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Speaker 1: Getting it all done in the afternoon can be so tricky. Today,

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Speaker 1: we offer a provocative slice of advice, built out of

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Speaker 1: twenty five years of raising six kids, on how to

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Speaker 1: manage the after school afternoon evening routine when there's so

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Speaker 1: much to do in so little time. This is the

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Speaker 1: Happy Families podcast, Real parenting Solutions every day on Australia's

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Speaker 1: most download parenting podcast. We are Justin and Kylie Coulson.

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Speaker 1: I'm the co host and parenting expert on Channel Line's

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Speaker 1: Parental Guidance, and we are the parents of six kids,

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Speaker 1: six daughters.

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Speaker 2: Afternoons and evenings are so intense.

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Speaker 1: I feel like workdays generally like mornings, afternoons, time with

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Speaker 1: the kids. It's all intense.

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Speaker 2: So our one slice of advice is actually based on

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Speaker 2: a book that you read a few years ago.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, and I love this book. This would probably be

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Speaker 1: in my top ten book. I think it's called Rethink.

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Speaker 1: Rethinking is the name of the book by Adam Grant.

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Speaker 1: He's a professor at the Wharton School. Fabulous book, brilliant advice.

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Speaker 1: This concept that we should take stock every now and

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Speaker 1: again and rethink, rethink everything. Doesn't mean you're going to

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Speaker 1: change what you're doing. But by rethinking, you get to

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Speaker 1: analyze where you're at and why you're there.

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Speaker 2: Over the years, we've done lots of rethinking.

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Speaker 1: We've rethunked our whole lives on reckon a lot of times,

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Speaker 1: and I.

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Speaker 2: Would often be stopped by people who'd say, Oh, I

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Speaker 2: hear you're doing so and so, and I'd look at them, going,

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Speaker 2: what are you talking about and realize that, yes, we

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Speaker 2: had rethink things, and we had tried that one and

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Speaker 2: it didn't work, so we didn't stay in their routine

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Speaker 2: for very long.

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Speaker 1: Life is a series of experiments in our family, isn't it.

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Speaker 2: Yes, it really is. We've spent our whole lives rethinking

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Speaker 2: and it doesn't stop. It literally doesn't stop. This year,

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Speaker 2: as we've come back, I've personally shared that I've done

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Speaker 2: a lot of rethinking about what this year will look

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Speaker 2: like for me personally and out children of the same.

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Speaker 2: I recently had an experience with Emily. She has a

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Speaker 2: social group that she goes to on a Wednesday lunchtime

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Speaker 2: with a handful of other girls who homeschool, and she

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Speaker 2: absolutely loves it.

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Speaker 1: But until then, just cutting off your sec that social

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Speaker 1: group's supposed to go for two hours and you're lucky

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Speaker 1: to get out of there in three three and a

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Speaker 1: half right of me, and she just cannot get enough.

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Speaker 2: She absolutely loves it. Before we found this group, however,

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Speaker 2: she was going bouldering in the afternoon from four o'clock

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Speaker 2: for just under an hour.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, that's like her Wednesday afternoon pa class pea class. Yeah. Absolutely, yep,

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Speaker 1: and she loves it.

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Speaker 2: But after a couple of weeks of doing the two

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Speaker 2: back to back, she just looked at me and she said, Mom,

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Speaker 2: I don't think I can do it all. And I

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Speaker 2: think that her recognition is something that we all experience

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Speaker 2: from time to time, especially parents. We can't do it all,

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Speaker 2: and the idea that we might rethink the things that

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Speaker 2: need to go into our daily routine would be really helpful.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, make no mistakes, some kids go getters and adrenaline junkies,

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Speaker 1: and some kids love it. I remember I was doing

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Speaker 1: a big PR campaign for a major company some years

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Speaker 1: ago and they had hired a young boy, I think

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Speaker 1: he was maybe ten years of age or thereabouts to

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Speaker 1: be another spokesperson for the brand during this whole PR

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Speaker 1: campaign thing that was happening, and this kid, I was

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Speaker 1: talking to his mum, and he, I think, if I

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Speaker 1: remember correctly, was doing eleven extracurricular activities. Eleven extracurricular activities

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Speaker 1: filled his week. Some of them he did more than

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Speaker 1: once per week. So when you've got an agenda that

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Speaker 1: is that packed, a calendar of it is that full.

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Speaker 1: I just looked at the moment and said, number one,

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Speaker 1: how do you afford it all? That's not my business.

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Speaker 1: I mean, you go for it if you've got the

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Speaker 1: time and the resources, that's up to you. But number two,

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Speaker 1: how's he go with it? And her response was, he

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Speaker 1: loves it, he eats it up. He just he's a

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Speaker 1: go get a kid with so much energy. He's bouncing

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Speaker 1: off the walls. And he has chosen every one of those.

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Speaker 1: Can you imagine paying for eleven different activities? But I

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Speaker 1: think that's pretty unusual. I don't think that's the normal

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Speaker 1: at all. I don't know too many families that can

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Speaker 1: afford it. But my point really is that emily situation

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Speaker 1: is probably more likely to be real. That is, I

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Speaker 1: can handle so much and then I'm kind of cat this.

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Speaker 1: I'm good port I need to take a break. So

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Speaker 1: I want us to rethink why we're so often so

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Speaker 1: willing to impose adult schedules on children's natural rhythms. The

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Speaker 1: real issue wasn't managing after school routines. It's our society's

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Speaker 1: fixation on productivity and control. There's a story that I

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Speaker 1: tell often about how when you were pregnant with our

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Speaker 1: second child, I was trying to be helpful, so I

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Speaker 1: decided to do all the washing. I put all the

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Speaker 1: darks in one pile. I put all the whites in

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Speaker 1: another pile. I put all the pinks because we had

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Speaker 1: a daughter and everything was pink, in another pile. And

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Speaker 1: then I grabbed all of the darks because that was

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Speaker 1: the biggest pile, and I stuck them in the washing machine.

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Speaker 1: And I had to really stick them in there. I

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Speaker 1: mean it was choc a block full, and I was

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Speaker 1: still trying to cram darks in. When I took that

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Speaker 1: washing out of the machine, it was dirtier than it

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Speaker 1: had been when it went in there. And once you

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Speaker 1: saw me browsing the Harvey Norman catalog to find a

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Speaker 1: new washing machine, you had to look at the size

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Speaker 1: of the pile of washing and identified that I tried

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Speaker 1: to cram too much in. And when you try to

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Speaker 1: cram too much in, you get lousy results after the break.

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Speaker 1: How to get this balance right? How to rethink the

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Speaker 1: stress and the structure of your afternoons and evenings, whether

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Speaker 1: you're a stay at home mum or dad or a

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Speaker 1: double income family with zero margin, so that you can

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Speaker 1: get those afternoon and evening routines. On Song Today, I'm

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Speaker 1: the Happy Thing his podcast. Our slice of advice is rethink.

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Speaker 1: Rethink the stress, rethink the structure. Make afternoons work for

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Speaker 1: you rather than you working for the afternoon and evening yourself. Kylie,

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Speaker 1: we have one optimal, one premium, one exquisite way to

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Speaker 1: get rethinking working right.

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Speaker 2: We talk about this a lot, but this is hands

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Speaker 2: down the number one tip we have for you.

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Speaker 1: Yep, and repetition is the mother of all learning. So

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Speaker 1: if you've heard it before, here it is again because

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Speaker 1: this is the stuff that works.

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Speaker 2: Family meetings are the key to getting our routines and

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Speaker 2: rhythms right. The magic of family meetings is that everyone

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Speaker 2: has a voice. In the story you shed earlier about

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Speaker 2: the young boy who had eleven extracurricular activities that he

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Speaker 2: was just busting to be involved in. Sitting down as

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Speaker 2: a family. The conversation might go something like this. I

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Speaker 2: know that you are loving the activities that you've handpicked

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Speaker 2: to do, and we love being able to give you

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Speaker 2: these opportunities. But right now, your mum and dad are

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Speaker 2: actually really really struggling financially, might be the case. Or

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Speaker 2: we're really struggling with time management right now.

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Speaker 1: Yah, the well is empty.

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Speaker 2: Have the capacity to do it right now? Or there

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Speaker 2: are some other things that you may not be aware

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Speaker 2: of that are really impacting our capacity to be as

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Speaker 2: supportive as we would normally be. What do you think

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Speaker 2: we should do about it?

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Speaker 1: Yeah? Yeah, Like mum, Mum had to go and get

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Speaker 1: a second job because everything's really expensive these days.

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Speaker 2: Well, mum's about to go and have an operation, or

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Speaker 2: dad's going to lose hours, or if any number of

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Speaker 2: things change the equilibrium in your daily life regularly.

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Speaker 1: Now, you're not using the kids as psychotherapists. This is

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Speaker 1: not a counseling session in that you're trying to work

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Speaker 1: through some kind of therapy. Your children are not your therapists.

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Speaker 1: It's literally saying, hey, cards on the table, here's what

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Speaker 1: we're up against. It's a bit of a challenge right now.

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Speaker 1: Where do you stand, what do you reckon is the

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Speaker 1: best way forward. It's amazing how creative the kids can

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Speaker 1: get and how understanding they can be when they see

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Speaker 1: what came we're playing.

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Speaker 2: Turn it on its head, though. We might be noticing

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Speaker 2: that the child who loves to do it all is

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Speaker 2: actually really struggling, but they can't see it. They're busting

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Speaker 2: their guts because all of their friends are doing all

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Speaker 2: of these activities and they don't want to miss out.

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Speaker 1: Or because they just want to please us, because we

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Speaker 1: keep on saying that these are the things that they

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Speaker 1: need so that they can have it enriching and enlarged life.

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Speaker 2: But you're noticing that they're struggling to get out of

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Speaker 2: bed in the morning, or that they're really grumpy when

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Speaker 2: they come home at the end of the day, or

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Speaker 2: whatever it is. And so we can sit down and say, hey,

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Speaker 2: I'm noticing these things. Are you noticing it? What do

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Speaker 2: you think is going on? Do you think that maybe

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Speaker 2: we might look at the routine and structure and just

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Speaker 2: see if there's something we could pull out to just

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Speaker 2: give you a little bit more of a breather. Our

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Speaker 2: kids are growing up in a world where they think

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Speaker 2: number one that they can do it all, and number

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Speaker 2: two often that they have to do it all.

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Speaker 1: And add to that, as parents like the in the

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Speaker 1: seventies and eighties, most parents weren't thinking, should we stretch

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Speaker 1: ourselves super thin so that we can give our children

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Speaker 1: every enrichment opportunity possible. That just wasn't the default back then.

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Speaker 2: I didn't even do any enrichment activities when I was growing.

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Speaker 1: Up, right Whereas twenty twenty five parents feel like it

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Speaker 1: is their sacred responsibility to make sure that the children

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Speaker 1: are participating in these activities.

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Speaker 2: Well, the kids are going to be on the back

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Speaker 2: foot if they're not involved in team sports and they're

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Speaker 2: not building skill sets and mastering their talents.

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Speaker 1: Make no mistake, these things are good things to do.

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Speaker 1: We would encourage you to do them if you've got

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Speaker 1: the time and the resources to do it.

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Speaker 2: But if you're feeling stressed, oh my goodness, if you're

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Speaker 2: feeling like you just can't keep going, then rethinking your

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Speaker 2: structures and your priorities is really going to make the

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Speaker 2: biggest difference.

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Speaker 1: All right, truth bomb, If you're that's stressed, and if

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Speaker 1: there's that much going on, why, like, what decisions are

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Speaker 1: you making.

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Speaker 2: So recently, you and I have been reading a book

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Speaker 2: called Essentialism.

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Speaker 1: Greg McKee in one of my top five books of

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Speaker 1: all time.

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Speaker 2: And I am absolutely loving it. And do you know

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Speaker 2: what the thing, the one thing that jumps out at

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Speaker 2: me every time we open it.

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Speaker 1: Up, the words on the page, You're so funny. I'm

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Speaker 1: so good this.

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Speaker 2: He is reminding me of the immense power we have

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Speaker 2: to choose. If our lives are so jam packed, who's

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Speaker 2: in charge of the agenda? Because if it's not you,

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Speaker 2: then we're in trouble. Firstly, but secondly, knowing that it's you,

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Speaker 2: you are the only one who can decide whether or

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Speaker 2: not you're going to keep the agenda the way it is.

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Speaker 2: And I know that that might sound really harsh, but

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Speaker 2: how good does it feel when you remember that you

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Speaker 2: actually get to choose if you want to keep living

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Speaker 2: life the way you are, that's your choice, and you

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Speaker 2: can do it, and you can recognize and know that

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Speaker 2: this is just a short season in life and you're

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Speaker 2: going to be exhausted for the next few years. And

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Speaker 2: if you're willing to do that, then that's great. But

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Speaker 2: if you are struggling from day to day to get

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Speaker 2: yourselves out of bed and keep moving forward and then

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Speaker 2: falling into bed at the other end, and you don't

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Speaker 2: want to keep doing that. Then you get to choose

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Speaker 2: what it looks like.

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Speaker 1: Does the schedule serve you or do you serve the schedule.

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Speaker 1: That's really what this is about. Rethink your afternoons, rethink

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Speaker 1: the default.

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Speaker 2: And use family meetings.

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Speaker 1: And instead of I mean the family meeting, does this right?

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Speaker 1: Instead of imposing the routine, collaborate with your kids to

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Speaker 1: design experiments and try different approaches, maybe for a week

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Speaker 1: or two each. Maybe it's homework first. One week. I

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Speaker 1: have some things to say about homework. We don't really

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Speaker 1: have time today.

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Speaker 2: A handful of years ago, I was done running, and

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Speaker 2: I literally said to you, we are cutting out all

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Speaker 2: extra curriculars. I'm done. We're not doing any of these.

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Speaker 1: You meant like running, as in running park run, running

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Speaker 1: five k's.

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Speaker 2: It felt like I was every day day, every day,

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Speaker 2: and we did. We took it out, and after a

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Speaker 2: term you looked at me and you said, we really

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Speaker 2: need to give the kids some more opportunities. And so

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Speaker 2: I said, all right, well they can only do two

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Speaker 2: things each. That's it. That's all I've got in me.

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Speaker 2: And over time, you being that let's just do it

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Speaker 2: all and say yes to everything, we slowly added more

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Speaker 2: and more to the calendar and we got back to

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Speaker 2: the same point where I said, let's get rid of

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Speaker 2: it all. But here's the reality, Like you said, this

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Speaker 2: is a life experiment. We're working it out all the time,

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Speaker 2: and things are going to change. Our capacity is going

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Speaker 2: to change, our kids desires and what's going to change.

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Speaker 2: And that's okay.

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Speaker 1: So keep having those family meetings, keep collecting dartro on

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Speaker 1: what works best for your family. Remember that the best

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Speaker 1: routine isn't the one that works for other families. It's

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Speaker 1: the one that emerges from your testing and learning together.

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Speaker 1: And recognize, as Kyle is very clearly pointed out, it

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Speaker 1: will keep on changing every single term, sometimes even more

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Speaker 1: frequently than that. You think you've got it nailed down,

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Speaker 1: and it just keeps on changing. But the keyword if

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Speaker 1: you want to get your afternoons and evenings right, or

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Speaker 1: perhaps perhaps any part of your life, the keyword is rethink. Rethink, rethink,

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Speaker 1: and communicate about it as a family. Collected data and

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Speaker 1: then rethink again. The Happy Family's podcast is produced by

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Speaker 1: Justin Roland from Bridge media. If you'd like more information

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Speaker 1: and more resources to make your family happier, we'd love

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Speaker 1: for you to check out Happy Families dot com dot

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Speaker 1: au