46. Natural Consequences for kids & (mostly) YOU!

Hello, my beautiful friend, and welcome to the Mind Body Alignment podcast. I'm your host, Tessa Romero, and also your coach. I'm here to teach you powerful skills and tools to not only know who you are, but how to become exactly who you want to be with a mindset that finally supports you. I'm so grateful that you're here. Let's get started. Are you freaking ready for this episode? Because I sure am, and I'm so freaking pumped about it. And I know that it's a little bit of an unpopular perspective that I'm holding on this, but I promise you it's not as triggering as some of the other things that we talk and share about here on the podcast and in other areas. So, you know, I just need to start this episode and say a big old friggin thank you. Thank you for showing up here, for holding space for my unique perspectives and for even considering them. A lot of times, like, it just means a lot to me. And I got to meet just the other day I went to Target with my boys and there's a sweet girl, Colby, that came up to me with her three daughters, twins, and then her five year old. So she had four year old twins, a five year old, and then a six year old boy was at home. So like so close together. And Colby said that her and her sister listened to the podcast so often and she was just so freaking wonderful and so freaking sweet. And it was just really nice for me to see and really hear from her that this work on the podcast matters and we're doing a great job together. And even if not everyone's going to get it, there are so many of you that do and appreciate it. And I just wanted to start this episode extending my appreciation to all of you. And if you ever see me, I just love it when you come give me a hug. Like, it's just the freaking best, okay? But this episode, yes, it's going to be a unique perspective. I don't think it's going to be as triggering as your kids don't make you mad, for example, but it might feel a little bit triggering. So hang in here with me. But let's talk about natural consequences, okay? Have you really heard about natural consequences being talked about when it comes to parenting styles? Like instead of punishing and disciplining our kids, we let them experience natural consequences. And I have a perfect example of this. So with Liam the other day, Liam is my almost 5 year old. He's super sweet, super tender, very friendly, very confident, and sometimes highly emotional and he's still learning how to feel angry without acting on it and how to. How to. How to just again, feel without becoming the feeling. And I'm. I think I'm doing a really good job teaching him and helping him with that. But anyway, he was over at our house playing with one of his cute little friends. And just a fun fact, there are 19 kids on my street, and I love it. And I am just determined to always be the house that kids want to play at and come hang out at. Um, and I'd say it's a tie between my house and my neighbor across the street. She might win most days because she's just next freaking level amazing. Um, but I try really hard to have a house like that. I'll even, like, intentionally buy snacks that guys. I will intentionally buy snacks and keep snacks in the pantry for the kids to just grab because I want them to play here. I want. I don't know. I just really want to be a part of that. I want to have them play here. I want to observe them, learn from them, and encourage them and just know that at least in my house, they're always going to feel welcomed and encouraged and really seen and heard and valued. And I can enforce a lot of what I teach my kids onto them, even if they don't maybe hear it in their homes. I don't know if they hear in their homes, you know? So, anyway, I feel very strongly about that. But Liam had her, his cute little friend over, and she's just a tiny bit older than him, like, by a month. And they're playing in our basement, and I was upstairs with Luke and his little friend. That was over. And then the little girl comes running up the stairs saying, I'm going home. I was like, okay, that's. That's totally fine. We'll see in a little bit. Do you want me to walk you home? And she just lives literally right across the street. So I remind her, like, watch for cars and all the things. She's like, yeah, I'm going home. And then Liam. I pro. So that talking with her probably took, like, one minute, if that. It was honestly probably like, 20 seconds. And then here comes Liam bawling his eyes out, screaming at her. Like, screaming at her. And he's, like, shaking his fist, and he just felt so. So angry. I could. Obviously, and very emotional, like, more. More than anger. It was just. There was a lot of hurt going on. I could tell, too. And I. I had no idea what happened or what was going on. This little girl is just Like, I'm going home. And Liam is very much upset about the whole thing, and I'm like, whoa, whoa. So here I am, trying to, like, have an understanding of what's going on. And then Liam decided he's never done this before when she said, yeah, Liam, I'm going home. She opens our front door, and Liam said, I don't want you to go home. And he's, like, shaking his arms, and he's like. His whole body is just, like, so freaking tense. And then I was, like, standing on one end of our kitchen, and I'm kind of, like, observing what's happening, and obviously, like, things are safe. There's no need for me to really, like, intervene at this point. And I'm, like, observing, trying to figure out, listen to what I can and respond in a way that I feel proud of. So I honestly didn't know what to do immediately. So that's why I was spending so much time observing, because I was like, wow. And anyway, Liam's like, I don't want you to go home. And then she's like, I'm leaving. And she, like, closes our door, and Liam just books it so fast to our front door, opens the door and runs out the front door with his fist waving in the air, saying, like, do you want me to hit you? I don't want you to go home. I'm like, whoa. That's the opposite approach to take if you want your friend to play with you. And anyway, I didn't, like, say that to him, but I, like, run outside after Liam because I just was not expecting that. It completely caught me off guard. So I run outside after Liam. I see everything that he's doing. I'm like, buddy, Liam, come on back. Leah's gonna go home. We're just taking a break. Let's go talk about it, and then we can try again. Let's just go talk first. And I honestly, friends. I'll be completely honest. I felt very upset about the whole thing. I felt just really. I felt disappointed that that's what he chose to do towards his friend. I honestly felt, like, a little bit nervous about what the mom was gonna be saying, and I'm. I'm really good friends with this mom. Um, we. We met each other moving into this neighborhood, and she's become, like, one of my very best friends. We've known each other for three years now, and we parent very similarly. But anyway, I just felt nervous of, like, oh, my gosh. Like, what is she gonna think? What is she gonna say? Why is Liam Doing this. This is like completely explosive. Um, this little girl's never gonna wanna play with him again. She's probably freaking traumatized. I'm like, Liam's trying to punch her while chasing her. Like, my mind was kind of going wild and I just felt, I felt the anger, I felt the disappointment. I felt like, I don't even wanna freaking talk to him right now. Like, literally, I'm gonna be completely honest with you. I did not wanna sit down and talk with Liam. I did not wanna be kind to him. I did not want to be nurturing and gentle and compassionate. I wanted to be stern. I wanted to be expressing this anger towards him and I wanted to give him the cold shoulder a little bit. Now that is my go to, is ignoring giving cold shoulders like that silent treatment. That's totally my go to. And I have to stay hyper aware of that because it does not align with the mother that I want to be in the way that I want to parent. So anyway, I wanted to discipline Liam and I, my mind was like attached. So I, I got Liam back inside and I'm like feeling how my body is very like tense and doesn't even want to stand or be next to him. And I'm okay, not cool with that. I need to do something about this. Obviously I don't love the choice that he made, but knowing Liam, he is tender, he is kind. Like, I know who he is a thousand percent. Like, I. I just know who he is. And that was not who he really is. That was him feeling very hurt and then guarding that hurt with anger and becoming that anger that he was feeling because it was so freaking intense. And you know what? I think that makes a lot of sense for a kid that's not even five. But anyway, that's not the perspective my mind wanted to have on him. I had to work really hard to get to that perspective. And then instead of trying to give him that consequence and punish him, which is what I really wanted to do. Not gonna lie, that was like what my mind was attached to just telling him, you know what you just showed me that you are not going to be kind to your friends. And so we are not playing with friends for the rest of the day. That's what I wanted to say. And I was like, okay, but like, what's the long term rest of our day gonna look like? Because this was at like 11 o' clock in the morning. So I'm like, if Liam doesn't play with friends for the rest of the day, what does that look like? And Asking myself that question was very helpful. And again, this didn't take a ton of time to do. I just knew like that's not the natural consequence for me to tell Liam, you don't get to play with friends. That's not the natural consequence. The natural consequence is allowing his friend to choose if she wants to play with him or not. That would be the natural consequence because it's not about me interjecting myself to decide what the consequences, it's just what naturally happens given his choices. And I can allow him to learn from it. And I knew that part, so I was okay. I don't need to take away this opportunity to play with friends because honestly, some things like that are just hard to follow through on. And I really prioritize in my parenting to not say anything to my kids that I'm not willing to follow through on. So because seriously, friends, like, we tell them one thing and then we think like, oh yeah, this is their punishment, I'm disciplining, blah, blah, blah. But then it's like something that you have to actually follow through on and sometimes that thing is really inconvenient for you. Have you ever like, have you ever noticed that sometimes the way that you want to punish, the way that you want to discipline following through on that is so freaking important because our kids are like, that's part of trust is my mom does the things she says she's going to do and if you don't do things you say you're going to do, then how do we have the trust there? And that creates a lot of pushback, right? And repeating ourselves and our kids just simply having those like, having that where they're just like, well, I don't believe that you're going to do that. So I'm just going to keep pushing because we don't follow through. So anyway, following through we could do a whole friggin episode about that is so important. So I didn't want to tell Liam something that I didn't think that I was even wanting to follow through on because I was thinking about the, the all day being asked, can I play with my friend now? Can I play with my friend now? Can I play with my friend now? Mom, I'm gonna, can I try again? And I love it when my kids wanna try again. I very encourage that try again mentality. So when they tell me like I'm ready to try again, I try really hard to embrace that. Even if emotionally I'm not there yet. I don't want to, like kids are just so freaking accepting. I know we're going in, like, 10 different paths on this episode, but whatever. Kids are so freaking accepting. They're so forgiving. They. Once they're to that place of trying again, I think that's the best time to encourage them to say, you know what? Yeah, life is freaking short. How long do we want to spend in the amount of time thinking, I'm just not ready to try again. I'm not ready to let you try again. I still feel so disappointed in you. I still feel angry. I still feel blah, blah, blah. Because we're still thinking the same way about it. Like, let's freaking be honest. It's not our kids creating these feelings in us. It's what we think about our kids and what our kids are doing that are creating the feelings. Our kids are not responsible for the way that we feel. We are. And I could say the same thing to you about your parents. You are not responsible for the way your parents feel or what your parents do or did. They are. But we have to apply that same thing to ourselves. It can't just be, well, yeah, that applies to your parents, but not to you. No, if it applies to your parents and it applies to you. If it applies to you, then it applies to your parents and their parents and their parents and their parents. Anyways, back on freaking track. Let's go. So I decided, still feeling angry, not wanting to, like, sit down and connect with Liam. Logically, I knew the best thing to do is to sit down and connect with Liam. Even if emotionally that's not what the choice would be. This is why my feelings are messengers, not leaders. I feel hurt, just like Liam feels hurt. I feel nervous. I feel vulnerable. I feel exposed. I don't know what this mom is going to say to me. Even though, like, we have a very close friendship, it's. I would feel a little bit upset if another kid chased my kid home, waving his fist in the air like he was gonna freaking beat him up. I would feel upset. So anyway, she's just amazing. So, anyway, I sent her a quick text, and I took Liam down to our basement, just him and I, and we sat on the basement couch in this process, literally, we were probably in the basement together for five minutes. Like, it wasn't a long time. It wasn't anything crazy, but I wanted to take him away from that environment into a place of just him and I. And Liam is my physical touch, words of affirmation guide. Like, he is my mama's boy through and through. He has the most tender Heart. He's so friendly. I know his intentions are always connection, love, play. Just fun. Like, it's just who he is. So we need to just come up with a better plan of, like, when your friends need a break, how can you give them that space? How can you take space when you need a break? And helping him see. Do you think your friend wants to come back and play with you if you were screaming at her and chasing her and trying to hit her and, like, helping him see this other perspective? Because kids don't naturally put themselves in the other person's shoes. So I'm just trying to guide. And I know that Liam is in a place where he can understand that. And instead of saying, like, this is your punishment. This is how I'm going to discipline you. I let him see the natural consequence. And he's like, I'm ready to try again. I want to try and play with her again. And I'm like, buddy, you know what? Sure. Because the other mom text me back, and she's like, oh. She's, like, completely unbothered by it. She's already moved on to the next thing. And I was like, wow, well, that's great to hear. And maybe it would be. It would be different if, like, the little girl was just not ready. That's. I, like, I can respect that too. And communicating with that mom is very helpful. But anyway, Liam said that he really wanted to try again, and I'm, like, guiding him, like, okay, if you're gonna go try again, what is something you could do to help your friend feel a little like you really care about the way that she feels? And he told me, like, well, I could say sorry, and then I won't do that again. And I'm like, I think that's a great place to start. So anyway, we hug it out. We connect. I'm feeling so much better just by doing the thing that I didn't feel like doing, but I knew would be better for me and better for him. And. And we go upstairs, and he's like, mom, will you walk me over there? And I'm like, yeah, I think that's a really good idea if we go there together first. So him and I walk over there together, and the mom answers the door, and she's like, oh, hi, Liam. And she's seriously, just the freaking sweetest. Bless her. And. And Liam said, like, I. I want to try playing again, and I'm ready to be kind and, like, just saying all these things. And she was like, yeah, and it just, like, totally modeled the whole, like, let's not wait until we tell the kids that it's a good time. Like, let's let them decide when they're ready and embrace that and. And really see it. And then they just continue to play together. Amazingly, like, so amazing. So I let Liam experience the natural consequence, and the natural consequence is that is letting his friend decide if she wants to play with him or not. Not me to decide that for him. And I know that was like a whole long story, but it brings me to this point of the natural consequences that we experience as adults and do we allow ourselves to face them? That's what I want this episode to really be about. And maybe the parenting thing was helpful for you. I don't freaking know. I would not consider myself a parenting expert by any means, but I do think I'm doing the best I can. And sometimes the stories I can share here can help you. But anyway, yesterday I took my kids out on like a fun playday. My husband was out of town for a few days and I was like, you know what? We're gonna go freaking do something fun. So we drive 45 minutes to the town over. And we live in a small town. There's like nothing to do here. So Anyway, we drive 45 minutes to town over, we get lunch together, we go to Target. We went to this ninja place with our friends, then we went to Costco. It was like a whole freaking thing. And when I left that morning, I did not make sure my house was clean the way that I would like to come home to it. And I even knew that leaving the house, I was like, didn't get those things done. Oh, well, don't want to do that right now. And like, the big basket of laundry on my bed didn't want to do that. The dishes in the sink didn't want to do that. The. The little. The little cleanup things, I'm like, no, I'll just do it later. And anyway, my natural consequence was coming home and all those things were not done. And my boys took a 40 minute nap on our way home, so. So they're staying up later. Liam literally didn't go to bed until 11 o' clock at night. Guys, that's just never happened. And it was intense. Anyway, so I had these natural consequences to face. I made a commitment to myself to work out for 20 minutes a day for the next a hundred days, and I didn't do that. Before we left for our fun day, I just wanted to get out the door and go to the fun day. And I Didn't do the things I needed to do first. I didn't journal first, I didn't work out first, I didn't clean up my house first. So when I came back home and it we got home at like 6 and then it was making dinner and it's unpacking, unloading Costco and I'm by myself and I've got three kids and you know, keeping up with them and it honestly felt like I was walking in circles where I was like, am I getting anything done right now? Because it doesn't really feel like I am. And it felt really freaking hard. And I allowed myself to experience those natural cosmic consequences and I ended up journaling at 11:15 at night. I did my 20 minute workout at 8:30 at night because that is me facing my natural consequences. Because if I don't allow myself to experience natural consequences, what happens? Things build up. I'm never going to get ahead. I'm never going to feel like I'm on top of things because things are going to continue build up, building up and I'm never going to learn the lesson. So if you allow yourself to just experience the natural consequence, you didn't do it earlier like you said you would get it done, then experience what it feels like to do it that late at night and teach yourself a lesson. This is why it's so important to me to get this done earlier. I don't Wanna Journal at 11:15 at night, but I do wanna keep my commitments to myself. I don't wanna work out for 20 minutes at 8:30, but I do wanna keep my commitments to myself. I don't wanna clean my freaking kitchen at 10. Like that's not the goal. And that's really never what I do because I maintain my daily routine that I know serves me, but yesterday I did the things I wanted to do before the things I needed to do. And I held myself accountable to facing the music and seeing the natural consequences in that. So just as you teach your kids natural consequences like, well, you were not kind to your friend and now your friend does not want to play with you and we are going to respect that smart space that she's asking for, that would be a natural consequence. And the, the same thing goes with when you don't keep up with the things that you say you're gonna do or the things that you know that you need to do because you are choosing to do the things that you want to do over that you want to scroll your phone. Well, what's the natural consequence in spending that Time scrolling your phone instead of doing those dishes. The dishes are still there. What's the natural consequence in me leaving my house first thing in the morning instead of spending one more hour getting all. I could have done the 20 minute workout I could have and got my house all cleaned in one hour? 1,000%. I know I could have. And I didn't, I didn't do that. I decided to do the thing I wanted to do instead of the thing that I needed to do. And there's time to do both. There's time to do it both. You can do the thing that you need to do and still have time to do the thing that you really want to do. You can, but the later you put it off in the day, there's just more distractions that go on. Did you know there's AN on average 2,400 distractions that we experience in a day? Yeah, 100%. So if that's the average, if we did the things that we need to do first, those big priorities, really, how many big priorities are there? Marcus came home from, he went to this like mastermind workshop type thing, personal development thing. And it was so great to hear his experience with that and hear about his goals since he's been home. And he was sharing this analogy thing that they did. Um, and that's where I just got that 2,400 number with distractions. But pretty much you have like seven priorities in a day. Like there aren't like a freaking ton of things that, you know, we just really need to do that day. Doing the things we need to do. There aren't that many. There aren't that many. And if you do those things first, all 2400 of the distractions can still come into the day after you did the things that you really need to do. And we get to, we get to do that. And you have plenty of time to do the things that you want to do. And you'll get better at planning, better at maintaining a mentality that supports you throughout the entire day. Staying focused on the things that you need to do because you're looking forward to doing the thing that you want to do. So when it comes to the natural consequences, it's not like, guys, I don't journal at 11 o' clock every single night. I don't work out at 8:30 at night every single night. No, that was me facing my natural consequence of not doing it earlier. I didn't wake up before my kids. I didn't get it done earlier. I didn't choose to do it before we left for our fun day together. I know for a fact I can journal around my kids, I can work out with my kids, I can clean my whole freaking house with my kids around. I know that. And I also know that it's way easier to do it in the morning and I didn't do that. So my natural consequence was holding myself accountable to doing the things I said that I said I'm going to do and facing that uncomfortable music. I don't really want to do this at 8:30 at night, but gosh dang it, I'm going to do the thing I said I'm going to do. And today, the next day I'm like, all right, let's get this 20 minute workout done right now. Let's journal right now. So when I want to go to bed at 9 and my kids are not staying up until 11, we're going to all thoroughly enjoy that instead of feeling like there's this long ongoing list of things still waiting for me at 11 o' clock at night. So if you're feeling like your daily life looks like doing it all at 11 o' clock at night, is that just the natural consequence that you're experiencing because you didn't get it done earlier? Like, how can you best hold yourself accountable to doing the things that you say you're going to do? Like, how can you do that? I can do it. And I know we all have different circumstances, but I promise you that if you want something bad enough, you will always find a way to do it. You will. And you are completely capable and you're wildly empowered to do so. But are you supporting yourself? Are you allowing yourself to come up with game plans and solutions? Or are you sitting in the problems? Don't just sit in the problems, do something about it. And you're the only person in your life that can do something about it. So look at the natural consequences that you're facing on an everyday basis and ask yourself, what can I do to help myself so that I'm not facing this at 11 o' clock at night? What type of smaller routine can I have throughout the day? What can I declutter in the home so that there's not so much to clean up? Yeah, your kids dump all the toys out, but really that's the freaking natural consequence of having that many toys there in the first place? It's not. You're an incredible mother. You're an incredible mother. You're doing the best you can. And there's ways for us to help ourselves and Be who we want to be. You're not stuck. You're not stuck. It just feels really scary to go, be who you want to be because you know you can. And then we also have to face the part of life where it's the natural consequence of looking in the mirror thinking, like, what took me so long? Why did I hold on to this anger and resentment for so freaking long? Why did I act in all this hatred and anger for so long? That's not who I am. And that freaking hurts. That hurts to look at all that stuff. Believe me, I know. But if we don't look at it, if we don't face our natural consequences, how are we really supposed to change? We're not going to. We're just gonna sit with a victim mentality and think, oh, this is just the way that my life is and I can't do anything about it. And that's just not true. That's not the truth. So I hope that this episode about natural consequences serves you tremendously. Tremendously. And I have a. I'm gonna do an episode coming up on Built In Accountability Buddies because I shared about that on my Instagram and people are like, what do you mean by this? And so we're gonna do a whole freaking episode about it because it's a real thing that helps me every single day. Just like natural consequences are a real thing that help me every single day. And I don't need someone else to keep me accountable when I'm just facing my natural consequences in life. If I didn't do the dishes at 9am, they're still sitting there at 9pm If I didn't journal at 6am, my journal's still there with a blank page at 11 o' clock at night. If I didn't journal at. I mean, if I didn't work out at 7, my body's still waiting for it. At 8:30 at night, the house is still waiting. My kids are still waiting for me to connect with them. What are the natural consequences when I don't connect with my kids? Behavior? The way that now they're now asking for my attention is very intense and loud and sometimes intense and aggressive. So I. I just want us to feel empowered to look at the way we're approaching life and to allow ourselves to do something about the natural consequences that we're facing. Just knowing that the natural consequence is there. To teach you something, it's an opportunity of learning and growth. It's not. It's not your be all, end all. Never get to grow past this no, it's like, oh, well, here's where I'm actually at and this is where I'm really starting. So. So let me freaking get to it. Anyway, I know that you can do it too, and I hope that in viewing these things just as natural consequences, it takes that shame and pressure off of yourself where you're just able to see like, well, no, this is just a natural consequence that happens. Meaning if I change my actions, I'll have different outcomes. I can do that. I can change my actions, I can change what I decide to do, how I spend my time and when I do things, for sure. And then the outcomes, the natural consequences will change with you. So I love you dearly, so freaking much. I think you're amazing and I'm excited to talk to you real soon in another episode. Thank you for joining me on this week's episode. If you enjoyed the podcast, don't forget to subscribe and share it. I love spreading the message of how positivity can come in so beautifully to help you through your journey of self discovery and healing. I'm cheering for you. I believe in you and I'll talk to you really soon.