Eps 468: Teens, tweens and screens

Resources:

Teens and screens mini summit: https://www.besproutable.com/teens/positive-discipline-course-online/teens-screens/

Joyful Courage today continues to be an exploration of who I am and how I show up if I’m NOT attached to outcome and generating my own sense of well being… This ongoing practice for me is bringing up a lot of new territory that I am trying to figure out how to be inside of. Don’t worry about me over here, I’ve gone back to therapy for support 🤣.

Transcription

Joyful Courage Solo 3.7.24
Mon, Mar 04, 2024 1:31PM • 41:50

Casey O'Roarty 00:05
Hello, Welcome back. Welcome to the joyful courage podcast, a place for inspiration and transformation as we work to keep it together. While parenting our tweens and teens. This is real work people. And when we can focus on our own growth and nurturing the connection with our kids, we can move through the turbulence in a way that allows for relationships to remain intact. My name is Casey already, I am your fearless host. I'm a positive discipline trainer, space holder coach and the adolescent lead. It's browseable. Also mama to a 20 year old daughter and a 17 year old son I am walking right beside you on the path of raising our kids with positive discipline and conscious parenting. This show is meant to be a resource to you and I work really hard to keep it really real, transparent and authentic so that you feel seen and supported. Today is a solo show and I'm confident that what I share will be useful to you. Please don't forget sharing truly is caring. If you love today's show, please please pass the link around snap a screenshot posted on your socials or texted to your friends. Together, we can make an even bigger impact on families around the globe. If you're feeling extra special, you can rate and review us over in Apple podcasts. I'm so glad that you're here. Welcome. Welcome, welcome. Enjoy the show.

Casey O'Roarty 01:31
All right, here I am. Here we are together again. So happy that you're here and listening. This is a solo show. It's Thursday. It's Thursday. I'm so excited to hang out with you today. Thank you for listening, and checking out what I have to say before I get into the content. I want you to know you wouldn't know this because maybe you're not a podcaster. But something really funky happened when Apple did its update on the operating system last fall. And a lot of podcasters most podcasters especially those of us that get a lot of our listens through Apple podcasts, our numbers have like, totally plummeted. And by numbers I mean the amount of downloads that are happening for the show. And so the fix it's really confusing and a little disheartening, but then I was really excited to hear why this is why this happened. Something happened with the algorithm. And I think people that weren't listening regularly became unsubscribed. So anyway, you can help me out. This is super easy. Wherever you listen, if you listen on Amazon, or Spotify, or Apple podcasts, most of you listen through Apple podcasts. Do me a favour and go into the show. And make sure you're following the show. Like click subscribe, click follow. Even in Spotify, there's an opportunity to do that. If you could do that, for me, that would be really great. And in return, whatever app you listen to the show through will automatically share the next episode when it comes up. So we do me a favour right now and just check yourself check where you're listening and make sure that you're a subscriber of the show. That would be super fab, I'd really appreciate it. And on that note, on that note, I got a couple of new reviews. Thank you so much. You guys are really pulling through for me and for the podcast. This also helps with reach and numbers as I've mentioned before, so on Friday, I got a review that says five stars. Casey has continued to show up and be real every time I listened to her I feel seen. She truly walks this crazy world of parenting alongside of us. This podcast reminded me that what I'm doing is new and hard but so worth it. Mary,

Casey O'Roarty 03:59
I adore you. Thank you for the review. Another review from Friday's said amazing. I can't say enough good things about this podcast. Every time I listen, I learned something new, and something I want to put into practice with teens. Thank you for continuing to share every week. Casey, you are welcome. I love it. I love podcasting. It's so fun. And you know, give me a mic. And let me say what I think and I'm a happy girl. So yeah, speaking of that, I did a huge so I'm recording this on Sunday, and this weekend, I really have leaned into my morning kind of spiritual practice and meditation and journaling and I'm moving through this really cool programme on Insight Timer about Buddhism. I think I mentioned this a couple of weeks ago. And do you use Insight Timer? It's such an amazing app. It is the whole shebang around meditation, there's music, there's core or says it's not expensive. I use it almost every day. I love Insight Timer. And so like I said, I'm moving through this course. And then I did this really cool meditation after I did the little 10 minute teaching about being open to anything being possible. And I feel like right now, my social media algorithm is really showing me a lot of like, you know, what's common, what lies ahead, you know, our kids are getting older, we're creeping towards that post kids in the house time. I know, some of you, you're like, No, I'm not still have some young uns. And that's cool, too. Just talking about my experience. But you know, one of the things that came up for me is really wanting to grow as a keynote speaker, and to do some work with corporations. You know, business retreats, corporate retreats, because isn't it so amazing how you come in here, you talk, or you listen to me talk? Or you're in my programmes, and you talk there? The work we're doing with our kids? Is human relationship work? Right? So it's so powerful to start to kind of pull the curtain back, do that inner work, get really honest with ourselves around how we're showing up in other places of our lives, right? Like, if we are, you know, in corporate America, what do our teams look like? What does leadership look like in our workplace? What does leadership look like in our classrooms? What does leadership look like, you know, in our city councils, and so it's not just this is how we should act with our kids. This is how should we be? How can we be with other humans, so that we are all moving forward, right as fully, you know, self actualized self realised, curious, aware human beings. So anyway, side note, I did this really great morning routine. And I just, I don't know, I'm feeling this vision around speaking and travelling to speak. So if you're listening, and you're like, yeah, man, I would love to have you come speak to my organisation, or our school or whatever, get in touch because I am for hire, and I'm ready to roll. And I'm entertaining. And I'm informative, and people really appreciate my style. So there you go. toot my own horn, coming in hot too. After listening to Monday's show, I just did a long walk with the dog. And I listened to what's came out this week on Monday, part five of the art of connected parenting part five of six. So next week is the last week of that limited series. I've talked to many of you who've been watching or listening because it's on YouTube, as well. And the feedback has been you love it. You love it, which is awesome. And I appreciate that. I love it, too. It's so fun to take those conversations that I have all the time with, you know, the two other founders of spreadable and put them out into the world. And it's crazy because we recorded everything in November. And we did it over the course of one day, we recorded all six episodes, which is not how I do this, you guys, I do not tend to batch it's called batching my episodes, and I was in the bed. The girls were like, oh, yeah, you come down to Seattle, we're gonna do this. I was like, Okay. And man, you know. I mean, the episodes are close to an hour long each. So it was a long day. And man, oh, man, I was really impressed with us listening to part five. We are energised and excited. And you know, really just showing up for each other. And for all of you, and I'm proud of us. I'm proud of us. Right. I am proud of us. And I'm grateful. I'm grateful for my business partners. I'm grateful for this work that we do together that I get to do for all of you. So today, I'm going to take a little bit, you know of what came up on Monday, but I'm really going to dig in the context of screens and screen news. This is something that has come up in the membership recently, as well as in the Facebook group. There's conversations just around our kids in their screens, and so be ready for that. But before we get there before we get into that I want to highlight some of those threads like I mentioned that came up and it's mostly around like this both and right that we are always dancing with right, you're doing the work we start off Monday's episode saying like yeah, okay, you can be doing all the things practising positive discipline, being ever more self aware doing your personal practices and challenges still exist. Parenting still feels really messy. Both and both of those things can be true at the same time, right? And then there's this work around letting go, you know, letting go of attachment, letting go of the outcome, letting go of the narrative and having faith that it's all gonna work out, right. And when I say that, I'm like, Well, yeah, it's all gonna work out. We don't know how it's going to work out. But we're all moving towards something else. And we can never really know what the challenges that we move through in life are going to open up for us, right. So there's the letting go and having faith letting go and having faith both and, and then there's this piece around following your child's lead, while also holding the structure to move them forward. Right, letting your child take the lead. And being in that confident authority to support them and moving them forward. I don't know if you listened to Monday show. But this is a favourite story of of Juliana's that I love the work she did, her middle child had an extreme phobia of dogs. And she shares the story of how their family really rallied around her middle child violet, to support her in moving through her phobia and getting to a place where she no longer was caged by the anxiety of wondering, gosh, if I go to this play date, will there be a dog, right? And I think this is so powerful. And I know this, I experienced it, you know, in my family, but I also have clients thinking about you, those of you that have kids with school refusal, those of you with kids that have these big anxieties. And, you know, I do not come from the school of thought where you like, just push them through as if you can, or you know, the whole tough love. I do think exposure is important. And sometimes the baby step is really, really small. And it's hard, right? Because it's like, oh my god, if these are the size steps we're gonna take, we're never gonna get there. But you're taking a baby step, you're moving forward, you're moving in the direction of moving forward, following our child's lead. And also holding that I'm going to do whatever it takes to help you move through this right? I want to move you to the place where you want to go. Right? So having those conversations about what they ultimately want and starting there. Okay, great. This is what you want, right? This is what you want. We're going to work together to get you there. Right. And there's this normalisation that I love that's really coming out this Monday, limited series. I don't know if you've listened to and heard it, but there's, like, what are we normalising as a family system? Right. And Juliette, I think really mean she shares a lot about this. And that's so inspiring. And it's also interesting. I mean, I said this last week, but I think it's really interesting that the three of us are all very committed to the work that we do. We're all positive discipline trained, and positive discipline looks different in all of our houses, right? I mean, it does. And so I'm always so intrigued to listen and tease Jules about, you know, how, amazingly by the book they are, and it shows I mean, I've spent time with her family, there is intense and amazing family cohesion because of her commitment to this practice.

Casey O'Roarty 13:42
So what are we normalising? We are a family who maybe does family meetings. We're a family who talks about and compares screen time. Maybe we're a family who makes time to hang out together. We're a family who stays solution minded and solves problems together, right? What's normalised in your family? If you were going to answer that question, were a family who dot dot dot what would come towards the end? Like what would the rest of that sentence be? And if you're like, gosh, I don't know start to pay attention. What is normalised because there are things that are normalised whether we are intentional about normalising them or not, it's interesting, I'm gonna tell you a funny story around staying solution focused, which is always my goal, and the humaneness can get the better of us as well. So just last week, I was in the bathroom that en uses to take a shower and I was washing my hands and I looked up at the mirror and there was this message written on the mirror from Ben so in love the kid. He is a towel hoarder. Maybe you have a kid like this, he is a towel hoarder, he will have all the towels in his room by the end of the week. And we're like, where are the towels? He doesn't Bring them up. He's not like, oh, I have plenty of towels. I should take them up on Washington. He uses them one time, probably, you know, I'm talking about. I know, I'm not alone with us. Anyway, it's annoying. And we haven't really focused in on a system, although we are having a family meeting tonight, and this is on the agenda. So I will get back to you on this. But we don't have a good system that's helpful in solving this towel. cording problem. And so you know, Ben sometimes, oftentimes stays up late, and he has like a cleaning frenzy. And apparently, the night before, he must have just hit the roof on the towel situation. Maybe he took a late shower, I don't know. But he hit his ceiling on patients around the towel situation. And he wrote this whole note to Ian on the mirror, just like my foul, dude, I love you. And you know, and he kind of spewed out all this stuff on the mirror. And I saw it and I was laughing. And I was like, Huh. And I said something to him later on. I said, So I saw your note. And he's like, Yeah, I was really frustrated. And I said, Yeah, I know. It's so frustrating, I get it. And let's make sure to bring it up in the family meeting, because we've got to help him by prompting and helping him prompt his himself to do something different with the towels. Because right now he's kind of in this rhythm and routine with the towels that keeps happening over and over. And it's not like us yelling at him, even if it's via the mirror isn't really going to change behaviour. So

Casey O'Roarty 16:32
we're going to talk about it in a family meeting, because we stay solution focused. And I reminded Ben of that, anyway, that's what we want to normalise, we are a family who stays solution focus. We're a family that solves problems. We're a family that does family meetings. Right? And, you know, really thinking about in that story of the mirror, the towel drama, you know, what do we want, we want in to be conscious and aware of his use of towels. Right? What's going to be helpful for that? Right? How can we create a practice or a routine that's going to be useful and help support him in doing something different? And then what does ease and flexibility offer in this scenario, right? We're a family who believes that we can move through problems and get to the other side. Also, you know, are you are holding we are a family who believes that we can move through hard things that we can move through disappointment and anger and frustration and defeat. Right. And this is another thing that shows up with my clients. This one requires us to be able to be with this the emotional experience of our kids, to be with them when they're feeling their feelings, to be able to handle it. And by handling it. I don't mean handling their feelings. I mean, handling what happens for you, when hard feelings show up? Right? It's really challenging, right? It's really challenging to see our kids and they're suffering, and we don't want them to suffer. And we are robbing them of really important life skill development. When we, you know, fix things or sue them. I mean, I don't know about soothing them. But like, we get to normalise that hard Shit happens. And we feel crummy sometimes. And we feel angry, and we feel heartache. We feel all the things. And there is another side and we have faith that they can get there, which is why we're not jumping in to fix everything, right? Instead, we're sitting down, we're being with them. Right? We're trusting that this is part of their developmental growth, right. So last week, I actually was leading co facilitating with Julieta, the teaching parenting, the positive discipline way parent educator training. And so we were certifying new parent educators, which is really special, something I love to do. And what I love about it too, is it really brings me back to the core competencies and the roots of positive discipline and positive discipline is really focused on teaching, modelling and practising life skills. Right. And as an educator, as a parent educator, we are trained to facilitate experiential activities. And if you've taken a class with me, then you know what I'm talking about the role plays, the group discussions, the different things that we do to put you to put the parents into the shoes of the child and really experience experience what our kids experience of us, when we show up in different ways, right? One of the activities that we do, pretty much it's a kind of a go to activity and you've, you know, again, if you've worked with me, you've done it with me, it's called Ask Seeing versus telling. And it's really an opportunity to practice shifting our language to engage our kids brains, while encouraging them to move forward and towards that goal of collaboration towards what's next, asking versus telling. And the way that the activity works is I have, you know, eight statements. So I invite eight of the participants to be parents, one person to be the child. And then we do two rounds. And the first round is all the telling statements like do this, do that right now, you know, how we typically show up? And then the second round is curiosity. It's what and how questions. And it was interesting, because in the processing of the activity, one of the participants pointed out that the child in the roleplay, you know, they may have decided to brush their teeth, because we said, you know, what do you need to do so that your teeth don't feel gross? Versus Go brush your teeth? She said, But, you know, sometimes our kids might comply, but they might not be happy about it. So are they really learning skills? And I loved that she asked this question, because we got to reiterate, our job isn't to make everything fun. And to keep everyone happy. Our job is to support our kids and their developmental growth, much of which once we get into the teen years, as you all know, happens when we get out of the way. Right? So there are times they're going to be disappointed. There are absolutely times where the answer is no, I love you. And the answer is no, not yet. Not tonight, right? You get to say no. I just feel like sometimes parents, you know, when they're really trying to tune in to positive parenting, positive discipline, conscious parenting, that there's this idea that we don't say no. And we do sometimes we say no, not tonight. That's not going to work. Sometimes we say, tell me more about that. And then we say no, ideally, tell me more about that. And together, we come to this place of like, yeah, I don't know that that's going to actually support you in what you want in the future. And sometimes we say no. And it's a dance, right? It's a dance. Yes. We get to be in relationship with our kids. Yes. Sometimes what we have to do instead of what we want to do, creates an emotional experience for our kids, and we get to be with it. That's okay. It's okay. We have emotional experiences all the time as humans. And this high repetition high practice is what helps us build resiliency, right? It's what helps us build perseverance, and a work ethic. Right. So yeah, middle school, early high school years, say no, you can say No, don't say no all the time. Like, you know, there's the possibility of power struggles, for sure. So figure that out. But you know, I'm all about yes to collaboration and negotiation. And you get to be the confident authority, you get to be the person who ultimately says, we can negotiate this to a place. And then here's my line. Right? So that being said, I tend to talk on the pod about whatever age my kids are, have you noticed that but I really am working on making sure that I'm not leaving you middle school parents, early, high school years, parents behind, I don't think I am but you know, this message is for you. This message is for you. Yes to collaboration and negotiation with your elevens, twelves Thirteen's and you get to be the confident authority, you get to embody that confident authority, and say no, and hold limits when you need to and follow thrill. Right. Let's talk about screens. I said, we're going to talk about screens. So you know, now we're how far in are we gonna find out? Now we're 25 minutes in, we're going to talk about screens. Screens, screens are so annoying, and screens are not going anywhere. So there's that young adolescents, right? I'm talking about middle schoolers need limits on their screens, absolutely. 100% 100%, the apps that they're on, whether it's YouTube or social media, feel free to keep them off of social media for as long as you want, the longer the better for their mental health, especially our girls beatab. Netflix, all the apps are designed by psychologists and addiction specialists to keep them engaged, to keep the device in their hands to keep the controller in their hands. Okay. That's how they're designed. It's not a character flaw, that your teenager can't put their phone down. Right? They don't have the skills and many of us adults, as you've heard me, say, don't have the skills to put their phone down. And this is where their social lives exist, which feels really weird as a Gen X or as someone who's out in the world and having my social life in real life. Right, those of us that grew up in the 80s, and the 90s, before all of this, like, it feels really weird. And it's still a thing like social engagement is happening on their phones. It's just, we just have to get over it and acknowledge it and live with it, right? We get to zoom in and zoom out in our relationship with our kids having relationship with their devices, right, we get to zoom in and out zooming out, is when we have conversations like, Listen, this device has the potential to get in the way of your life. Yes, it makes sense that our teens love these devices, because they are wired for connection. Yes. And we are all creating pathways that will keep us reaching for our phone, or our video games or the YouTube when we are not conscious and aware of what we're doing. Right. I think I said this before I have an app on my phone that literally shuts down certain apps throughout the day. That's what I need, I need support. Otherwise, you know, my phone use can look like teenagers, which really sucks when I'm like, Hey, let's compare phone use.

Casey O'Roarty 26:17
And then you get to zoom in, right? Then you get to zoom in the bottom line is devices aren't going anywhere, they are a part of the human experience, at least until the grid goes down. Social Engagement, like I said, is happening on their phone. And so we're zooming and we're talking to our kids, how can we collaborate on limits and structures that keep you from overuse or from misuse? Right? That's the goal, helping them stay out of creating those neural pathways that move them towards over or misuse of the devices. What does that mean?

Casey O'Roarty 27:01
Well, overuse misuse, when our time on our devices are getting in the way of sleep, when they're getting in the way of school in the way of extracurricular activities, getting in the way of overall health and well being right? Can your child be away from their device? Can you ask them like, Hey, can you be away from your device? Sure. They'll say I can't I just don't want to? Can you put it down and walk away? Sure. I just don't want to write, I had an interesting conversation with him about something different, but a problematic behaviour that I was worried about, you know, and we were just talking about this exact thing around how, like when we habituate any behaviour, it starts to become, you know, this regular thing that we do. And we get to be reflective of that we get to notice that we get to decide, do I want to move in this direction of kind of being caged? Because I've created a habit, right? Or not? And I said to him, and if you find like, okay, yeah, I want to change this behaviour. And you can't if you're in that ambivalence, well, then we're having a different conversation, right? Because then we are talking about needing extra support. And that's true with the device too. Like, yeah, I can be away from my phone. I just don't want to Okay, well, let's do a little experiment. Let's spend a few hours, put it over there. We'll go take a walk. And, you know, noticing, like, just for the sake of noticing, I mean, have you ever been in a doctor's office and left your phone in the car? Maybe you have? I know, for me when I do that, I realise, Oh, what am I going to do in the doctor's office? I don't have my phone. Fortunately, they have magazines, but we want to distract ourselves. Right? It makes sense. It makes sense. So yeah, another, you know, misuse. Overuse indicator is excessive amounts of time, excessive amounts of time. And you get to use your gut you parents, you get to use your gut, right? Screen limits make sense. And screen limits are a minefield for control and power struggle. Okay? So this isn't about how do I control and have power over screen limits are an opportunity to create collaboration amongst you and your kiddo. They're an opportunity to connect around what's important to them. They're an opportunity to talk about physical, mental, emotional well being right. Screen limits makes sense. And when we come at it from a place of control, it will just add to how hard it is to be in relationship with our teens who have a relationship with the screen, right? Do not use the screens as leverage for other mischief. We want to we know they care so deeply, of course, because their entire social experience is happening on these screens. They care a lot about them. Do not leverage the screens. For other mischief now, if the screens are getting in the way, say of school, or if they're texting and driving, then absolutely, there's a different conversation you're going to have. But you know, if they're late for curfew, or you know, they gotten a big fight with their sibling, or were swearing at the dinner table, that's not a reason to take away their screen. So remember, solutions related, reasonable, respectful, helpful, right? And then also do so don't do that. Do be curious about how things are getting in the way how the use is getting in the way Do ask what would be helpful for you do share, here's what I'm noticing, right? Tell me if you notice the same thing, do hold some kind of structure for getting the data and putting it up against the results, right? Like, here's what I'm noticing. And then you get to say to your kiddo, let's pay attention this week, I'm thinking specifically around like homework, and screens and how they're like, simultaneously happening. And we know as the adults, that it is not useful. I know when I sit down to work on a podcast that if I have to turn off all notifications on my computer, and on my phone, or I'm terribly distracted, our kids are learning that. And right now, what matters more to them than not being distracted, while they're doing their homework is not missing out on the phone. And we just get to talk about that. We get to talk about it, we get to find solutions, right? And where's the both? And can you help them find the both and and then you get to follow up? Right? If you're gonna say, let's pay attention this week, and talk about what we both noticed next weekend, do it. Talk about it next weekend, right? Again, let's zoom out. This isn't about control. This is about helping them to learn. rigid rules do not help our kids learn. rigid rules actually tend to have our kids go underground. They tend to invite power struggles. It's not useful, right. And the other end of the spectrum being really permissive, giving them all the space that is also going to influence problematic use and habits that are hard to rein in I have a couple of clients with younger adolescents with middle schoolers. And they're already kind of in this craziness around the screens. Which makes sense, because a lot of times this is the early days, the kids have just gotten their screens, they really are unskilled. And so yeah, you middle school parents, it's hard, highly encourage you to just wait till they get to high school, but you haven't. And they have the screens, like you've got to be vigilant about being in the discomfort of Yeah, we got to talk about the screens. We got to talk about the screens, like every week, and it's not a conversation that's judgmental, that's critical. It's really like really leaning in to the practice of curiosity, right? Curiosity, and really being in the question of what do you want? Right and asking our kids that? And yes, I know, a lot of times our kids will say, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know what I want. Okay, that makes sense. You know, do you want to have a healthy relationship with your device? Do you want to be in control of your use, rather than letting the device control you? Right? And even as I said, that I kind of could hear my tone. Did you hear that? Like, Well, do you want to have this? So watch your tone, watch your tone? And then think about what do you want as the parent? What do I want as the parent, I want my kids to be self reflective and aware and discerning. So we have to have these conversations, they have to have these conversations? What do we need? Right as the adult humans? What do we need to be in these conversations because they are highly emotional. They are highly emotional, because it's emotional for our kids, because their little spidey senses are used as a trap and you want to take my screen away and no way Jose, right? And so they get defensive and emotional, which triggers our mirror neurons. Right? So it makes sense that now we're agitated. So what do we need to have these conversations with our kiddos? Right? What do we need? What do we need to support our kids to move through a phobia or make mistakes or whatever screens or whatever? Right? When we move through this hard the challenge? What do we need? Well, I would say for me, I need just that sense of feeling grounded. Right. You know, I talked about competent authority, like strong backs off front. A couple of weeks ago, we did a podcast about that. We need relationship, right? We need them to trust us, because we're asking them to step into a really wobbly conversation or you know, with anxiety or phobias, we're asking them to be uncomfortable. So they need to know that we've got them, right. They need the relationship, we need a solution mindset stay focused on solutions. And we need to have trust and faith in the process. For sure. Right, I loved was it Alana, the conversation on Monday when we talked about, like, believing that things can be different. And I talked about this with my clients, because sometimes, you know, when we're kind of brainstorming and talking about different possibilities, and the discouragement is so thick, for all the reasons, right, sometimes I'll pause us and I'll ask like, Do you have faith that things can actually be different? Because if you don't have faith, that things can be different? There's no way things can be different. Right? So that confident authority and have some chill, have some chill, my friends have some lightness and levity. Right, some humour, find your chill. You know, the other thing about energetic responsibility. And what we talked about on Monday is that, you know, we really want our kids to develop intrinsic motivation, right? It's when we say, you know, for us, it's like, I just want them to put away the towels because it's KY sees them right, or we want them to want to study because they care about their grades. And they want to, I don't know, get into a certain college, right? We want them to learn for the sake of learning, we want them to be self driven. Right? The only way that this is developed in our kids is when we hand over the energetic responsibility. What are we responsible for as parents, right? We are responsible for creating an encouraging connected home environment, that is your responsibility, right. And we are responsible for following through and holding the structures of routines and agreements, that includes co creating limits and boundaries around screens or other things and family meetings, we are responsible for having faith in our kids to move through what they're going through. And then what our kids responsible for our kids are responsible for their choices and their decisions. They are also responsible for moving through the natural consequences, The Good, the Bad, the Ugly, of those choices and decisions. So a lot of times, you know, as we're trying to figure out, how do I get them to study? How do I get them to not be disruptive? How do I get them to put their phone down? Right? No? How do I hand over the energetic responsibility so that it's what they're realising that they want to do that? It serves them? Right, it serves them. So energetic responsibility, and it's kind of a chicken in the egg. Right? Without relationship. This is so hard. So work on relationship, right, and shits going down.

Casey O'Roarty 37:54
It's all happening at once. I think we can really, that sense of urgency, I think is false. Not always. But I think there's a lot of kind of, like this false urgency that exists. And we think we've got to handle everything right in the moment. Now we're never everything's on the line. It's not calm down, pause, take care of yourself. And, you know, lean in, and on the devices, like don't forget these devices that our kids have that are sucking them in the devices are a privilege, right. And privilege comes with responsibility. One of the responsibilities for having the privilege is that we have conversations about use, you stay out of judgement, we stay out of criticism, we have conversations about use, right. And so again, if this is a place where it Stacy, it's spacey with your kids, take a look at what you're bringing to these conversations. Yes, you have control and whether or not your kid gets a screen you have control over the Wi Fi. And if the router is on your you can take the devices away. And what do you want? What are the skills that our kids need in this digital world? Right, and they don't need free rein straight out of the gate. Right. Anyway, that was a little bit of a meander. But yes, I'm using screens as the topic this week and inviting you into continued self reflection on your own intentionality on trusting your kid and the process on looking for how to use this thing that we're all trying to navigate as an opportunity to learn and grow. It's annoying. They're not going away. Right. So yeah, so here's the homework. What are your takeaways? What came up for you today? What do you need to practice so that you can show up to hard conversations in a way that doesn't feel critical or judgmental? Like how you find you're neutral. And if the overuse or problematic use of screens is something that you're navigating right now, what is one small thing you will do to pivot and how you're approaching to the challenge? And that's going to look different if your kids in eighth grade versus 12th grade, right? So keep that in mind. All right. That's what I got for you today. I hope that was useful for you. I'm so glad that you tuned in. Let me know if there's something else that you'd want me to talk about. If you have a hot topic. Shoot me an email at Casey at joyful courage.com I typically always respond how that to me an email or send me a message on social media. I love hearing from you write that review, make sure you follow in the places subscribe, follow whatever you need to do want to keep the numbers up so ever more people are tuning in and getting turned on to this way of being with our kids and with each other in the world. All right. That's all from me. Have a beautiful day. Bye.

Casey O'Roarty 41:10
Thank you so much for listening in today. Thank you so much to my spreadable partners, Julieta and Alana as well as Danielle and Chris Mann and the team at pod shaper for all the support with getting this show out there and helping it to sound so good. Check out our offers for parents with kids of all ages and sign up for our newsletter to stay better connected at B sprout double.com. Tune back in on Monday for a brand new interview and I will be back solo with you next Thursday. Have a great day.