Family MattersPractical Parenting Blog

Save Your Marriage with Better Time Management

Couple holding hands on a street
This entry is part 31 of 34 in the series Save Your Marriage

Relationships are a sacred thing. Some say it is the only thing that matters. At the beginning of every relationship, we dedicate a lot of time to each other and over time, it gets harder.

Every married couple with children will tell you how their life changed as soon as their first child was born. Suddenly, quiet time to hold hands or cuddle becomes a rare event that must be carefully planned. Therefore, good time management can often make or break a relationship.

I have been working with many couples who come for coaching with the hope to save their marriage. Most of my clients think that to save their marriage, we need to focus on the big things, but for many of them, the problem is time management. I know it sounds funny, but it is one of the simplest one to fix.

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How to Focus: 20-20-20 Vision

Magnifying glass - helps you focus
This entry is part 1 of 2 in the series How to Focus

If you wear glasses, you understand focus really well. Why is it easy for people who need glasses? Because many of them just cannot see what is in front of them without their glasses. If you cannot see clearly, it is very hard to function effectively.

I have been shortsighted since I was 15 years old. Without my glasses, I cannot read well, drive, enjoy TV or notice facial expressions from half a meter away. Without glasses, I cannot do my presentations, coach, cook, clean the house or even choose what clothes to wear. My vision plays a big part in my life, and without it, I am crippled.

Mental focus works the same. If we are not focused, it is as if our vision is blurred. The lack of focus affects all aspects of our life negatively and we are crippled.

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Mental Pain Shouldn’t Kill You. It Can Make You Stronger

The word depression projected onto a sad man's face

I have written before about emotional pain as a reaction to a perceived threat and our body’s way of telling us that something is wrong. Mental pain is not the enemy. It is the messenger. And it is very important not to kill it.

Many people will tell you that when you come out of the other side of pain, you feel stronger. I have learned the hard way that the fear of pain takes more energy than the pain itself. Worry is an example of it. When we worry, we experience mental pain from something negative we have imagined in our head. Yes, all in our head.

There are many techniques to turn mental pain into psychological strength and the more you use them, the less you feel the pain. I have gathered some of them here to share with you. All of them are proven and practical. I use them with my clients.

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Mindfulness Questions to Change Your Life for the Better

Woman holding up a button that says I'm a winner

Questions are very important on our way to mindfulness. The ancient Greek philosopher Socrates thought that questions could lead us to many discoveries. One of the most important discoveries is that questions can reveal to us what we think and lead us to a better life.

The formula is simple. When we ask good questions, we get good answers that can help us grow and evolve to a better version of ourselves.

As a life coach, I use questions a lot. I know that some questions I ask (myself or others) will lead to pain and others will empower. Questions can trigger responses like “let’s move on”, “let’s do something”, “let’s think positively”, “let’s plan”, “let’s change perspective” and “let’s appreciate”, like pressing a button.

Every thought we have also triggers a feeling, so by “pressing the button” for that thought, we can create that feeling. For example, the “good memory” button will make us happy and “bad memory” button will bring us pain and suffering.

We may not have more bad memories than good memories, but if we press the “bad memory” button more often, we will have more suffering.

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What Kids Really Need to Grow Up Healthy, Successful and Happy

Little girl looking happy

Children do not really choose their parents (I say “really” because some people claim that we chose our parents in some karmic or spiritual way). Like it or not, they are born helpless and needy. Therefore, the power over the relationship is in the parents’ hands and the fate of the kids depends on the parents’ ability to care for them.

During my parenting workshops and seminars over the last 30 years of my career, I have seen many thousands of parents. I can tell you that parents are full of love for their kids and want to give them the world. If not, I would never have met them in my line of work…

Parents want their children to be healthy, successful and happy. That’s it! If I could sum up all of parents’ desires, they would fit into those three areas. I meet them when they feel they cannot do that, because their kids are not healthy (which is very hard for a parent), they struggle at school, lack social skills, have behavior issues or are simply unhappy. Too many times, their children need to overcome two or even three of these things.

My conclusion is that parents’ hearts are in the right place, but action always beats intention. Parents simply do not know what kids need in order to be healthy, successful and happy.

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Tips for Teens: How to Make Good Career Choices

Wrench and a note saying "job search" in the back pocket of jeans

Teens have a bad reputation. Many people believe that they generally make bad choices, misbehave and lash out in ways that hurt them (and others) later. Among other things, they think that teens do not know how to make good career choices.

I have had the honor of working with many teens. This has given me a chance to prove to many of them, and to their families, that the bad reputation teens have is wrong. There are always teens who choose well, behave well and do well. And if they can do it, so can other teens!

Many of my clients share teen horror stories, like “You know teens. They never have any money”. I do not know what they are talking about. My own teens have always had money, and it was their own money.

Another common belief is “You know teens. They don’t want to work”. No, I do not know, because my own teens have always wanted to work. My kids also have friends who started working as soon as they could and are doing very well.

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Find Your Inner Child and Discover Your Intuitive Wisdom

Little dirty boy eating ice cream

I have been working with children all my life. I think they have some wisdom that fades over the years. This is “thanks” to the education system, which teaches kids to ignore their intuitive wisdom and focus on memorizing, analyzing and following external rules. I always see my students as my greatest teachers, because they teach me what I once knew and forgot.

Children live from the heart. When they do something, they do it with every cell in their body. When they are happy, there are happy with every cell in their body, and when they are sad, it is heartbreaking to watch them.

My own children have made it easy for me to examine this purity, which is later lost. I have three of them, and they are totally different. Although they are 6 years apart in age, it was easy to notice that inside, they had a free spirit and only used the intuitive voice inside to guide them. When they played, they played with all their senses. They were not afraid to be silly or loud. When they ate, they never counted calories and I could see the satisfaction on their face when the food smeared all over it. I have hundreds of photos of them eating with a mess and looking very happy, which makes me wonder, “What do they know that we don’t?”

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Parenting Focus: Point Your Flashlight and Magnifier at Good Things

Flashlight

Parents want to raise happy children. In all of the many parenting workshops I run, regardless of their parenting style, cultural background or socioeconomic status, all the parents want their kids to be happy, healthy and successful. The problem is that parents whose kids are not happy, healthy and successful do not understand how they contribute to this. They just cannot see how their parenting focus and the attention they give to problematic things creates these problems.

When children do not behave like we want them to and when they do things we do not like, we tend to pay attention to their behavior more than when they behave like we want them to and when they do things we like. This attitude only makes them continue to behave “badly” and creates a never-ending cycle of attention to “bad” behavior.

When pay attention to the problems, the problems keep growing, and then we pay attention to them more and we trap ourselves and our kids in this dysfunctional parenting style. In life, we get what we focus on. Some call it “the law of attraction”, I call it “the flashlight model”.

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How to Have a Good Day Everyday

Every day may not be good but there is something good in every day
This entry is part 16 of 19 in the series From the Life Coaching Deck

Martin was a gorgeous 7-year-old who came to me for child coaching. His mom called and said she felt she could not help him. He never had a good day. He did not even know what one looked like.

After an abusive relationship with her husband, she divorced him and moved away to start a new life. They had been living in a nice place and their life changed dramatically.

For the first six months after they divorced, Martin’s mom insisted on taking him to see his dad, but his dad did not show up. When his dad did show up, he was angry and aggressive and Martin refused to spend time with him.

Since his dad did not care whether he came or not, his mom decided to stop putting pressure on them to see each other. “Martin is way better than before. He used to cry and have nightmares, but it’s much better now”, she said.

Still, six months passed and Martin was angry, negative and grumpy and life was tough on him. He never smiled, the whole world was bad, it is everyone else’s fault and every tiny thing made him blow up with anger and throw temper tantrums. After years of abuse, Martin’s mom told me she needed help, because she felt she was losing her son.

So first, we played “If I were a wizard”.

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Why (and When) You Should Not Ask Your Kids “Why?”

Woman looking up in front of a blackboard full of question marks

Recently, I ran a professional development course for teachers and we had a big discussion about the simple question “Why?” When I told the participants we had to consider the use of this question carefully, they were confused. To them, “Why?” was an open question that allowed children to express themselves.

Why should we consider not allowing kids to express themselves?

When asked “Why?”, all the people in the world activate a mechanism in their brain that searches for the answer. Even if you ask the question and give the person a long time to find the answer, their brain will not rest until it finds the answer.

Therapists and teachers can make very good use for this when they want to develop mindfulness and critical thinking skills.

But “Why?” is a bad question when someone has done something we wish they had not done, like mess up the carpet, break our favorite vase or forget to do their homework.

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