How to resolve family problems

Misunderstandings and challenges and conflict can absolutely tear families apart. But you know what? I believe they don't have to. This is Lead with Confidence Now, the podcast dedicated to helping you grow your confidence and live your best life. I'm Travia Steward, and for the past 27 years, I've been on a mission to help as many people as possible reinvent their relationships, their career, reinvent themselves. And my goal with this podcast is to show up for you so you can rock your world with the confidence to make big changes in your life. All right, let's get into it. Every time I sit down to do a podcast episode and think about what is it that I want to talk about, I'm always focusing on things that are occurring in my life, things that are going on with me and Right now, we may be, you know, say the things that are going on with my family. And I know that I am not alone when I talk about these things because I know things happen in everyone's family. You know, sometimes conflict arises. Sometimes, you know, we have misunderstandings. Sometimes it's we stop talking to each other. You know, sometimes we have hurt feelings. All of the things. But what I wanna share with you in today's podcast episode is out of all the things that we have in our life, we have choices. We have choices in how we respond to everything. We have choices that shape our relationships in a positive or even a negative direction. And one of the most empowering aspects of dealing with family dynamics is recognizing that we have these choices and how we use these choices and respond to each other in different situations really ultimately creates the relationships that we have with one another. And so as we begin, I want you to think about, you know, I did a podcast episode, I think it was last year, it's podcast number 118, and it was about, are you forever obligated to family and friends? You know, because there's so many times we have this belief that, oh, blood is thicker than water, all those things. And you know, in some situations that is true, But in some situations, in some families, that's absolutely not true. Sometimes as adults, we recognize that, you know what, we don't feel as close to our family. We're not as close to our siblings. We're closer to friends who have become family, and that's okay. Those are the relationships that we create. And even with all of those relationships, whether we're talking about blood relationships, whether we're talking about friends, we're just, I'm just talking about close relationships that are family, and even close relationships that are like family. Because it all comes down to this. When we think about navigating family dynamics, we have to come from a place of having good intentions. We have to come from a place of assuming the best. Of each other's actions and motivations. And that helps us to prevent conflicts to begin with. It helps us to prevent them from escalating to a place of, you know, that we can't return to because we want to always assume that our family members, our sisters, our brothers, not trying to hurt us or upset us. Instead, we want to believe that everyone's doing the best that they can. Now, the caveat in that is if we all come from a place of having good intentions and doing the best that we can, if we set aside the greed, the, you know, we're bringing in old stories, we're bringing in preconceived notions, we're bringing in all these things, these paradigms and patterns that create how we show up in relationships. So we wanna have good intentions with each other, but we have to come and originate with good intentions of serving and being with each other in the best possible way. And so many times we get caught up in our own feelings of they did such and such. Well, I'm hurt because of this. I'm hurt because they said this. I'm hurt because he's talking about me. Instead of being hurt and upset, we want to actually begin to communicate, open up the doors of communicating with each other so that we can squash the conflict that's, that's arising in the family, right? So if we're going to break it down, what I talked about episode 118, that we I believe we're not forever obligated to family and friends. I believe that we get to choose who we spend time with. I believe we get to choose if we even want to be close to our siblings, to our cousins, to our nieces and nephews, aunts and uncles. We get to choose those things. I don't enroll in a belief that blood is thicker than water. I don't enroll in that we are forever obligated to have close relationships with our family members, with our siblings, with our cousins, all those things. I enroll in the belief that I get to create these relationships, that I get to create who I want to spend time with. And frankly, I don't want to spend time with people that I don't have anything in common with except who birthed me. And so when it comes down to how we handle conflict and misunderstandings, let's think about first, what is— how do you define what that relationship looks like? Is it, you know, I have this other podcast episode, I don't have the number before me right now, but it's recreating relationships. What is that relationship? Is it a relationship that is, you know, I call it, you know, I have 3 different categories for relationships. Is it a 3-minute friend or whatever relationship? Is it 3 hours or 3 days? Like 3 minutes mean, you know, you see this person in the hallway, you get to catch up for 3 minutes, you probably said all you needed to say, and you've moved on. If it's 3 hours, think about something like lunch. Like you are cool having lunch with this person, but anything past lunch is like, we've run out of things to talk about. I don't want to spend any more time with this person for another few months. But if you can spend like 3 days with a person, never running out of things to say, never running out of things to talk about, That's an intimate group of people. So when we're talking about family, I want you to think about which level, which category are you on with the person that you're having this challenge, this conflict, this misunderstanding with? Is this person a 3-minute friend, a 3-minute, you know, sibling? If so, we want to react differently than we do with a 3-day, than we do with a 3-hour. Okay? And so when we talk about these disagreements, first we begin to look at what is the relationship that we've created? You know, what category are they in? So for me, for example, when someone is a 3-day friend, that's my closest orbit of friends, of people in my life that I want to always have an open channel of communication with. Because the quality of all of my, of all of your relationships is reflected and created by the thoughts you have of one another. And so there's a reason why someone is a 3-minute friend, a 3-hour friend. There's a reason those— how we think and feel about another person creates that relationship. So when we're talking about misunderstandings and conflict, we don't want to apply the same rules to a 3-minute person that we apply to a 3-day person. You know, some associate 3-minute person, your sister, your best friend. We don't want to misconstrue those rules and standards that we have for our relationships. Now, we do all want to be the kind of person who takes responsibility for the choices that we make, for the choices in how we respond to each conflict and misunderstanding. And a common misconception is avoiding the conflict altogether just to keep the peace. Because I believe when we avoid conflict, we put this thing up on the shelf, we put this next thing on the shelf, and then 3 weeks later we put that next thing on the shelf. That shelf becomes so heavy that it falls down. And so avoiding to keep the peace I believe does not work. It builds up and it leads to bigger problems down the line. But what I do want you to think about in how you've created these relationships, whether it's a category 1, 2, or 3, we get to choose how we respond to everything that happens. When we assume, and, you know, not even assuming because we know what assuming does, right? Makes an ass out of all of us. But when we create ourselves to be someone who comes with good intentions, someone who wants the best, like authentically and genuinely wants the best for the other person, we start at that foundation. And then when conflict and misunderstandings arise, we get to choose how we respond. How do you choose? You get to choose if you want to shift out of that bad mood. You get to choose if you want to shift out of that anger. You get to choose if you want to, you know, add fuel to that fire. You get to choose to shift your state. You get to choose to not hold onto things by controlling how you respond to things. Because one of the most profound things I ever learned in my coach training, from actually my Tony Robbins training, was that we're always doing 3 things. We are always deciding on what to focus on. We're deciding what it means, and then we take action based on that meaning that we've created. And when we talk about the things that fuel us, we've decided what things mean. Like, you know, for example, if you have a conflict, like something that's full of conflict in your family, And now we're just focusing on maybe the person's tone of voice. We're focusing on the one word that they said, and now we're making that word mean, you know, like I have a friend, here's an even better example. So I have a friend, one of my close friends, and if she listens to this podcast, she's gonna be like, I can't believe you gave me that example on your podcast. But here it is. So, She, in her marriage, always hated when her husband gave her like an emoji of thumbs up. So when he did the thumbs up, she, you know, made it mean that that was like a fuck you. And so anyone who sends her a thumbs up, that's what it means. But if we just stick to the facts, That's not what a thumbs up means at all. So we're always focusing on something. We're always concluding what it means, and then we take action in accordance with that meaning that we gave it. And so when we're talking about family and friends and intimate relationships, ways of, you know, coming from a good, honest, pure, loving, intentional place can help us really think about how can we move on from this? How can I just let this go? How can I release and forgive? Because when we hold onto grudges, it's like, you know, we are doing a disservice to ourselves. We are punishing and poisoning our own being. Instead of just releasing, because forgiveness is more for, for me, for you, than it is for the other person. And so one thing I wanna remind you of, I've talked about this in prior episodes, what we think and believe about another person creates that relationship because your beliefs become your thoughts, your thoughts become your words. 'Your words become your actions. Your actions become your habits. Your habits become your values. And your values become your destiny. And this is how we treat each other.' That quote is by Mahatma, uh, by Gandhi. So what I want you to think about is if you're not sure where your close people lie, where the people in your life, which category they are in, Give them a score. So if you're thinking person by person, what score would you give them on a scale of 1 to 10? 10 being the absolute best, I share everything, I'm my authentic self with that person. What score would you give that person? And if this is a relationship that you want to improve, like let's say you give that person a 3, well, what would have to happen? What would you want to happen that would make it a 4, that would make it a 5? And then you do that with every person if you want to improve that relationship, if you want to recreate that relationship. And one thing that we want to make sure we're not doing is comparing our relationships with our siblings, with our family members, to other relationships in other families. And once we stop comparing ourselves, that we're We're supposed to do these kinds of things, right? It's supposed to be. We should do this, right? But we all know that we shouldn't be shoulding all over ourselves. And so as I begin to wrap up this episode, I want you to think about things being neutral, okay? Something happens in your family, just look at the facts. Just look at the facts. Event that happened. Because we have an event, and then when we add your chosen response to that event, now we have an outcome. Because we have event plus your outcome equals— I'm sorry, we have event plus your response to that event will equal an outcome. And if you want a different outcome, if you want to create a different relationship, then you have to begin to change how you respond to things if you want to. You don't have to be, like, we cannot be in control over the events that happen in our lives, but we 100% have control of how we respond and therefore influence the outcome going further into the future. So my point overall in this podcast episode is focus on what you can control. Focus on how you respond to things because that alone will transform your life. Because there are only 3 responses that you can control: what you choose to focus on, the meaning you give it, and what you choose to do based on that situation. And last but not least, I want you to ask yourself 3 questions. If you're in a conflict, does it need to be said? Does it need to be said by me? Does it need to be said by me right now? And if you, if, if you really come from an authentic place with the best intentions possible, ask yourself those 3 questions. And if it doesn't need to be said, It doesn't need to be said by you. If it doesn't need to be said by you right now, then we don't say it. We just move on, move forward. So ask yourself if you want to recreate your relationships. Ask yourself how you want to choose to respond to the events, to the conflict, to the misunderstandings in your life, and what kind of outcomes do you want to have because of your response. And so overall, you know, dealing with these types of things, it takes patience. It takes a willingness to understand each other from the best intentions possible. But again, you have to have, each person needs to have good intentions. Like we can't have one person who has good intention. I'm gonna see the best in her and the other person is shitting all over that other person, right? We all come from a place of having the best intentions. And wanting the best for each other. And the last podcast episode I did last week was about active listening. The power is in how we listen to one another and how we all want to feel seen and heard and appreciated. And if we can begin doing that in our intimate relationships, in our family relationships, I believe that the level of conflicts will decrease.. And so it takes absolute good communication, both in speaking and in listening, and that helps us to create our world. So my peeps, I hope this, this episode has been helpful, and I hope you are subscribed to this podcast. And if you found value in it, I would love if you could share it with someone else who will find value in it. And if you have not left a review of the podcast, either on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, wherever you get your podcasts, I would really love it. And it would just make my day if you would leave a 5-star review. There you go. I'm going to ask for it, a 5-star review. And it helps other people be able to find the podcast. And I believe that it is my mission. I am a messenger. That's what my goal is here, is to help you improve your confidence so that you can make bigger decisions in your life. I'm a messenger. I'm a messenger for helping you navigate these things in life because I, I'm not saying that I'm perfect and I've done it, done everything, but I believe that God, the universe, my training, everything, my destiny is about me helping as many people as possible with the highest vision for their lives. Without selling. So together we can do this. Together we can create the relationships that we want in our life. Together, if we begin to trust one another to have the best intentions, not just in our families but in each other, in the world, we can change this world. So my peeps, that's what I have for you. I hope you're having the most amazing time Endless July, and we'll talk next week.