MOM BURNOUT GOT YOU FEELING LIKE A FAILURE? Match Expectations to Reality

0:00 - Like so many people around the world, you might be stuck or safe at home right now with young children. You are in the same boat or similar boat to many other people out there. If you're feeling like you're swimming under water, like you're drowning, like you don't know how to manage this crazy change in what's always been your reality, then I have a message of hope for you and hopefully something practical that you can put into place right now.

0:29 I can only imagine some of the things that you might be struggling with. You might be struggling with great anxiety over the future. When is all these gonna end? What will the world look like when it does end? How am I going to get back on my feet emotionally, financially, physically? You might be struggling with just getting through the day or really feeling like you're showing up as the worst version of yourself. I bet you have found yourself with a shorter fuse.

0:57 Greater, closer to the edge right? Yelling more, maybe punishing, bribing more, and relying on screens a lot more than you're used to. If this is you then you are very much in good company. Millions of parents around the world struggle to get through this time with high doses of cabin fever and frustration, and a lot of screen reliance. We are all being pushed to our edges in various ways. I totally get it. What I'm hearing from my coaching clients is a great sense of failure.

1:31 Like "I'm failing as a parent during this time. "I'm failing my kids because it's all too much" "and just managing to get through the morning" "without yelling or without developing a big migraine" "is becoming near impossible." I hear that regularly daily from many, many people. And so if that's your situation, you're not alone. That is a normal reaction and unfortunately it's very, very, very common right now. We're all feeling like our back is pressed against the wall.

2:01 However, I am here to provide you with some hope and some actionable steps, and little bit of pumping you up, cheerleading you on, so that you can try to claim this time and reclaim this time, and make the most out of it right? Like I keep saying "making lemonade out of lemons". There are some very real silver linings and we're gonna explore those together. Just this week I was coaching a beloved Present Player, shoutout to Haley, who is at home with two tiny children.

2:31 A two year old and a one year old, and is pregnant with twins, and is facing all sorts of Corona related challenges. And we discussed this very concept that if we're holding on to the high expectations that we had of ourselves before we lost all of these resources right, before our level of resources changed, then we're going to feel like failures. We're going to feel like "I have all these expectations of how I planned my life," "and how I set a schedule, and how I'm productive" "throughout my day, or how clean my house should be," "or how much homeschooling I should do," "or how peacefully I should parent."

3:05 "You know I have all these expectations of myself" "and suddenly I'm not able to meet them" "and so the answer to that equation is that I'm a failure," "that I'm a disappointment." And I'm here to tell you that the answer to that equation is not that you're a failure. The answer to that equation is that the equation itself is wrong. If you have high expectations you have to meet them with high resources every day of the week.

3:29 There is no such thing as any project in this world that has high expectations and high yield, high results, that isn't resourced. The only reason that I'm able to show up here on Instagram, YouTube, blog, et cerea, all the places is because I am resourced right now. I have help in my home, I have help with my kids, I have help in my business, I have help with my content. I am resourced and I'm so grateful because that means I can continue to show up for you.

4:01 But if I didn't, you better believe I would be dropping my podcast like it's hot and my business would be on pause because I wouldn't be resourced for it. I wouldn't be able to continue. And so you have to realize there are lots of different types of resources right? There's money, there's time, there's the stuff that we know. But there's also the emotional resources right? There's our physical resources. How physically strong are we when we're sick?

4:26 That's a depletion of resources right? There's our focus and attention. When we are distracted by Coronavirus, and the media, and news about everything that's going on, our attention is depleted. That's less resources. When we have had added things to our plate, like suddenly we have to do all the daycare, or all the homeschooling, or all the household work, whatever it is, then that's depletion of our time and our physical energy. That's all fine, there's nothing wrong with it.

4:56 Nothing that I'm saying now is a judgment on those things. We just have to realize that they're true and adjust our level of expectations accordingly. So the answer to the equation is "I expect a lot of myself but "I am not meeting those expectations" isn't that then you are a failure. The answer to that equation is you need to adjust your expectations to your resources and they have to match every single time. And so, here's the plan.

5:23 I want you to really look around, look at yourself, take stock of what's going on. Notice where have my resources changed? Have I got less support, less time? More projects, more responsibilities? Do I have less friendship? Less social interaction obviously right? Maybe my partner isn't available. Maybe I don't have a partner. Maybe I have less income right now. Maybe I have less help around the home. Less community, less access to my, you know, to our grandparents.

5:53 All of that kind of thing. And then if you wanna increase, you know, that list to also include anything that's irking you emotionally right? "I'm worried about something." "I have concerns about the world in general" or about specific people's health, about my own health, et cetera. Those are all depletion to our resources. Depletion to focus, to time, to energy, to physical energy, to money, all of the resources that we have. When there's depletion there there must be a depletion of expectations.

6:23 So that means we lower our expectations. We really must do this now guys. I'm saying this in such, I wanna call you to action here. I want you to realize that if you wanna stay mentally strong, you have to do what I'm about to say. You have to realize that it might just be about getting through the day. It might just be about I fed my kids today. I put them to bed at certain point, great.

6:50 That's the level of expectation I can hold of myself right now. It might just be about increasing support in ways that you may not, might not usually see it as support. Like more screen time right. You don't usually see that as support but that is a resource you can rely on right now. It's a digital baby sitter that can help you if you need it right? And I'm particularly talking to those of us who feel like our back is against the wall.

7:14 When you feel like your back is against the wall and there's this general sense of complete overwhelm, of panic attack, of sinking into depression. We feel that helplessness and we feel like failures. And instead I'm saying no, you're not a failure. This is about adaptability, about resilience. It's about agility and it's about flexible thinking. Not getting rigid in our expectations. Not getting rigid in our identification with a specific parenting style like screen free, or like peaceful.

7:41 No, you know what? When you have no emotional resources left yes, you're going to yell. You're gonna have to forgive yourself for that and you're gonna have to rely on repair work as we all do. That is how this kind of thing works. That is how crisis works. That is how survival mode works. Lowering expectations also means that we don't have capacity for planning, for being all planned out for the week. We have capacity for simply putting one foot in front of the other.

8:10 For just getting through this moment, and now this moment, and now this moment. And I want you to focus your energy, if you're in survival mode, I want you to focus your energies on just the next task. "What's the next task?" "Getting lunch on the table." "Okay I can do that, I can get lunch on the table." "What's the next task?" "Sitting down and eating it with my kids, I can do that." "Gonna sit down and eat it with my kids."

8:32 I want you to take your mind off that huge picture of 'When is it gonna end?' and 'What will be of us?' and 'What will happen?' Take it right down. To align with taking the expectations down we're taking our focus right down to the small, to the doable, to the step by step by step. Take it right down to what's the next step. "What's the next most loving thing I can do?" "Okay I can out "Frozen" on for my kids."

8:58 "I can put them in bed" "I can run a warm bath" Just the next task, you can do it. And finally, when you're in that survival mode, you've got to celebrate every little success. If you managed to get lunch on the table, that's a huge success. If you managed to yell but not to hit, that's a success. If you managed to get up in the morning and change your clothes, that's a success. Focus on winning, on all those little wins.

9:28 You're not gonna win big right now. No one's gonna win big right now. When you're not resources, you can't win big. No big project, no thriving mom, no happy family is under resourced. And so when you're under resourced you match it with your expectations and you realize that you used to think winning was doing the Pinterest projects, or going on the incredible hikes, or homeschooling your kids with the beautiful Montessori materials. Now, winning is just about making it through the day without another major crisis.

9:59 Or about making it through a bad time without you breaking down in a massive tantrum. Or having the massive tantrum and then repairing it. That's winning. So focus on those wins. You will never succeed through this time with the mindset that you're failing, with the mindset that you're behind, with the mindset that you are, you know, not meeting your own expectations. But you will make it through this time strong with real, you know, joy actually, and real connection when you focus on all of the ways that you are winning.

10:32 On all of the ways that you are meeting. The appropriate expectations for the resources you currently have. We are holding a free 21 day challenge and each challenge stands on its own so it doesn't matter what point you join. They're all really quick and really easy. It's something that you can do while your kids are there. You can do it in less than five minutes usually and it's going to make a big impact. We specifically designed each and every challenge to have very low intensity, low demand on you, but very high yield in how it changes the day right?

11:05 The way your kids play, the way that you should feel, the way that you show up, your mindset, or the way that your home functions. So to jump on that challenge just go to TheParentingJunkie.com/challenge and you can sign up to get the emails or you can follow along on YouTube, on Instagram, on Facebook. It's all free. And at the end of the challenge I'm going to be opening the doors to Present Play. Now, you've probably heard of Present Play before.

11:31 We've got thousands of people on our wait list because it only opens one a year. But what I want you to know is that on a personal level it is surreal how relevant our work in Present Play has suddenly become to the entire world. Why? Because Present Play is performance coaching for parents who want to reclaim presence, peace, and play, for their families. It's all about getting our kids to play independently, designing our home in a way that supports that independent play, and getting ourselves into a great mindset, great feeling of self care, and flow, and time management, and all that good stuff.

12:11 Which is so important any day of the week but during Corona times it's just become heightened how very important that is. And so if you want a quick taste of the type of thing that's inside, join us for this free challenge. Everybody is welcomed and please just share it out with everyone you know who's stuck home with young kids. You know, the Coronavirus has spread throughout the world. It's time we spread some joy and love and something good to counterattack this virus and to bring up our levels of joy, and capacity, and strength, resilience, and creativity, to counter balance all of that anxiety and depression that everybody's experiencing.

12:50 So join the challenge, share it out with friends, www.TheParentingJunkie.com/challenge It's free, it's gonna be so much fun, and I can't wait to see your results.