This was first published on KSL.com

Question:

My husband has a lot of hobbies and friends, and he stays very busy. How do I help him balance that better and let go of my resentment when he is having his "me" time? Should I always be number one (like I feel I should) or do I need to be more flexible and let him have his time? I build up a lot of resentment that I can't let go of and I feel like he doesn't want to be with me. He says he does, but he has a lot going on and is always busy. How do I communicate my feelings out of love, instead of resentment, nagging and bitterness?

Answer:

Before saying anything to him about this, you must figure out what it is you really want. Do you want to spend more time having fun with your spouse? Do you want more time to go have fun with your friends? Do you want him to help out and stay home more? Or do you want your spouse to feel guilty and bad for being selfish?

If you don’t get clear about what you really want, your subconscious programming and your ego may drive behavior that will create something you don’t want. So, take a minute and decide what you really want.

Then, understand resentment around your spouse’s “me time” can be a sign that you aren’t taking care of yourself and getting the “me time” you need. And I hate to tell you this, but you are the one to blame for that.

You are the one who is in charge of taking care of your needs. If you need something more or different in your life to feel happy and fulfilled or supported, you must ask for it and make it happen.

You cannot make your spouse responsible for your self-esteem, happiness and fulfillment. You are in charge of those. If you have trouble doing self-care, you may want to get some coaching to help you get past the guilt issues that prevent you from taking care of your own needs.

It is not selfish to take care of yourself and ask for what you want and need. It’s healthy, and when you realize this and start getting yours, you will also stop seeing your husband's self-care as selfish and you will resent him less.

Also, remember there is a difference between being his first priority and you being all he needs to have a fulfilled life. We are all very different and some of us need friends, hobbies and outside interests to feel fulfilled, while others are totally happy with just their spouse and children. The question isn’t what is right or wrong, but what is right for each of you.

It sounds like your husband may be what we call an “Affectionate” Psychological Inclination. Affectionates have a huge need for friendship, connection, variety, travel and being social. They can’t be happy without it. They thrive on connection and socializing. If your husband is like this, you must decide if you can love him as he is, because it is the way he is wired.

The good news is he also loves his family and spouse a lot and values time with them too. So, if you start planning activities, trips or fun adventures with him, he would love that. If you need to get baby sitters more often so you can go out with friends or have more time away, he would also understand that.

Before you approach him to talk about your feelings about his activities, do these three things:

1. Get accurate about your feelings of resentment and own the fact that you are responsible for your own self-care and have not been doing it. Make sure you mention this in the conversation you have with him. Own that you are not good at asking for what you need, and that’s why you resent him for doing it. Tell him that you could honestly learn from his example and tell him what you need so you can feel happier, supported and more fulfilled too. Then, without any guilt around it, start taking care of yourself: plan activities with friends, take a class or take up a hobby yourself or plan some fun things with your spouse and make sure your bucket is full every week. Then you will have more to give your family every day.
2. Don’t attack or make him feel like a failure, bad or wrong. If you try to make him feel guilty for being the way he is, you are bringing fear, not love, into your marriage and your problems will get worse. This doesn’t mean you don’t have a serious talk about your needs. Just do it from a place of love, remembering that you aren’t perfect either. Come to him without judgment and figure out what you want and need and ask him if (moving forward) he would be willing to support you and help you have what you need.
3. Change your sacrifice mentality. You probably have a subconscious rule (that you may have learned from your parents) that “good people sacrifice what they want and unselfishly give to others and that only selfish people focus on themselves.” Just because this has been your belief doesn’t make it truth. The truth is that being overly selfish and being overly selfless are both a problem. You will not create happiness being either one. What you need is a healthy balance between taking care of yourself and taking care of those you love. An equal balance is what you must create if you want a fulfilled life and good relationships.

Chances are that you have been taught to be so overly selfless that anyone who takes care of themselves (as your husband is doing) may look really selfish, even if they are, in fact, pretty balanced.

When you are overly selfless and sacrifice yourself all the time, even a little self-care looks selfish. So, be open to the possibility that you are the one who is actually out of balance, not your husband. I could be wrong though (maybe he is a tad too selfish) and if that’s true, you definitely need to speak up and ask him to get more centered.

Just handle the conversation right by not casting him as the bad guy, and own your issues around not asking for what you need. Then, find a solution to this problem together as a “WE,” not against each other as two “I”s. Whenever you are overly focused on protecting yourself, you are focused on the marriage. This is true because fear and love cannot happen at the same time in the same place.

In each interaction with your spouse, you are either putting more fear or more love into the relationship. If you are feeling taken from, mistreated, defensive and resentful and you are seeing your spouse as the bad guy, you aren’t bringing love, you are bringing fear.

So see your husband as the same as you, as a struggling student in the classroom of life trying to figure this whole thing out the best he can. Let him be the same as you in value and talk to him as a peer, equal and partner. As a team you can figure out how both of you can have a healthier balance between selfish and selfless. If you approach it this way, you both win.

You can do this. 

Kimberly Giles is the president of claritypointcoaching.com. She is the author of the book "Choosing Clarity: The Path to Fearlessness" and a life coach, speaker and people skills expert.

This was first published on KSL.COM

SALT LAKE CITY — In this edition of LIFEadvice, coaches Kim and Nicole share four ways to shift your relationship out of its current rut.

Question:

Our relationship has gotten sticky lately because I feel really unsupported by my husband. How do I feel loving, trusting and forgiving towards him, when it isn’t reciprocated? I have recently realized my actions and love are dependent upon his. When he is engaged in the home and helps me, then I will love back. But most of the time he doesn’t help at all, and I feel so drained, like we are unequally yoked, and I have been for so many years. He doesn’t even do the traditional "husband" jobs. How do I love and serve him when he doesn’t show love for me in the way I need him to? I’ve tried and I can’t get past the irritation over his behavior. Am I supposed to forgive this and love him anyway? Shouldn’t he need to change and start showing up for me too?

Answer:

The answer is YES. Your spouse should do better to pitch in and help around your house, and YOU should love him regardless of whether he does, but that doesn’t mean you have to stay married to him. Loving him from afar is one of your many options in this situation.

Before you choose from those options, though, listen carefully to your inner GPS (intuition) and figure out if it is your perfect classroom to stick with him and love him while you also try to teach him to behave better, or if it’s your perfect classroom to continue on alone. Only you will know which path is your perfect classroom, but if you feel your perfect classroom is still in this marriage, and you still feel drawn to make it work, there are a few things you can do to get this marriage unstuck from its current rut.

This advice will also be helpful for everyone in a relationship right now. Whether you just met and are enjoying that playful "honeymoon" phase or you have a well-established life together and many years under your belt, all good relationships take the same core principles to work.

Here are four ways you can consciously unstick and strengthen any relationship:

1. See your relationship accurately: Remember, you are on this planet for one reason, to grow and learn. Life is a school, and every experience you have is, at some level, there to teach you how to love yourself or other people better. Your marriage is no exception to this rule. You are always drawn to and marry your greatest teacher. You were drawn to this person because they can help you grow by pushing your buttons, triggering your fears and giving you amazing opportunities to work on yourself.

It sounds like your fear trigger is around “the fear of loss,” and your spouse’s disinterest in helping you is triggering this fear and making you feel taken from, mistreated and unloved. Fear of loss can bring unloving and selfish behavior to the surface. Whenever you feel taken from or mistreated, you will want to pull back your love.

Instead, there is a growth opportunity here where you could see the mistreatment as your perfect lesson, and instead of pulling back and being less loving, you could rise to the occasion, turn this moment into a human achievement, and choose to be loving, kind and hardworking without a chip on your shoulder about it.

You could look for opportunities to encourage your spouse and appreciate his good qualities, even if they aren’t the ones you hoped for, and see them as your perfect classroom. This isn’t easy to do, but there is beautiful growth and maturity that could come from this challenge.

Ask yourself what else being married to your spouse could teach you. How else could it force you to grow? How could a spouse who doesn’t help out actually serve you in some way? When you find the answers to these questions, you will be seeing your marriage accurately, and amazing peace will come.

2. Avoid disappointment in your partner: One of the gifts of a loving relationship is the role of support, encouragement and motivation to make each of you better people. However, this support can be loaded with expectations of how things should be and where you feel your spouse should be in their work life, financially, spiritually and emotionally.

All of us wrongfully project potential onto our partners. We see what is possible and we are often disappointed with what is. Disappointment is the biggest poison in a marriage, because it brings even more fear of failure and loss into the relationship, which sucks the love from it.

The irony is that when we see partners accurately for who they are, without projections or expectations about their potential, they are more likely to fulfill their potential and become more to your liking, but this takes unconditional love and patience.

We believe the more encouraging you can be about your partner's strengths, talents and good qualities, instead of nagging about weaknesses, faults and mistakes, the more you will quiet your partner's fear of failure (which we believe is the real cause of all bad, unmotivated, selfish behavior), and he will be able to show up for you better. Keep giving as much positive reinforcement as possible, and even tell him he is the very things you want him to be. This often nudges people in the direction we want, because they like to live up to your highest opinion of them.

3. Choose to serve your partner: One of the kindest ways you can show up for your partner is to ask yourself, “What does my partner need most?” To serve him, you must see him accurately. You must take notice and really look at what he values and what he fears. What stresses, pain, imbalances and pressures are happening there? How is he balancing all of his responsibilities, and is he having his needs met?

Look without judgment or criticism, with only a compassionate and loving heart, and ask, “How can I serve my partner and love him in a deeper and more impactful way?” We believe that becoming the cure to a partner's core fear (either failure or loss) is the way you can serve your partner best.

If your spouse is doing battle with a big fear of failure (which I would guess he is since he knows he isn’t living up to his potential), he may really need validation of his intrinsic worth and to hear that he has value. You may find giving him some validation quiets his fear and shame and even motivates him. If he is just not a motivated person, look for other qualities about him you can validate and appreciate.

4. Take care of your own needs: You are the one responsible for your own happiness. Figure out who you are and what you need to fill up your bucket so you can handle giving to your spouse and family. What do you need so you have the energy and capacity to keep caring for others?

We work with many couples who have found themselves lost in this misalignment, disconnected from their own needs and showing up only for their families and harboring a great deal of resentment about it.

You must own the responsibly for your own self-esteem and happiness. So, what do you need in your life to feel fulfilled, happy, confident and joyful? What do you need to give yourself permission to do so your bucket is full and you have something to give? What are you doing to strengthen your own understanding of who you are and what you are here for?

It may be time (or long overdue) for you to engage in some personal development or coaching and find your balance and truth, which in turn could greatly strengthen your marriage. You may want to start with our DIY coaching program workbook or hire a coach.

It sounds like you and your spouse are very different from each other. You value tasks and getting things done, and he might not share these values. He might value other things that aren’t worse, just different than yours. Most of us believe the way we are is the right way — but that’s a matter of perspective, it's not fact.

Your spouse has different fears and values, and understanding those is the first step to a better connection. You may want to take our free online Clarity Assessment to see your fears and values on paper and see if your spouse would do the same. We also recommend coaching or counseling with a relationship expert. A little help makes a huge difference.

You can do this. 

Kimberly Giles is the president of claritypointcoaching.com. Nicole Cunningham is a human behavior expert and master coach.

This was first published on KSl.COM

Question:

I work in an office with all women and there is so much cattiness, fighting, gossiping and judging that it is a pretty unpleasant place to work. I realize you might say I should leave and find another job, but jobs that work with my schedule and pay this well are hard to find. Is there anything I can do to be an agent of change or influence others to be kinder and more compassionate to each other? Or is there a way I can at least stay above it all and not let it bother me so much?

Answer:

Unfortunately, businesses who have a lot of female employees often have more office drama and gossip than offices with more male employees, but we also get calls from human resources directors whose companies are going through a merger, have high stress environments or are in fast growth, because stress and change always create people problems.

This happens because change and stress cause fear of failure and loss issues to rise to the surface, and these two fears are the hidden cause behind most bad behavior and relationship clashes. If the issues can’t be resolved by HR, they often bring us in for executive coaching and performance evaluations to figure out and solve these people problems fast.

Every single employee brings some pain, stress and fear around their families, money or relationships to work with them every day. These pressures in their personal lives mean they come to work almost every day in a fear state.

People functioning in a fear state will be easy to offend and quick to feel criticized, taken from, threatened or unsafe. These employees may be subconsciously looking for mistreatment and they could have a short fuse and a rather selfish viewpoint. Understanding the fear behind the behavior is the key to gaining compassion for them and seeing their gossip and bad behavior accurately.

Every person in your office is fighting a battle at home you know nothing about.

They are very likely in pain and fear, at some level, almost every day, and this is the real cause of their bad behavior. If you want to change how you feel at work, you must get a more accurate perspective about bad behavior and you must not take it personally.

People behave badly because of their fears about themselves. It is rarely about you.

Also remember — it is only hurt or hurting people that hurt people. This means the people whose behavior is bothering you most are the people in the most pain about their value and their journey. Bad behavior is always a sign of inner suffering.

We talk a lot in our articles about the two core fears (the fear of failure and the fear of loss) and how they drive human behavior. The truth is, whenever people are in a fear state they are completely focused on one thing: getting anything or doing anything they can to quiet the fear.

In this state they are incapable of thinking about what others may need or want. All they can focus on is "What would make this fear or pain stop?"

If someone functions in fear of failure, they are deeply afraid they might not be good enough. When the fear is bad and they experience shame or feel insecure, one of the most common ways they react (subconsciously respond) is they focus on any bad in the people around them.

The more they focus on other people's bad behavior, they don’t have to think about their own. We call this the Shame and Blame Game and we all play it at times. The more shame we feel, the more we blame others, criticize and gossip. I suspect many of the gossipers in your office are doing so, because they’re covering their deep insecurities or shame.

If any of you are prone to gossip yourself, ask yourself if your fear of not being good enough might be in play. Be aware of the safety you might feel if you put others down or focus on their bad. The first step to changing any bad behavior is being conscious of why you do it.

If someone functions from a fear of loss, they are deeply afraid of being taken from, mistreated or losing control. These people may be territorial, defensive, protective or controlling and they will be quick to be offended and see mistreatment everywhere, even when it’s not there.

We want you to understand the real cause of bad behavior so you will have more compassion for yourself and the people you work with. We recommend you don’t try to "stay above it" though, as that can be a place of judgment looking down at the "bad" people involved and that isn’t accurate as we all have the same intrinsic value.

Just see bad, immature gossip or dramatic behavior accurately, as fear-driven behavior that happens when people are afraid they aren’t good enough and need to look for the bad in others to distract them from their own.

If you see bad behavior accurately you may also see what these people need, which is to quiet their fear, so they can stop criticizing others to feel better. What they need is validation and reassurance about their worth. This is often the last thing you feel like giving someone who is acting haughty, arrogant or better than others, but it is what they need.

Look for opportunities to point out kindness, compassion and good behavior in your gossiping co-workers. Tell them often how grateful you are to work with such kind, encouraging and non-judgmental people.

You may even say that when you first came to work there you heard a lot of gossip and backbiting, and you are so grateful that doesn’t happen as much anymore. Tell the people who do it the most how positive they are and you admire the way they never say an unkind word about anyone.

I know this may seem like lying, but it’s really helping them see who they have the potential to be before they even show up that way. This positive encouragement literally encourages better behavior, because people always want to live up to your highest opinion of them.

When you point out their good qualities you literally push them in that direction. This is the most compassionate way to encourage better behavior. When you help them to see their light, instead of their darkness, you push them toward being their best.

It may also help you to remember that all unloving behavior is a request for love. Every unkind word or fearful reaction is a request for validation and reassurance they are good enough.

This is true for the people in your home, too. We have seen one person completely change the culture at work or home by just giving more compliments and validation to the team. When people start to feel safer, more appreciated and even admired at work, they are happier and show up with more respect and kindness.

Go get them with your positive uplifting attitude and help them rise into better behavior. Don't criticize or point out their bad behavior because that will increase their fear and will only make it worse.

If you do all this and they still remain in negativity and drama, see this as your perfect classroom, take nothing personally and work on being a source of light and love in your office anyway.

You can do this. 

Kimberly Giles and Nicole Cunningham are the founders of claritypointcoaching.com and Identiology.com. They are human behavior experts who help companies and individuals to be their best.

This was first published on KSL.COM

Question:

My husband and I have been married for 17 years. We have been happy for most of this time and have raised four children together. I find myself now struggling to connect, and at some level even not wanting to be around him. I look at him differently and cannot connect to the reasons I married him in the first place. I just can’t respect him for the way he is behaving now. Is it possible that some of us fall out of love or change so dramatically that our marriage can’t be salvaged?

Answer:

It is possible to feel disappointed in your spouse, but it is also possible to salvage the relationship, change how you feel and even grow to love and respect your spouse again.

Understand that the way you are feeling right now is based totally on your perspective (how you are looking at your spouse), and perspective is possible to change, and when you look at something differently, it can feel totally different.

It sounds like you have lost respect for your spouse because of the state he is functioning in right now, and this can be a hard place to come back from. But the first step is figuring out which fears are driving his bad behavior. (By the way, we call any behavior that isn’t loving or positive bad behavior. This includes being mean or being insecure or timid.)

It’s easy to pull back when you experience a spouse’s bad behavior. However, the truth is, all of us have some bad behavior that is not appealing or attractive. You may not have the same bad behaviors your spouse does, but you have others. (We know this because there is always a downside to being married to anyone. We all have bad, immature or insecure moments.)

The key to changing negative behavior (in yourself or others) is understanding the emotions in play that drive the behavior. You must see the behavior as fear-based reactions, not something fundamentally wrong with the person. Your spouse is fundamentally a divine, amazing, human soul capable of fantastic behavior. It is only fear that is bringing out the bad.

All of us experience times when we feel taken from or mistreated, and when you experience fear of loss like this, you might lash out, become defensive or angry or withdraw. You will then subconsciously choose behavior (good or bad) you think will quiet your fear. You may also get defensive or withdraw when you feel insulted or criticized. If you look behind your spouse’s (or your own) bad behavior, you will see one (or both) of these fears in play.

If you understand your spouse is scared, you won’t take their bad behavior as personally. You will also remember they are in a fear state driven by emotion; they are not a bad or broken person (at least most aren’t). We can all get ourselves into a balanced clarity state and behave better too. Everyone has the potential to rise.

So, take another look at your husband and his behavior: What is going on for him lately? Has he experienced any trials, challenges or changes that were not in his control? Maybe he is feeling some loss or having his confidence or position challenged at work. Could this be making him feel insecure? Is his age getting to him; is he losing his hair, struggling with his weight or feeling out of sorts? What are his triggers that bring out his worst behavior? Is he triggered when he feels insulted or criticized (fear of failure) or when he feels taken from or mistreated (fear of loss)? If you can figure out his core fear trigger, you will also know what he needs most to rise out of the bad behavior. He probably needs a great deal of validation or reassurance.

Sadly, it’s easy to judge, be disappointed and pull back, while it takes effort to see them accurately, lean into the relationship and have compassion. We strongly encourage you to try to figure out what your spouse needs to make him feel like he is good enough, safe and on track and see if that brings better behavior to the surface.

When people feel loved, wanted, respected and admired, they usually behave much better. They also become madly in love with you and treat you really well.

The one emotion that could absolutely destroy your relationship is disappointment. If you feel disappointed in your spouse (and your spouse feels your lack of admiration or appreciation for them), it cuts to the deepest part of their fear of failure and it creates more fear of loss in you. In this place of fear, neither of you is capable of loving behavior. Love and fear cannot exist at the same time in the same place.

If your spouse can feel you are disappointed in him (at any level) he will stay in fear and the bad behavior will continue. If you can show him you see the bad behavior as fear (not who he really is) you can inspire him to rise.

When one or both parties feels disrespected or disappointed, there is always a deep disconnect in the relationship. If this is allowed to go on for years, the resentment and dislike can create a huge wedge between you that gets harder and harder to heal. We work with couples to remove these emotional blocks and forgive each other, so they can repair and prevent disconnection, disappointment and disrespect.

To prevent disappointment from occurring in the first place or to repair it, here are a few tips:

1. Every person has the right to think and feel the way they do (and they are always right about how they feel). Your spouse is allowed to have different opinions and feelings and express them. Watch yourself for arrogance that your opinion or perspective is the right one. As soon as you see yourself as right and your spouse as wrong, you step into a place of ego, and this creates frustration and disappointment on both sides.
2. See your spouse as the same as you. This means not talking down to them or casting them as the bad one and yourself as the good one. You must respect their right to be in their own classroom and be a work in progress. Notice your attitude and response to your husband right now. Are you making him wrong or beneath you? Or are you allowing him to have his own process or experience and find his own way?
3. Have compassion for fear-based behavior. We all have bad behavior (every one of us) when we experience fear, stress and overwhelm. None of us can escape this, and we must take responsibility for our own behavior and how it hurts others. Then, we must have compassion and forgive when they have bad behavior because of their fears. A healthy marriage requires emotional resiliency from both sides, and this can only occur when you forgive and allow each other to be imperfect.
4. Lean in and love more. I know it’s hard, but when marriage gets hard we have to love harder. We have to create less space between us and make a conscious decision to love one another more. Love is a choice, not a state. We don’t fall in, we choose in. We do this by creating a safe place for empathy, validation and compassion to come in and resisting the need to shame, protect and make our partner wrong.
5. Look at your own behavior. Where are you in fear or anger and feeling unsafe? See accurately how this is mixing with your husband’s imbalanced behavior and creating a perfect storm for disrespect and disappointment to occur. Consciously choose the WE instead of the I — and lean in to being responsible for your own unbalanced state. This creates the best and most loving outcome for your WE.

Disrespect and disappointment can be hard to come back from, but you can heal it. There is an "Understanding the fear in your marriage" worksheet on my website which might help you see the fear in play in your marriage. We also offer couples' retreats to heal this dangerous emotion and see each other in a new light.

This will require both of you to connect on an equal playing field though, where you both have the same value and you are both worthy of your feelings, thoughts, ideas and experiences. You are both exactly where you are meant to be (to teach you something). It will require you to lean in and love your spouse through this fear stage and help him to see himself as good enough, safe, on track and even admirable.

You hold a lot of the power right now, as you are the one who is disappointed and therefore the only one who can change it. (We know that is counterintuitive because you could see the problem in his control). But the answer to this problem lies more in your changing the way you see him than in him changing his behavior (partly because you have no control over that).

Focus on what you have control over and choose to see the highest, best potential in him (instead of the faults). If you can help him to see himself as awesome, kind, patient, hardworking (or whatever qualities you want to see more of) you can inspire him to change himself. This works because people always want to live up to your highest opinion of them. Encouragement always works better than disappointment or disapproval.

You can do this. 

Kimberly Giles is the president of claritypointcoaching.com. She is the author of the book "Choosing Clarity: The Path to Fearlessness" and a life coach, speaker and people skills expert.

By Kim Giles and Sean Barnett

This was first published on KSL.COM
Question:

I’m really suffering here; our son (who is now 19) is drinking and smoking weed. He is always lying, his grades have started to plummet, and he is of no help around the house. We tried everything from taking away his phone and car, grounding him and sending him to counseling, but he keeps gravitating toward friends that are obviously not concerned with their future. He only attended one semester of college and has lost two jobs in the last three months. The more I try to help him see that what he is doing is leading him down a miserable path, the more he pulls back. He doesn’t respect any of the family rules, and he often sleeps all day. I know he is depressed and anxious, but I am at my wit's end. What would you suggest?

Answer:

(I have brought in coach Sean Barnett to help me answer your question, as he is an expert at working with at-risk teens.) 

He says you must focus on the one thing you have control of: your suffering.

This may be hard to hear, but you and only you are responsible for the pain you are experiencing here. The intensity of your misery is in direct proportion to how far you are willing to go to avoid being responsible for the pain you are feeling. In other words, if you own responsibility for your suffering, you would finally have the power to lessen it.

It will also help if you will separate the facts from the judgments and meaning you are applying to the situation. The facts are that your son uses drugs and does not perform well in school or at work. You and your wife have tried punishing him and sending him elsewhere to be “fixed,” but he is still making the same choices. You would like to connect better with your son, have honest and direct communication and help him avoid a hard life, but you are not experiencing that.

The judgments and applied meaning to your story are that drugs are terribly harmful, school and work are critical, his friends are a bad influence, and your son is disrespectful, unhelpful, lazy and depressed. These are not totally true.

Let’s start with the drugs. Drugs can become addictive and can cause mental, emotional and physical damage to users, and the ones you are talking about are illegal, which means they can lead to incarceration and close doors to countless opportunities. It is normal for a parent to fear these things for their child. It can also feel like your son’s struggles are a reflection of the job you have done as a parent, and that brings personal fear of failure into the equation.

The reality of drug use (from many addiction experts) is that only about 10 percent of people who use recreational drugs become addicted or experience serious long-term adverse consequences. This means your son has at least a 90 percent chance of getting through this stage of his life with no more than a few figurative or literal bumps and bruises.

The hard truth is you have little control over what your son chooses to do. Even if he ends up in the place you fear, it will be the result of his choices alone. He will have signed up for those classes. Period.

You only have control over how you choose to feel and respond. So, the question is, how can you sleep well at night and feel you’ve done everything you can to be a good parent?

Here are a few things we recommend:

Trust that your son is choosing the perfect classroom journey for him. The most valuable lessons in life always come through extreme adversity. If your child experiences pain from his choices or makes choices that create rough trials, and there is nothing you can do to prevent this, do not carry the weight of having to save him from these consequences. Remember, a baby chick dies if you help it out of its shell because it needs the struggle to become strong. Some children need some of their lessons the hard way. If they keep signing themselves up for those classes, they apparently need the lessons (and consequences) those choices will bring. The message you want to send to your child is you love him no matter what and believe in him to come through this. Then trust he is in the hands of someone greater than you, who is ultimately in charge of your child’s journey and education. Hand the weight, worry and fear over to a higher power and trust him to see your child through. You aren’t giving up supporting your child, but you are trusting God to help make it all work out. (You are more likely to keep or create a good connection with your child, too, if you stay out of fear as much as possible. Fear-based responses are void of love, and love is what your child needs.)

Be the person you want your son to be. It is crucial to realize our children can’t hear our words. They only hear our actions and how we live. It is insane to yell at your kid in an attempt to teach him how to be a respectable adult. Do you remember being 19? Would you open up to someone that labeled you lazy or hated your friends? Would you feel comfortable sharing your deepest fears and shame with them? You want to be a safe place and an understanding person they can come to for unconditional love and support. Do not enable the bad behavior, but always love and believe in him to turn it around.

Speak your truth clearly and follow through with consequences. If drug use is unacceptable in your house, have the courage to stand in that truth. If you believe a 19-year-old should contribute to household operations, or be either enrolled in school or employed to live at home, own it. Write your ground rules clearly, and then let your son know these are simply conditions of residing in your house. They have nothing to do with how much you love him. These are rules that are necessary for your sanity, not his. But remember, you have all the latitude in the world concerning how drastically you set your consequences. Sean wrote contracts with his son that were clear, progressive and agreed upon, long before he realized he was no longer a good fit for living under his parent's roof. He would be happy to help you develop a sensible, fair and effective family contract.

Accept your own faults and fears first. Anything you see in your son that makes you angry or fearful might be a projection of fears within your own shadow side. Shadow work on your own fears can be frightening, but if you trust the treasure you seek is always in the cave you fear, this can be the most liberating work in your life. You must own all the faults and weaknesses you hate about yourself, and learn to tell the truth about them. It is only in this kind of vulnerability and humility you find true freedom and connection with your son. Take off the masks you have created in an attempt to protect you from your fears of not being good enough. As long as you have secrets about your own life, no one can connect to the real you. When you get real about your fears and weaknesses, you can connect with your child as two scared students in the classroom of life, with the same intrinsic worth, who are just learning different lessons. From this place of vulnerability, your child will feel safer with you, and you will have greater influence in his life. But you have to get off your high horse to connect from here.

The key to alleviating stress within your family has everything to do with addressing the things you control and accepting the things you cannot control. Remember, you are in charge of the amount you suffer over your child’s choices. Accountability for your feelings always resides directly with the person having the feelings. When you recognize a behavior in someone else that results in your emotional pain, the best place to start is by working on your own fear issues. We highly recommend that parents of at-risk teens be the first to get coaching or help. You cannot help your child from an unbalanced place.

Focus on trusting that we are all going through the perfect classroom journey for us, to teach us the precise lessons we need most.

You can do this. 

Kimberly Giles is the president of claritypointcoaching.com. Sean Barnett is a master coach working with teens, parents and others who need greater skills to build good relationships.