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21. 4 Stages of Parenting - Summer Series Kick-Off · A Heart That Beats for Home

• 0:02
  Speaker 1: Hey friends, I'm Nikki Smith, your host here at A Heart that Beats for Home, the podcast where we're ditching filters and diving headfirst into the raw beauty of all things home.
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: Now, I am no expert when it comes to this whole parenting and marriage dance.
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: I'm simply a gal who's been riding the mom roller coaster for 22 years and a wife still untangling the mystery of it all 25 years after saying I do.
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: My goal is to bring you unapologetically messy and boldly genuine conversations about cultivating strong families.
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: We're gonna laugh, possibly cry, and straight talk about the joy and chaos that comes within the four walls that we call home.
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: No judgment and certainly no perfection, just real talk from my heart, a heart that beats for home.
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: Let's dive in.
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: Hello friends, welcome to another episode here at A Heart that Beats For Home.
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: If you are listening to this the week that the episode is dropping on podcast platforms, then you are in the month of craziness.
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: As a mama, I know that May has quickly I heard somebody say it's now called Maycember because it feels so much like December.
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: In just the craziness of school activities and programs and graduation and grad parties and final projects and getting ready for the summer, there is just a ton.
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: That happens in May, and so I know here at the end of the month it is a crazy time of trying to get all of your ducks in a row and get these kids through these final days of school.
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: Whether you're a homeschool mama or a mama that has kids in school, it is a crazy time.
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: And so today is probably going to be the record for the shortest podcast that we do, because what I'm going to do is just simply set up what we are working on here on the podcast at A Heart that Beats for Home.
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: Coming into the summer, I have really been asking God for guidance.
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: I have shared very transparently here with you all that the podcast is definitely a passion project for me.
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: There is no denying that I feel called to be here.
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: I feel God has placed a real calling on my heart to talk about marriage and family and cultivating strong families, and this podcast has been a definite undertaking.
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: It is not something that is just an hour or two a week.
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: There is a lot that goes into planning and to writing and organizing and then recording.
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: I am doing all of the editing and producing on my own.
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: I felt passionate about really needing to take this on for the first year as a solo project to learn it and understand it and just learn to do it well, and so it has been a lot.
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: We're now 20, some episodes in which I'm super grateful for, and so really trying to process through.
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: What am I going to do with the podcast over the summer?
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: How can I still show up for you guys every single week and add value, but have it not be something that takes so much of my time with my family, as we have the beautiful opportunity of heading to the lake for the summer and just really leaning in?
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: I treasure every summer that we get I always have, but now in even a different and more special way because, as my children are older, I never know, walking into a summer, if this might be the last summer that looks exactly like this, with our family all together for an extended period of time.
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: Reality is, is that people are going to be getting jobs and have careers and find spouses and have their own families, and as I stare down, what was?
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: I know that things are just going to look different and I really want to protect that space for us this summer and so really felt like God was calling me to do a series that I could do a lot of pre-recording for so I could go up to the lake knowing that we had a ton of awesome content.
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: Some of it's going to come freshly recorded up there.
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: I plan to interview a couple of my kids and maybe some sisters and my mom to help us in this series, but we are going to do a series that I have been working on recording already with so many amazing women that I am just stoked to be putting before you, Really diving in in June, july and August into a parenting series centered around a book.
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: That has been one that I have just really enjoyed.
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: I know I've spoke on earlier episodes about Andy Stanley message series.
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: That's a six message series that was done about a decade ago called Future Family.
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: Well, andy and his wife Sandra ended up writing a book called Parenting.
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: It's a very basic title that is really around a lot of the concepts that he spoke about in that Future Family series that I revisit every single year, and so the way that that book is broken up really lends itself to be a great way to tackle a series for the summer on four different stages of parenting, and the way they're broken down is to the early stages, which is kind of the discipline stage.
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: It's where we're creating foundation for safety and for order in those younger kids, birth to five years old-ish.
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: Then we move into that five to 12-year-old age, which is really a lot of teaching.
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: It is so much hands-on, it's so much repeating over and over and over the same things and just honing in skills and how to take care of yourself and how to show up for school and how to be disciplined and how to take care of yourself and how to show up for school and how to be disciplined.
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: There is just a lot of teaching that happens in that stage.
• 5:30
  Speaker 1: Then the third stage is ages 12 to 18.
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: And this is a stage where we're coaching and we're kind of coming alongside.
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: It's where dynamics start to shift a little bit, especially as our kids get to the end of that stage in the 16, 17, 18-year-old, where they're not looking for somebody to constantly be disciplining them and teaching them.
• 5:47
  Speaker 1: They are really working at spreading their wings and getting ready to take flight and what it looks like to coach our children.
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: And then the last stage of parenting, which is that 18 and beyond, and that's when our goal and our hope is that we go into a friendship stage of parenting with our children and really just this book has been something that has been a guiding force for us, for myself, as I look at the different stages, and we're just going to dive in each month to a different stage.
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: So we're going to spend the summer taking June primarily to focus on that first training stage, that zero to five kind of, then, towards the end of the month, overflowing into the next stage, which is that teaching stage, spending most of July there in that five to 12-year-old age.
• 6:36
  Speaker 1: Then, moving into August, we'll end with that coaching and friendship stage.
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: What I'm really excited about is the amount of guests that I have been able to chat with, that coaching and friendship stage.
• 6:43
  Speaker 1: What I'm really excited about is the amount of guests that I have been able to chat with that are in different stages.
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: We have so many parents that are gonna be able to come to you with so much good information, some that are right there in that stage right now that are gonna talk to us about what's working, what they're learning, maybe where they've had to redirect and course correct to have a better result.
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: We're going to be talking with an amazing therapist who's going to talk to us in June about how mom guilt and shame and past trauma that's been undealt with can carry into how we parent and how we can free ourselves from some of that to really show up abundantly and authentically as we parent these precious children.
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: We're going to hear about marriage tips through all of these different stages, as each stage has its own challenges and its own amazing wonderful parts, and so I am just so excited to spend the entire summer digging in to this parenting series, talking about all different stages and just being able to bring so many great people before you.
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: The one thing that this book has really taught me is that when we don't do these stages in the way that they're laid out and, of course, this is just a guide, this is not the have all be all book right, it's like anything.
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: You take the pieces that really resonate, you run with them, but the one thing that I can say is powerful is that what I think we find so often in society is that people do these stages differently backwards and then they wonder why their kids are kind of a train wreck.
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: And when we don't do things like discipline and train in those early years because we're trying to be the friend or we're just trying to be the coach.
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: That then what happens is when things start to go crazy as the kids get older and we go, oh shoot, now I need to train and discipline.
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: It is so much harder to do these stages in reverse order.
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: It leads to frustration, it leads to rebellion, it leads to loss of relationship.
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: And so, really, the importance of really following this guide, of being intentional about disciplining and training before we move into coaching and friendship, and just how that creates security and stability and relationship.
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: I really believe that structure and training and discipline our kids really crave.
• 9:06
  Speaker 1: And when I say discipline, I'm not talking about punishment, I'm talking about discipline in life.
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: When I look at my life and I think, where do I have the most success, where do I have the most structure, it's in the areas that I'm disciplined, and the areas where I'm most disciplined have the most fruit.
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: And when we look at our role as parents as a foundation of discipline and training, it sets our kids up for success.
• 9:34
  Speaker 1: It sets our kids up to know boundaries, to understand what is good and what is bad, and what is right and noble and what is wrong, and so I am just super excited to come into the summer with this series.
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: I hope that it is something that just blesses you all a ton.
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: I pray that we get lots of great feedback from it, that there's lots of engagement on social channels and that you are able to share this with other mamas.
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: I know that coming into the summer there is a lot of pressure to show up, to entertain, to keep kids occupied.
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: I was just talking to a girlfriend that has little kids and she is so amazing at planning so much for her kids and all of the activities and the fun things.
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: And just a reminder and an encouragement to her that our kids don't need complete day camp all the time.
• 10:23
  Speaker 1: They don't need us to show up as a camp director, they just want us to show up.
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: They want us to be there to sit and to slow down.
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: And so, as you look at the summer, what are small little windows that you can carve out to just go outside and explore, to have that scavenger hunt, to go fish at the river, to go on the nature walk, to meet with friends?
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: What are ways that this summer that you can lean into relationship, let go of expectations, maybe let the house go a little bit and just really lean into the moments that you have with your kids, friends.
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: I say it all the time Time goes so fast.
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: The old saying that the days are long but the years are short is true, but the caveat to that is the older your kids get.
• 11:11
  Speaker 1: As the years go by and our kids get older, not only are the years fast, but you will find that the days are no longer long.
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: The days are fast and the years are fast.
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: Time is a resource that we do not get back.
• 11:25
  Speaker 1: It is one of the most precious gifts that we have, and how we spend it matters.
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: So as you go into this summer, I just want you to know that we're here to support you, to cheer you on.
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: We know that you are being intentional about the way that you show up and we are super proud of you.
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: So join us as we dive into this series next month on parenting.
• 11:46
  Speaker 1: We will see you here all summer.
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: So if you're excited for this summer series, I hope that you would share this podcast with other mamas who are walking into the summer that could be on this journey with us.
• 11:56
  Speaker 1: So until next time, friends, take care.