Welcome to Simple on Purpose!
I am Shawna, mom of three kids and counsellor. I aim to help you simplify your home, heart and life – remove the distractions – so you can show up with intention for the life you want. Your life, on purpose
I can distil it down to a one-liner. But don’t let me make it sound fast and simple.
No, it is a slow process of getting to know yourself,
giving yourself permission for the things you want,
bumping up against your blindspots and general life hurdles,
all the while being a human with hard thoughts and feelings and just trying to ‘feel better’
It is hard.
Even harder as a parent right?
A while back I saw this graphic on Instagram:
View this post on Instagram
The hardest part is doing our work, reparenting ourselves, trying to sort our own emotions WHILE parenting our kids and trying to teach them to sort their own emotions.
And that is an overwhelming task. Especially when we are having a tough time with our own emotions, we have a reduced capacity (window of tolerance) to help others with THEIR emotions
I think back to a situation about 5 years ago. I was dealing with my SPICY kid.
They kept saying NO to me, and it felt like they were being impossible.
Finally, I said to them ‘You can’t keep saying no to me, I need you to work with me’
And they were so elevated they yelled, ‘You always say NO to me! You always get your way and I NEVER do’’
It made me pause
They were right,
And also not (if I got my way I would never have to make dinner, my kids would never argue with one another and this kid would be easier to work with aka compliant)
But I did say no, a lot.
Not that I felt that was a problem. After all, this is the kid who asks for everything and anything all at once – so by default, with the volume of requests from this kid, the ratio of ‘asks’ to ‘no’ answers is gonna be higher.
But I could see that they needed some wins, some sense of control of their own life
They needed some AUTONOMY
They needed to feel like they had control of their own life and could be their own person
Which is the topic I want to talk about.
The concept of autonomy-supportive parenting, a term that refers to allowing our kids to practice independence, self-initiate, express themselves and grow their skills.
It means we let them be their own person.
And as always, I aim to share this as a concept
It is an idea.
This is not a prescription for parenting.
This is not me telling you there is a right way and a wrong way.
This is just another idea to consider, see what you like about and what you don’t.
I think many of us love the idea of more independent kids –
They can get to sleep on their own, get themselves dressed, packed up for school and out the door. (Of course, some of our kids have different abilities and they might need more support with this.)
In theory, I want to raise independent kids . . . . until those efforts impact me personally
And here we see our need to control our kids take over
We want to control how they act
We don’t want messes, tantrums, or fights.
We don’t want deviations from the plan, we don’t want to be embarrassed by them.
We want them to just listen to the rules!
That control is pretty apparent. We have a lot of threats, bribes and consequences.
Episode 112. Are you parenting the wrong issue? (Power struggles and problem solving)
How about the control that is a bit more sneaky?
We want to control how they think
We want to control what they think about us, about their teacher, about themselves, about their friends, about their hobbies, about school
We want to tell them what they SHOULD think.
We catch ourselves saying things like . .
‘No, you LOVE this dinner!’
(they hate this dinner and will for the next 14 years).
‘Don’t think that about your sister, she didn’t mean to’
(regardless of sibling intent, sibling offense is still taken, even well into adulthood)
‘Don’t say you hate school, you NEED school, you are LUCKY to go to school’
(can we just say that sometimes school does suck and it is ok to feel like you hate it sometimes)
We want to control how they feel
ESPECIALLY because we have been sold the message that if our kids are happy we have done it right – which completely shifts the focus from teaching our kids life skills and resiliency to just keeping the peace and making all the people around us happy.
Should ‘Happy Kids’ Be Our Parenting Goal?
It is a shortcut to mother burnout and resentment.
I was a Mom Martyr, here’s how to tell if you are too and what to do about it
When Did I Stop Enjoying My Kids? (and my journey back to enjoying them)
If you notice you hustle for happiness in your kids’ lives, remember that you aren’t alone. Things are easier and we feel better about ourselves as a parent when everyone is happy.
But to in order control our kids’ emotions we take away their autonomy
We might punish their hard emotions, send them to their room for being angry.
We might tell them they shouldn’t be sad, maybe even gaslighting them and telling them that their topic of sadness is ‘not that bad’.
We might try to distract them with something that will move them out of their emotions and into ‘happy’.
Parenting Book: Review for Raising an Emotionally Intelligent Child
Episode 123. Myths about emotion coaching our kids
I heard a podcast with Dr. Emily Edlynn, she has done a lot of research on the topic of autonomy – and she talks about the two main ways we control our kids
One way is to use psychological control – shame, guilt, withdrawal, silent treatment.
If this was used on you, you know that it can be effective but it hurts and becomes a trigger for you in future relationships.
And the other is to use behavioural control – which can be done in healthy ways or unhealthy ways
Healthy ways would look like having clear limits and structure. Unhealthy would be threats, bribes, punishments and coercion
And for all of us who hear this and are like, “Bribes are the hammer in my parenting toolkit” yup, I get it – it is an easy default. In her explanation, she outlines that we can reward and celebrate positive behaviours, but the vibe of bribes is more coercive.
In my mind, it is worth making the distinction that this isn’t permissive parenting and this isn’t about authoritative parenting or helicopter parenting.
A good self-reflective question to ask is, ‘How do I try to control others around me?’
What strategies do you use to control your kids? Does it work? Do you like it?
Once a year, we have ‘do whatever you want day’ – a day when I say yes to everything
You may have heard me talk about it over the years – I used to call it Abundance Day but the kids changed the name to Yes Day (thank you Hollywood!)
The limits are: it can’t cost me a lot of money and we can’t leave town. Otherwise, ask for whatever you want and I will 99.9% say yes.
I see that they fill their day with the things they want the most. Which are the things that I control the most: Screen time and sugar.
For moms who are feeling a need to put the phone down (+ teen cell code of conduct)
Often my boys will play hours of video games – maybe throwing in some hockey rink time.
My daughter is often on the iPad with friends or baking in the kitchen while talking online with friends
And I think back to my own experience as a kid.
When I was their age, my younger sister and I were home alone, a lot. Both my parents worked full time and my older siblings were out and about being teenagers
We had free range of the kitchen and free range of the tv. We could go walk to the corner store and buy candy, if we had any money.
And I wonder what I would have done with my time if my parents limited me, especially with the tv.
Part of me wishes I had limits, that I was forced to do more productive things and develop some healthier routines to be more rounded. (Instead of parenting myself through this in my 30s)
But part of me, especially looking back, knows that I was just kind of done with the day and would have felt really frustrated to have limits put on me.
All in all, I don’t think the answer is one extreme or the other, but somewhere in the middle.
In thinking of Abundance Day, and thinking of the lack of limits placed on me growing up, I am often reminded that there are areas where I should give my kids more autonomy and control of their own daily experience.
Giving them autonomy helps with their motivation
I was looking through some old notes I had about how people are internally motivated (meaning they are motivated by their own inner goals and drives) and I had written down that internal motivation happens when three things are present:
- Mastery – the ability to become skilled and grow in an area
- Autonomy – the ability to make their own choices and be their own person
- Purpose – working towards something personally meaningful
This is in contrast to external motivation – which is being motivated by rewards and incentives.
The research tells us that when we start to reward or incentivise something that someone is ALREADY internally (intrinsically) motivated to do, their internal motivation diminishes. Extrinsic motivation is not considered long-term sustainable
So, to help our children grow into people who can become internally motivated, more confident in themselves, and more skilled at making choices and handling consequences, we can allow them more mastery, autonomy and purpose in their lives.
We can give them more agency over their choices, their preferences, their time, their body.
We can give them space to learn who they are, to try different versions of themselves.
Which is also developmentally necessary, for a kid to explore different options of ‘who’ they are.
Growing Through Life (how Erikson’s Stages of Development shape who we are)
Because, here is the thing. . .
Even if you control all your kids’ actions, how they dress and speak and how they spend their time – they will still use autonomy in what they choose to think, how they feel and what they believe.
This goes for everyone in our lives. Our spouses and our siblings and our bosses and friends.
They all have autonomy with what they choose to do with their relationships, their bodies, with what they choose to think about US, they all have autonomy.
And I will just say a quick note about the other relationships in our lives, particularly our partners.
There are so many double standards we have between ‘husbands and wives’ and one of them is the cultural norm of the wife taking the autonomy of the husband. Even though we live in The Patriarchy, we see this cultural trope of a wife who dictates what her husband should be allowed to eat, how he should dress, where they can go, how long he can stay, etc.
The trope is that a man needs a woman to ‘mother’ him. But it is another piece of the conversation we have around autonomy. Who has it? Where do we have it? Where are we not allowed it?
My coaching and counselling work includes a lot of moms and when the subject of autonomy comes up we laugh. We want our kids to have it, but also, we don’t want them to.
We know our life is easier if we can control all the things and all the people.
Episode 115. A Controlling mom, or a capable mom?
We tend to catastrophize what could happen to our kids if they didn’t have us there telling them what to think, feel and how to act!
We also catastrophize what society will think of US if we can’t control our kids, or ensure their life appears a certain way.
Because society does tell us that we should be exhausting ourselves as moms. Good moms make sure they do all the things for all the people (and look good doing it!). Their kid needs to be good, productive, polite, never late, trying their hardest, etc. etc. This is a lot of expect for an adult, let alone a kid who hasn’t bought into all those cultural pressures yet.
Episode 188. Motherhood & Social Media (how online communities impact your motherhood experience)
It comes from a loving place, but it leads to burnout for the mom and the kids.
Who would our kids be without all of our control?
Our control (aside from safety issues) is often a way of containing them in a version of who we want them to be.
I think we do well to notice that we have tremendous influence over our kids and that when we step back a bit, we get to see them step into who they are.
Maybe your kid is sensitive. Maybe they aren’t into sports. Maybe your kid wants to wear shorts in every season. Maybe your kid wants to hang weird posters on their wall. Maybe your kid is ok with messes and mismatched socks.
Episode 59. Moms who want control, time to lean into influence
Episode 134. Do you typecast your kids? (Labels + how they impact our parenting and our kids)
To me, giving our kids more autonomy is letting them know ‘I don’t want power over you. I don’t want to dictate who you get to be as a person in the world. I want to keep you safe and will step in when that is necessary. But I want you to pay attention to your own power and I want to teach you how to use it with integrity and love.’
If we have some resistance to the idea of our kids having more autonomy, it is necessary to listen to this.
Whenever you have resistance, get curious.
Don’t double down on it, get curious about it.
If you have resistance to these topics, explore:
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- Were you allowed autonomy as a kid?
- How does it feel to not have control over the people in your life?
- Do you trust them to figure it out? (and with kids, I mean age-appropriate autonomy of course)
- Do you put your value in the roles you play for others and stepping back feels untethering?
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So, if giving your kids more autonomy is something you would like to practice, here are some ideas on ways to step back so that they can step up
Let them feed themselves.
As a new mom, I was Control Queen. I managed all the things.
However, I did that thing where I put soft foods in front of my baby and they smashed it into their mouth and fed themselves.
Of course, 1 out of my 3 kids just wouldn’t stoop to the level of eating with their hands, and we did more spoonfeeding for that one. But this was kind of a good lesson for me early on as a mom – to notice that they can do this on their own, and I can sit back and watch them and talk with them and eat my own food.
Let them dress themselves
I have always done this with my kids. And I’ve had dear friends share ‘I just couldn’t do that’ and that I get it. I mean, it’s not just mismatched socks it is like ‘When your grade 3er is wearing an elephant costume to school day after day’.
But I have also loved seeing my kids express themselves through what they wear.
I know, as they get older we need some parameters around where different clothing choices are more or less appropriate. But in my eyes, as a parent, this was an easy win for their autonomy.
Let them answer for themselves
The mom becomes the translator between the world and the child.
Especially when they are young, we are paraphrasing questions to our kid and then paraphrasing answers on their behalf.
It can support your child’s autonomy to let them practice (especially as they get older) answering for themselves at the dr office, the restaurant, and so on. (Of course, we also need to be there to step in on their behalf if someone is disrespecting them).
Let them decorate their rooms
Growing up my room was covered in ‘self-expression’ and I loved that my parents gave me free range to coat my walls with posters, have things hanging from the ceiling and all the other ways 14-year-old me wanted to create her space.
I know there are limitations if you are in a rental or small space, but letting your kids have a say in their space can really increase their sense of autonomy.
Let them make a playlist and listen to it in the kitchen/the car
For some families, music becomes a shared language. I love hearing the songs my kids want to show up and love that they let me do the same for them.
Ask them how they feel about situations and then ask them how they want to handle situations
This is moving into a coaching role rather than a directive role. And I get it is hard as a parent. The impulse is to tell them what they SHOULD feel and how they SHOULD handle it.
I have learned a lot about my kids’ through this approach.
If I would come in and tell them how to feel about a situation, we would both miss the opportunity to see that they don’t need me to do this. They have self-reflected and feel a certain heavy emotion – they need my support to know that they can use this hard emotion to take reparative actions.
Let them decide how to use their free time
Sure, most of us parents will set limits on screen time and make sure they are being safe online – but even beyond screens, let them listen to themselves and their own interests.
I think just getting curious about what is true for them, what it important for them, what they think, what they are interested in. And not so we can judge it or tell them it is wrong (that is our fear or our ego speaking) but so we can KNOW THEM, and love the real them, not the ‘them’ we think they should be.
Some books I’ve liked that can relate to the sense of autonomy:
Never Say No – I read this prob 10 yr ago now, so I should prob refresh but it did inspire me to say yes to the kids crazy ideas. Like, I had a kid who wanted to bring their friend a bunch of bananas as a present. My impulse was to say no, but I thought, this means something to them, it is how they want to express love to their friend, that is pretty awesome of them
Hunt, Gather, Parent – I recently read this book and shared some on IG. It is about how other cultures of the world parent differently than western culture and it had good points on how to get them doing chores, letting them learn on their own, and handling anger as a parent
And the book that I think I need to read next, is Autonomy Supportive Parenting by Emily Edlynn.
More episodes on parenting right here
