What you and your teen really want. . .It’s what I want too.
It’s what we ALL REALLY want.
Every person on the planet.
Actually…Every. Single. Human. Ever.
We all want to feel better.
There is nothing we covet more than feelings.
It’s our secret driving force.
It’s secret because it’s not what we THINK we want.
We think we want:
– a bigger, nicer house,
– a teen that doesn’t put homework off till midnight,
– a husband that helps out more with the kids,
– a mother-in-law that minds her own business,
– a child that doesn’t constantly make a mess,
– a boss that recognizes hard work with a raise.
Yes, we believe THESE are the things we REALLY want. But, WHY do we want these things?
Let’s say our teens were to do their homework as soon as they get home. Zero procrastinating. Zero putting it off. Zero social media or video games before they do their work. Just pure focus and, suddenly, their homework is done.
What do we, as their mothers, get from this?
We get to tell ourselves a story. A beautiful story that our teen knows how to get stuff done, that they’re productive, and that they’re going to be successful in life because they can do their homework without procrastinating. We get to believe that we’re raising an amazing teen because we’re an amazing mom!
This story, this paragraph of sentences in our mind, causes our brain to release chemicals that flood into our bodies. This flooding results in what we humans label and experience as feelings. Feelings are simply chemical vibrations flowing through our bodies as a result of particular thoughts.
All the sentences in our brains, the stories we tell ourselves day in and day out, these are what create our feelings. The truth is…we want our teens to do their homework without procrastinating because we then get to feel a certain way. If our teens are doing what we think they should, we get to feel confident, successful and happy as mothers.
Feelings are what we really want.
We want to feel. We want to feel good.
We’ll do anything to feel how we’re longing to feel.
Notice the thing we want and the feeling we believe it will create:
– A bigger, nicer house = Excitement, Joy, Pleased
– A teen that doesn’t put homework off till midnight = Confident, Successful
– A husband that helps out more with the kids = Relief, Appreciated, Supported
– A mother-in-law that minds her own business = Content, Liberated, Responsible
– A child that doesn’t constantly make a mess = Cheerful, Love, Grateful
– A boss that recognizes your hard work with a raise = Honored, Respected, Determined
Feelings are the driving force behind everything we want and everything we do. Emotions are everything to humans. There is NOTHING we desire more than to feel a certain way.
For most of us, that certain way is HAPPY. We want to be happy, we want our kids to be happy, we want our lives to be happy. We long for happiness because it feels SO good.
We’ll even go to great lengths to feel happy. We formulate extensive plans and attempt to creatively manipulate situations AND people in our lives to feel good. We invest our most precious resources of time, money, and effort into precisely manicuring our existence in hopes of feeling exactly what we’re longing to feel.
The problem is…THIS never works.
Emotional awareness is critical. Knowing what’s going on inside of us is where we must start. Too many of us start by looking outside. We look to our circumstances. We look to our teens. We look to their behavior. To their words. To our house. To our job. We think they hold the answer. That they’re creating our feelings. That they’re responsible for how we feel. We hold them responsible for our enjoyment of OR lack of happiness in our lives.
This false understanding keeps us stuck attempting to control the world to control how we feel. Remember, feelings are created by thinking, not circumstances. No matter what happens outside of us, we feel because we think. We feel because of WHAT we think. We often want to blame something or someone for what we’re feeling. Our heightened awareness of what happens outside of us AND our amplified focus on how we feel results in us creating a connection between the two. A connection we believe means one creates the other. But just because our minds tell us there’s a connection doesn’t mean there is one.
That’s where we get confused. We believe our minds are always right. That they speak the truth to us and decipher the world factually. But they don’t. Our minds don’t think in facts. Our minds think in perception that is unique to us.
Here are the foundational truths to embrace to create emotional awareness:
We’re driven by our desire to feel.
We all want to feel good.
We all want to feel better.
Thinking creates feelings, not circumstances.
Manipulating people and situations in our lives to create a particular feeling does not work.
As I’ve been reflecting on my transformation as a mother of teens, one of the most impactful changes I’ve made is understanding feelings and the role they play in my life. During the month of March, here and on social media, I’ll be focusing on feelings as it’s THE topic I coach parents and teens on the most.
Imagine being able to create a feeling with ease.
Imagine keeping your cool when a worst-case scenario becomes reality.
Imagine letting go of controlling the world to control how you feel.
Now, stop imagining cause we’re going to make it happen…together.
Welcome to March Happiness, my friend.
