Latest / Good Morning From The Chicken Coop! / Season 2 - Episode 312 - Holidays! Setting up to avoid difficult interactions

Transcript

Season 2 - Episode 312 - Holidays! Setting up to avoid difficult interactions · Good Morning From The Chicken Coop!

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  Welcome to the Good Morning From the Chicken Coop Podcast with
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  Kim Johnson, your creative strategist and mastermind set
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  coach. Filled with inspiration,
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  distinctions, perspectives, and possibilities, we help you to
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  cultivate a mindset that leads you to create the best version
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  of yourself you could ever imagine.
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  Join Kim every morning from one of her favorite happy places,
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  her chicken coop along with all her chickens.
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  Hey everybody good morning from the chicken coop.
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  OK, next part of holidays, let's talk about uncomfortable
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  relationships and conversations during the holidays.
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  Now we all know we don't want to fake put this out there that
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  this is what's going to happen during the holidays.
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  But we all know we are going to see somebody that we don't
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  necessarily want to see and we are going to end up in a
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  conversation that. Probably is not the best thing
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  for us. We all know that there are those
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  things that we just as families when we go together.
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  Somebody always says something, somebody always does something.
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  And the car ride home consists of, OK, what were the top three
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  stupid things that happened today?
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  Or who said the stupidest thing you heard today?
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  And we all have these parts of our family that we just look at
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  and go, God, why? I just so wish that we didn't
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  have to go through that conversation.
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  So let's talk about navigating these conversations.
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  Let's talk about what it is with these conversations that pushes
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  our buttons. So first of all, you know, back
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  to the old Wayne Dyer adage of no one can push your buttons if
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  you don't have them. It's a very important thing to
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  remember. They're pushing buttons because
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  we have the buttons. If we didn't have the buttons,
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  they couldn't push them so. Just understanding that you're
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  going to try to clear up your your button pushing parts of
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  you, so you're not pushing any buttons, buttons before you go
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  into events. Because if you're the button
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  pusher, stop it. It's not fun.
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  Just go in and say I'm not going to, I'm not going to pick it,
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  anybody. I'm not going to say anything.
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  And if you don't think you're picking, just realize if you've
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  been a part of a few conflicts and you can't find clarity about
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  things, always come back and ask yourself, well, what part did I
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  play in this? It's always an important part of
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  it. Like for me, I don't typically
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  start things, but I always try to close them out.
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  And growing up, I had to really learn how to control that in
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  myself because I'm very good at being very sharp.
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  When I feel like somebody's coming at somebody I love and I
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  will stop in and I will cause uncomfortableness in the room
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  and I can own that. So over the years I have been
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  very cognizant of my training. Mindfulness training has really
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  helped with this, to stay in my own lane and unless I'm asked to
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  come in on something, I don't need to go and rescue everybody.
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  And that was a big thing that I had to learn.
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  Big, big thing. Big thing.
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  And I still have to learn it regularly.
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  And it still happens in my life. And one would think, how could
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  that possibly be? Don't you surround yourself with
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  great people? Yes.
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  But you know, anytime my children have an issue, I am the
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  person that wants to jump in there and I have to let them
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  navigate it. You know, my daughter's married.
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  I She has to navigate it herself and making sure.
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  I'm not. I ask permission.
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  Do you want my help? That's an important thing.
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  Remember, ask those things and and find out for yourself where
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  your role flies into it. Now the next part is of this is
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  that when you are part of an uncomfortable conversation, if
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  you're all sitting at the table and uncomfortable topics are
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  coming up and you feel them, you can feel other people shifting.
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  You can always change the subject.
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  It's amazing how quickly that works when you change the
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  subject and people always say. But how when they're in the
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  middle of a conversation, you can actually just get up and
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  say, you know, what Would anybody like anything else to
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  drink? Does anybody need more gravy?
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  What does anybody need? You're interrupting the pattern.
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  Think about interrupting the patterns.
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  Now I actually have developed over the years with one
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  particular client of mine. We call them the Pattern
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  Interrupt bag. Because she knows she has a very
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  difficult family and basically she has all these little things
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  in this bag that she can pull out anytime if she feels like
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  everybody's getting too antsy or too rude with each other.
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  So there are lots and lots and lots of little things, games,
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  questions that you can. You have out, but one of the
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  greatest ones is setting up if you've ever gone in restaurants.
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  Years ago they used to have Trivial Pursuit cards and cups
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  on the tables. So while you were waiting for
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  your food, you had something to do.
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  This was like pretty standard procedure and it all kind of
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  went away. But Oh my gosh, having those
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  brain bending questions and Trivial Pursuit cards out in
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  stations around the house during the holidays having little tiny
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  games. Out those mind bending games.
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  Oh, those really work, whether they're questions like that or
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  the little physical ones where you can go to.
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  Barnes and Noble has a great section of puzzles and they have
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  these little metal puzzles that lock up and you can't get them
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  done. That tends to keep people
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  occupied for quite some time. It is an excellent idea to have
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  them around because everybody gets involved with it right away
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  and you'd be surprised. It's like having a kids table
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  for adults mentally. So put yourself in the position
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  where you're going to interrupt those conversations before they
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  happen. This is not about saying how do
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  I navigate them once they happen.
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  This is about saying how do I mitigate them before they
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  happen. So work on getting your bag
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  together, making sure you stay mindful, don't participate
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  unless you're asked, and have all those little tools and
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  tricks around to have a very nice holiday where nobody loses
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  it. OK my friends, I'll see you
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  tomorrow. Bye.