Episode 325 The 2 Things You Must Quit to Be An Emotionally Healthy Woman
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Speaker: [00:00:00] You are listening to episode 325 of the Peaceful Mind Podcast. Welcome to The Peaceful Mind Podcast, a place where you can move out of overwhelm and into a calm, confident motherhood with God at the center. I'm Danielle Thienel certified life coach Catholic Mom and creator of the Cyclone Mom Method. I help you create emotional, steadiness and peace of mind from the inside out.
So you can experience more balance and more joy in your busy mom life. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Let's get started.
Hey there, mama. Welcome back to the Peaceful Mind Podcast. I'm your host Danielle, and I'm so glad you're here with me today. I wanna start by asking you a question. Let's just dive in to those two things that you must quit to be an [00:01:00] emotionally healthy woman. I know I want to be emotionally healthy. I'm hoping you want to be emotionally healthy, and that this episode will have you checking in and feeling empowered to move forward to reaching that goal.
And so the question I wanna start. With this episode to get things going is what does it mean to be an emotionally healthy woman? When you saw the title of this episode, did you ask yourself that question? And if so, did you come up with an answer? If not, let's do that now. I think a lot of us have never really stopped to think about this.
We know that physical health, what that looks like, right? Eating well, exercising, getting enough sleep, but emotional health, that's a little bit more elusive. And I did talk about how to get emotionally stronger in [00:02:00] the previous podcast series that I did just a few episodes ago. But here's how I wanna define it in the context of how I wanna help you today to be become a more emotionally healthy woman.
First of all, I want to talk about it from the aspect that an emotional healthy woman takes responsibility for her own feelings and reactions. She doesn't try to control or manage other people's emotions. She doesn't blame others for her circumstances. She sets boundaries. She knows where she ends and where other people's boundaries begin.
She feels calm and grounded most of the time. Not because your life is perfect, but because you've learned how to respond to life from a place of peace instead of reacting from a place of chaos. [00:03:00] That's how I define an emotionally healthy woman. So does that sound like you? If not, don't worry. Most of us were not taught how to be emotionally healthy.
Most of us learn patterns that actually work against our emotional health, and then it's only because you've probably been practicing those earlier patterns for years now and then without even realizing. It. And so that's what I always am wanting this episodes, these episodes, to be, to move towards me.
More peace of mind requires us to stop and reflect on these aspects and we don't even have to be, maybe some of those things I ra rattled off about being an emotional healthy woman. Like some of them maybe you're like, yeah, I'm pretty good at that. But we want to look at the wholeness of it and find out where we have that room to grow and [00:04:00] concentrate on that.
And if you're somebody who's no, I don't do any of those things, then I wanna just say, no problem. You're in the right place. We get to just start and have small steps, and that is so good enough. Okay. I want to, specifically though, what I think would be helpful is to talk about two things. Two specific things that could be stealing your emotional health or keeping you from being the emotional healthy woman that you wanna be.
And then I'm going to invite you to just, we're gonna quit them. We're just gonna decide that we're gonna stop and. There's no longer going to be part of who we are or how we continue to conduct ourselves going forward. And those, what those two things are, I'm gonna tell you right now, [00:05:00] the two things that I would like to invite you to quit so that you can be emotionally healthy and reap the benefits in your life of what that.
Would be is to quit blaming and to quit over functioning. Okay? So if you are ready to feel emotionally free instead of emotionally exhausted, if you're ready to feel calm and more grounded instead of anxious and overwhelmed. Then let's talk about why these two patterns are holding you back and how you can start changing them today.
Okay. First things first. We'll start with the first one. What we must quit blaming. Now blaming is when we make other people responsible for our feelings, our [00:06:00] reactions, and our circumstances. And I just wanna say right off the bat that when I was in the throes and despairs of what I would say was my lowest point, but also I'm so grateful for that point because there was a turning point with coaching.
But what I didn't see. Is that I was doing this on a daily basis. I thought that the reason why I was so stressed, the reason why I wasn't enjoying my motherhood, the reason why I was talking in tones that I didn't like and nagging and just feeling defeated and not seeing progress in my goals, it's because I was making other people responsible for.
The results I was having, and all of them, my reaction was their fault. How I felt was their fault. [00:07:00] What I was currently like circumstantially living in was their fault. So I wanna say, and like I'm raising my hand. This was me. It just happened. 'cause you don't know until you learn something different.
I just wanted to give a little bit of context that I'm not offering you anything that I haven't worked through already and have realized that there is an A side, a place on the other side where I can honestly say I am very healthy emotional woman, and it is because I quit blaming others. So let me just give you some examples of what this sounds like.
My husband makes me so angry when he doesn't help with, fill in the blank, X, Y, Z dishes, taking out the trash, supporting me for my job, change, whatever it is. Okay? This one was big for [00:08:00] me. My kids stress me out when they don't listen. My mother-in-law ruined my whole day with that comment. I'm overwhelmed because everyone expects so much of me.
I'm unhappy because my family doesn't appreciate me. Are these familiar to you or some flavor or some different version of these? Can you familiar? Does it, is it like, yes. I say that. I say that a lot. I think that a lot. If so, first of all, again, I rose my hand. These were definitely ones that I thought, and so you're not alone here.
This is how most of us were taught to think about our emotions. But here's the problem. When we blame others for how we feel, you have just given away all your power. [00:09:00] In fact, this has taken you in the opposite direction. Of having a peaceful mind and having peace of mind, which is what you all want.
We want inner peace, and you cannot get there when you blame others. So for if your husband if he's responsible for your anger, then you personally cannot feel the feeling of calm until he changes. And if your kids are responsible for your stress, then you can't feel peaceful until they start behaving differently or what before you, they move outta the house.
Your mother-in-law, right? She's responsible for your mood. Then your emotional state is at the mercy of whatever she says or does. So if she's coming over, she calls, we'll just have to be like, Ooh I wonder. I wonder if [00:10:00] I'm gonna be in a good mood later or not, depending on what she says to me or how she acts.
No, this is where I get so passionate. For all of you who are listening, I love you too much to continue giving away what. Is so valuable, and that is your emotional healthiness. When we blame others for how we feel, we literally become victims of our own lives. But here's the truth that I want to set you free with today, and that is that no one can ever make you feel anything.
Your feelings, your emotions, your emotional state are always your [00:11:00] responsibility. Now, before you hear that and be like, get possibly, because the way the brain is might get a little defensive, right? I'm not saying that other people's behavior doesn't affect you. Of course it does. Their behavior is something that you see and there's going, there can be a reaction there, right?
It'll trigger something. And I'm not saying you should just accept bad treatment or behavior or, and I'm also, not saying that everything is your fault. What I'm saying is that you always have a choice in how you respond. See, I didn't know that. I didn't think that I wasn't, I was so equating with what they were doing, which was the actual cause for how I felt and how I was acting, that there was no space for me to go to pause, to say, wait a minute, I have a choice [00:12:00] here.
Because I didn't have that knowledge that there was a choice. And that's what I wanna give you today. This is when I talk about God giving you the gift that is your mind and your mind's capability that he uploaded into our bodies. Is that. We will always have the choice of what to think and how to respond no matter what's going on.
You always have the power to decide how you wanna think about what's happening and how you think then determines how you feel. Okay, so let me say that again. We always have the choice, the power to decide how we wanna think about what's happening around us, and then what we choose there in that step.[00:13:00]
That is what determines how we feel. So when you stop blaming others for your feelings and start taking responsibility for them, everything changes. You stop being a victim, you start being empowered. You stop waiting for other people to change so that you can feel better. And then you, when you're not doing that, you start creating your own emotional experience, the one you wanna have.
Okay. And again, not necessarily, you are not jumping from, I'm feeling, heavy and pressured and anxiety and worry. And then you're not jumping from that to yay. Everything's all great. It's wonderful. There are people who might act in a way that you do want to show up in a committed, determined focused way, but you will be doing that because it's, you'll be creating a better result for yourself, okay?
You [00:14:00] won't be stuck. And we are stuck when we think it's other people who are causing our emotional healthiness. Okay, so I wanna talk about the second thing that I'm inviting you to quit. And the thing is these two, you actual these two things, you actually must quit them. If you want to be an emotional, healthy woman.
If you are continuing to do both of these things, it's just not a formula that adds up to. Getting you to be an emotionally healthy woman. So the second thing that you actually must quit is over-functioning. Okay? What I'm talking about when I say over-functioning, it's when we do things for other people that they should be doing for themselves.
It's when we [00:15:00] take on responsibilities that aren't actually ours. It is when we work harder on other people's problems than they do, and here's what over-functioning looks like. Let's say you wake your teenager up three times every morning because they, quote, can't get up on their own. Okay, maybe you do your husband's laundry because he doesn't do it right when he tries to do it on his own.
How about you constantly remind your family members about their appointments, their responsibilities, their commitments, because they forget if you don't, maybe you clean up after everyone because it's easier than asking them to do it. Or they'll complain or they'll whine and you say I don't wanna, hear that.
Maybe you make all the decisions for your family because they don't care or they can't decide, or you have the thought that if I don't make [00:16:00] all the decisions, then none of this that I want will ever happen. Do you solve all your children's problems for them because you don't want them to struggle? This is a big one.
I see my clients fighting with this all the time. And I really help you see that you're actually, you know how you're not helping your kids because struggle's a part of this human life. You want them to be able to build resistant resilience. You want them to build resilience, not resistance. Do you manage everyone's emotions?
Like when someone in your family is upset, like you immediately jump into the fix it mode. I need to make this better. I need to take away their discomfort, their pain. Now again, your brain might be like, yes, but that's what, a good mom does, takes away their pain. I'm just throwing out these ideas to to have you [00:17:00] evaluate whether you are over functioning.
Where you're putting your efforts might actually not. We wanna question, we wanna stop. Might not be as helpful as you think for your family, for others, and for yourself, right? Because we're talking about you being an emotionally healthy woman. So if any of those things that I just mentioned sounded like you, here's what's actually happening.
You are working harder on other people's lives than they are. You are taking responsibility for things that aren't your responsibility, and you're robbing them of the opportunity to grow, to learn, to become capable human beings. We're actually like stepping into a role that isn't ours to take care of.
Okay? And we think we might be doing a good thing. [00:18:00] But what if they were meant to learn something else or grow in a different way and for them to become closer to see how capable they are, and then that's no longer the case because you are over-functioning in their lives and over-functioning always leads to burnout.
Always because you are carrying a load that was never meant for one person to carry. I know you've heard me say this a million times, but that's, you like stepping into what a robot's job, right? All of us have limited time and energy, and if you're spending, you're pouring out from that. You wake up in the morning with that filled up picture and you're pouring out each day with all you're doing, and if you're doing all that you are carrying and all that other people are carrying, you are going to run out.
You're gonna burn out. And here's the thing about over-functioning. It often looks like [00:19:00] love, but it's not. It's usually about control. I know it. Again, I have to just bring up myself thinking that I was trying to control everything and I was trying to control it in a way that it was coming also from my perfectionistic attitude and mindset.
So that's like a double whammy. And it's about our own anxiety, our own uncomfortable feelings that we don't wanna feel when we jump into, like fixing it and putting our energy into changing things for other people. It's, and it's not over, it's not about our own discomfort with letting people experience the natural consequences when we personally over-function.
We send a message to the people around us that we don't believe they're capable of handling their own lives, and eventually they start believing us. [00:20:00] Like in their mind, they stop trying because they know we'll do it for them.
I can see this with my own mom. Why it, it always makes sense that I started operating that way too. There were many things that I know that brought like her joy, so she did them or she wanted it done her way. Or it was I just want this end result. Whether it was like just the meal made or the house clean because, I get to control and have it done. And again, like I, I see where it was coming from. This wasn't, it wasn't something she was like aware of. But I also know, like for instance with, to this day, I don't enjoy being in the kitchen or don't really feel like really equipped to make, like meals and things like that.
But it was because. My mom took over that [00:21:00] personal kind of thing herself and didn't let me in on the process. But again, there is no, it's, I'm just using that example to, to have you trigger examples in your mind where you might be over-functioning and. And again, like I do know it's coming from a loving place when we think I'll just do it, or they have too much on their plate too, so I'm gonna help them.
Or literally coming from I love it when X, Y, and Z is finished and completed, but we don't wanna keep sending that message to the people around us that we don't believe they're capable right now. With the blaming, with the over-functioning, I want you to see how they're connected. Okay. When we over-function, we often end up [00:22:00] feeling resentful.
We're doing so much for everyone and they don't seem to appreciate it, right? So we then start blaming them for our exhaustion and our overwhelm and our frustration. Like I do everything around here and no one appreciates me. But the truth is we're the one choosing to do the quote, everything. No one forced us to take on all those responsibilities.
We over functioned and then we blamed others for the natural consequences of our over functioning. I relate to this when all of my kids were in the middle school and when they, each when I said yes and to, to all of their like activities. Sports and clubs and all kinds of things, right? I was totally over-functioning.
I was not an emotional, healthy state at that period of my motherhood, right? But the truth was I was choosing to say [00:23:00] yes and to pay for it all and to commit to being at these places on certain days and to be the one that drives them. And then is that the games or do the traveling? That was right. And then I blamed them when we were late or it cost too much or it was taking up too much time, or we had to do this over that, or why we were always like.
Running around frantically and gathering, or if somebody forgot something, and yeah, it was a vicious cycle. When we over-function and then we blame, then we over-function more to try to get the appreciation we think we deserve. Then we blame more when we don't get it. So both blaming and over-functioning are all they're ways [00:24:00] of avoiding responsibility.
Either the responsibility for our own emotions or the responsibility for letting others handle their own lives. So what does life look like when you quit both of these patterns? When you stop blaming others for how you feel, you become emotionally free. You stop being at the mercy of other people's behavior.
You stop walking on eggshells, you stop trying to manage everyone else so you can feel okay. You start creating your own emotional experience, and when you stop over functioning, you start having energy again. You stop feeling resentful. You give the people in your life the gift of growing up, of becoming capable of handling their own responsibilities.
You start feeling calm instead of anxious, peaceful instead of overwhelmed, empowered instead of [00:25:00] victimized, and all of these. When I just even say that out loud, I'm like, that is why I'm doing what I'm doing, because I was not calm, not peaceful, not empowered. I was anxious, overwhelmed, and I was totally a hundred percent in victimhood, and life was hard and pretty miserable, and it felt stuck, and I started to feel resentful.
And I just, it, it was hard because I knew there was more. I knew what God told us about wanting an abundant life and I just wanted more peace. I wanted to feel more, I in control in, and I say that in control. I wanted to feel more [00:26:00] on, on top of things and more. Slower paced, and I wanted to feel more confident, like stop being mean to myself.
And I definitely wanted to feel more balanced in my life, right? So again, when you stop functioning and when you stop blaming, you will start feeling calm instead of anxious, peaceful instead of overwhelmed and empowered instead of victimized. And you will start having time and energy for the things that actually matter to you instead of spending all your time managing everyone else's life.
So I hope I've made my case for that. And so now I want, let's talk about how we could actually start making these changes today. First, I would like you to start paying attention to your language. Notice [00:27:00] when you say things like, he makes me so angry, or she stresses me out. Catch yourself. Catch yourself in the act of blaming, then practice reframing it instead of, my husband makes me angry when he doesn't help try.
I feel angry when my husband doesn't help. And I need to decide how I want to respond to that feeling. Okay? Another example, instead of my kids stress me out, try, I feel stressed when my kids behave this way and I can choose how to handle this stress. Do you see the difference? It is subtle. If you literally looked at it in the sentence on paper, it's a little bit of a tweak, right?
Especially from the he or the she [00:28:00] to the I. But it's everything. It is everything. When you take on the responsibility. Start asking yourself, what am I doing for others that they could be doing for themselves? What responsibilities am I carrying that aren't actually mine? Then just start stepping back a bit.
Maybe stop doing your teenager's laundry. Maybe stop reminding your husband about his appointments. Maybe try and stop solving everyone's problems for them. This will feel uncomfortable first and others might complain about it. I wanna give you that like warning. They're so used to it. They don't wanna change.
They have a lower brain too, remember, and the lower brain does not like change at one status quo. So I get it that my mom who made my dinner and was waiting for me every [00:29:00] night when I came home from my ballet class, if she all of a sudden was like, you know what? I'm not gonna be making your dinner every night.
And or some form or fashion that she was telling me, of course, I probably would've had a little fit and definitely complained about it. So you just wanna be beyond yourself that nothing's gone wrong. When that happens and we can be understanding and we can say I know this is a change.
I know this is hard, but you want to be an emotionally healthy woman, right? They might even say, you don't care anymore. But that's not true. You are caring. You're caring in a healthier way. You're caring enough to let them grow up. When somebody tries to make you responsible for their emotions, just gently hand it back to them.
It would go something like this. I can see you're upset [00:30:00] and I love you, but I can't fix this feeling for you. What do you think would help? Do you see that when someone tries to make their problem your emergency, you can say That sounds stressful for you. Do you have a plan for handling it? Remember, you're not being mean.
You are being healthy. You're teaching the people in your life that they are capable, and you are preserving your own emotional energy for the things that are actually yours to handle. And as always, that I like to repeat again and again on my episodes here for you is start small. We don't need a whole big overhaul.
Pick one area where you're gonna stop over functioning. Pick one relationship where you're gonna stop taking responsibility for the other person's emotions. It's gonna feel weird at first. You might [00:31:00] actually have some thoughts that create you feeling guilty. You might worry or attach being selfish to it, but you're not.
You're being responsible. That's way different and way more healthy. We're being responsible for our own emotional health and responsible for allowing others to be responsible for theirs. And an emotionally healthy woman knows the difference between what's hers to carry and what isn't. And she takes full responsibility for her own feelings and reactions, and she allows others to do the same.
Now that is loving. An emotionally healthy woman doesn't blame others for her emotional state, and she doesn't try to manage theirs, and that's so loving. And this is the foundation of emotional health Mama. This is how you [00:32:00] stop feeling emotionally exhausted and start feeling emotionally free.
Remember, you can't control other people, but you can always control yourself. You can't make other people change, but you can change how you respond to them. And when you quit, the two things that you need to quit blaming and over-functioning, you take back your power, you take back your peace, you take back your life.
I'm that. I think that's where I'm gonna end today. Thank you for spending this time with me today. I'm so grateful you're here. I'm always cheering you on as you're practicing these new ways of being, the ways that will lead the more peace of mind. And if you'd help identifying where you might be blaming or over-functioning.
And maybe how to start [00:33:00] create some more healthier patterns. I'd love to invite you to schedule a free peaceful mom strategy call with me. Okay? You can always find out how to do that or go straight there from the links in the show notes of these podcasts, and we can then explore what that would look like for you to become more emotionally healthier starting today.
All right everyone. Until next time, may peace be with you always. Thank you for listening to The Peaceful Mind Podcast. If you've been feeling a quiet desire for more peace and steadiness in your motherhood, I invite you to take the next step by scheduling a Peaceful Mom strategy call. At DanielleThienel.com you'll also find the link in the show notes.
It would be an honor to support you at any stage of your motherhood journey.
