Ep #162: You Are the Key to a Healthier Future

Welcome to Co-Parenting with Confidence, a podcast for those courageous moms out there who want to move past the conflict and frustration of divorce and show up as the mom they truly want to be. My name's 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.

Hi, and welcome back to the podcast. Today. Listen, we're just going to have a little pep talk. I think I need a pep talk. Sometimes my clients need a pep talk, and I thought, why not offer you a pep talk? Because sometimes it can feel overwhelming to be parenting. It can feel like a never ending battle to try to get on the same page and agree with your co-parent. It can feel like just when you think you're about to figure it out, something happens and you get pulled back. So many of these things happen on the daily moment by moment, and we can feel really alone. We can feel like we're the only ones going through this. We can feel like nobody understands and we can feel like we're on an island. But what I want you to know is you are not alone and that there are so many of us who understand what you're going through and are here for you.

And so today is a little pep talk to keep you moving in the direction that you want to go. So first and foremost, what I want to say is that you are the key to a healthier future for you and your kids. Absolutely. I tell clients this all the time, and I believe it in my bones, research backs it up. My mentor, Dr. Ali Tisbury, she constantly says this, but kids need one parent. One parent who is grounded, who is calm, who is steady, who is present, who is a safe place for them to come to. If they get one of those, listen, they've got it. That's what they need. If you get two that's like winning the lottery, just bonus points. But most kids don't even get one. And so here's the thing. You are the key to helping your kids navigate everything in their life, but you are the key to a healthier future for you, first and foremost, and for your children and for your family.

And here's also what I know to be true. No matter what has happened in the past, you have the power to create a healthier future for you and your kids. Today, I want to acknowledge that we all make mistakes. We all do things that we're not proud of. We all say things that we wish we could take back, but we don't want to live in regret, right? Because what that regret does is keep us trapped in the past to keep us trapped by the mistakes and weighted down, and that doesn't allow you to move forward in a positive direction. So I'm not saying that we ignore the past. I'm not saying that we just hands up and forget about it, right? Or that we get to act a fool and then act like it doesn't matter. No. What I'm saying is your past doesn't define you.

Those mistakes that you have made, listen, as long as we are learning from them, mistakes are okay. What we want to do is learn how to make a mistake, have a hiccup, do something maybe we don't really like, but take ownership over that. Take accountability to make amends for it. And so this is your pep talk to say that regardless of what happened in the past, regardless of how you acted or how other people acted, or the difficulty in the dynamics, you are not your past. You have a choice to learn from your past and to move forward and to transform tomorrow. But that happens in this moment. This is the opportunity right here and now for you to choose differently, for you to say, I'm not going to be weighed down by the regret of what didn't happen or the regret of the divorce, or the regret of how I acted, or any of those things.

This is your time to say, I'm not going to be held down by the difficult dynamics with the other co-parent. I'm not going to be weighted or shackled by their ridiculous behavior, by their demands, by their unhealthy, unrealistic expectations. You are in control of what you choose to move forward with, what you choose to believe. And so part of that is a refusal to say, I'm not going to drag the past with me. What I'm going to do is I'm going to acknowledge my part in it. I'm going to take ownership, and I'm going to learn from it, and I'm going to move forward. And when we're able to do this, we're able to really acknowledge and stand in the present moment and say, I am choosing my way forward. This shifts our energy instead of being weighted down and drained and overwhelmed by all of the baggage that we're carrying with us.

When we choose to stand up and say, you know what? I'm choosing in this moment to do the best that I can to learn and to move forward, we start to shift our energy. And our energy is what shapes our children's future. It's true. Think about it. When your kids come down in the morning and you're stressed out and you're overwhelmed or you're exhausted and you've got your head down or a cup of coffee that you're trying to get down so that you can have a conversation, what are they feeling from you? Are they feeling presence? Are they feeling love? Are they feeling joy? Or are they feeling the weight of all of the pressures that you're under? Listen, we are all under pressure. We all have stress. I am not saying that we shouldn't have that. What I'm saying is we need to be aware of it so that we can make sure that our energy is coming from a place of power, coming from a place of positivity, coming from a place of what stuff happens, and we're moving forward, not toxic, positivity and ignoring, but really choosing how can I show up today, present in this moment to start to shape my future and my kids' future differently?

This is where we have to really do the work to have a more regulated nervous system. I talk about this a lot, but it's being able to recognize when we're stressed, when we're triggered, when we're overwhelmed and choose to shift. That doesn't mean that we just get rid of everything or that we're weighted underneath it all until other people change. No, we can calm our nervous system. We can learn to be present to what we're feeling and then decide how we want to move forward, right? Life happens, difficulties happen. Sad times happen. All of these things are going to happen. But what we need to learn to do for ourselves and for our kids is to be able to navigate it, to not be crushed by it or overwhelmed by it. And that starts with learning how to be more present in the present moment, present to how we're feeling, so that we can choose the direction forward so we can be emotionally resilient so we can heal what's going on in ourselves because that helps our children thrive when we're able to be present with ourself, our own emotions and heal ourself.

You know what we do? We offer an example to our children of how to do that. We teach them the skills just naturally to do that. But we do it by regulating our own nervous system, really monitoring how we're talking to ourselves and what kind of mindset that we're coming from. Are we doom and gloom or are we looking to move forward and transform? It's always a choice. We always get a choice. And that's what I want you to know in this moment. You always have a choice. And so really working on your energy and how you are showing up will determine how things move forward for you and your kids. So there are some little small shifts that you can start to make to actually start to do this right? And compassion is one of those things that we have to talk about.

I know you're listening to this because you are a really good parent, right? You’re kind and you're loving and you're wanting what's best for your kids. And I bet for the most part, listen, we all make mistakes and we all lose our temper and we all lose our cool. Totally happens. But for the most part, I'm guessing you speak pretty compassionately to your children. You do everything you can to help them as best you can with the tools you have. Well, here's the thing. What I want you to start to do is speak to yourself with that same kind of compassion. Speak to yourself the way that you want your children to talk to themselves. Do we want our kids to grow up, to hate themselves, to trash themselves, to cut themselves down at every moment, to blame themselves, to beat themselves up? No, of course not.

But we have to start to be the voice that we want them to have when they grow up in their head. And so we do that by being that voice to ourselves and to them. So it just starts with a little bit more gentle approach, a little bit more understanding, a little bit more patience. And when we start to do that with our kids, it comes from actually being able to do it with ourselves. And so just starting to notice how you talk to yourself. Another little shift that we have to make when we don't want the past to define us is to release it. And part of that is releasing blame. That might be towards yourself. It might be towards the situation, it might be towards your ex but learning how to let go of that blame is so important. And this doesn't mean that you're letting go and just agreeing with and condoning any bad behavior that's happened in the past.

No, that's not what I'm saying. But what we do need to do is to recognize it's in the past. We have no control over it, but what we do have control over is this moment and what we are choosing to believe in this moment. So when we can let go of blaming, of needing to punish other people ourselves or the situation that starts to create more freedom. And that freedom is what lightens our energy and allows us to learn and move forward differently. And so it might not happen overnight but starting to find ways that you can release blame, release the past, and it might just sound like that happened in the past. I have no control over it today, but what I can do is, and moving forward that way, and one other little shift that I want to offer you in this pep talk is daily resets, pausing and learning how to create some space in our life.

We are so reactive because we don't have any space, right? We're triggered because it's like we're moving in the world and everything's coming at us. We need to put kind of an invisible force field around us that offers us some space between what happens to us or other people so that we're not just reacting, that we're actually responding, right? Taking responsibility, that ability to respond happens when we create a little buffer, a little bit of space around us. So this can look like taking a moment to pause and take a deep breath. It can look like three deep breaths. It might look like movement or gratitude, but finding simple ways to actually empower yourself to have more spaciousness, to have a little bit of a pause. One of my favorite sayings comes from Jefferson Fisher, and if you don't know him, please check him out on Instagram.

But he says, let your breath be the first word of every sentence you speak. And what does that really mean? It just means learning and practicing and building up the muscle to take a pause before we speak, before we act, before we put our energy out there. And that comes from shifting to learning how to take a pause, take a breath. And this does not come naturally to any of us. What comes naturally is reacting, right? Getting triggered, stress responses, all of that comes natural. What we can also do is use our breath to take a beat, to give ourselves a pause, and that builds the muscle over time of having more and more space. This is what creates calm, grounded, present in control, parenting for ourselves and for our children. And so that's what I wanted to say to you today is that your past does not define you.

You get to choose the energy to which you show up in this world, and that is what is going to shift your children's future, right? When we are able to pause, to slow down, to choose how we want to respond to everything and everyone in our life, this is the most powerful place you can come from. And it starts with a breath. I know it sounds simple. It might sound ridiculous, but I promise you, with everything in my being, this is a game changer. I just wanted to offer that to you today in case you needed to know that you're not broken and you're not failing. You're learning, and you're growing, and you're leading your family forward. And I know that you're doing this, and you need to give yourself some credit for this. Your kids do not need a perfect parent. What they need is a parent who is showing up with love, with intentionality, and can admit mistakes and repair.

Our kids don't need us to be perfect or never make a mistake. They just need us to own what is happening and repair. And the one small way that you can start to step into your power today is to let your breath be the first word of every sentence. And we do that by just building the muscle of pausing, of taking a breath, of choosing to respond instead of react. You can do this, my friend. I have zero doubt in my mind that you are capable of it, because I already know what an amazing loving parent you are. And so if you need any help, you know I'm here. I say this on the podcast all the time, but if you need help or support, schedule a breakthrough call with me. Let's talk about it. Let's figure out a plan to get you moving forward in a different direction.

Change does not happen to you. Change happens when you start to make that change. And it happens one decision at a time. I have moms and dads come to me all the time and say, oh, it's just not a good time for me to do this. I just don't have the time right now. Or when things slow down, then I can work on myself. Then I can do this. No, it's not how it works. Today's the day. This is the moment. This is the moment that you choose how you are going to move forward. And I hope that you're choosing you because you are the key to a healthier future for yourself and your kiddos. You got this, my friend, until I talk to you next time, I love you. I'm here for you. Keep going. Your kiddos and the world need you in the healthiest, most balanced version.