Hello my fellow worklifers,

Today is Mother’s Day. Happy Mother’s Day.

I want to use this opportunity to talk about thoughts about children. At worklifeunstuck we coach on relationships and one of the most important ones is how to get unstuck when it comes to thoughts that keep us stuck with our children. This is one of the top priorities for worklifers because we all struggle with our unique situations as parents and caregivers. At worlifeunstuck the framework we coach, allows you to get unstuck on any situation. There are some secrets embedded in the framework. Today I want to unlock three secrets and share them with you. I want to do so by storytelling alongside one of my favorite poets Kalil Gibran and his beautiful poem On Children.

These secrets may seem intuitive just like many life lessons. However, as you internalize them and apply them to your work life situations they are bound to help shift your perspective. I was able to use these secrets and the wisdom they have to many situations around my children and also as a daughter and raise my belief ceilings.

Secret #1 – Your kids come through you but not from you, and though they are with you they belong not to you.

As parents we all have manuals of how kids should behave or what they should do or not do. I do believe having some manuals are important as we care about their safety and wellbeing. We also want to impart our values that we believe are important. However, as our kids grow up, a parent has to accept and learn that though their kids have come through them, they do not belong to them. What this means is that when kids break our manuals we can have thoughts that cause us pain. However, how we manage our minds around that pain is still in our control. This is a choice we always have, even though at times we may choose not to exercise it at the moment.

Secret #2 – You may give them your love but not your thoughts, for they have their own thoughts

Another secret of parenting is to understand that you cannot give or change the thoughts of others (including your kids). What they choose to think and feel about you or your behavior is completely up to them. You are merely a circumstance in their model just as they are in yours. By themselves kids are neutral. They bring us joy and pain only because of the thoughts we have about them or their behaviors. We try really hard to change their thoughts and opinions around certain events and sometimes even ourselves. This effort is not in vain. It is the role of a parent to offer a different perspective. However, expecting them to take on our beliefs as their own is still a choice they get to make. The choice they may make whether it is in your favor or not is still their own. No matter what the result, you always have the choice to love them unconditionally. That choice is yours.

Secret #3 – Let your bending in the archer’s hand be of gladness; for even as he loves the arrow that flies so he loves the bow that is stable

This secret took me sometime to unlock. However, once I did it had a profound impact on my behavior. As a worklifer, I struggled for a long time around the scarcity mindset when it came to the time I got to spend with my kids during a work week. I felt the guilt, the shame, of choosing my work over my kids when I had to meet deadlines. I felt at the mercy of the day and work events. I ended up being hard on myself, for making the choices, I did. I felt a lot of pain due to my thoughts around feeling that scarcity with time continued to be hard on myself.

When I started to remove my scarcity mindset with time, I started rethinking how I want to approach my thoughts around my kids. When I chose abundance it was clear, that the time I spent was not a measure that I wanted to chase. I deeply desired to improve and increase abundance around my state of mindfulness around them.

In order to do that, I had learn to listen to my frequency (my thoughts) first. This allowed me in turn to tune to their frequency (their thoughts). If I desired to be more mindful parent and coach to them, I had to meet them where they are. I had to hold space when they were talking to me. In order to do that, I had to be present in the now for them. Once I created space for myself within my mind, I could offer so much more of me to them. I felt abundant.

I learnt how to interpret that last secret in the poem. In order for the arrow (the child) to fly the bow (the parent) has to be stable. Stability comes when we work on our thoughts. This because our thoughts cause our feelings and we end up driving the behavior changes we desire. This is the biggest gift we can give to our kids. The present us. The mindful us. The loving us.

In closing…

Our kids are a big part of our work and life. Leveraging these secrets helps us get unstuck, accelerate their and our goals and sustain their and own wellbeing.

Another action item for all of us is to practice unconditional love for ourselves when we do this thought work. This is also something our kids teach us (unconditional love). They teach us this the very moment we find there is a tiny heartbeat inside us.

They say children are the best teachers. I couldn’t agree more. This because they bring us back to practicing unconditional love for yourself.

They also have the magical quality that forces us to continuously keep rethinking our beliefs.

We get to learn from our mistakes, re-define our parenting beliefs, and evolve and grow with them.

Maithili Vijay Dandige