#318 How to Have More Joy in Family Life—Even During the Hard and Messy Moments

Greg Denning (00:00)
the easiest way for our kids to feel joy and happiness is for parents to model for them joy and happiness

we think, well, no, I'm a victim to their behavior.

Is it possible to have that joyful state while I'm cleaning up the mess?

your children have been watching you from birth to learn how to handle life.

We're the adults. We have to be the adults.

You can't fake it. You can't pretend. It has to really be there.

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Extraordinary Family Life podcast. We're your host, Greg and Rachel Denning.

Today, we're going to talk about being genuinely and truly happy and joyful and excited for life. Because if you stop and think about it, honestly, how do you measure life and the quality of your life? How do you measure a time period or a moment or a day?

Well, it's connected to how do you

measure

the happiness of your children's childhood. Yes. Right. It's based on what you said is how you feel. The feelings you have, the feelings your children have in everyday life, that is the essence of their childhood.

Because it's coloring their experience, which then of course colors and paints their memories.

Exactly. So, hey, what was your childhood like? Blah, blah, or, oh man, there was a lot of fighting or, it was okay. Well,

because we...

launched the Extraordinary Parent Mentoring Method course. It's kind of a mouthful there, but ⁓ we had the participants go through a form that they filled out talking about their biggest pain points, their biggest problems, and then of course their ideal, like their vision. What is it you want to create? What is it that you want to have more of? Of course, a lot of the pain points are things like sibling rivalry, sibling fights, yelling.

You know on and on there's a whole list

but but a common denominator in everything people wanted to have included I Want to have more peace. I want to have more joy I want to have more love more connection in the the moments of life I want my kids to remember a positive childhood. I want them to just feel my love for them and to know that I love them

And it was interesting to me as I thought about that, because of course, and I relate to this as a mom, one of the things standing in their way was this never ending to-do list. This whole plethora of jobs and chores and charts and things that have to get done, right?

And so they feel like,

I just can't feel the joy, the peace, the love I want to have because I've got this whole to-do list.

That is so fundamental. We got to talk about that.

Yeah. So I really want to dive into that today in depth to figure it out because I realized that they're focusing on to-do, right? The to-do list, it's doing.

But what they want to experience is being. They want to experience that feeling of peace and joy and love, which comes not from doing.

Like, yeah, there's a connection there because you can do things that are acts of love or do things that bring joy. But in essence, it's a way of being.

And so when you develop the sense of being, you can actually feel those emotions while doing.

the same

things. You don't have to change what you're doing. You change how you feel about what you're doing and that brings more of those positive emotions into your life.

Or even just you just decide and determine how I'm going to feel and then whether there's a big to-do list tomorrow or not, whatever.

I guess that's what we're going to get into is like I don't have to be there. And I think one additional thing is like, I have so much to do and so I get so focused on that. The other piece is

Things aren't exactly how I want them to be. Yeah, I have this ideal in my head and they aren't idealistic or

Realistic or maybe even sometimes realistic but you allow that to totally disturb and disrupt your emotional state like ⁓ Man, my toddlers made a mess again. I guess I can't be happy Yeah, it is almost for many moms

It's like we have this idealized vision of what motherhood looks like and if it doesn't look like that

You know, we picture rosy-cheeked, clean children in beautiful clothing in a clean house. And while that's amazing, like when that happens, whew, that's amazing. But it's rare.

And so if we think we can only have that peace and joy and rest when all of that's in place, well, we're never gonna have it. Or we're very rarely gonna have it. And so the key then is not to wait for those situations for it to occur, but to learn how to have that

peace, joy, rest in the messes, in the chaos. When your kids took their new clothes and they're literally rolling in a mud pile in the rain outside, can't you be just as happy in Jovio's? Look at them, are being kids. a moment of joy, right? Instead of a moment of stress or frustration or anger. And I can literally hear your mom saying, and dad's too, but like, but now I have to...

Wash it. it up and hose them off. it's like so And they were expensive. Yeah, they were so nice. The waste of money. And so then there goes that that could be joy or happiness or contentedness or even excitement is like that's gone because now I'm already forecasting the work I have to do. And it comes back. like, why can't we be happy while we're working? Yeah. And that

That right there comes back to this difference between doing and being. Because being has to do with being in the present.

And when you're in the present and you're feeling the joy of the moment and the joy that they're experiencing, even as they ruin their clothes, right? That's where joy is found.

Whereas opposed to mentally when you do a process like that, you're not living in the now, you're forecasting to the future.

about this is all the things I have to do and that's why it's going to be so miserable and that's why I can't enjoy

this moment. So I could be laughing and having fun, but I'm already thinking about, this is what that means. It's going to fill my washing machine with all that mud. Yeah. So important.

And this comes up all the time. When you take just an examination of your own life and a normal week, like, well, what are you feeling most of the time? What are you experiencing?

And I would say hands down, ladies and gentlemen, the easiest and best way for our kids to feel joy and happiness is for parents to model for them joy and happiness

and to bring that energy, to bring that emotion. Like we're responsible for that. We're the adults. We have to be the adults.

So like, well, if I want my family to be jovial, I have to lead from the front. Yes. Being jovial. And but your mind's like, but I can't because I have to pay the bills.

And I have to do all the work. with all of these children that are frustrating. That are childish. And making messes. Yeah, so. And being loud. I'm supposed to be jovial, but they're disturbing my peace, right? And so we have to flip that switch in our heads. Well, and I just want to say this another way to emphasize how important this is,

because when parents come to us and talk about how they want to have

more joy, more peace, more love, more calm at home, rather than the chaos and anger and frustration and irritation they're having. What they don't realize, and this is the hard, uncomfortable truth, is that they are the creators of those problems. And they don't believe that, and they don't want to believe it. One, because it is painful, but two, it feels so much easier to blame it on the kids.

It's like, no, they're the ones who are doing the annoying things. They're the ones who are making the messes. They're the ones that are causing this chaos and creating this anger. But the truth is, that's not true. The truth is it's coming from us. It's starting with us. We are the ones who are either bringing that to

the dynamics, right? Because it's the way we respond to the things that actually generates the anger.

Which is super important because like, I'm in my bedroom, I wake up, wow, I feel amazing. I feel so good. I walk out and wow, the kitchen is a disaster and the kids are going after it. So then there goes all my good feelings.

Right. Right. So it feels like contrary to what you're saying, how could this be me? I was I was fantastic. They ruined it. Right.

That's what it feels like. And this is why it's so difficult to understand this nuance because even though it feels that way that they are the ones that inflicted that emotion on you of like, okay, I was calm, I was feeling good. And now I don't because of what they did. When you begin to learn how under how psychology works, how emotions work,

you realize that it's simply our interpretation in another way.

the story we're telling ourselves

and the meaning we give it. Even if it's instantaneous, right? Because you're like, I'm not telling myself a story. It's the meaning you give what is happening that causes your emotions about that thing. And it took me a while to really understand this. That's I was just saying. Like this is our journey. Yeah, it was. Like what is going on here? don't want to be grumpy. I don't want to be upset. I don't want to be irritated. I don't want to be blah.

And so we think, well, no, I'm a victim to their behavior.

When the reality is their behavior is simply revealing something that's already in us.

The anger is already there. The frustration, the irritation, the annoyance, it's already there and they're triggering it. If it's not, and we know this because we've worked on this ourselves and we've helped clients do it.

When you remove that,

then you can't be triggered. And so they can do the same exact behavior and you don't respond in the same way because that trigger is gone.

So let's recreate that scenario where you have a good night's rest, or even if you don't. So a couple of kids disturb you during the night and you're like, I'm tired.

More common than not. Hey,

I want today to be a good day, so I'm going to choose my emotion. I'm going to choose to be We're going to talk about that because some people are going to be like, what are you talking about? Just choose your emotion.

You can set the intention.

I wake up, I feel happy. And then let's say I walk out in that same scenario again, the kitchen's a mess, the kids are in there and they're duking it out over something. Who knows, orange juice cartons or whatever. The new me, after we learned how to do this, would stay peaceful,

stay happy, stay jovial and walk in and be like, whoa, what is going on in here?

Come here, guys. Good morning. And I go and I give him big hugs. Yeah, but she did. He did. Come here. Come here. Big hugs. Okay. Who's going to clean up that part? Who's going to clean up that part? Okay. Grab your rags. Grab stuff. Let's get this cleaned up and let's start our morning. That's going to be my reaction. And I don't let it, overpower.

the positive emotions I had, don't let circumstances push that out and be like... own negativity overpower your positivity. I'm like, I'm going to do the opposite. I'm going come in and let my positive emotions overpower the negativity and the circumstances and say, you know what? We can clean up this whole kitchen and still be happy. And resolve whatever the issue is together. From a better state. From a better state of love and positivity.

But that only happens... Well, it happens, I guess, easiest and best...

when we remove some of those

triggers, we then can come from and bring and maintain that positive state that does what you're saying. It overpowers the negative state. we're not saying that... I don't want to be misunderstood.

When I'm saying, you know, that our kids can't make us be angry or can't make us feel frustrated, I'm not saying they don't do things that are...

Irritating or frustrating or inappropriate or wrong. I'm not saying that that's not true What I'm saying is that regardless of what they do and how they feel? They cannot elicit emotions of anger or frustration or irritation from us if we remove those triggers

and We have all of us have these things we all have triggers because we have trapped emotions We have things that happen to our own childhood

We have unresolved trauma, we have unresolved issues. That's just the nature of being a human being. It's not like any of us have escaped from that. We haven't. We all have some of that. And so when we begin to realize that these feelings we're having because quote unquote what our kids are doing or their misbehavior actually has more to do with us than with them, we begin to realize that, when I resolve these things,

It's so easy to come with that positivity. It's so easy to bring that love to the family. It's so easy to bring that into my parenting. So everything these parents are talking about in this ⁓ survey they're filling out, like I wanna have more joy, I wanna have more peace, saying yes, absolutely, but that doesn't come by changing the circumstances, it comes by changing yourself. And then you bringing that into the interactions, the same interactions are happening.

Same to-do list is there, right? You don't get rid of the to-do list, you don't get rid of all the things.

You just bring a different way of being to those activities, to those interactions, and that's what changes the whole dynamic. For some reason, it just popped into my head this old saying I remember that, I don't know if it was, it came from Christian monks or it came from Buddhists, I don't remember, but the point was, after enlightenment comes the dishes,

right?

And it's this idea that just because you receive enlightenment and pure peace and joy and love, it doesn't take away the dishes. It doesn't take away sweeping. It doesn't take away interacting with your family. You have to bring that into your interactions and your life. If you want to feel more of those things as opposed to eliminating those things.

So you can then feel those emotions.

And you and I used to feel and many people still do. It's like, well, OK, I hear you. And that's a nice idea. But, you might in your head right now, you might be thinking, I literally cannot be happy and joyful if my house is a mess or if my kids are fighting. Right. And that's again, that's a perfect example of what you were talking about earlier is like, that's the story

we're telling ourselves. That's a rule we've created. And in our heads, like.

But it is, that's just the way it is. I literally cannot be joyful if there's clutter everywhere. And that's not true. It's just your programming. It's the internal systems. It's what's going on. And you can rewrite that. You can recreate it to the point. And this is what I had to do specifically,

because I just remember thinking like, no, man, if somebody treats me poorly, there's no way I'm staying in a good state because they just did that to me until I realized why? Why would I give away my good feeling? Why would I?

And I guess this is part of my story. I remember being really upset or getting bothered by things that happened to me. And then realizing I had ruined a perfectly good experience by having a bad attitude or still being bothered by something else.

So I got cut off in traffic in the morning. I go and could have had this really cool experience, but I was sitting there fuming over it. then afterwards, it happened a few times and I would get, I guess really disappointed and frustrated with myself. like,

man, I ruined a perfectly good experience.

because I was so bothered by this thing. like, well, what's going on? Why? And I realized to your point, right, removing the triggers, like, wait a minute, it's me. I'm the one that's choosing to be annoyed by small things. And if I just stop doing that, then there goes all these annoyances and I can be more happy and joyful more often.

And I know for some people using that word even choosing sounds...

So impossible. I definitely want to address that. But I do want to go back to your point because I do feel that, and this is true, this is supported by psychology research and other things. Yes, there are certain things that can contribute to more peace and happiness.

In fact, there is research out there that shows, especially for women, but I think it's true for men, that a cluttered environment does lead to more stress. that's true.

So we're not trying to say like we're discounting all of that and it's all just inside. It's all in your head. But what we are trying to say is that it's all in your head. No, I'm not actually, I'm not trying to say that. What I am trying to say is that part of it is in your head because if you believe, if you fully believe I cannot be happy unless my entire house is perfectly clean, then you will spend

a lot of your time being unhappy. it's, especially when you have young children at home, it's unrealistic to have the house completely clean all the time. So you have to find the yin and yang balance of like, yeah, I prefer it when my house is clean. But I'm speaking in generalities. But I'm saying we agree. that

we're not misunderstood here that we think, we just allow the house to be messy and the kids fight and whatever, and we're just going to be.

happy and peaceful about it. They can do whatever they want and we're just gonna be over in the corner being blissful. Like no,

we want our house to be clean and organized and neat. We want our kids to get along. But I guess here, sorry to interrupt you with your statement, but here's the crux of it that really hit me.

Is it possible to have that joyful state while I'm cleaning up the mess?

Well, and I think the point is too that it's actually easier for me.

especially as a mom to get people on board to help me clean the mess when I come from a place of peace and love and joy and happiness. Then it's easy, much easier to get the kids on board because they feel that from me. I'm demonstrating that it's actually a joyful process to clean up because that's part of the process. I had to learn this for myself. I realized, you know, and a lot of moms will say in these survey responses,

I just feel like I'm constantly nagging and getting after everyone to clean up and that they don't even want to do it. I had to realize for myself, they were learning that from me.

I didn't want to do it. I felt it was a drudgery. felt it was a chore, but someone had to do it. So it had to be me. I'm the victim here. I'm resentful about it. And when I learned to change my thinking about it and say, no, I want to clean up. I want to do the dishes. I want to do these things. If nothing else, because I want the outcomes.

I'm going to do them by choice. I'm going to do them pleasantly. I'm going to do them with fun.

That's how I was able to lead my children into, oh, yeah, it's not bad to clean up. It's a good thing. It doesn't have to be drudgery. It can be fun. We have to lead the way for them.

That's gigantic. It's huge. Because everyone's thinking, I would love for my kids to willingly help out and joyfully do the things that need to be done.

Well, okay, great, great, that's fantastic. Well, how do you teach that? Modeling it. Exactly. You have to be willing to joyfully do the work that needs to be And that can't be faked, that's the other thing. You can't be like, I'm so happy to be cleaning up right now, yay. Like,

I had to genuinely discover that within myself. I had to create that way of being, which even for, you know, that meant that for a time,

I might have been doing the chores by myself because I was trying to find that joy in doing the chores, right? And once I found it, then it's like, it's easier to share that and to model it for other people because it was sincere, it was authentic, it was real. And that's what people, that's what your children especially and all people learn from. They learn from that authenticity. And so then in this desire to have more joy, peace and love in the family,

I'm not changing anything. Well, I mean, you know, we're doing the day to day stuff.

I just have more joy when I'm doing the day to day stuff, which then means they have more joy while doing it because they learn by imitating. So it starts by even joy in looking forward to the day, knowing, I've got things to do and joy while doing the things in the journey with them and getting people engaged and, and enjoy in the accomplishment. And then.

joy even in that it just gets undone immediately after by the children. But you're learning to just have joy all along the way. ⁓ And just to clarify this for a second, again, we don't want to be misunderstood.

doesn't mean we never feel frustration or anger or irritation because that's life. You go to do something and you're like, my gosh, I'm trying to do this. It's supposed to be so simple. And now it's taking all these extra steps. That is life.

But the point is, especially that we want to emphasize in this podcast, the difference between having more joy and peace at home and having the normal feelings people have of the blah, the irritation, the frustration, is that gaining the tools that when those irritations occur, you are able to deal with them, process them, find solutions effectively, rather than taking that emotion

and then spreading it around to everybody

like a disease. that's what parents are doing. often happening. They don't realize it. And they've been doing it from the very, very beginning. They've just been ⁓ radiating out an emotional state around things. And so that's just training everybody in the house of how to feel and how to experience things. And without having to ever say anything, the kids notice,

Well, when we do that activity, this is what we're supposed to feel. Right. Yeah. parents don't, you said, know, parents don't realize it and because they don't fully understand how closely our children are watching us. They don't realize that your children have been watching you from birth to learn how to handle life.

And so they are picking up about, ⁓ when we're irritated or annoyed or frustrated, this is what it looks like.

This is how I act that out in the world. And so

parents who come to us looking for help with their children of like, they keep fighting, they keep nitpicking, they keep getting after each other, they keep nagging, they keep exploding about things. We're like, well really, they've picked that up from you because they've been watching you their entire life. How old are they? That's how long they've been watching you.

And they're simply imitating what you do.

very likely exaggerating it because they lack the prefrontal cortex and the self-regulation, but that's what's happening. They're just imitating you.

So the very first step to changing that is for you to learn to control yourself. And controlling it is helped significantly by learning how to process and release and remove the triggers or we could call them the wounds.

Because if you know, we've used this analogy before, but

Let's put it in here because it's relevant. If you have this open wound on your arm and someone bumps up against it, that's going to hurt way more than if you have no wound on your arm. If there's no wound and someone bumps it, you're like, yeah, no big deal.

Or in a very real way, let's say like there's some kind of ⁓ emotional wound or something associated with chores or works. Then every time you're doing the dishes, every time you're doing the laundry.

That wound hurts. And because what it's doing is it has some negative association with something. And so then every time that happens, every time the kids fight, every time they make a mess, ⁓ there goes that wound again.

And ⁓ man, I'm upset. Right. Which is why we often feel as parents that we're overreacting to the response. Right. Because again, with the analogy, if you bump it when you're healed, it's not a big deal. It was just a little bump and you're like, no big deal. Everything's fine. It's OK.

But with that wound there, now it's extra painful. You respond with this strong emotion because of the wound or the trigger. So when we can remove those, then the regular behaviors that our children are doing, it doesn't cause us that severe response. And this made such a big difference in my own parenting because I, people would ask me like, well, how do you...

It took me a while to figure out that this is what had happened because they're like, how do you stay so patient? How do you not get upset? And I realized it was because I had gone through this process of removing my triggers, healing my wounds, so that when my children did the things that were previously irritating, I didn't have to respond in irritation. I was able to be more objective, was able to view it from ⁓ a place of

curiosity, interest, love, and then respond in a way that was effective rather than reacting with negative emotion.

For me, I did that same thing because I had to go through and do a lot of internal processing for me. But I remember another experience. This was early in our marriage. I can't remember. I read a couple of different biographies and some personal development books, heard some discourses, and finally one day it just clicked.

Wait a minute. This experience or this situation is going to happen.

Now I get to choose. example, my kids are going to make a mess. Right. So pick something so simple. even more fundamental is like if I eat, I have to clean up afterwards. There's going to be dishes and pots and pans that need be washed. If I wear clothes, like I have to do the laundry.

And even if I'm like, I'm never going to wear the same thing twice, then I have to do a lot of shopping and pulling tags off, whatever. So just being alive requires work. So then I'll say, okay,

let's just say pretty, pretty fair assessment here. We're all going to have to wash dishes pretty regularly in life and do laundry. Let's just take those two. So if I were to add up, like take the ad, how much time in an entire lifetime are you going to spend washing dishes and doing laundry? It's like, wow, that could be a pretty big number.

But it has to be done. So at the most fundamental level, I'm gonna do it no matter what. Do I wanna be happy while I'm doing it or do I wanna be frustrated and

And right there, that's that choice that we've been talking about. And then, well, do I want to be grumpy? Do I want to be upset? Do I want to be unpleasant? I don't, I wanna be happy. At least not, especially not for that many hours of your lifetime.

Well, because it starts adding up. How much time do I spend sweeping and vacuuming? And even if you hire an outsource and you have help, it's great. OK, there's there's things you have to do. Right. Like, am I going to be grumpy every time there's something that I quote have to do just even to maintain life? No, man. I want to be happy most time because I like being happy. It feels good to be joyful and pleasant. So I'm like, wait a minute. Well,

Why don't just choose that

tomorrow? I'm going to have to do dishes and tomorrow my kids are going to make a mess. I'm going to clean up. So now I'm going to choose today how I'm to go into that state knowing that that's going to happen. And that was just an absolute game changer for me. Like I can do it. It's, and I, I had to mentally foresee it because otherwise it kind of

was hilarious, ridiculous. It keeps catching you off guard.

my gosh, there's dishes in the sink again. How did this happen? We literally cleaned them yesterday. I told you not to leave the dishes. And there they are, right? So you know what's going to happen. It's like, wait a minute. not just be pleasant? Why not? So you talk about controlling those emotions is critical. And then the second piece is directing them. I'm going to choose to have a positive emotion while those things.

happen and while I'm doing them.

Well, especially because in essence, those moments, all of those moments you're describing are what make up life. Like that is the sum total of life is all the moments you live. And so if you think that the only moments that you can be happy, like we talked about before, is when everything's perfect and clean, well, you're gonna have very few of those moments. So you're gonna have very little happiness. The way to switch that is to be like, I see that the moments of life create my life.

You know, so if I choose to be happier in more of those moments, I will then by default have more happiness in my life.

Now there are a couple things though that you're talking about here about choosing and I don't know why, maybe it's because I'm a woman and I feel that because of hormones and whatnot, I'm more of a, for lack of a better word, a victim to my emotions, that it's not always easier for me

to choose my emotions,

for me, it's more a process of processing, I think. I have to process and remove negative emotions before I have any space in there for positive emotions. Or even more, I have to be intentional about doing specific things that generate positive emotion. I don't think I

the ability. So a choice to get there instead of a choice to immediately be there. Exactly.

Right. I feel like I can't automatically go into any situation and be like, I'm going to choose happiness right now. And it's there. It's not. That doesn't work like that for me. I can do what you talked about. I can take a space where I'm like, OK,

I'm going to look at, I spend every single day doing dishes or cleaning up or, you know, I do these things. And so over time, yes, I want to choose more happiness in more of those moments.

so I can have more happiness in my life, I can do that process. But then when it comes to the direct application of that, if I come into a moment and I'm feeling those emotions, I can't just be like, I choose happiness. I have to do something to process and remove that negative emotion so I have space to bring in the positive.

I love that. I think I've become so good at this.

that it feels immediate, but what I'm doing is I'm processing fast. Yeah. I'm moving so quickly through that. It's almost instantaneous. I'm just choosing it. It's like, well, no, I'm moving through that process so fast because I've been doing it. Yes. Because I wanted it so much. I want to look back. Well, I want to experience joy and happiness in life.

I want to have a happy life. And I do. And I want to look back and be like, yeah, that was awesome. Even in the hardest times.

I still look back at some of our most difficult times in our marriage and our family. I'm like, that was a good time. Yeah.

Because what am I looking back on? What I felt and the feelings. So even though there was, there were struggles in circumstances, I still was happy and jovial and grateful and had all these good positive emotions. And that's what I remember.

And part of the reason you can do that is because

you are so low in neuroticism. When you look at the Big Five Personality Test, and there's a scale for all of the Big Five, it's openness to experience, conscientiousness, ⁓ enthusiasm.

I don't remember more. There's an acronym, it's OCEAN, and I'm trying to think. Openness to experience, conscientiousness, enthusiasm, agreeableness, and neuroticism. ⁓

Everybody is somewhere on that scale. You are very low in neuroticism now, but I do know that you weren't always there, right? I'm sure you were much higher in neuroticism. Previously in your life. I am currently at like well last time I took the test like a 56 So I'm 56 times higher in neuroticism than you are So I guess I'm sharing this because I'm trying to help you understand all of these aspects that go into this while still not saying

Well, there's nothing I can do about it, Greg. Sorry. I'm just going to have to be miserable because I have more neuroticism than you. That's not true either. I bet you're lower now. Probably. As you strategically are working on all of us. Because that's the thing with the big five. can't, it's changeable. It's flexible. It's on a scale. And you just keep working on your mindset and your habits, your actions, and you transform your being from the inside out. It's doing all the inner work.

But, so for someone who is much higher in neuroticism, because you've had clients that are literally like a 99, yes, it's automatically going to be more difficult for them to feel positive emotion because neuroticism means that you view past, present, and future events in a negative light. So anything and everything that happens to you is going to be like, ah, neuroticism, it's bad, bad, bad, bad.

So again, but that's in a way you could view that as a wound or a trigger that you have to work on processing and healing and removing to lower that neuroticism so that you have space to have more positive emotion. Some of it also is just a matter of focus. This is what you choose to focus on. Because what you focus on, you feel. So we can plan outings with friends and go to the most beautiful beach. Just this perfect day. Everything's great. And your mind's like, but it's

the sun's gonna be so bright and it'll probably burn us all and then I'll probably die of cancer and there's gonna be sand and I'm sure it'll get me between my toes and it'll be miserable. And so you could take this beautiful, perfect experience and you could focus on being annoyed and bothered. And really all it is is just a matter of focus. Like what are you gonna choose to focus on? You could, you could focus on little grains of sand in between your toes.

and be all bothered. Or you can be like, you know what, there's gonna get sand in my clothes, everyone's clothes, then they're gonna put it in the car and then they're gonna bring it home, it's in the house and I have to spend all this time vacuuming. I hate the beach. And there goes that whole beautiful experience you could have had because you're forecasting. Which goes back to what we were talking about, the being in the moment as opposed to mentally forecasting all the work that's involved or everything you're gonna have to do. Or even going back in time.

Right. I'm going back of like, oh, whoa, I went to the beach before. Remember when I got washed by the waves? That was horrible. sand. Yeah. And so, so essentially, yeah, you're rewording this

another way of saying, well, that has to do with what you're focusing on. What you focus on, you feel, what the story you're telling yourself. We're using the same or saying the same thing, but in different ways to help you get this, to grasp this concept that when you choose where to put your attention,

And for me, I remember, like I remember thinking, okay, yeah, we had this whole realization, we're gonna do dishes for the rest of our life. That's part of eating and being alive. And so then I began to see it as an opportunity, not as a chore, not as a responsibility of like, okay, ⁓ I wanna have clean dishes. I don't wanna just have them piled up for days and days. So I choose, and I remember that part of it. Like, no, I am choosing this because it is what I want.

And that switch alone can help you to focus on more of the positive aspect of it. Because you're like, no, I'm choosing it because I want the result. I want the cleanliness. I want the order. So I would consciously do that every time I would go to wash the dishes. Because

very often we're doing this subconsciously and we don't realize it. We're going to wash the dishes subconsciously and we're telling ourselves this story in the back of our minds of like,

I'm the victim here. I'm such a martyr. me do the I'm resentful that I have to do the dishes. Yeah, I always had to do the dishes as a kid. Whatever. So we have this subconscious programming going on. We can consciously change that. Where I say, I'm grateful we have dishes. I'm grateful we have hot water. Because I've been without hot water sometimes. we have. Right? I'm grateful we have hot water to wash. I'm grateful that I have a family to love.

And that's why I want to do the dishes. I love that. We have tons of dishes because we have nine people in our family. And you could be like, there's so many dishes or you'd be like, wow, there's so many dishes because we have a big, beautiful family and everybody's healthy and well. And we're eating healthy food. This is amazing. And we have we have food. There are people who don't like this is great. And so we totally transform that and start looking for ways.

that we can feel good most of the time. Right, by feeling more gratitude. I have this quote hanging up in my office that says, ooh, I hope I can remember it. It's essentially like we don't feel, we don't experience happiness and then have gratitude for that. We feel gratitude and that's we experience experience happiness, yeah, I love That's not exactly how goes. But that's the essence of it.

So then I guess right now is a really good time to. sorry. go happiness that makes us grateful. It's gratefulness that makes us happy. Beautiful. I love it.

So that's one place we can start. It's like, well, what can I be grateful for? I hate the laundry. Oh, you can be grateful you have clothes and a washing machine,

I'm presuming, because we've had to do laundry by We've had to do laundry by hand in our travels. I had to do that in Peru when I was a young, when I was out on my own, the first time as a teenager, I was like, everybody.

Everybody did laundry by hand and I was like and we what this is a thing and like it was wild countries where we had a washer but you had to hang all of your clothes to dry I mean even when we lived in Germany it was like they didn't have dryers you had to hang it up close Yeah, lived in the Dominican Republic and used to wash wash our hand clothes for the whole family nine of us No, we didn't have that many kids yet, but seven of us by hand in a pila outside ⁓

So we're so glad when we have a washer and dryer. It's so convenient.

son, when he and I, the first time we went up to the base camp of Everest, he got sick and they didn't have toilets. They just had a hole in the ground. Yes. And man, afterwards, he was like, I never, ever take a toilet for granted. Like, I love toilets. And so this idea of like, I have to clean the toilets is horrible. like,

You have a toilet. I am so grateful to rub this thing down because it exists. It's amazing.

So you just totally transform your entire paradigm. again, the, the valuation, the invitation, the valuation today, ⁓ those of you listening, just stop and say, well, how are you doing most of the time emotionally? Like what state are you, are you radiating positivity? Is it, are you neutral or are you negative? And obviously it's quite easy just to wake up and

And your mind's like, ⁓ here's another day. Another Another day and more chores and have to pay the bills and deal with people. And that could be your state. And just, just unpleasant or neutral, just blah. And most people, most adults have subconsciously set their emotional baseline, usually pretty low in general. It's like a thermostat.

And then every once in a there's a little blip up, just a little bit. Oh, that was kind of cool. Oh, I felt happy for a second there before the kids woke up or after they went to blip blip blip. And then these big dips down. Oh, I was so upset. I'm so angry. I'm so frustrated. I'm so disappointed. I'm so discouraged. And so for the most part, it's pretty flat line with a blah, with a few little blips up to positive emotions and a big hit sound negative.

Our invitation is change that.

Raise that thermostat raise that emotional baseline where you're pleasant and positive most of the time and a lot of your big emotions are going up Wow, that concert was off the charts. Wow, that day at the beach was incredible Wow, we just went scuba diving and had these great memories together

well and Before you get too into all the exciting things you can do because I want to bring it back to the daily

life. why can't it be exciting? Well it can be but to emphasize the point we're trying to make in this episode is you don't yes you should do those things those things are awesome they should be a part of your life but you can feel more joy in the daily moments even in the chores and the the routines and the and I want to say grind but the point is we're trying to switch it's not a grind it becomes a

We need a new word like meditation or it's a practice labor of love Right like you can have more joy in those moments

and that to me at least as a mother Yeah, I like to go skydiving. I like to go on trips. I love to travel I do But when I have more joy at home, that's what matters most to me because that's where I thrive. That's where I spend

Most of my time still. That's where I want the real joy. That's where I want the peace because that's where I am. And that's the heart of our family.

So to me, it's more about that than about adding. it's stuff. Yeah, it's a great point. And I and I love

I love all of it. Like I love our breakfast and devotional together. I look forward to it. So every morning I wake up and I look forward to that.

I love working out and exercising as a family. I love going out and doing chores outside and, getting my dogs out and making things better and working on projects. I love that. I love having conversations with the kids. I love reading to our kids. I love discussing great books with the kids. I love doing cool projects with the kids. I love all of that. And I'm allowing myself to feel all these positive emotions, even in some of the quote, smaller things.

Right. And that's the point I think is that those are all in many ways, just small, simple daily activities. not a big thing like scuba diving or skydiving. It's just, this is the daily stuff. And yet we still look forward to it. We find peace and joy and pleasure in it. Yeah, there's still some frustration and irritation when the dogs do this or that, or this happens or the whatever. Like that's a part of it. But we are intentional about

processing, releasing, recovering from negative emotion, which I want to talk more about here in a second, so that we overall maintain more of this positive state, more of these positive states.

Because I'm sure people are thinking, well, wait, like how do we do this? How do you actually heal those wounds? How do you actually get rid of those triggers? How do you move up to those positive states?

And that is something that is a, it has to be, I think, a practice that becomes a part of your life in order to see the biggest benefits from it, at least in my experience. It starts with this awareness of saying, well, okay, yeah, my life could be overall more happy if more of my moments were happier. I want that. How do I get it? And you even a minute ago talked about like, you wake up in the morning and you feel a little blah or grumpy.

That's where I start. If I wake up like that, and in some ways that's normal because for whatever reason, our body uses cortisol, which is the stress hormone to help us wake up.

So we often feel groggier and blah in the morning because of cortisol. In some ways it's just, it's hormonal. It's not necessarily our life sucks, it's just cortisol.

It's biochemistry. It's the biochemistry.

So I take every, and this is part of our morning routines and something we've taught for years, I take intentional action every day to change that, to change the biochemistry so that I feel more positive emotion before I go into my day. Ideally, if I can, before I interact with my kids, or you even sometimes, but that's not always possible. you know, I...

Obviously I'm proactive about that, but then I'm doing specific things that are changing my biochemistry so I have more positive emotion. In some ways it's that simple. It is that simple. It's simply changing your biochemistry. If we could put it into terms of drugs, it's like, take this drug. you're filling the cortisol? Take this drug. But we're saying, well, no, you can do this in natural ways to change the biochemistry. So almost immediately you can get, in fact,

The actual drug there is you're gonna get some dopamine, you're gonna get some serotonin, you're gonna get some endorphins. And so that's as easy as getting up, drinking some water, moving your body, of swinging Even that little thing right there. And people don't think about all of this stuff. You have to be intentional and strategic. So we have these very clear things like drinking water every morning and we tell our kids because dehydration contributes to more cortisol or the negative emotions.

You can keep going. But it's just like these simple things.

And I can hear people's like, yeah, but I don't feel like doing that. I don't want to do that. Of course. Like your body's just swimming in cortisol or whatever and you're like, I feel groggy. So it takes this tiny little bit of self-discipline just to say, well, no, I'm going to do it because I want to feel better.

And you start with the easiest thing. mean, at least to me, like drinking a glass of water is like an easy entry.

And that automatically is going to help start changing your biochemistry because you're rehydrating your

body. then, then while you're there, take a drink of water and then just take five really deep breaths. Do that five times already. You're changing. And then if you can step outside, just get outside. If there's some sunlight out there and if you can go out and just do just a little bit of movement, yoga, stretching, something in sunlight. Now you're getting some rays coming in. I as simple as like, I just move my back.

my arms back and forth like this in the bathroom. I go in and use the bathroom and I'm like, I just go like this because that little bit of movement starts to wake you up. Starts to change your biochemistry. Your body's like, oh, okay, yeah, let's create some different hormones here. Then if you can do some jumping jacks or actually get a workout angle for a run or a walk or a bike ride, like wow.

Before I do that though, I actually spend time meditating and especially if I'm feeling,

Cause there's one thing where you wake up with the cortisol and you're just kind of but then sometimes I feel, wake up feeling negative emotions. Maybe I'm feeling stressed or worried or overwhelmed or whatever. I actually take time to process that then before I go into the day.

And is that for you, is that more of a feeling or thought patterns? mean, they're so closely related.

So when you wake up feeling like that, are you noticing your brain worrying about things, stressing about things, or is that which one comes first? Well, it's difficult to say. It's like the chicken or the And especially if I wake up, because oftentimes it could be directly connected to maybe what I was thinking about before I went to bed or dreams I was having. sometimes, you know, maybe I don't know if this is just me think. No, it's not. Maybe it's a woman thing. I feel like I sleep with part of my brain on.

And so my brain's thinking about things while I'm sleeping. And so I wake up with, because as we talk about the brain and body are a pharmacy, it's created all of these hormones and emotions while I was asleep so I can wake up with them, right? It's not like I'm waking up with a clean slate. It's carried over from the night before or during the night. So in that case, and I'm intentional about, okay, I'm gonna...

Process this because because it

for most of us. It's very Inarticulate like it's a feeling or an emotion. That's not connected to specific thoughts so if I can concretize those thoughts if I can write it out and say like well, I'm feeling anxious because I'm worried about XYZ happening today or next week, I'm

Bringing solidity to those emotions which then allows me to either come up with a plan Okay, well I'm gonna do this so that I don't have to worry about it because I can take this action to solve that problem or you know we Process it and release it because it's out of my control,

right? But you have to bring that awareness to it in order to well basically you're just taking it and setting it on a table exactly so you can see it you can know I don't need to worry about that I can dismiss it or like okay, now I see it an action step. Here's what I can do about it

Yeah, so it solves the problem because what happens for too many of us, I know because it used to happen to me and still does if I don't take this action, is instead I have these just emotions and they're just running in the background, Kind of like on your computer. And it's just there and it's using, it's burning up bandwidth, it's using up energy, it's using up ⁓ will.

It disrupts the positive emotional state you could have. Well, of course. Because anytime you're using up the energy, it's just like a computer or your phone. If you have too many apps open, your phone can't work as well. Because it's processing. All that processing is going on in the background. So the same thing is happening to us. If we don't process those emotions and do something with them and get rid of them, they're just running in the background and taking energy.

from what could be put into joy or love or peace. And the other thing I wanted to emphasize is because, I can't think of the right word, but like we have, ⁓ it's not, discipline. ⁓ Every single, self discipline, there's another word I wanna use, but I can't think of it. Like we have this ability to self discipline, but it's,

It's a renewable resource, but we can also use it up. So it's generally stronger in the morning. There's a better word for it. ⁓ And then as we use it throughout the day, we kind of use it up. And so it's more difficult for us to be self-disciplined and control your cravings or whatever later in the evening. willpower. Yeah, guess willpower is a good way of thinking about it.

That also is being used up with this energy processing in the background. It's like depleting your resources, depleting your willpower so that you don't have the ability to respond with as much patience or to not eat the food you shouldn't be eating or, you know, X, Y, Z.

I love how you're articulating that. There's a lot of subconscious things going on that are just keeping us in a blah state or in a negative state and just taking a few moments to just clear those out.

Yeah. It's like, now, wow, now I got a clean slate and I've got all my energy and all my resources available here. Wow, now I can really lean into being a positive force and bringing all kinds of good energy to my family.

It's just so much easier that way. Right. Like for me, I can't, I've gotten to the point where I can't do it the other way because the other way is just, it's incongruent, it's fake, it's not authentic. You know, I have to use my willpower to do it as opposed to just

being authentically who I am so that I just bring that to my interactions rather than trying so hard to be, because I hear mom saying this or your client saying all the time, it'll be like, well, are you interacting with your children with peace and calm? And they're like, well, I'm trying to be calm. I'm like, trying to be calm is not the same as actually being calm. There's a difference. And that's where I think too many parents are

failing.

They're trying to be calm. They're trying to be happy. They're trying to be patient. That's not the same. Do or do not. There is no try, right? You're either calm or you're not. You're either peaceful or you're not. You can't fake it. You can't pretend. It has to really be there.

And that's so good because pretending to be calm or

Outwardly. Trying to control the anger with calmness. Right. So inside you're just all upset and there's a big storm, but you're putting on the mask or the facade of patience. Yeah, we think that that's what it's about. We think that if we're going to be joyful or patient or peaceful, it's almost like this mask or this cover that we're putting over the anger and the irritation and the frustration.

But I'm like, no, it doesn't work that way. Remove all of that and what's left is the piece.

It's like the parent who pretends to love family life, love having kids, oh, this is the best, all the while just so resentful and so bitter and just angry and upset about all the little things that come with family life. And what a tragedy, what a waste.

Especially when, and I get that we're not taught these things, we don't know this.

But when you learn these skills, then family life is so good. It's so wonderful. You're like, yeah, this is how it could and should be for all families. But we have to learn the skills of removing everything that's standing in our way and blocking us from that and using up our energy and our bandwidth so we can let...

the authentic self radiate, which is, and we teach this all the time and I truly believe it. Like when you fulfill the needs and remove the blocks, what's left is a person, whether that's a parent or a child, that wants to be happy and peaceful and calm and connected. That's what's left. That is the authentic, like that's the authentic seed of family life when everything else is removed out of the way.

And when we do it well.

Like we're setting up our kids to think, well, this is just how life is done. Exactly. And we are doing them the greatest favor we can possibly do them because they don't have to undo all the other stuff and unlearn all the habits and unpack it. There's still going be a little. But in general, if they just learn the way of happiness, then they just go on their life. There is no way to happiness. Happiness is the way, remember, that's what Buddha says, but...

But that's what we're talking about, right? That when we remove the blocks and then allow the happiness to shine through, happiness is the way to what it is we want. And that's what they get to. That's what we get to enjoy. And that's what they get to enjoy. It's even easier for them because they think, this is just it's modeled. This is the better way to do life. We have to pay the bills. We have to eat well and sleep and

and try to get good sleep and do all the stuff and things just to maintain life. So might as well be joyful about them.

So our invitation today is raise that emotional baseline. Choose process the negative emotions. Get rid of those negative emotions, any stuck emotions, do the healing. is a fantastic way to do it. Exercise. Just let them go. Boxing.

There is a mental element and once you do it, you'll realize, okay, it was easier than thought. And when you're on this side of it, it looks hard. When you're on the other side of it, you're like, okay, I was easy, I get it. But at some point, you literally just get to choose.

I heard this metaphor recently, it's like a jukebox, those old jukeboxes, you'd push a button and it would take one CD over and put it in play. And you're like, I don't like that one. And would grab that tape off and put it back and it'd grab one you like. And we can do that in our minds.

It's like, wait a minute, I don't like this one. It's not serving me. I'm going to take it and I'm going to throw it away.

Literally, I'm going to it and I'm going to throw it out because I don't want that there. It's disrupting my moments because I'm holding on to this thing and I don't like that. So I'm going to get rid of it and replace it with something I do like. Well,

I do like the analogy and I want to expand on it because, you've got this jukebox and sometimes that's what's happening. People are pushing the wrong buttons and they're playing the song you don't want to play.

But part of what I'm talking about here, because you're right, we have choice and we can choose. I want to play this song because I like it better. But I think when we're talking about this real healing and this real processing, you're essentially getting rid of that CD you don't

like. For good. You're taking it and throwing it out so that when someone pushes that button, you've replaced it with something else that you like. And so they no longer.

Play that song that you Be the jukebox manager. Take the key, open that sucker up, take that CD and literally throw it in the trash. Break it, burn it, destroy it, take a ski shooting. Get rid of that thing so it's no longer part of your life. And maybe we're using words differently. You're just saying, ⁓ just choose to do that. And I'm saying, because to me, choice is pushing which button. But it's almost like I want a different word. And I guess processing is the word. I want a different word for.

Yeah, you choose to process, but to me it's more than just choice. It's practice that you have. I guess for me it's differentiated because it's not just, ⁓ choose, push button, done. It's a process of doing something. The processing requires that you do something. You either journal about it and write about it. You talk to someone about it. You go kick a...

punching, no, you punch a punching bag. You do something that's intentional about, I've identified this emotion and I'm going to work through my feelings around it. I'm gonna articulate it. Until it's removed. Until it's gone in the garbage like that CD. Yes, exactly. So to me, that's why I wanna use a different word than choice because yeah, I make the choice to do that, but I also have to do the work to do it. Yep.

Love it. It's not just a one time choose done. Sometimes. For me it's not. There are people, if it works with clients, when they understand the framework they're like, okay, I realize all along subconsciously I've held onto this, I've given this this meaning, I've let that be a part of my life and today is the last time. And is that for, just out of curiosity, is that men and women or is that mostly just men? Both.

When you understand what's happening and you understand the framework, you're like, oh, wait a minute, what is it that's disturbing my peace? What is it that's this limiting factor on my happiness and joy? And when you get down and identify it, you're like, oh, it's because of this is the story I've been telling myself or the meaning I've been giving it, the meaning behind cleaning up the house. Oh, great, I'm just a slave and a servant around here and nobody cares or appreciates me. I'm, know, ah.

You know, and you just tell a story and it's like, wait a minute, is that true? Well, no, it's not true. So I'm going to stop today. I'm literally going to stop believing that. And when you stop believing that, you're like, ⁓ well, now I get to have a completely different experience. get that. But at least for me, I can make that decision. But then I have what I call memorized emotion that still will come up when that situation comes up again. So I have to make a conscious choice in that scenario.

to tell myself the new story. Right, because it can still come up. Okay. Yeah. So I guess that's what I'm talking about because I don't feel like it's a one and done

and I never feel that way again. I have to consciously be reminding myself of the new story I want to believe. Yeah. Love

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