Transcript
Speaker: Hi, I'm Kyle Gois, and welcome to the Inwards and Onwards podcast.
Speaker: For the longest time, I've been fascinated to understand more about showing up authentically, vulnerably, and presently in life.
Speaker: As such, I started to understand that my external world was a reflection of my inner one.
Speaker: And when I've had moments of hitting rock bottom or needing to pivot in my life, I've had to go inwards to move onwards.
Speaker: So come join me as I explore other people's journeys, from entrepreneurs to coaches, spiritual teachers, friends, and beyond.
Speaker: as we learn their innermost thoughts and peel back the layers to share the moments where they've had to go inwards to move onwards.
Speaker: Let's jump in.
Speaker: Today's guest, Chloe Paniotu, is an inspirational woman who is passionate about making a difference for the adults of tomorrow.
Speaker: As a certified psychologist and hypnotherapist, she has experience working with children during their formative years through to adults during their childbearing years and beyond.
Speaker: Chloe is also the co-founder of Mindfully Loved, who are focused on helping prepare couples mentally and emotionally before parenthood.
Speaker: In this episode, we explore the roots of Chloe's passion for changing future generations, the importance of modeling the behaviors we want to see, how to self-regulate our own emotions, and the impact our healing has on generations to come.
Speaker: So grab a cup of tea and join us for an insightful conversation as we lean and learn from Chloe's experience and perspectives on creating a brighter future for generations to come.
Speaker: Welcome, welcome.
Speaker: I am so excited for today's guest.
Speaker: I have the lovely Chloe, who has had a phenomenal journey.
Speaker: And even just the way we've kind of met is really awesome.
Speaker: We met during personal development days, you know, many, many moons ago, and then reconnected out of fate, I think.
Speaker: And when I say fate, my wife and her both wanted to meet up.
Speaker: But from there, I was like, you know, I just thought you would be actually a perfect addition to the show, purely for the fact that you're so passionate about changing future generations.
Speaker: And the work you're doing right now with Mindfully Loved, you know, and helping parents before they even conceive or think about having conceived, think about conceiving kids.
Speaker: I love this work that you're into.
Speaker: So before we get into that, I want to understand what brought you on this journey.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Well, thanks, Kyle.
Speaker: I've been eagerly waiting for the invite to come to your podcast.
Speaker: So thanks for having me.
Speaker: I'm very excited.
Speaker: Wow.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: It's been a long journey.
Speaker: It's been a long journey.
Speaker: But yeah, it started for me, started for my teenage years, to be honest.
Speaker: I've always loved being around children.
Speaker: I used to just babysit family friends and just being around children.
Speaker: And I always had that
Speaker: passion and I think longing to become a teacher.
Speaker: I always wanted to be around kids and just working at schools.
Speaker: So that's kind of like around 14, 15, I was like, oh, I would love to be a teacher and work around kids.
Speaker: And then as I was getting closer to, I think, graduating, it just shifted more into just becoming a psychologist and working with children, helping children.
Speaker: And through my studies,
Speaker: I went to America and obviously your degree, your first degree, you do just general psychology.
Speaker: So I did that.
Speaker: And then when it was time to look into expanding into my masters, my postgraduate studies, I decided to continue into school psychology, which meant working primarily in schools with children, with parents, with teachers.
Speaker: And I did that.
Speaker: I did that for 10 years.
Speaker: I worked at schools in America and Australia.
Speaker: And then in private clinics and some of my personal work and just loved it.
Speaker: I loved the whole setting of schools.
Speaker: I loved the energy in schools.
Speaker: I love entering a school and hearing the laughter of children and just like the energy, the playful energy.
Speaker: I think that's what it is, just a playful energy.
Speaker: And yeah, I did that.
Speaker: And then probably four or five years ago, I caught myself coming home and just feeling a little bit agitated.
Speaker: Feeling a little bit just starting to feel that I wasn't doing enough, that I was just feeling helpless and hopeless and just that I wasn't getting enough time with the kids.
Speaker: Like it was just it's not enough.
Speaker: Like I want to like help all these kids, but making them feel worthy and welcomed and accepted in those that hour in our session was just didn't feel enough.
Speaker: I'm like there's so much more that I want to do.
Speaker: And that's when I started coming and like talking to my husband about a Michael.
Speaker: And we realized that so much work needs to happen with the parents.
Speaker: And I realized that most of those kids were just holding on to things that weren't theirs, you know, stress, emotions, anger, resentment, that weren't theirs to hold on to.
Speaker: They were the parents that were just passed on to them.
Speaker: And, um,
Speaker: I might get into it a little bit later to this, but that's what kind of like drew me into start exploring some more work with parents and start questioning, you know, what would happen if we actually worked with parents and then even better, what would happen if we actually started working with couples before having kids, helping them, not helping them, not just helping them deal with their own trauma and just start doing healing, but teaching them ways to deal with their own emotions, teaching them emotional intelligence.
Speaker: So then,
Speaker: they don't have to just teach their kids.
Speaker: The kids can just model what they see every day.
Speaker: Which is one of the biggest ways kids learn, right?
Speaker: Exactly.
Speaker: Exactly.
Speaker: So that was like kind of like one part of my journey through school psychology and then just psychology.
Speaker: So now I work with couples, I work with individuals as well as kids still.
Speaker: But I think the idea of just
Speaker: fixing the kids you know the idea that parents like here like my kid has issues kind of deal with it yeah fix them you know you have no idea how many times i've heard that you know fix them yeah i've seen like completely separating any accountability that as a parent and just throwing all the blame into the kids they have the issues
Speaker: So now kind of seeing that if I'm seeing a kid, I'm definitely seeing the parent as well.
Speaker: Like it's not just a child.
Speaker: You know, the child is holding on to those things, but where are they coming from?
Speaker: Let's support the child through you.
Speaker: And even in the schooling system, I think one of the things that is so challenging is that like when parents drop their kids off at the school, they expect the school to model and teach and correct behavior.
Speaker: You know what I mean?
Speaker: Rather than like realizing that, you know, I don't know what percentage I was just going to fling out, like, you know, 80% of the work is actually on the parents, 20% is on the school.
Speaker: You know what I mean?
Speaker: Of course, of course.
Speaker: And I think it's society, unfortunately.
Speaker: We have these expectations that we take them to the school and it's their responsibility.
Speaker: You know, like, you know, we don't have to see our kids do what our kids are like eight hours a day.
Speaker: It's their responsibility.
Speaker: I'm hoping that they're not only teaching them how to write and read,
Speaker: but also how to behave, also how to, you know, deal with their emotions, which, you know, it's not fair.
Speaker: But also it's not the right way of teaching emotional intelligence now.
Speaker: There is so many curriculums at schools around teaching emotional intelligence.
Speaker: And we have teachers that themselves don't know how to deal with their own emotions, trying to teach, you know, something.
Speaker: But then sending the kids home,
Speaker: And being around families that don't do any of that either.
Speaker: So it's kind of like very contradicting that we're just sitting kids on a desk and telling them, this is how you communicate your emotions.
Speaker: This is how, you know, this is what you do when you're anxious.
Speaker: This is what you do when you're angry.
Speaker: But there's no modeling around them.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: They don't see teachers do it.
Speaker: They don't see their parents do it.
Speaker: So...
Speaker: It's kind of, and then we get angry when they don't do it.
Speaker: How often would you see like a kid and you'd be like, when you see them, you've dealt with them and the parents are like, oh, I need you to fix them.
Speaker: And then you call the parents in for say a session or something.
Speaker: Would you just be like, yo, this is, you've copied and pasted your shit into your kid.
Speaker: You know what I mean?
Speaker: I think the first time it kind of like realized it, it was when I had a parent coming into my office and they were like, ah, like my kid is so anxious and I don't know how to deal with it.
Speaker: And their energy was just,
Speaker: And I'm like, okay, surely I can tell whether a kid is, you know, kind of feeding this energy.
Speaker: It's like you are in a constant, you know, flight or fright state.
Speaker: So the anxiety, of course, your child does not feel safe.
Speaker: If you're like this all the time, if you're anxious about what's happening at school, if there's any issues with lessons, with how they're doing academically, all those things, and you're always in that state, your child cannot feel safe.
Speaker: so they're starting to feel anxious because all the time because you're teaching them in a way that there's something for them to worry about yeah so it's all about kind of calming the parent down teaching them the skills so it's you know even when parents come to me like what can i do with my kid i'm like okay what do you do when you're upset what do you do when you're anxious well nothing like well
Speaker: How are we expecting our kids to, you know, to tell them to take a deep breath or go, you know, go in the room and do something calming when you don't do that when you're anxious?
Speaker: So, you know, teaching our parents that it's not about hiding your negative emotions.
Speaker: It's about expressing them, but also teaching them how you deal with them.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: So it's a lot of the parents are trying to all be just be happy and just not show any negative emotions.
Speaker: But our kids are growing up feeling all those emotions and they're like, what's wrong with me?
Speaker: I've never seen mom, you know, get angry.
Speaker: I've never seen dad being anxious or sad.
Speaker: So why am I feeling those things?
Speaker: What's wrong with me?
Speaker: So then they start thinking that there's something wrong with them.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And it's so interesting.
Speaker: And like, I love this because I was like, I've seen when you speak to people, right?
Speaker: I've found a different way of now myself trying to tap into like compassion and kindness towards someone when you realize like, hey, they like that person may be responding from their own
Speaker: Pain, experience, childhood, I'm going to say trauma for just lack of a better word, but their childhood experience, sorry, childhood experience that has led them to respond this way.
Speaker: And a funny example is like, you know, my parents, whenever they were like fight, they would yell.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: I am like, they were like the yelling type.
Speaker: So my modeling of this was like, when you are arguing or when you're in a, when you're tense or you're feeling aggression, you yell at each other, right?
Speaker: I actually thought this was normal.
Speaker: I legit like, and people were like, why are you talking so loud in general when I get passionate about things?
Speaker: Or if I get angry, they're like, you know, it's a very big confrontation.
Speaker: You know, my wife, Paul, like I feel bad for her because she, in our earlier years, had to deal with a lot of me until I understood this better, but had to deal with me like yelling at her.
Speaker: Whereas flip side on her end,
Speaker: her understanding from her parents is like they never argued in front of her or anything like that.
Speaker: So it was like quiet.
Speaker: So she would go down the quiet treatment.
Speaker: I would go down over talking and yelling.
Speaker: And it was like to find the common ground of actually realizing like, hey, this is not how communication is on either end.
Speaker: We're kind of funny.
Speaker: We're on like polar ends in this end.
Speaker: in this example, but it was actually realizing that it was like, oh, wait, I don't, like, I've learned this from my mom and dad, but I don't need to show up that way anymore.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I can figure out my own work of communicating in my relationship.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: But it takes, it takes a lot of work and yeah, like realizing that, as you said, not, not, not knowing that it's normal.
Speaker: And that's the thing, like you grow up in your family and you're like, this is what normality looks like for you.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And, and I've, I've seen it with a lot of my clients that grew up in a very chaotic environment.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: and then they enter trying to enter um relationships and when it's a calm safe relationship they feel uneasy like and they're looking to grab on draw on to drop like drama because it's like this is not normal i'm not meant to feel this calm and this safe like where's the chaos so and they're trying to seek the chaos because this is where what they used to they used to always have chaos around them so it's kind of like
Speaker: like you realize how it's embedded within you, that state of normality and trying to figure that out.
Speaker: But, yeah, it's amazing.
Speaker: And you can go so deep and trying to figure out all those things.
Speaker: But, yeah, by modeling, it's the number one.
Speaker: Like another example with a parent was that, you know, you have parents that come and yell and yell at the kids, you know, stop hitting or stop yelling as they're yelling.
Speaker: You know, so it's kind of like, oh, again, that defeats of head.
Speaker: Like you're yelling at them and telling them to stop yelling by yelling.
Speaker: So we are giving our kids mixed messages.
Speaker: What would be your guidance then in these situations, especially because when you're talking about dealing with kids, say children with trauma or like who are experiencing trauma and they don't know how to regulate their emotions, how would you actually help that inner child?
Speaker: Are we talking about, yeah, we're talking about children, yeah?
Speaker: Children, yeah.
Speaker: I realize I said inner child, but I meant in a child.
Speaker: Inner child, yes.
Speaker: We'll probably touch on inner child stuff for adults later on.
Speaker: Yeah, so, and that's the thing.
Speaker: My work during school was to work with children mostly.
Speaker: So obviously being at a school, my primary clients were kids.
Speaker: So my job was to teach them all those things, how to regulate emotions, you know, how to communicate their emotions differently.
Speaker: and you do the best you can.
Speaker: You teach them all those things.
Speaker: And some of the kids were doing so great, and they're trying, because kids want to be accepted.
Speaker: Kids want to please adults, especially their parents.
Speaker: They want to feel loved.
Speaker: So they want to do the right thing.
Speaker: You know, sometimes they just don't have the capacity.
Speaker: So being able to teach them, and you see them trying in the classrooms when they get aggravated and trying to, like, use the skills that we have,
Speaker: learning our sessions.
Speaker: However, you don't know what happens at home.
Speaker: If a child gets angry at home and we're like, okay, well, Chloe said I need to do this and this and this, but then they don't have the capacity to do it at home because the environment isn't there or the parent doesn't tell them, okay, I can see you angry, go to a quiet room and do what you need to do.
Speaker: If they don't understand
Speaker: what they're going through.
Speaker: If their parents are not at the same page as well and they just see them that they need to deal with it, then unfortunately it's not as helpful.
Speaker: You know, it's the same that there are kids that, you know, do it as well by themselves.
Speaker: As sad as it is, you know, want so hard to please their teachers and their parents that they try and learn how to regulate their emotions alone without any modelling around them.
Speaker: And is there like a core feeling then that these kids are like, cause like when you're sharing this love, you said love before, right?
Speaker: Is it love?
Speaker: Is it safety?
Speaker: Like what do kids actually, is there like an underlying theme that you found that this is what kids are looking for?
Speaker: Like when they're actually feeling a big emotion.
Speaker: So we'll say a big emotion being whatever, anger, stress, anxiety, you know, or even sometimes you have dangerous euphoria, you know, when you're too happy and you can be a bit reckless and stuff.
Speaker: When someone's feeling a big emotion, what is the underlying reason for it?
Speaker: Or like, not feeling a big emotion, sorry.
Speaker: What's the underlying reason of not being able to regulate?
Speaker: Is it they're looking or seeking safety or they need more safety or more love?
Speaker: Most of it is seeking connection.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Connection, acceptance.
Speaker: And most kids want to be seen and be heard, you know, which we don't usually, you know, we don't like, they're not important.
Speaker: We don't, you know, they're just kids, you know, so...
Speaker: But yeah, be seen, be heard, seek connection and seek acceptance.
Speaker: Feel that they're worthy and that they're wanted.
Speaker: You know, when we shame our kids, when we constantly tell them more, when we say things like, why are you like this?
Speaker: Or just stop crying or just go, you know, just live out of there.
Speaker: I'm busy right now.
Speaker: We, you know, the message that they get is like, they don't want us.
Speaker: They don't love us.
Speaker: We are wanted.
Speaker: Yeah, there's something wrong with us.
Speaker: So they start feeling that shame and they start feeling that they're just not good enough.
Speaker: There's something wrong with me.
Speaker: I'm not important enough to be heard.
Speaker: I'm not important enough to be seen.
Speaker: And these are the messages that most of us, even as adults now, I'm trying to heal from childhood.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So it's...
Speaker: Those are the main ones, like the feeling that we're not good enough, that we're not wanted, that we're not accepted for who we truly are, that we need to change in order for someone to love us.
Speaker: And what's something you – do you have any advice on what you can give kids or help kids from a parent's side to regulate, you know?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So there's so much.
Speaker: But the most important is to be able to regulate your own emotions first as a parent, you know, because –
Speaker: Kids will do things to test our boundaries, to, as they explore the world, they will do things.
Speaker: They're learning, you know.
Speaker: So the number one thing that I do tell parents is lower your expectations, first of all.
Speaker: You know, I see parents telling off kids, three-year-old kids, for, you know, for hitting their sibling, you know, for slapping their sibling because they got angry because they grabbed something or they're not being able to share and yelling at them for not sharing.
Speaker: Three years old.
Speaker: Yeah, we're adults.
Speaker: I know I don't like to share my stuff.
Speaker: Like being able to, you know, expect if I was reading a book and someone came and said, I want that book now.
Speaker: I'm like, well, I'm reading it.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker: Like wait for me to finish.
Speaker: Yeah, I'm not expected to give it to them right away because they asked for it.
Speaker: But we're expecting three years to do that.
Speaker: But it's that lower expectations that we expect –
Speaker: expecting three-year-olds to not hit, to not yell, to not, but we know there's adults that still do that.
Speaker: We know there are adults that still show violence, that still scream, that still yell when they're angry.
Speaker: So we're expecting kids to not do that and know how to do it without us teaching them.
Speaker: Be nice, be gentle, but without showing them how to do that.
Speaker: So first of all, it's kind of like lowering our expectations and reminding ourselves that there are
Speaker: Children, they're still learning.
Speaker: They've been here for two years, three years, six years, eight years even.
Speaker: We've been here for like 30, 40 years.
Speaker: And we're still learning.
Speaker: We still have days when we crack it with our partner, you know, and we swear or we say something.
Speaker: I think lowering our expectations is the first one and then learning to manage our emotions.
Speaker: So when we do get angry, you know, because our child broke something that we really liked or wrote on the walls before we react,
Speaker: being able to identify, okay, I'm feeling angry right now.
Speaker: What do I need?
Speaker: And I take a deep breath.
Speaker: I know that kid didn't do it on purpose.
Speaker: You know, I know it's learning.
Speaker: It's okay to give consequences.
Speaker: That's completely okay.
Speaker: It doesn't mean, you know, but regulate your emotion rather than scream.
Speaker: No, stop it.
Speaker: You're bad.
Speaker: Leave the room without any understanding.
Speaker: Because most of the kids are like, what just happened?
Speaker: I don't even know what I did wrong.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: You know, being able, once we regulate our emotions, we can still be assertive, go down to their level,
Speaker: You know, tell them what's happening, you know, tell them how you're feeling, you know.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker: And being able to kind of give a consequence through that.
Speaker: But regularly in the emotions, the first thing.
Speaker: And being humans, you know what's going to do this because you might be tired, you might be busy, and you might kind of, you know, react in a certain way that you might, you know, regret later.
Speaker: And then that's where apology happens.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: So showing them that we make mistakes as well as parents.
Speaker: We can lose our, you know, shit sometimes and that's okay.
Speaker: Like we're humans, but how do we fix that relationship?
Speaker: We can go back to them and apologize.
Speaker: And that's another big thing that our generation as kids never got apologies from our parents, especially as children, because their parents were always right.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: No, and that was the thing.
Speaker: It was such a, I just, I really, I'm jotting down notes because I'm like, I love the way you've said that, right?
Speaker: Like, lowering expectations, huge, because it's like, and look, I'm a little, I'm a dog parent at the moment.
Speaker: So relating this into just being a dog parent, it's like, yeah, sometimes we put these unrealistic expectations on people, animals, whatever the kids are being in this situation.
Speaker: Like, I can imagine that so easily coming to kids going like, wait, why do they not respond to this?
Speaker: And it's like, they're three years old, they're two years old, they're five years old.
Speaker: It's like, they're still learning, right?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: that regulating our own emotions is so powerful because if you're talking about like the kids modeling, they're going to model from whatever we respond to, how we respond and stuff like that.
Speaker: So if we start creating a bit more awareness in our body, it's going to have a massive impact.
Speaker: And then the last part you were saying is like showing them that it's okay to make mistakes and that apologizing.
Speaker: I was like, yeah, yeah, it was, yeah, I'm just trying to think back myself on my own childhood.
Speaker: And I know that wasn't something that often came easy.
Speaker: It was usually after like, you know,
Speaker: We did something and it was like, like it went to the next extreme.
Speaker: Then like, if there was something wrong that my dad would ever, you know, my parents would ever apologize in that sort of sense.
Speaker: And it's not that I don't think they didn't want to apologize, but it's like, again, were they given that as kids for themselves when they were kids?
Speaker: Did their parents give them that?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: But there also there's that misconception that if I apologize to my kid, I'm giving my power to them.
Speaker: Like it's a hierarchy.
Speaker: Like I'm, you know, I'm meant to be, you know, higher than my kid.
Speaker: Like if I apologize, that means I'm going down to their level.
Speaker: This is what we need to do, though, you know.
Speaker: Getting rid of that idea that we're parents and we own our kids and we're here and they're meant to be doing whatever we tell them, that they're here to listen to us and kind of like breaking all that and be like, no, we're here to learn from each other, to teach things to each other.
Speaker: And we're here to guide our children and to be the best versions of themselves and hopefully be better than us, you know.
Speaker: But we can do that without having that kind of like power over them or feel that we have that power over them.
Speaker: So apologizing is so important and apologizing for the way we responded, you know, and tell them that, you know, sorry that mommy, you know, yelled at you.
Speaker: Like I think it was a little bit too harsh and I took some time to reflect on this.
Speaker: And I know that next time I get angry, I think I might take a minute to go to the other room, take a shower, take a few deep breaths, and then come and chat to you.
Speaker: So by doing that, you're not only apologizing, but you're also keeping yourself accountable because you're telling them what you would like to do next time and also teaching them ways to deal with their emotions when they're feeling that angry.
Speaker: So next time they do that with a friend, they can go and apologize as well.
Speaker: You know, so it's kind of like passing on that lesson through experience, through model link, rather than just telling them when you do something wrong, go apologize.
Speaker: You know, really understanding the purpose of an apology.
Speaker: You're not just saying sorry.
Speaker: You know, you're reflecting on your own behavior and understanding how it affected them and then taking accountability of what you're going to do next time.
Speaker: So there's a few little steps.
Speaker: Yeah, no, that's awesome.
Speaker: That's beautiful because I was like even – I was just feeling into that of what you're saying.
Speaker: I'm like imagine the difference or the impact we would have or the kids that would start being raised just following some simple things of us.
Speaker: I feel like one of the things that stood out the most is just us regulating, understanding our own emotions and leading from experience.
Speaker: Like us stepping into that place of like it's okay for us to be vulnerable if we want our kids to actually learn and grow up healthy.
Speaker: And the thing that I find so –
Speaker: like it's such a challenge is we've the society right now like has created this thing of like a good kid and a bad kid you know and i feel like them putting these definitions and labels underneath each category of a good kid does a b c d yeah back it does xyz um i feel like that's so difficult because then all of a sudden it's like you it's
Speaker: Even when you're talking about that, that expectations, then you're going to be creating inevitably these expectations on your kids of like, hey, that's what a good kid does or a good kid is response like this and all that stuff.
Speaker: And it's like society as a whole, I think, like has kind of messed up on this one of like these labels of a good and bad because there's no such good and bad as long as there's understanding of explaining how we can actually change the the the habit if it's if it's an unhealthy habit to something that is actually more empowering and more healthy for the kid.
Speaker: But it's like, and the reason why I say changing it from like good and bad to this kind of different variation, and I would love to hear if you have a better definition of what you see.
Speaker: But it's because I realized like some people like, oh, it's good to always just respect your elders and always listen and don't speak up or don't talk back to your elders.
Speaker: That's like, that is not good.
Speaker: When you get older, there is reasons why we have issues with speaking with other people or say people with, you know, who are older than us who, you know, are treating us rudely.
Speaker: We won't stand up for ourselves because we're never taught to stand up for ourselves when we're younger because you're told never to talk back to your elders, you know, like as an example.
Speaker: But that's what a good kid does, you know.
Speaker: You're obedient, you're quiet.
Speaker: You just sit there and do what, you know, what you're told, you know,
Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker: And so I was like, what's your thoughts on just the concept of good and bad or do you see it differently, I guess?
Speaker: No, yeah, exactly what you said.
Speaker: And actually from like from working with my clients, what I realized is the lack of self-love that we have as a generation all stems from that, from having that innate belief when you were little that I'm bad.
Speaker: Yeah, I'm not a good girl.
Speaker: I'm not a good boy.
Speaker: I'm bad.
Speaker: They keep telling me I'm a bad boy.
Speaker: You know, I'm naughty.
Speaker: you know, that label rather than focusing on the behavior.
Speaker: So focusing on the person of who you are as a person rather than your behavior.
Speaker: I'm not bad.
Speaker: I might have done a bad, you know, a bad thing or like my behavior was naughty, but I'm not as a person, I'm not bad.
Speaker: I make mistakes like anyone else.
Speaker: Like we make mistakes and we learn.
Speaker: So one of the other things that we do go through with parents is teaching them
Speaker: like how do you change the language around this?
Speaker: How do you kind of change behaviors through focusing on the behavior rather than just labeling a kid?
Speaker: You're naughty, you're being bad now, you know, go to your room, you know, that was bad, you know, really kind of targeting what you did, you know, was not appropriate or like kind of like reflecting on the consequence of the behavior.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Are you pushing that child, you know, what do you think happened?
Speaker: You know, so then kind of like going through
Speaker: through that rather than calling you bad as a person.
Speaker: Because so many of us have this innate belief deep down, you know, that shame, that belief that, wow, shit, like we hurt someone, we're bad.
Speaker: We, you know, we yelled at someone, we're bad, you know, kind of that.
Speaker: And we still carry on that as adults.
Speaker: You know, that's where the shame, that negative talk comes, that instantly we make this like we as a core person bad, which we're not.
Speaker: We as a core person are perfect.
Speaker: They're where we are with our mistakes, with our shadow selves.
Speaker: Our behaviors, still as adults, might not be, you know,
Speaker: And I don't even like saying the right one, you know, because what is right and what is wrong?
Speaker: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker: Just maybe the appropriate one at that point.
Speaker: Or every behaviour has a consequence.
Speaker: And whatever behaviour we choose has its appropriate consequence.
Speaker: And, you know, teaching our kids to learn from that.
Speaker: And consequence doesn't mean punishing them.
Speaker: It means, okay, you know, you stole from a friend.
Speaker: Now that friend doesn't want to be your friend.
Speaker: anymore yeah so that is the consequence of your behavior in a way like things happen from things you know it's okay to be sad it's okay to grieve that relationship what do you want to do out of this do you want to try to fix that relationship do you want to you know do you want to um restore this relationship how do you want to do this is it through apology is it through crying something from it is it to talking you know so this is how we teach our kids to just kind of um take the next step after they do something wrong um
Speaker: And I think I went through a bit of a rant.
Speaker: No, no, no, no.
Speaker: This is like, you don't understand how, like, I feel like it's so important for myself even hearing this and other people because it's like, this is so important.
Speaker: And even when we're talking about this, when we go into inner child work, in a moment when we talk about adulthood, it ties directly to all these experiences that, like, we're talking about kids.
Speaker: It doesn't matter if I don't have kids.
Speaker: You know, you don't have kids yet.
Speaker: It's like, it doesn't mean that we can't understand these concepts and it doesn't apply to us.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: You know what I mean?
Speaker: It's like your interactions with kids as a whole is so influential and impactful, like other kids, whether it's your family, your nieces, your nephews, et cetera, to like show up in this right, healthy way so that you can start creating that more awareness for them and showing up in a modeled figure that actually allows them to know that it's okay.
Speaker: I think that mistake part, it's okay to make mistakes as long as you own up to it, you understand it, you know the consequences and the ramifications of it.
Speaker: And removing, yeah, I really want to, like, I hate the stigma of, oh, he's a good kid or she's a bad kid or naughty kid.
Speaker: It's like, no, no, I don't think that's true, you know?
Speaker: And which kind of brought me to one of the things you said was,
Speaker: The idea of like, just because you've done a bad thing doesn't make you a bad kid, right?
Speaker: Or a bad child.
Speaker: It's the same thing.
Speaker: Like, I feel like, yeah, when I, when it's something I'm, I always kind of talk about actually with other people when we're trying to change a behavior or you're trying to move out of being an angry person.
Speaker: It's that feeling of like, allow yourself to feel the feeling.
Speaker: Same with a kid.
Speaker: Like when they're going through something, right?
Speaker: It's like,
Speaker: Allow yourself to feel the feeling so I can feel angry and aggression move throughout me, but I don't need to identify as that feeling.
Speaker: I am not an angry or aggressive person.
Speaker: Exactly.
Speaker: I'm still being angry.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And I was just like, yeah.
Speaker: So when you were sharing that with the kids, I was like, yeah, the kids may have done something bad.
Speaker: It doesn't mean they're a bad person.
Speaker: Obviously, th is is actions compared to feelings, but it's the same sort of principle I feel like applies in life.
Speaker: Exactly.
Speaker: Yeah, because once we identify as I am, it's so powerful.
Speaker: Our brain listens.
Speaker: Our body listens.
Speaker: You know, it's the same idea as affirmations and mantras.
Speaker: You know, when we say something positive, we want to make it I am.
Speaker: We want to embody it.
Speaker: But when we embody the, you know, the stress and the anger and the idea of being bad, then we actually embody that.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And that's why when we have, you know,
Speaker: kids that are defiant at school and you just you know see them they seem like constantly angry and pink like they've embodied this this idea and they tell me it's like well everyone expects me to do that everyone thinks I'm bad anyway
Speaker: So they actually embody this idea that I'm the naughty kid at school.
Speaker: So they start playing into the identity that... Everyone says that they are and everyone puts.
Speaker: So it's kind of like, well, they expect me to respond this certain way because everyone has been saying it for the last three, four years.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So it's... And I see it so much and it's so important.
Speaker: And then being able to change that identity, it's so hard.
Speaker: And you're going to push onto a brick wall for so long
Speaker: and they're going to push back and they want to see that you're going to stay there.
Speaker: They might swear at you.
Speaker: They might try to hit you.
Speaker: But knowing that you're not going anywhere, that you're still there for them, you still accept them, even though they might be, you know, then they're going to start softening up.
Speaker: They're going to say, okay, they see me for who I am.
Speaker: I don't have to keep being this angry child.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: That's what I loved doing in my sessions.
Speaker: Unfortunately, you know, not everyone has said,
Speaker: you know, uninterrupted hour a week with a child to just sit there and just let them be angry in the room without getting in trouble, you know, because I'm just going to throw things in the room, play with bread, rip stuff, expressing their anger without getting in trouble.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And then when they knew that I was still there, I didn't go anywhere, you know, and obviously in safe, you know, in the safe ways, then you're like, okay, maybe I don't have to be this angry person all the time.
Speaker: Mm-hmm.
Speaker: like letting their shell come down yeah yeah i was like did you find that you were able to be super impactful in these situations with kids with this or do you find that it was because of the impact that they or the identity that they may have already adopted it just it needs a lot more work and attention but more from that parenting guidance guardian kind of perspective yeah um so
Speaker: Some, some, to be honest, not as much as I would like to, because it needs to be their whole approach.
Speaker: Unfortunately, especially when you are in an educational system, in a school system, it's very different.
Speaker: Yeah, you have the rules you have to follow, you have to the guidelines that you have to follow with suspension, with expansion.
Speaker: So it's really tricky.
Speaker: And you have so many staff members that see that behavior very differently.
Speaker: you know and so many opinions so it's it's really hard you know you have teachers like everyone that have different beliefs around being a good child and that that behavior is intolerable you know which is you know some of it yeah like it can be really aggressive but seeing past the behavior and some some teachers seeing them as bad why are they still here they should be suspended you know so then you have the other ones that are more empathetic
Speaker: And you as a therapist, you know the past, you know the family history and you are more empathetic, but not all staff members know that.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: They're just, you know, in their mind they're like they're not a kid.
Speaker: So when you're in a system like this, unfortunately, it is pretty hard because not everyone is on the same page.
Speaker: And unfortunately, even the parents can't do, can't show up empathetically for their child because they're still dealing with their own trauma.
Speaker: And even as you're saying that, it's like, even for teachers, right?
Speaker: And it's something to give compassion and kindness with teachers, but teachers are parents, they're just like in a different suit in the sense of like, the teachers are responding in the same way, like you said, like they may not have known or been taught themselves how to fully regulate their emotions and things like that, that may lead them to be less compassionate or identifying and labeling kids in certain ways.
Speaker: And it's not to say it's easy.
Speaker: you know, in a classroom.
Speaker: So it's kind of like at that point, you know, they have to also protect the other 24 kids.
Speaker: Correct, correct.
Speaker: That's what I was trying to say.
Speaker: So like this is not, this is actually going like, yeah, there's a lot more involved in that.
Speaker: But that's what I was like, yeah, it's.
Speaker: Yeah, there's a lot.
Speaker: And unless our educational system changes, you know, I think, you know, we can't efficiently support our children.
Speaker: And there's some great success stories, you know, don't get me wrong.
Speaker: Great success stories with children.
Speaker: But overall, I feel like there's a lot of changes that need to happen in our system in order to support, not just the teachers, look at the whole generation, you know.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: which is why obviously you started, I can see the connecting the dots coming through from like, you know, studying psychology, working with kids through to then going like, well, the actual problem, it doesn't start at kids, it's generational, right?
Speaker: So it starts before the kids, you know?
Speaker: And I guess you stepping into now, you do quite a bit of work with adults, especially with couples and all with Mindfully Loved.
Speaker: Talk me through that journey and like what kind of sprouted the idea with that, how to kind of moved in.
Speaker: Yeah, well, I think when I mentioned before that, like when I started having that feeling that I wasn't doing enough at schools, that's when I started kind of like reflecting and trying to think what is the best way?
Speaker: How can I tackle this?
Speaker: You know, I know there's a lot of parenting specialists out there that work with parents and they do all this work.
Speaker: And from my conversations with parents, they're just always overwhelmed, always busy.
Speaker: The parents are always overwhelmed.
Speaker: Yeah, like the parents are just busy.
Speaker: They're busy, they don't have the time, they're working, they're parenting, doing all those things.
Speaker: And when I had meetings with the parents and I would come out with suggestions and tips, you would see them just like, shit, like how do I do all these things?
Speaker: I don't even know where to start.
Speaker: And, you know, and I feel for them.
Speaker: It is hard, you know, and then reflecting that there's a lot of work that you need to do.
Speaker: You need to go talk to someone.
Speaker: You need to learn how to manage your own emotions.
Speaker: But then I understand that when do you do that?
Speaker: If you're working full time, if you then have your kids, you know, setting them up for bed, cooking for them, and then, you know, when do you fit that in?
Speaker: So then I reflected how about taking a step back even further and encouraging and supporting couples to do this work before becoming parents because we have all the time in the world.
Speaker: And we don't just have that time, but we have the capacity to spend a day in bed,
Speaker: because we've had a realisation about our past and we are dealing with a lot of emotions and we want to spend our whole day in bed crying and grieving stuff.
Speaker: But when you're a parent, you don't have that privilege, unfortunately.
Speaker: And I started reflecting on couples entering that conception journey already being aware of the trauma.
Speaker: And I'm not saying healed because we never stop healing.
Speaker: I now know that
Speaker: entering parenthood is a big chapter of healing.
Speaker: Like, you know, you need parenthood in order to, like, start digging in a different path of your healing.
Speaker: But already entering that journey by becoming aware that I am carrying some stuff.
Speaker: You don't have to necessarily heal it all, but just becoming aware is already a big step.
Speaker: And also tapping into some of the emotional intelligence.
Speaker: Kind of being able to learn how to communicate just with your partner, your feelings, um, recognize how you are feeling.
Speaker: Cause most of us still don't know how to do that.
Speaker: Like, I think I'm okay.
Speaker: Like, you know, I'm not angry.
Speaker: I'm not crying.
Speaker: I'm not sad.
Speaker: I don't know what else I'm feeling.
Speaker: You know, being able to explore that vocabulary of emotion.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: You know, and as simple as when people ask us, we just, how are you?
Speaker: Yeah, good.
Speaker: You?
Speaker: You know, it's a very basic.
Speaker: Good.
Speaker: And even me, like I've done all this work and I'm still like, okay, what else can I say?
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: It's a challenge.
Speaker: And you also don't want to say something that will make the other person uncomfortable.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: No, no, no.
Speaker: You like what you're saying is so true.
Speaker: Cause I was like, how often like, like I've had things, sadly, like friends when they, when people ask me, Hey, how are you?
Speaker: I don't like giving the standard answer.
Speaker: So if someone asks me how I am, I'm like, I will reply honestly.
Speaker: I've been good, man.
Speaker: I've gone through da, da, da, da.
Speaker: This is what's been happening.
Speaker: Oh, Hey, now I've been a bit shitty.
Speaker: I've gone through this and I'll be very, I'll try to be vulnerable with it.
Speaker: Now, here I'm having this conversation, but sometimes friends respond and receive it differently.
Speaker: And sometimes they'll take it going like, oh, dude, when I ask you, how are you?
Speaker: I just want, I'm good.
Speaker: That's it.
Speaker: I don't really care.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker: I just kind of ask to be polite.
Speaker: And it's like, you know, the shallow, not in a bad way.
Speaker: I kind of see the time and place for different conversations.
Speaker: Of course.
Speaker: But it's like in those environments, they're just like, oh, yeah, like I don't care.
Speaker: Like the how are you has lost its depth sometimes, I think.
Speaker: That's why like it's funny in like work situations or even like, you know, having one-on-one coaching conversations with people.
Speaker: Sometimes I found that how are you, you actually have to ask them like three, four times to honestly peel back all the freaking layers.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker: Until they finally go like,
Speaker: actually, this is how I am, you know, because, and it happens.
Speaker: And it's like, I say work is a good example for this, for me, at least, where it's like, yeah, sometimes I'm like, you know, it's been a tough week, a tough month, whatever.
Speaker: I'm like, how are you?
Speaker: Like, oh, yeah, I'm good.
Speaker: I'm good.
Speaker: And that's like, oh, cool, cool, cool.
Speaker: Then I'll chat, chat, chat.
Speaker: Seriously, though, how are you?
Speaker: And I'm like,
Speaker: yeah like look it's been a bit difficult okay okay cool chat chat and it's like honestly be honest with me call it back how are you and then you're like that third how are you it's like i do it in three they're like oh yeah yeah just like it comes crying out but i get it i get it and it's like yeah like you said there's just so many barriers sometimes even to adults having that conversation and and creating the awareness to be able to show up and talk with you because i feel like
Speaker: One is when you're trying to create this awareness, having a community around you is so important and to lean on to leverage and stuff like that.
Speaker: And it's also so challenging when you're trying to, you're like, okay, I'll try to show, like I said, I tried to show up honestly and vulnerably, but then to kind of be met with, you know, I'm interpreting it as rejection.
Speaker: But when someone's like, oh, I didn't really want to, I didn't care.
Speaker: I just wanted like a high level answer.
Speaker: I didn't want to have a DNM or, you know, a TED talk with you or something like that.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: You're like, oh, I get it.
Speaker: I respect that.
Speaker: But it's also like, oh, I feel a bit rejected.
Speaker: So,
Speaker: what what do you do i guess within your own relationships and stuff to create more awareness to also create safety and uh create space for yourself to talk uh you know vulnerably honestly well i guess you know it depends it goes through waves because you know like everyone else life gets into you know um into a bit of a role and you go into a bit of a routine and there stays and i'm going to be honest it stays that
Speaker: I don't even know how I'm feeling.
Speaker: Unless I actually take a time to check in with myself, really tap into how I'm feeling, how it was today.
Speaker: And that's where journaling comes in.
Speaker: That's where little check-in times during the day with yourself comes in when you're able to take a deep breath and just kind of feeling your body, feel physically if you have any tension and then kind of reflect on what's happening in the day and how you are feeling if you're holding any emotions.
Speaker: It's really easy to just go through the day and not even...
Speaker: pay attention to it.
Speaker: You know, so if I'm not doing that, it will probably come up in, you know, in something very small that I get triggered and it just, you know, comes out and you're like, oh, shit, like what just happened?
Speaker: I forgot about this.
Speaker: And then you're like, okay, let's start looking into it.
Speaker: Definitely shows up a lot more, I feel like, in relationships because then you're like, why did you do that?
Speaker: You're like, oh, okay, wait, wait.
Speaker: They just left the dishes there.
Speaker: Exactly.
Speaker: But then when you start reflecting, it's the...
Speaker: And uncovering, it might be the same kind of core need that you had that's just coming up in different ways.
Speaker: It might be like, I feel like I'm not hurt.
Speaker: You know, I've told you to put the dishes away so many times.
Speaker: And if this time you didn't, I feel that you'd never hear me.
Speaker: It becomes a very generalized thing.
Speaker: If I felt that a few times during the week, I felt that my partner didn't hear me.
Speaker: So it's that need of being heard usually, of being seen.
Speaker: You know, really, like, you don't see me for who I am, you know, and that's the other person asking what you said before, I really like that, but really, how are you, you know?
Speaker: You're constantly sitting there and keep asking, you see the person, like, I see you, like, I see past your, I'm good, like, I'm here, so I'm ready to, I'm ready for you to just kind of unload because I'm here for you.
Speaker: So the power of being seen and being heard and the need that I'm wanted, you know,
Speaker: yeah like save that i feel like you want like i'm wanted like i'm accepted i'm wanted by someone you know so then most of the times when you i get tricked when you get triggered and you like snap or get angry or cry once you kind of like reflect and take a step back and reflect and reflect and go back back back what's the underlying reason of that emotion most of the time is i'm just not feeling loved
Speaker: Yeah, I'm so surprised actually how like I don't want to be like love, love, love.
Speaker: It's always love.
Speaker: But it's like it's that self love.
Speaker: Self love.
Speaker: It's been imprinted on us from the kids and what we learn and what we didn't learn maybe even as well.
Speaker: um but as we get to all the years it is so interesting how often it's just like oh i just want to feel like it's like core emotions of like i just want to feel loved yeah i want to feel safe yeah i want to feel um because like even like being understood i i kind of link that for myself it's it's been often tied into i just want to feel safe yeah because when i'm understood i feel people understand me i feel safe then and when i'm safe i can let my guard down i can be who i truly am i don't have to put a mask on because i know
Speaker: I know I'm safe to be who I am and I know I'm going to still be accepted.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And these, and these are the parts that I was like, society will be such a better, safer, more pleasant place.
Speaker: Um, more safe.
Speaker: I say safer in the sense of even just understanding each other better.
Speaker: If we allowed for people to drop those masks and to allow people to drop those masks, we have to be able to like face our own shit to drop those masks, which funnily enough leads into what we're, I was going to, I was talking about with inner child work.
Speaker: Um,
Speaker: in that sense of like, because I know you're very passionate about some of the stuff you're doing with inner child work.
Speaker: Maybe give a little bit of a definition of what inner child work is to you.
Speaker: Well, so first of all, like what inner child is.
Speaker: So inner child is the idea that all of us as adults have that inner child within us, that childhood version of us inside us.
Speaker: And any needs that we were not given as a child are still come up to as adults.
Speaker: So if that inner child within us
Speaker: when we were little felt unloved, felt not accepted, felt that we were bad, that we were always naughty, we're still holding that child within us.
Speaker: So those come up manifest in different ways, subtle.
Speaker: So when it comes to inner child healing, we are connecting with that inner self of us within us.
Speaker: And we are reparenting that child.
Speaker: So we parent that child the way we wished we were parented as children.
Speaker: We tell that child within us what we didn't hear growing up.
Speaker: You are loved.
Speaker: You are accepted.
Speaker: You are wanted.
Speaker: I see you.
Speaker: I hear you.
Speaker: You are safe.
Speaker: You know?
Speaker: And there's so much in the inner child healing.
Speaker: Like there's different ways you can do this.
Speaker: But, you know, one of the most, like one of the ones that I really like is when you are feeling a big trigger, you know, you can tap into them like, okay,
Speaker: when did I first feel that feeling growing up?
Speaker: You know, what age was it?
Speaker: You know, and some people can tap into, you know, into this really quickly.
Speaker: They can say, I felt it first when I was four years old.
Speaker: So, you know, you connect with that four-year-old, you know, child and you give them what they needed at that time.
Speaker: You know, instead of being shamed for being silly in front of a family gathering, you know,
Speaker: you imagine yourself, and it all comes from visualisation.
Speaker: You imagine yourself hugging them, playing with them, allowing them to be silly and be silly with you.
Speaker: So there's that way of connecting with your inner child and telling them what you want, parenting them the way you wanted to parent.
Speaker: But there's also another side where you as an adult become more childlike.
Speaker: So you play more.
Speaker: You start being more silly in your life.
Speaker: So you connect with that inner child
Speaker: you know what you're accepting that inner child you're accepting that inner that child like um self for you so that's when you start being more playful loving being out being messy um connecting with nature you know all those things that children do becoming more curious about being wondrous you know so and yeah like it's there's there's there's a lot when it comes to inner child healing but it's it's
Speaker: It's very powerful.
Speaker: And the way I see it is the way, the moment we go back and we heal a wound from our childhood, from letting a child, it instantly heals that as an adult.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Just kind of like filling it with love in a way.
Speaker: Again, it goes back to love, but filling it with love and acceptance.
Speaker: And this is something that's what I love about this.
Speaker: And the whole point of this podcast is like going inwards to go onwards.
Speaker: And it's not just about just inner child stuff, but it's actually going like,
Speaker: healing, I found whenever I do myself in a child work or I do shadow work or deeper work myself, like
Speaker: Whenever I do that, there's two parts that I started making a lot more sense.
Speaker: One was, and I love the word, reparenting.
Speaker: How would you approach the situation now?
Speaker: How would you reparent yourself, given what you know now and the understanding you know now?
Speaker: And I love that idea.
Speaker: So it's like reparenting that situation to be something that you're like, this is what I needed as a child.
Speaker: And now filling that void with that love, that compassion, that kindness of what little Kyle needed back then.
Speaker: That's the one part is like you changing, you rewriting that story now, right?
Speaker: You're changing the fundamental foundation.
Speaker: You've changed the foundations of the story from here though.
Speaker: The other part is integration.
Speaker: Because what I realized is recently with a lot of the stuff I've been doing, it's like, oh man, I've changed this meaning.
Speaker: This is the understanding I've had for myself.
Speaker: I've given myself that reparenting and that love that I needed.
Speaker: But then I was like, oh, but the integration, I used to always think it was a passive thing.
Speaker: You know, integration just happens to me.
Speaker: I will sit back and then everything in my unconscious mind will digest all this information, spit it back.
Speaker: And I'd be like, oh yes, I am my best version right now.
Speaker: Only, yeah, it doesn't work.
Speaker: It's the hardest part.
Speaker: It's the hardest part.
Speaker: And I was like, I wish someone would fail in a way.
Speaker: Like I think like we, you know, we find it hard to implement.
Speaker: Yeah, because accountability comes into place.
Speaker: Correct, correct, correct, correct.
Speaker: And this is, and it's not just the accountability comes in place, it's repetition.
Speaker: Like the biggest thing with integration I found is repetition of the new action behavior feeling that you want to start like, you know, living out, right?
Speaker: But what was the challenge is that I was like, yeah, because the integration,
Speaker: The way I started realizing and looking at this is integration is now going all those beliefs, all those patterns that you did, all those habits you did, all the actions you took, it's re-changing those that have been so conditioned because of repetition you've done for so long.
Speaker: For the last X amount of years, you've held on to this trigger or this trauma.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: To like now, it's like, oh my gosh, no wonder it's so hard because it's like, yeah, I've just conditioned myself for so long.
Speaker: So yes, now I've given myself an empowering foundation, right?
Speaker: So I've like, you know, given myself a new foundation, but now I need to go into these layers of actually going like- Changing the pattern, yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah, yeah, changing the pattern.
Speaker: So how the heck do I do this?
Speaker: And I was like, oh, that was, that's hard.
Speaker: And that's where I think like the community, the people around you and all that can be so important and so powerful.
Speaker: I know we've gone off a tangent, but bring it on to the next.
Speaker: it's part of any healing journeys, you know, that integration part.
Speaker: And, you know, as simple as when I, when I say, you know, tell your inner child, I'm safe, I'm calm, I'm loved.
Speaker: You know, how do I implement all those things on a daily basis?
Speaker: How do I remind my inner child that they are loved on a daily basis?
Speaker: What are some things I can do during the day?
Speaker: I can, it can be, be playful.
Speaker: It can be trying a new sport.
Speaker: It can be going to like a trampoline park, you know, once a month, you know, so it's really then,
Speaker: you add the behaviors because at the end of the day, we are now in human form.
Speaker: So we need to start implementing those things in like human form.
Speaker: So behavior wise, what can we start implementing little things on a daily basis to continue in reminding ourselves of those things?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And is this now the work you're doing with couples?
Speaker: Is it going into a lot of this inner child shadow work?
Speaker: Is it, yeah, what's the kind of process that you currently do now with couples?
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: So through Mindfully Loved, we have our program, an eight-week program called Mindfully Healing, and we dive into it.
Speaker: everything that we've said plus more.
Speaker: You know, we do a lot of the self-awareness part or a lot of the inner child healing.
Speaker: So we go through a lot of weeks of the self-exploration and awareness and self-healing where we go into those different modalities, teaching them how to change the limiting beliefs, how to become aware of their self-talk, of the negative thinking and how to challenge those as well.
Speaker: So in a way, take control of
Speaker: you know, thoughts of emotions or feelings and how to tackle that.
Speaker: We go through inner healing and we do a lot of relationship work as well.
Speaker: So how to communicate with your partner, you know, exploring self and love languages, understanding each other's love languages.
Speaker: How do you show love to each other?
Speaker: All those things.
Speaker: We go through emotional intelligence.
Speaker: So, you know, because I love, I love that.
Speaker: And being able to understand our emotions, communicating emotions, learning ways to deal with your emotions.
Speaker: How do you self-soothe?
Speaker: You know, like we're expecting babies to soothe themselves.
Speaker: You know, when they're crying, like don't pick them up.
Speaker: They need to learn how to self-soothe, you know, newborns.
Speaker: We have adults that, you know, and I ask this question a lot and a lot of my friends and family don't know.
Speaker: Like what do you do to soothe yourself when you're not feeling well?
Speaker: You know, and most of them are like don't do anything.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker: Ignore it, suppress it, and they just keep going.
Speaker: Nowadays, we don't take that time to rock ourselves, you know, hum, take a shower, and it's mostly sensory, you know, but just finding what works for you.
Speaker: Wrap yourself in a blanket, you know, cry, take deep breaths, shower, go for a walk, like having your own toolkit, you know, and know what works for you for when you're feeling a little bit blah, knowing that you have the power to self-soothe and that you
Speaker: you deserve that time to self-suse you know we go through that big part and then we also move into kind of preparing for conception you know because we be god forgets of not just self-love but um also slow living so we have a big part of self-love as well and then how you how can you set up a life you know entering parenthood when you do
Speaker: feel slow when you do kind of, you know, slowing down everything, intentional, very intentional, very sustainable kind of life moving forward.
Speaker: And that's when you have the conversations with your partner.
Speaker: How do you imagine your parent to be?
Speaker: You know, how do you want to be a parent?
Speaker: How do you want the energy of the house to be?
Speaker: And what can we do now to, you know, have this one's parent who has?
Speaker: What are support systems?
Speaker: So you start having those conversations.
Speaker: And I always say this, like you can't do this
Speaker: early you know like the earlier you start having those conversations the better it is because you kind of like create an an idea you create a visualization of how you want yourself to be as a parent so you kind of like prepare yourself to enter this journey with the skills that you want to have
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And I feel like, look, each of those, there's so many different topics you covered that I was like, each of those you could spend yonks talking about, you know what I mean?
Speaker: And that's what I was like, that's why I like that even the way you encompassed inner child work, it's not just going like, oh, here's the different, you know, trauma or the experience I had as a child that, you know, I need to change or, you know, reparent myself on.
Speaker: It's actually like everything around it from the behaviors, the flaw and effect to, I like the way, like when you talked about soothing, it's like, yeah, we do.
Speaker: Like I was just thinking about that thought you said with soothing.
Speaker: And I was like, in today's society, I find that like, we don't know how to self-soothe.
Speaker: So what do we do?
Speaker: We kind of go to vices to self-soothe, right?
Speaker: We'll drink excessively.
Speaker: We'll gamble.
Speaker: We'll smoke.
Speaker: We'll whatever, drugs, alcohol.
Speaker: quickly or numb.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker: And it's, it's, it was so interesting, because I realized like, and this is something that I went through for myself, in one of these reflections I had for myself, I actually went and understood that, like, you know, that when things were getting tough, like, say, within my relationship, I actually started becoming numb to certain parts of the relationship.
Speaker: Because when things were tough, it was like, oh, okay, if I don't do certain actions, I won't get rejected.
Speaker: And if I don't get rejected, I won't be unhappy.
Speaker: So you know what?
Speaker: I'm not even going to feel into that or even do so.
Speaker: I'll just completely block it off.
Speaker: But then that numbness plays out in different ways, right?
Speaker: Because that numbness meant me not showing up.
Speaker: wholesome or completely for my wife, for my partner.
Speaker: You know, it also meant that like that numbness meant that like the feeling like when you numb one area of your life, you actually numb all areas in a certain level because it's like that numbness is the stopping of
Speaker: full expression of emotions and i feel that full expressions of emotions when you actually allow for the like when you allow yourself to feel then you really feel like both the highs and the lows just as and you see the beauty in both of them right um but yeah that numbness i was like wow that's that's yeah it was sorry just it took me off on a a trail thought but i was like yeah that numbness is such a easy thing we do because we haven't ever been taught about self-soothing yeah and exactly and most of us are scared to feel any uncomfortable feelings
Speaker: We have this fear of pain or uncomfortable feelings.
Speaker: So most of us hate feeling upset, hate feeling sad.
Speaker: Mostly it's sadness that we don't like, you know, and we're scared to feel sad because at that moment we think we're always going to feel like this.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: You know, so that reminder that everything is temporary, nothing is permanent.
Speaker: Every emotion is going to come and go, you know, but in this society now, and it comes with physical pain, emotional pain, everything.
Speaker: we are just so scared of pain, you know, any discomfort, not just pain, any discomfort, you know, and we're trying to avoid it in every way.
Speaker: You know, even that when you said like that fear of rejection, you know, it's that fear of like I don't want to get hurt.
Speaker: Yeah, 100%.
Speaker: So, you know, so many people don't enter relationships because of the fear that they might get hurt after.
Speaker: So they miss out on all the other possibilities of all the other beautiful emotions that
Speaker: for just, you know, that percentage of maybe I will get hurt, maybe they'll reject me.
Speaker: Yes, so it's something that we've talked about, but with my husband the last few months a lot, that so many of us are just fear of discomfort.
Speaker: We have that fear of discomfort.
Speaker: We don't want to feel any discomfort, physical, emotional, and we try to avoid it.
Speaker: We try to, you know, use painkillers to just numb it, alcohol, drugs, whatever it is to avoid any sort of discomfort.
Speaker: And we were reflecting on how can we
Speaker: you know, how can we change society in order to surrender more into that pain?
Speaker: And instead of seeing discomfort and pain as something bad, you know, something that we should be avoiding, let's surrender to it and let's embrace it and let's see what teaches us from that.
Speaker: And I think this is a lesson that I've learned personally from, through planned medicine journeys, you know, because if anyone has done any planned medicines, but
Speaker: From our first journey in Awaska in Peru, I think surrendering to it was the first lesson of welcoming discomfort.
Speaker: You know, with any journeys, it comes the discomfort first.
Speaker: You know, you feel that pain.
Speaker: You feel it physically.
Speaker: You feel it emotionally.
Speaker: You feel that you are in hell, you know, and you have to surrender to it.
Speaker: I remember the shaman that was telling us, when you are feeling the pain, instead of going to a fetus position, open up.
Speaker: lay on your back and open up, surrender to it.
Speaker: And the moment you do that, you feel that peace.
Speaker: You know, you let that discomfort run through you.
Speaker: But it's when we resist it, when we resist the pain, when we resist the discomfort, it's when it becomes worse and it sticks around.
Speaker: The moment we open up, the moment we welcome and surrender to it, it kind of rides over us like a wave.
Speaker: And the quicker it kind of like leaves us.
Speaker: And it's something that,
Speaker: You know, we try to welcome more in our life and we try to explain to others.
Speaker: But we find this so much around, especially with family and friends, that like, but I don't want to feel hurt.
Speaker: You know, I don't want to.
Speaker: Why would you want to feel discomfort?
Speaker: We see this as something bad, but it's part of being human.
Speaker: We feel happy and we feel angry.
Speaker: We feel sad and we feel hopeful.
Speaker: You know, this welcoming all emotions rather than just the positive feel-good ones.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker: No, no.
Speaker: And even that it's like, yeah, what you're saying about surrendering to the pain is such a, yeah, I struggle with that the surrender piece quite a lot.
Speaker: And I often struggle more, more from I'm like, Oh, but I am surrendering, I'm letting I'm trusting.
Speaker: And it's like, it's more of that release, like, I guess, a question for you, how do you define surrendering?
Speaker: Like, what does that actually look like, or feel like for you?
Speaker: Surrendering.
Speaker: So it's, first of all, not
Speaker: not resisting it, not trying to suppress it, not trying to distract yourself, sitting with it, literally allowing yourself to feel that discomfort without trying to distract yourself, use other means to kind of change the way you're feeling.
Speaker: Sit with that discomfort.
Speaker: And that might be crying, sobbing, yelling in a pillow, you know, rocking, moving, shaking, anything that will kind of let you sit with that.
Speaker: Yeah, like and just let it kind of run through you.
Speaker: So it's not, it doesn't mean grabbing your phone.
Speaker: It doesn't mean start talking to someone.
Speaker: It doesn't mean start drinking.
Speaker: It means literally sitting there and expressing it in a healthy way, you know, expressing it through you, letting it be.
Speaker: And you might be writing stuff, you know, that's where artists come, like me painting something, literally letting it come through you without trying to distract it, kind of like letting it, you know, come out.
Speaker: And, you know,
Speaker: sitting with it doesn't mean just sitting there and letting, because once you accept it and once you sit with it, it's not going to linger.
Speaker: It will want to come out.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: And it's really finding your way, what works for you.
Speaker: Do you like to grow?
Speaker: Do you want to punch pillows?
Speaker: Do you want to scream?
Speaker: Do you want to draw?
Speaker: Do you want to write?
Speaker: Do you want to rock?
Speaker: Do you want to dance?
Speaker: You know, finding your own mean of allowing that emotion to come out.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Expressing it was, and that helped me connect the dots a little bit, right?
Speaker: Because sometimes when I'm surrendering to things, I'm like, I see sometimes in myself as like sitting in the fire.
Speaker: So I can understand the concept of surrendering and sitting in the fire.
Speaker: But then sometimes I was like, well, what do I do from here?
Speaker: You know?
Speaker: And it's like you said, it's actually expressing whatever emotion comes out without judgment.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And sometimes if our expression part is blocked, we can't because we've never seen anyone or don't know how to even express things.
Speaker: It is hard.
Speaker: you know, and what, you know, what I work through my clients with is it might be just opening your mouth and just that sign, you know, and then, you know, slowly opening up, you know, that channel or start just like moving around slowly.
Speaker: And then, then your body will, you know, will go on and we'll start slowly, you know, that sound will get louder, will become into like a bit of a scream.
Speaker: Or if you're breathing heavily, you know, tears must start coming out.
Speaker: If you're shaking and dancing,
Speaker: then you will start getting lost into that.
Speaker: But, you know, most of the people just sit there like nothing's happening, so I don't know.
Speaker: But, you know, sometimes you need to, like, help yourself a little bit, you know, like, you know, start even journaling, start writing, start drawing and see where that goes.
Speaker: But you need to figure out what your me needs, you know.
Speaker: How do you get to that?
Speaker: Are you, like, yeah, are you more of a crier or a screamer or do you want to do more creative work?
Speaker: So it's really finding what, you know, what's your outlet.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker: How can you express that in a healthy way?
Speaker: I like that.
Speaker: You touched upon...
Speaker: awareness and you were kind of saying like one and this this awareness and just you the reason why I'm it kind of came to my attention a bit more as well is that it is a common theme like from when you're a kid it's creating that awareness of like what are you feeling in your body what are you feeling is happening so you can actually understand how to better regulate creating awareness of the consequences as well so even prior to doing things it's like the more repetition through that it's that awareness right through to an adulthood before we can regulate or tell our kids how to regulate we need to create awareness in ourselves what is happening in our own bodies
Speaker: What's causing us to feel tense or angry or happy or joyful?
Speaker: For me, I do a daily practice of I'll check in.
Speaker: I just do a physical check-in followed by every week I'll do a journal and I'll reflect on the week.
Speaker: But physically check in, I'll just be like, okay, I'll close my eyes, sit, take a breath in.
Speaker: And as I breathe in, I'll just be like, okay, what am I feeling throughout my body?
Speaker: And I realized like one thing with awareness, it was like, there's the physical awareness, there's also the emotional awareness, right?
Speaker: And a good way to get out of our heads and into our bodies is, was this technique I got told.
Speaker: And it's like, as we take that breath in and you go through, you kind of scan from head to toe and just going, what am I feeling?
Speaker: It's like, cool, my head's feeling light, my ears are feeling alert, you know, my head.
Speaker: My nose is a little itchy.
Speaker: It's not judging it.
Speaker: It's just it can be anything.
Speaker: Right to then, oh, my shoulders are feeling tension.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Okay, cool.
Speaker: My arms and you go through your whole body.
Speaker: As you go and you scan, you get all these little points of information.
Speaker: And then you can actually ask yourself, okay, my shoulders are feeling tension.
Speaker: Why?
Speaker: What's coming up with that?
Speaker: And it's just sitting with it.
Speaker: And it's allowing, like you said, yourself to just experience that.
Speaker: It's like, oh, this I realized I was holding on to blah, blah, blah, blah.
Speaker: And that's what I found, like, for me was so powerful for awareness is that the more I've started doing this now is like a daily practice.
Speaker: Now, all of a sudden, I can feel what's happening in my body and it starts connecting.
Speaker: to what's happening in the outer world in terms of that emotion.
Speaker: Like, you know, so the feeling of tension in my shoulders is often for me, it's like I'm carrying or I'm holding on to a lot of stress and tension.
Speaker: It's this feeling of like expectation and I'm not hitting a certain expectation is what a lot happens where it's like, you know, discomfort in my throat, you know, which often happens is like I'm not speaking my truth.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: And I know this kind of ties into the more spiritual side of things as well.
Speaker: Yeah, of course.
Speaker: But just in that awareness piece, it's like that's really helped me harness that.
Speaker: And then I can journal like at the end of the week.
Speaker: I'll be like, how was my week?
Speaker: And then I'll journal on my week.
Speaker: And sometimes I'll do an awareness, a scan of my body, and I'll be like, my legs are tight.
Speaker: I don't understand why, but they are.
Speaker: Then I'll journal at the end of the week, and it'll be like, oh, when I'm journaling.
Speaker: Yeah, it drops in.
Speaker: It's like, oh, this week I did A, B, C, D, D, da, da, da.
Speaker: When I did this, it made me feel this.
Speaker: And it's just exploring like what I did and what it made me feel.
Speaker: Like I always do like what's my thoughts and feelings.
Speaker: I try to connect that or like that head and heart.
Speaker: I try to do as much as I can.
Speaker: And it's like, yeah.
Speaker: So I was like, that's how I do awareness and how it's now expanded my awareness of all the things.
Speaker: What's yours?
Speaker: So my, similar to yours, a bit quicker.
Speaker: So it's, it's that check in, you know?
Speaker: And what I always tell my clients to do is just put random reminders in your day, on your calendar, like during the day.
Speaker: Like, so you don't know when that kind of like ring pops up, but when that ring comes,
Speaker: Just take in two minutes.
Speaker: Doesn't it take long to just, as you said, close your eyes, take a deep breath and just check in and tell yourself, how am I feeling?
Speaker: You know, just a question.
Speaker: Non-judgmentally, as you said, and self-physically, it's easier, kind of like noticing the tension, heaviness, lightness, you know, if you have any pain in your headache, in your head, like a headache, and then kind of like, okay, how am I feeling?
Speaker: Am I feeling overwhelmed?
Speaker: Am I feeling a bit anxious?
Speaker: Am I feeling content?
Speaker: Am I feeling at peace?
Speaker: Am I feeling a bit irritated?
Speaker: And then just that.
Speaker: And then continuing your day.
Speaker: So keeping it really simple because I find, and obviously, like, I find that easier for me as well, but I find it with my clients, it's so much easier to incorporate two minutes here and there rather than assigning 20 minutes a day to do something.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker: But the end of the day is another great one.
Speaker: um that i tend to do um not as often i'm going to be honest i wish i could be more often um generally the journaling um just reflecting on your day and what i could have done better what i'm proud of myself and just again non-judgmental just like reflecting okay the way i talked to this person today maybe wasn't the best way um i did this probably i was irritated i was overwhelmed i was feeling under pressure next time i'll um
Speaker: I'll try and, you know, respond differently, try to take a deep breath, kind of like, you know, those ways.
Speaker: But another way that I really like to incorporate awareness, not necessarily my own awareness, but like awareness around you, is the way of mindfulness.
Speaker: And that's what I teach kids, which they love.
Speaker: And it's that when you're outdoors, it's that becoming aware of your senses, you know.
Speaker: So you go through a little thing of like five things that you can see, four things that you can hear,
Speaker: three things that you can feel.
Speaker: So like the clothes, the ground on the floor, your hair, two things that you can smell and one thing that you can taste.
Speaker: I love that.
Speaker: Yeah, so again, it's a one-minute exercise that kind of brings you back to the present moment and you become aware of what's going on around you, you know, kind of like, you know, and because of your kind of the clothes, things that you're like, it brings you back to your body as well.
Speaker: But that's an easy thing and an easy little game
Speaker: to start introducing awareness into your kids, which I love.
Speaker: Like the idea of awareness, what does that mean?
Speaker: Yeah, no, no, no.
Speaker: And mindfulness.
Speaker: Yeah, no, I love that little technique.
Speaker: Honestly, I was just like, oh, that's actually such a nice way because like the senses brings you into your body.
Speaker: You know what I mean?
Speaker: Back to the present moment.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Beautiful.
Speaker: So where to from here then?
Speaker: oh so so many things um so many things obviously we have mindfully loved um and you know mindfully loved the idea of mindful life we want it to be like an umbrella you know right now it's focusing more on couples um but i'm working on a project um where i'm creating a program for teachers so kind of like what we chatted about together just before that how even teachers need that
Speaker: sense of awareness, you know, kind of what are they carrying around?
Speaker: What are their beliefs around teaching, around behaviour, around how a kid should be behaving in a classroom, you know, and challenging those things.
Speaker: So, like, I want to work a lot on schools at the moment and teachers to kind of work on that.
Speaker: We are developing our first physical product for expecting parents as well, which hopefully will be about in a few weeks.
Speaker: And then just
Speaker: some individual work which I'm creating some um it's they're like women I'm calling them women gatherings so they're a combination of women's circles and group counseling yeah so I want to welcome a creative space for women to um tapping into their own because their own issues their own insecurities their own fears as well as creating that um
Speaker: ritualistic kind of space where they can tap into the true power.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I love that.
Speaker: And I was like, look, honestly, I feel like that same concept, I know you're focusing on women.
Speaker: It's like that applies to men just as equals.
Speaker: And that's something that, you know, my husband might be able to do.
Speaker: But I think it's a journey that I've gone through the last year, like the last year, I've been connecting more with my feminine side and wanting to create relationships
Speaker: creating that space for women.
Speaker: I think I've realized that I've been a lot in a masculine kind of like masculine power and wanting to kind of like enter that and creating that space will support me.
Speaker: I love it.
Speaker: I love it.
Speaker: Look, on that note, creating space.
Speaker: Thank you for creating the space for jumping on the podcast today, like a little segue.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: It's been an absolute pleasure.
Speaker: And I feel like you just dropped, there's so much I've taken on and written literally notes of just like the stuff you've covered.
Speaker: And I just, yeah, I know this is going to be a beautiful experience for others to listen to.
Speaker: Thank you for having me, Kyle.
Speaker: Thank you.
Speaker: Thank you.
Speaker: If you enjoyed this episode, it would mean the world if you could subscribe, rate, and review this podcast.
Speaker: And if you know someone who needs to hear this on their own journey, share it with them.
Speaker: Thanks so much for listening.
Speaker: And remember to go inwards and onwards, my friend.
