Whinypaluza Wednesday This is 45

2 minutes.

Hi! Hello! Hello everyone! Happy Winey Palooza Wednesday! No need to whine, it's Winey Palooza Wednesday! Have some wine and join us on the Winey Palooza Wednesday with the Green Family!

Cha-cha chicken!

I can't do this. Wait, did I do it?

You do it.

Yeah.

Watch out, let Ella escape.

What is my issue with this camera?

It's backwards, it's backwards. It gets you confused. You gotta be used to moving in the opposite direction you think you're moving. So I'm moving to the right and it's going to the left. This is very tricky high technology.

I'm gonna leave that stuff to you, Seth.

This is my left, this is my right.

It took me a long time to figure that out. I'm not gonna lie.

What lovely Winey Balooza swag you're wearing.

I was just getting there. So I am really excited because you have heard about our fabulous, fabulous graphic designer Kristen, and I wanted two things for my birthday. My birthday is Friday.

Happy birthday!

And I got both things, so thank you, Chris. One is an awesome Whiny Palooza decal for my car because I live in my car driving my kids around, so I wanted to advertise.

That's right, while I live in my car, and it helps me find it at Wegmans.

And I wanted my first piece of Whiny Palooza ice, so my first swag. And Kristen, I don't know if you're gonna tune in to see this because I told you I was gonna wear it on my live, but I love it. And she doesn't know this, but this is like my favorite shade of pink ever. And I love the design she made, and I'm so excited, and I got it for my birthday.

Oh my God, you're like 16. So cute.

Uh, where are all the people? Where are all of you? Are you outside enjoying this day? Um, are you at a baseball game? Soccer game?

Just finished soccer, made it back in time.

So I had a meeting and Seth had a soccer game with Max, and Seth was like, you know, you're live at 9:00. Are you going to be back by 9:00? And I was like, oh yeah, that, that little thing that we do. So we just got home a little while ago and we are ready to rock. And every year I use my birthday as an opportunity to reflect on that I have made. And so my latest blog topic is This is 45. And I am turning 45 in 2 days, and I am going to start with the fact that I will never be one of those women who are ashamed of my age. I will be one of those women who wear it like a badge of honor, and I will wear it and be proud of it, and I want to recommend that all of you do the same. Every year is a gift. I do not take it for granted. And I feel very fortunate every year that I get to celebrate a birthday. So I'm going to start with the fact that one of my lessons is that Max was turning, I think it was 10, and my friend called and she knew that I was going to be crying because my baby had entered the double-digit world. And she knew how sensitive I was. And she knew that I was going to be crying and she wanted to see how I was doing. And she said, every year is a gift and he's supposed to be growing and he's supposed to get older and live is horrible.

Yes.

And some people don't get to celebrate.

You don't want to age in reverse. You don't want to end up like that movie where he's going back in time.

So you don't want, you know, she said some parents don't get to celebrate their kids' 10th birthday. So be happy and fortunate that you get to. And a lightbulb, it was like sometimes we have lightbulb moments. She turned a switch in my brain, and from then on in, I have celebrated my children's birthdays with a feeling of fortunate thankfulness, gratefulness, and the same with my birthday. So be thankful for your birthday, women. Be proud of your age. Don't shy away from it. Wear it like a badge of honor. So that's lesson number 1, okay? So I'm going to tell you all about what I have learned this year.

You learned a lot.

I learned so much. We all did because it was such a crazy year. And my son's making me laugh. And we all went through the pandemic. And it really— you have heard me talk about the lessons that I learned. It really made me learn how to slow down. I didn't really know how. It made me embrace being home with my family. I loved the family time. I loved not living in my car. There were so many things. It wasn't a good reason, right? But there were so many things that I learned and so many things that I actually enjoyed. I even did a puzzle, and I never do puzzles.

She did a couple puzzles. There's still one that hasn't been worked on in a while.

I think I put it away. Oh good. I gave up because I, I don't sit I tend to read or watch one of my shows.

Yes.

I don't tend to puzzle.

No, it was just because you had so much time to sit that puzzles came along.

Yeah. So I— so this was probably my first year doing a puzzle. So that was new for me too. I want to talk about my health because as we get older every year, I look at it differently and I think about— so my morning ritual that I'm very attached to is that the kids go off to school, walk my dog, and I walk my dog for my dog, and I walk my dog for me. And like today I did super speed, and I made—

super speed walk.

Yes. And I made him walk super fast and just thought about my health and that I was able to walk fast and I'm able to walk farther. And I remember when you know, 2 miles might have made me feel winded, and now after 2 miles, I'm like, darn it, I have an appointment, I have to go inside, I want to do 3 miles, I want to do 4 miles. So I appreciate my health differently, and I think about walking and exercise as something for my health, and I'm not like chasing this body image that I used to chase. And I just feel like there's a lot of maturity that I have gained with how I view my body and how I view my health, which brings me to how my eyes have softened. My eyes have softened in so many ways. My eyes have softened towards myself, which is first and foremost important because it rubs off on other people. And I find that I am talking to myself in the mirror. That is new for me. And I will say things like, "I am so proud of you." or that was a really good live vlog that you just did, or you really did a good job talking to that lady on your podcast. You're doing such a great job. I'm so proud of you. You look so pretty today. I'm talking to myself in the mirror and I'm lifting myself up in it. And try it. It really seriously works. Do you do that? Yes. Okay, so you don't think I'm crazy?

I do not think you're talking to yourself is not crazy. That is the title of the book.

So I didn't know that.

It is.

So my eyes have softened towards myself, and I find that I'm looking at myself nicer, and I'm not ripping myself apart physically, and I'm talking nicer to myself, and I'm finding that that in turn is, is rubbing off on how I'm— my eyes are with other people too. And I'm kind with other people, and I feel like I'm holding them, you know, I have such high standards for myself, and I feel like as I've loosened up on myself and been kinder to myself, it has then rubbed off to everyone else in my life, my kids, my husband, my friends. Have you noticed that at all?

Yes, you are definitely softer.

Softer, yes, which I greatly appreciate. Which brings me to reactivity. And when we make goals for ourself, the most important thing over the years has been for me to work on my reactivity because I don't like myself when I'm reactive. I don't think I'm being a good wife or mother when I'm reactive. So I consciously have been so focused on my reactivity and I think that the reason why I have made strides this year with my reactivity is because I have stopped focusing on what Seth or Lily is doing wrong and I have focused on what am I doing wrong. How am— what can I do to make the situation better? I was just talking to Lauren Aster today. We recorded a podcast that you will hear in late July. And she brought up the power of the pause. And you have heard me talk about the power of the pause. It's one of like the most important skills that we can all learn. It will improve all of your relationships. And we talked about how it's like a lifelong of learning how to take the power of the pause before you, but that you don't react. And I have thought about, okay, is what I'm gonna say going to help the situation, or is it going to make the situation worse? And I have focused on my own state and my own calm and what I'm doing in the situation, and it is making me less reactive. I'm not putting my pride and my ego into the conflict and thinking about, oh, I can't believe Seth said that. Or, you know, like, one of the things that tended to own my mind before I was focused on myself was, oh, he's being such a dick. That, that is what would be going off on my— in my mind is, you know, I don't like how Seth is talking to me. I don't like how he's acting. And that wasn't serving me. It was making the situation worse and it was fueling it. So if, if I can do it, you can do it. Focus on yourself in the situation and watch how your conflicts decrease. What do you think about that, honey?

I think that is an excellent pointer. I think that applies to work as well.

Clients. Yes.

And staff.

And staff. It applies to every relationship.

Yes, for all relationships.

It improves every single relationship. And I think that as we work on our marriage, it improves our relationships with our kids. As we work on our kids, it improves our relationship with our coworkers. All as, as we work on ourselves, you'll see it in all areas of your life. So it's a work in progress. I'm not 100% successful.

Nobody is.

I am thinking right now where I did not do a good job. And I think it is important for me to evaluate that and what tends to go wrong. What are the patterns and how can I fix, fix it? And the pattern in my life was I would rush Lily, Lily would get reactive, and we would clash.

Yes.

So the biggest conflict in the house is when I rush Lily, she gets reactive, and then I get reactive, and then I get more stressed out because I don't want to be late. So the solutions to that is number one, try to be prepared before the situation. So if we're going to a dance dress rehearsal, have everything laid out that you need, everything, bobby pins, everything, okay? So, I was ready. I had everything prepared and sometimes she helps me with that because she's super independent and try to give as much time as possible. So, if Lily can get ready slow manner, she's super happy. If she has to rush, she gets super frazzled and the issue is we only have 30 minutes. There's nothing I can do. We got home at almost 4, we had to leave at 4:30. I can't give you an hour to get ready. You're gonna have to do it in 30 minutes. And yes, a conflict erupted because I was rushing her. So I know the pattern. I know I need to be prepared and lay things out. I know I need to give her as much time as possible, and I know I need to communicate in a way that doesn't sound like I'm rushing her.

So yes, if you can give her the illusion of time and independence, you'll get more of what you want and less of what you don't.

So if we look for patterns, then we can look for solutions and we can fix the pattern. So I think that's been huge this year. Huge. The other thing, the older I get, and you've heard me talk about this before, but this is, this is 45, and this is things that I have learned that I want my kids to learn before they're 45. Quality of friendships over quantity of friendships. And I use in my blog that I wrote that you can go read at whinypalooza.com is, would you want 100 pennies or would you want 4 quarters? And I want 4 quarters, and I want quality. And the more we put into a relationship, the more we will get out of the relationship. So we have to put effort in. We can't We can't expect to have a good marriage without putting effort in. We can't expect to have a good friendship without putting effort in. So I definitely put effort into my relationships, and I definitely think quality is more important than quantity. I have told all 3 of my kids, I mean, one good friend is fabulous, even 2. You don't have to have 10 friends to call. You know, just a couple friends that I want them to go spend time with. So that, I think that was, that took me a long time to learn that. And what else have I learned? What else I have learned about what I think. And I laugh when I say that because I was so worried all the time about what other people think and pleasing other people.

Yes, the people pleaser curse.

So the people pleaser that went through life pleasing her parents and pleasing her friends went on to get married and please her husband and then went on to have children and please her children. So the people pleasing just continued and continued and continued. I have learned that I care about things too.

You need to please yourself.

And what about me? What about pleasing myself? And the best example that I thought of when I was writing this is you have heard me talk about this before. I wanted a dog and nobody in my family wanted a dog and they didn't know what they were missing. And fortunately we got the dog and everybody loves the dog. It could have gone a completely different route. I'm, I'm, I wasn't sure that it was going to go well, but I said, you want a dog? It's okay that you're the only one who wants a dog. Get yourself a dog. And I had that conversation with myself a few times.

I bet you did.

To reassure myself that it was okay to do something that my family didn't agree with. And Max was like, we're good, we have the cats. And Seth was like, we're good, we have the cats. And Lily didn't— Lily was like, ah, I don't really want a dog. And and she's little, am I gonna be able to carry it? And Seth was like, no, I am not getting a little dog. And Ella was like, I'm afraid of dogs, please don't get a dog. That was the— that was the hardest part of this whole thing, was if Ella was afraid.

Let me see whose finger you wrapped around there.

Well, I mean, the reasons that you guys were giving me was, we have cats, we're good. Her reason was Lily didn't really have a reason, and, and Ella's reason was, please, Mom, I'm afraid of dogs, don't get a dog. And I was like, if I get a little cute puppy, is she really gonna be afraid of the dog? I questioned that part a lot, but thankfully it worked out, and she fell in love with Tanner like as soon as he walked through the door.

Yes.

So it's okay to do things for yourself. And I'm telling you that because I know that you need to hear it, because I need to hear it. Now we're talking about pools and hot tubs, this conversation. And I don't know, I don't know that— again, I don't know that they know what they're missing. And I grew up in a house with a pool, and I had tons of pool parties. And tons of friends over to swim in my pool. And my memories of the summer were spending time in my pool. So they really don't know what they're missing. So again, this might be something for me that turns into something that my whole family loves. I don't know. What's your opinion over there?

We shall stay tuned to see what happens. You'll watch it live.

Oh my gosh.

So Who knows, you may see a future episode from in a pool.

Oh, can we do that? We can, because we can—

I don't have to put it on something so what didn't get wet. We'll see, the Wi-Fi would have to go out that far.

So I embrace my age. I am not embarrassed. I am not ashamed. I'm happy to tell you my age. I have learned to slow down and smell the roses when I'm— because I have 3 kids and I have a lot going on.

Yes, Maria says hi.

Hi, Maria.

Maria Jackson.

Hello. I have learned to do exercise for my health and not to achieve a certain body standard. My eyes have softened towards myself and other people. I am talking nicer to myself. Which is then leading to having lower expectations and being kinder to others. I have learned that quality of friendship is better than quantity. I have become less reactive by focusing on my role in the conflict and not on other people's role in the conflict. And I have learned to care more about what I think. And I think that I've learned a lot.

You have.

What do you think of all those lessons?

I think they are valuable to anybody looking to improve their life, no matter what age they are.

I would love to hear how old you are and what you have learned this year. Please comment. Tell us, tell us, you know, I'm 50 and I learned to love to run this year. Tell us what you learned. What are you doing?

Melissa says no, no, that's not what we're talking about. What are you doing? I thought that was somebody sending in their tip.

Seth Green, do not read text messages about PTA.

Oh, I didn't know that's what it was. I apologize. Conditions you have to work under, I tell you. So hard to find good health.

It's free. So this Friday there is a new Family Friday podcast And last week I did a Father's Day special. This week I wanted to do a birthday special because it's airing on my birthday. So I handed it over to Seth and I said, here you go, all things Rebecca, all things birthday, go. And he did a fantastic job. Now mind you, he's done how many podcasts?

1,000.

He's done 1,000 podcasts. So I had no doubt that he was going to do fabulous with this interview. You, and he did. I think you're gonna really like it.

I learned a lot about you and things that you've learned.

Really? I didn't know that.

You have to tune in to find out.

So listen to my podcast Friday.

And how do they listen to your podcast?

Oh, you're gonna show them. So my friend— I had lunch with my friend. She took me out, um, for a pre-birthday lunch, and she said, I don't know how to listen to your podcast.

So here's your quick technology tutorial. You have a phone. Somewhere on that phone, if it is an Apple phone, it has a purple app. Purple app that says Podcasts. It's, it's on your phone. You cannot delete it. It's there if you search for it. In the Podcast app, you're gonna hit the search button at the bottom right. You're gonna type in Whiny Palooza, and that is W-H-I-N-Y P-A-L-U-Z-A. It will come up. It will look like—

they can't see.

Yeah.

The lighting is terrible.

There you go. You'll see my wonderful wife's smiling face.

So click on it.

Click on that and you will find her episode.

And you can pick an episode.

It works whether it's a Google— Click on it. An Android phone or an Apple phone.

So there are 55 episodes to choose from.

Listen to them all, binge.

I would love for you to listen to them while you are driving in your car like I do, doing dishes, doing laundry.

We'd love a 5-star review, please.

Walking your dog, um, listen to my podcast and leave a review. When people leave a review, then Apple rewards you by showing your podcast to more people, or Google Podcasts, or whatever platform it's on. Yes, so we appreciate your 5-star reviews.

And she is on iTunes, Google Play, Spotify, Stitcher, TuneIn, iHeartRadio, Pandora, and Audible.

Or you can watch it on YouTube.

Or you can watch it on YouTube. Whether you prefer to watch or listen is up to you.

Okay, so also on Friday, I'm going to launch a birthday challenge in my Whiny Palooza Mom Facebook group. And if you win the challenge, you will get a, um, present from me. So I think what I'm doing, I'm either doing I'm going to talk to Seth. I'm either going to do some jewelry because I love jewelry and this is about me on Friday. So I'm either going to get you some jewelry or maybe some Starbucks because I love some Starbucks. So I'm just—

well, I'm presuming that the jewelry is going to cost more than the Starbucks. So either you're not going to drink a lot of— a lot of— well, you might drink a lot of coffee.

Either a Starbucks gift card or some jewelry. I'm deciding. And please feel free to weigh in on what you love to win because if you're like me, you love Starbucks. And jewelry.

And that doesn't really help. Or I can get you—

I can get you one of these.

Oh, we in Winey Palooza swag! How about that?

I can—

how about people buy Winey Palooza swag from us, they take pictures, and the best picture in Winey Palooza swag wins something? Not this month, but maybe in July.

Hmm. Ah, there we go. Sandy says jewelry. Thank you, thank you for weighing in.

You gotta vote.

Okay, so the So look for my birthday challenge on Friday. I'm also going to launch a July challenge. And what, what the purpose of my group is, is I am on this venture to help women and men, but mostly women, learn that they're not alone and that we're all experiencing the same things and we're all here for you and we can talk about it and we can support each other and you can vent. You can tell us a challenge that you're having. You can tell us something successful that happened in your marriage or in parenting to help other people be successful. And it was just another step that I took to help support— help us support each other. And I'm loving the community, and I appreciate you tuning in. And I need one of my daughters Ella Lily, why don't you let Lily do it? Let Lily do it. Except we're still waiting for her.

Well, you can't rush her.

So tell us how old you are and tell us—

or maybe they don't publicly want to comment with their age. How about just something they've learned?

You don't have to tell us how old you are, but I want you to be proud of your age. You can tell us something that you have learned over this last year. Yes, thank you, honey.

Why don't you go that way?

Come here, come on, they're waiting for you. Thank you for watching Learning Palooza. One day with the great family, Cha-Cha Chicken. And she just went swimming and I don't even think she brushed her hair, so we'll work on that.

Thank you, everybody.

Have a good week, everyone.