Ep #99: Why Bother???

[music] Welcome to Co-Parenting with Confidence, a podcast for those courageous moms out there who wanna move past the conflict and frustration of divorce and show up as the mom they truly wanna be. My name is Mikki Gardner, I'm a certified life and conscious parenting coach with my own personal dose of co-parenting experience. Throughout my co-parenting journey, I have learned to become confident in who I am as a woman and a mother, and I'm here to help you do the same. If you're ready to learn what it takes to become a great co-parent and an amazing example to your children, we'll get ready and let's dive into today's episode. Do you ever feel like you're doing all the things? You're trying to do everything you can do. Putting all your in all your energy. Taking care of everything. Yet nothing seems to be working well if you felt this way, I want you to keep us in need today, because this episode is for you. Before we dive into that though, we are coming up on the 100th episode of this podcast, and I'm so excited. I really do want to celebrate this and give some little gifts here, so I'm gonna ask you for a little favor, and then I'm gonna give you a gift, the life blood of podcasting is having people rate and review the show. So if you are gaining value and you enjoy listening to the show, I would be so appreciative if you would go over wherever you listen to it and rate and review the show. It'll take less than a minute, I promise. All you have to do is click the subscribe button so that you don't miss out on any of the upcoming fun things. And then also, if you would just take 30 seconds to review it, I would be so, so appreciative. So what I wanted to talk about today, because it keeps coming up, is this idea of why bother. Why bother doing all the work when I don't see the change? Why bothered putting in all my effort when nobody else is? Well, I wanna talk about why bother, because there's a point, and you do need to bother, you know why? Because you matter. And the simple fact is, is that no one else is gonna do it for you. When we want our life to be different, when we want things to be easier, when we wanna have more peace and calm and ease in our lives, oftentimes we think that we have to change everything around us or that the people have to change, or I just need a different co-parent or I just need different kids. But here's the thing, those things aren't changing, at least not right now, so you can put all of your energy into trying to change those things outside of yourself, or you can let yourself matter. You can let yourself do the work, you can put your focus and your time and your energy into the most important catalyst for change, which is you. So one of my clients ask me recently, she's just starting the program, so excited to be here, she's made the time and the energy and the investment of money to put herself first, to make these changes, to start healing, to start becoming the co-parent that she wants to be. But she said to me, "Mikki, nothing's changing it. When am I gonna see the difference?" And this is such a common question, certainly in the work that I do with my coaching clients, but it's in anything. And here's what I told her, "Sometimes it doesn't appear like anything is changing, but it is." Change and healing is not a linear journey, it's like going to the gym for six days and then expecting to have a six pack at the end. You would never expect that, you know that to get that six pack, it takes time and consistency and decisions of what you're eating, what you're drinking, how you're feeling yourself, how you're moving your body, what exercises you're doing, it's all of the little things that add up over time to get you that result. Well change is no different, changes in co-parenting are no different, and it really is about you making the decision to let it matter, to help yourself through those times when you're like, "Why bother? I'm not seeing any change." That's the exact time to double down and keep moving, and this is what I told her when we were on the phone the other day, this is when we root ourselves deep into the why. Why are we doing this work? Well for her and for so many of my clients, it's so that she can be the best example to her sweet baby girl, and that is the why for her. So that she can start to become the strongest, most flexible, most pliable version of herself, so that she can heal those generational patterns, so that she can grow and learn how to move forward even in the face of conflict, even when her other co-parent is not being cooperative or is being downright argumentative and set in conflict. So that she can evolve and be able to move forward no matter what he's doing or what is going on outside of her that she can stay true to what it is that she desires. This is the why bother, this is what we're here to do, we're not here on this earth to make things easy for ourselves, change doesn't happen in the easy times. We are a soul having a human experience here, so what does that mean? Our soul is here to evolve, to learn, to grow, to heal. And many of us are carrying generational patterns, generational traumas, we're carrying trauma and pain from our childhood, there are so many things that we have to overcome. And yes, it can seem daunting and yes, it can see why bother, but the point of why bother is so that you can feel peace, so that you can feel ease, so that you can feel calm and joy. That's the why bother. Because when you experience and feel all of those things, you become the example for your children to do that too. You're teaching them how to live a life where they are in control of their experience, not where they're at the mercy of it. And isn't that what you want for them? To have joy and to have freedom and independence, to be able to have emotional freedom, to be able to take care of themselves and emotionally regulate themselves in a chaotic world. In order for your children to have that you know, the best way for them to do that is to watch you do it, there's no one else that's gonna come along behind you and make it all easy for you, that's your job. But we have to be willing to push through the why bother. So when my client and I were talking about this the other day, and frankly it comes up so much, I get DMs from you all the time saying, "You know what, I really wanna do this, but it's just too difficult or my ex won't change. And so why bother?" Well, why bother is because it's all about you and you creating the experience that you want, and this is what I told her, and this is what I tell each of you, and I want you to know this today because you are more powerful than you know. When you decide to make change, when your brain says, "Why bother" that you say "Because I'm willing to invest in this, I'm willing to push through this discomfort." You're willing to let it be less about the past and more about how you're showing up, less about the hard things and more about, how can you be flexible, pliable. How can you get your root so deep in the ground that regardless of what storm comes you are standing, this is the why bother. And it happens with the little promises that you keep to yourself every day, those little decisions that you make each and every moment that keep you aligned to the direction you want, it's by not people-pleasing, but by actually starting to create peace for you and for others. It's letting yourself have compassion for where you are, but not falling victim to it. So what does that mean? It means having compassion saying, "Oh, this is hard, this is tough, I am sad, I'm feeling alone," allowing yourself to experience that, but not staying stuck in it. You know what I see so often, and I think we all do is we're living in this quick fix world, everything is at the drop of a hat, a instant gratification, you can have anything. I mean, Amazon delivers too, in like four hours. It's ridiculous. Amazing but ridiculous, when you think about it. We have to wait for nothing, and when we have to wait for nothing on these little decisions around our day, it makes it really difficult for us to learn how to have the long-term growth, the long-term vision to stay at something even when we don't see the results. And that's why when we get to that point of why bother I want you to dig deep and say, "Because it matters," it's about creating consistency, it's about creating support around you so that you can keep going when you hit that why bother moment. And it's about making the decisions in the present moment that are going to be clean. And What do I mean by that? It's making the present intentional decisions of what you wanna do so that there is less mess to clean up later. When we aren't being conscious, when we're not being present, when we throw up our hands and say, "Why bother" and then give up and lash out, or make a mass, or enter into the drama, you know what we've done? We've just created more mess for your future self to clean up later. So part of this is just deciding to continue, even when you make a mistake, even when you falter, even when you get stuck in the why bother, even when you stay stuck in maybe the victim mentality, it's okay, you have compassion for yourself, and you move forward and you say now what? It's deciding to learn how to create the peace from inside of you so that you're not running your life out of fear, but you're choosing intentionally to create peace inside of you, because this is how we heal ourselves, how we heal our families, and eventually how we all heal the world. And it's all about those decisions of how are you keeping yourself going in those moments of the why bother. It's what are those non-negotiables? This is something I talk to my clients a lot about, and I've talked about on the show before, but knowing what are the little promises that you're gonna keep to yourself, because when you keep the little promises day after day after day, that is what creates big results. Those non-negotiables might look like drinking enough water, getting enough sleep, going to yoga or exercising, meditation, just walking, preparing good meals for yourself. Whatever the non-negotiable is for you, this is what I work with a lot of my clients on is learning how to keep those little promises, 'cause we all know we have an intention and you say, "I'm gonna walk every day or I'm gonna exercise every day," but then we don't. And then we don't for two days or three days, and then we're like, "Oh, why bother." Well, the why bother is, is because it's good for you, it's what you need, it's what your soul is craving, it's the healing that you need. So whatever that is, how are you setting yourself up to be able to stay consistent, to be supported and to keep moving forward, so that even when you hit that point of why bother you're able to keep moving in the direction you wanna go. You know, for me, I've learned this in yoga, because the yoga practice that I do at least Bikram is 90 minutes of staring yourself in the mirror and moving your body. It's a moving meditation. And there are days when it's hard to look in the mirror, there are days when it's hard to get off the mat, there's days when I'm rocking it and I feel like a rock star. But really, it's just the consistency to show up, to look myself in the eye and to try. And many days, that's all that's required, is just to show up, just to try. Even if I sit on the mat half the class or more at least I got there. And can I have the compassion to show up again over and over and let each day be different? Because each day is different. We're different humans. We're constantly changing and evolving, and I just wanted to say this today, because I know so many of you get to the point of when the circumstances are outside of your control when the other co-parent is being so difficult, when your kids are struggling, it's like why bother doing this work for myself. Well, because this is the work that is needed, investing your time, your energy, and your money into things that are serving you, that are pushing you forward, that are helping you heal, that's the point, that's where we wanna keep you moving forward. Creating decisions that are going to build on top of one another, so that you can little by little start to move forward, build that foundation. Then all of a sudden you look back and you're like, "Wow, I'm so far from where I was." That's when you look in the mirror and you say, "That's why I'm bothering." So that you can feel stronger and heal and grow, and it is possible for you. I know this friend, I know that you might feel like even though things are difficult with your ex or maybe you're just starting out on this journey and you're like, "I don't even know where to start," well start with you, start with healing and loving yourself, so that you can do that for your children. Because when we do that for our children, we create stronger, more resilient, more joyful children, and you know what that's gonna do, it's gonna create a stronger, more resilient, more joyful world. And that's why we're here. At least that's the way I see it. I just want you to know that you're not alone on this journey. I know that so many of us feel like we are. We tell ourselves that we are, but you're not. And if you're ready to do this work to free yourself, to actually start to create momentum and change, to create the space to evolve, then I want you to use the link in the show notes to get on a clarity call with me, and you and I are going to get into a plan to figure out how you and I together can support you for long-term change, to create the life of emotional freedom that you really desire. It is possible, my friend, and I promise you we can get you there, when you decide, you decide to invest in you, your time, your energy, your finances, when you decide to step in and choose you, because you're going to hit that point of why bother? But I can 100% tell you, you are worth it, and I want you to start making those investments in yourself, whether it's five minutes a day to give yourself some space, whether it's investing in coaching, whether it's investing in therapy, whether it's investing in exercise, whatever it is, whatever you're feeling called for your healing journey right now, I want you to step in and give yourself that gift. Even if you're telling yourself you can't, I promise you, you can. And I'm here to support you, I love you so much, thank you for being here with me. Until next week, take really, really good care of your friend. Oh, and one more thing. The legal stuff, this podcast is solely intended for informational and educational purposes only, it is not intended to be a substitute for any medical advice. Please consult your physician or your qualified medical professional for personalized medical advice. [music] Thanks for listening to Co-Parenting with Confidence. If you want more information or resources from this podcast, visit co-parentingwithconfidence.com, I'll see you next week. [music]