Episode 95: Honoring Your Unique Child with Ryan Haddon
/For this episode, I am so excited to be joined by Ryan Haddon. She is a certified Life and Spiritual coach, clinical Hypnotherapist, and certified meditation teacher with over 16 years of experience with clients around the world. We will be diving into how you can use parenting as an opportunity to grow and heal through crafting healthy, well-differentiated relationships.
Here is an overview of our discussion:
Honoring Your Child's Uniqueness - and accepting that they aren't an extension of you
How To Grow Alongside Your Children with Conscious Parenting
To get more resources for this topic, follow Ryan on Instagram @ and visit her website.
Instagram: @ryan.haddon
Website: https://ryanhaddon.com
TRANSCRIPT
Parenting is often lived in the extremes. It's either great joy or chaotic overwhelm. In one moment, you're nailing it and the next you're losing your cool. I want to help you find your way to the messy middle, to a place of balance. You see balance is a verb, not a state of being. It is a thing you do. Not a thing you are. It is an action, a process, a series of micro corrections that you make each and every day to keep yourself feeling centered. We are never truly balanced. We are engaged in the process of balancing.
Hello, I'm Dr. Laura Froyen, and this is The Balanced Parent Podcast where overwhelmed, stressed out and disconnected parents go to find tools, mindset shifts and practices to help them stop yelling at the people they love and start connecting on a deeper level. All delivered with heaping doses of grace and compassion. Join me in conversations that will help you get clear on your goals and values and start showing up in your parenting, your relationships, your life with openhearted authenticity and balance. Let's go!
Laura: Hello everybody, this is Dr. Laura Froyen. With this week's episode of The Balanced Parent Podcast and in this episode we're going to be talking about how as parents, we sometimes need to step back and let our kids live their own life and honor who they are as individuals.
And I'm really excited to have this conversation with my new friend and colleague, Ryan Haddon. She is a life coach and a clinical hypnotherapist and a certified meditation teacher and so we're gonna be having this conversation over the next little while. Ryan, thank you so much for being with us. Welcome to the show. Why don't you tell us a little bit more about who you are and what you do?
Ryan: Well, hello, Dr. Froyen, nice to talk to you and nice to be here and hello everyone. It's a pleasure to talk to other parents in the trenches on the field, you know, we're doing our best and I just want to give everyone a high five today for showing up.
Laura: It's so important, right? We are just doing our best.
Ryan: Yeah. And the fact that you tune into someone like Dr. Froyen to get a sense of what's out there and other sources of wisdom and insight. It just says a lot about who you are, right? And how you want to expand and develop.
And that's really, I think generational, I think that's our generation that really is not expecting to know everything, not knowing that it's okay to admit I'm fumbling my way through this, but my heart's in the right place and I want to be my best self modeling that for my child and I'm going to make mistakes and it's going to be okay. So I love who we are as a parenting segment me to say that
Laura: Isn't, it's such an honor to get to walk alongside parents in this journey of figuring it out and I have kids who are eight and a half and six and you have four kids. We're in this together, right?
Ryan: We are, we are and I will say having, you know, a first set of kids and the second set of kids. Even back in the day, I mean my kids are 22 and 19, those older ones. I do think at that time it was really hard to find parenting groups. It was hard to find, you know, real conversations happening.
I had a mommy group that we were pregnant together and had our babies together. We would meet all the time and I can't tell you that was like such a tall drink of water in a desert to just be like, what do we do about this? How do we handle that? What do we do about tantrums? How do we, you know, so I just think that we're the swath of parents, even one, you know, 10 years apart is there's just so many more resources, so much gratitude for that.
Laura: I agree. You know, I was just talking with my membership community yesterday about finding that community, finding that support network for yourselves as parents and what a struggle it is for some folks in some settings because their parenting differently. The folks who are listening to this are attempting to parent kind of against the grain. It's not necessarily mainstream parenting.
And we were talking about how they've, a lot of my group has been learning about respectful parenting and conscious parenting solely during the pandemic, solely during quarantine. So they've been really kind of in their bubble, do practicing this and parenting this way and they love it. It's life giving, it's joyful. There's deeper connections than ever.
And now they're going back slowly out into the world and they're realizing like, oh how do we keep this going with intention and consciousness in a world that is different. I know that that's not exactly what we were going to be talking about, but it speaks to consciousness, intention. What, do you have any advice for families who are moving into that space?
Ryan: Well, I want to say that those parents that you're describing really made the most of this time. You know, they really did. So you know, props to you. Bravo because you went deep. It's like you know, a natural childbirth when you're using your breath or even if you're assisted childbirth, you're using breath to go under the waves of intensity, you know, in those contractions and those you know that because there is a level of intensity being home with your child all day long and this home schooling and like let's just call it what it is.
I mean it's unrelenting in a way and it does feel like a bubble. So it can be glorious and there's also keeping it real moments where you're just pushed against the wall of like I don't think I can give anything else. And then you find that reservoir deep within to give more or understanding I have to pull away now to practice some self care and it might be some breath work, it might be some journaling, it might be those quick fix things to be able to then come back to it and offer something from a place of overflow because it's not easy to be on duty all the time.
It's hard for us to be on duty for ourselves all the time. We want to check out, you know? So it's then to do that with another little being who's just looking solely to you? It's like I said, I think the intensity of the pandemic and is beautiful. Those parents that you're speaking of, who have had an experience of a full immersion of going deep under those waves, calling something within themselves to be more available through themselves and their offspring. They really took that ride, you know, in a beautiful way, instead of treading water. And just when you get a break, when I get a break, you know what I mean?
Like that's like that's why I referred to the childbirth paradigm because it's a lot like that. You're not going to make it through if you're just going to stay on the surface of things treading water and taking little sips of air. It's when you deep dive under those waves of contraction and pain that you're able to really roll with it and come out another version of yourself and with a little being, you know, so I mean there's no one great way to give birth, let's be honest. It doesn't matter.
But I just know I've done both and when I have thought of those images certainly with my children when I'm in a face off with them, but also in giving birth, I was able to transcend and transmute those moments and integrate, you know the pain, the suffering, the contraction because there's all of that. And if you're not having that in your parenting, I don't know that you're doing it. I don't know what you're doing but that's our contracts with each other, right? They're going to help, we're raising them and I'm doing air quotes for those of you that are listening. But we're also you know, that's what it looks like from the outside. But yeah, go ahead. Say it.
Laura: They're raising us, too.
Ryan: Exactly. Exactly.
Laura: Rather they're giving us the opportunity to grow up alongside them. I never like to put the responsibility for our own growth onto kids, but they invite us and it's our choice and responsibility to heed that call to healing that they invite us to.
Ryan: Well they're mirroring, those darker places where they were not healed.
Laura: Yeah, they're showing us. I like the visual of a geode cracking open, that our kids crack us open and show us the part that have been hidden and then it's our responsibility to shine the light on them and let the shadows kind of fall away and step fully into ourselves.
Ryan: Yeah, for sure. And I think that's the healthiest way to look at it. I really do. And I think it's the most spiritual way, honestly. You know, so then it puts you off the hook of having to perform or be something you're not. You're intuitively moving through while keeping that focus on yourself in an unselfish way. Like, oh, what is this activating in me? Wow, you know, I have a special needs kid. So it actually had two of them and that kind of ratchets things up another level as well, because the tools that work with the others don't work with that one.
So I might seem like an expert with my four kids, but my fourth one, it's like everything went out the window and I have other experts that I work with to really learn these new ways of being, these new acceptance for what is. You know, I can't put her through a square peg; a round hole is one of the one thing I can't, it's not going to happen. So we all have to work with where she's at in any given moment.
And the truth is, is that's radical acceptance and when I can apply that to her and I can apply that to me, that compassion that we're not trying to move things along in a certain linear way, then we all benefit. You know, so those are her gifts and in the moment I don't see it that way. So I want to be fair and clear in the moment. I'm like, not always, but it does.
Laura: it's there. I feel like there's this like thread through what we've been talking to and I just feel like I want to say it. So I think oftentimes people worry that focusing on yourself and your own growth is selfish. But in actuality, it allows you to be more selfless with others because if we are focusing on our own growth, our own stuff, the stuff that our kids activate within us, we take responsibility and ownership for that and we allow them to not be responsible for it.
So rather than asking them to change themselves to make things more comfortable for us. We're working within ourselves to allow them to be who they are. You know, I think we often as parents, when we're in those stressful moments and we're uncomfortable, we're feeling our emotions, we just want our kids to listen or do what we say or be a certain way to make things less more comfortable for the world around them. And it's not their responsibility that when we focus on our work, then they can, we release them from the responsibility of any of our expectations and allow them to fully step into who they are. We accept them.
Can you talk about radical acceptance? What does that mean to radically accept a child?
Ryan: Well, first of all, want to say what you just said was so beautifully said. And so thank you for the clarity around that. And I think you're right. What happens is, is if we're not taking ownership of the activations, then we end up projecting onto them. And then there's those little voices, we have that say we're not doing this right, because they're not behaving a certain way.
And so it becomes like a self esteem pipe to the knees. You know, I'm right, I'm not doing this right. If things were, they should be behaving this way, that should look like that, they don't respect me. I'm not, you know. I can only speak to who comes through my practice and I know my own little voices like that that pop up that committee that pops in there in those emotion mind moments when everything gets really intense.
Like it just goes that primal and you're not thinking, oh, this is all happening as it should. Like, those are not the, that's not the voice that pops in unless you keep curating it. This is absolutely okay. So it's that self talk is so vital in those moments, but it's something to practice because otherwise those unconscious understandings of what should be happening instead.
And I'll segue right into radical acceptance, are what caused us so much pain as a parent, right? And so we move into radical acceptance for me means we stop spinning our wheels around what's actually unfolding in the moment, who someone is and that's where the pain is. The pain is in fighting reality. It shouldn't be this way, why didn't it happen this way? They should have done this, I should have done, like it's the spinning around something. That's how I see it.
The spinning around it is where the pain is. When if we can just say it is what it is and from that place of accepting the way it is. Then from there, I can come up with solutions of how it could go forward next or what I might do next time, but it's not fighting reality as it currently is presenting.
Laura: It’s the fight that causes the pain, not actually the thing that you think shouldn't be happening. It's the ship and we,
Ryan: I think it's like a defense mechanism, we do that. Like if a job, we miss it, lose a job or we miss a promotion or something and why did they do that? I should have got it. I worked hard. Like that's all the leak. It's an energy leak for us instead of, you know, we feel our feelings. It's not that we're doing a bypass, like we can feel all that, God, I'm disappointed. God, I really thought I was going to get it.
So we stay with the feeling around it and what it's activating versus trying to make reality go in a different direction and wanting it to be different and fantasizing how it should be different and digging in our heels around it, that's where that spinning happens.
Laura: I think you're hitting on something that is so important to understand. I think that lots of people here, the phrase radical acceptance, think that it means like we have to like it or that we have to pretend not to have feelings about whatever it is that's happening.
I love that you just differentiated those two things because radical acceptance is not about having any feelings towards it, like even positive feelings towards it. It's about acknowledging what is and separating our feelings from reality like that we can be disappointed about what is happening and at the same time accept that that is what's happening, you know, we can feel all the feelings about it and claim them and take responsibility for them. Own them versus disempowering ourselves by putting our responsibility for our feelings on the circumstance or on our child, or on radical acceptance comes up a lot in my interactions with my parents or my mother in law, you know, where I have to kind of just accept who they are except that they will not change and and then work with the situation as it is, you know?
Ryan: Yes, and it doesn't mean we condone it. Do you think that's important because if it's an injustice or traumas happen and we're not saying, oh, it's all great and wonderful, just like, you know, both of us are saying the same thing, it's just saying I don't necessarily like it. I don't agree with it, but it is what it is, you know? And I think that, and then we get to decide this is the empowerment piece who we want to be in relation to that. And I think that's always and it comes up with me with my little one, you know, it is what it is, and I find the resistance comes in like why is she still doing that? Why is this still happening? Why, we tried this or this? Why is it?
It's the why that really is what pulls me out of present time and keeps me out of the gift that's unfolding in that moment. Instead, I can just feel like I can just go back right to my feelings. God, I'm so frustrated. I feel so pissed and I find myself saying that to her sometimes I feel so frustrated and I'm modeling for her because she doesn't have the verbiage, you know. When you do this, I feel this, you know, and I think she understands that I don't say you're making me feel this. I'm very careful about that. I take and try to really take responsibility.
And I think that's and then I'm starting to hear her say that mom when you do this, I'm mad when you do this. I think that's all this good modeling that I'm learning for myself and that's the part where we're taking ownership and responsibility while modeling all the range of our feelings.
Laura: Yes. And reading in our generational change, you know, shifting the trajectory of our family. It's our legacy, it's beautiful. Okay, so I feel like this was perfect framing for what we actually wanted to talk about today because these are all involved in the idea of honoring who our children are, right, honoring who they are and accepting that they are not an extension of us.
This is something that comes up with my coaching clients frequently where the parents want the kids to do things or be a certain way and they simply are not there, it's not them and there's living through kids that happens. And so do you see that in your practice?
Ryan: Absolutely.
Laura: What are some of the things that we, that parents need to know about? This piece of honoring our kids of accepting our kids that we're not them or they're not us--they're not our extension, they're not our second chance, you know, all of those things?
Ryan: Well, that's just like you said, we'll go back to intergenerational healing because I do think our generation is different and I think a lot of people are hip to this idea, you know, these are souls that come in through us and they have their own contracts. They have their own experiences that are laid out for them and that sounds really great on a t-shirt and then a meditation retreat, but in reality these are places where we can get tripped up--places where if they're not doing something, it's a reflection again that we didn't do something right, or we didn't prepare them for the world or we didn't set them up for success or we didn't, you know, do this.
That what they accomplish somehow; this is the selfishness of it is somehow denotes our ability to parent in a good way because they have these accomplishments or because they are moving on a track forward. You know, that looks this way that we've all agreed societally, you go to college, then you have this kind of job and then you this and you get married. therefore you've raised a child that's successful and I want to say, and this might not be for the listeners, but I just feel like those paradigms are crumbling.
This old idea of what it should look like and what success looks like and the white picket fence with the, you know, 2.3 kids, like whatever it is in this bank account, we're all kind of in agreement. This is not necessarily what creates a successful human and we're renegotiating that and I do think that our group, our segment of parents is renegotiating that I'm hearing a lot of other parents say, I just want them to find happiness.
And that wasn't what I grew up with. You know, it was, you get to college and you have this, you get your degree and this happens and that happens. And then I remember getting out of college and being like, I am so ill prepared for the world. I do not know how to balance a check, I don't do this, I don't want to file taxes. I think that more and more, I have two kids that decided not to go to college.
My older kids or they started and decided not, it did feel resonant to who they are. And my first reaction to one of them was, oh my God, this was, I was like, oh my God, what have I done? You don't know, this is important and then to the other one, I could completely see this isn't a good match for you, you know? So I had both reactions to both and I had to make an apology to my other child for saying that because that was a slip on my part. You know, that was my fear that just came out, out of my mouth before I could catch it.
But that's the beauty, is that they know that I'm going to apologize, I'm going to contemplate and I'm going to come back and say, you know what, that was totally off, this was an old voice that I have in my head. I have to make peace with it so I apologized and she was like, no biggie mom, I know where you really stand. You know, she's making her way and it's fascinating to see that it's not what it was. So we get to pull in all our expectations, all our projections, all our old ideas and you know, that's true for my bigger kids.
Laura: I want to just sum up what you've said here. So we do this sometimes. I mean most of the time unconsciously, right? So we do this unconsciously because one, we kind of have this understanding that our kids' behavior reflects poorly on us or reflects on us at all. Really, that has something to do with how the society or the world will see us. And there's legitimate concern about wanting to be loved and accepted. So there's this one piece of it.
We also have deep concerns for them and their well being. We want them to be loved and accepted. We want them to be successful. So we have those very valid concerns that lead us to perhaps push them where we think they should go.
And then there's this third one that I think that is kind of the projections and the living through that happens at times with kids. Those three pieces are so important and they're in crucial to consider as you're making conscious decisions in your parenting, right?
So conscious parenting is about releasing the our unconscious default responses and choosing with intention, how we interact with our kids and we don't do perfectly like, you know, when we make our mistakes, we acknowledge it those three ways that we do this or the three kind of reasons that we do this are so important to be aware of. Like what is my motivation? Why am I pushing my kids this way?
Ryan: Yes, and trusting that they have an inner compass. It's everything; you stop parenting, you stop. It becomes like hopefully, I mean they say it never ends, but hopefully you're always, you know, that safe harbor there comes a point where they're just like done with input and it becomes a friendship that it's not two way.
Because it's not like it's like, oh, hey, I'm going through this right now. Like I mean we do speak openly like that, but it's not, I want to get clarity around that and speaking it, it's not like we're besties, you know, we're still, I'm still holding that line where I have this whole inner life that you know, they're not actually privy to because it would be a burden to them, right? I'm still holding the line as a mentor as a person in their life who's anchored into herself and so they can come to it's a safe harbor. They can, they can tie their boat too when they need to, but they go back out to sea and then they come back to me.
And it's an interesting thing when you're raising teens to find out when that point is because you don't want to burn bridges, well I’m just full of metaphors today, I apologize. Burn bridges, boats out to harbor.
Laura: The safe harbor one was beautiful. And now achieve of what secure attachment looks like in the teen years and in the young adult years because we still have an attachment relationship with our older kids throughout the lifespan. It's still there and that's what attachment looks like in the older years. Yeah.
Ryan: Yeah. It's finding those times to really, it is not an easy road to press in and to pull back and it is a total dance with them. When do you give advice? When do you say this? How I'm seeing it? Do you see it this way too? Because I'm hearing you say this, much like we do in our practice. You know when we're listening it's just that really holding space in that sense. And also, you know, but with parenting, it's it's harder to cultivate the detachment. My kids are like, mom stop coaching me. I'm like, okay. Yeah, they know that voice.
Laura: My kids call me a feeling doctor. And they will say mom, I don't want a feeling doctor right now, I want my mom.
Ryan: You know, I know that's adorable.
Laura: I know, it's good boundaries set good boundaries.
Ryan: Yeah, they do have a sense. They're like, she's got the voice. Yes, it's happening. But I love that and what a joy that they know that we have that wisdom that we're sitting on and that we're also using in our own life. You know, that's really like you can say everything, but it's what you're doing that's in a full observance. So they both have to have to be congruent.
Laura: They do. There has to be coherence there between what you say and what you do. Otherwise that dissonance can be really confusing to kids. Okay, so I feel like so, what this looks like then honoring your child, trusting your child, accepting them as they are. I feel like looks different at different ages.
And so I would love to just kind of touch on some of those different places, tight? And so we were talking before we started recording about this a little bit that with your young ones, they still need more guidance. They, you have information that they don't have the fully developed brain that can make rational decisions and you need to help them.
But when do, you, know like a moment where you need to let go and step back. How can you tell when those moments with younger kids? Because I think younger kids have that internal compass. I think they have it, I think they're born with it.
Ryan: Yeah, I mean if I lined up all four of my kids, they each came in with their own specific personality, their own mission. I know that their own, you know, I believe in reincarnation so I believe they're all at different points of development in the spiritual world. And I can see that, it's very clear and I feel like they help each other. Does with the agreements they have, their soul agreements. Four of them absolutely see how fully formed they actually are and their sense of who they are.
And so my job, I feel like is to really allow them each to bloom and grow at the pace that they do and the way that they do do that because I don't want to close anyone's ability to flow and bloom and say it has to be this way. It has to be that way, this is how we do things. Although I do, you know, say those with honesty and you know, apologies and this is what our family does and this is how we, you know, show up for each other.
And you know, I do say those types of phrases, but essentially I find myself explaining each to each other. She's doing that because of this. Do you see that? And they're like, oh yes, I do. That's the part I do get in there a little bit. Certainly when they're younger, when they're older, I had the other to understand each other quite, quite well.
Laura: Because they’ve done that work when they're younger
Ryan: Probably and they each kind of are so different that they look at each other and they're like, I can't believe that's how you're coming at this. It's like what, you know, it was fascinating because they're both oil and water to each other a little two and the older two. So that that's fascinating to see how they made that agreement to do that this round.
Laura: I have a story of a moment of this with my oldest daughter. So swimming lessons, she spent two years in swimming lessons when I knew full well that she couldn’t swim without ever leaving the wall or leaving her instructor's arms. When she was older, she was five during this, you know, so she, between four and almost 6.
Two years of swimming lessons, clinging, scared, unwilling to do what the other kids are doing just but wanted to keep going. She wanted to go every week. She was strong, she has an athletic body, she's beautiful. I knew she could do it and then one day, her grandmother's pool and she just swam across the pool, she just was ready right when she was ready.
And so it, that watching the swimming lessons, like I'd sit on my hands not saying anything. I'm confident you'll do it when you're ready. If the teacher started to pressure her, remember she's going to do it when she's ready, you know, like really holding that boundary of she will bloom when she's dang well ready to. She will and that's her personality. If there's an ounce of pressure, she won't do it. And when she was ready she swam across, I mean, she's a beautiful swimmer now, you know.
Ryan: What a beautiful story. Yes, that is that it just shows you held that line for her knowing that she would get there and, you know, her personality that's really intuitive parenting. I think that's what we're speaking about is really clawing into the personality, the soul, the person and saying it doesn't have to look like this to be successful. Knowing this is part of her process and putting so much value on the process versus the end result.
And I think that's what I was speaking about the college and how that's shifting, you know, it was so about outside appearances. I think that's what a lot of our parents we grew up with do this because this is how it's done, this is how we do it. And we're more about process. How do you feel? What is your soul telling you to do? What's your guide? What's your inner guidance? How do you feel about this?
You know, I find that's something I've had to really work with my kids when they come and ask me for advice is just to push it right back. What is your take on it? How do you feel about it first? I get that read and then, you know, to put value on their own process through their own filter, their own perspective. And I think that's what we can just keep pushing, put that back in their court and then offer up. Yes, that makes sense. That you'd see it that way. I totally understand that. That's good reasoning right there. Yeah, absolutely.
But also how about this thing? You know? And so I think that these are just ways where our parents are. I'm thinking a little older than you, but our parents were like do it because I said, so do it because that's how we do it. That's how it's done. This is, you know, it's a lot of that
Laura: Or even so I was on the receiving end of a parent who is living through me and my sister. So those kind of those three things that we were talking about, you know the way our kids will reflect on us kind of looking out for their own well being or the living through, you know, those kind of three things that we've hit on here. I was on the receiving end of a living through parents. And so I mean I went to a college that had, did not have the major that I wanted, that I could go and have the career and profession that I wanted to be. And I'm, I like I'm doing this work, which is beautiful and a beautiful calling for myself. But I'm doing this work because my dad wanted me to go to a specific college that didn't happen to have my major and he convinced me to and I wanted to please him.
Ryan: Yes. Oh my gosh, what a huge healing you had. What was that moment where you decided to follow your own path?
Laura: Much later. So I wanted to be a marine biologist. I still fantasize about going back to grad school and doing that work or you know, but I didn't and there's a piece of accepting what is that's ongoing in my life.
Ryan: And how have you made peace with that parent? How does that show up today?
Laura: He has acknowledged some parts of that at various times and there's acceptance that he has deep wounds and fears about his own inadequacy and having his daughters go to a college that he wouldn't have been able to attend in his wildest dreams was his attempt to heal himself.
Ryan: Yes.
Laura: Misguided attempt, but it was still an attempt.
Ryan: Yes, yes, for sure. I get all that I really do. It's so amazing because I'm listening to you and you are so good at what you do. So that’s a part of me that's like thanking him and I had tears in my eyes right now. You have a very specific insight about how to, that's your gift. You know, that you're listening for that and other people.
And I'm guessing all your clients benefit from you helping them find their voice and pushing against a parent's projection and and I'm sure you're raising your children to make damn sure like you did with your daughter because of that, you know, correction that you're making that course correction through your parenting. I know I've done that too, inversion. So we try to make sure our kids have a different experience and that really speaks to who you are and your path.
Laura: You’re making me cry.
Ryan: No, it's true. My goodness.
Laura: But it's not easy. So because of that, you know, it's, I am so grateful I get to do what I do because in teaching every day I do my own work, you know, and doing this work, I do the work for myself. I don't know if you experience that, but it keeps the top of mind for me, you know, allows, it invites me to be conscious throughout my whole life. But it's not easy.
Like there are moments where like my dad's voice comes out of my mouth, There are moments where I'm stuck and attached in the way that he was and I see myself going that path. It is a conscious effort to undo and unlearn that so that I don't pass it to my kids. It's not easy.
Ryan: No, it's not, it really isn't. This is as real as it gets and I know everyone listening has that voice or a version of that voice that they arm wrestle with. You know, I know I do too.
Laura: So it's and there's this is the work. Yeah, it is the work, there's a piece of it too, that is the understanding that I'm going to do this work, that's my work and there will still be stuff that comes out the other side that our kids will have their work to do, that is just the nature of it. You know, there will be mistakes that I make, that they all need to work through as they become parents.
You know that it's just how it is and I think that a lot of people go into respectful and conscious parenting with this deep fear of I don't want to screw my kids up the way that my parents screwed me up. And of course you don't, but there's a piece of it again on this acceptance and of things as we do have to accept that they will have their life and their life will have ups and downs and have pain in it and they will have work to do just like we do.
Ryan: And the spiritual blueprint is that this, this is earth school and so we're here to work things out., So there's nothing wrong with working things out, right? And so like I truly believe that those souls, they choose the exact parent who's got that exact set of lessons and things that have to be overcome and you know, and your kids chose really well because their mom is totally committed to this path and this journey and you're transmuting on the ground in the moment that just takes a special level of commitment, you know.
Laura: I think that true to every, for everybody who's listening, everybody who's listening, your kids chose you for a reason and they chose well.
Ryan: Really well and you can't f*** it up. You can't and that's not just like a dismissive things to say, but I think if you're someone whose heart's in the right place and to say, I don't want to f my kids is a beautiful thing because somewhere there's a knowing that you're going to be, become another version of yourself growing up alongside them.
And so that's, if you keep coming back to that, you're winning. That's it. Every time you notice and you say, oh wow, there's my stuff, wow, look at me projecting. It's not about this idea of perfection. We're smashing that to the ground. It's over. It's just about, that can get messy and just knowing it's not them, it's you.
They're doing what they're doing; come back to you, come back to the feelings that this is bringing up in you and then come back to them and keep offering from that place of that willingness, that devotion, that self love. That's keep growing that out and you're doing everything you can possibly do.
Laura: That's where true, deep, authentic connection happens when we get all of our stuff out of the way so that we can see our kids clearly and see ourselves clearly and connect on this true self level. Beautiful. Thank you, Ryan, for that.
Ryan: Thank you. What a beautiful conversation we've had.
Laura: I so agree. Thank you so much for being here with lots of directions I wasn't expecting, but it was all beautiful and so necessary. Thank you so much, Ryan
Ryan: Same. Thank you.
Okay, so thanks for listening today. Remember to subscribe to the podcast and if it was helpful, leave me a review that really helps others find the podcast and join us in this really important work of creating a parenthood that we don't have to escape from and creating a childhood for our kids that they don't have to recover from.
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All right. That's it for me today. I hope that you keep taking really good care of your kids and your family and each other and most importantly of yourself. And just to remember, balance is a verb and you're already doing it. You've got this!