terrible tooth because it wasn't so terrible,

1:01:42

but she would have outbursts at times. And

1:01:44

rather than the don't do that or stop

1:01:46

that, then the positive

1:01:49

intent, which I actually think she really resonates

1:01:51

with, is I

1:01:53

would say like, okay, hey, show me kind. Instead

1:01:56

of don't hit, show me kind

1:01:58

and gentle. Like

1:02:00

that matches her intent, that matches

1:02:02

her business. But she really wants it. And

1:02:05

it's like, she could be like wailing away

1:02:07

at something and it's like, hey, hey, show me kind

1:02:09

and gentle. And it's all of a

1:02:11

sudden, it's like, oh. Like,

1:02:13

I was like, okay, that works. Yes,

1:02:15

it aligns with her true nature as opposed to the way

1:02:18

that she's experiencing. Yeah, it's like understanding

1:02:20

that the emotion of the moment is not who

1:02:22

the person is. I think one of the challenges

1:02:24

we have in our society today is no one's

1:02:26

allowed to even grow. They could have written something

1:02:28

20 years ago and then we're gonna tweet and

1:02:30

then we're gonna beat them up for the rest

1:02:32

of their life. There's what's the upper term they

1:02:34

talk about in religion that not, what's the word

1:02:36

I'm looking for? Redemption or? Yeah, redemption, like that

1:02:38

the person improves and they redeem themselves and everything

1:02:41

else. And so we don't even give our kids

1:02:43

sometimes a chance to redeem themselves. We've already judged

1:02:45

in jury that they have this bad intent as

1:02:47

opposed to, no, they're experiencing a wave.

1:02:49

Underneath that wave is still that pure intent.

1:02:51

And if we can align with that, it's

1:02:53

like magic. She changes so quickly when you

1:02:55

see that. I see that with other kids when

1:02:57

we do it with other kids too, like our

1:02:59

friends around them. Giving them a sense of

1:03:01

positive intent about why they're doing what they're doing as opposed

1:03:03

to why you're doing that. Or you shouldn't do that or

1:03:06

whatever the case may be. It's a beautiful piece. But

1:03:08

probably you really, you do this

1:03:10

with adults, you do it with our family and

1:03:12

you do it with her and that

1:03:14

is, you apologize. Tell me about

1:03:17

your philosophy about apologizing. Well,

1:03:20

it's selfish and it's

1:03:22

selfish because it clears

1:03:24

the space of resistance within inside myself.

1:03:28

And I feel it creates

1:03:31

alignment. It

1:03:33

realigns, creates

1:03:36

unbound energy for myself. If maybe

1:03:38

I was bound in a circumstance and I felt

1:03:40

like I missed or I did something that maybe

1:03:42

wasn't my most conscious self

1:03:44

or I created friction in some way. And

1:03:47

then there's just the practical thing. I've tripped

1:03:50

her many times, I've dropped her in a

1:03:52

pool, I've banged, I've headbutted

1:03:54

her. I mean many things. I

1:03:56

can't tell you in a matter of like,

1:03:58

it's quite remarkable. or

1:04:01

you know sometimes maybe I something

1:04:04

that she's really schooled me by is that

1:04:07

you know allowing our

1:04:09

children to flower at their pace

1:04:11

in cadence and so I

1:04:14

remember when she was learning

1:04:16

how to swim and she was learning how to float on

1:04:18

her back and I was like she

1:04:20

did it once and so I was like hey let's

1:04:22

do it and so you know I was helping her

1:04:24

get in position but I moved like my I you

1:04:26

know I was just moving quickly I was moving quickly

1:04:28

at a pace and she put her head back and

1:04:30

got a ton of water and so

1:04:32

you know she was crying

1:04:35

hysterically and after

1:04:37

she got out and we caught our breath and we went

1:04:39

in the kitchen and I said honey I said I want

1:04:41

you know I'm mom sorry I learned

1:04:44

in that moment and I recognized that mom

1:04:46

was too fast next time I'll

1:04:48

slow down because I also wanted her to know that she

1:04:50

could feel safe with me again to do that and

1:04:54

you know for some reason a lot

1:04:58

of times can be absent in the space

1:05:00

with us as parenting and I

1:05:02

have just found it to be so beautiful

1:05:04

and our daughter is so conscientious and she

1:05:07

also apologize because she does she

1:05:09

does say dad I'm sorry yeah

1:05:12

but I think those are magical words that

1:05:14

are missing in our culture it's missing on

1:05:16

airplanes it's missing in lines somewhere in our

1:05:18

culture since Covid we've lost I'm sorry and

1:05:21

or my love you know I

1:05:23

was a mess you know please forgive me

1:05:25

you know thank you we've missed

1:05:27

that component but it's alive in her because it's

1:05:29

alive in us and I think that's a great

1:05:31

gift for her because we all are gonna make

1:05:33

mistakes I mean the word sin means miss that's

1:05:35

the original translation of it you miss this

1:05:37

so it's like okay we don't ever make it heavy

1:05:39

you just miss this I'm sorry you clean up right

1:05:41

away it doesn't become something really big or

1:05:44

if we're there or say for the dinner

1:05:46

table and Mary maybe Mary's feeding

1:05:48

her and I sit down so one of

1:05:51

the things that we recognize as well so

1:05:53

that we don't step on each other is

1:05:55

there's a captain and as a co-captain at

1:05:57

any point in time or there's the person

1:05:59

who's driving So if you're driving,

1:06:02

I'm mindful if our daughter's having

1:06:04

a behavior not to, not to

1:06:07

mention something. I, you know, create the

1:06:09

space for you to be able to

1:06:11

have that conversation. And

1:06:14

sometimes I do, I interject. And so,

1:06:16

you know, I'll apologize to

1:06:18

you or I'll apologize to you. It's

1:06:20

just, it just clears the energy and

1:06:23

it brings self-awareness. And then

1:06:25

there isn't that resistance, which that

1:06:27

resistance builds to, you know, a

1:06:29

resentment. It keeps,

1:06:31

it creates a space of harmony and unbound

1:06:34

and it's just kind. It's considerate. I agree.

1:06:37

I, you know, you mentioned, you

1:06:39

know, we have a lady that's an

1:06:41

early childhood educator and just a

1:06:43

really brilliant mind who's been a part of our team

1:06:47

parenting meetings. And I'm only

1:06:49

sharing this because whether it's

1:06:51

a teacher, whether it's, you

1:06:54

know, you're just, everybody brings different

1:06:56

gifts. We've all learned

1:06:58

so much from her. And

1:07:01

she shared a

1:07:03

couple of brilliant articles. Mary, you had mentioned one

1:07:06

that really struck you. You

1:07:08

did. I think I know the one you're, the key. Yes.

1:07:11

There's been a couple of things that have been

1:07:13

like, it's like we don't see ourselves in our

1:07:15

blind spots as people, as parents, whatever it may

1:07:18

be. And this one she recommended

1:07:20

and you mentioned Magda Gerber's name earlier. I

1:07:22

think it's in that kind of school

1:07:24

of thought of respectful

1:07:27

parenting. And there

1:07:29

was this one article that was, if

1:07:31

memory serves, it was called cuteness

1:07:34

syndrome, I think it's by a man named

1:07:36

John Holt, I believe was his name. So

1:07:38

it's like an, he wrote a book, but

1:07:40

this, this was like a little magazine

1:07:43

article or something. And

1:07:46

to summarize it, it was like,

1:07:48

you know, kids are so cute.

1:07:50

Their babies are like irresistibly cute

1:07:52

that we kind of use them as like love

1:07:54

objects. We can do anything we want and go

1:07:56

up to them. People just like, you see now

1:07:59

I feel so protected. as a parent. Yes. Like

1:08:02

it's when it's your child, you're just

1:08:04

watching people like descend on her. And

1:08:06

as an energetic myself, it's like, that

1:08:08

would freak me out. Imagine you're just

1:08:10

this tiny little like, you

1:08:12

know, 10 pound per baby. And

1:08:15

so the article went on to say

1:08:17

like, oftentimes it's

1:08:19

about our needs and our wants. And

1:08:21

there's no such thing as too much

1:08:23

affection in

1:08:26

our own eyes. But really it's like, we

1:08:28

have to give space for that child if

1:08:31

they're in a flow in the same way. Like you

1:08:33

mentioned, if Tony is working on something and he's visibly

1:08:36

in state, we're not gonna be

1:08:38

like, hey, Tony, what are you, you wanna play pickleball here? It's

1:08:41

like, no, like let him be. I'm

1:08:44

a total pain in the ass of science if I'm

1:08:46

honest. I love it. We all can be. I love

1:08:48

every bit of it. We all can be. I love

1:08:50

every bit of it. But you know, it's

1:08:52

like, if you think

1:08:54

about that also, I think that brings one other

1:08:56

thing that I would wanna bring forth in our

1:08:58

family. Which is our daughter, there's a lot of

1:09:00

people that come through because our home is our

1:09:03

home, but we have meetings with important people. And

1:09:05

well, every moment, there's so many people going by,

1:09:07

there's somebody gushing on her, gushing on her, but

1:09:09

I probably really wanna acknowledge you because you're the

1:09:11

first one who really brought that up and made

1:09:13

sure we held the line on it, which is

1:09:15

she's constantly, every moment, oh, oh, maybe you can

1:09:17

talk about that. But like when I come into

1:09:19

the room now, it's like even for myself, same

1:09:21

thing about where's the energy I look. And

1:09:23

when I open the door, if she doesn't turn and look, even

1:09:26

when she does, I go greet you and I

1:09:28

greet you, and then I greet her. So she

1:09:30

doesn't think she's the most important thing, even though

1:09:32

I adore her and love her and she feels

1:09:34

totally loved. It's like, you're always the first thing,

1:09:36

that's how you've created adult things, they're supposed to

1:09:38

be the center of every moment's attention. And that

1:09:40

makes a miserable adult because that's not real life.

1:09:42

And you're not gonna have a lasting relationship when

1:09:44

it's all about me, me, me, me. So

1:09:46

would you address that a little bit Yeah,

1:09:48

I think it started, I

1:09:52

can't thank you enough for sharing about that cuteness factor because

1:09:54

I feel like it ties into it, Mary. It does.

1:09:57

And when our daughter was... about

1:10:00

six months, I really recognized just like,

1:10:02

like this home, it's our home, it's

1:10:04

our workspace, it's our studio, it's our,

1:10:06

you know, so there's, it's a high

1:10:08

traffic area. And what I really recognized

1:10:10

is everybody that saw our daughter was

1:10:12

like, you know, you're so

1:10:14

cute, you're so beautiful. And, but then you turn

1:10:16

one corner, and you have that there, and you

1:10:19

turn another corner, and you experience that there. And

1:10:22

because you know, just your heart could be

1:10:25

a little girl, little boy, they're so stinking

1:10:27

cute. And, you know, the attention goes there.

1:10:29

So I recognize I was like, gosh,

1:10:31

there's a hierarchy of respect. There's a

1:10:33

reason why it is in

1:10:36

our nature to respect our elders.

1:10:39

That's been a lost art in our society.

1:10:41

You know, growing up, I mean, Mary,

1:10:43

you and I've spoken about this many times, it was

1:10:45

always Mr. and Mrs. You know, Mr. and Mrs. so

1:10:47

and so, they're coming or a

1:10:50

teacher, and we've gotten so familiar

1:10:52

in our society. And so

1:10:55

we had a conversation, we had a team

1:10:57

parenting meeting. And I really recognized

1:10:59

I was like, guys, look, we need to start

1:11:01

with the adult. So it's

1:11:04

Hello Miss, you know, Miss

1:11:06

Maria, whomever it might be, or Hello,

1:11:09

Mommy, Hello, Daddy, and then

1:11:11

greeting our child. And that

1:11:13

just creates a balance and

1:11:16

creates a space to that breath of

1:11:18

space there. And also, I

1:11:20

feel just reflects real life. You don't go

1:11:22

out on the street and the whole world

1:11:24

stops to see you. That's not real life.

1:11:27

And so it's keeping an anchor and

1:11:29

a groundedness and a humbleness of

1:11:33

one's nature. So I want

1:11:35

her to have authentic interactions as

1:11:37

well. And so if every interaction

1:11:39

that she's experiencing, especially in this

1:11:41

formative stage, is like a tickle

1:11:43

and a high and this and that and everybody's

1:11:46

voices up here. It's like

1:11:48

that translates to her and that

1:11:51

becomes her as she grows

1:11:53

on. And it's like I want her to feel just

1:11:55

like, yes, that she can just

1:11:57

exist in that authentic emotion, whatever that may

1:11:59

be instead of...pleaser

1:12:01

is born. Pleaser for him, exactly. Yes. And

1:12:04

we both did that. If you saw your... Yeah, I've been

1:12:06

there. If you're your favorite person in the

1:12:08

world that comes in and you go, oh, hi, it's great to

1:12:11

see you, that's wonderful. But if you come back in three minutes,

1:12:13

hey, it's really great to see you. It's great to see you

1:12:15

every time it becomes false. It gets a little weird. And fake.

1:12:18

But then also, in her mind, if that isn't

1:12:20

happening then, well, what's wrong with me? How come

1:12:22

people aren't responding me to it that way? And

1:12:24

I think that's a big part of our world

1:12:26

today from helicopter parenting, you know, became the gross

1:12:28

metaphor for it of overstimulation,

1:12:31

over-controlling, over-directing, no autonomy to the

1:12:33

child. And the child's looking to you

1:12:35

to solve everything and now, I think, it's the children looking

1:12:37

for the government to solve everything because it's how they've been

1:12:40

raised. So to wrap up, I think, you

1:12:42

know, we've covered a lot of principles. We

1:12:44

talked out, started in the beginning here about

1:12:46

just this whole idea of what is this

1:12:48

conscious parenting as opposed to stress-based fear parenting,

1:12:51

this awareness, this conscious that, as you

1:12:53

said, says the awareness that can change

1:12:55

anything and begin to see the patterns

1:12:57

being seen what's real and really having

1:12:59

the outcome of knowing you

1:13:01

want to raise a beautiful human being. We talked

1:13:04

a little bit about the idea that you can start creating that.

1:13:06

If you already have a child, you can still decide who they

1:13:08

need to become. Not what they do

1:13:10

for a living, not that kind of controlling thing. What

1:13:12

are the qualities that whatever they choose to do

1:13:14

will create a great quality of life and I

1:13:17

think that's homework for all of us to constantly

1:13:19

enhance. We talked a little bit

1:13:21

here, you know, about the importance of your state

1:13:23

being the basis of it all. I'm just trying

1:13:25

to give you a recap of the things because

1:13:27

we've covered so much there. I'm looking at my

1:13:29

own notes here. We talked about the power of

1:13:31

language and choices, not creating language

1:13:33

that makes fear but language, again, that creates

1:13:35

the awareness, the idea of not be careful

1:13:38

all the time but rather be mindful. We

1:13:41

talked a little bit here about overstimulation and

1:13:43

what that creates and teaching your child to

1:13:45

be able to experience life as opposed to

1:13:47

judging right, wrong every single moment. We've covered

1:13:50

a lot of areas, how to deal with

1:13:52

ways of emotion, apologies,

1:13:54

positive intent, learning

1:13:56

to hold the line. So it's all

1:13:58

a dance. the most important

1:14:00

one I want to bring back to everyone listening is we

1:14:03

have enormous compassion. I

1:14:06

speak for myself but I know we all have it. For

1:14:09

all of you out there that are parents that give

1:14:11

your souls to these children and children

1:14:14

really come adults almost never fully can ever

1:14:16

fully appreciate all that you've gone through just

1:14:19

to have them be born if you're the

1:14:21

mother come through your body. All

1:14:23

the things that all night long

1:14:25

thoughts and feelings and emotions that you have and

1:14:28

if you're stressed and you got so much going on your life

1:14:31

we get it and we aren't pretending in this one

1:14:33

little you know conversation that we can

1:14:35

solve all that but what I hope you

1:14:37

got from this is there are some

1:14:39

principles worth looking at like a little to create a checklist you may

1:14:41

not agree with all of them but out of these

1:14:44

things we talked about what are some of these things you'd

1:14:46

say like this might be our card for the week we're

1:14:48

gonna focus on you know noticing here

1:14:50

positive intent or we're gonna really work on

1:14:52

giving choices for everything one or two choices

1:14:55

the choices either one are gonna be good

1:14:57

or choices with consequences not heavy-duty ones what

1:14:59

can you do to chunk this down because

1:15:01

you know we don't have a course for

1:15:04

this we'll eventually build one but hopefully this

1:15:06

conversation is helpful to you

1:15:08

this is not you know a trip

1:15:11

of something it's predictable you know what's gonna happen how

1:15:13

it's gonna have so my trips are boring a

1:15:15

journey is an adventure you were being when you're

1:15:17

being called to an adventure was a child you've

1:15:19

been called to discover things you never discovered in

1:15:22

yourself much less your child you're gonna meet different

1:15:24

people that can be mentors you're gonna face the

1:15:26

dragons and eventually conquer all that

1:15:28

so I just love the fishes up by saying

1:15:30

you know it's my pro that

1:15:32

sometimes you you call it the dance right it's like

1:15:34

the dance to get this job done what would you

1:15:36

have what do you have to say about the journey

1:15:39

of being a mom and being a parent

1:15:41

and is there anything else that we've not touched that either one

1:15:43

of you want to share here to wrap up gosh

1:15:52

it is a journey and a dance

1:15:54

as life is and it's

1:15:57

an opportunity to grow It's

1:16:00

an opportunity to reflect love. It's

1:16:04

an opportunity to hold space

1:16:07

for these beautiful beings,

1:16:09

these beautiful children that we are

1:16:11

blessed with. It is a privilege

1:16:13

to usher a child

1:16:16

through existence and to recognize

1:16:19

as well that we're not the center

1:16:21

of attention. They

1:16:23

do not. We're simply

1:16:25

a puzzle piece. For

1:16:29

myself, I always see our daughter walking

1:16:31

this way. Every

1:16:37

picture that really, actually I find

1:16:39

most profound, she's walking away from

1:16:41

me. And I feel... Because

1:16:43

she's secure. Yeah, she's... And it's

1:16:45

just like she's going to live her life. And

1:16:49

we have the privilege

1:16:51

to co-create with this existence, to bring them

1:16:53

into this world. And

1:16:56

we have the privilege to create safety,

1:17:00

to create support and

1:17:03

to love them. That

1:17:06

doesn't mean that we're going to do it

1:17:08

perfectly. It doesn't mean you're going to be

1:17:10

conscious every moment. I'm not conscious every moment.

1:17:12

But it does mean that there is a

1:17:15

dance between you and your child,

1:17:17

between you and your family members

1:17:19

that offers us an opportunity to

1:17:21

reflect, to grow, to evolve,

1:17:24

to become our truest

1:17:26

nature. And

1:17:29

I really believe that that's why we're here. And

1:17:32

if I think of my life before

1:17:35

our daughter, I used

1:17:39

to wonder, how is... And

1:17:41

I just say this for parents who are maybe

1:17:43

contemplating having a child. How

1:17:47

is this going to happen? Where is

1:17:49

she going to fit in this really busy life? And now

1:17:52

I look at our life and I'm like, oh my gosh, I

1:17:54

can't imagine our life without her. And

1:17:58

there's just that centric. And

1:18:00

yet tonight she had a whole life

1:18:02

without us and I love that for her. She

1:18:05

came home dressed in this fairy dress

1:18:08

and had a thing of chapstick and

1:18:10

living her life. And

1:18:13

I'm so touched that she wanted to share

1:18:15

her world with me in that moment. And

1:18:18

that's a privilege. And

1:18:21

so I don't know if that answered your

1:18:23

question, Tom. That's it. I'm

1:18:26

so glad you... That's it. That's

1:18:28

the outcome really. It's like we're not trying

1:18:30

to raise an obedient

1:18:33

child. It's like we're trying to raise a

1:18:35

child that grows up and goes out into

1:18:37

the world and can figure things out for

1:18:39

themselves. It

1:18:42

makes me emotional to think of those

1:18:44

pictures of her looking out. And

1:18:46

they're not selfies of us

1:18:48

or something. It's like her going out to

1:18:51

do something or her looking out a window

1:18:53

and you feel just the revving

1:18:55

engine of this little being like, I want

1:18:57

to go do this. And that's

1:18:59

our job as parents. Just

1:19:01

love her up and get her ready to go

1:19:03

do it and watch her go do it. I

1:19:05

agree. I can't wait to watch her go do

1:19:07

it. Well, we already are. We're

1:19:09

watching her like... Happening in real time. Sometimes

1:19:12

I'll... Not to be a creeper, but I'll... If

1:19:15

she's outside with her friend

1:19:17

and I'll peek out

1:19:19

the window and just... I don't know.

1:19:23

I feel joy. I can

1:19:25

witness your happiness. I can witness your happiness.

1:19:27

I can hear you guys laughing or

1:19:30

anybody, my mom and my dad. I don't

1:19:32

have to be a part of that. And

1:19:34

I definitely find that to be true, being

1:19:36

a parent. And I'm

1:19:38

just so happy for her happiness. I'm so

1:19:40

happy for her life. I'm so happy for

1:19:42

her growth. It just... To

1:19:45

see her life living through her

1:19:48

is the most extraordinary thing. And I couldn't

1:19:50

imagine my life any other way. So...

1:19:55

There's no greater gift than to have

1:19:58

the privilege of... helping

1:20:00

the soul in its development at this stage

1:20:03

of life and then to see that soul

1:20:05

mature and grow and master

1:20:07

life and become a force for

1:20:09

good and a force for God, a beautiful source.

1:20:12

I'm so deeply grateful. It's

1:20:15

Mother's Day. So maybe

1:20:18

this is a great way to celebrate

1:20:20

is to think about whoever was a

1:20:22

mother to you, not always your physical mother. Not always

1:20:24

your physical mother. Sometimes it was somebody else but somebody

1:20:26

else who loved you so much or

1:20:28

saw what was in you so much and

1:20:31

truthfully sacrificed so much for you to be

1:20:33

there. So I'm grateful to my mama since

1:20:35

past. I'm grateful to both of

1:20:37

your amazing moms, yours who just

1:20:39

recently passed and yours who still with us. And

1:20:42

I'm grateful for the fathers that we had as well. It

1:20:45

takes it all. But if you're at home,

1:20:47

I hope you'll leave this

1:20:50

message with a feeling of being

1:20:52

loved for who you are for taking. If

1:20:54

you decide to take this jump or you already

1:20:57

have, just realizing I might hear some people say,

1:21:00

so I'm just a mom, I'm just a dad. I'm thinking, what

1:21:02

on earth could be more important?

1:21:04

So maybe on this day, I

1:21:07

acknowledge the goodness of what you've given to

1:21:09

your child because you've only built on success. Maybe

1:21:12

come up with some principles of the next level or

1:21:14

if you're not having one, what you're hoping to do

1:21:16

in the future. And if you don't

1:21:18

have a child, I doubt you're still listening. But if you

1:21:20

were, I'm very touched by that. And I

1:21:22

hope maybe you'll make a call to a mother

1:21:25

in your life or a woman in your life

1:21:27

who, a being in your life that

1:21:29

played that role and thank them from

1:21:31

the heart and from the soul.

1:21:36

Blessings to all of you. Thanks ladies. That was

1:21:38

gorgeous. Thank you, Tony. I love

1:21:40

being with you. Thank you, Mary. Thank you,

1:21:42

Tony. The

1:21:50

Tony Robbins podcast is inspired and

1:21:52

directed by Tony Robbins and his

1:21:54

teachings. It's produced by us,

1:21:56

Team Tony. Be right. Robbins

1:21:59

Research International. you