This Is How We Rise with Nika Lawrie

How To Be A Conscious Parent Even During Difficult Times with Dr. Robert Saul

• Nika Lawrie, Robert Saul • Season 2022 • Episode 29

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This week Dr. Robert Saul (Bob) shares insight into how to be a Conscious Parent. He explains how we as parents can learn on the job and build strong, healthy relationships with our children, even during difficult struggles. He also gives some tips on how to raise our children to be good citizens. 

ABOUT THE GUEST:
Dr. Bob Saul has been guiding the physical, behavioral, and mental care of children for over 40 years. His Parental Awareness Threshold is a simple framework to actively parent with self-awareness, empathy, and compassion where children learn to build nurturing relationships as well as exhibit love and respect for others.

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*This podcast and its contents are for informational purposes only and are not intended to replace professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always consult your physician or a qualified health provider for any questions concerning a medical condition or health objectives. Additionally, the advice and strategies contained herein may not be suitable for every individual and are not guaranteed for business, personal, financial, or wellness success. Use discretion and seek professional counsel when necessary.

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Speaker 1:

Welcome to the Inspired with Nika Laurie podcast. Bob, welcome to the show. I'm so grateful to have you here today. How are you?

Speaker 2:

Thank you, it's my pleasure to be here.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, so you are now retired from a clinical practice in pediatrics, but you are still very passionate and very connected in the community. Can you give me a little bit about your story, share about your story, your backstory and really what's driving that passion to stay involved now?

Speaker 2:

Well, it's been an interesting journey, one that I would not have anticipated. But I finished my pediatric training in 1979 and then decided to also do medical genetics training, so, and then moved to South Carolina. So here I was, a young, idealistic physician, wanted to be the best I could be in every way possible and jumped in and was working hard. I could be in every way possible and jumped in and was working hard, but after about 14 years I felt like I wasn't paying back to the community. That is, I was sort of thriving in the community, but was I using my pulpit as a physician to really pay back to the community? And I didn't think so. So I started to try to look and see what other things were out there and at the same time I heard, went to a talk where somebody told 12 words that have had a profound impact on me For anything that happens in our community your community, my community, our community we need to think of that. I am the problem, I am the solution, I am the resource.

Speaker 1:

I saw that. Yeah, can you explain that a little bit too?

Speaker 2:

Well for me. So it's not. I need to take ownership in things and I need to understand that it's not their teenage pregnancy problem, it's not their drug problem, it's not their homelessness problem. It needs to be my problem if we're going to work together to make a difference. So I need to be the problem, I need to be the solution. And to be the solution, I need to devote my resources to it and, in point of fact, you can change the pronoun, and it should be. We are the problem, we are the solution, we are the resource.

Speaker 1:

I love that yeah.

Speaker 2:

So I heard those 12 words and I sort of said, oh my gosh, that really is. That's very profound what. But what am I going to do? And I had a tough time internalizing the message. It actually took me several months. And then I went to the community leaders and I said put me in, I'm ready, I'm ready to do some work. And I got involved and I was maybe even smugly proud of my work. And then, april 20, 1999, two teenagers walk into a high school in Littleton Colorado, massacre 13 people and kill themselves. I was profoundly shaken.

Speaker 1:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

That happened in my community and the answer was yes. What have I done to make a difference? And the answer was not enough.

Speaker 1:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

So I started. I put pencil to paper, which we did, but you used to do back then. I still do this day. So I started. I put pencil to paper, which we did used to do back then.

Speaker 1:

I still do this day.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, and wrote an op ed article to the local newspaper about what we could do as our community to make a difference and what I called the five steps to community improvement, and over the next 12, 13 years wrote over 160 op-ed articles to the local newspaper about that. And so that started my journey going forward. Yeah, so it's been almost a 30-year journey.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I remember when I heard about the, the Columbine shooting, and I I at that time was in high school and I was just about graduating from a high school and Columbine happened and it's it's like nine, 11. For me it's one of those moments where you know exactly where you are. When you heard about it, I can visualize everything and and the impact that it had on me and unfortunately, there continues to be so many more of those. But I just remember how big of an impact that made in my life in the sense of how I felt security-wise. It's made a big impact about the decisions I've made about my daughter and where I put her into school and what that looks like. And it's, it's, you know, it's. It was such an a powerful moment for so many of us that I I kind of relate to you in the sense of how do we make change, how are we inspired to make this better, and so I commend you for for taking the steps to do something to help the community and improve it.

Speaker 2:

Well, and at the end of this journey, of all these op-ed articles, that was my first book. It was entitled my Children's Children Raising Young Citizens in the Age of Columbine. But those five steps are sort of what got me to that and I'd be glad to go over those with you if you'd like me to.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I would love to know about the five steps.

Speaker 2:

And again you could come up with your own five steps, I guess, but these are mine and I'm going to stick with them.

Speaker 2:

It's a good place for all of us to start, so yeah, First one is learn to be the best parent you could be and I chose those words carefully because parenting is a lifelong learning journey, so you're always learning. You know, two steps forward, one step back in this parenting journey and learning to be the best parents you could be. Not everyone has the same abilities, Not everyone has the same circumstances. So early in my career I found myself sometimes as a pediatrician, sometimes telling people what I thought they should be doing.

Speaker 1:

And.

Speaker 2:

I now realize it's taken me my whole career that my job is not to tell people but to enable them, to empower them, and sometimes I have to gently peek behind the curtain and see what I can do to see the situation and provide the best information possible for them. So learn to be the best parents you could be, get involved and that there's so many different ways one can get involved in their community. I don't want to say this is better than that, and it can be big, it can be little. Every part of involvement is important. The third step is it might sound odd, but it's be big, it can be little. Every part of involvement is important. The third step is it might sound odd, but it's stay involved. Sometimes it's easy to get involved, but it's tough to stay involved.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, that burnout comes sometimes.

Speaker 2:

And so you have to be willing to change your focus, I think, at times. The fourth step, I think, is the most intuitive and the most obvious, but it seems to be the most difficult in today's society Love for others. In this very divisive society where we're name calling and can't have a rational discourse. At times it's very difficult. And the fifth step and this has been the most important one for me is learning forgiveness learning how to forgive myself, learning how to forgive others and learning how to move on. And so I think those five steps together are can make a difference, because what I, as I was along this journey, what I felt like we've lost track of, is citizenship.

Speaker 1:

Yes.

Speaker 2:

Is that we're, if it's. Citizens care for each other. Citizens care about each other. Citizens care for each other, and to do that, you have to exercise these five steps and learn to be a good citizen. And that's, to me, what parenting is about. Parent parenting is raising your children to be good citizens. Absolutely Well, go ahead. I'm sorry.

Speaker 1:

No, no, no, you go ahead, go ahead.

Speaker 2:

Well, I remember my parents divorced when I was young and I remember my mother saying, Bob, I just want you to be happy, I just want you to be happy. And I could have easily just pursued that in a very, you know, selfish way. Fortunately for me, my mother set the good example of what I should be doing. But I think and this is simplistic, but I think what we really should be pursuing in terms of parenting is raising our children to be good citizens. Happiness is a secondary, blissful side effect of that, you know. I mean, we're happy when we when our you know your child was happy at Christmas. We're happy when we get that new car, but that's not, that's not the happiness I'm talking about.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, absolutely, I think so much of when you become a parent, you have this naturally born guilt that comes kind of instantly, especially as a mom. The moment you find out you're pregnant, you already feel guilty, like you've messed up your kid before the kid's even really developed and born. So that's kind of a funny thing, and so we spend so much time trying to find our happiness in pleasing our children, opposed to really just raising our children, and so I think learning that dynamic is really important, especially as a new parent.

Speaker 2:

Absolutely.

Speaker 1:

Yeah. So I wanted to ask you because before we started recording today via email we were talking about conscious parenting and I know that's a big thing for you Can you share kind of some insight into what conscious parenting is and why it's something we, as parents should consider?

Speaker 2:

Well, conscious parenting for me has been a logical progression of all this work that I've done with the, the, the, my children's children, and then citizenship and trying to figure out how to get that message to parents. I have to back up for just a second. I made a late career change about nine years ago, and when I did that I had to take a leadership course and I must admit I rolled my eyes. Do I have to do this again? But I must admit I'm much better for it. And what they talked about that and I'm simplifying again is they talked about conscious leadership and conscious leaders.

Speaker 2:

Think of when you're open, you're receptive and you're ready to learn, you're a conscious leader. When you're closed, you're defensive and you're always right. You're unconscious and there's a line there. And when you're above the line, you're conscious. When you're below the line, you're unconscious, you're defensive, you're always right. The whole point about conscious lead up is just to be conscious of where you are. You can be below the line and just then say, oh golly, gee, I'm down here and I need to make a change, or I want to stay here for the rest of this meeting.

Speaker 2:

For example, we've all been in that three o'clock meeting where we roll our eyes and say when is this thing going to be over?

Speaker 2:

We're talking to ourselves and if you recognize that, then you're now conscious of where you are and you can make it, hopefully, can make a change and be more engaged and be more understanding. Or you can just say I'm just going to stay here until the meeting's over at four and then I'm going to make a change, so conscious. And so I think the same principle I think applies to parenting, and I talk about the parental awareness threshold. When you're above the parental awareness threshold, you're open, you're receptive, you're ready to learn. When you're below it, you're closed, you're defensive. Because I said so, because I'm the parent, um, and we need to be need to be willing in the moment to sort of analyze where we are with a conscious awareness of that, and then in retrospect, because we're going to make some bonehead decisions along along the way, and so we need to say, well, you know, that didn't go well, how can I make a difference next time?

Speaker 2:

yeah, yeah and so that's so. Conscious parenting is sort of a conscious awareness, one of where you are as a parent and that can change minute by minute, hour by hour, day by day. The same situation. You might have a very different response because of something that happened in your family, something that happened with your spouse, something that happened with your child, something that happened just because of a meeting. You might be tense, you might be a variety of things. You need to be conscious of where you are and you need to be conscious of where you are and you need to be conscious of where your child is. Elders go through this developmental stages and you cannot expect the same thing out of a one-year-old or a six-year-old or a 16-year-old. You need to sort of understand consciously where they are and how you anticipate their responses to be.

Speaker 1:

Mm-hmm, I think you know that for me really speaks to me One the podcast is called Conscious Living and for me it's really about trying to make conscious decisions about all the parts of your life, and I tend to focus on health and sustainability, but it really plays into so many parts of our life, Like parenting is a perfect example, and I know for me becoming a mother and growing with my child through this child rearing process, I really had to understand that there was a time and place for me to be an authority and then there was a time and place for me to be kind of a guider for her, someone to kind of just point her in her own direction and really to understand that she is her own little person and she needs to make her own decisions and she needs to kind of find her pathway, you know, still keeping her safe and protected along the way, but really understanding what that, where those lines were for, not, you know, controlling too much and expecting her to do everything I want her to do all the time and then giving her space to grow and become her own, her own self, if that makes sense.

Speaker 2:

You see, you're doing step number one. You're learning to be the best parent you could be. You're, you're learning the, the situations, situations where you can and can't do things. Yeah, and as you become more and more adept at that, you can anticipate certain situations. I mean, a lot of times, parents would come to me how do I prevent a temper tantrum? How do I do this, how do I do this, how do I do that? Well, I think the savvy parent oftentimes anticipates what's going to happen and heads it off at the pass. And a lot of some parenting experts will say well, that's coddling the children. You need that. You're the parent, you need to do this and they need to learn how to do that. Learn how to do that. Well, I think lines in the sand need to be very carefully drawn. Yeah, and because you just need to, as you've learned and you will continue to learn, especially as your child becomes an adolescent, you need to pick your battles.

Speaker 2:

Yeah absolutely as your mother did with you.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, yeah, and I do with my daughter. Yeah, it's definitely pick my battles there's. Sometimes it's just not even worth it. But I want to ask because society kind of thinks that parenting should just be this innate thing that's built into us and I think there are some aspects of it. Some aspects are we just know kind of how to keep the child alive in a sense, but I think so much of it is learned, it's so much of a practice skill that you do as the child is growing. What are your thoughts about, you know, this innate thing that we should be born with or maybe it's born when the child is born versus a skill set that's learned and practiced over time?

Speaker 2:

I don't think parenting in today's complex technologic society is an innate ability. Biologically, some of the things are innate in terms of our desire to protect and feed and nurture, but there's so many complexities in today's society. There's so much interdependence. If a blizzard comes to Albuquerque, where you are, all of a sudden, you're very dependent on the outside world If you hadn't done things, and that ties in very much to your ability to parent. So you have to anticipate and learn various things about your child and how you can appropriately nurture them. So I do not think it's innate. I think it requires a lot of practice. I think it requires a lot of learning.

Speaker 2:

I think that's why parenting is a lifelong learning process. You have to be constantly taking in information and processing it, learning it and altering your own responses. An example would be discipline. A lot of people will say when I was bad, my daddy gave me a good whipping and everything and I really learned a lesson. Well, we now know that that's not a good idea, that the overwhelming majority of significant percentage of children that suffer from physical punishment express that as they get older. Yeah, so the whole point of discipline, the root word of discipline is disciple, which means to teach, of discipline is disciple, which means to teach. So the hope in terms of we should be teaching ourselves child development and we should be teaching our children different situations and how to respond in different situations.

Speaker 1:

Absolutely. Can I maybe give kind of a hypothetical example here, because you mentioned earlier about kind of people with coming to you with like kids are throwing temper tantrums and nowadays we see a lot of kids that are kind of hyperactive or I feel like ADA, add and ADHD are, you know, kind of diagnosed all the time. Now I'm not sure that's always needed, but I think you know it's such a prevalent thing and I see so many parents struggling with it. I want to get your thoughts on kind of how do we teach kids that are maybe struggling with this some coping skills, or are there things that we can do differently as parents to help kind of mitigate some of the temper tantrums or help with the discipline issues or kind of help stop the trigger for those temper tantrums or anger, if that makes sense?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, a lot of it depends on the age. Let me go through a couple ages with you. Say that two-year-old with the temper tantrum. Most of the time the root of a temper tantrum is the child wants to change your behavior. You are not doing what the child wants them to do, right?

Speaker 1:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

So over time, you need to take away that audience. That is so long as the child's not hurting themselves or hurting something else in the room. It's okay to walk away in a loving way, not in a hateful way. Yeah, that it's not. I hate what you're doing. I hate you. Until you learn how to do this, I'm going to walk away.

Speaker 1:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

You need to say I really don't think what's happening right now is good, and so mommy's going to walk out. No, you need to say I really don't think what's happening right now is good, and so mommy's going to walk out of the room and as soon as you quiet down, I'll come back and we can continue doing something. Now, that's easy for me to say as a pediatrician, but if you are consistent with that, over time it does get better. Now I went through that myself as a parent, and there were times where I literally had to hold my child and restrain him between my knees until he could quiet down.

Speaker 1:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

Because I worried about him hurting himself or hurting something else. But so long as you stay calm, stay quiet and respectful of your child, remember you never hate your child. Respectful of your child, remember you never hate your child. You might dislike their behavior, but you hate them, so you have to be careful of your words and your actions. So, for temper tantrums, you really sort of have to anticipate and if you know, every time I do this the child goes into a temper tantrum, well then you need to be creative. You need to figure out a way not to get into that situation. I now have a one-year-old granddaughter and my son was telling me you know, if she doesn't get her nap, if she doesn't get this, you know it's really family meltdown time at night. And I said, well, that's a message there.

Speaker 2:

You need to figure out how to rearrange the schedule as best you can, the six-year-old that seems to be in and out, just hyper and running in and out and sort of uncontrollable. As a pediatrician, I do think there is such a thing as ADHD. I do think it's overdiagnosed. I do think it's overdiagnosed. I do think there's probably a biologic basis to it, given some of the changes in our environment these days. But how do you? But that's the question is how do you deal with the behavior? No-transcript, don't take him to the grocery store. Do not put him in a situation where you know he's going to fail. So you have to be creative. Do not put your child in a position where you know they're going to fail, as best you can.

Speaker 1:

What do we do for? I understand not taking him to the grocery store, but in the sense of what? If they're struggling at school, you have to send them to school, but you don't have control over those dynamics. Are there things that we can structure, maybe things we can put in place? Is there diet and lifestyle habits we can change? What are things in that sense?

Speaker 2:

Well, I think a good, healthy diet obviously is important. I'm not convinced personally, but some other folks I'm sure would disagree with me that just sugar causes hyperness. But a good, healthy diet. And then lifestyle is very important, obviously adequate sleep, making sure they're in bed at a good time and getting up and having a nutritious breakfast. So, yes, you're right, those are very important. But then in terms of going to school, remember, that's where children really need a good evaluation with their pediatrician or their physician, because there might be other things that are going on. I mean, might they have a learning disability, might they not be responding in school, because a certain aspect of learning is very difficult. So to do that, it's just easier for them to act out. And I'm convinced that if I was growing up in today's world, I would have been diagnosed as ADHD, but fortunately I was able to channel it in the right way.

Speaker 1:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

I spent a lot of time in my grade school years out in the hallway.

Speaker 1:

I guess we don't send children to the hallway anymore. I don't think it's as much yeah.

Speaker 2:

But I think it's very important that we sort of look at the dynamic and so, yes, diet, yes, lifestyle, and those are very important and then work hard with the child at home. I mean, if you have this child that you know has all this pent-up energy, and when they come home, let them have that hour and a half of just being their normal crazy self instead of no, we're going to sit down and get this done before supper, because I know after supper it's not going to work. Well, each child is going to be different, so you're going to have to look at it. But it really requires a very introspective look in the family and then some professional advice in terms of how to structure things. And since each child is different, I hate to give a global answer.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, that totally makes sense. And what about the power struggle in the sense of you mentioned a little bit of? You know, if they're throwing the temper tantrum, you can kind of walk away and avoid that being the audience for them. But as they get older especially, you know, we see, you know six-year-olds, 10-year-olds and then into teens we see a lot of those power struggles. Are there ways that we can avoid that as a parent?

Speaker 2:

Well, I don't think you're going to avoid it, you're going to try to mediate it that's right. Okay, totally makes sense much like, much like you're not going to be able to avoid disagreements with your spouse. Yeah, hopefully you mediate them in an appropriate fashion. Yeah, um, so I think it's important that when you have those, those, those disagreements in the power struggles, that you acknowledge them for what they are. Uh, understand, I understand that you know you think that this is the most appropriate way to do this.

Speaker 2:

Uh, as your parent, I don't and here's why Um and don't, and again, don't get into the yelling and try to avoid, because I said so and because I'm the parent I mean I'm. I've certainly fallen into that trap many times.

Speaker 1:

I think we all do sometimes yeah.

Speaker 2:

As a as a go-to response. I don't think it's the it's the right response. I think you have to try to reason now. You know. I'd say you know this is the 10th time I've tried to reason with them on this one and the answer is yes. It'll probably take another 10 times. So that's where you have to keep your cool. And when the teen years hit, some of those power struggles are, and even in younger years some of those power struggles can be mitigated with privileges. You know, the ability for you to participate in this or even to drive a car is a privilege.

Speaker 1:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

And it's a significant privilege, and so to do that. These are the behaviors that are expected and we will be watching these, and I'm not doing it because I'm mean or because everyone else's parents let them do it and you can't. This is, this is the way our family does things and I want to be sure that you understand how we're, how we're doing this. Again, those are easy for me to say, and I've been. I've been there tearing my hair out in this situation, but I've tried to try to keep my calm and go forward.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, absolutely. Do you think you kind of gave the example of these are privileges. So in the sense of maybe positive parenting, in the sense of giving kids an award to work towards, opposed to taking away and a punishment when they do something wrong, do you feel like having kids work towards gaining something is a better approach to parenting? In that sense.

Speaker 2:

Oh, absolutely. I think again. Sometimes in our busy world I think it's hard to do to think proactively in terms of what, how can I, what's my end game in terms of my child's behavior and what award can I set for doing that? If you clean your room every other day, for the next week we get to go to Gary Queen or whatever. I think those are the kinds of things that make good sense. You just have to sort of make sure that you continue to keep the rewards proportional.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, yeah, I know I started a. We have a what we call the pom-pom jar and it's these little, you know, it's those craft pom-poms, those little fuzzy ball things, and we just have a little Mason jar and and the pom-poms come in different sizes and so if my daughter cleans her room, she gets a big pom-pom. If she puts her dirty clothes in the laundry basket or something, she gets a little pom-pom, and when the jar is full she gets to do something fun. We go to the store and buy a prize or we go get ice cream or whatever it is, and ever since I've implemented it was game-changing, it was the greatest little experiment we did and it just totally changed our relationship and her approach to daily activities. And so I was curious about your thought about it, because I know it worked really well for me.

Speaker 2:

The one thing I would emphasize, also in terms of parenting, related to this is forgiveness. When parents goof up, we need to ask for forgiveness, we need to extend an apology. I'll give you a little example. I think my son was about seven or eight. My youngest son was about seven or eight. One night he did something that really got on my nerves and I yelled at him. He just turned into a puddle. My wife got mad at me for yelling and we went into that family meltdown mode where nobody talks and just walks by each other.

Speaker 2:

I'm sure that that's never happened at your house.

Speaker 1:

Never.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, yeah. So later that night we went down to we always laid down with them for nighttime to read books and I lay as I laid down. I said son, I'm so sorry, I think you did something that was wrong, but dad's response was completely inappropriate and I want to ask for your forgiveness, I want to apologize. And he said dad, would you be quiet? I said why? He said I hate it when you're nice.

Speaker 2:

So I'd like to think even back then that I was learning some of this conscious parenting. Back then that forgiveness is so important, for we need to forgive ourselves sometimes because we feel like you said you feel very guilty as a parent. You're screwed. You screwed up during pregnant. You know when, when your child was in utero, you screwed up because you ate broccoli or something or and so. And now, as a parent, you make this little thing and your child melts and you're oh, I did that wrong. What am I going to do? And so oftentimes you have to forgive yourself and move forward. But the best thing about conscious parenting, I think, is three steps Whenever you're in a situation pause, assess and choose. So don't do that knee-jerk reaction yeah and assess the situation and choose.

Speaker 2:

You might choose wrongly, you might choose a wrong response, but that's where retrospective analysis can help you. You know, I really goofed up on that yeah and in the book I use an example.

Speaker 2:

mom picks up her child after school. They go by the drive-through at the fast food to get a drink and mom hands it back and says don't spill this. And sure enough, two blocks away mom. Well, so your immediate reactions and you pull over and start cleaning it up. Pause. It could have been that maybe that turn you took knocked her book bag into the drink and that's what caused it so directly. It might've been your fault versus the child's fault Right?

Speaker 2:

I've actually had that exact situation happen before, so yes, so pause, assess, take a deep breath and then choose what's the way to do it and even if it was the child's negligence. The important thing is to do it still in a loving way.

Speaker 1:

Absolutely yeah. So I want to ask we think about raising our children to be good members of society, being kind and loving, successful, those kinds of things. But I want your opinion. What is the actual goal of parenting? Is it just happiness in our children, what you know? What is kind of the end goal there?

Speaker 2:

I think it's to be to raise your children to be good citizens and and have empathy, and empathy is I just read a book recently that talked about what you and I think of as empathy is trying to be able to put ourselves in somebody else's shoes and understand and care about their situation. I heard a concept called radical empathy that I really liked. It's not just understanding but actually actively trying to learn what their situation was like. So I liked that concept of radical empathy, and radical empathy and citizenship go together. Happiness to me, is a secondary effect, and happiness again is not that in the moment. Joy, it's that soulful love that we have for others.

Speaker 1:

Absolutely so. How do we raise our children to be good citizens? Are there things that we can start implementing now to help them kind of figure that out as they grow?

Speaker 2:

Well, going back to the five steps, as the parent learning to be the best parent you could be, number two is getting involved, being that example, whether that's a Girl Scout troop or soup kitchen, or working at your church and bringing your child along, there's a variety of different ways Sustaining involvement in exhibiting on an active basis what it means to practice love for others and actively pursuing forgiveness. And forgiveness is not just personal. Forgiveness should also be communal. For example, the American Medical Association years ago did not allow black physicians in.

Speaker 1:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

They recognized that error, they changed it, and they could have just blissfully gone along and not done anything. About 15 years ago they published an article and said we were wrong.

Speaker 1:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

Now the folks that wrote that did not do that. They could have said it wasn't me, but it was us. Yeah, and we need to practice communal forgiveness and it helps us reset our moral compass going forward. So in a community, we need to help try to help our fellow citizens understand how we need to practice forgiveness, not just personally, but as on a community basis.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I mean, I love that. I think it's so I don't know if underutilized is the right way to say that but I think we are so busy in our day-to-day activities and we're so, even if it's not intentionally. We're self-absorbed in the sense of what's going on in our life and what's going on in our homes and with our family and our children, and so few of us take the time to really think about the impacts that society has had on other groups, what things have caused things know, things that we've done as Americans and I'm doing air quotes around Americans how that's affected other countries, how there are countries that continue to be third world countries because of the decisions we as quote unquote Americans have made, even if it wasn't us or myself making those decisions. You know we're part of this bigger community and and we all need to take a little bit of responsibility for all of those decisions in order to help one prevent those things from happening again in the future, but to help heal the wounds that we may have caused.

Speaker 2:

We are the problem, we are the solution, we are the resource.

Speaker 1:

Absolutely. I love that. So I have one more question for you before we get to the quick fire questions. But I just want to say that I am so grateful for this time because I think these tools and information is so powerful and so empowering to parents listening, I think you know we are just expected to figure it out and do it all on our own and you know the reality is most of us kind of have no clue, we're just figuring it out as we go. So I'm always so grateful to speak to someone like you and for the work that you do to help all of us be better parents along the journey. So thank you, I appreciate that.

Speaker 1:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

Well, if you haven't seen, you need to listen to the opening number to Dear Evan Hansen Talks about does anybody have a map and has these two mothers lamenting about raising their teenagers?

Speaker 1:

I love that you said that, because that's actually my last question for you in the sense of this conversation, but I wanted to know. You talk about parenting being a journey, and are there any signposts or maps or tools that you can discuss, that you've discovered along the way that we can use?

Speaker 2:

Conscious parenting, love it. In the in the book I try to provide those, the traits that as parents, we need to be looking at. That are specifically sort of parenting traits, citizenship, conscious awareness, always be on this learning journey and understanding how your children are developing, because that will change and understanding where you are in the situation you know again, you might have been working all day and come home and see the situation that everyone else sees is very benign, but you blew up because of the situation at work, the ability to think okay, was that because of me or was that the situation or was it both? But it was 75% me, 25%. And so that conscious awareness is so important and using that. It's obviously in parenting, but in everything in our lives.

Speaker 1:

Absolutely Well, bob, I want to say thank you. I have a couple of quick fire questions for you, if you're ready, but before I get to those, where can people find you online? Where can they find your books and get access to Conscious Parenting and your other books as well?

Speaker 2:

My website is mychildrenschildrenaltogethercom mychildrenschildrencom and that has the now four books that I have out and it has a blog that I put out on a regular basis and it has to contact me on that website if they want to.

Speaker 1:

Perfect, and I'll be sure to link to those in the show notes too, just to make it as easy as possible, so you're ready for the quick fire questions.

Speaker 2:

Sure.

Speaker 1:

Okay, what is your most impactful either podcast, book or television show and why?

Speaker 2:

and why Can I say a Broadway play?

Speaker 1:

Yeah, absolutely.

Speaker 2:

Dear Evan Hansen.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I haven't seen it, so I'm dying to see it.

Speaker 2:

It goes through the angst of adolescence, but it also goes through the angst of parenting and just had a profound message to me.

Speaker 1:

Perfect, I'll have to check it out and I'll see if I can find the little intro, too, to share as well. So what is your most important or useful eco-friendly or non-toxic living tip?

Speaker 2:

Ooh, I don't know that. I ever considered that. I mean, we're very much into recycling in our family and I just commented the other day, because we have two trash bins the recycle bin and the trash bin we now have more recycle stuff than we ever had trash.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I had to buy a bigger bin for my recycling.

Speaker 2:

So, yeah, I'm very proud of that than we ever had trash. Yeah, I had to buy a bigger bin for my recycling.

Speaker 1:

So, yeah, I'm very proud of that Recycling only comes every other week and it's stuffed to the brim when they come. Oh good, Well, that's a good thing. It's a shame that they only come every other week, but it's good that it's packed. Okay, my last question for you what does conscious living mean to you?

Speaker 2:

It means being aware of who we are, what we are and how we interact with others in a very empathic way. I love that and practicing forgiveness.

Speaker 1:

Absolutely that forgiveness. I think it's so, so important. Yes, I totally agree. Well, bob, this has been fantastic. I'm so grateful for the opportunity. Thank you so much for coming on the show.

Speaker 2:

Oh, it's been my pleasure. I really enjoyed it, thank you. Thank you so much.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, thank you.

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Nika Lawrie

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