0:00:00 – Speaker 1
nextTalk contains content of a mature nature. Parental guidance is advised.
0:00:30 – Speaker 2
Are you ready for the nextTalk?
0:00:35 – Speaker 1
Today we continue our series on expectations. We did a show about expectations that are both healthy and not for our spouse and then one for our kids, because a lot of times we have unmet, unspoken, unrealistic expectations in both of those areas of our life, but today we want to talk about expectations for ourselves.
0:00:55 – Speaker 3
This is the hardest one for me. I will just be honest.
0:00:57 – Speaker 1
You have to look at yourself. Isn’t that always the hardest?
0:00:59 – Speaker 3
Because I’m hardest on myself. I expect more of myself than anybody else, and I’m one of those who struggle with giving myself the same grace that I’m going to give my spouse or my kids, because there’s no grace over here. Mandy, get it together. That’s what I’m telling myself all the time. You’ve heard me say this. Push through, mandy, get it together. We can do this, I feel like wait a minute.
0:01:24 – Speaker 1
I think you share that with a lot of people. I think there’s a lot of us out here who feel that way. We can give it to everybody else the grace and understanding and the realistic expectations when it comes to ourselves. Forget it. It all falls to the wayside.
0:01:39 – Speaker 3
It’s true, the self-talk starts, and the negative self-talk really You’re a failure, you didn’t meet this, you didn’t accomplish this by a certain age or whatever, and that just Satan gets a hold of that and creates a spiral in my life and I’ve seen it over and over again and I still fall prey to it, even though I know that’s how he’s going to attack me Well, socially, we’re even in an interesting era to grow up in, with parenting and being a spouse and being a professional.
0:02:11 – Speaker 1
In fact, we did a two-part marriage series about midlife crisis, the concept and how it has changed, and one of the things I thought was fascinating is that having a midlife crisis is on the rise, but it looks different because the expectations that we have on ourselves are more unrealistic than ever, which I thought was just so interesting. Men are expected, for the first time in history, to not just work and bring home the bacon, but also to have meaningful relationships and conversations with their kids every day, to be the coach on the team, to be at every game, to talk them in at night, to do all the things Grocery shop cook help clean.
0:02:49 – Speaker 3
Well, you talked on the spouse show. You know how you had this vision of Charles coming home and like running in and the kids and like all this stuff. And again that all boils down to the expectations we’re putting on everybody, and women too. You know, before it was like you stay at home, you run the household. Now it is, you have a career, but if anything is failing at the household then you’re a failure too, because you have to do it all Like we have to run the Bible study.
0:03:18 – Speaker 1
You’ve got to run your household You’ve got to be president, your assistant coach on the soccer team.
0:03:23 – Speaker 3
And now you got nextTalk saying you got to make time for conversation how dare. And so you know you’ve got these male and female being unprecedented pressure. And then you add in all the social stuff that’s going on, you know, or we were just talking about how I was watching the Super Bowl and I always go to the hashtag that’s trending because I want to see all the funny memes and stuff, and then we joke about them as a family and it’s that worldview perspective. You know, we have everybody now speaking into our lives telling us what we need to be and what we need to do, yes, all the things.
And so you see why we’re all out here struggling. Yes, because the expectation is so high and so unrealistic and we’re walking around feeling defeated because we can’t achieve it.
0:04:12 – Speaker 1
Yes, and so that’s why the midlife crisis issue is on the rise for both men and women more than ever. We’re done, yeah, we’re just done. We’re overwhelmed and done.
0:04:23 – Speaker 3
I want to go live on an island where there’s nobody without Wi-Fi and I want to grow my own fruits and vegetables and never leave right. That’s what I want to do, because there there aren’t as many expectations or people looking at you or people expecting things of you.
0:04:38 – Speaker 1
You can just be Well, and that’s really what our show is about today. So much of that pressure we put on ourselves, we bring it on ourselves and it’s retraining your mind and your heart to filter that out, and it’s easier said than done. You know one of the ways that is helpful. We even did a show about it the importance of building a tribe, having people who know and love you and who will hold you accountable. Not easy to find those people. We’re not going to make light of it at all, and it doesn’t have to be a big bunch of people, but at least finding that one person who will say what you are saying about what you need to be and who you need to be is unrealistic. You’re setting yourself up for failure.
0:05:16 – Speaker 3
I feel like I have struggled my whole life to find a tribe that I can really be me, like, really let my guard down and I may get emotional because I’m looking at Kim and I like I found it Like Kim is the person and I will tell you, you know, outside of my husband and my kids. Just recently, I said to Kim these are the five things I want to accomplish in 2019. And she was like, maybe that’s crazy.
0:05:44 – Speaker 2
You can’t do all that.
0:05:45 – Speaker 3
Like you are going to get to the end of 2019 and you’re not going to accomplish all of that and you’re going to feel like a failure, like you know, and it’s having those people like I looked at my list and I’m like, okay, number one really could be like 10 things but I’ve got. You know, I put it all into one thing and so having those people be able to speak into your life, because sometimes, like with Matt, he is just like go, go, go, like he’s an encourager.
He’s an encourager, and especially with nextTalk, like he doesn’t understand the day to day operation and what it entails. He doesn’t, you know, quite understand the book and how it came out and all of that and so. But I think you know, because we work so closely together, you’re seeing it, and so when I say I’m going to accomplish this as an nature, like sister, I love you but that’s like a five year plan, that’s not a 12 month plan.
Yes, and you need to have those friends and it will take a minute to find those friends. It has taken me 41 years to where I don’t feel like I have to be fake or I don’t have to be like. I can honestly say like this is my struggle.
0:06:52 – Speaker 1
Well, you can just drop the mic now because I’m going to cry. But anyway, it’s true, it’s not easy at all. We don’t want to minimize it, but I will say that even last night you texted me like do not spiral, because you know me so well. That just one little short text and you’re like, oh, she’s going there.
0:07:13 – Speaker 3
And I know you’re, I, we know each other’s triggers and so everything that’s going on and everything, and so we can see Satan working on each other. Yes, and we’re like. You got to stop that.
0:07:24 – Speaker 1
Shut it down.
0:07:24 – Speaker 3
Yeah, shut it down Like.
0:07:26 – Speaker 1
I understand why you’re panicked right now and I understand everything that’s going on, but this is Satan, yeah, so listen to that show to remind you and give you some direction and ideas on how to find those people, because, I will tell you, life is not hard, as you know, and having people in your life who are willing to help you, set realistic expectations or, just in love, say you’re crazy it makes a big difference. So one of the things I want to talk about with that is, in order to set healthy expectations for ourselves, we have to know who we are first. This is a big one.
0:07:57 – Speaker 3
It’s big for our kids too it is.
And a lot of times we’re missing it with our kids because we don’t have it right yet. And you got to know. You know we are God’s children and I know that sounds cliche, I know that does. But once you grab ahold of that truth and you hang on to it and you are searching the word, looking for your worth, it changes things. It does.
I know that has been a real journey for me with the book. I’m just going to put it out there. The writing world you have to. You have to be okay with rejection, like you have to be okay with people saying, yeah, that’s not for me, that’s not, I don’t like that. You have to be thick skin, which I am not. But once you find out, like once you establish God, I’m going to do what you called me to do. I’m going to be who you want me to be and not worry about who rejects you, who doesn’t like it, who speaks illy of you. Once you get ahold of that, you’re unstoppable because it’s God. It’s God doing it and you’re just letting it go, like I don’t care what people think of me, I don’t. I was actually talking to some people the other day. They called us for it, keb and I for advice on the radio. Oh yeah, they’re getting ready to release their podcast.
One of the tips that I gave them for doing their podcast was just be willing to humiliate yourself, like, just like, throw yourself under the bus because it’s not about you, it’s about the work you’ve been called to do. Right, so true. And I think if we can really grab ahold of this, um, a lot of those expectations, unmet expectations, we go by the wayside because we’re like okay, I made steps forward, I made out of, accomplish what I wanted to, but you’re just. The self-talk is so much more positive to yourself because you’re like God loves me regardless. Yes, I didn’t check everything off and God still loves me.
0:09:48 – Speaker 1
Yes, and you know that peace that you have when you know that you’re doing what God has called you to do. You can kind of like abide in that peace because, no matter what everybody says or what’s happening around you, or you’re like man I did this thing and nothing is happening the way I thought it would. It’s not succeeding the way I thought it would, but then there’s that peace that you can stand on. Well, Lord, you’re going to do something with it. You had me do this for a reason. I know I’m doing what you called me to do, Period. There is nothing like that. It’s the piece.
0:10:21 – Speaker 3
The Bible says it’s the piece that surpasses all understanding, and it truly is. I mean, even as we’ve grown. With nextTalk, you know, some things we’ve launched has been great and some things we’re looking at like, oh, we need to reevaluate that. Is that as effective as we thought it would be? Is that worth the time, you know? And it’s just all a learning experience. We’re learning and growing and we are not questioning that. God called us to do it. We have that piece that surpasses all understanding, even when it looks differently or it doesn’t turn out the way we think.
0:10:51 – Speaker 1
So true, you know Colossians 3, 12 through 15. I just want to read the first part because it always speaks to me when I’m struggling through this conversation with myself.
0:11:00 – Speaker 3
This is a good one.
0:11:01 – Speaker 1
Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourself with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. I just feel like the Lord wants us to look in the mirror and say that to ourselves.
0:11:16 – Speaker 3
I wish, just getting ready to say that, and that’s totally not what’s not scripted or anything.
0:11:22 – Speaker 1
I feel like he wants us to see ourselves through his lens Like dearly loved I say that sometimes just to myself, you are dearly loved. Like it’s a deep compassion and love that he has for us. And he wants us to know yes, we are flawed, but we are forgiven. It is okay. We’re not supposed to be good at everything, we’re not too exposed to excel at everything. He designed us for certain things and when we walk in that and we search and ask him to show us what those are, that’s where we find that piece and that’s where we can say okay, so this was not my gift, I didn’t do well at that, but this is what God has called me to do.
0:12:01 – Speaker 3
You know, I love that because you break them each down in its compassion. Be compassionate to yourself. Kindness, be kind to yourself. Humility, be humble we talk about that a lot. Be gentle to yourself, and I love this one. The last one Be patient with yourself.
Oh, that’s so hard, you know, when you’re three year olds, in the back of the minivan and you’re digging deep to be patient, right. But when you keep making a mistake, like maybe you keep going crazy mom mode or crazy wife mode or whatever, we just beat ourselves up and it’s good to recognize it. It’s so good that you are self aware and you can say I messed up today, but we got to let go of the guilt. We have to. You know, I had a conversation just last night, actually, with one of my kids and we talked about the difference between conviction and guilt. That’s so good.
And how conviction is God? Like just stinging you a little bit, you know. Like giving you an internal red flag alert you may need to do something differently next time. You didn’t handle that. Okay, I still love you, you’re still mine, I don’t look at you any differently. But this is I’m teaching you like as a father, like God is teaching us as a father. But then guilt, you know. So that’s conviction. Ouch, I need to learn something here. You know, as a parent teaching a kid and guilt is that overwhelming, always feeling defeated straight from Satan because he wants you to walk around feeling awful about yourself all the time. And you know our kids are trying to figure that out on themselves. I think we are trying to figure that out Absolutely. And it goes back to exactly this point, ken, that you brought up knowing who’s you are and knowing having that peace that surpasses all understanding.
0:13:45 – Speaker 1
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0:14:12 – Speaker 2
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0:14:44 – Speaker 3
Okay, so today we’re talking about expectations for yourself and we kind of dove into know who you are and, in God, you know that he’s going to love us, no matter what. You know. Go ahead. You wanted to say something.
0:14:58 – Speaker 1
You’re looking at me like wait a minute, I have something to say Just something that I remembered that if we don’t know what truth is, how can we align ourselves with it?
0:15:06 – Speaker 3
Amen, sister, you know what I’m saying.
0:15:07 – Speaker 1
Preach that all day long. If we know who’s we are and why and how we are his, then we can live in that truth and it makes it easier to spot the lies.
0:15:18 – Speaker 3
You’re so true and so many times we want what God has to offer in a crisis, or we want what God has to offer you know. I mean we need to be digging into the word when we are on top of the world. Yes, like seriously on the mountain tops. On the mountain tops, because that is the truth, that is going to get us through, it’s going to keep us, keep us humble. When we’re on the mountain top, when we’re in the valley crying and don’t know what to do, it’s going to give us the answers, and so being grounded in that is 100%. I love what you said. That’s so true. We got to know it.
0:15:50 – Speaker 1
We got to know, um, you know, parenting and, like I mentioned before, parenting, being a wife, um, working. Just navigating in this online world in this day and age changes so much, including our expectations for ourselves. I really believe we base so many of our expectations these days on false realities because of the state of the world that we live in and social media. Well, yes, that’s what I mean. That’s the world this online world that we live in is. I mean, we are basing so much of how we want to operate or see ourselves on a world that oftentimes we only see half truths or we see complete lies and we’re trying to live up to something that’s not even real.
0:16:30 – Speaker 3
You know, I would never do a reality show, but sometimes I wish we could have cameras in our house. You know, because I know people come up to you too and they’re like oh my gosh, I know you are put together and you’re having all these great conversations at dinner.
0:16:44 – Speaker 1
And someone just said that to me this morning. I know your kids talk to you about every single thing all the time and I was like what?
0:16:51 – Speaker 3
As I was just telling you this morning. You know I’ve got one of my kids going through something and they’re just don’t want to talk about it. They’re still trying to process it, you know, and I have to respect that and I have to know when to back off and give them a minute. You know people only see part of the picture, yeah, and so you know, and even we’re all guilty of it, we put the highlights on Facebook. Yes, I mean very rarely I do sometimes, but very rarely am I going to take a picture of myself crying with the covers over my head, saying I hate everything right now I’m overwhelmed.
0:17:23 – Speaker 1
My pants are too tight. My husband left without talking to me this morning. Hi, Facebook friends Like you just don’t even see that. If you do, it’s in a joking way. Yes, you know. If it really happened, our people are just trying to be quirky. Right, you know? Right, it’s so. We don’t really know the truth yet. We base so much of how we operate on it.
0:17:41 – Speaker 3
So we turn on social media and as we scroll, you know, we see Beth taking her third vacation of the year, and it’s February already. You know, we see everybody who looks beautiful put together with no gray hair and no wrinkles, and I’m over here smiling and it looks like the grand canyon on her forehead, you know.
0:17:59 – Speaker 1
Or we see Christian girl Instagram who’s like at the Bible with the coffee cup. That okay, and the flowers draped across the table. I’m so glad you said that.
0:18:07 – Speaker 3
Yes, Because I can’t. So you know, we’re like talking about being in the word right and I see all these pictures on Instagram and Twitter and it’s like the fires going, the copies.
0:18:18 – Speaker 1
You see their feet in the cozy socks or the Bible open.
0:18:21 – Speaker 3
I don’t know about you, but mine looks like my phone, google and different Bible verses, different translations, while I’m in the car pickup line.
0:18:27 – Speaker 1
That’s what mine looks like sometimes, and everybody knows I get my best work done on the potty I do.
0:18:33 – Speaker 2
Don’t take a picture of that. I never do.
0:18:36 – Speaker 1
And I tell my kids, because they know it’s like a rule Don’t have phones or tablets in the bathroom. I’m like I’m sorry, that is not our rule, because that’s the only time mommy gets anything done.
0:18:46 – Speaker 3
Can you guys imagine scrolling through Facebook and Kim has a picture of her on the potty? Yeah, I have thought that many times.
0:18:52 – Speaker 1
I feel like this is dangerous, but I need Jesus. I feel like this is dangerous, but I need to text my friends. That is like my best work time, and so it does not look like the fake posed pictures that we all compare ourselves to and fall short of.
0:19:07 – Speaker 3
Yeah and you even talked on the video series about how, with three young kids and I think that’s why bathroom time is big for you- it is.
0:19:13 – Speaker 1
It’s when you have little people. It’s the only time you’re alone and they kind of respect it a little bit more.
0:19:17 – Speaker 3
A little bit. Sometimes they still barge in, but I remember on the video series you said you know, sometimes my daily Bible thing is just meditating on a verse while I’m boating the laundry Exactly, you know, because I’ve got little ones yelling at me for everything, so it looks differently for everyone. Just get in the word. However, you can do that. Listen to a podcast, listen to I don’t know, meditate on one scripture for one day and then go to another one, but get that truth into your heart.
0:19:44 – Speaker 1
I do want to give a high five out there to all you mamas who have mastered the art of looking amazing when you go to pick up and drop off your kids in grocery shopping and working, because I have not figured that one out. Like when I do wear makeup, people think like she is obviously going to a wedding or something, but I’m impressed by women who are able to pull it together in that way. It is an art, it is a gift, but I have found in my own life that I have tried to live up to someone else’s standards.
0:20:15 – Speaker 3
And.
0:20:15 – Speaker 1
I compare and I’m like you know what I’ve had to come to the realization that she’s just not who I am, that she’s just not who I am. I can’t look at the magazine cover and see the girl with the pretty curly hair that has curly hair like mine, but I don’t style it like hers and my makeup doesn’t look like hers and her thighs are flawless, like she doesn’t have any dimples and it’s easy to compare myself to something like that or to the friends who pull it all together, but that’s just not who I am. One and then two. Sometimes those images are not even real. The marketing that is done and the altered images that our kids and ourselves are exposed to constantly is not even real, and so it’s not fair to feel like a failure.
0:20:56 – Speaker 3
Yeah, photoshopped. I think of the more that you know that you are God’s child. And the more that you are in the truth, like you said, you’re gonna be able to see those lies and it makes it very much more clear and then you see yourself for the good that you are. I mean, yes, we’re off-lawed, like you said, but we have gifts to use for God’s work and being able to look at ourselves and say, okay, god is using me this way and I’m not good at that, and that’s okay, that’s okay, that’s okay.
0:21:27 – Speaker 1
The key is getting to the point where you can say that’s okay.
0:21:29 – Speaker 3
Well, and I think that’s where you move into, you know we should have expectations and goals. It’s what makes us better people but they have to be healthy, yes, and they have to be realistic, and one thing that has helped me immensely is self-care. Yeah, I think we need to talk about this Absolutely. You know we are. I think our team saw that I was spiraling and some of us we were all struggling.
0:21:50 – Speaker 1
All of us were struggling.
0:21:51 – Speaker 3
And we got a team counselor to come in and help us just talk about self-care and that has been one of the best things for me because there were. It’s almost like a. We always talk about the shift in parenting and how we have the mindset has to change. It was the same thing with self-care. Yeah, so she, our counselor. She was like you know, if you have to do grocery pickup, don’t beat yourself up that you’ve failed as a mom because you don’t have time to grocery shop.
If that’s not your thing and you don’t enjoy it and there’s not enough hours in a day, put that in your budget, talk it over with your spouse and that becomes your self-care. And we actually made a list of 10 simple little things that look like self-care that you can do and what I loved. What she said was a lot of our self-care was well, when the house is clean and I can sit down for Bible study and start the fire. It went back to those social media pictures in our head.
0:22:43 – Speaker 1
And she said no, or like I’m gonna make an appointment at the spa, like, use it, take a lot of work.
0:22:48 – Speaker 3
Take a lot of work, never get to it that you see on social media that you wanna live up to. Her whole thing was no, I need self-care lists to be something you can do in a minute when the whole house is like burning down, like it’s crazy. The kids are arguing the bills need to be everything and, for an example, go sit on your back porch, buy yourself for 10 minutes self-care, take care of yourself and teach your kids and family to respect that.
0:23:14 – Speaker 1
Don’t you come out here right now. That’s what I say, don’t you even don’t you don’t do it.
0:23:20 – Speaker 3
Well, bang through your teaching that you’re modeling for them how to take care of themselves. Yes, so when they need a minute, they can say to you, can I have it? Like my daughter said to me, I need a minute, like I don’t want to talk about this yet, like I need to process it. Yeah, you know, give me a minute.
0:23:34 – Speaker 1
We’re modeling that for them, and part of those healthy expectations for ourselves is being able to effectively communicate that, so that you know you’re telling your daughter that you can say this it’s okay. Yes, like my husband and I have this thing we’ve talked about on the radio show before where we say I’m tapping out, and what that means is I’m not going to explain to you why I don’t want to cry, I don’t want to talk about it, I just need to step away from this moment right now.
0:23:58 – Speaker 3
I need a minute.
0:23:58 – Speaker 1
I need a minute and I did it last night, Like all craziness was happening and has that loud and nonsense, and it was normally a time where I step in and take over and instead I was like I’m tapping out and I had to go do some self care. We have to do that. We have to identify for ourselves mind, body, physical, physical and mental all of that. What is it that we need to do? That is a real, realistic expectation that helps us be healthy and when you’re healthy like that, you can identify.
0:24:27 – Speaker 3
I need self care. Right now, I need a minute. And you’re not feeling like a failure. It’s not like, oh my gosh, I’m spiraling. You look at yourself and you’re like I’m a human being, I cannot do everything and this is what I’m going to give up, and I’m not going to feel guilty about it or walk away from or hire to like the grocery, grocery curbside. I’m not going to feel like a failure, because I need to have that in my budget.
0:24:49 – Speaker 1
Absolutely Self care. It’s self care. It’s being able to know what healthy expectations are and implementing them and then giving yourself grace when you do mess it up, because we all do. Back to that second point. You know, see God how you, how he sees you, and give yourself grace and patience and love as you become the person that you are called to be.
0:25:10 – Speaker 3
For our wrap up segment today. One in order to set healthy expectations for ourselves, we have to know who we are. We are God’s child. Two recognize that the online world makes it easier than ever to base our expectations on false realities. And three expectations are good and important when they are healthy Practice self care.
0:25:34 – Speaker 2
Thanks for joining us on nextTalk radio with Mandy and Kim on AM 6 30. The word. You are not alone trying to figure out how to parent in this digital world. We are here with practical solutions to help you. Follow us on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. Find our free video series and podcast at nextTalk Dot org. Are you ready for the next time?
Transcribed by https://podium.page
