Speaker 1: Hi, everybody, and welcome to Katie's Crib. This is this
Speaker 1: is just a very very very special episode. This is
Speaker 1: a special episode. We have one guest and one guest only,
Speaker 1: and her name is Dr Safali Sabari and she is
Speaker 1: a clinical psychologist who specializes in the integration of Eastern
Speaker 1: philosophy and Western psychology. She is the author of three books,
Speaker 1: The Conscious Parent, out of Control, and The Awakened Family.
Speaker 1: Here's how I came to know her. I got pregnant
Speaker 1: on Scandal. I went to Carrie Washington, who, as we know,
Speaker 1: is the most incredible actress, mother activist. I mean, the
Speaker 1: girl is just incredible. And I said, oh my gosh,
Speaker 1: I'm sitting here amongst piles of how to parent books
Speaker 1: and I don't know what to do, and I'm very overwhelmed,
Speaker 1: and I'm pregnant. And CARRY said, if you're going to
Speaker 1: read one book, and only one book, it has to
Speaker 1: be The Conscious Parent. And the book blew my mind.
Speaker 1: And I am sitting now across from you, staring into
Speaker 1: your gorgeous eyes in Great neck Long Island, you guys,
Speaker 1: which is literally the town next to where I grew
Speaker 1: up in nor Washington. Um, thank you. So much for
Speaker 1: being here. Of course it is. It's such an honor
Speaker 1: to meet you. I am a super fan. Um. So
Speaker 1: this book The Conscious Parent that you guys run, don't walk,
Speaker 1: um to read? What is the Conscious Parent? That's? What
Speaker 1: is that? The first question you get from everybody. Sure,
Speaker 1: And then I get an indignant affirmation from these parents
Speaker 1: saying I'm conscious. I'm already conscious. So then we have
Speaker 1: to deconstruct what consciousness really means. And I'll just tell
Speaker 1: you a little bit about the inspiration behind the Conscious Parent.
Speaker 1: You know, having been a meditator for almost fifteen years
Speaker 1: before I had a child, I was exposed to the
Speaker 1: concept that we have this thing called the ego. And
Speaker 1: this ego is a false self, a false persona that
Speaker 1: gets created because our intrinsic, innate self was never seen, heard, understood,
Speaker 1: or validated by our parents. And all of us had
Speaker 1: very unconscious parents, so they pass on this unconsciousness to us,
Speaker 1: and because we want to preserve and thrive and survive,
Speaker 1: we create this false self called the ego. Now, the
Speaker 1: ego is not who we truly are, and we talked
Speaker 1: about who we truly are. It's the things we think
Speaker 1: we should be which society tells us. Culture tells us,
Speaker 1: So we should be beautiful, we should be skinny, we
Speaker 1: should be tall, we should be short, whatever it is,
Speaker 1: the flavor of the culture's day, whichever culture, whatever, the
Speaker 1: the most exalted qualities are. So we grow up thriving
Speaker 1: to be that in order to feel validated. And it's
Speaker 1: this thirst to fill the inner self that actually propels
Speaker 1: most of our life. And we don't realize that we're
Speaker 1: doing things because we're hungry, and it's coming from lack
Speaker 1: and which is really fair, And so we're not doing
Speaker 1: things because it's truly us. We're doing things because we
Speaker 1: think we should. And having children is one of them,
Speaker 1: getting married is another. All of these prescriptions one after
Speaker 1: the other. And so then we have kids, and then
Speaker 1: we think we're having kids because the kids wanted to
Speaker 1: be saved from wherever hell they were at, but it's
Speaker 1: not true. They were fine wherever they were at. We
Speaker 1: think we should have kids because we have it on
Speaker 1: our checklist, because it's one more thing we think we
Speaker 1: should do um and of course we want to have kids,
Speaker 1: but I don't know how many of us really deconstruct.
Speaker 1: So then consciousness becomes about really becoming aware of who
Speaker 1: it is you are and who it is you've been
Speaker 1: playing all these roles you've been playing because you really can't.
Speaker 1: You cannot raise a con just child unless you, yourself
Speaker 1: are conscious. Yeah, this has nothing to do with the child.
Speaker 1: This is okay. So the word all has to do
Speaker 1: with me. I knew. And the conscious is about you
Speaker 1: realizing that you have been playing to your false self,
Speaker 1: and you've been raising a false self within you, And
Speaker 1: if you don't become conscious of that, you will then
Speaker 1: negate and dismiss and eviscerate the true self and the child,
Speaker 1: and raise the child to now play to the tune
Speaker 1: of your false self. And this is what we do,
Speaker 1: We've been doing for generations. Every generation lives false and
Speaker 1: raises false and we have a culture of false right right?
Speaker 1: How what is the kind of work that a parent
Speaker 1: can do to get to be conscious, to consider them?
Speaker 1: You know, if if, if, if I'm going to raise
Speaker 1: my son to be a conscious being, and I want
Speaker 1: to start with me, which is what it sounds like
Speaker 1: I have to do? How do I do that? Yeah?
Speaker 1: Well it's there's a simple answer and then a complex answer.
Speaker 1: The simple answer is understand that every time you react
Speaker 1: to your child, it's because of something that the child
Speaker 1: has re evoked in you. So it's not the child's
Speaker 1: bad behavior, the child's temper, tantrum, or the child triggering you.
Speaker 1: It's because you have an in avoid within that gets
Speaker 1: awakened and triggered by your child. So it's all you.
Speaker 1: So that's the simple answer, Okay, to to know it's
Speaker 1: all you, at least start turning the spotlight within. And
Speaker 1: then the complex answer is you have to undertake a process.
Speaker 1: You have to go through a journey. Right, It's like
Speaker 1: going to the gym. Do you go one time or
Speaker 1: do you commit to a lifestyle? So it's a lifestyle
Speaker 1: of awakening, a lifestyle of self help and deconstruction and
Speaker 1: healing your childhood wounds. It's it's a lot of work.
Speaker 1: When we talk about making a lifestyle change, like it's
Speaker 1: the gym, Like that would include what feels right for you, meditation, therapy, yoga.
Speaker 1: I don't know or these the types of things that
Speaker 1: we're using. I don't know how much you a god necessarily,
Speaker 1: but yoga is a great exercise, yes, and it does
Speaker 1: bring you into the ground at present moment. But I
Speaker 1: think what you What everybody realizes when they have a
Speaker 1: child is that the child lives in the present moment
Speaker 1: like no other, and we don't. So there's a huge discrepancy,
Speaker 1: there's a huge mismatch, misalignment. So we're always out of
Speaker 1: sync with our children. If you know, you know, especially infants,
Speaker 1: they're so in the moment, and they don't care that
Speaker 1: you have a party, They don't care that they just
Speaker 1: vomited on your beautiful dress. They teach you to strip
Speaker 1: yourself of all those ego attachments I was talking about.
Speaker 1: They teach you be in the moment. Mom Who are
Speaker 1: you without that? So let go of your party, let
Speaker 1: go of your phone, let go and the outfit, all
Speaker 1: your machinations in your mind, and focus on me now here.
Speaker 1: And because they're so impetuous, they really make you keep
Speaker 1: up with them, meaning moment after moment. So all the
Speaker 1: spiritual wisdom that you learned through meditation gets applied in parenting.
Speaker 1: So when I mean what I mean by a lifestyle changes,
Speaker 1: you begin to see that you're not in tune with
Speaker 1: your child. If you're an aware of person, and you
Speaker 1: begin to see that you're frustrated with your children, not
Speaker 1: because of them. But because of your inability to slow down,
Speaker 1: drop your agenda, be in the moment, and have the flow,
Speaker 1: you might be having like a totally disproportionate reaction to
Speaker 1: something small because because you just read an email that
Speaker 1: stressed you the hell out something at work. Then they
Speaker 1: throw something on the floor and all of a sudden,
Speaker 1: you're so piste exactly and it has you know you
Speaker 1: are not there with your kid with exactly what they
Speaker 1: just did. Correct When many parents are oblivious to the
Speaker 1: fact that they're not present, they just presume it's the
Speaker 1: kid and they fix the kid, and they blame the kid,
Speaker 1: and they shamed the kid. So my work is all
Speaker 1: about toppling that paradigm and making the parent have the
Speaker 1: onus to turn the spotlight within. No, what is it
Speaker 1: about you? How did you react? Why did you react?
Speaker 1: It's nothing to do with your child. It's all about
Speaker 1: raising yourself. Oh my god, it's all about raising yourself, guys.
Speaker 1: But it's complex, yes, but it's for for me. It
Speaker 1: really when I read The Conscious Parent, it really took
Speaker 1: in some ways the pressure off, because I all of
Speaker 1: a sudden felt less responsibility, like I have to teach
Speaker 1: him everything. I know because good Lord, I don't know
Speaker 1: a lot of stuff, like when he asks me difficult
Speaker 1: questions in the future like what is God? Or why
Speaker 1: is this person mean to this person? Or something like
Speaker 1: there's going to be a lot of times where I
Speaker 1: I don't know the answer. I really don't. And there's
Speaker 1: a huge topic in your book about you know, my
Speaker 1: son is here to teach me. You know, my son
Speaker 1: is here to bring me to another level of consciousness.
Speaker 1: My son has been born because he's my greatest teacher
Speaker 1: um And so it for me that might truss some
Speaker 1: people out. For me, I felt incredibly a weightlifted, like
Speaker 1: I didn't have this responsibility to teach him the ABC
Speaker 1: is and how to divide and also I mean, please
Speaker 1: let them learn that stuff. But like whatever I mean,
Speaker 1: I was a terrible math student myself. But because you're
Speaker 1: an easy going parent and you were okay with giving
Speaker 1: up that control, many people aren't. They want the pedestal
Speaker 1: of being superior and being the ones who know, and
Speaker 1: they want to fix the kid. It's very hard for
Speaker 1: them to turn all that onto them and kind of
Speaker 1: fix themselves. So but I hear you. It's it's a
Speaker 1: relieving message for me too, And many people who get
Speaker 1: it say the same thing. A weight is lifted off
Speaker 1: my shoulders. This is the only way to parent, because
Speaker 1: it is actually the truth is everything in life is
Speaker 1: only about us. Nothing is happening to us against us.
Speaker 1: Nobody is here to ruin our lives. It's all about
Speaker 1: our ability or inability to handle our in her terrain.
Speaker 1: And our children show us that more than anything. I mean,
Speaker 1: we become one year olds, if they're one year olds,
Speaker 1: we become three year olds and they've become five. Know
Speaker 1: we're having temper tantrums because we were never raised in
Speaker 1: our wholeness. So the moment we lose, we feel like
Speaker 1: we're losing control with our children, like they're pressuring us
Speaker 1: too much, or there they're too shy or too withdrawn,
Speaker 1: or making us look bad in front of our friends.
Speaker 1: That's a huge See, that's where I think I'm going
Speaker 1: to fail. Is like, see, I can say all this
Speaker 1: and it's wonderful to have a one year old, I'll
Speaker 1: be is about to be one. I can put my
Speaker 1: phone down. There's nothing is wonderful to me. Is like
Speaker 1: if I get one hour that I'm not working and
Speaker 1: I know that it's going to be a very present
Speaker 1: exchange of an hour, like I'm not going to look
Speaker 1: at my You know I have this, but but I'm
Speaker 1: speaking from a place where it's not that hard yet.
Speaker 1: I know that when he gets older and he is
Speaker 1: throwing temper tantrum in public, or he's not behaving how
Speaker 1: he should be behaving at whatever thing we're at, that's
Speaker 1: really where conscious parenting is going to be challenged and
Speaker 1: hopefully utilized and and made stronger because it is an opportunity.
Speaker 1: But the problem is, what about everyone else raising my son?
Speaker 1: How do you work with families where it's very difficult
Speaker 1: to get maybe one person on board, but the spouse
Speaker 1: isn't on board, or the nanny. I mean, how do
Speaker 1: you fashion like this? Right? So just understand that just
Speaker 1: because it's your conscious doesn't mean you're not taking action.
Speaker 1: So if your kid is throwing a tantrum, you will
Speaker 1: still address it, but in a very different way. First,
Speaker 1: you won't be reactive. You won't take it personally. Of course,
Speaker 1: in your in your head, your your little mind may
Speaker 1: get you know, all upset and your ego. Of course
Speaker 1: you care in your mind, but you know better as
Speaker 1: a conscious to return to the breath, to not take
Speaker 1: it personally, and to help your kids through their big feelings,
Speaker 1: because children just have big feelings that they don't know
Speaker 1: how to deal with, and they need control. They're feeling
Speaker 1: out of control, that's all it is. But we get
Speaker 1: so threatened by their need for control, then we upper
Speaker 1: control and now we have a power struggle. So that's
Speaker 1: one thing, and then dealing with unconscious people around you
Speaker 1: is extremely hard. So I have always been misunderstood. People
Speaker 1: have always told me that I am a bad parent
Speaker 1: because I'm not doing things how they think I need
Speaker 1: to do it. Oh, always, because they believe in control
Speaker 1: and domination and time outs and I don't believe in
Speaker 1: any of that. So I look like a loser parent
Speaker 1: in front of them, and my kid is out of control?
Speaker 1: Is that real? Like response you would get, like if
Speaker 1: your daughter was acting out or something wetting her in
Speaker 1: a time out? Completely and so completely I've been judged,
Speaker 1: maybe just still a few days ago when I don't react.
Speaker 1: My daughter was at a party. The police were called.
Speaker 1: His fifteen and a half now, But she handled it.
Speaker 1: But she handled it so well. However, all her friends
Speaker 1: were vomiting and and my husband got upset like usually
Speaker 1: sender you you you you, and all I could see
Speaker 1: was her strength, Like this was amazing. I was doing
Speaker 1: understand what he was talking about. So it's diametrically opposite
Speaker 1: from mainstream and it is lonely. But once you get it,
Speaker 1: you can't go back, Like I can't go back to
Speaker 1: mainstream ever again. So it doesn't matter to me if
Speaker 1: I get disapproved or people's scoff or people laughs. Do
Speaker 1: you think it's affected your daughter as far as like
Speaker 1: is she good at knowing bound? I mean, I'm selfishly
Speaker 1: asking for myself because like I'm like, okay, if I'm
Speaker 1: choosing to raise Audie in a conscious parents style, what
Speaker 1: type of adult is that going to make? But who
Speaker 1: have you seen? Like how does it work? But yeah,
Speaker 1: but you can't again focus on the other because they
Speaker 1: will they will be raised according to the tune of
Speaker 1: their authentic destiny. You are here to usher them to
Speaker 1: that destiny with love, with support, with presence, but you're
Speaker 1: not invested in how they turn out to be. So
Speaker 1: I'm really not invested. So for example, it was my say,
Speaker 1: was my daughter, I don't care if care not, I
Speaker 1: don't care. It's if I care it's my ego that cares,
Speaker 1: because my ego would feel good to know she's secure.
Speaker 1: But who's to say if her path is If her
Speaker 1: path is secuitous and she first wants to be homeless
Speaker 1: in a third world country and then, you know, and
Speaker 1: then ends up in jail, I don't know. I'm just
Speaker 1: being extreme right now. Who's to say that path doesn't
Speaker 1: ultimately make her more mother trees and then mother trees.
Speaker 1: I don't know, We don't know, you know. So these
Speaker 1: are all projection projections, So we do. We don't, of
Speaker 1: course take our kids to drugs, and we don't offer
Speaker 1: them alcohol. We definitely teach them the ill effects of
Speaker 1: everything and the blessings of living. It's not about being
Speaker 1: less a fair It's about having wisdom and the detachment
Speaker 1: of your ego in their life. Their life is their life.
Speaker 1: So say my daughter had called and she had been vomiting,
Speaker 1: then I would look at it as an opportunity to
Speaker 1: re educate, to rehall, to reconnect. Everything is an opportunity
Speaker 1: to come back to center. So fear is not the
Speaker 1: response you see, and fear is the typical response of
Speaker 1: the typical parent. I refuse to go into fear now,
Speaker 1: do I get scared sometimes? Of course. Do I caution
Speaker 1: her all the time, of course, But I won't be
Speaker 1: trapped in fear, and her future will certainly not be
Speaker 1: my obsession. My future will be my obsession because I
Speaker 1: need to fix myself. If I embody consciousness, that's the
Speaker 1: best thing I can do for everyone around me. Now,
Speaker 1: she chooses to wake up to it, she chooses to
Speaker 1: embrace it, or she chooses to experiment in some other way.
Speaker 1: I'm here for her on her life path. So this
Speaker 1: is the philosophy, you know, the way here spirits ushering spirits.
Speaker 1: They just happen to be smaller and less mighty. But
Speaker 1: my daughter is more strong than me. Yes, she can
Speaker 1: like you're not here to write, and you're here to
Speaker 1: usher alongside them and to lovingly and spiritual guide them.
Speaker 1: But you're not here to to control their life. And
Speaker 1: I don't want her to live a controlled, prescribed life.
Speaker 1: I wanted to if mistake filled, unordinary, non traditional, fully experimented,
Speaker 1: fully alive, fully well lived life, I don't want to.
Speaker 1: I've not given her prescription. I didn't tell her who
Speaker 1: to pray to. I didn't give her agard to believe
Speaker 1: in I really didn't give her any of that, but
Speaker 1: she knows right from wrong because right from wrong doesn't
Speaker 1: come from external sources. It comes from a spirit connected
Speaker 1: to their own heart. So if your kid is connected
Speaker 1: to their own heart, they won't harm anyone else, So
Speaker 1: it doesn't We've been fooled to think that all these
Speaker 1: external prescriptions create a good self, you know, And what
Speaker 1: is a good self? You know? So I've turned everything
Speaker 1: on its head and I challenge all prescriptions because I've
Speaker 1: seen their futility and I see how people just hold
Speaker 1: on to them like a raft in in turbulent waters,
Speaker 1: only because we're afraid. We're all afraid, afraid really of
Speaker 1: the inevitability of our death. Really, at the end of
Speaker 1: the death, we that do you feel? So you behaving
Speaker 1: and existing in this fashion alone is enough to influence
Speaker 1: the other caretakers around you. I mean, I'm personally asking
Speaker 1: me because I have a nanny a husband, so like, yeah, no,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. It's no unfortunately thought shit,
Speaker 1: I think this was a huge and continuing to be
Speaker 1: a very humbling, humbling experience, Like I think because I'm
Speaker 1: also being traveling alongside my husband, who I have chosen
Speaker 1: to make a child with. But remember whoever you choose, nanny, husband, mother, father,
Speaker 1: if there is contrast, meaning you're a clashing means there's
Speaker 1: something for you to learn, and you're learning through contrast.
Speaker 1: And most of us in our first four years, because
Speaker 1: we were raised devoid of worth, we typically will choose
Speaker 1: people of contrast where there's conflict, whether it's back and forth,
Speaker 1: where there's argument and let's let's talk about it. We
Speaker 1: don't because we haven't yet learned to flow with our
Speaker 1: own authentic selves. We're really living false sells. So we're
Speaker 1: going to attract lots of people who also are living
Speaker 1: in false seals. So we're all going to clash as
Speaker 1: we evolve. And I've seen this happen in my own life.
Speaker 1: Those people kind of dissipate and then you begin attracting
Speaker 1: more synergistic people, more aligning people who you flow with.
Speaker 1: But this is the problems number. It's I think it's
Speaker 1: after forty, like late forties. Alright, guys, this is really
Speaker 1: because you have to evolve. Evolution takes time, so there
Speaker 1: has to be a passage of time. You know, I
Speaker 1: started meditating at twenty one. It didn't matter. I still
Speaker 1: fell into cultural prescriptions and still had to evolve. So
Speaker 1: to answer your question, it's not about influencing everyone. This
Speaker 1: was my biggest and continues to be my most humbling
Speaker 1: experience because I have so many people who learned from me,
Speaker 1: but the ones who I want to learn from me
Speaker 1: may not. So I can't pick and choose who's ready
Speaker 1: for consciousness. I can just only shine with my own light,
Speaker 1: and it's annoying as hell, but this is what you
Speaker 1: have to Just keep coming back to shine with your
Speaker 1: own light. Don't interfere in another's path. Everyone's path is
Speaker 1: their own path. They have a right to their own consciousness.
Speaker 1: You just stay in your lane, you know. So I
Speaker 1: just keep telling myself that because otherwise you keep wanting
Speaker 1: everyone else to change. And no one owes you transformation,
Speaker 1: no one owes you, no one owes you anything. So
Speaker 1: just because I'm talking consciousness doesn't mean people owe me
Speaker 1: to be conscious too bad? Yeah, what about in the
Speaker 1: same way, like teachers in school, I mean the teachers
Speaker 1: look at you like what the hell? Like has that
Speaker 1: ever happened? When you're a kid? Like I know you
Speaker 1: mentioned this event because she's fifteen and a half. That happened.
Speaker 1: But like, have did you notice when she was growing
Speaker 1: up and in school, like well, well a lot of
Speaker 1: other parents or teachers who all stressed out about grades
Speaker 1: or yes, let's talk about this. This is a huge
Speaker 1: cultural scripture grades. I mean, I just looked at eight
Speaker 1: or nine preschools in Los Angeles and it's like it's
Speaker 1: just very already lining up with chores and jobs and
Speaker 1: like all this stuff and and and it's interesting because
Speaker 1: I'm a little bit more I'm gonna go with the flow,
Speaker 1: I think, although no, I super have anxiety. I don't know,
Speaker 1: but I but I I don't know, is what A
Speaker 1: lot of my answer like, I'm figuring it out, Like
Speaker 1: I'm just trying to figure out what feels right to
Speaker 1: how to raise a kid. But you're very soon realized
Speaker 1: that apparently every parent knows. This is how I was two.
Speaker 1: At the age of eight, I took my daughter for
Speaker 1: her first ballet class and they said they're going to
Speaker 1: put her with the four year old. And I said,
Speaker 1: what do you mean? Apparently all the parents knew to
Speaker 1: start kids at far. She didn't, like, are you and
Speaker 1: I didn't know? So apparently this we'll figure it out
Speaker 1: and this time is not the way, but but it's
Speaker 1: it's the right thing, let me tell you because but
Speaker 1: it was fascinating to me when I came out of
Speaker 1: you know, my little wooden boxes at home and home
Speaker 1: grown everything, and came out into the real world to see, Oh,
Speaker 1: let me try and enroll her in a few classes.
Speaker 1: She was way behind the curve by eight, like I
Speaker 1: had already disadvantaged my kid, and I wanted to know
Speaker 1: how did all the other parents know, because having a meltdown,
Speaker 1: I was terrified. I was like, what if I got
Speaker 1: crippled my child already? But she's so way behind now,
Speaker 1: like she can only do solo activities because all the
Speaker 1: group activities she's behind. So she did horse fighting and tennis.
Speaker 1: I mean, what did one racket and one horse? One animal?
Speaker 1: Because all the group activities she was behind. She was
Speaker 1: a four year old. Yeah, I hope she doesn't hear this.
Speaker 1: I've just told her she loves horses and loves tennis,
Speaker 1: and I've put that into her. But really, she didn't
Speaker 1: get into anything else because she was so behind. Please,
Speaker 1: but everybody is doing things at three and four. If
Speaker 1: you're saying everything is so overscheduled, it's it's really it.
Speaker 1: But but here's where I empower parents out of out
Speaker 1: of my own legacy of shame that you know, you
Speaker 1: don't buy into this, This is an insane culture. Don't
Speaker 1: buy into it. Don't buy into it. And the moment
Speaker 1: you don't, and you free yourself and extricated, and of
Speaker 1: course work on all the insecurities that come up because
Speaker 1: you're the odd one out. You realize that, oh, I
Speaker 1: don't have to subscribe to all this anxiety and all
Speaker 1: this achievement pressure. I want to live my life differently.
Speaker 1: So yes, I live my life differently. My daughter may
Speaker 1: never go to college, she may never you know, learn
Speaker 1: anything dollars exactly, but she'll be but she won't be
Speaker 1: anxious as much, she won't be pressured as much. But
Speaker 1: most importantly, she will learn to tune into her own
Speaker 1: rhythm and find experiences that match to who she is
Speaker 1: versus filling up a college application and what looks good
Speaker 1: on that. Talk to me about this awesome, that, this
Speaker 1: natural consequence, this thing, because I like to see how
Speaker 1: conscious parenting again, I think it's I think it's really
Speaker 1: wonderful to subscribe to when things are in flow and
Speaker 1: you're having a good day, but when ship hits the
Speaker 1: fan and you're really dealing with a kid that that
Speaker 1: is a let's say a biter, Adam and I always joke,
Speaker 1: what if what if our kid in kindergarten is the
Speaker 1: biter right, and the teachers like, holy crab albags is
Speaker 1: biting everybody? Like, what do you do in that situation? Like?
Speaker 1: How do you not? I feel like conflict is the
Speaker 1: biggest opportunity to practice conscious parenting, right because that's when
Speaker 1: things accelerate very quickly. It's when your ship does come up. Um,
Speaker 1: so how what would you do? Like what is a
Speaker 1: natural consequence? How do you if you don't believe in
Speaker 1: time outs? Are grounding? Or Okay? So let's just let's
Speaker 1: just think and create the two paths that people could take.
Speaker 1: So the kid is biting, the traditional path and the
Speaker 1: non traditional, which I'll call the conscious path. Let's go
Speaker 1: with the traditional path. What would the traditional path? Say?
Speaker 1: My kid is biting? Therefore he is what would you
Speaker 1: call that kid? So say Sean some kids seen by
Speaker 1: So Sean is what's the first thing at all the
Speaker 1: parents in the class whol thing bad? He's a bad boy, right,
Speaker 1: So first, he came up in one second. How horrible
Speaker 1: is that? I was like, oh my god, he's the
Speaker 1: bad kid. Yes, absolutely, absolutely, he's the bad kid. Correct.
Speaker 1: So when Sean starts biting, and Sean is just a
Speaker 1: poor little three year old who doesn't know how to
Speaker 1: do anything but bite, because that's how he expresses his frustration,
Speaker 1: he remembers that he's a primate. You see, all the
Speaker 1: other girls have forgotten. He's like, no, I know who
Speaker 1: I am. I snell, growl, and I bite. You guys
Speaker 1: are pretending to be human. I'm a primate. Okay, so
Speaker 1: but but look how we adults will quickly judgment. Of
Speaker 1: course we call that kid bad. Now, traditional culture will say,
Speaker 1: what do you do to bad people? You must to
Speaker 1: bad children, especially punished? Straight right, so straight now we punished.
Speaker 1: So what are the techniques of punishing. You have to
Speaker 1: take something away, you have to yell, threaten. Okay, So
Speaker 1: now that's that's the mainstream paradigm. Okay, it's just so predictable,
Speaker 1: it's so linear, and it ends up. Let's imagine how
Speaker 1: it ends up. So now you've put Sean in a
Speaker 1: time out. He doesn't even remember he's bitten. He's like,
Speaker 1: I don't even know what you're talking about. I have
Speaker 1: no clue what to do. Instead, nobody's teaching me, No
Speaker 1: one's helping me. You're just telling me I'm really bad.
Speaker 1: I really don't know what I've done, right, but I
Speaker 1: guess I'm bad. So now, what do you think is
Speaker 1: going to happen in sean psychology? After this? He's I
Speaker 1: think he's bad? Right. Is he getting up the next
Speaker 1: day thinking, Wow, I'm the most awesome kid. No, he's
Speaker 1: now become sedimented with the psychology that he's not, So
Speaker 1: he's not that cool right now. Imagine this continues for
Speaker 1: five six months, and imagine the parents are truly isational.
Speaker 1: They only no control, only punishment. Do you think it
Speaker 1: will stay at just the time out. No, it will
Speaker 1: become from time out to a little as whooping to
Speaker 1: a little bit isolation. Then the kid is crying. I mean,
Speaker 1: I've had clients at the age of two who were
Speaker 1: locked up in closets and basements, you know, and they remember.
Speaker 1: So Sean will grow up and remember this. So you
Speaker 1: can go ahead and spend all that money in therapy
Speaker 1: because it's coming right for sure, and you're creating disconnection. Right,
Speaker 1: So the very tenets of parenting, which is to create
Speaker 1: confidence and comfort and warmth and worth are being eroded
Speaker 1: through this linear paradigm. Okay, so that's the traditional So
Speaker 1: my work completely debounced it. Like you're not allowed to react.
Speaker 1: So the moment there's a trigger, I tell I teach
Speaker 1: all parents to pause and watch right and watch because
Speaker 1: I show them where they're going to go, watch how
Speaker 1: they're dying to label the kid, and they just have
Speaker 1: to pause till they come back to neutral. So they're like, please,
Speaker 1: can I call my kid bad now? And I'm like nope,
Speaker 1: Like you can't talk to your kids till you go
Speaker 1: back to neutral. And they're like, but what about now
Speaker 1: my kid told me to f off and told me
Speaker 1: I was an evil witch. Can I now go my
Speaker 1: kid back? Nope? Nope. So we're not allowed to go
Speaker 1: down the path of judgment because judgment leads to hierarchy,
Speaker 1: leads to superiority, leads to a righteousness, leads to punishment
Speaker 1: and violence. So you're not allowed to go down. So
Speaker 1: parents like, what do I do? So then you came first,
Speaker 1: you pause, and then you come to the other side. Now,
Speaker 1: if you're willing and you haven't gone down that train
Speaker 1: wreck path. You now say, what is my kid needing?
Speaker 1: It's a need? What is the need beneath the behavior?
Speaker 1: Who is my kid developmentally? Who is my kids spiritually? Consciously?
Speaker 1: Who is my kid emotionally? You begin to seek to
Speaker 1: understand the human just like you would want to be
Speaker 1: understood if you have a temper tantrum at a lunch
Speaker 1: and you monopolize the entire lunch and the next day
Speaker 1: all your friends say, you know what, she's an attention seeker.
Speaker 1: We need to teach her a lesson. Where are going
Speaker 1: to speak to her for six months? Would you like
Speaker 1: to be treated like that? No, you want to be understood.
Speaker 1: You want to be heard, heard, and validated. So it
Speaker 1: is with our children, and they don't have sovereignty because
Speaker 1: we are a controlling culture that strips children of sovereignty.
Speaker 1: So when they cry, we seek to understand, We seek
Speaker 1: to give them words, we soothe them, we let them
Speaker 1: be heard, and then if we want to teach them,
Speaker 1: we can then do some role playing where we show
Speaker 1: them how biting hurts. Doesn't mean you bite them to
Speaker 1: hurt them, but you could like playfully show you know
Speaker 1: this hurts, and then you can show create empathy and
Speaker 1: do it with a dog. That's what I was just thinking.
Speaker 1: I would use the dog. I mean, not make the
Speaker 1: dog bite, and but I'd say the dog and the dog,
Speaker 1: even a dog. That's a good idea. And you and
Speaker 1: you can he can practice about the dog. Okay, a dog.
Speaker 1: But you use creativity, right, you teach through creativity. But
Speaker 1: you can only come to the place of compassion if
Speaker 1: you don't make the judgment that he is bad. You
Speaker 1: stay in oneness, You stay in compassion. Right the moment
Speaker 1: we make judgments, that's it. The train wreck starts, right,
Speaker 1: does it? This is brilliant. Does the judgment work if
Speaker 1: it's positive? Because see I already see it happening with
Speaker 1: my son a lot. My son is. I don't know.
Speaker 1: If it's because my husband and I smile a lot,
Speaker 1: I don't know, but my son smiles a lot when
Speaker 1: he sees people. He if we're in an elevator and
Speaker 1: someone's there, he makes it a point to smile at
Speaker 1: that person. And um, if I take him to a
Speaker 1: baby class, he's gone and he's I would describe him
Speaker 1: as social and very jolly in his disposition. Now I
Speaker 1: associate with that he is a really good baby. But
Speaker 1: I'm already like, oh my god, we're already labeling him
Speaker 1: as such, and I want to be sure that on moments,
Speaker 1: in times where he's sad, or maybe phases of his
Speaker 1: life where he's not social or have separation anxiety, or
Speaker 1: we no longer can pass him around to people like
Speaker 1: right now we pass mound. He loves it. It's fine,
Speaker 1: but that might not always be the case, and then
Speaker 1: we I don't want to associate that with oh no,
Speaker 1: it's bad. Right, So you're yeah, so you're very aware
Speaker 1: that you're already getting attached being jolly and him being
Speaker 1: so shilled. Yeah, so we just watch watch how you're
Speaker 1: getting attached already, rather than saying that's who he is
Speaker 1: right now, very aware that it could flip tomorrow. So
Speaker 1: don't set yourself up. You see, this is what we do.
Speaker 1: We set ourselves up because we're like, oh my kid,
Speaker 1: now you know, it's potty trained, and then in two
Speaker 1: days they're not. They've regressed so bad. Yeah, just don't
Speaker 1: get invested because that smiling behavior could also be the
Speaker 1: makings of a people pleaser, Like, don't be so excited,
Speaker 1: you know, we don't know. That's who I am, Chef,
Speaker 1: you nail that. And we've only been talking for what
Speaker 1: how long? Twenty minutes? So look how we we just
Speaker 1: put all these adjectives and it's all our need as
Speaker 1: parents to feel good about our emptiness. It's really that
Speaker 1: all this projection onto these children, they're just being who
Speaker 1: they are and they're going to flip and change tomorrow
Speaker 1: and we're like, look my kid, my blood, my DNA,
Speaker 1: Look how amazing, Look what I've created. It's because we
Speaker 1: are empty inside that we need this. That's why we
Speaker 1: cling to our children. That's why we want them to
Speaker 1: become something so that we feel good about ourselves. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's horrible, Well, it's just as human nature, I think.
Speaker 1: I don't think it's horrible. It's very predictable. It's universal
Speaker 1: and we're all doing it and it's our ego that
Speaker 1: is doing that. Um, what happens when my child asks
Speaker 1: tough questions like is there a God? What are you saying? Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's only tough for you because you haven't deconstructed it yourself, right,
Speaker 1: Oh no idea? So so you could say, well, some
Speaker 1: people say da da da da da, and others say
Speaker 1: da da da da da. But I really because I
Speaker 1: don't know if if that's what you really believe, just
Speaker 1: we'll keep exploring. I don't know. You know, you just
Speaker 1: have to say the truth, so you know, I I
Speaker 1: had deconstructed already, so I was able to give my
Speaker 1: daughter an answer. But you you say it from your truth.
Speaker 1: But I do have an issue when parents put onto
Speaker 1: their children very rigid belief systems, because I want us
Speaker 1: to expose our children to what's out there and maybe
Speaker 1: even what we believe in, but allowing for them to
Speaker 1: have self expression and self ownership. But we don't. Most
Speaker 1: religious people will put on their children their religion, and
Speaker 1: again it's another it's another another attachment that you're putting
Speaker 1: on them without the discovery of who they would want
Speaker 1: to be. Is it ever too late? Let's say someone
Speaker 1: has been an unconscious parent for years and years and
Speaker 1: years and read your book and they come into it.
Speaker 1: I mean, yeah, I was already too late by the
Speaker 1: time I became conscious, because I also took time. I
Speaker 1: mean you have to really try, you know. I had
Speaker 1: to see my ego at play to believe that I
Speaker 1: was so unconscious. I couldn't believe I was so unconscious,
Speaker 1: so I myself was three or four years late. So
Speaker 1: the answer is no, you're you know you're never too late,
Speaker 1: and you're always late. So just let just let it go,
Speaker 1: just let it whatever, whatever to come into this practice
Speaker 1: and you, within yourself and for your family is the perfect.
Speaker 1: Every moment is too late and and never too late.
Speaker 1: It's just the perfect moment. So stop worrying now, it's
Speaker 1: another way to worry right now. Oh, I messed up
Speaker 1: for the past fifteen years. No, forget the past fifteen years.
Speaker 1: You're here and now let's start aligning now. The moment
Speaker 1: is now, and when you can hit the reset button
Speaker 1: in every now, that's the best you can do. Don't
Speaker 1: look at the past. I mean we all can already cringe.
Speaker 1: I'm sure you already in your one year can cringe
Speaker 1: at the mistakes you've made and the scowling faces you've
Speaker 1: shown your kids, scared your kid. We've all made mistakes.
Speaker 1: There is no perfect parent. I was completely unconscious till
Speaker 1: my daughter was three or four, and I was a
Speaker 1: meditator for twenty years. So please, there is no pedestal here,
Speaker 1: there's no hierarchy. It just is everybody's evolution. Whenever they
Speaker 1: arrive at it is when they were supposed to arrive
Speaker 1: at it. M HM. And your children chose you, you know.
Speaker 1: I tell very unconscious parents who then wake up and
Speaker 1: they're full of they're full of guilt. I just tell
Speaker 1: them your your children chose you to. You know, they
Speaker 1: knew how left up you are, so and they still
Speaker 1: chose you, so relaxed, like, don't we have many lifetimes,
Speaker 1: you know, the many lifetimes. And he's mine, my child
Speaker 1: for a reason right now, Like we're really here to
Speaker 1: teach each other, so obviously he came to learn from you.
Speaker 1: So once you let go of this hierarchy that you
Speaker 1: need to do it perfectly and it's about you raising
Speaker 1: this child. And turn it around to we are both
Speaker 1: raising each other. We both chose each other at some
Speaker 1: energetic level to wake each other up. Then the anxiety
Speaker 1: goes away. You know, you can look at your kids
Speaker 1: when you act crazy and go, well, why did you
Speaker 1: choose me? You know you should have known better to
Speaker 1: have chosen me as your mom. You know, you can
Speaker 1: just play with it. It's just once you have the
Speaker 1: right perspective of us all being spirits or energy just
Speaker 1: incarnating in this moment, then you just have the right lens,
Speaker 1: you know. I know, we got into a little bit
Speaker 1: about like grades and getting into the college and you
Speaker 1: wanting what's best for your child is what you think
Speaker 1: is best for your child. It's not necessarily what's best
Speaker 1: fair child. I mean, your child gets to figure out
Speaker 1: that for him or her. And guess what, it's not
Speaker 1: even what you think is best, fair child, it's what
Speaker 1: you've been puppet to you and you're a parent to
Speaker 1: what culture says is best fit like college, like he's
Speaker 1: a doctor, Like he went to this school or got
Speaker 1: these grades, or is a member of this many you know,
Speaker 1: or he went to a third world country and build houses.
Speaker 1: Whatever is the faith that you want to prescribe to um?
Speaker 1: What is this idea of ordinariness? Like what is that?
Speaker 1: Because I think I don't know. I mean, you're from India,
Speaker 1: I don't I don't know what it's like there. But
Speaker 1: I think there really is this concept here and it
Speaker 1: wasn't my fly two of of this being special and
Speaker 1: you want your kid to be special, which is at
Speaker 1: the opposite of ordinary. I don't know. And I think
Speaker 1: every kid is unique and we're all unique, But I
Speaker 1: don't know whether anyone is really special or not. I
Speaker 1: mean it's like right, right, but just unique. I think
Speaker 1: that's the thing. And when we can focus on each
Speaker 1: person's uniqueness, actually then we will not fit every ear
Speaker 1: into the same mold. But we want that kids to
Speaker 1: be special, which means better than other kids. Think about
Speaker 1: how sick that is really, Oh it's horribized for sure.
Speaker 1: So we're so anti children actually when we do what
Speaker 1: the social media ship is because it's like everyone and
Speaker 1: myself included, like posting all of the first birthday parties,
Speaker 1: the first steps, like look at how special but yet
Speaker 1: like a lot of it, like it's all the same,
Speaker 1: Like it's not. But you see now, it's so beautiful
Speaker 1: that our social media exposure, uh lends a light to
Speaker 1: our dire, desperate need to be seen. I mean it's
Speaker 1: so sad. Oh my god, first birthday party, first piece
Speaker 1: of spinach, first boop, first lebon, first tooth pulled out.
Speaker 1: I mean, really do I don't. I don't need to
Speaker 1: know about your kids, but you have a need to
Speaker 1: tell me about your kid because you get something from it.
Speaker 1: You comments, and oh my god, we definitely doely. I'm
Speaker 1: admitting it right here, right now, like Albi went to
Speaker 1: his first dun disappointment this morning, And let me tell
Speaker 1: you something that is going to be posted to the
Speaker 1: iCloud sharing for the whole fucking family to see. And
Speaker 1: it's going to be so special and I'm gonna get
Speaker 1: so many texts about how cute Albie is and how
Speaker 1: lovely is teeth and what a good mommy. And I'm
Speaker 1: going to feel because you're acting as if you're going
Speaker 1: through milestones, like you are achieving something exactly. I just
Speaker 1: talked about this because his one year birthday. My husband's like,
Speaker 1: who cares? Is this one year birthday? Like he's never
Speaker 1: we don't have to do this whole thing. But I'm like,
Speaker 1: but it's about me. I've done a great job raising
Speaker 1: him for a year. So his first year birthday is
Speaker 1: my birthday, then you should. You should just be real
Speaker 1: and say I have a party for myself. Yeah, And
Speaker 1: everybody's like, where's your kid? You're like, I'm my favorite,
Speaker 1: Like I'm doing what I wanted to send your kid
Speaker 1: out for plated because it's nothing to do with amusing.
Speaker 1: He loves this music. He wants to go have a nap,
Speaker 1: and just be with his five toys and let him
Speaker 1: go and you have the party then, So that's not
Speaker 1: pre tend we're doing this so selflessly, Like that's what
Speaker 1: is the biggest farce that always such selfless parents, when
Speaker 1: it's so clear that we're egomaniacs and so thirsty. So
Speaker 1: coming back to the concept of ordinary is we're all
Speaker 1: ordinary and we should have no pressure to be anything
Speaker 1: but whoever it is we are, which is really we're
Speaker 1: just people. We're just some of us are talented in something,
Speaker 1: but everyone has something unique. Who cares? Does everyone have
Speaker 1: to be on the stage? Is everyone need to be
Speaker 1: having accolades and medals? This is our sickness because we
Speaker 1: feel so empty inside. Our children don't have that need.
Speaker 1: You know, my daughter, I say the story all the time.
Speaker 1: She once did an assignment with a tutor and I
Speaker 1: paid a hundred dollars and all this big fancy assignment
Speaker 1: with all these these poster boards, and after the tutor left,
Speaker 1: she began taking pictures and sending it to all her friends.
Speaker 1: So here here came my competitiveness, and I was like,
Speaker 1: what are you doing? She's like, oh, I'm just sharing.
Speaker 1: Look what a great job I did let them all
Speaker 1: have the benefit, and I went ballistic. I was like,
Speaker 1: did their parents pay hundred dollars? Like, why are we
Speaker 1: sharing what I paid for? No? No, no, no, no,
Speaker 1: no no. And she's like, Mom, I don't care if
Speaker 1: they do well. I was like, and in my head
Speaker 1: I knew she was saying really great pearls of wisdom,
Speaker 1: but in that moment, my ego was roaring. I was like,
Speaker 1: I don't care that you don't care. I care, like
Speaker 1: this is about you. I did this for you. And
Speaker 1: I saw my venom and my small mind and my competitiveness.
Speaker 1: But thankfully my daughter didn't care about what I said either,
Speaker 1: and so she just went ahead and sent it to everybody.
Speaker 1: And she did it anyway because she truly was divested
Speaker 1: of the desire to be the one. See, we want
Speaker 1: our children to be the one. But that's a sick mentality,
Speaker 1: because the one at the cost of others, right, because
Speaker 1: we don't care about other people's children. We just want
Speaker 1: Arcid to be the first. And we're sick in that.
Speaker 1: And she taught me a lesson and I stopped caring
Speaker 1: as much. Now as much I don't care, I've let
Speaker 1: it go because I want the higher vision of what's
Speaker 1: good for all, and the system is set up in
Speaker 1: a skewed way to be competitive. So again, once we
Speaker 1: let go of this dire need for us to all
Speaker 1: be the best, the most perfect, the most beautiful, we
Speaker 1: will realize that we're all one. All our children are important.
Speaker 1: There is no need to be the best, because we're
Speaker 1: all good at whoever it is we are. So we
Speaker 1: as parents need to propagate this because children are good
Speaker 1: at that. Children don't need to be the best, the prettiest.
Speaker 1: They've learned that from us. So we need to really
Speaker 1: re educate our children and ourselves to take away all this,
Speaker 1: to take it away and say, no, you don't need
Speaker 1: to be the best. You be the best at who
Speaker 1: you are. You fight towards your standard, not to the standard,
Speaker 1: because the standard is not an objective standard. It's an acculturated, conditioned,
Speaker 1: often toxic the god. So you figure out who you
Speaker 1: are and just play to you. You play to the
Speaker 1: tune of you. It's really there's going to be a
Speaker 1: real adventure to folly. That's how I feel, because I
Speaker 1: I think this is going to be a real It
Speaker 1: already is. It's just very challenging like to just keep
Speaker 1: yourself and your expectations and your wants and desires to
Speaker 1: be the best, which obviously I was definitely raised with
Speaker 1: and not put that on him. It's gonna be like,
Speaker 1: and what's great about your book? And it I you
Speaker 1: have to see it as an opportunity for the chance
Speaker 1: to get to practice over and over, and you have
Speaker 1: to ask, what is my mission? My ultimate mission as
Speaker 1: a parent is to allow my child's true self to unfold,
Speaker 1: whatever that looks like. If you can't decide, and of
Speaker 1: course I can hear all your audience, perhaps some of
Speaker 1: them saying, oh, well, what if his true self is
Speaker 1: an addict? What if it's true self is a criminal. Well,
Speaker 1: that's again fear talking and lack and jumping to conclusions.
Speaker 1: The true self isn't that doesn't have to be anything
Speaker 1: like that. The true self is simply their real self,
Speaker 1: not conditioned and produced by you. That's all. It doesn't
Speaker 1: mean now we're raising criminals, right. People get so afraid
Speaker 1: that unless we micromanage our children, they're going to be criminals.
Speaker 1: My child grew up without a religion, My child grew
Speaker 1: up without competition, without achievement pressures, and she's a good kid.
Speaker 1: She's a just an ordinary good kid, and I don't
Speaker 1: expect her to be anything other than that. If she
Speaker 1: chooses some other path, it's her choice. It has nothing
Speaker 1: to do with me. If I want success, I need
Speaker 1: to go get it for myself. If I want fitness,
Speaker 1: I need to go get it for myself. If I
Speaker 1: want good eating, I eat good for myself and I
Speaker 1: model it. And if she chooses, she chooses. You know,
Speaker 1: and of course, when they're younger, you have more quote
Speaker 1: unquote control, Yeah, because I'm but soon you'll have to,
Speaker 1: you know, give and take. There will be a lot
Speaker 1: of compromise. This was so amazing. I can't tell you
Speaker 1: how mind rocked I am and how excited I am
Speaker 1: to have my husband listen to this podcast. And like
Speaker 1: everybody I know, are there any closing words or statements
Speaker 1: or advice or anything you want to add? If not,
Speaker 1: we are chock full of a million gems. But if
Speaker 1: there's anything else, but I just I would just end
Speaker 1: by saying that every parent needs to decide if they
Speaker 1: want to do it the traditional way or be daring
Speaker 1: to try a new way, so that we can raise
Speaker 1: a new generation of kindred spirits. Who are truly illuminated
Speaker 1: for their own sense of divinity, worth and well being.
Speaker 1: I want to do that. Thank you so much, Dr
Speaker 1: Shefali Safari, Thank you Summer Summin Party. I do