Monica: Okay, so now, we’re going to introduce our next speaker Nichi Kuechle. She is amazing and I’m very happy that she’s going to be able to join us today. Listeners who are parents, you will specially get a lot of Nichi’s talk.

Nichi Kuechle is the owner of myhealthybeginning.com. To the parent coach, a craniosacral therapist, childbirth educator and doula here in the Twin Cities. She speaks, she teaches live and she does virtual workshops as well. She provides individual coaching and publisher of the weekly e-zine called Raising Healthy Babies. She’s here with us to talk about authentic parenting, which many of us know, we’re parents, it can be a very fine line and a very tricky business.

I’m happy to have you here Nichi and I’m handing it over.

Nichi: Maybe I should call it a tricky business. Thank you. Oh my gosh, as I was putting this together like we’ve had some really major bumps in our family life in the last couple of months and every time something shows up like in the moment of feeling the lowest and the worst, the most awful and like no family around us has ever gotten through something like this. I’m sure we’re the only ones. You can’t even see the light at the end of the tunnel and then like, we got to the light in the last week and then I’m like, “Oh, yes, that wasn’t very fun,” but like we couldn’t be where we are right now without all of that garbage.

I was setting this up, it’s so funny. It’s like I have the steps that I’m going to show with all of you today like ingrained. It made me realize how much I do this without having to check in with like, “Okay, what’s step one, what’s step two,” and it was just the reference of like, “okay, gosh, I’m pulling myself really, really well of these days as a mama.” It totally takes a lot.

Monica: It’s hard.

Nichi: It is hard. Really the message that I want to get a cause in terms of the benefit that you all as parents are going to take away from this is obviously the idea of authentic parenting, but really the idea of how you show up for yourself or not and then the effect that has on your children. Because I think a lot of times, we’re functioning from like a total lack of power and then our kids are like, “Oh, this is a hay day, let’s team up on mom or dad,” or whatever.

A lot of that comes from like more and more parents I work with, a lot of it comes from the actual garbage that we carry around. And we see it showing up in our kids and then we more than like totally telling our kids for their behavior or … like, “What’s wrong? What’s their problem? Why is this and why that?” We totally forgot to look in the mirror.

I’ll walk through these four steps that I personally use and that I use with other parents because they are the kind of steps that you can literally jot down a few notes and then come back to and you can use them in multiple situations. Certainly, when you are A, working on your suffering in this place of like, “Oh, there’s nowhere to go,” but us, this is a really great place to start to getting shoulder on your parenting and then who you are for yourself ultimately.

Monica: It’s so important.

Nichi: The first one is Realizing Your Limiting Beliefs and I think some people get stuck on the goal what are limiting beliefs and I always say that limiting beliefs are what … like in realizing them are what types is acquainted to … it’s kind of like that that whispering voice that we use ourselves. It’s like the one that we have ourselves to hear that we shouldn’t listen to. There’s one to listen to and then there’s one that needs to be turned off.

This is the one that needs to be turned off. This is the one that I was like, “Your daughter isn’t good enough,” and, “I can’t believe you think you can pull this off,” and, “I can’t believe you want more kids,” and like, “the blah, the blah, the blah.” At all, down our beliefs …

Monica: You’re talking about the difference between our negative conditioning and out intuition like the voice that we should be tuning out is what’s been programmed that’s kind of keeping us down and it’s not really true versus the voice that we hear that we should be looking to, which is more accented in our intuition. Is that what you’re saying?

Nichi: Yes, and it’s like we want to tune it out, but we kind of … for the point of this exercise, you have to kind of listen to what voice is it that it’s saying. Because for most of us, there’s kind of one or two or three sort of topics or things that it’s always telling you like, “Why can’t you ever lose weight or, “why can’t you stop yelling at the kids?”

For me, that saying is like, “Ugh, why are you always scrambling around? Why are you always in scramble mode? Why can’t you just figure it out?” That’s what I hear and I literally, I mean I have to manually turn off switch in order for that to not be in my world. Here is sort of the goal is that

whatever the voice is telling you isn’t actually the problem. You just have to know what it is you’re being told.

If you can look at what you nag on yourself about so to do it, take note of what it is. What is it that you’re constantly [crosstalk] …

Monica: You’re not ignoring that you’re looking at that still.

Nichi: Yes, you’re not ignoring. You’re just like having a little pat on the back and then for it to leave the room. For me, it’s like, “Why are you always scrambling around? I feel like I’m always scrambling around.”

To kind of use that as an access, then what I do is I make a list of what’s not working in my life. Marriage doesn’t seem to be working. Finances aren’t working. The whole logistical world … our family is not working and working from home sometimes is not working and if you kind of just make that whole laundry list of just what doesn’t work? Maybe it’s a particular relationship, maybe it’s the transition to the school year so maybe there’s this whole thing around. I can’t manage getting all the kids off to school on the bus and myself ready to work and to work on time.

Just look at what’s not working, but the third piece of that is … and I say this, it planned us to remind us that we’re human, but I always say like, “Who was the common dominator in all of the things that don’t work in your life?” Because it’s just us like it’s always just me and I also use that as a reminder like A, that I’m a human and B, that I’m not looking to anyone else around me for that change because it has to be … transformation has to be like a personal thing. It has to come from you and within you and then you get to share who you are and that transformation with your loved ones and your community.

Monica: Right.

Nichi: What I do then also in that space is that I … when I’m saying, “Oh, I’m scrambling around,” and, “oh, this is just too much,” and, “why can’t I figure this out?” I’m scrambling around because my marriage isn’t working. I’m scrambling around because our finances aren’t working. I really scrambling around because of this whole scheduling of kids and work and being alive. All of that isn’t working. I’m the center of all that, I’m the only one who could transform any of that for myself.

In the process, when I’m telling myself is, “I don’t have enough time. I don’t have enough energy. There’s not enough harmony in our home. We don’t have enough money. There’s not enough space on the

calendar. We don’t have enough connectedness. We don’t have any date nights. We’re not even breathing.” There’s all of that.

You can just see and I know for each of you, you could probably connect with all 27 things I’ve said and then for some of you, maybe there’s one that does resonates a little bit more. That’s the conversation around realizing what your limiting beliefs are and getting acquainted to what it is that we nag on ourselves about. It’s like this thing that we totally bring ourselves down about and we need to use that in other access point.

For me, when I first … with walking myself through this exercise, there was almost like I had done it and then I kind of reverse engineered it to figure out how I got that and it works every single time.

The second step is finding your AHA moment or in other words getting … get related to kind of what got your undies in a bunch to begin with because it’s usually one happening or one circumstance or one situation. It will come up as a little memory and it might be just new, but more often than not, it’s really something from our past that we’ve carried forward. It just seems so silly that I just really set me up for this whole idea of, “Why can’t I figure this out? Why do I have to be scrambling around all the time?” Just kind of keep that in the back of your mind.

When I was about … I must have been like eight, I’m the oldest of the four kids, but at that time there, it’s just the three of us and we always took home lunch because it was a money thing, right. We’re just … packed lunch was expensive and so we always took home lunch and we also made our own lunches. My dad was usually in the kitchen making his lunch in the morning as well.

That particular morning, I don’t remember who being in the kitchen and my mom was in the bathroom blow-drying her hair and I remember opening up the refrigerator to like a choice of two things again. It seemed like that was a sort of the everyday thing was, I open up the fridge and I’m like, “Really, a peanut butter sandwich again?” Like there’s literally nothing else to put in there, but like an apple. I just was stuck with this whole like, “How do I go ask my mom why we have to have peanut butter again? Like is their not something else available for us.” I remember I took up a whole bunch of courage for me to go because of course I was like worried about getting yelled at.

I knocked in the bathroom door and through the door while blow-drying her hair, “Mom, if you’re listening to this. Thanks for doing this and don’t worry.” She was like, “What do you need?” I was like, “Can we have something other than peanut butter sandwiches for lunch? I’m not really

very excited about that.” I was just not with … not the ideal answer. In my head, I was just like, “Oh, maybe she would say, ‘Oh yes, maybe today I’ll put some honey on there or add some jelly or I forgot to tell you there’s tuna fish in the cupboard,’” or whatever, right? Instead, what I got was like, “You know what, you just have to have peanut butter sandwiches because that’s just the deal because I don’t get paid for two more weeks and then when I get paid, I’m not even buying groceries because we have all the other bills to pay.”

I remember just standing there thinking like, “Oh, okay.” Well, I kind expected that this would be the answer because any request or question that we had as kids was really respondent to our own little world, lack of money like that was always the reason. In that moment, I just kind of went like I make this vow to myself that I was not going to ask anymore then if I did, I was going to ask for less than what I really needed. It of course was never enough.

It was such as gain changing realization for me like when I’ve got this just recently in the last year about myself because that just sums up my whole life like when I think about this memory, I think that that didn’t stop. I took that into my future and I made it mean I’m never going to have enough money, I’m never going to have enough happiness in my marriage. I’m never going to be able to grow the family that I want to, I’m never going to be able to build a successful business, I’m never going to be able to build these great relationships, I’m not going to have the house that I want. It was just like …

Monica: It’s so powerful too, isn’t it? I mean it wouldn’t happen to such a young age those kinds of messages, they do stick with you for life.

Nichi: Well, in that moment too, in that little 8-year-old head of mind, I kind of thought like, “Okay, well, if I only ask for less than what I really need, then I can go about life quietly and I’ll be okay.” Because like, “Fine, I’ll have a peanut butter sandwich everyday for the rest of my life,” and then because of that, it won’t cause too much commotion and I can take care of myself and I don’t have to ask too many questions and I may never have to ask for help and I won’t get yell that. I literally spent the next 29 years of my life not asking for help and not asking for whatever I really need like in relationships and for resources like across the board.

This really moves us to this third piece, which is to look at the effect on our children. Some of you might be thinking like, “Well, what does that have to do with you being a parent?” Well, I have everything to do with my parenting like everything.

What it means like the effects on my children is that I’m always troubled, I’m always scrambling. What my kids hear is like, “Hold on a second. Will you just wait a minute? I can’t right now.” What I really get … what I really get present to what I’m saying to them, it’s like I’m telling them I don’t have time to them when everything I do, I do in this world to buy a time with them.

Monica: Right, I can relate.

Nichi: It’s like if I’m getting too crazy and too far in the scramble mode, I might not touch it myself. I might searching all those things like, “Gosh, I’m doing acupuncture and I’m going to yoga and I’m going from a run and I’m juicing everyday, that’s strange. I really shouldn’t be like how … I shouldn’t really be experiencing shallow breathing.” Those things that pull you into consciousness like, “Oh, something is off kilter right here.”

I don’t see that necessarily for myself. What I see is the kids acting out. I used to say that I’m nine-year-old when she was little. She would kind of spin out and I just really thought it was all about her. It really took me bringing another child into the world. It’s not almost five and seeing her get super topsy-turvy to realize that she’s just a direct reflection of my action, my behavior, my language, my inability to like trail off and just relax and get present and be … when we … I guess what we forgot to do is look out what’s being modeled for them.

The aspects on them is like no real connectedness because how can you … how can they connect with me if I’m like really scrambling all the time. I’m scrambling, that means I constantly have a load of laundry over one shoulder and a frying pan in the left shoulder and someone’s backpack on my elbow. Do you know what I mean? There are so many things that I’m attempting to do at one time that there’s like no room for them to come in and access their mama. When you [crosstalk] …

Monica: It’s so common today too for a lot of family that’s such a common thing of the coming and the going and trying to pack everything into the day and it is. It’s sort of modern life sort of prevents connectedness I think.

Nichi: It’s us and then the beautiful thing now is just like when we see that, we really think we get to be causing a matter of changing that for our family. That was really … what it brought me to is just like, “Whoa! This is not going to work, but I can see where this is going to take us and it’s not the happy place for anybody.

That effect is … for me, it was really heartbreaking because it’s nothing that I would ever have intended to really do in a place of being present

and you have to see that as a fact because that brings you back into focus. I think that you’re responsible as a parent and then it allows you to reclaim that power. When you become an … when your parents from an empowered place, then you’re in that place of total authenticity versus being that parent that is only in a reactive mode and just moving from one reaction to the next instead of one situation to the next or one circumstance to the next or one conversation to the next. Makes sense?

Monica: Yes, [crosstalk 0:18:04] awareness in there.

Nichi: Right, so once you see that effect, then you got to do the fourth step, which is sort of like declaring the change or making the commitment and it’s all about who you’re being as a person, like I said about who you were showing up for, like how you show up, how you show up for yourself. That’s where you get to share the transformation with your kids and the process in making that commitment. I sort of say, there’s probably three little steps in that and the first thing we have to do is get real with them like, “You know what, here’s where I’ll messed up.”

Because if you notice, your kids are really stuck in the world of, “I’m not a good enough speller. I’m not a fast enough biker. I can’t build the fastest so and so. I can’t, I can’t, I can’t, I messed up, I messed up, I messed up.” Often times, even if we’re … so for me, I’d be like, “Oh my gosh, I’ll never say things like that. I never do. I never say them out loud. With this thing, I’m always saying that to myself like in my head, “Why can’t I ever do this? Why can’t I ever do it like that person? Why can’t I ever be faster with this?”

When we can get real with them, when we can say, “Here’s where I messed up,” it lets them know that they’re human too and that you are also a part of that humanity and then there’s connectedness in them. When you say, “Here’s where I messed up,” I mean, I said this when I really meant that. I took this action when the appropriate action was XYZ. Initials in it, we are taking responsibilities for our words or actions and then that creates the space for forgiveness that that’s needed because I think that’s a whole other can of worms right there, but …

Monica: It links no on their own self forgiveness and they can …

Nichi: Yes, like when we don’t do that, our kids just see resentment build up and so that just creates a space. The second part of that is when we are speaking to our kids, we really have to get down on their level like on our knees, heart-to-heart and eye-to-eye and then they will walk right into that. They will walk right into us. It’s that whole … you know that book

How to Talk So Your Kids Will Listen and Listen So Your Kids Will Talk, it’s like that piece of we find ourselves only check in.

We’re like, “Wow! No wonder nobody is listening to me.” If I’m constantly walking the other direction to attend to the next task I’m like to do with and they’re all behind me and I’m expecting them to hear me and put into practice whatever I’m collaborating at them about, it’s like the Peanuts teacher like, “Wo, wo, wo.” No wonder nobody is doing anything like whatever here.

It’s because like for me it’s just like this, “Okay, I’ve got to stop for a second,” and I’m like get down on my knees and I’ll hold them in my lap or stop and have a little like tickle fest, like a little moment of like, okay, holding everybody back to just a place of speaking from the heart and kind of being in love with your kids and then like have there listening.

Consequently, they know that we have theirs and then we get to share with them the action that we are declaring into play so the commitment we are making to them in ourselves. Really, that commitment is for ourselves, but then maybe you’re kind of like the direct beneficiary of that. They get to see the work it takes to follow through, but then they also see how hard it is when we have to start over because we didn’t keep our word or we didn’t follow through or we reneged on that commitment. They see that we mess up too, but that you can keep recreating that commitment. I think that lies always has this chances to show up for yourself so that might mean …

Monica: That might have so much because it’s like you don’t have to be perfect showing … you don’t have to be perfect as a parent and children learn from that. They see your commitment to changing and making a positive transformation and they learn about that by watching that and they know it’s not about the result necessarily. It’s about the process and it’s wonderful. It’s such inside out parenting because we are hard on ourselves, aren’t we all?

Nichi: I know. It’s little like for us right now, we realize with our oldest thing in public school for the first time for the third grade. She is … this is the thing about … she’s not super excited about the homework, but she can tackle it and do it, but after school, she really needs kind of an unwinding: play outside, run around, unstructured time. Yet after dinner, like when the little one is going to bed, that’s also sort of her key time because whatever parent happens to be around, she really wants that one-on-one attention and she doesn’t want it to be focused on homework.

What we realize was we try to be doing the homework after school and that backfires for several reasons. She needs to unwind and the little one is … if they’re making lots of noise. We decided instead of like giving her of this sort of semi-focused attention right after school doing homework when I’m making dinner and the little one is right here. Let’s do it after while someone is putting the little one to bed. It’s like that game printing because then the parent that gets to be with her, it give her undivided attention and then you realize it wasn’t even about the homework being issued, it was about the undivided attention being issued.

It’s like so simple to just be like, “Here’s our commitment.” It’s not, “Whoever is helping you with your homework, like there’s just going to be [inaudible 00:24:00] space for that,” and the other one will deal with the happenings around the house. Like you just get to have us.

It’s super hard being a parent. I screw-up all the time. I feel like … we have a nine-year-old whose ears are like bionic and she could hear anything from any room in this house and it’s so tricky to keep … what do you keep for adult conversation and how much about can you share with your kids. Mostly what I do is I keep these four steps just in my awareness so … like they’re on a post-it note next to my bed kind of deal so that I can keep recreating for myself and our kids.

Then, here’s the cool thing that you have to understand is that when you ask a spouse or as a partner in your marriage or in your relationship, when you do this work for yourself, it can create declaring for people to do that work around you, through you. Does that make sense?

Monica: Yes, definitely.

Nichi: Because they might not be like, “No, [inaudible 00:25:14] checking in salary even listening to the [inaudible 00:25:16], telling something and asking questions,” but they benefit from the space you’ve created like you are doing the own work, your own work on your own …

Monica: It’s like the ripple effect, that word.

Nichi: Totally, so it is more about who you show that for yourself, but when you don’t at least for me, there’s total breakdown, there’s fallout, there’s loss of integrity and communication. On one hand, it’s like everything we totally are as humans like that’s just it. There is like ups and there are downs and yet, everything we are totally capable of being is who we show ourselves. Like I know when I show it for myself and always that … I’m like, “Wow! It’s just like my full potential. This is how I was created.”

Now, the trick is like, “How can I do this more often?” Which takes into effect than like, for me, that means what kind of self-care do I really have to put into place so that I can function optimally, so I can continue to show up for myself, meaning, getting up at 6:30 in the morning and taking care of what I need to before the rest of the world wakes up. Like for me …

Monica: [Crosstalk].

Nichi: Yes, if I do that, I can show up for myself and the rest of the world like nobody’s business for the rest of the day, but I will tell you what, if I hit that snooze button, I’m doomed. It’s all day long that I’ve kind of like I drag. I drag because I’m down on myself because I didn’t get things done and because he didn’t have lunch with me, I have to scramble and to scrambling then that I was short with the kids and all they wanted to do is show me whatever little bees wax model they made.

Right and then all ready, 25 minutes after getting up, they’re already getting their brunch. Me, just not showing up for myself so it’s cool because when you do this work, your kids then will create something from … it’s like a foundation for who you are to them and then you get revel in who they become for you. That’s like goosebumpy. It’s pretty awesome.

Monica: Yeah. It’s so wonderful

Nichi: Let me just add in three to four steps just add like bullet points so people can jot them down. If you guys want to write this down and you’re listening.

The first step is realizing your limiting beliefs. That’s where we kind of get acquainted to what we nag on ourselves about. Remember from me, it was like I’m always scrambling around peace and there’s not enough of this and nothing seems to be working.

The second step is finding your AHA moment. Getting related to what got your undies in the bunch and for me, that was that. That story I created when my mom said, “You just have to have peanut butter sandwiches because that’s the way it is.” I took that to mean, “Oh, so I’m just going to ask for less than what I really need,” and then that continued to show up in the rest of my life.

The third step is looking at the effects that has on your children and often, that’s kind of a mirror thing so just kind of turn it around a little bit like you’re not super excited about what your kids are doing and saying.

You might want to just stick with that personally for a little bit and see if that resonates with you. Then you can get real.

Step four is declaring that change or making that commitments and that could be to the family or to the children, you can take that on in whatever way feels best for you.

Those are the four steps. I’m really excited to see what kind of questions we have sitting out there.

Monica: Awesome! Thank you Nichi for sharing your personal stories with us and just making that connection between authenticities with yourself can really help our parenting. That was powerful so I’m excited too to hear if we have any questions on the line for you.

Go ahead if you have question, hit star six to unmute yourself.

Male: I have a question.

Male: I have a question.

Monica: Nichi, are you still there?

Nichi: Can you hear me?

Monica: Oh, there you are. Okay, sorry, we had switched modes.

Nichi: Sorry, here I am.

Monica: Oh, awesome! Okay, it sounds like we have a question on the line.

Nichi: Okay, great. What’s that?

Male: My question is related to arguing in front of the children and being authentic and yet, not letting the children experience that, just your advice.

Nichi: I think I’m having a hard time hearing you, but I think what you’re asking is what are my thoughts around arguing in front of the kids. If you’re question is like, “Do we argue in front of the kids?” or, “do we not?” Or so how to if that’s going to happen.

Monica: Yes, all of those.

Nichi: It’s funny because Monica and I have this conversation last week when … because at our house, we don’t argue so much as we give each other the silent treatment once I think is even more vicious. I think the important

thing is that like as a family or as a couple, if arguing does ensue, like sometimes I know it will do is it will kind of … if one of us can see it and this doesn’t always happen, but if one of us can see it, then suddenly like I was mentioning before. Like the tickle fest or like a total joke bomb where I just completely startles everybody and then you have to stop and take pause because you’re like, “Are we really fighting about burnt toast? whatever the case may be at that time.

Making the kids a part of the resolution of whatever it is you’re arguing about so having them understand that mom and dad might not agree on everything, but that you can agree to disagree. You can give them an analogy. Like right now, our daughter is struggling with like a girl wants to be her friend and then once she goes to play with her on the playground, she acts like she doesn’t even know her. It’s like how you handle all that. Like you and your friends can have disagreements so it doesn’t mean that you’re not friends anymore, it doesn’t mean that your mom don’t love each other.

You could also bring up the idea of when your children argue, it’s not that they don’t love each other and don’t have a connectedness, it’s just because they’re seeing something differently than the other and so we struggle to have that. We struggle for feeling connected in that moment and so if you can see an argument before it gets too far away, we’re just pretty easy to get hooked into. If you can kind of stop it and be like, “What is this really about?”

For us recently, we’ve been saying to our kids like if we are arguing, it isn’t a direct reflection about you. We are arguing because we love you. It’s because we’re not in agreement on how we should move forth with a decision around our family or whatever the case may be and so, it’s really hard to understand the other person because we don’t want to give a ton of logic to our kids unless they’re older than nine and they can carry some of that logic.

Getting down on the feeling level with our kids have to be like, “You know what, moms and dads, this is just what happened. Remember that little fit you threw in Target last week, well, this is kind of like what our mama that looks like.” It just happened to me in the kitchen, not in Target. Does that resonate with you?

Male: Yes, okay.

Nichi: I always say, as a parent, we always end up with what I call the ladder carry and that’s for you like you have to pick up your child, who’s going to be stuck totally straight horizontal under your arm and march out of the

grocery store or Target or wherever because they’re in the middle of a meltdown. It’s sort of like … the funny thing of that is like, “Could you pick up your wife and toss her over your shoulder and walk out of the room?”

Actually, I should say that has happened in our house and the kids then get hilarious and then we all end up laughing because whatever we’re arguing about isn’t actually really what we’re arguing about. There’s always like these underlying unresolved issues like keep getting brought up over and over and over again and that’s really in my opinion where the arguing comes from.

Male: Yes, I think that that was terrific.

Nichi: [Crosstalk 0:33:49].

Male: That’s terrific. I’ll try those things. Thank you.

Nichi: You’re welcome.

Male: Thank you. Bye.

Nichi: Any other questions out there, Monica? I don’t know what happened, but I was like in limbo and I couldn’t hear so I’m sorry if I missed anything.

Monica: No, I think we have it on the wrong setting here where the callers may have tried unmuting themselves and we’re unable to do so, so we fixed that. If you tried to unmute yourself before and had a question, try it again and see. I think it should be working now.

Nichi: Any questions out there?

Monica: You didn’t actually miss anything though, Nichi.

Nichi: Okay, great. It’s a big topic. You can like hear the gears turning.

Monica: Well, I know. I’m just going to jump in while people are thinking about their questions too because we do have a little bit of time here. What I think is, the challenging part in being authentic as a parent is you want to be real about how you’re feeling so that kids don’t feel like they have to interpret or they can’t figure out what the emotional landscape looks like. It’s very clear and they can understand it, but you want to do that in such a way that isn’t giving them too much information they just aren’t able to process because they’re just simply too young.

That’s like how do you find that line of being honest and authentic while still protecting them and I think that’s something that you can’t ever do and learn once and for all. It’s something that you might find a way to do it with the certain age that your children are and then a few weeks later, once you feel like you’ve got it down, developmentally, there are changes and now you’ve got to change it up again. Have you found that to be true? Have you found that [crosstalk 0:35:41]?

Nichi: Was that you or someone else, sorry?

Monica: No, that was me talking over. I’m very sorry. Go ahead.

Nichi: No, I find that I sort of like in that to … when your kids go from crawling to toddling to walking to running and they’re running into like the corners of the coffee table and they suddenly able to reach like the picture frames and the candle holders, where you are like, “I just rearranged the living room last week and now I have to do it again.” Simply because they are developing so fast and not as … it’s like if anything, they grow because it keeps us on our toes, but it keeps pulling us back into constantly having to find a way to relate to them on whatever level they’re on, which is a total challenge.

Then if you have more than one child, that’s even more challenging because it’s like playing a video game. It’s like all fantastic. I do one thing or two things at just one time. Can I attend to all of their needs at one time?

Monica: Right, because it’s different for each child.

Nichi: Right, yes.

Monica: I just want to encourage anywhere else on the line too because I don’t want to hog Nichi here. Does anybody have any questions? Don’t be shy. If not, I wanted to ask you Nichi what you’re working on right now. If there’s anything that you’re even working with newborns and young children and parent coaching and I wonder kind of where you’re at with your practice or if how you’re incorporating your concepts into the work that you’re doing now and where you’re headed?

Nichi: Well, I am super, super excited. If anyone goes to my site myhealthybeginning.com right now, they’re going to say, “Oh, this is a beautiful site and it looks like it’s completely done.” Well, it’s never done. It’s about 90% there. A lot of it is that I’m just … I’m not changing things.

One of the things I’ve taken on in the last year is becoming a childbirth educator partly because it’s how we birth our babies with probably not that of natural childbirth and served … I’ve served walking the talk for the last eight or nine years and teaching sort of private childbirth intensive without necessarily having “that specific instructor training”.

What I found is that the thing that people get hooked on is like, “I’m having a baby. We are birthing a baby right now and this is what their whole life revolves around.” I guess what I get really, really present to and it gets me sort of the quantum of moments of in class number 12 of 12 as we’re sitting there and everybody is really getting excited to move on to that last four to six weeks of their pregnancy.

One of the things I really drive home to them is this like you guys are not just birthing a baby right now, you are birthing your family. When you put that spin on it, it’s just … again, it gives me the goose bumps because that sort of method of childbirth education really gives you these lifelong coping skills and this sort of bond that obviously as a couple you’re not going to have with anybody else and it’s really, really powerful.

I’m really focusing my energies right now on filling those classes because those families are the ones that cycle through for like eight or nine years with me and it’s a blast because they keep coming back for more. They come back when they get stuck on what to feed our kids, they come back when they get stuck on … I don’t know, for making the right decision on what schools we’re going to choose. We have three kids going in three different directions. I don’t know if this feels right and then we end up doing coaching with mom because she’s now done raising kids and it’s heading back into the workforce and it’s like such an honor to be able to watch family just grow and mature and develop together.

I’ve got all kinds of exciting little programs that we’re working on in the backburner. One that we’ll be launching here within the next 60 days is an info product actually because I’ve realized it’s a science that I can feed our family of four … actually natural and organic foods on $400 a month and I get a lot of coaching call request for that and I’m … like the light bulb when I’m like, “Oh wow!” I didn’t realize how eager people are for that information. I’m turning that into an info product that we’re going to launch like I said here pretty before Christmas that … in terms of our project, that’s what I’m super excited about so lots of irons in the fire.

Monica: Yes, [crosstalk].

Nichi: Good stuff.

Monica: Yes, good. I thought I saw … there might have been somebody on the line that was getting ready to ask the question. I just want to invite this last call here for anyone who has questions for Nichi, go ahead and press star six to unmute yourself while we still have her on the line.

Female: Hello?

Monica: Hi.

Nichi: There’s someone. Yes, hello?

Female: Hi, I was wondering if you could give a little guidance on how to find that AHA moment because it seems like there is a ton of them?

Nichi: Yes, that’s a really good question. Do you know kind of what it is that you are on your own case about all the time? Have you identified what that is or did something kind of come to you as you were looking?

Female: I think it’s like that I’m not capable or I’m not enough.

Nichi: That’s like for everyone so you’re not alone in that one.

Female: Yes.

Nichi: Okay, so can you remember … like sometimes for people, it can be fairly recent like in the last three to five years, they’re really more often than not. It comes as almost one of our earliest memories as a child so if there’s something that just pops up there for you like …

Female: Well, when I just said that to you, it was interesting because maybe it’s helpful to say it to somebody other than try and think of it myself.

Nichi: Yes, right.

Female: When I just said it to you, I thought of that I used to come home and I was teased a lot and I’d come home and my mom wasn’t home usually. I never knew when she’d be home and felt … I just remember like opening the door probably having a lot of need for nurturing at that moment and then opening the door to the empty and it was usually pretty messy. There was this overwhelm that that was not really nurturing either, none of it, the mom not home, messy, nowhere to turn kind of thing.

Nichi: Well, and that’s easy to see if that’s the instance for you like where that message come from because I’m not important enough for her to be here. I’m not important enough for the house to be tidy for me to come home, I’m not important enough chocolate chip cookies waiting the oven

or whatever it is that we all have these ideas of what we want to come home to.

Sometimes it’s more than one moment like when I share about mine, that whole thing about asking for a lesson what I really need. Like I said, it has shown up time and time again in my life as … in the bottom-line truly is like I’m not enough. I must not be worth enough if I’m never going to ask for what I need so I spent 29 years not asking for help in anything. Being the strong, independent, responsible child who did come home to an empty house with siblings in tow.

Yes, so I can relate to you there in what that is. You may find now … I don’t know are you someone who journals or spends time in meditation?

Female: I practice a lot in non-valid communication which is like trying to get to the present and then I’m an artist so I do a lot with alchemy images and stuff and I use that as kind of like my healing.

Nichi: Well, it might be interesting for you to take the sort of idea of, “I’m not enough.” You don’t want to like hang out there too much necessarily.

Female: Yes, no.

Nichi: You might want to visit at just enough to get really clear on, “Are there other images or memories that come to you?” Did it become like a mantra for you in like subconscious level as you grew and develop and matured into? Are you a parent?

Female: Oh, yes.

Nichi: Yes, so right, looking at that because probably, that mantra and that message like where you’re still loving, what you do is we hand off this baggage to our kids unknowingly and so there’s definitely something to …

Female: What’s really tough is I have a child with autism and my husband is a vet. It really feels like I’m not enough right now for how challenging my life is at the moment.

Nichi: Sure.

Female: I’m really trying to be there for my kids. When you talked about yoga and all that stuff, I’m doing that and I’m trying to be there and then it’s like to have the time and then how do you juggle all that and then not tell yourself, “I’m not enough.” I’m sorry, I interrupted.

Nichi: One other thing that I’ve learned is if I have to take that message and I have to flip it too because like I said, it screw up all the time, 20 times a day where I have to catch myself and say, “I almost have to tell myself the opposite of whatever I’m feeling.” Like this morning, I was super troubled about the time because we have these three appointments and I run to the firm. Then, in order to be home in time for this call and even though I knew I had plenty of time, there was still the sense of urgency and I think it’s all the stupid stuff like, “What if my phone battery dies? What if the internet down? What if the wind … well whatever.”

I just said … I keep telling myself that all is well and that struck me of like a fairly mature thought because I don’t always do that. I don’t always have the clarity to really quickly flip it, so like the negative self-talk isn’t what I was consistently getting this morning. I was also getting this voice, “Wait a second, everything is fine.” Does that resonate?

Female: Yes, no, I mean even saying that it’s like so many say the positive mantra or something like I think of Louise Hay and stuff that it’s more healing to say, “All is well,” than to go into the anxiety or worry.

Nichi: The other piece is like to look at the effect on your child so if you’re saying like you’re married and you have a child, when you fall into that space of like, “Okay, so I am not enough,” it’s like a space of recognition. If you just literally say that, “I’m not enough,” you can’t help, but feel like your body is going to turn and wore down itself. There’s like that physical manifestation that instantly comes with it.

When we look at that, like if we were to do that in the presence of our kids, you can like look at them and you could watch them in response, like you may not have verbally spoke that phrase, there’s like an impact.

Female: Yes. Well, one of my children has turned into like a big manipulator.

Nichi: Fun, yes.

Female: Fun, yes.

Nichi: I mean that’s really, really tough.

Female: Yes, and then the whole question of how to be there for a child with autism is a whole other ball game because it seems like to have … it’s not good to show him those weaknesses in that way more like the way you talked about it like, which is repair.

Nichi: Right. If you can … I don’t know, I just would come back to the getting, present and what can you declare in that moment of I’m struggling, you’re struggling.

Female: Yes.

Nichi: Right, like how can you … the word convince comes to mind, but that’s not it because that’s plague out of desperation and you know like … this is really hard for me, right? You can’t like … nothing really gets done in that space and yet, maybe you can … maybe enrolling is the right word when you can enroll the other person in this might be hard for you, it’s also hard for me or I’m having a hard time, but I guess that that makes it also hard for you. There’s this occurring of that, that person is never in their moment alone whether it’s you or them.

Because there is that idea of … then you can create a partnership in that. With those partnerships, there’s like double the energy, double the love when things a lot easier to move out of their synergy there.

Female: I like what you just said, it’s thinking, a parenting is so much more partnership with the child rather than your partner.

Nichi: One of the things … I’m trying to remember … this was … I think it was Mary [inaudible 00:49:50] who wrote The Spirited Child. I just think I read five times in the nine years of my oldest daughter. I think it’s her that said when you … for us right now, with the oldest being nine, I really discovered the power of negotiation with her. I might not be happy about something and she’s certainly not happy about something and then truly, all I want to do is walk away. I just want to turn and run as far as I can in the opposite direction, but I can’t because whatever has to be done has to be done.

I can sometimes find like, “Okay, I don’t want to answer her with that attitude that I’m like talking in her about.” When I can look at what kind of bartering tool do I have here, what kind of … and we actually use it with our youngest one too a little bit. It’s like, “Okay, well, here is what needs to be done. I’m happy to step up and do more than my part in this way. Are you willing to step up and be more than your part in that way? As a result, we’re going to end up with more time to do the stuff that we want to do if we can just kind of get the stuff we don’t want tucked in right now.”

Again, that is like creating a partnership without even … like your life partner in the conversation because I know that that’s some things happens with parents a lot is that there’s one parent who’s more

physically present throughout the day or evenings or … you know what I mean just at home? Then, other parent will lock in. That is like a big question that I get is like when the other parent locks in at the end of the day, how do you manage that … how do you know?

There are times if I can get there in my head early enough, I’ll try to remember like some time around the dinner hour if my husband hasn’t come home yet. Like to just either send him a quick text so he has a heads up to what he’s locking into so and so in that place or at in this place or maybe it’s best if you work until we’re all in bed, right?

Because then you have that then you have that communication, you’re not accomplishing something with your children or your child, having a little bit of that residue that’s sort of still there in the air and then to have that be like totally quickly glommed onto when the other partners walks in the door. Does that communicate? Because then you have the overriding of parenting and all of that at the house that just creates total fallout and it is that really quick. The child is crawling then the child is toddling and then the child is walking and he did it all in one day in the course of six hours.

There are those days in parenting where you have that kind of rollercoaster ride with your kids and then finally, at 5:30 or six o’clock, you land. You land in that place of peace and you’re just so grateful you’re out there because the end wasn’t in sight a few hours earlier. Or you get to a place where it is tolerable and you know you can make it the next two hours until bedtime, but it’s frustrating because you know that the other partner is going to walk into the door and sometimes it’s like that, are they paying attention, it’s nonverbal communication, how can you say if I just leave. What’s done is done right now, I’ll explain later.

It’s like giving each other that space of parents like trust that I’ve got this and I know that their attitude are present or whatever. It’s happening. Isn’t normally what we would allow? In that space of right now, this is something that needs to be allowable.

Monica: Yes, I totally agree, Nichi. Thank you so much. I want to just thank you again. I appreciate you coming online so much and sharing your personal wisdom and stories with us. We are going to have to close off Q & A now because we were going to have a little bit of a break before our next speaker is going to come on at 2:45.

Then, if you have any … if anybody else has some questions for Nichia that you didn’t get to ask, Nichi, how can they contact you?

Nichi: Probably the best way would be to just shoot me an email. You can send that to info@myhealthybeginning.com.

Monica: Oh, great.

Nichi: [Inaudible 00:54:15] sense and I can just get right back to you there. Thanks for having me, Monica.

Monica: My pleasure. Thank you, Nichi.

Nichi: You’re welcome.

Monica: Have a good day.

Nichi: You too.

Monica: Okay, bye-bye. All right everyone, we’ve just got a short little break here before our next speaker will be starting at 2:45, Heidi DeCoux. Go ahead if you want to just hang on the line. It’s probably not even worth hanging up at this point in time since it will be just in a few minutes. Okay, I’ll talk to you in a few minutes.