Episode 207

Kyle Wester (33:25.324)
Have you ever had one of those really frustrating moments where you hear coming out of your mouth, the very thing that your parents would have said, like it almost sounds like their voice is coming out of you and you're speaking the same words they would have spoken, right? It might come in these ordinary moments where a door slams or your kid shuts down and won't talk to you, right? Or, okay, okay, okay, start over, take three, take three. Take three, here we go, listen.

Have you experienced those moments where like you hear your parents voice coming out of your mouth and you're saying like the exact same thing that your parents said to you and you said, I'm never going to say that. Right. And you know, you've read the books and you're, you're trying, but you're still reacting in these ways. And you're like, how do I change this? Right. And it's not about trying harder, but it's about actually understanding what is underneath all that.

It's about understanding your nervous system. It's about understanding your wiring, but you can change it. And today we are going to equip you with the knowledge and the skills to be able to play that long game, to change the generational patterns in your family. So if you haven't already take a moment before you listen to the podcast to rate, review, to comment. We'd love a good five-star review. We'd love to hear from you how this is impacting your life and your family. And so we really appreciate any feedback you can give us. And

Get ready to sit back and enjoy hearing about how to break the generational patterns that you want to change.

Kyle Wester (00:00.718)
Well, hello, welcome to the Art of Raising Humans. I'm Kyle. I'm Sarah. And you know, Sarah, I think all of us as parents hope to leave a better legacy, right? Like, I think in our hearts, we want to change. You know, we can look back at our childhood and go, I really like to do that differently. I hope our kids see the world different in this way, right? And sometimes people might call those generational patterns, right? Like things that were passed on to our parents from their parents and so on.

And it's sometimes we're not maybe as aware of them as we'd like to be but we do see them we're like, my gosh, like I'm doing the same thing that my parents did that I said to myself I would never do that thing. And like, how did I get trapped in this? right. So it's really, think it's at the core of every parent when they have kids, they're like, I wanna do things a little better. And so today we wanna talk about what it actually takes.

to break those generational patterns if that's what you're wanting to do, right? We're gonna talk about what keeps families stuck, what the brain is doing underneath, and what change looks like in ordinary moments, right? Because that's maybe where you're not looking for, but that's actually where the change starts to happen, okay? But let's hit upon, why is it so hard? You know, like I said, I think we start out going, I wanna do this better, but then before we know, we're like, my gosh, I'm doing the exact same thing. So how come it's so difficult?

And I think I just want to take a short little time out to say it's not even about like bashing the other generations. know, it's like we all recognize they gave us amazing, wonderful things and we're going to give our kids amazing, wonderful things. And then our kids will want to change some things that we do just like we want to change some things our parents did. And right. This is, I think each generation shows up and goes, okay, I want to tweak this. And so we're talking about like, okay, how do I do that? How do I tweak this thing?

because we've learned, we've grown, each generation is growing and learning, right? With more information and more skills, yeah. And then to speak to your point of why is it so hard? It's wired into us, you know? It starts even before we're born, this way of showing up and the patterns in life. Yeah. And those things get programmed into our brain. This is how you do this. This is just like, this is how I walk. This is how I eat. This is, it's not just those actual skills.

Kyle Wester (02:21.982)
It is how do I show up when someone's mad at me? How do I handle conflict? How do I handle sad moments? How do I, it's in every little area, your little tiny brain is going, okay, no, that's what we do. Okay, that's what we do. Yeah. Well, before we dive into that, I want to do a quick plug. This episode should be dropping on April 13th. And tonight we've got Tina Payne-Brice, an author of No Drama Discipline, Parenting from the Inside Out, The Whole Brainchild, Yada Yada, all these New York Times bestselling books.

will be in Tulsa tonight. So if you're listening on Monday, April 13th, she'll be at Riverfield tonight. I believe the timing is gonna be like six to seven 30, but you can look at Riverfield's information or on our social media to find out, cause she's gonna help you getting information as well on how to break these generational patterns. How to do things differently with your kids. Yeah, she's a brilliant speaker. So I just want to put a plug there. If you can go get there. She's never spoken in Oklahoma before and we were able to talk her into coming to Riverfield and doing this with

partnering up with them, very excited about it. So, but the reason why it's so hard, I know I've wrestled with this myself, Sarah, is first of all, it does seem like a character flaw. It's like, what is wrong with me? You know, I'm obviously not trying hard enough or I'm not reading enough books or doing enough because there's this dad I want to be, but there's this dad I continue to become when I'm reacting in moments, right? And you hear this kind of sadness, the shame, this disappointment in a lot of parents who are like, I wanted to be like this, but I keep

doing this. And really, we want to dispel some of that that isn't a character flaw, because patterns that live in the nervous system don't change just because we have good intentions. Just not how it works, right? Like the nervous system actually absorb the environment that you grew up in. Okay, so it's not just like a memory that you can look back on, but it's actually an automatic physiological response that is wired in you under stress. And that's why I know Sarah looks at me sometimes like

are you reacting that way? But to me it's like, because that's how I grew up. But like a child pushes a button, says something. mean, you guys, come on, if you're parent, there's something that kid says and all of you're like, I can't let them say that. Or you'll have this big reaction to it. And that's because there's this old pattern that's been wired deeply into your nervous system. And so it's not about weakness. It's not about a flaw. It's just about neuroscience. It's just about understanding.

Kyle Wester (04:48.172)
Yeah. Okay. It's just like your brain learned how to function in those moments. Yeah. And so it just like everything else, it goes right into that same. This is how we do it. Yeah. So let's talk about what generational patterns are Sarah. Okay. So they're not just the easy ones. Like you can see those with abuse. You can see those with addiction, right? those kinds of things are easy to spot, but most patterns are just pretty ordinary and kind of invisible. Now,

Since we do this for a living, we can see them lots of times. We'll see them not only in our family, but in other families that we're just observing. be like, oh yeah, that's interesting that they did that way just because we're curious. We'll just notice these things. But it could be like a quick escalation to yelling. It could be avoiding hard conversations, using shame or guilt even when you say you hate it and don't want yourself. that's a real, real easy common one. And another big one is just emotionally shutting down or becoming over controlling out of fear.

But these are not like conscious choices. Like you're not going like, I'm going to do this and like, bam, you do it. It's like, it's really just these habits that your nervous system has gotten into and they're just reacting to these moments. Okay. And so kids absorb how we regulate, how we react and how we repair. Okay. And, and I mean, in an opposite of that,

We've also built a lot of really wonderful habits. And we also give those to our kids. So in the same way, there's so many other things in life that you're doing and you just go through life and you're not even conscious of it and you're handing that beautiful thing off to your child. And they're also learning that same way. Maybe you're a great hostess. When people show up to your house, you're there and you're creating this delightful atmosphere and things.

you might not even consciously break that down for your child, but your child is watching and learning and then they grow up and they they're able to write repeat those same beautiful things. And so we do it here too, or where where when I make a mistake, I fill myself up with shame because that's how I do things. And so then when my child makes a mistake, I make sure they know to be full of shame. I look give them that look. Yeah, yeah. So it's so it's just those things that

Kyle Wester (07:04.182)
We just go along through life and we've learned them and we're repeating them. Well, what I think is interesting too, a lot of people will talk about, man, at work, I'm different. I'm not like this at work. Well, because that generational pattern wasn't happening at work. was happening. was a different atmosphere. It's a home. Yeah. As a kid, you weren't growing up at work. So lots of you come to work. Now, hopefully by the time you're at a job, your brain is fully formed and you might have some similar reactions, but it's really a different atmosphere. So it's different. So it's kind of interesting how they'll be like, I've heard from some dads.

who would just prefer to stay at work because they feel like they're just a better human being there than they are at home. They have an employee who messes up and they go to that. They'll say that. Yeah, I'm very patient. I think it's a learning process. then at home, it's... Yeah. And then they'll say that, I don't know why I can't do that with my own kid. Well, because it wasn't done to you as a kid, right? Okay. So let's break down the brain just a little bit. We want to get too technical. We're going talk about neuroscience. Let's talk about the brain stem. Okay. We're going to talk about these three basic parts, these basic stages of your brain.

the brain stem, that's your fight, flight or freeze part of your brain. Here, the brain learns through threat patterns. So it's all about the whole thing there that the brain's doing is just how do I keep myself safe? The limbic system is more where the emotional center of your brain is and it stores emotional memories there. Lots of times when I'm there, Sarah, I'm thinking, man, when I was a kid, we would never do it that way. And that's kind of like, when I was a kid, I was already doing this by this age and we'll have this kind of thought. The prefrontal cortex builds meaning

around relationships, right? Like we're all in this together. Okay, so of course it makes sense that you don't do it the same as me because you didn't grow up in my home. And it was like this understanding that we're building something different, okay? And so we're emphasizing that because we want to show you that's why it's so important to get to that prefrontal cortex if we want to be able to break these generational patterns, okay? Because what happens is this kind of brain, how they're interacting with each other, it becomes just automatic pathways. Like they just start firing.

before thinking, before the thinking brain can even catch up. Can you speak to that a bit? There's just these triggers. Your child does something, looks a certain way, talks back, spills their milk, whatever it might be. And your brain, because it's learned this thing, it does it automatically. And so you're there before you realize it. It has stored that memory in that, OK, if this happens, this is what we do.

Kyle Wester (09:24.428)
And we use that in lots of really beneficial ways, but in this case, it's not serving us anymore, but it still thinks that's how to function. Yeah, so think about those moments that are like that. What are things that you do that you get triggered about that your spouse doesn't? Literally think of it like a neural pathway that has been wired and wired and wired over repeated patterns, and that's why you default to that. But it doesn't mean you have to continue defaulting to that. You can create a new pathway.

I may give an example sometimes like this one makes sense to me if there's been conflict and as a kid you learn that it was just better to kind of hide away and shut down right because you don't want to get in trouble or something might have happened so you just think there's conflict I need to shut down that's not gonna be safe to engage it's gonna get bigger I'm gonna get punished so in that way when I was a child you know okay here's the pattern and my brain gets so good at that after years and years of doing that but then when I'm older

And now I don't want to keep doing that pattern, but it's still the same thing. Conflict arises. want to shut down. My brain shuts me down before I, it's not a conscious thought. Oh, what do I want to do right now? You know? And so when I see my children and there's conflict there, that same, that loop just goes on. When you're thinking, I mean, thinking like parents will talk about being a youngest kid and how they were bullied by an older kid. And then now when they watch their kids do it,

they freak out if the bigger kid does something because they, cause they be like, I need to protect that. I can't let that happen. You know, because you are reacting like you would have. You wish somebody would have done for you when you were a little kid, right? But you didn't have the power to do it, but now you are the big person, right? Okay. So let's talk about three reasons patterns are just really difficult to break. Cause you know, if you've tried it, it's like, it's, it's a two steps forward, three steps back. It seems like it's very hard to change it. Right.

So like you might even be saying to yourself I know better I mean I know but why do I still react this way? Okay. Well, first of all number one is when we're flooded we don't parent from our values So you actually might have a vision and a concept of how you would like to respond to a situation But you keep reacting because when you get flooded emotionally your nervous system Responds like as like a threat. Okay, so the thinking brain just goes offline under this type of stress

Kyle Wester (11:36.352)
and then your older, faster survival wiring will just take over, okay? So this isn't about being a hypocrite, you know? It's about just basically being dependent on this physiological state that happens in that situation. And this happens to everyone, including very connection-based parents, meaning us. So like, it happens to us too, all the time. daily, weekly, there's moments where we can spot that and be aware of it.

I mean, it's just there. have to realize if your nervous system is triggered, bam, all your goals and dreams are out the window and it's on autopilot. Yeah. And so you just have to go, okay, I flipped to autopilot. You know, it's the wiring that's there and it's so strong. That path is dug deep and it's really hard to get out of that path. We're going to get there though. Okay. So number two, implicit memory, not explicit memory, implicit memory, which means kind of the memory that's just stored in your body. It's the memories that formed. I mean, back

before you had language, this stuff was getting laid in your brain. It's yeah. So that memory runs faster than conscious thought. So those stored emotional experiences from childhood, that they end up having this like fast body based largely outside awareness, where it's just gonna like quickly happen without you even thinking about it before you know it, you're caught up into it. And you're like, how did I get here? Okay, because you're the child's behavior mirrors

something from your past, know, like something that they're doing, whether you're, you don't, you're not really aware of it, but it seems to be mimicking or mirroring something that happened to you. And the nervous system reacts before the thinking brain can register. You know what I'm thinking of Sarah, I'm thinking of that time when one time Abby was little and there was this moment where she was upset about some kind of clothes that she forgot to bring to do this event and like.

You were upstairs trying to empathize with her and I was just so sick of that. was getting annoyed with this. So I remember coming up and saying something like, oh my gosh, Abby, like it's not that big a deal. Like get over it and just get down. I remember just doing it. Came downstairs. My mom was there. My mom says, what was going on? I go, well, Abby, something happened with her clothes and like, and she was, my gosh, you would do the same thing. And I was like, what do you mean I'd do the same thing? She's like, oh, you would freak out if your clothes got wet or you didn't have the right clothes. Like, what would you say? I'd say, get over it. Like, that's not like, and she almost word for word said.

Kyle Wester (13:55.566)
what I had just said to her and I had no idea that that happened. I had no idea that my parents said that to me and that's why those words came out of my mouth. mean we've got to be curious as parents like why am I saying this? You're in the same, so you're not saying it, why am I saying it? Because somebody said it to me. That's where my brain goes, this makes sense for this moment. So implicit memory runs faster than your conscious thought. Number three, chronic stress

shrinks your window of tolerance. Okay. Speak to that, Sarah. Yeah, no, I love thinking about this, this one. It just really helps me whenever we have to realize that the more stress we're under, which I mean, hello world, we're under a lot of stress. There's so much going on. And when we're in those moments, which right now is probably most of us, it is harder. So we just have to recognize where we have this window of tolerance. So when you're in that window of tolerance,

you can, you know, things can come at you, you can kind of process and deal and cope and regulate. But when you increase stress, you can go into this much more, you know, reactive state or shut down state because you're outside now of that window. Yes. Okay. So now, as we're so the chronic stress is going to shrink that you just think about when you have more pressure, when there's more stimulation, when you have less support, you know, like, come on, you're on your own and the other

person's not there and it's just you and all the kids, you're gonna be more reactive, okay? Sustained stress over time narrows your range of calm responses. So I'm thinking of Sarah Day's when I was really anxious about work or I had a long to-do list I had to get done. I was definitely less living, I wasn't living out my values in those moments. It was all about just expediency and efficiency, So even well-resourced parents have less margin than they think.

and it's not weakness, it's just the load is genuinely heavy. So I I like it, I'm thinking like if I'm lifting a big weight, I'm just gonna be less patient, you know? And I've gotta realize that's what that is telling me is I'm not patient because I have too much on my shoulders. Okay, so these three things that we just mentioned will start kind of stacking on each other, okay? So let's talk about what actually keeps families stuck.

Kyle Wester (16:19.106)
Okay, so let's go through real quick what doesn't work. Most parents have already tried some of these, so listen closely. I bet you will find yourself in some of these, and I know we will too. So number one, fixing the kid's behavior before stabilizing your own nervous system. So basically, you're trying to fix the kid before you're taking care of your own dysregulated self. Yeah, same like the airplane thing, know, put on the mask first, on yourself first. You need the oxygen. You gotta make sure you're regulated in a good space.

Yeah, so you might be trying, I know you have, you've been trying, okay, I'm gonna try this new script that I was taught that Kyle and Sarah taught me. I'm gonna try this new set of consequences I heard about on Instagram or this new strategy. But I gotta tell you, no matter how well intentioned, when you're dysregulated, no strategy is gonna work consistently. Okay, so that's number one. Number two, expecting transformation faster than the brain rewires. What do we mean by that? Well, take like three good weeks,

stress hits and then old patterns fire feels like failure. It's normal. It's not failure. Okay, that's normal. Okay, we see this all the time when we're coaching parents is they'll be like, my god, things are great. Things are good. Like, I'll do my first parent coaching. Yes, which if you are saying, hey, we need some help. Reach out to me at Kyle at art of raising humans calm. And we'll see if you're a good fit for the program. But I'll talk to him Sarah in those first one or two meetings and they'll come back like

This is awesome. Like things are working out great. And I know I'm glad things are working out great, but I know some of that stuff is just this newness. It's like things are changing, but once we get back, like once stress hits, we're going to default back to that old generational pattern and then we're going to be ourselves. Yeah. Yeah. It's like a success line. no, I thought I was better. This is like,

when you're trying to eat better, you're trying to like, I'm gonna exercise and like, you let go for like every gym knows you're gonna get that gym membership. And typically a month or two in, you're gonna get busy and you're gonna stop going and then you're gonna be like, oh, I stink, I failed again. We wanna just build that new wiring so fast and switch tracks, know, like the little railroad just go on the other track, but it doesn't work that For some reason we don't seem to be wired that way. Yeah. So number three is shame.

Kyle Wester (18:32.94)
So when shame comes on, that's not gonna help you get unstuck, right? So shame is stuff like, I'm just like my parents or God, I'm just like my dad. As opposed to the growth would be my nervous system is learning something new. I just need to give it some time, right? So once you understand what you're actually trying to accomplish, you don't need to give into shame. Yeah, that shame will derail you. It's rough. Yeah, it will make it less motivational to try. Number four is stopping old patterns.

without building new ones. Okay. love this one. Okay. We'll speak more about it. Because so many times it's like we, we, we go, okay, I don't want to do that anymore. I want to do this, but we don't recognize that it took 18 years to build that other wiring that you're so efficient at. And so we can't just stop it. You have to have something to move into and you've got to build the thing you're moving into, you know? And so I love just thinking, okay, I I got to build that. I got to build that.

is you need something to go towards, not just stop at. I just got to throw in a sports metaphor. It's so true. It's kind of like a person who's playing basketball and their shot techniques are bad or quarterbacks. It'd be weird if he's like, this coach showed me a new way to do it and now I'm good at it. It's like, no, you have to practice it, practice it, practice it. And even you got to have some patience that in the middle of crunch time, when it's stressful in the game, you're probably going to shoot the way you used to. And you've got to, okay, okay, I did it for most of the game.

But in that moment, okay, okay, so I still got work to do, right? So it's always gonna be there, but that's really, really hard to change. Especially when you were a little kid, you learned how to shoot a basketball a certain way, it's difficult to change it. Any habit you're gonna build, know, I stay up too late, don't stay up too late, that wouldn't work. You would say, okay, I'm going to go to bed at this time, I'm going to read, I'm gonna shut down my screen, or I'm gonna listen to music, or.

whatever it might be, I think we know in other areas of life, we've got to build the thing we're moving into and that's gonna take a little bit. So you just gotta think if I'm gonna stop being so reactive to my child, I've gotta build the thing I'm moving into. Yes, like you're saying. So instead of saying I'm gonna stop yelling, I'm gonna start building emotional safety, right? I'm gonna start being a safe person. does that look like? What are my little steps and I'm gonna have to practice that to get really good and have that be my default instead.

Kyle Wester (20:51.052)
And I maybe already know this, but this might be a new insight to you. You cannot shame yourself into becoming the parent you want to be. It's just not going to work. So you can all day long tell yourself how you're not the parent you wish you were, but it's not going to help you change. connection before correction isn't soft. It's neurological. Okay. So you want to make sure that you're doing that as well. Like you're always connecting with the kid, in these moments to be able to change these patterns. and it's not.

being soft, it's not being easy. It's actually really, really hard. And it's gonna rewire your brain and then help wire your kid's brain to where they don't have these generational patterns inside their brain. So let's talk about how to actually break generational patterns so you can do that. So here's four practices. So get ready for four steps that Sarah and I intentionally do our best to do to break these as well and to create new legacies for our kids. And I know that's your heart if you're listening to this.

These four practices, they build simultaneously, not sequentially. So just think that in mind. So they're all kind of working together at the same time. Number one is regulate first before you respond. And that's important because a calm brain creates new pathways. A flooded brain reinforces old ones. You've got to buy yourself a few seconds before you actually respond. And something that could be really helpful, especially for me, I can be a loud person.

is lower your voice, slow down your movements, one breath, take one big breath to your stomach, and then your neurological signals will calm down, okay? They'll start to go, it's no longer an emergency. So this isn't some kind of like calming trick, this is really you're relaxing your nervous system, and I'm telling you, it will be a game changer for

I like to tell myself this is not an emergency. We heard that one a long time ago from Becky Bailey and that one just has really been meaningful to me to it helps me move into the take a breath, relax, calm down. Cause cause you do kind of feel like everything's an emergency. mean, like in a logical way, you know, it's not, but you're responding as if it were. And so just to remind myself, it's okay. I can take a few minutes to get to where I need to be. Sarah, I'll always remember this moment where I was talking to Abby and her.

Kyle Wester (23:10.702)
She was little Brennan was probably maybe two and he three three probably three or four he comes in the room and we were having kind of a tense conversation and Brennan pops in and Immediately I could tell like I was really annoyed that he came in the room and like Abby was telling him to do something I take something out of her room and he just like froze there you could tell he was frozen by the Intensity of the moment and in my brain. I'm like dude get out, know, I'm just thinking this Yeah, and as I'm looking at I'm like I'm thinking what is your problem? know, why are you not listening to what we're saying?

And I stopped and I did exactly what we're asking parents to do. I stopped. I actually smiled. I took a deep breath. And then I was like, that was weird. And Brennan goes, that was weird. And Abby was like, it was weird. You were just like staring at him and then you started smiling. I'm like, I know for a minute there, I thought you need to get out of this room. But now I'm kind of like, I'm kind of curious. How come you're in the room? What are you doing here? And then he came over. I gave him a hug and I asked him if it felt different. He said it did. I felt like

At first, you didn't like me, but when you smiled and then you talked to me in this calmer way, I felt like you loved me again. And I thought he articulated it so well that that's kind of what I was thinking in my mind, right? Is he went from being the villain to just being a kid who's just coming in the room. So that's where moving from step one to step two, that's kind of what I was able to do. I got curious, kind of curious about these triggers instead of critical. You start asking yourself, what about this specific moment is activating you?

What is it about this? I want to just slow it down and like just be curious for a moment. And then typically you're fine. There's some common themes. Maybe you feel disrespected. You feel out of control. You feel some fear. You feel like there's some old wounds. I think for mine it was like, he's not listening to me. I want him to listen to me and do what I'm saying, right? And the fact that he wasn't moving right when I said it was like somehow he's defying me or something, you know? And naming it actually can weaken

the automatic loop, it kind of takes the power away from it and gives the power back to you. And it creates this gap, this gap that you need between the stimulus and the response. So what you're doing is you're trying to slow this moment down so then you can actually see it happening in real time. and it feels so empowering when you're able to see it and then change it and then respond the way you want it to. It just feels, feels beautiful.

Kyle Wester (25:32.716)
Yeah. Yeah. And you'll, as you practice, as I'd say, like it, can be kind of clunky, but as you get more and more, you're like, okay, you kind of learn that you learn your favorite ways to regulate your favorite ways to kind of turn towards yourself for a second and go, what's going on in me? Cause it's curious about the kids, but it's curious about what's, what's here, what's going on in me? What, why is this moment taking the meaning it's taking in my mind? Okay. Number three, I want to repair quickly and make it visible.

So you might say something like, hey, I didn't handle that well. I didn't handle that the way I wanted to, and I'm really sorry for that. The child learns so many deep things. And I'm telling you this, because I've had to say this a lot. So this is something I've had to say a lot. I think I'm actually really good at it, because I feel like I got to do it so many times. But the child learns that mistakes are repairable and relationships are resilient.

they can survive these kind of conflicts. The opposite of it's the opposite of what most generational patterns kind of taught us, you know, that, that like these conflicts are scary and we should avoid them. We shouldn't talk about these things or we shouldn't take responsibility. Yeah. I shouldn't say what you did was wrong because then the kid will see that you're not perfect. And then, you know, all this kind of stuff, right. But an imperfect repair still rewired rewrites the lesson in real time. So it's not that you got to say everything perfect.

But the point is like, you're really helping rewire, reframe, relearn that situation in real time. And if you never do it, you've missed that opportunity. Yeah, it's really powerful for your brain. If you're trying to build that other, that alternate wiring that you want to be your default, if you just jump into it right then, you know, do these things right then. And then you're building that because then when that trigger comes, your brain goes, yeah, I have a couple options here. And eventually the

one you want gets stronger and stronger. just remember this repair is not about damage control. It's actually the most powerful teaching tool a parent has. And so I've really seen that play out where the repair has helped me grow, helped me understand myself, but also help my kids learn the skills to where we can do that better next time. Right. And number four is build new family patterns. Like this is super fun. Build new family patterns, small and repeatable. Okay. So like the brain wires through repetition, not intensity.

Kyle Wester (27:54.286)
So it actually isn't through these intense moments that we need to focus on, but it's about doing the little things, okay? So like calm, limit setting, asking a question instead of giving a lecture, staying in the room during a hard emotion rather than just shutting down or exiting, saying I was wrong when you were actually wrong. I these things are huge. I know, I hear songs, I see movies about these things, because they're like so impactful. I mean, think how much that would impact you if there's things that you were hurting about that your parents...

did when you were growing up, if they would just say, hey, I was really wrong and how I handled that. mean, just think that would have been 20, 30, 40 years ago, but it still would mean something to you today, right? And repeat, if you repeat these things over months, the child experiences you as safe and they feel like they can trust you and that we can handle this as a family. Pick a couple and just go, okay, I'm gonna really focus on these couple things, you know, and layer it in there and.

get really good at it and build more and build more. Yes, maybe pick a couple of patterns that you want to see change. of things that you just mentioned. know, like I want to be quick to say I was wrong. Yeah. Or I want to be, I want to make sure that when I give a directive, you know, I'm doing it in this way. Yeah. Yeah. I'm not yelling. I'm being calm about it. That's great. A child who feels safe with their parent will come to them when it matters most. And I know that's everybody's heart listening to this. You want your kid throughout their entire life, cause they're going to go through some hard things, things that you

hope they never have to go through, but they're gonna experience, because that's life. And you want them to know you're a safe person to come back and do that because they know you have shown them that you can change, that these patterns don't have to continue on. And so often, Sarah, I think is what, the kids don't see this change happen, and then they'll just tell me, I'm just tired of trying. I just feel like my mom or dad don't want these patterns. They say they want the patterns changed, but they're not willing to do anything to change it. And even like I've seen, I've heard kids too, talk about where they can see it. They can see with grandma and grandpa.

They can see with aunts and uncles like, my gosh, like you can see they've been doing this for a long time. And then that they're like, I don't think my parents know how to change that, you know? It feels very fixed. Yeah. And so then they're like, I don't want to be like that, but I don't, my parents don't seem to know how to fix it or change it. Okay. So just in closing, we want to encourage you that you are not behind. You are not failing. I mean, I really believe this, that the most courageous work Sarah and I have ever done has been

Kyle Wester (30:19.734)
in our parenting because changing these things, I mean, it is hard work. Cause you can imagine how hardwired our bodies and brains are and to do that work is just very, very challenging, but it is so rewarding. So the goal here is this, is that you want home to be where repair is normal. It's not that we never mess up at home, do, but repair is normal. Emotions are survivable, okay? Relationship is greater.

and bigger and more powerful than the hard moments. Like we can survive these hard things. And you know, like Sarah said, we're in a stressful time. Like the world is a stressful place and you want your home to be a place where kids know that we can overcome hard things. Okay. We can change things that we don't like in our family. It's not about one transformational day. That would be cool. That would be cool to just plan a transformational day, but we're going to transform that. But it's actually doing a bunch of ordinary moments and choosing differently in those ordinary

Yeah. Yeah. So we believe in you and your power. So maybe the power to change these generational patterns, but I would encourage you to reflect on them. Like talk with your spouse. What are some patterns that maybe you guys have never spoken about? Maybe you have, and you have felt defeated that you couldn't change them, but you are the one getting to build the family and co-create it with your kids that you actually want to bring to the world. You know, and if we all do that work, we can make this world a much more beautiful, safe, caring place. Okay. So we want to encourage you to do the courageous work.

And we're so glad that you're joining us on our journey as well doing this. And please take a moment if this is helpful to you to share this with a friend, you know, where they've talked about how they want to do it differently than their parents. I hope you share it with them and let them know that this podcast will give them the tools to do that. So thank you so much for taking time to listen