How Letting Go Of Shoulds Helps In Building A Good Relationship With Your Teenager | Lisa Giruzzi | Episode 73

Raising teenagers is challenging but building a better relationship with your teenager will help you parent them well through the teen and college years. Knowing how to communicate well with your teen and having appropriate expectations are 2 key ways to strengthen your relationship with your child. In this episode of the Mighty Parenting podcast, communication expert Lisa Giruzzi shows us how the simple phrase “I Should” undermines that goal. Judy Davis and Sandy Fowler go in depth in the discussion about letting go of shoulds to find out why and what we can do to instead.

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A Favorite Quote from the Show: 

“People need to stop shouldering all over themselves.”

High Points of How Letting Go of Shoulds Helps in Building a Good Relationship With Your Teenager:

When people talk about communication, they tend to have a narrow view about it. Thinking about communication in a more expansive and powerful way, it can enliven you and allow you to have so much more freedom and much deeper connections, whether it’s with your children, your significant other, extended family, or friends and co-workers.

People need to stop shoulding all over themselves.

We live in this world of SHOULDS—we should do this, we should do that, I should exercise, I should eat better, I should act this way, I should be better listener, I should be more understanding, and on and on. This is not something that leaves you in a place of power. Even the word SHOULD has an energy around it that’s very dispiriting. It lowers your energy to think about it. Letting go of shoulds can empower us and our children.

We don’t stop and examine them. We don’t stop and say, well, should I? Is that true that I should exercise more? Is that true? Is that something I could do? Is that something I want to do? What does that even mean?

Our brains naturally tend toward the negative in order to keep us safe. 

We often mistake our thinking for reality. But every experience we have comes together to create a filter and we view new experiences through that filter.

Shoulds only exist in a negative view. If we are doing something or going to do it, we don’t use the word should. We use should when we aren’t going to do it.

The “I shoulds” support the limiting beliefs about ourselves. Letting go of shoulds helps us move past those beliefs.

Our thinking and reality are not the same thing.

If I’m walking around with a list of shoulds then 9 times out of 10 I have a list for you too. These thoughts hurt our relationships.

Let’s look at the reality. These things aren’t happening but are the things that actually need to happen actually happening? Even though they aren’t doing it our way, is it getting done?

When you carry around shoulds about other people, it comes across in every interaction with other people. It may not come out in your words, it can come out in tones, actions and other expectations.

If you start to see your thoughts as energy passing through your brain as opposed to being reality then you can start to understand that thoughts are not things. Unless we get caught up in them they just pass through. It’s like a pinball machine. Left to its own devices the ball will hit a few bumpers and quickly drop through the hole and disappear. But when we hit those paddles, the ball hits many more bumpers and stays in play. When we stew on thoughts it’s like hitting the paddles and we keep thoughts in play. If we just let go, the thought can simply be released and will go away.

We don’t have to fix the thought or think positively. Rather, we can simply need to do nothing and let the thought go.

There aren’t tips and strategies for letting go because working at it actually makes us think more and hang on more. We just have to be willing to let go, to not do anything. Once we have the realization that we are shoulding and, if we’re willing, we can simply choose to allow the thought to pass. It’s like riding a bike. No matter how much someone tells us how to ride a bike, the only thing that can help us learn to balance is to get on the bike and ride. Balancing is an insight, we just feel it. Releasing thoughts is similar.

Then we start to realize that we are not our thoughts, especially the thoughts that aren’t ours, that we’ve inherited.

Looking at ourselves in this way allows us to communicate on a deeper level and create a deeper connection.

Think about a time when you were having a conversation with someone and you were in the flow. You were totally in tune with each other, you could almost complete each other’s sentences because you were that in tune with each other. When you listened without a lot on your mind. You were able to have compassion for the other person as well as yourself. When you’re not rushed. When you weren’t trying to manipulate them to see things your way. When you weren’t trying to coerce your child or significant other to do something you wanted them to do. You were clear-minded and at peace, simply allowing the conversation to emerge. There isn’t anything better, it’s connection in a space beyond the superficial and what we all crave.

Just letting go of our thoughts around what our child should be doing can end the battles we are having with them.

Our Guest:

Lisa Giruzzi is a peak performance coach, best-selling author, an accomplished speaker and an award-winning trainer with more than twenty-five years’ experience helping people to be the best they can be. She specializes in empowering people to create and realize audacious futures. Ms. Giruzzi works with people whose intentions are so bold they require a new level of power and performance.

She is the author of 31 Days to Transform Your Life and co-author of 42 Rules for Creating WE which Angela Ahrendts, CEO of Burberry, called “today’s greatest guide for team success.” The book reached #1 on Amazon in Leadership, Management, Motivation, and Organizational Behavior, and was an overall bestseller.

Lisa’s latest book, entitled Bringing Out The Best In Your Employees: The Ultimate Guide for Managers and Supervisors to Engage and Empower Employees to Be More Successful and Productive Through Effective Communication was called, “Fast moving and insightful…” by New York Times best selling author, Brian Tracy.

Lisa specializes in causing breakthrough performance for individuals and organizations. She is a dynamic speaker, captivating audiences with her powerful message at keynotes, presentations and workshops nationwide, and a transformational coach.

To learn more or connect with our guest visit https://lisagiruzzi.com