Episode 35: 5 Tips to Regroup

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10/03/19 • 20 min

Adventures Of A New You

Hello and Welcome to the podcast; Adventures of a New You

I am your host, Jen Parke a social worker and fellow adventurer!

This is Episode 35 of the podcast and today we are going to chat about: 5 Tips to Regroup

I have been attending a training series for supervisors/ leaders and we have been talking about improving a skill or an area that we struggle with.

The area that I have been working on (trying to work on is patience)

I find that patience is something that I struggle with not just at work but also at home and frankly with myself.

In general there are a lot of areas of our day that require a great deal of patience. Driving in the car, waiting in line, trying to get our kids out the door, and then patience at work well that is another level.

For right now, let’s talk about patience more at home but know that you can carry these ideas over into all of the other areas of your life

One of my biggest triggers is getting out the door in the morning. I start to lose my patience here. First know that I wake up usually around 5:30. I like to have at least an hour to myself before the circus begins. Yes I call it the circus. The minute my eyes open a cat is crying to be fed, sometimes the dog is dancing at the door, other times I have to wake him up. Then I like to try to get all of my stuff done before my son gets up

Some days the second the circus starts I wish myself out of this place. I wish to be somewhere quiet. Somewhere calm. Somewhere that doesn’t have Old Town Road blaring from the bathroom.

Sometimes.

Sometimes I lose my cool.

Listen there are only so many times you can say put your shoes on before you lose your shit. But something that I have been working on is recognizing that I am escalating well before I lose my shit.

This is something that I am working on. The first step for me has been being more self aware. I highly recommend that you check out

Heather Chauvin’s podcast Mom Is In Control Episode #263, Red , Yellow and Green Zones

In this episode she shares a super basic traffic light system that encourages you to be mindful of yourself and how you are feeling. Green is basically that you are calm. Yellow means you are a little on edge and red... well that is when you lose your shit. So absolutely go check that out.

Being more aware has allowed me to just realize when I might be in a yellow zone and very close to teetering into a red zone. By being self aware I can try to prevent going into the red. But guess what we can’t prevent every episode that would push us into red. And honestly it’s ok to get in the red zone sometimes! We are allowed to get upset, we are allowed to get angry.

But now let’s talk about how we can get ourselves out of the red zone.

Now some of these are idea world situations. Not when you are literally trying to race out the door in the morning. But sometimes we need to be able to calm ourselves as we are running out the door because you don’t want to be that crazy mom that is yelling at her kids the whole way to school and then setting everyone up for a crap day. Trust me I have been there... some days are really hard... but you know what is harder? Working through feeling like a shit mom when we lose it.

These are tried and true tactics that I have used when I need to regroup, calm down and get out of the red zone. They are super simple and literally can take just a few minutes.

5 tips to regroup -

1. Get fresh air

2. Eat something&

Hello and Welcome to the podcast; Adventures of a New You

I am your host, Jen Parke a social worker and fellow adventurer!

This is Episode 35 of the podcast and today we are going to chat about: 5 Tips to Regroup

I have been attending a training series for supervisors/ leaders and we have been talking about improving a skill or an area that we struggle with.

The area that I have been working on (trying to work on is patience)

I find that patience is something that I struggle with not just at work but also at home and frankly with myself.

For right now, let’s talk about patience more at home but know that you can carry these ideas over into all of the other areas of your life

Some days the second the circus starts I wish myself out of this place. I wish to be somewhere quiet. Somewhere calm. Somewhere that doesn’t have Old Town Road blaring from the bathroom.

Sometimes.

Sometimes I lose my cool.

Listen there are only so many times you can say put your shoes on before you lose your shit. But something that I have been working on is recognizing that I am escalating well before I lose my shit.

This is something that I am working on. The first step for me has been being more self aware. I highly recommend that you check out

Heather Chauvin’s podcast Mom Is In Control Episode #263, Red , Yellow and Green Zones

But now let’s talk about how we can get ourselves out of the red zone.

These are tried and true tactics that I have used when I need to regroup, calm down and get out of the red zone. They are super simple and literally can take just a few minutes.

5 tips to regroup -

1. Get fresh air

2. Eat something&

Previous Episode

Episode 34: Workout Ideas For Busy Moms

Hello and Welcome to the podcast; Adventures of a New You

I am your host, Jen Parke a social worker and fellow adventurer!

We are approaching the last quarter of the year and if you take a look back at those goals that you set in January you might realize that you are not exactly where you want to be. Or maybe you are and you are already starting to look forward to next year. If you have heard of my girl Rachel Hollis and the last 90 days then this is the time to start planning for next year.

So the last 90 days uses the 5 to Thrive

Get up an hour earlier and use that time for yourself
Workout for at least 30 minutes a day
Drink half your body weight in ounces of water each day
Give up one food category you know you shouldn’t be eating
Write down 10 things that you are grateful for each day

I used to be the mom who picked up dinner and would sit and eat at the park. I lived in a crappy apartment that I loathed because everything about it represented everything that was wrong with my life. I wanted to have a house with a backyard for my son to play. So we spent so many nights at the park.

Now I drag the kid and the dog on runs at the park. They don’t always even want to come but it is so good for us to get outside and move!

I used to google how to fit a workout in as a busy mom. Actually I would google how to fit a workout in your busy schedule and a single mom.

As a full time single mom it can be very frustrating to not have time for yourself.

No amount of googling helped me find the answer. I’m not going to sit here and tell you to just find the time either. I’m going to tell you that you have to find your way and your time in a way that feels good for you. You have to weigh how you will feel. Some days the Mom guilt is all too strong and it won’t feel worth finding the time to work out. Other times if you don’t find the time to work out you will feel the mom guilt because you can’t show up for your family as your best self.

Working out is about self care and so is managing your mom guilt. Self care isn’t always about getting to relax. Self care is about literally taking care of yourself. If you don’t take care of yourself how can you truly take care of anyone else? For us to give the best to others we have to take care of ourselves.

For me the answer has always been to being my son along. Losing time with him or asking my tribe for one more minute of babysitting had always been hard to ask for when it was for self care. But why? We should be confident enough to ask for support to care for ourselves.

What if just once this month you schedule a time take care of yourself? Let’s start small and all grab our calendars and schedule time for ourselves and make sure that we show up for ourselves!

Ways to work out with your kids/when you have kids

Bring the kids along
- Use the gym daycare
- Use a running stroller
Get the kids busy too!
- YMCA
- Workout during your kids activities. Heck sign them up for an activity just so you can workout
- Include the kids.... Kids yoga cosmic kids
- Join activities together (karate)
- Now we Bargain - if we go to the park he has to walk/run one lap with me and then he can go to the playground

** always be careful and monitor your child!

Workout at home
- Homeowner workouts
- Barre 3 classes or other workouts online
- Treadmill at home

Next Episode

Episode 36: Stop Comparing Your Life

Hello and Welcome to the podcast; Adventures of a New You

I am your host, Jen Parke a social worker and fellow adventurer!

We all have moments when we catch ourselves comparing our lives to others. We may compare our careers, our cars, our bodies or our families to others.

There are times as a single parent that I struggle because it is incredibly hard not to compare. For example when I take my son to his activities like football or baseball and there are dads everywhere. There are dads watching, there are dads coaching. So many times this has really gotten to me

My son has an entire village of support and honestly he has never said a word about all of the other dads so I know that this is my stuff.

There are times when you go to family activities like for example we went to the pumpkin patch this weekend and sometimes this is another place that in the past I may have gotten caught up in something I call all of the happy families. But it is interesting because if you actually take a minute to listen to the other people everyone wants what they can’t have.

While we were there we were playing a tic tac toe game and a dad who had a son who was probably 2 said to me “I can’t wait until my son is old enough to do stuff like that!”

Sometimes when we look at our lives we think society tells me to do it this way.... or everyone else does it this way.

But just because that is how everyone else does it does not mean that this is the right way.

You need to figure out your own path, your own Journey . You need to decide what is best for you every day.

Maybe working 9-5 isn’t the right path for you. Maybe you are supposed to be working in a different way.

Maybe you don’t have to be married to have a happy family.

Maybe you don’t have to buy a new car that you really can’t afford just to keep up with the neighbors.

Maybe you just stop waiting for life to happen and you just get out there and make the best life that you can.

Life may not go the way you want or even in the direction that you ever thought possible but that is not a bad thing!

Here are three ways to help you stop comparing your life!

Reflect on why you want to be like the jonses
Embrace what you have and be grateful!
Set goals for yourself

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