Rebeccah Silence offers four ways parents can take better care of themselves: establish a non-negotiable daily self-care ritual, stop blaming yourself for your kids' behavior, keep your own identity separate from parenting, and practice direct communication so your children see what a full life looks like.
Hey, it's Rebecca. Silence. Creator of healing is possible, owner of inspired results and emotional healing coach and I'm here to talk to parents today about what they can do for themselves as we're heading back into another school year and the ground beneath us is, let's just face it, still pretty shaky. So I have four things that you can do to take care of yourself right now so that you can be an even better parent in an even more grounded, healthier, more healed version of yourself for your kids and your families and your workplaces and your communities as we head into another school year. So the first thing that I want to invite you to take on is making sure that you've got a self care ritual and routine in place for yourself. But when I say that calm down, all I mean is when what's one thing you can do for yourself a day to start? If you're already doing one thing, what's the second? For example, I have celery juice every morning, I do boot camp every morning, every night I take a bath and I cleanse after my workday with people transitioning me back into time with family and kids. What's one thing to start or no matter how many self care practices you already have, what's one more? And then make it a ritual, make it a consistent, sacred, non negotiable. This is the key daily practice that will change your life. Build everything around your self care ritual and you will never have sacrificed your self care. What's easier to do is to try to build self care into and around the day to day grind. But I'm suggesting pick at least one thing, make it a ritual and build everything else around that second thing. No matter what your kids say about you or to you, no matter how well they listen or show up at home or in the world, it's not your fault. Please stop seeing your kids as a reflection of you. That puts a lot of pressure on yourself, puts a ton of pressure on them and it's just not true. Your kids are a reflection of them. They are their own entity. So the second thing I want you to do is, is just take the pressure off of the way your kids show up being about you. Because it's not. You're there to love them no matter how they show up and more importantly, to love yourself no matter how your kids show up. The third thing that I really hope you'll hear that I wanna invite you to take on heading into the new school year is I want you to make a commitment that you're not Gonna lose yourself. And in your role of parent and or spouse, this is a big one. It is your job to be your best for your kids, but it's also your job to commit to not losing yourself. Meaning you are going to commit to staying independent in this feisty spirit version of you that you actually are. Even though you've got kids and responsibility and potentially a relationship as well. Don't lose you. That isn't part of being a parent. But that is so often what we saw growing up and then repeat sometimes without even realizing it. So instead of losing yourself, I want you to be more of yourself. You living your life your way for you, even though you also are a parent, raising kids and or in a relationship and working and all of it at the same time. Don't give you up. The final thing is be real and willing to have honest, straight talk. Model you not stepping over the little things that add up and blow up later. Model you being willing to have the hard conversations. And what I mean by that is just really simply starting with owning what you need, what you want, how you feel. If, for example, there's a breakdown with your kid, saying, I want to get through this with you. I want to be able to have trust between us. I need to know you care about that too. I'm feeling so upset right now that I need to take a break before we have this conversation. I need, I want, I feel you owning it powerfully. Being willing to risk it and have the conversation instead of closing your eyes or crossing your fingers and hope it changes or goes away. That's everything to model for your kids. And then bonus, model living the life you've always dreamed that you could because you can, so that your kids can see that they can live their life their way. It's not about trying to teach them or train them the way they should be or how they should live. No, because again, their results, their choices, they're a reflection of them, not of you. But you get to be in leadership of the life you want for you so that they can have whatever version of that they want for themselves.
