Latest / MIDDLE GROUND - Real Conversations on Faith, Identity & Becoming — Through Brynne's LDS Lens of Curiosity, Love and Doubt / How I Process Anger Before I Take It Out on My Kids — A Real-Time Walk & Talk
Transcript
- Brynne Erickson (00:01.346) Hello, hello. Today I am out walking. We're gonna chat about processing emotions because I just had a real experience I'm gonna share with you guys. I'm pushing a stroller, got my doggie with me and my two oldest were in bed and my husband's at home. And we have a big day today. It's our city celebration, our founders day. and there's a parade and fireworks and we're having a family party tonight and my son's gonna do a lemonade stand. So lots going on. Well, before I left at seven, my two olders woke up around 6.20 and we went to bed at nine last night, which is really late and they didn't end up falling asleep till 10. So that's really late for us. And so when they came out at 6.20, I went, no, no, no, no, you need to go back to sleep. So they went back to sleep and my older one knows, well. He's supposed to know, right? He's only six. That he's not to wake up his younger brother. Little brother likes to sleep until 8.30 at night most days. And so I went on my walk, but I kept checking the camera in their room to see if they were awake. And sure enough, older one woke up because it's hard for him to fall back to sleep once he's awake and he's excited. And I get that. but he went and woke up his younger brother. And you guys, I was livid. I was so mad. I rate. And this all happened like five minutes ago. So I've had a minute to process it that's why I wanna talk about this. This is such a helpful skill. So I'm walking and out loud, I just keep saying all those words. I'm validating how I feel and saying I am so angry about this. I am irate, I am livid, I can't believe it. Should have known better, all the things, right? Call my husband, wake him up. And I'm like, you go tell those boys that they're not allowed to have screen time just because they woke up early. That's not a reward for this happening. And tell them how angry I am. I will be home and hopefully not bite anyone's heads off. And so I kept walking, kept processing how angry I was. Brynne Erickson (02:24.908) and how silly this is. And yet here I am five minutes later and I'm almost home and I'm not gonna bite anyone's heads off. I'm feeling so much better. And I think movement has a lot to do with it. Being able to move this energy through my body, this anger and aggression. And I'm feeling so much better and already grateful that I wasn't home. If I had been home, there definitely would have been initial yelling for sure. Some very angry emotions passing through and I would have had to apologize later. thankfully that won't be the case when I get home. I'll definitely say, look, bud, do we wake up our little brother? No, we don't. I don't need to yell about it now. And it took like five minutes for this to move through my body and my head. I'm feeling so much better. And that is how emotions are. They come, they show up, they give information about a thought we had. And then we need to sometimes give them the attention that they need just for a few minutes and then move on. And that's exactly what emotions are. They're just information about our thoughts. And sometimes we are the ones that are there for when people are experiencing their emotions. In fact, all the time we are. And sometimes we're on the receiving end of anger and irate. Sometimes we're on the receiving end of frustration or sadness or pure joy or depression, know, super sad. And that's okay. We can allow people to experience their emotions, but we don't need to let them hurt us. And I would have probably used yelling words at my kiddo. Probably would have very much been like, you know better. We don't wake up our little brother. How dare you? I'm going to take this away. You're going to leave us this privilege. Right? That's probably very much how this conversation would have gone. Then after I cooled off, I would have been like, okay, nevermind. Brynne Erickson (04:56.536) You didn't lose any privileges. You're fine. I was really angry. I'm sorry. And we can shame ourselves for when we react in ways we don't really want to react. But we're human. And I think the most important thing we can do is say we're sorry and not shame our humanness. because in fact that only tends to make it worse and it shows up more. But the awareness of it is key and allowing of the emotions is also key. So remember that emotions are just information and the more aware and the more grace we show ourselves to others and to others and ourselves, the better really we'll get at reacting in the way that we, highest self would want to. or true self rather are false and not true to own self. So take that to heart. Maybe it'll help you like it's helped me. I'm gonna go talk to my family now. See ya.