Eps 486: The beauty of parenting in community with Julietta Skoog

Today, coming off of this fabulous weekend experience, Joyful Courage means going for it and having faith that everything IS and WILL BE amazing, however, it unfolds. Really leaning into this right now and feeling the momentum of the satisfaction I am feeling in each and every part of it.

 

Actions steps from this episode:

• Save the date for the second annual retreat, May 2-4th 2025
• Sign up for Casey’s email list to stay updated on retreat details
• Find tools and practices to incorporate spiritual nourishment on a regular basis. Reach out to Casey and Julieta for support!

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Transcription

00:05
Hello, Welcome back. Welcome to the joyful courage podcast, a place for inspiration and transformation as we work to keep it together. While parenting our tweens and teens. This is real work people. And when we can focus on our own growth and nurturing the connection with our kids, we can move through the turbulence in a way that allows for relationships to remain intact. My name is Casey already I am your fearless host. I'm a positive discipline trainer, space holder coach and the adolescent lead. It's browseable. Also mama to a 20 year old daughter and a 17 year old son I am walking right beside you on the path of raising our kids with positive discipline and conscious parenting. This show is meant to be a resource to you and I work really hard to keep it really real, transparent and authentic so that you feel seen and supported. Today is a solo show and I'm confident that what I share will be useful to you. Please don't forget sharing truly is caring. If you love today's show, please please pass the link around snap a screenshot posted on your socials or texted to your friends. Together we can make an even bigger impact on families around the globe. If you're feeling extra special, you can rate and review us over in Apple podcasts. I'm so glad that you're here. Welcome. Welcome. Welcome. Enjoy the show.

01:31
Hey, everybody. Hi. Welcome to this week's solo show. However, it's not gonna be so low. It's the opposite of solo. It's a duo. I am recording right now from El Cerritos, California for my dear friend and your friend and podcast guests galore. Julieta scoops childhood home will

01:56
technically not my childhood home. They moved here when I was in college. I think we need to correct you about that. But it just seems like a minor detail that I didn't want to read Correct. Well, your childhood Hood Hood, this is my head for sure. This is my Yeah, I grew up just down the street. Yeah, yeah.

02:10
So the reason that we're here right now is because we just spent the weekend in Pacific Grove at a space called a Sylmar conference grounds, leading our first ever retreat. IV there

02:29
was epic, it was so epic, it exceeded expectations. It was beautiful. I just couldn't have asked for anything more and to do it with you is what made the magic.

02:38
Yes. And so the idea is we're going to tell you about the retreat, while also highlighting the depth of important experiences that allow us to get to know ourselves better and be in communion and community with each other. How important that is on this parenting journey because we saw it in action. So will you start us off? Like we talked about how excited we were? And like, what our vision that we had all those? For many years, we've been talking about this? Yes,

03:10
I mean, I think part of our practice, why it's so helpful to parents is the experiential aspect of our work. And especially pre COVID, a lot of the classes in the workshops that we were leading were in person. And for myself, having been trained in group therapy, you know, the power of just a group itself. And then also being a participant as a retreat like lover, we love a good retreat to yoga retreats every year with my bestie. And the transformation that can happen and the power of the group, right. So you and I had always had that in our back pocket as a next level, right? So we would leave these groups, we would leave these workshops and classes, and then we evolved into the Zoom space. But I think there's something about this retreat space, that's was a totally different part to that. So you and I have been talking about this for years, and to finally have our memberships, our core group of people that we could say, we're ready to launch and then our merger, of course, over the last couple of years are deep friendship and love for facilitating together. And this year, we were like we're gonna do it. Yeah. And so we did.

04:21
Yeah. And you heard about it. There were ads on the podcast, we've been posting about it on social media and on our newsletter. So we know that you know, that this was happening. And I think for me, I mean, I just love being with people I get so full in the experience, the collective experience and the collective energy of a circle of people who are all saying yes, and showing up and, and willing, I think something that's really special about the two of us is our authenticity is such an invitation and our willingness to be exposed and to be vulnerable creates an invitation and a say EFT for people. And we definitely experienced that this weekend. And when I thought about what I was hoping we would create what was really important to me, and as you all know, yes to the parenting tools, yes to the parenting strategies, and then Yes to the learning and the practice of what do I need to do on the daily so that when I lean into these tools, when the shits hitting the fan, it's useful, and I'm showing up authentically inside of my encouragement inside of my curiosity inside of my firmness, right. And so I really was excited for us as we were planning the retreat, to think about all these different little practices that we popped in and guided our people through that they could take and then integrate,

05:45
right, so it wasn't just like, let's peace out for a weekend and disconnect, right, it was actually a reconnect, you know, reconnect to the soul in a way to come back more equipped, I think, like, actually, with, you know, those extra tools, and I keep coming back to like bone marrow, like, we just like gotten to the bones of it. And the day to day isolation that parenting can bring naturally like, it's just part of that journey. And so to be in community and be reminded of the collective experience, the collective for this group, motherhood parenthood space with different ages of kids, was also super powerful. And I think the piece too, you know, there's things that we can do, like you said, on the daily like, just to be reminded of those parts, you have to create space, there's got to be that space for it. And so that's the other piece that I think you and I were really intentional about is what is that space, how safe that space is going to be? The group itself, creating that space internally and physically. Yeah, and

06:56
I feel like either this came up in the circle, or just in euthanise conversation, you know, we you and I are in different stages of motherhood and parenting, as Ian gets ready to launch and I'm just living my best life as a. And I have a first grader. Yeah, exactly. And you have three kids all at home. And we have, you know, a shared common commitment and intention around making the time, right, and you guys are friggin busy. Man, you are on the go. Right? And I am on the go in my own way. But it's that how do you make it work?

07:32
We are so overscheduled it's ridiculous. I mean, it is Excel spreadsheet ridiculous. And it's only ridiculous because you times it by five. You know, if you really look at each person, it doesn't seem like so much. And of course, she's like, I want to do hockey, you know, I mean, there are these parts. And we're really active bunch. So it just gets like I said, it just gets times five. But I think how we make it work is we have a steady pulse. And we have a steady pause on what is the pulse like right we're in our family meetings once a week in our My partner and I sitting down with the Excel spreadsheet every week looking at the calendar, literally you have an external sector rally, but only because John loves Excel spreadsheets. And so he put it into that now we have yet like a whole calendar system. But I mean, that's the part of positive discipline that I love that it's always solution focused, we're looking at iterations of our routines and our rhythm. And so we recognise when we're off, we recognise when we're out of the rhythm, and it's no blame. It's just like, oh, okay, we're off. And so let's bring it back. What's the solution? How do we level up? What's our next agreement around screens? What's our next agreement about the routine? What is our, you know, what are contributions looking like, where am I feeling resentful, depleted? Not fair, you know, or just where am I just feeling? Yeah, like that, you know, and then maybe it's, we're doing too much. And so there's nothing we can do about that now. But next decision point, we're going to make a different decision.

09:10
I think that's so important right there. Next decision point, like, Okay, we've said yes to this thing. And now we know this extra thing when these other things are happening. It's too much. We have to set a boundary and something you were talking about when you said like, I'm thinking about this spreadsheet and the structure of family meetings, the structure of having routines, I think about that phrase, freedom within structure, like when we know that these pieces are in place, then there's like, it's kind of counterintuitive, but there's actually spaciousness that

09:42
can be created. And even I mean, most recently, my tween my sixth grader,

09:49
she tween she 12 or 13, she's 12 she's a total tween

09:56
and she's got real screentime issues. So you know, and so Julieta is a human turns out for sure. And as are her family, and also she's, like I said, she's our party monkey, we stay up late with her. She's so fun. And so, you know, when it's like, okay, we've gotten off track here. And then she's like, but I want more, you know, and we're able to just come back to, like you said, the freedom within the structure is like, awesome. What's our structure? Let's put pause, come back to us with your new first draft of your agreement. And we're ready to meet you where you're at. And also, privilege comes with responsibility. So what's the responsibility gonna look like to match that level of privilege? And also, I get it. I love to watch TV, too. Yeah. And sometimes there's a not yet. That's right. And also, there's a part of like, let's zoom out altogether. And notice your feeling. How are you able to create those boundaries for yourself, too? I'm feeling like there's so much going on, I'm wanting to check out and what's really going on beneath your own iceberg. Yeah, of wanting to check out even more and plug in, you know, I think there's some kids who intuitively are able to regulate the amount of time with friends, you know, they can feel out. I'm the introvert, like the kind of that tipping point of introversion, where it's like, I'm good. I know, I need my own time. And there's other kids that just blow it out of the water until they're so out. It's just right. That's party monkey time. And it's just like Bun Bun Bun into like, oh my gosh, now I really need to be. So it's also navigating that part for as a tween of saying, you know, what's really going on? What are some other things that this has actually given us an opportunity to check out for yourself?

11:43
And my head is spinning right now. I love you know, we talked so much about the iceberg. You guys listeners, right? And bringing up the iceberg all the time. We're all curious what's going on into the iceberg. And what I just heard you say that I love is like, they get to check in on their own iceberg. Right? We use the iceberg metaphor as something that we are observing in them. But we have icebergs, you and I, and I think probably that's like the work of growing in our self awareness. Right? And being curious about, Oh, I feel like being super Rayji and going off or whatever your you know, whatever your favourite way to lose your mind is, and that is that indicator. And I feel like we talked about that this weekend in the context of responsibility and being response able, right. And that willingness to recognise, oh, my body's really hot, and I kind of want to rip my kids face off, or my husband's face off, or whatever. I mean, I had that last night. I'm going to tell this story. So last night, we were at this retreat all weekend. So dreamy, I'm feeling really good about myself all weekend, like literally, we played with soul navigation cards, and my card was inspired. And I was like, You know what, you guys, I inspire myself like, I am so inspired by myself and I really owned that felt good about that. You know, and then we have this great, leisurely Sunday and debrief Julieta and I and then I'm like, Okay, it's 930 I'm going to check in with my fam and I call my husband and my 18 year old answers, and I can hear that he's in my husband's truck by the sound. And I'm like, Oh, what are you guys doing? And he was like, Oh, Dad and I are just driving to the casino. And I was like, What the fuck are you talking? Like, being response able I was a little less response able than I could have been. But I realised very quickly like, oh, wow, I am having a full body. I can't believe what the hell what are you doing? There's so many things I want to say to my husband, you know, and I realised I need to just get off the phone. I need to get off the phone. I need to regulate myself. Julieta came in support it one

13:58
thing that I heard you say over and over again on that phone call was you just kept coming back to I love you. I love you and I'm getting it off the phone now. I love you and then we would stay on there would be some more but I love you keep him up to I love you. I love you and I'm gonna get up Yeah,

14:13
I love you and you're killing me right now basically. Right and that's the thing right? I did not see that coming. I was so shocked that that was the evening event and not even the evening event like it was you guys it was 930 and Ian was like Oh, I got a late start tomorrow. So we got time and dad wanted to teach me how to play blackjack. I can't believe I'm talking about this on the podcast but he is 18 everyone so it's all you know on the up and up legally. But still oh my god, we're gonna have a conversation when I get home or maybe not. Maybe I can let that go because what was happening was Ben an EN and Ben is gonna have a really hard time when he goes to college. They are so tight and they were having this really special experience and I'm looking at Julieta right now and she's like yeah, case listen to yourself. It is the truth is the truth. But to be able to be with that or something out halls really requires us to have like the daily practice of tending to ourselves so that we can notice like, Whoa, I want to go off right now, I could go off right now, I don't actually want to go off right now. Well, and

15:14
what's in our body? I mean, that was one thing that we really got to play with all together in person is what's in Speak of the

15:22
devil, Ian just texted me. You must know that I were talking about him.

15:26
But the peace around just recognising the body and then having that space before the reactivity, you know. And so I think the place is like, just like I'm talking about my twin unit, just on the daily when those things come up that we're not like, what catching her on it underneath the covers. It's like, oh, what's happening here? What's this? Where do we go back to and I think there's some fluency that is required. And so it's sort of like, if you haven't gone to the LAN, you know, whatever language that you're speaking, if you've been gone there, I was gonna about to say, Canada, and then I'm like, Oh, actually,

16:03
he didn't go to Canada. So they might have gone to Canada, who knows where they went last night, you guys, you

16:09
know, you've got to, like be immersed in. So I think that's also what that retreat experience helps us do is it actually strengthens the fluency of that language and the language of being together. One of the things that we talked about this weekend is the power of language without words, yes, talk about that. Just more idea of the communication that so much is being communicated to us without words, and what we communicate without words and the power of deep listening, that when we can actually pay attention to signals. I mean, its relationship staff, you know, and also, that there's messages coming up for us. I mean, I think it's just that dropping in that presence, that being able to feel safe enough with yourself to be able to be vulnerable, available, present with the other person. So whether they're a little or whether they're high schooler or whether they are parenting partner to Yeah.

17:09
So what of all the practices that we facilitated? And that, you know, we've said this now multiple times, but the what I think is our superpower is being both guide and participant and really being in our own work as we also are the facilitators, and are the mentors. And I think that keeps it really real and really authentic. So what were a couple of your favourite experiences that you had for you, because we both had some pretty awesome, like, oh, experiences, personally, in the practices that we did, what's one that you want to share? Well, I'll

7:45
do two, I mean, one was having that movement, the really feeling we walked with fear, we walked with worry, we had some embodiment around a challenge that's coming up for us as parents, I loved that. It just reminded me you don't remind me that I'm here. I've always been here. So come back to that truth come back to that confidence. It really allowed me to grow those roots a little deeper. In my embodiment of I know, you talked about this on the podcast, that continent authority, you know, that place of really deep like Mother Earth deep, you know, like mother parent, I got this confidence, it really got me into my body with that. And then the other practice with the soul cards was just so fun. It was just so fun. I totally loved the permission to have the neutral interpretations, to have the guide with the beautiful visuals and the inspiration and to use it as a tool for me to remove the obstacle that I had to come in with intention for and just to feel by the end, deep hope. I mean, just a hole. And like I said, Obama sighs hope.

19:04
I mean, it was just awesome. I love that. Yeah. And for those of you that follow me on Instagram, every once in a while, I will post these cards that I use in my morning practice, and they're called Soul navigation cards, I will put a link in the show notes to the gal that creates them and she has some resources there. So I will dial you in, in the show notes. That was one of our gifts to our people this weekend as everybody got their own deck. And as I shared how I use the cards, I guided everybody through the process of you know, creating their own spread, and everybody had a different spread. And they're just words, right? They're just different words and what I love about a practice using cards like this, it's just an invitation like what if I could look at right here right now from Hope, like what does this look like if I Put on my hope glasses. What does this look like if I put on my courage glasses, what does this look like, if I put on my letting go glasses or my joy glasses or trust came up, integration came up, there were so many juicy words and the gals got to journal about it and then pair share about it than we share it out. And it was profound. And it doesn't take that much to look through a different lens. And it doesn't mean you have to look through a different lens, and then that becomes your truth. It's just like, hey, play with it. Like maybe you could look at this through the lens of you no strength, or even entanglement. That's one of the cards are agitation. I love the agitation card. And it's like oh, yeah, agitation is actually how the clothes get clean. Everyone without the agitation, the clothes don't get clean. And like what does that look like in the context of an unruly teen or tween, or even a six year old little agitation? Cleans everybody out, right? Yeah, the soul navigation cards and the movements. I loved that too. And I really appreciate getting ever better at recognising how different emotional experiences feel in my body, versus just being in reactive mode, when we can recognise that tightness for some of us or that like, desire to, like, curl up into a ball and, you know, turn away, when we can notice that that's happening. That's the first step towards like, okay, and how do I want to intentionally show up? Is this who I want to be? Do I want to be curled up in a ball and ignoring the hard things? Or do I need to find my competent authority, and where's the stepping stone towards that? So I love the embodiment to the just the collective

21:46
nervous system healing that we bring back to our family that we have with our family around that part to just that integration of the mind body. And I will say to with the backdrop for me, personally, of the ocean, that it was in my happy place. I mean, there was such power there that was really healing and restorative. And like you said, it didn't take long, it was less than 48 hours. Yeah. Yeah. It was like 36 hours of retreating with our people. So that idea that like, wow, look at that transformation over that time. You know, how can we then pull a thread of that pull a chapter take a little drop home and use that on the daily on the monthly that can resource us that people walked away with that? People

22:30
walked away with so much? I mean, the group chat is still blowing up. And

I love it. I love it. I know I missed them already. I

22:37
just Yes, yeah. Oh, dreamy, so dreamy. And here's the good news. You guys, listeners, save the date. Next May the weekend before Mother's Day here in the States. So the first weekend of May, we're doing it again, second annual second annual and you know details to come details to come. So if you're not on my email list, go to be spreadable.com and scroll to the bottom of the page and you'll see how to join the email list and you will be kept up to date. Oh, and I wanted to actually dedicate this whole podcast to our gals. So Nancy, Carla, Ida Daniela Bonnie Aaron Sedra Gen Kim and gel, rock stars, rock stars. We are so in love with all of you was so lovely to watch. You fall in love with each other. Something that Kim said and her testimonial was the words that came to her about the weekend that she had was Holy Communion. I mean, like makes me to me is that spiritual nourishment? Yes. Yes. Yes. spiritual nourishment. And that is what we did. And that's what we invite you to do on your own. Find your own tools and your own like regular practice. If it's not daily, make it weekly. Make the time get a spreadsheet if you need to. Jon's available for support. But make it happen. And if you're like, I don't know how to make it happen. Reach out to us reach out to us because we will support you. We will help you. We're good at it. Yeah, that's our show. I love you so much. So good. And we love you listeners. Thank you so much for hanging in with us today. And we'll be back on Monday with an interview. Have a beautiful weekend. Bye.

24:29
Thank you so much for listening in today. Thank you so much to my spreadable partners, Julieta and Alana as well as Danielle and Chris Mann and the team at pod shaper for all the support with getting this show out there and helping it to sound so good. Check out our offers for parents with kids of all ages and sign up for our newsletter to stay better connected at B sprout double.com tune back in on Monday for a brand new interview and I will be back solo with you next Thursday Have a great day

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