Episode 344 Stop Losing Yourself in Motherhood (CMM Audiobook Part 3)
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[00:00:00] You are listening to episode 344 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.
Hello everyone. It's Danielle, your host, and just welcome back. We are moving through The Cyclone Mom Method audiobook series here, where I'm handing you my entire book free, just a few [00:01:00] chapters each week. Are you new here? If so, welcome. But also scroll back two episodes and start at part one of this series because you deserve the whole method, not to come in the middle of it.
But for those of you who have, who are ready for this one, you have heard so far the foundation, the cyclone swirl, the key to feeling better, plus you've heard the first step of the method, calling on your faith. So today in part three, you'll hear chapters eight through 10, and this is where the method gets wonderfully practical, right?
Clarifying your goals, connecting with yourself, and confidently being mom. If you're somewhere you can, then jot a note or two about it. Grab something right now to write with. But if you're driving or folding laundry, no worries at all. It will be here to replay. Okay, everyone, here [00:02:00] is the next section of the audiobook of The Cyclone Mom Method.
Chapter eight: Clarifying Your Goals. "Open your works to the Lord, and your intentions will be set in order," Proverbs chapter 16, verse three The next part of my framework to help you be a calm, in control, and confident cyclone mom is to design your future. It's time to look ahead and become the designer and creator of what you actually want.
Set your brain to the future. In order to create a roadmap, we need to have a deeper understanding and clarity as to where we are going. We'll also need to get specific and understand the driving force behind our choices. Sometimes we get swept along in the flow of life. We wait and see where things end up, and that is an option of how you could live your life.
There are some things we [00:03:00] can choose to be relaxed about. If you find you fall into this laid-back category, my invitation to you is simply to get curious. Activate curiosity mode in your brain and flow in a direction of getting a little bit clearer about some goals you actually want to set. Part of stepping into your God-given power and finding more balance and joy is becoming more deliberate about how you're living your life.
This concept of deliberation has woven its way through multiple chapters in this book. It's a power notion that carries us to where we wanna go. I want you to think about a GPS system. There are two elements you need in order to properly use a GPS for its intended purposes. You need a current location and a specific address of where you would like to go.
I want you to see that it is necessary for you to decide and get [00:04:00] specific about where you want to go in life. Planning ahead of time puts you into gear, utilizing your higher brain, the prefrontal cortex, as we learned back in chapter five Your first step is one of my favorite exercises. I call this your personal mission statement.
Organizations around the world craft a mission statement to help them remember what is most important in their actions. It's short enough to memorize, and it's easy to keep in front of you. This mission statement is crucial to clarifying your goals. It informs your path forward. For example, let's say I have a goal of traveling across Europe.
I want to see the world. But my personal mission right now is to be present as a mom and attend as many of my children's activities as possible. Can you see how the goal doesn't quite serve my current mission? Mission statements will shift [00:05:00] with each stage of motherhood. Having a personal mission statement crafted will help you get more specific about what goals support the way you want to show up in your life.
Crafting a mission statement helps you to feel less like you're throwing goals on a page willy-nilly, and more like each goal you pursue truly aligns with what you want out of this stage of life. Here is an example. "It is my personal mission in life to follow God's plan for me, as well as love and lift those I interact with.
I seek to deepen my marriage through communication and quality time, to take care of my two children with love and quiet answers, and to bring excellence into each project I take on at work. Everything I do points to a life centered around the qualities of Jesus Christ, love, courage, and meekness, to name a few.
It is my mission that I can live as God would have me live to share his spirit, love, and grace [00:06:00] wherever I go." This was from Kim, a thirty-one-year-old mother. Can you see how Kim's statement would make it easy to discern between two competing choices? Let's say Kim is offered an incredible opportunity to travel across Europe for a year, but she would have to go alone due to her family's circumstances.
Given her mission statement, saying yes to this opportunity would make it difficult to deepen her marriage or take care of her two children in the way she wants to, and it would be in conflict with the mission statement she wrote for herself. Having a mission statement makes it easier for Kim to decline the invitation and live with purpose To write your own personal mission statement, I suggest following three simple guidelines.
Number one, what responsibilities do you have at this stage in your life? Don't be shy about including [00:07:00] all of the hats you are currently wearing. How would you like to show up to these roles? Number two, at its core, where is all of this leading you? Is there a common thread or theme you feel represents the life you want to live?
And number three, relate your answers to the teachings of Christ and God's plan for your life. How does he tie into your personal mission during this stage? Goal setting. Oftentimes, I coach my clients to put pen to paper and write down what your ideal future looks like. Where do you live? How many kids do you have?
What kind of school do they go to? How much do you weigh? How do you dress? What vacations are you going on? How much money do you have? What car do you drive? Where do you work? What I find most often for clients I coach is they can pick out maybe five or [00:08:00] ten things, and that is a great start. But keep asking your brain what else it wants.
What else sounds fun? If you had a magic wand, what would you wish for? Have fun with it. Then move on to prioritizing what goals you want to go after first. Picking five is good, but three is even better. As we'll discuss in chapter eleven, you can build momentum by choosing a smaller portion of your list to tackle first.
Once you have your three to five goals you want to pursue first, your next step is to overcome the obstacles inherent in the journey. You need some strategies in place to help you get to where you wanna go. For example, let's say you choose to focus on a trip to Europe. Maybe your brain is telling you that you don't know if you can get time off of work, or perhaps your passport isn't up to date.
[00:09:00] You can strategize by taking steps to get actual answers about taking time off of work or what the process and timeline are for getting an updated passport. Take the guesswork out of any obstacle that comes up. This allows you to commit to taking action and actually see progress towards your goals. In the midst of the journey, you see yourself make achievements.
You're creating results, which creates a feeling of empowerment, which feeds into achieving more goals. Like other areas of becoming a cyclone mom, this begets a positive cycle of growth and momentum. Even when you haven't reached the ultimate goal yet but can recognize some progress, I want you to know that you can celebrate the small wins along the way.
This exercise of getting clear on your goals, taking action, and celebrating along the way will help you design and achieve the [00:10:00] future that you want. Have peace of mind that you're on your way. Like you do with your time, evaluate along the way. Make adjustments and celebrate the failures that help you learn just as much as you celebrate your successes If you want some help getting clear on where you are now, where you're headed, or help building consciousness over your life to face those obstacles head-on, I can offer you strategies and one-on-one help to celebrate and create together until you've reached your dream future.
This is what I do professionally on a daily basis with other mamas just like you. Moms who are trying to balance their relationships, their motherhood, and their time. Mamas who feel like that an eventual trip to Europe, a farmhouse, or peaceful mother-in-law relationship is out of reach. Whatever your goals are, having an organized home, [00:11:00] a regular self-care routine, or starting a side business while you focus on raising your children are not out of your reach.
They are ripe for the taking. If you'd help along the way, please reach out using this link, www.daniellethienel.com/my-calendar-page.
Together, we can get started designing the life you've always dreamed of. Here are the chapter eight key takeaways. Become a designer and creator of the life you want by clarifying your goals. Make a list of twenty-five, yes, twenty-five things you want to experience, feel, do, or achieve. From the list, go through and choose your top five.
Put those five in order of what matters most to focus on. Do one thing today [00:12:00] toward making progress with your number one goal Part of stepping into your God-given power and finding more balance and joy is becoming more deliberate about how you're living your life. Take five minutes and visualize your life working exactly as you want it to.
What are all the specific details of that vision? Crafting a mission statement is crucial to clarifying your goals and informs your path forward. Put pen to paper and write down a few notes about your core values and some priorities for the current stage of motherhood you are in. Include three to five goals that support your personal mission statement.
Even when you haven't reached your ultimate goal, celebrate the small victories along the way. How can you begin to enjoy the journey, however near or far you are to your goal? Chapter nine, connecting with [00:13:00] yourself. "The kingdom of God is within you." Luke chapter 17, verse 21. This part of my framework elevates the relationship you have with yourself.
First, we wanna discover what current beliefs you have about yourself. This is essential before we do anything else. Many of us keep going on with life, birthdays pass, and years go by, and we don't stop to reevaluate and ask ourselves, "What do I currently believe about myself?" And the important part, "Do I want to keep it, or am I ready to let go of it?"
There is so much that you can find out about yourself, parts that you love and parts that you believe in. This work could be the best thing you can do for yourself. Of course, there can always be room for improvement if you want to focus on it, but I wanna focus on your inner voice, which is your thoughts.
What [00:14:00] does that voice sound like? Is it criticizing? Is it compassionate? Are you judgmental of yourself or full of self-love? My guess is you're likely somewhere between those extremes. Are you naturally someone who believes that you're confident and capable? Do you believe you can achieve your dreams, or are you doubtful about your ability?
In my coaching program, we take this a little bit deeper. We examine the biggest fears you have about yourself. We get clear on how you handle both positive and negative life events, and what feelings play into your perception of yourself. An important aspect of doing this for yourself is to take a look at your values.
Are you using your values as a guide when you talk to yourself? Do your self-beliefs and your values line up with each other? Especially in moms of faith, I can't stress how often a [00:15:00] mom can be compassionate to everyone around her and so distressing in the way she talks to herself. Does the way you speak to yourself align with something you would tell your best friend?
If not, then stop saying it to yourself. I urge you to take on the internal speech that would align with something Christ would say to you if you two were sitting down and having a conversation. This notion of speaking to yourself with either love or condemnation is important to catch and to understand When you have a relationship with someone else, it takes place in the mind, including what you think about them and what you feel about them.
It's the same principle with your own self. Your relationship with yourself is literally just the thoughts you think about yourself. Spend some time in awareness of what that inner voice sounds like. Then I invite you to consider what is keeping you stuck. [00:16:00] Perfectionism. The first thing that keeps a lot of us stuck when trying to improve our relationship with ourselves is perfectionism.
I personally had to redefine this for myself because I had this thought and belief that striving for perfection was a good thing. It helped me to achieve a lot, but in retrospect, what I learned through my own coaching is that perfectionism was holding me back big time. I'll write more in depth about this later, but I often talk about aiming for B-minus.
This concept changed my whole motherhood. Instead of going for a gold star and getting on myself if I didn't show up perfectly, I allowed myself to simply show up and do good enough. When we are full of the fear of failure, we don't try. We don't go after everything we want and can achieve. The thought pattern to look for here sounds something like this, [00:17:00] "I can't do it.
I don't know how. I've never done anything like this before. It's not good enough. I might embarrass myself." Whatever the pattern that is keeping you stuck, we want to identify it so we can get out of our own way because what you really want is progress and results. When we are stuck in perfectionism, we don't make progress or complete things because striving for perfection keeps us exactly in that state of striving, so we never arrive at the finish line.
We can adjust from a fear of failure to understanding that we win when we set out for something, whether we get it or we learn from it. Failure helps us learn Holding on to the past. Another aspect of our inner voice that can keep us stuck is struggling with our past, wishing it was different than it was.[00:18:00]
In this moment where all of your power lies, we refer back to what has been and what we've done up until now. We look for what we're capable of today by going back and thinking about our past. But whatever took place in our past doesn't have any bearing on our future. Only our thoughts about the past that we choose to think about today affect our future.
We want to let go of the things in our past that don't help us move forward. We do this by rewriting the story, our collections of thoughts and beliefs in our minds about what took place. I use a specific exercise with my clients who struggle with their past. This exercise shifts the narrative and has them becoming the hero of their past experiences.
You get to tell your story any way you want to, [00:19:00] and I will always urge you to pick something on purpose that will be life-serving to you. Refusing to relinquish your past is like carrying this extra big rock around in your purse. In order to elevate your relationship with yourself, you need to let the rock go.
You've got to take it out of your purse and throw it off to the side. You'll feel lighter, be kinder to yourself, and greatly enhance the outcome of your future Not living your own truth. There are two different ways you can block your relationship with yourself in this category. First is people pleasing.
When we participate in people pleasing behaviors, we are really lying to ourselves and to the other person we're committing to. When we say, "Yes, I'll do," whatever the thing is, even when we don't really want to, we are not [00:20:00] living in our own truth. We have this idea that if we say no to them, they'll think poorly of us, and that you somehow don't qualify to be a good or generous person.
People pleasing doesn't benefit anyone. The second way we can block our relationship with ourselves by not living our own truth is to live based on what other people think. This usually goes hand in hand with people pleasing. I help clients with this particular problem over and over again. If this is a struggle for you, I urge you to go down the path of elevating this part of your life.
It will change everything. We do not have any control over and cannot change what goes on inside of other people's heads. No matter what we do or say, even if we believe we're doing the right thing, there's no controlling the reaction inside of someone else. Instead of [00:21:00] making choices based on other people's thoughts, I help my mamas come back and live an authentic life where what matters most is what you think about your own self.
To start, stop using the word should. I call this shoulding. There's not much benefit from the thoughts that spring from the word should. Starting with should automatically creates a heaviness and pressure that will always stop you from being the best version of yourself A lack of boundaries. Many times when a client first comes to me, they'll say something like, "I just need to make better boundaries."
They believe that these boundaries need to be set for their children, in-laws, or boss to follow. I see this and ask, "Are you establishing boundaries that work for you?" There's a slight miss here for many of my clients. [00:22:00] Whenever you make a boundary, it is about you. For example, what you will and won't allow or what you will or won't do if a request you've made isn't followed.
When helping clients with time management, it is essential to set and uphold boundaries in order to prioritize schedules and complete work tasks, chores, and daily to-dos. The focus, however, is on you and your follow-through that really has you taking control of your time. More on this later in chapter 11.
Becoming a better setter and follower of our own boundaries can really elevate your relationship with yourself. As you take a look at your current beliefs and thoughts about yourself, keep an eye out for perfectionism, holding on to the past, not living your own truth, and lacking proper boundaries.
These are [00:23:00] important topics that create a pathway for you to move from feeling overwhelmed and busy to living your greatest potential. Chapter Nine key takeaways. An important aspect of becoming a cyclone mom is addressing the relationship you have with yourself. Take a look at your values. Are you using your values as a guide when you talk to yourself?
Do your self-beliefs and your values line up with each other? Your relationship with yourself is literally just the thoughts you think about yourself. There are four areas that can hold you back from having a healthy relationship with yourself. Perfectionism. We can adjust from fear to failure to understanding that we win when we set out for something, whether we get it or we learn from it.
What are you currently trying to do perfectly? [00:24:00] Holding onto the past. You get to tell your story any way you want to, and I will always urge you to pick something on purpose that will be life-serving to you. Rewrite the story of the past where you are the hero of the story. How is it different from what you tell yourself now?
Do you see how this new way of telling the story of your past will serve your life going forward? Not living your own truth. Instead of making choices based on other people's thoughts, I help my mamas come back and live authentic lives where what matters most is what they think about themselves A lack of boundaries.
Whenever you make a boundary, it is about you. For example, what you will and won't allow. Pick one area of your life where you want to have more boundaries. What would it solve for you if you were to follow through on your boundary? [00:25:00] Chapter Ten: Confidently Be Mom. "I have told you this so you may have peace in me.
In the world you will have trouble. But take courage! I have conquered the world." John chapter sixteen, verse thirty-three. This part of the Cyclone Mom method centers around understanding your role of mother. First, I'd like to point out something seemingly obvious. You are a mother, but it's also separate from you as the person you are.
Being a mom is your function, position, responsibility, and vocation. It's not all wrapped into one when it comes to who you are. The mom part is only part of your capacity. The goal within this step of my framework is to maximize your role as a mom. I want you to show up ten times more effectively than you currently are if you want to.
I [00:26:00] want you to notice that I mention the importance of elevating your relationship with yourself in chapter eight before we talk about motherhood. Elevating your own inner relationship makes this part easier, because being a mom is only one part of who you are, and when you exquisitely take care of and connect with yourself first, you will automatically enhance how you show up as a mom.
You are a good mom. At this point, I invite you to own your infinite worthiness. There's all this talk about good mom and bad mom, and that just doesn't need to exist. You're here reading a book about trying to become a calm, in control, and confident mom through your own God-given power. You exist. You were breathed into life from God.
By this divine law of existence, you are 100% worthy. That's a [00:27:00] fact, and so is the truth that you can't get any more worthy than you already are because you are infinitely worthy. You also are a good mom. There isn't an upside to believing anything but this. Don't allow yourself to question it anymore.
It's a choice, and when you choose to focus on faults, mistakes, and not seeing your humanness, you fall prey to a false belief that you aren't good. The other option is to take on a lighter attitude that will serve your motherhood a thousandfold. Two of my personal favorite thoughts or phrases that help me and my clients ground ourselves in truth and not question our good enoughness are, one, "There I go being human again," and two, "I am both amazing and a mess."
This [00:28:00] reminds me that I am divinely made, yet am having a human experience. I invite you to adopt these mom mindset conditioners as often as necessary, too. Imagine what would change if you didn't question whether or not you were worthy of the title of good mom. It's just a constant truth. Accepting this fact is the first step to maximizing your role as mom.
Prioritize self-care. Self-care matters. It matters so much. And I want to right off the bat dispute the idea that self-care is selfish. By definition, a selfish act puts others in harm's way. You taking great care of yourself is anything but harmful. In fact, it benefits everyone you encounter. So if you are doing something that is good for you, that you want to be doing, [00:29:00] and that makes you feel good and your brain thinks this is selfish, then check in with yourself.
Am I putting somebody in harm's way because of this? That is a simple way to either quiet your brain or take action in alignment with who you want to be. Most likely it's not selfish, at least not from all of the examples I have in the moms I coach. Taking care of yourself is going to fill yourself up and give yourself the energy to show up as the mom you want to be.
That love you show yourself overflows and becomes more love that you are able to give to your family and those around you. This principle of self-care also ties into your worth. Everything is based on this. You are worthy. You are a good mom. Good moms take care of themselves. When good moms prioritize their own care, they are better able to take [00:30:00] care of those around them.
It's a beautiful cycle of love. Since we already know that you are infinitely worthy, you are worthy of participating in the self-care cycle. When we prioritize self-care, we also build our self-confidence. It helps us feel better. And when you feel better, you do better. Self-care will help you maximize your role as a mom because you then take the actions necessary to carry out being the mom you dream of being.
There is another version of you, one where your mental and emotional health is soaring, one where your physical and spiritual well-being is filled to the brim. It all starts with believing that filling your cup, prioritizing self-care, and putting yourself on the to-do list while making it mandatory to check off is actually the roadmap to all you dreamed of when you became a [00:31:00] mom Expand your emotional wellness.
Living through a global pandemic in your lifetime highlights the importance of physical well-being. We focus on washing our hands, getting enough rest, and eating nutritious foods that make our bodies strong. In my program, we focus on emotional health. From chapter four, you know what feelings are, where they come from, and how they're created.
I'll go more in depth on this principle later, but I coach on a principle that is called the fifty-fifty. The punchline of this tool is that negative feelings are okay and to be expected. Negative emotions are also a sign that your life is on track. Again, I go more into depth on the fifty-fifty later. We don't have to avoid, react to, or resist negative emotions.
We have to learn how to [00:32:00] process them, which we discuss more in chapter nine. If that sounds foreign to you, I promise it isn't as hard or difficult to learn as it sounds. The key to emotional health is learning how to allow negative feelings and how to process them. Expanding your emotional wellness will help you maximize your role as a mom because you won't be as caught up in battling your emotions.
You'll know what to do with them. What I'm offering you here is the pathway to more peace, balance, and joy in your mom life. When you feel guilty, worried, or overwhelmed, how differently would your day play out if you possess the skill to accept and process that emotion? If you learned how to be gentle with yourself, wouldn't that change how you show up as a mom?
A lot of moms come to me with their top feelings on a daily basis being some combination of overwhelm, anxiety, stress, [00:33:00] defeat, and tiredness. What would change when these feelings weren't in the top three, but instead the bottom 10 of what you felt on a daily basis? This is the change that is available to you and what I help my clients with daily.
Be clear on where you are buffering in your life. And by this, I mean gain awareness on when you are avoiding feeling uncomfortable feelings by getting a quick dopamine hit. You could be avoiding feelings with food, sugar, alcohol, or drinking, anything you use to escape from the feelings of stress and overwhelm.
We want to pay particular attention to this behavior because it accomplishes the opposite of what we want it to. We don't show up at maximum capacity when we avoid our emotions. For example, when we shove our emotions, quote, "under the rug," or when we resist our emotions as if we're trying hard to [00:34:00] hold a beach ball underwater, the ball eventually bursts up out of the water, and it makes an even bigger splash than if we let the ball just rise gently to rest on the surface.
Buffering is something I address often in my coaching. Seeing that it is possible to stop, process, and participate in our favorite experiences because we want to, not because we don't know how to handle our negative emotions, is key to going after our dreams. Be deliberate about enjoying motherhood.
Whatever stage you're going through, there are things you can find joy in. I know it can sound so difficult, especially when you have a new baby and you're up all night, or you're navigating a disability with a child, or you're having a difficult time with your teenager, or you have children growing up and moving out.
That's the stage I'm [00:35:00] in now. My twin daughters are in college, and my son has his driver's license now. I've learned that I don't have to stop maximizing my role as their mom, even when they aren't physically under my roof or have more independence. I am now and forever their mother, and there are things I can find joy in during this stage of my motherhood too.
Yes, there are particular circumstances in this stage of motherhood that are very challenging. Yes, your day-to-day can be hard. What I want you to lean on is that there are also some very special and wonderful things about the particular stage of motherhood you are in right now, and your brain is just not focused on these positives enough.
Before you know it, your kids will grow, and different circumstances and challenges will arise. So don't leave one stage and enter another before you've soaked up every ounce of [00:36:00] goodness out of your current stage. Right now, I don't have a little soft cheek to cuddle up in my lap and press into my own face.
But I do have time to just pick up and go somewhere with ease. Don't miss what's great about the present because your joy and your power is only found in the here and now. Don't delay. Enjoy the journey. Find what is great about now, because it will pass. And this ability to be deliberate about what you are enjoying is a game changer.
It strengthens your mindset and will help you maximize your role as a mom. Chapter 10 key takeaways. Maximizing your role as a mother is the next step in becoming a cyclone mom. You are a good mom. Own your infinite worth. Prioritizing self-care [00:37:00] is not selfish, it is essential. Make a list of 15 self-care activities, both big and small.
You will always be able to remind yourself of what to do to take extreme care of yourself when you make this list Expand your emotional wellness. You don't have to avoid, react, or resist negative emotions. In chapter 13, you'll learn the process of what you can do instead. Be deliberate about enjoying motherhood.
Don't delay. Enjoy the journey. Find what is great about now, because it will pass. Name five wonderful things about the stage of motherhood you are in right now, and especially look for things that won't be a part of a future stage. Okay, we will stop there for today. Look how far we've come. We are three weeks in, and you now know more about how to create calm from the inside [00:38:00] out than most people will ever learn.
So we've got one more part to close out the audiobook. So next week, the final part, you're gonna be hearing the last chapters of the book, Taking Control of Your Time, The Three Critical Tools You Need to Have, How to Process Negative Feelings, and then the conclusion, which I call The Discomfort Corridor.
And then the week after that, I have a special episode planned about how moms can take this method from just listening it, to it here, like you have to actually living it out, embodying it. You won't want to miss either one. So until next week, 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 of scheduling a free coaching consultation with [00:39:00] me. We'll meet over Zoom to explore options and possibilities of how having a personal life coach and mentor could help you experience the exact motherhood and life your heart desires.
To talk through current options, schedule a free coaching consultation today. You'll find the link to schedule in the show notes. It would be an honor to support you at any stage of your motherhood journey
