Calm Parenting Podcast - Coronavirus: 9 Ways to Counter the Anxiety

Episode Date: March 14, 2020

Coronavirus: 9 Ways to Counter the AnxietyThe best way to counter the anxiety caused by the unknowns of the pandemic is to create an action plan with specific goals. Let’s use this opportunity to break old patterns, learn new skills, and change our relationships. Kirk gives you 9 ideas. For more practical strategies, podcasts, and blog posts, please visit our dedicated resource page at www.celebratecalm.com/coronavirus. Email [e-mail] for the most helpful service on the planet.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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series of podcasts, newsletters, blog posts, everything we can think of to help you out given this new world that we're living in with the coronavirus because we want it to be a very purposeful, intentional time. And we're looking at this as a big opportunity. I know right now there's a lot of fear and anxiety, but we're going to try to walk you through this on many different levels. I'm not going to hit everything on this first podcast, but I want to do this in a very logical way, in a way that kind of builds so that you can have a plan for your family. And we can actually use this to our advantage as families in many, many, many different ways. So we are going to have a webpage. It'll be celebratecalm.com. And you do that little

forward slash thing, coronavirus. And on there, our plan is to have lots of little tips, a lot of strategies that you can use, links to different podcasts, and anything else we can help you with. So there's a lot of fear and anxiety out there. It was very interesting. We were on the road for the last two weeks, actually, speaking New York, New Jersey, Northern Virginia, D.C, all over the place, military families, all kinds of different people. And nothing was really hitting until Wednesday and Thursday night. But Thursday night, especially, we didn't know if anybody was going to show up to the live event. And as it was, we had a huge crowd and it was awesome. One of the best nights we've ever had. And so, but you could really feel things turn. And what we talk a lot about is the fear and anxiety

right this there's so much anxiety anxiety is caused by unknowns and that's what trips your kids up so much because they have such busy brains and everything feels like it's out of their control and that's why they're controlling and bossy and you can't play board games because they cheat change the rules of the game and quit all the time. And it's why they struggle with new experiences. And so if you know our stuff, you know that one of our favorite tools to use with anxiety is wherever you are taking your child, have another adult give your child a job to do. Because then when he wakes up in the morning or he's going to that new taekwondo place, his focus isn't on all the unknowns and things he can't control. It's on doing his specific job to do. So we're going to get into that a little bit today, what you can do as a family using that kind of mindset. The other thing is this,

anxiety causes us to be extremely inward as human beings. And that's why you're seeing the shelves emptied of toilet paper. And so you'll see people get stocking up, getting like a year's supply of toilet paper. And so you get very inward and you're like, well, what if, what if, what if, and you start not to think about other people. And so there are people who have a year's supply of toilet paper and there are other people who are going to run out. And so part of what drove me to be calm besides restoring my relationship with my son at first and later all the relationships, right? Because it impacts your marriage, your kids, all of your relationships and your relationship with yourself is that I had so much anxiety. My whole world was about me.

Everything I did was about, really about managing, not really managing, but satisfying my own anxiety. So the fact that you lecture your kids all the time isn't really about your kids. It's about your own anxiety over your child's future because you don't see them living up to their potential and they're capable of doing so much more. And so you lecture them and you lecture them and you get on them and try to micromanage their lives and it ends up having the exact opposite result. And it hurts your relationship with your child because it's all about looking inward. So part of being calm is

learning how to control your own anxiety so that, watch how this works. Now because I've satisfied and I'm calm my own internal anxiety, now I can look outward. See, now when my child is melting down, instead of making it about me and how frustrating that child is to me and how when he doesn't do his homework it affects me, instead I can look outward and actually help my child and how I can help other people, right? Because we don't want to have this spirit of fear and anxiety. I want us, I want my calm family, all of you listening, to be people who walk around with more of a spirit of peace inside, of love, of looking outward toward other people, of having a sound mind, of being the calm, rational ones who can actually come up with solutions during this time

so we're not contributing to all of the panic and all of the anxiety. We can take this seriously and we can attack it head on, but instead of being hostage to it, here's my goal for you. And this is the goal of this podcast. This is the first thing I want you to listen to. This is the first thing I want to do. Let's be purposeful. Let's be intentional because some of you, we're going to go through all the different variations. Some of you are going to have your kids home from school for the next two weeks, next six weeks, next four weeks. It may be longer than that. Some of you are going to be working from home. Some of you have a situation where one of the spouses works from home and he or she is used to being quiet around the house while the kids are

at school. Guess what? That's gone. So what are we going to do now where we're all jammed together and we have reduced mobility out to go do things because it's not like, oh, well, let's just go to a theme park and let's just go to museums. They're all going to be shut down. So you're going to be together a lot. So let's have a goal. So I encourage you. Here's the first podcast. Here's your first goal. Write down three goals, at least three, maybe not too many, don't do too, three goals in the next two, four, six weeks, whatever time this is, that all of this is going on and it could go on for months, who knows? Let's have some purposeful goals. Let's write those goals down because look, the anxiety is all about the unknowns. Let's counter that by having a plan.

So I just, this morning, just wrote down eight goals. There are probably 50 other ones. But let's learn some, let's go with some goals. And I'm going to take these in future podcasts. We will flesh these out a little bit. Here's a good one. What a great time to learn about your child's natural learning style. How does your child learn best? See, all through the school year, everything's busy, busy, busy, busy, busy, and we're too busy and we don't have time for things because we've got school and

extracurriculars and you're working your job and you're doing all these things and we don't have time to do anything. This may just be a gift to you to slow down your life and learn how does your child, how does each of your children learn best? Because we have time now when you're at home to actually learn this, to experiment with different things. See, in the classroom and at school, it can be tough to do this. Now, we show teachers how to do that in our teacher training, but it's tough to figure that out because they all have to do the same thing. But at home, you can experiment with giving your kids, saying, how do you learn best? Do you learn best laying upside down off the sofa doing your math work that way? Do you do best laying on the floor, listening to music, eating a snack

while you're doing it, doing your schoolwork outside, doing it in a closet, doing it after you've done exercise, working in spurts, using momentum, managing your energy. Look, this is a huge insight about managing your energy, not your time. So there's a goal. Over the next few weeks, I'm going to study and observe and experiment with my kids and see how their brains actually work best. That's what we teach through that ADHD University program and why it's so helpful as we go through that of how do your kids' brains work? Figure this out now. Then when they go back to school, you'll have some tips for the teachers and you'll know for homework time. Hey, my son does his homework best when he's laying upside down. My daughter does it best with complete silence, whatever it is. Second goal, learn to

break the generational patterns, right? Some of you, you go, you go, you go, and you're lecturing and you're yelling and you all say like, well, I I'm gonna, you know, I really want to do the calm thing, but you haven't really made it a priority. And if you don't make it a priority, nothing will ever change. You'll make little things here, but you'll fall back into the back pattern. So my goal, one of your goals, I'm going to break that generational pattern that I got from my father or from my mother, where I yell and I scream my way or the highway approach, or where you're too sweet and you're not really confident in yourself and your kids walk all over you, where you do too much for your kids. Break that pattern. Write that down. Let's go on offense.

You know why? Because you're going to have a chance to practice it because your kids and your spouse are going to be with you 24-7. And so you can become kind of held a hostage to this situation, or you can say years from now, I remember when that coronavirus was wreaking havoc all over the globe. And that was the time that we finally decided as a family, we're going to break some generational patterns. Or if you don't want to do it as a family because your spouse isn't ready for it yet, or you married someone immature, kidding, not really. I'm going to break it myself. I'm going to do that. Three, restore broken relationships. You've restore broken relationships.

You've got broken relationships because you've misjudged your kids' motives and you've been on them possibly. No blame, no guilt here. Just own it. You've been on them since the day they were born. Nothing's ever good enough for you, right? You have anxiety and you lecture and yell at them all the time, shake your head, nothing's ever good enough. And they've internalized that and

they've shut down. Or maybe you have a teenager and he's felt like you've never really liked him or her and they've shut down. Why not use this time to restore that broken relationship and find some different ways you can connect with this child and find different ways that you can learn to appreciate and actually enjoy this child. And I just encourage you, I'm going to try to do some stuff. We've got this program, it's called the No BS Program. And it's awesome. I love it. It's 25 action steps. And I'll go through some of those in future podcasts, because you need to break this. You need to break that old pattern of how you look at your strong will child and start to enjoy them and take the first step and say,

during this coronavirus time, I'm going to restore a relationship that has been broken. Because some of you have never really dealt with it. It just sits under the surface. Or you have a spouse, a husband, who's never quite really accepted your kids as they are. There's always a little tone in there of, I wish they were different. Now's the time that you restore that broken relationship. You've got the time to do it. Why not do it now? Otherwise, it will wreak havoc. Look, broken relationships are going to wreak havoc more than the coronavirus will. It just will. Broken relationships result in a lot of bad stuff going on with your kids and with your relationship. So heal that. Number four, this is an awesome one.

If you can own this one and you can attack this one, this coronavirus, and again, not making light of all the havoc that is wreaking for people on so many different levels from death to sickness to job losses to everything else. We're not making light of that at all. But I can't control. I can't. Look, that's not in my domain to control the physical part of this, right? I'm not a doctor. There are plenty of good voices out there. Do the right thing. I'm not going to repeat that. You've heard it from a million people. Here's my domain now, what I can actually have some impact on. Break the addiction to screens once and for all. Are you finally tired of it? Because people complain, complain, oh, my kids, my kids, my kids all the time.

You're ready to do something about it. Here's your opportunity. And I know what you're thinking. Opportunity? Our kids are going to have 20 hours a day where they have nothing to do, so I'm going to put them on their screens. And I get that. I get it. I get it. I get it. I get it. We homeschooled Casey for a while. So we know what this is like. We had 1500 kids in our home. We spent days after day after

day after week with kids, eight, 10, 15 kids like this in our home. And guess what? They weren't allowed to get on their screens. I know how hard it is, but you can do this. Why not use this as an opportunity to actually break that addiction to screens in your home? I'm going to do a podcast. We'll go through some ways to do that, but why not make that a goal? How cool would that be if you came out of this next however long it is and your kids and you had alternatives and didn't fight over screens all the time? Number five, serve others. How can you serve others? There are some elderly neighbors that are much more vulnerable than many of us are. And they're afraid. My mom's 85 and my stepdad's 84. I don't want them going to Walmart to get their stuff

and to Giant and the grocery store, Wegmans, where they live. Fortunately, I have an awesome brother that lives up there and he's going to serve them and help them. But maybe there's some neighbors in the neighborhood that need some help. Heck, maybe there's some people that have run out of toilet paper. And if you hoarded two years' worth, maybe you can have a little, instead of a lemonade stand, you can have a little paper towel stand or a little toilet paper stand and just put it out on the corner and say, hey, we stocked up. We've got enough. Honor code. If you're running out,

this is for you. And if you want to leave a donation for it, we'll donate that to a local charity that's helping homeless people or helping people struggling with cancer, whatever it is you want that means something to your family. How cool would that be for my Christian or religious Jewish Muslim friends out there whose purpose is to live a life that gives out? How cool would that be, that you become a refuge for people during this time, a place where you look out for other people? Maybe you leave a note because you don't want to infect other people with your nasty breath and whatever you have or catch theirs. You can leave a note, wipe it down, but leave a note on their doorway and say, look,

I've got three kids. They can do yard work. They can do stuff for you outside. If you're an elderly neighbor and you need something, here's my email address. Just email me, right? Email me what you want from the grocery store and we'll deliver it to you. We'll just leave it right on your doorstep, right? And then if you want, you can leave us the money for it in an envelope so you don't even have to interact with us if you don't want, right? Be creative. Look, you guys, this almost made me cry when I was thinking about this for this reason. You guys have strong-willed kids, and strong-willed kids,

I know they're very, very difficult, but they have big hearts. Why not let them shine right now? Challenge them. What can we do as a family to serve? You've got have big hearts. Why not let them shine right now? Challenge them. What can we do as a family to serve? You've got a big heart. Never toward me as your mother or father, but you have a big heart. How can we serve other people, right? How can you fix things around people's homes for them or outside? What can you do to rake up their leaves, right? To do yard work. Some of your kids, that's how you could use the energy. Homeschooling families, you're used to homeschooling. So why not reach out to some other families and say, here are a few things in a humble way. Here are a few things that we've learned that work really

well for us while we're homeschooling. That would be a cool thing to do. Number six, build some new patterns. Build some new patterns in your home. Here's a good one. Self-respect. Moms, moms out there who do everything for everybody else and nothing for yourself, that's your issue. So why not break it during this time? Why not start telling the kids, say, look, we need to build some new patterns in here. I do everything for everybody else. And that's selfish of me. Because when I do that, what happens is I haven't had the self-respect to stand up for myself and ask that you guys do things for me. So we have time now. You don't have extracurriculars. You can't go hang out with your friends all the time

and you're not going to sit on your iPhones all day long, right? You can do a few TikToks if you want, but you almost, we're going to TikTok, we're going to TikTok you starting to work and do some things around the house and cook dinner. And guess what I'm going to do? A couple nights a week, I get the night off from cooking dinner. Guess why? Because I just ordered a really cool book from Amazon and I haven't read a book in years. I haven't done anything for myself in years. So guess what I'm going to start doing? Well, you guys are fixing dinner and yeah, I know strong willed child, you're not going to follow directions and you're not going to clean up because that's true. Mom and dad, they're not going to clean up. So chill. There's something to work on. You're a little control and perfectionism issues, right? Because what happens, your kids are going to cook

dinner for you and do this cool thing. And some of your kids are going to come up with a cool idea and they're actually going to create a menu. And they're going to create this whole dining experience, which is awesome, because many of your kids are going to make money off of cooking one day. So use this as an example. And they're going to do all this cool stuff, make this really cool meal, and all you're going to say is, nice job, but you guys didn't clean up nicely. Ugh! And you'll ruin the whole thing.

Look, I'll just tell you, I know these kids. They're not going to clean up. They're not going to do it to your satisfaction. So just be grateful. Enjoy the meal that they made and love on them and encourage it and then just clean up as a family. You clean up, right? Just relax.

But now you're sending the message while you guys are in there cooking dinner, I'm going to sit in here and I'm going to read my book and I'm not going to do everything for you. I know some of you have toddlers, so come up with other little things that you can do while your toddlers are doing their little stuff while they're sleeping, if they ever do. But start to break that pattern and create new traditions

where after this is all done, once or twice a week, the kids cook for mom. Or maybe it's this. Or maybe one night a week, it's kids cook for mom and for dad. And then one night a week, depending what your pattern has been, whoever's been cooking, dad and the kids serve their mom. How beautiful is that to teach your kids? Number seven, I just kind of mentioned this, but learn some new skills.

Learn some new skills. You're going to be stuck together for weeks, maybe months. Who knows? Learn something new. Maybe you all learn a foreign language together, right? Maybe each person in the family comes up with a goal for one new thing they're going to learn. Maybe it is cooking. Maybe this is the opportunity where you teach, get to teach your kids how to cook, how to fix things around the house. Dad, teaching how to grill out. By the way, go get propane before it's all gone. That was a note for me, for our family. But don't buy like eight tanks, please. So look outward. Or if you buy an extra tank, keep it for when that neighbor calls you and says oh we ran out of propane hey guess what my friend we're planners we're a little bit OCD we're hoarders

so you can have my tank right or when they call if you've hoarded the toilet paper keep some in reserve so you can give it out to people when they need. How awesome is that? That preaches a whole lot louder than most of the other stuff you've been yapping about. So, true. So, maybe teach them cook, teach them fix stuff, teach them how to do stuff around the house. Everybody learns a new skill. Here's a cool one. It's one of the best insights. I think it's one of the steps on that No BS program is allow your kids to teach you something. That's awesome because kids love that. Number eight, this is going to be tied in a little bit to breaking the screen saying is learn some new things outside. Start exercising. The weather's getting nice unless you chose to live in a horrible place with a horrible climate.

But I'm kidding. But it's starting to get nice. It's March-ish. So get outside. Start doing some things together as a family. Get those bikes out. Are your kids going to be like, yay, I can't wait. Can't wait to go.

No. But you're the leader in the home. So start leading. And do those things that you didn't have time to do before. Do treasure hunts out in the neighborhood. Hide stuff in the woods. If you live in a place, your woods are like eight trees in the backyard, right in your neighborhood, but hide some stuff, make them dig up stuff, right? Be creative, go for hikes. You can do that stuff now. Get out and do that and start creating some new patterns. But the point is, let's go on offense. Let's have a plan. Let's write down three goals and let's start working toward those goals. Email us. Casey, that's our

son at CelebrateCalm.com. Email us if you have questions, ideas you want addressed. We'll do it. Go to CelebrateCalm.com. CelebrateCalm.com forward slash coronavirus. And you'll find it's going to be sparse. This is the first podcast, but we'll start adding to it. Share this with others. I don't want to spread panic right now.

I want to spread calm and I want us to be purposeful. I want us to people who spread good things, who do things for other people, who serve people, who use a time of anxiety to actually counter that. And we become lights and we become the celebrate calm people, become those people who during trying times were the people who would managed their own anxiety so they could look outward and they could help other families and people in distress and people who need your help. We are the ones who can change this and you can actually use this to change your family. This is a great time to do it. Let's not be fearful and be anxious about it. Let's control

what we can control and these eight things and there are 50 other things you and I can control. So spread this podcast. Tell people about it. Email us with questions. We are not traveling for a few weeks, and so we have time. We are going to throw our energy into helping you. I want this to be the greatest time of our lives that we have broken generational patterns.

So you are a new family when you come out of this and you have learned things about your kids' brains. And so let's do it. Let's do it. For those of you who already have our CDs, right, who already have them, use this as a time. Use the CDs as curriculum. I've had homeschooling families for years doing this, where they'll pick a goal, one class during the next semester, where they say, okay, we're going to learn how to control our emotions. We're going to learn how our brains work best. So at work and at school, we can use our brains to the best of our abilities and use momentum and manage our energy, not our time. And they've done with sibling fights. I've had homeschooling families said, hey,

we're going to work on sibling fights for this next semester. And they've had a study for that, a period of focus study where the kids listen to the sibling fights program and the parents work it. And so you can use this. And on this, we have one on screens. We have one on everything on defiance, disrespect, everything. And my son has a whole program where it's my son speaking to your kids about how to control their emotions, impulses. Why not use that right now? So if you already have the CDs, pick one and say, hey, for the next week, we're going to listen to this one. And I want to know kids, what can we as your parents, that sounded kind of funny, didn't it? We, what, my voice is really hoarse from two weeks of traveling and speaking. So what can we do as a family? What can we do as parents to stop lecturing all the time to stop

getting on you and what can you do differently to start owning your choices because as Casey says our son to your kids if you learn how to control yourself we won't have to control you that's really cool so use it if you don't have the CDs, get them. We have a special birthday sale that we're extending. Why? Because it's an awesome deal and it will change your family. And if you need help financially, if you need help picking out the right programs for your particular family, all you have to do is email Casey at CelebrateCalm.com. C-A-S-E-Y. He's our son. He'll give you the best customer service on the planet. And it's just email. Or you can call him at 888-506-1871. And nobody's going to get

infected. And what will happen is he will help you out. You will have a game plan for your family. And it's going to be awesome. I'm now, by the end of this podcast, I'm excited about this opportunity. I think your family is going to change. I think we're all going to be awesome. I'm now, by the end of this podcast, I'm excited about this opportunity. I think your family is going to change. I think we're all going to change and come out of this stronger than we were before with a game plan and new ways to help your kids succeed in school. Thank you for listening. Spread the word. Spread the podcast. If we can help you, let us know. Love you all. Bye-bye.