My daughter is 9 years old now. She acts pretty much like a teenager already. She's great kid, creative, funny & independent. She's an only child. Biggest challenge right now is finding a mindful way to get her to cooperate more around the house with chores. I have very little patience and don't want to yell or threaten her, which is what happens half of the time.
401: Getting Your Child To Do Chores
[On-Air Coaching]
What do you do when your child won’t do chores? Paloma is the mom to a 9-year old daughter who is starting to act way too much like a teenager. Tempers have been running high and she wants her daughter to contribute to chores. Hunter walks her through how to heal this relationship and get her daughter to help around the house.
[On-Air Coaching] Getting Your Child to Do Chores [401]
Read the Transcript 🡮
*This is an auto-generated transcript*
[00:00:00] Paloma: She's getting to those preaching years where she's trying to find her voice and her uniqueness, which is awesome. But oftentimes we collide because I tend also to be a perfectionist, and I want things to be certain way.
[00:00:23] Hunter: You are listening to the Mindful Mama podcast, episode number 401. Today is a special on air coaching session about getting your child to do chores.
Welcome to the Mindful Mama podcast. Here it's about becoming a less irritable, more joyful parent. At Mindful Mama, we know that you cannot give what you do not have. And when you have calm and peace within, then you can give it to your children. I'm your host, hunter Clark Fields. I help smart, thoughtful parents stay calm so they can have strong, connected relationships with their children.
I've been practicing mindfulness for over 20 years. I'm the creator of Mindful Parenting, and I'm the author of the best selling book, raising Good Humans, A Mindful Guide to Breaking the Cycle of Reactive Parenting and raising Kind Confident Kids.
Welcome back to the Mindful Model Podcast. Welcome. If you are new, hey, listen. If you haven't done so yet, please hit that subscribe button so you never miss an episode. And if you get some value from this podcast or have ever, please go over to Apple Podcasts. Leave us a rating and review.
It helps the podcast grow more and just takes 30 seconds. I hugely appreciate it from the bottom of my heart. In just a moment, I'm going to be sitting down with raising good humans, reader, Paloma, and she is the mom of a nine year old daughter who is starting to act way too much like a teenager.
Tempers have been running high, and she wants her daughter to contribute to chores. So I'm gonna walk her through how to heal this relationship and get her daughter to help around the house using tools and methods from the Mindful Parenting course. Paloma wants to have more patience with her nine-year-old and wants to stop yelling and threatening her and taking away screen time and play dates.
And we're gonna talk about how to transition from that and what to expect. I know this episode is gonna be super helpful, whether you have tweens like Paloma does, or whether your children are little, cuz you're gonna learn so much about what to do now to have them help out more when later. So I'm so excited to have you join me for this.
Let's dive in.
Paloma, thank you so much for coming on the Mindful Mama podcast. I'm so glad you're here. Let's take a moment just to pause. Let's put both feet on the ground, maybe rest our hands and our laps, and just if it supports you, close your eyes and let's just take a deep breath in
and a long, slow exhale.
And then again, take another deep breath in and slow down your exhale. And then just take a moment to just feel your breath come in and out. Nothing to do. Breath in
and ow. And may this session be a. And no offering of the heart from me to you and you to me, and from both of us to our families, our communities, and to the world. Because as we create more peace in ourselves, we create more peace for everyone. And gently opening your eyes as you're ready. So glad you're here.
Yay. I love doing an honor coaching call. I'm excited to talk to you and maybe first you could tell me just a little bit about yourself and your situation with your child.
[00:04:11] Paloma: Sure. So my daughter is nine years old. She's an only child. She's great, very creative. Child. I think I'm mostly struggling because I am not a very much patient person.
I'm very mo impatient. She's getting to those preaching years where she's trying to find her voice and her uniqueness, which is awesome. But oftentimes we collide because I tend also to be a perfectionist and I want things to be a certain way. And when she doesn't wanna go with my flow, that's when things don't go too well.
And since she was little, I also oftentimes raised my voice to her. But over the last, I will say like a year and a half or so, I'm trying to change my waist, but a little age, she's screaming at me back. She's screaming back at me and don't try
[00:05:15] Hunter: my best. Oh no. Oh no. Okay. We're gonna get to the challenges in just a second.
And are you single Parenting? Are you Parenting with a partner? Yeah, I'm with my husband,
[00:05:25] Paloma: with her dad. And he's a great, he's a great guy. Most of the time he's more conscious than me and he tells me, you expect her not to scream on you, but that's what you will been doing at her for a long time.
And he'd tell me, you have to be more patient.
[00:05:41] Hunter: I say, I know. Okay. All right. And we're definitely gonna, that sounds like that's good. That's great. You have more support than just you. We always feel good about that. And what are your wins? We always wanna start with that. What are some things, what are some wins that you can just acknowledge
[00:05:57] Paloma: I've been doing Tried to learn a lot about conscious Parenting over the last couple years I started with Dr.
Shefali and G exercises are a lot of meditation, but really when I started reading your book is when I clicked a little more. For me. So I'm been doing a lot of that more than before. Not a lot, and I don't sit down for an hour. I sit down for at least 10 minutes in the morning.
[00:06:26] Hunter: That's awesome. High five, Paloma. That's great. Good for you.
[00:06:31] Paloma: Yes. And I do like more guided meditations, but I know it helps. I'm feeling like I'm more. Harm myself, but still it takes a lot of effort for me to not like, get very frustrated with her. For example, I want her to do help more around the house, because she's not a baby anymore. She can help more, and in my mind she should be helping more, She doesn't what she wants to not, to test her limits. She wants to test her boundaries, which I know is completely normal for a child her age. Yeah. When I get mostly more frustrated, I think.
[00:07:23] Hunter: Okay. So the wins are the, you've been like learning a lot. You're really educating yourself, which is so awesome. You've been reading Dr. Shefali, you've been reading, raising Good Humans. You're doing 10 minutes of meditation at day. It's awesome. Good win. Good for you. Yay. You're building that, sending blood flow to that prefrontal cortex area.
That's really great. Especially for someone who might be a yeller, cuz I know I was one. I'm definitely like in that camp with you so I know how it helps enormously. And, but it sounds like your daughter, she's nine, you want her to help around the house, but sh also she's nine, so she's, you guys have been around the block for a little while and when there's been frustration, there's a tendency to raise your voice and so now she's.
Reflecting back to you what you've modeled for her, right? Like that, like yelling is how you get your way. This is a warning lesson for everybody who has smaller, younger children. If you could go back in time and tell your younger self. Okay. And that's gotta be incredibly frustrating cuz you're probably feeling oh God, what do I do now?
Like she's nine. This is, these habits are pretty strong at this point.
[00:08:41] Paloma: Yes. I try sometimes to do what you recommend that I try to whisper when she starts yelling or I tell her, why don't have to do that. You can calm me. You know when you need to tell me. But of course, her brain is still developing such shingles and understand that
[00:09:01] Hunter: sometimes.
Yeah. Yeah. She doesn't have that impulse control yet. That is really only developed like in their early twenties. Okay. So the challenge, one of the challenges you're having with her is that you want her to help around the house. What tell me more about that. What kind of chores are you wanting?
Is she doing what do you want her to do and how are those conversations going? I'm giving her simple
[00:09:28] Paloma: things. Nothing crazy for a nine year old. Like she can help me build the floor in the main area or help me feed the cats. We have three cats and she loves them or help me clean up their boxes, all very thing simple, nothing crazy.
And most of the time she's no, I'll do it later. Or No, I don't wanna do it. Then I try to tell, okay, if you don't wanna do it, No play day with your friend. And then she gets frustrated and she starts screaming or goes to the rule, her rule, and chops the door. And then I'm like, how do I get her to learn to cooperate, and know that we are a team.
It's not just me or her dad doing everything. She can help around more.
[00:10:22] Hunter: That's incredibly frustrating cuz you know that she needs those skills. She needs life skills. Not only, do you need help around the house, but also she needs life skills and things like that. Exactly.
Stay tuned for more Mindful Mama podcasts right after this break.
Okay, so I'm hearing like we've got the challenge of her and the chores, but then we've also got the challenge of the relationship overall and your, you were saying your patience and perfectionism and things like that. I wanna take a moment to take chores, that challenge, cuz I think we can talk about that in a second and look at.
Like just, yourself and your relationship with your daughter as it's gone along. And I'm just wondering is this for me, my temper came from my family and that was just very normalized and my family, my father had a lot of rage and would spank me and stuff too. And that same for you?
Yeah. My dad too.
[00:11:32] Paloma: Okay. A lot of rape, a lot of screaming. Not my mom, mostly my dad.
[00:11:38] Hunter: Okay. And what was your relationship like with him when you were tween and a teen? I remember
[00:11:43] Paloma: I really I would get frustrated and really scream at him. Like the whole neighborhood will go at it.
[00:11:50] Hunter: Yeah. Yeah. And did you, did it ever heal?
Did you ever heal your relationship with him? Yes.
[00:11:56] Paloma: Yes. Some of him are good place with him now. I have a lot of compassion for him cuz I know. That is, he didn't do it on purpose. It's something that he learned from his mind. So it's not his fault that, he did the best he could with what he knew, which I know his best was not the ideal.
It's not what we
[00:12:20] Hunter: want, but it wasn't his fault. So you can see that.
[00:12:24] Paloma: No, I'm, I love him dearly and I feel, yeah I feel bad the way, he was raised. Yeah, I feel a lot of compassion for him and a lot of little bit pity. I pity, so I hold no grudges with him cuz you know, he's in a different stage in his life now.
He's a very, he's a very kind grandfather and he daughter, cuz I explain to her why I am like, I am, like it came from him and she was like puzzle. She was like, what? He's such a kind. Guy. Oh, really?
[00:13:05] Hunter: Oh, okay. That's wonderful that you have that perspective and that you can see that, you can see that his suffering and see how it led to your own and it's really.
Really lovely to move beyond that, like blame and to really see that because it just helps you, it's gonna help you so much more. So it sounds like you've talked to your daughter a little bit too, about like your own challenges with your temper. Yeah. Yes.
[00:13:32] Paloma: I apologize to her. I try, most of the time now I tell, I try for her to understand that is not her fault.
That if I get mad and pursue it It's definitely not her fault. When I think about one win something I've been trying to do is tell her Mommy loves you when you scream. Mommy doji. When you're quiet. Mommy loves you when you're sad. Mommy loves you when you're happy. When it's, I know it's getting into her brain, cuz the other day she told me, mommy, I love you even if you yell at me.
Oh, that's so sweet. Yeah, it was just so sweet. She's a child. She's very feisty. She's sweet.
[00:14:18] Hunter: You're shifting together. It sounds like the apple's not fallen super far from the tree here, I'm guessing.
Yes.
[00:14:26] Hunter: You, and in fact, you said you're like a fitness professional, right? Like you have some energy you gotta burn. Is that true for you? Yeah. I
[00:14:39] Paloma: teach wall glass I try to be Mindful, as meditation is helping, trying to understand. I come from like the yoga fitness, so I'm trying to shift things a little and make it more like a Mindful, like more like the traditional yoga
[00:14:56] Hunter: world.
Okay. All right, cool. Yeah, I think both can help. Like it's nice to have yoga to burn off some energy and it's nice to have yoga that's like really more calming and. Centering and things like that. So some things I'm hearing that are really good for you are like, that you have all this awareness and that you're talking you're talking to your daughter, you're sharing what's happening with her because I think that what I would encourage for you, cuz especially cuz she's so much older at now, she's nine, she has these habits.
But the truth is sure, it would've been amazing to have been able to do all this legwork when she was like one, whatever. But that doesn't matter. Like we start when we start, right? And it's never too late to heal a relationship. And I think that's, even if she was 24, like it wouldn't matter, right?
It's never too late to heal a relationship. And that's what we wanna think about here with this is What I'm here is that she's rebelling against, not against you, but she's rebelling against the strategies that you've used just because they're the strategies in our culture and in your own upbringing and all of those things.
It's not your fault. It's not like you were like, oh, I think I'm gonna just threats and yelling are like, this is the way to go. And you wasn't like, this is the water we are swimming in. So this is what happens, like when we use power, when we use threats and we yell and that scares our kids and stuff.
Eventually they yell back at us, they threaten back at us. And our power runs out too. As we start to get to be, they start to get to be your child's age. Like we can, there's only, you have to escalate those threats and it becomes, it's like painful. Like you don't wanna do that and it hurts the relationship and all of those things.
So she's in this place where she's asserting her autonomy and all these things they cause resistance, right? Ultimately it's N it's like she doesn't wanna cooperate with you intrinsically because she has a habit of resistance. When we yell and we use threats like our kids, it puts them into fight, flight, or freeze.
And so fight, I'm gonna fight back at you, or I'm gonna flight, I'm gonna go to my room and slam the door. Or like I freeze. And sometimes then they flip into submit. So it's either fight or flight or it's like submit. And either way is not like great. We want our kids to cooperate because they want to.
So she's like a train going 90 miles an hour in the direction of resistance to you. Yeah. And you're not only, it's gonna take some time because not only has this train gotta slow down, is it gotta stop and then it's gotta turn around and there's a lot of momentum. It's gonna take some time because not only has this train gotta slow down, is it gotta stop and then it's gotta turn around and there's a lot of momentum.
So we just wanna acknowledge that because you might be able to change and shift your ways faster, then it's gonna take for you to see like results in your daughter. But it still doesn't matter. It's never too late to change. We just wanna acknowledge that there's gonna be. These challenges, does that feel like daunting as I say that to you?
What comes up for you as I say that to you?
[00:18:23] Paloma: Yeah. It just, I know that sometimes you just gotta go with the flow and her flow is like she wants to recess. Okay. Yeah. And I. The other day she did something that really amazed me. For a long time. And I stopped cuz I gave Bob for a long time.
I was like, you have to clean up your room. You have to clean up your room. And then the other day out of the blue without anybody telling her anything, she clean up your room. And I was like,
[00:18:56] Hunter: starts singing.
[00:18:58] Paloma: Yeah. So sometimes he just gotta, and just, you gotta choose your battles, is this battle worth it? I was talking to a nice friend the other day and she said, they send up certain things that there's no point about fighting for because that's really not essential.
But other things, yes. Like she has to trust you and tells you, tell you the truth. Even that, even if the truth is, something that you're not gonna
[00:19:26] Hunter: Yeah. I think that's really important to recognize, like as we talk about like solving problems with your daughter, we wanna think about.
I was thinking about solving, we wanna resolve problems based on needs, and that goes to the idea of picking your battles, although that's not my favorite metaphor, cuz I don't like a war metaphor between parents and children. But the idea that do you really need her room to be clean or can you just close the door?
Is them even matter? I don't say hard. That doesn't stop. Yeah, exactly. Just, yeah, you just close the door because really it's not impinging on your needs at all. Is it? Is it. Impinging on you getting going about your day or no, none of that. So that's good. So one of the things I wanted to, why I wanted to talk about you and her rela her relationship before we talk about the chores, is that because she's gonna be in the habit of resistance, your relationship, like all relationships are like a bank account, right?
Like you need to put in a lot more deposits before you make any withdrawals. And there's research that shows that like we need, humans in general just need five. Are so positive interactions for every negative one, right? Because that's just how relationships work, right? If you were with a partner or spouse and you had a whole bunch of negative relationships.
So interactions are one positive, you would just be not, you'd be reconsidering. So it's the same with our kids. Like any relationship, we wanna be able to be putting those deposits into that bank account. Before we withdraw. And so right now your bank accounts in a debit, you got relationship debt.
So if you think about that, right? If you wanted to, if like you were in a space with your husband and things had been bad for a while, like what would you do to get yourselves back on better footing and together more?
[00:21:22] Paloma: Change perspective, do something
[00:21:24] Hunter: different. Yeah. And you might make sure you have a date night, right?
You might, just some of those things you would invest in the relationship. You would invest some time and energy and stuff in the relationship. And so I think that this is the idea of like connect before you, correct. Like you need to connect with your daughter, not on a, like a roll to roll level, but on a soul to soul level, like on a.
I'm connecting with you and I'm interested in you and your life. Cuz really, she's at the cusp of that time, and when they're little, they're all like, mommy, mommy, ma, give it. They want the attention so desperately and you're transitioning into the phase where they're lucky you. You're lucky if they talk to you, right?
So I would encourage you to, to date your daughter, I'd like to put some intentional time into the relationship where you are finding things to do that you could do together actually in raising good humans every day. A whole list of date ideas. I don't, I can't pull it up right now. I don't have it printed on me, but that's the next one.
But what do you, what can you think of, if I throw out that idea of dating your daughter, what are some things that come to mind for you that you could do together?
[00:22:34] Paloma: I've been thinking about that because, I've been thinking like I need more connection with her and there's some things that she loves doing, but I have no interest in.
Like video games or, yeah, like video games or Legos or things like that. Or playing cards. So I'm thinking like I have to make an effort and even if I'm not really truly, genuinely interested, like just make an effort to like, Do it with her even if it's not something that I enjoy fully.
[00:23:11] Hunter: Yeah, it's not totally your thing. You gotta meet her in her world right now. Okay. So video games, playing cards and Legos out of those, which is your the least icky,
[00:23:23] Paloma: Parks. I'll beat the cards. The other day we cannot play on the way home. She had the cards with her. We walk from the bus stop home and.
We played cards and something that we've been doing is also, it's at nighttime. I don't know if she's like regressing a little, like she wants me to go in bed with her and I do, I go with her and she wants to play with her stuffings. So we do that. And she's been loving that. I make funny voices with
[00:23:54] Hunter: one of her stuffies.
[00:23:55] Paloma: Yeah, that I enjoy fully, so I'm good with doing that. So I think I have to like, maybe. Can effort to, instead of that being ha, 10 minutes before, maybe half hour before bedtime. So we can,
[00:24:11] Hunter: Yeah, you don't have to go crazy, but I think that yeah, that sounds like a really nice connecting moment with her and yeah, maybe playing cards and just thinking about wanting to put those, yeah, just I would encourage you to just be intentional about trying to make those times of connection.
And and then tell her like when you do the stuffies and you snuggle in bed it feels so good. It feels so good in my heart to connect with you, or whatever you might say. Yeah.
[00:24:42] Paloma: I tell her, when we do that, I tell her this is my favorite part of my day.
[00:24:48] Hunter: Oh, that's so sweet.
Yeah. And that is probably like helping her, so that's great. Yeah. I would encourage you to do that. Look for those moments of connection, play the cards, do the stuffies and even and even try to catch her in good moments or cuz you know, our brains are like Velcro for negative things.
Try to just appreciate the things that when she does help. Appreciate it hey, thank you so much for doing x. That made my life easier. I really appreciate it. Okay. Fair.
Yeah.
[00:25:27] Paloma: When she did her, when you fix her bed, I didn't say because I heard that. It's not good to say you're a good girl, so I told her I'm very impressed.
I'm happy for you cuz this is, I know this is gonna help you feel better when you see things organized and clean around you. So I'm very excited for
[00:25:48] Hunter: you. I told her that. That's great. Yeah. No, that's great. Yeah, cuz like saying you're a good girl, it's like judgment, right? And just saying oh, I bet that feels good to have a nice, neat room.
Yeah. That might be good. Or, yeah, sometimes when my kids come home and they tell me like, I go to good grade or something like that, I'll be like, oh, that's awesome. I'll say, I bet that felt, feels great. And they'll be like yeah, it actually does. Okay. I'm like, okay, great. So those are great.
Those are great ways. And just keep an eye out for different ways to water her flowers. Think about that way like she's a bud. You wanna water her positive seat. So just think it. Look for ways for that.
Stay tuned for more Mindful Mama podcast right after this break.
Okay, let's get to the challenging part then the like chores around the house. So the thing with chores around the house is that we want to make it like, we wanna invite our kids into it, right? Like we want to make it not something that's like super painful, but it's hard cuz it's chores cuz they're painful Anyway I would encourage you to find a time with your daughter and your husband where you can talk about the jobs around the house and say, listen, we're gonna talk about the jobs around the house.
Maybe have some fresh bake chocolate chip cookies or something like, nice, like while you do it and just say, listen, we're gonna make sure everybody can give their input and we're gonna make sure everybody can get their needs met. Okay, so this, we're basically, I'm gonna talk you through a little bit of win-win problem solving cuz you wanna make sure.
You wanna make sure that she gets her needs met you get your needs met, your husband gets his needs met, right? And so with chores, a really nice way to do it that I encourages to think about, like almost take a sticky note or write down all the chores on like a piece of paper and cut 'em out like little pieces of paper, like doing the cat litter, whatever is sweeping the bedroom, things like that.
And if you have all these little pieces of paper with the jobs on it, what's nice about that is that then you could put them in different places. So what I would encourage you to do is you get like a piece of paper, divide it in three, write you Paloma, write your husband, write your daughter's name, and then just say, okay, so right now this is the way the chores are like, and you'll put all the chores and show who's doing what.
And it'll be overwhelmingly you and your husband probably right. If you did that can, if, can you imagine? It would be, yeah, I will
[00:28:32] Paloma: be over where? When? Yeah. Mostly me, some him, and nothing here.
[00:28:37] Hunter: Okay. All right. See, and what you wanna say here is you need to give like an iMessage about how this is like affecting you, right?
So when you talk about an iMessage, Thomas Gordon talks about a three part iMessage. You wanna talk about what it is, how it affects you and how you feel. So you could say like something like, When all the chores are on me, or the majority of the chores are on me, how does it make you feel?
Paloma overwhelmed. Okay. And how does it affect your day?
[00:29:11] Paloma: Because I feel overwhelmed sometimes I'm feel like I'm rushing or stressed
[00:29:18] Hunter: out. Okay. Rushing. Yeah, and the stressed out is great because when we think about, we wanna share with our kids the concrete, tangible effects or consequences of the actions.
On you. And stress is a really a concrete, tangible effect because what is stress? It's the tightening of the muscles, it's a raising of the heart rate. It's all of those things. So when you are feel stressed, how does it affect your body? I feel like
[00:29:49] Paloma: neck pain or back pain.
[00:29:52] Hunter: Okay. Okay. So when most of the chores are on me, I feel so overwhelmed.
And then I have to rush and I feel this, the stress causes neck pain and back pain. For me it's getting too much. Okay. So you're gonna give this message you wanna practice it for me?
[00:30:13] Paloma: Yes. So I, so because I feel like I'm doing everything almost every day. I feel stressed, I feel rushed. I feel like it's.
Little bit not fair. And I feel then back pain or neck pain because of the overwhelming
[00:30:40] Hunter: Yeah, that's great. I would just say just say it very, just simply and directly when most of the chores are on me, don't say I feel, just when most of the truths are in me, this is how it affects me.
You did a great job of that. That's, that was great. So you're gonna give that message. And then you're gonna say, okay, so I'd really like us to figure out a way to do this more fairly, and I'd love, I want your help. You know it. I wanted us to divide these fairly, so here are all, here are all the jobs.
What would you like to take? What can you take on? And you can look through the list together. And what's nice about this is you, rather than you saying to your daughter, you have to do X, Y, and Z, cuz you've thought about it and you figure these are the best starter chores for her, whatever, she can decide what chores are good for her, right?
And you guys can talk about this together. And it's the idea of giving her that agency to choose. And when she chooses, like she has some buy-in, And you're inviting them to help you and you are asking for their help, but you're asking, and you're just being very honest and transparent about this is like the way things are right now.
It's not me needing my needs because of the stress and the rushing and the overwhelm. I need your help. How do you imagine this landing with your family? I
[00:32:02] Paloma: think yes, since I love the idea of letting her, like telling her exactly why I want her help. So I think she will connect with that in her brain and I think letting her kind of choose, letting her choose.
She will like that even if she shows us something. I think she might choose something that I don't think is app, appropriate. Like she might choose to do the dishes. Okay. You gonna try? I'm sure and I can see it, that she's gonna be like, oh no. I'll go click clean the calculator cause this for simple task.
But I'll let her choose. Okay, go ahead. Choose. So then she can
[00:32:44] Hunter: experience it herself. Yeah, that would be great. And then what's nice about this is say she just chooses, okay, I'm gonna I'm gonna clean my room. And she's that's not enough. You can say, Hey, does this look fair? We can arrange, let's put all the jobs.
Is fair now that the jobs are like the in and and you can be a conversation together. And the idea is you wanna make this conversation not judgemental. Which is very much like on a human to human level, what I need versus what you need and things like that. Yeah.
[00:33:17] Paloma: I love that. Yeah. I love that. Doing it as a family, the three of us.
Yeah. Yeah.
[00:33:23] Hunter: Maybe even your husband start doing some other things. Now
[00:33:28] Paloma: he's lost a lot of things that most men don't do. He cooks us his laundry, so I'm good. Okay.
[00:33:37] Hunter: Good. Good. I know I could have never imagined doing someone else's, like in my house if friend does their own laundry and this way, and I just could never imagine doing some all of some other.
No. Yeah, A lot of
[00:33:49] Paloma: women do admit
[00:33:51] Hunter: all images. I know all of it. Some people like it. That's okay. So you said earlier that you're a perfectionist. Now one of the challenges for you, as you say, you come to agreement and then you wanna write down what you guys agree. Okay? So you agree to do this and this many times a week.
Okay? And I agree to do this and this. Okay? And we'll write it down. One of the keys here is that you wanna set then a date. Like a week or two in the future to check on it. We'll just, we'll set a time. We'll all make it nice again. I'll, we'll, I'll go over ice cream, but I'll get Bena, Jerry's, and we'll all, and we're gonna check on how our problem solving is gone.
Okay. And just check in to make sure everybody's, it's meeting everybody's needs. One of your needs is for fairness, right? So that's totally fine. So yeah, so you wanna check on it and then the challenge for you might be, say she chooses to do the dishes or whatever, things like that. Is to notice the perfectionism.
Do you think it might interfere there? Oh yeah. Yeah.
[00:34:58] Paloma: I can see that how, and I can see when, like now she should the dishes, cuz I know she's not gonna do all then, or she's gonna do half and then the other half for me.
[00:35:08] Hunter: Yeah,
[00:35:08] Paloma: I can see my brain
[00:35:10] Hunter: going now and it might be true, like maybe she does leave half the dishes for you.
So that's why you wanna set a time, maybe in a week or so, to check on the win-win problem solving results and to say, okay, I really appreciate that you wanted to, the dishes, so hasn't been working out so well for me because I've had to come in and do the other half. So going along. So this isn't really meeting my need for fairness.
Like what can we do about this? And just inviting that conversation. So that's why you wanna have okay, next week we're gonna check on this. But in the meantime, your job, Paloma, is to practice not reacting, practice tame the perfectionism, practice, like biting your tongue, all of that stuff, right?
And sometimes it's like hard as yeah, it can be really hard. It's like trying to stop your pee midstream practice, but it's possible. Yeah.
[00:36:10] Paloma: But I think I've been practicing a little already with her fashion choices because now she's been on these roles for, I think more, she wants to chew, choose her clothes.
So first I was really very, Resistance and now I'm just like, Hey, let's be thankful that she wants to wear independently, that she's choosing her clothes and it's not like other kids that a mom still has to choose, even though I don't agree with the color combinations or choices. So
[00:36:45] Hunter: yeah, you're so you're practicing biting your tongue.
That's good. Yeah. In that department, yeah. It's interesting with like teens and preteens these days, like with. Things like some of those things that like things like clothes and even some things like makeup and things like that. It's interesting. I've noticed for some kids is a whole different thing than it was for maybe me and my friends when we were young.
Where it's like more about self-expression than it is about looking older and like a sexy young. Person or something. Also
[00:37:23] Paloma: the culture and the environment. I grew up in a very different culture environment, so it was not about self fresh, about looking good and makes you sure your hair is okay, your whatever.
[00:37:34] Hunter: Yeah. Yeah. Okay, so how do you see this like win-win problem solving session going for you? Can you imagine a time where you guys can sit down and do this? Yes. Yeah,
[00:37:46] Paloma: I think we can set a time, like in the weekend we'll work good. And I love your idea about checking the future because we have actually done something similar already where cuz she takes karate classes and she had a very nice cheeses where they will give her like a little price and she will cook, but then she started cheating on the list.
And it's because we didn't do like a follow up, kind of thing to work with her and tell her, okay, are we all sticking to the plan? We never did that. I think that's what we have to, yeah. So thank you
[00:38:20] Hunter: so much. Yeah. So yeah, and what your practice gonna be is to do also is you're gonna really practice refrain from yelling as best you can.
Like I have tools and raising good humans that you can make that list. And you're gonna practice to refrain from using your threats because you wanna, as best you can, avoid it. Go for 80%. Skillful means, as best you can because when you use that power you are gonna undermine your influence.
And she's really getting to the age where you want her to be able to talk to you, right? You want her, you wanna listen. So she'll talk to you, you wanna. You wanna be able to be that person she goes to that she is not all in a resistant battle with. You wanna be that person more in the teen years than ever before because that's when they really need like that stable.
Foundation and that available person to be able to talk to, cuz the problems get bigger and deeper and more challenging, right? So these little things are not gonna be as important as the relationship itself is gonna be. Putting those deposits in the relationship bank account is gonna be most important.
So if you can refrain from using the threats and give yourself time to step back. And try not to make any decisions when you're in a heightened state, cuz you don't have your whole brain on board. You're not using all your problem solving ability, your impulse control, your verbal ability, right?
Like with most things, with her it's gonna be like, you can be like, and right now I feel so frustrated that I need a break. Or if she's screaming at you, you're gonna be like, this is too much for me. I need a break. I, and you're gonna try to step. Out of situations like that and refrain from making those decisions and ultimatums any of that stuff until you are like a calm mind and body.
Does that sound like a doable or start to aim for?
[00:40:23] Paloma: Oh yeah, no, I agree. I don't want her to, later when things get really more serious in her teenager years to not be able to trust me. Calm to me. So
[00:40:36] Hunter: yeah, that's great. And the, that you've been apologizing is super awesome cuz that's really great.
It shows your humanity, your vulnerability. Annette teaches her to do that as well. That's really great as well. So high five. Okay, so we talked about your daughter, we talked about, the challenges, the wins. We talked about sort of the overall challenges and then the chores challenge. For you, Palo Paloma, what is your biggest takeaway from talking today?
[00:41:05] Paloma: Yeah, I think the biggest one is when you mention like if you keep doing the tricks, you're actually gonna diminish my power because it's gonna, what I understood is like it's gonna break our connection, and I definitely want her to be able to keep trusting me. Especially as she gets older, because things are gonna get, different challenges.
She's gonna get into being a teen, almost adult, and that's when things, it can be more, more dangerous for them not to trust their mom and dad. Yeah.
[00:41:44] Hunter: Yeah. Awesome. Awesome. I love that takeaway. Yay. Thank you so much for, Coming on and sharing your story and sharing your experience with your family.
I know it's gonna help so many people that you've done that. I really appreciate it.
[00:42:01] Paloma: Thank you. Thank you for your time and thank you so much for spreading this more much important message to everybody. One of more parents and caregivers need to know about this, so I'm glad I can help a little.
Yeah. Thank you for everything you're doing.
[00:42:26] Hunter: Thank you so much for listening to this episode. I hope you enjoyed it. To dive in further to this, you can always learn more about the Mindful Parenting membership and the Mindful Parenting teacher training. So I do a membership where we offer lots of live coaching. We offer one-on-one coaching now for every single member who joins.
And if you are serious about changing and learning how to change, And transforming your family. If this is the place for you so you can learn more at Mindful Parenting course.com, you can get on the wait list there. We'll invite you to a class to learn more about it and maybe it will be for you. And if you love this podcast please leave us a review on Apple Podcasts.
I wanna thank Laura t y for the five star review on Apple Podcasts. She wrote amazing, helpful conversations. I have been so grateful to find this podcast she wrote. Each episode is full of applicable, helpful topics. You are my virtual mom tribe. Yay. So thank you so much, Laura. These reviews make a huge difference.
So please leave a review on Apple Podcast. Just takes 30 seconds and let me know what your takeaways are at on Instagram at Mindful Mama mentor. Let me know what you're getting from this. Is this honor coaching call helpful? Do you want more of these? Let me know. Just to let you know, we have applications for on-air coaching calls on my website at Mindful Mama mentor.com.
You can apply and maybe we'll talk on the air. Let me know, okay? All right. That's it my friend. Thank you so much for listening. I wishing you a beautiful week, wishing you peace and joy and ease and. Less stress with your family and more joy, all that good stuff, and I will talk to you again next week.
Thanks so much for listening, and I must stay.
I'd say definitely do it. It's really helpful. It will change your relationship with your kids for the better. It will help you communicate better and just, I'd say communicate better as a person, as a wife, as a spouse, it's been really a positive influence in our lives. So definitely do it.
[00:44:51] Paloma: I'd say definitely do it.
It's
[00:44:53] Hunter: so worth it.
[00:44:55] Paloma: The money really is inconsequential when you get so much benefit from being a better parent to your children and feeling like you're connecting more. With them and not feeling
[00:45:05] Hunter: like you yelling all the time, or you're like,
[00:45:07] Paloma: why isn't things working? I would say
[00:45:10] Hunter: definitely enjoy it. It's so worth it.
It'll change you no matter what age someone's child is. It's a great opportunity for personal growth and it's great investment in someone's family. I'm very thankful I have this. You can continue in your old habits that aren't working, or you can
[00:45:29] Paloma: learn some new tools
[00:45:30] Hunter: and gain some perspective to shift.
Everything in your
[00:45:34] Paloma: Parenting,
[00:45:39] Hunter: are you frustrated by Parenting? Do you listen to the experts and try all the tips and strategies, but you're just not seeing the results that you want? Or are you lost as to where to start? Does it all seem so overwhelming with too much to learn? Are you yearning for community people who get it, who also don't want to threaten and punish to create cooperation?
Hi, I'm Hunter Clark Fields, and if you answered yes to any of these questions, I want you to seriously consider the Mindful Parenting membership. You'll be joining hundreds of members who have discovered the path of Mindful Parenting and now have confidence in clarity in their Parenting. This isn't just another Parenting class.
This is an opportunity to really discover your unique lasting relationship, not only with your children, but with yourself. It will translate into lasting connected relationships, not only with your children, but your partner too. Let me change your life. Go to. Mindful Parenting course.com to add your name to the wait list, so you will be the first to be notified when I open the membership for enrollment.
I look forward to seeing you on the inside, Mindful Parenting course.com.
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