31: New year changes that stick. How to make resolutions that actually work.

Rachel Richards: 0:02

Hello, I'm Rachel Richards and welcome to teenagers untangled the audio hardware. We use research by experts and our own expertise to discuss everything and anything to do with parenting teenagers.

Susie Asli: 0:14

Hi, I'm Susie as the mindfulness coach, mindful therapist and musician, and mother of three teenagers two of them are twins.

Rachel Richards: 0:22

As a parenting coach, I've seen the transformative power of listening to how other parents work, we can feel supported, get fresh ideas, and even if we disagree, it helps us to think more clearly about the way we parent and why. So welcome, fill up a chair. And let's begin. Now in this episode, we're going to talk about making changes to our parenting maybe using New Year's resolutions. Did you make some new year's resolution? No. I used to diligently every New Year's Day sit down and write down what my New Year's resolutions were gone.

Susie Asli: 0:55

Yeah, no, I used to when I was when I was a teenager I used to. But they were really specific ones. And they it was the classic, you know, crash in week two of January and throw it all out the window, because I'd set stupid targets. Whereas now I will I haven't really said much this year a little bit. But I will set intentions of resolutions which are broader and more sort of feeling based. How do I want to be or how do I want something to be interesting, which I find really helpful.

Rachel Richards: 1:22

Interesting. So yes, we'll come on to that we have had some more feedback, which came in before Christmas, but we haven't met since then. So this one was from an irregular listener. I just want to say a huge thank you to both of you. I have two teenagers, girl and boy and struggle with a support network. Because I live in Istanbul, far from family and in a culture that doesn't discuss these kinds of issues. I discovered you in September and have listened to every episode on my way to and from work to say you have been a lifesaver is an understatement. Your wisdom has completely changed how I relate to my teens. I can't wait for more episodes. In the meantime, wishing you both a wonderful Christmas and New Year, honestly, and that made me choke because it sort of reminds me of my mother's situation. She was living a lot of her parenting life in a foreign country with no family support network. It's incredibly tough. Yeah. And I in a way I wanted to do this because I felt for my mother and I think so many people struggle, parents and fathers as well as mothers we need. We don't you know, men don't get talked to other parents enough. And they need advice and kind of a bit of like, you're doing fine.

Susie Asli: 2:34

Oh, that's such lovely feedback. Thank you so much. Yes, thank

Rachel Richards: 2:37

you. Thank you any reviews, any feedback are really really welcome. You know, and if you can subscribe that helps other people to find our podcasts. Now for nuggets, because we came up with this, if you episodes ago, and our nuggets are the things that we've done, or we've experienced that have helped us sort of think a bit more about our parenting or we've learned something. So Susie, go ahead. What do you What have you discovered? Well,

Susie Asli: 3:01

mine is related to this idea of New Year's resolutions or intentions. And this year, I've it's not wasn't so much a conscious decision, New Year, but it's kind of evolved in the last few days of week, I think New Year's resolutions and an intention setting is always kind of problems solving. We're finding all the stuff we don't think we're very good at and then trying to improve it and pick it up. Absolutely. So I've decided to turn that on its head and look at the things that we're doing well, and celebrate them a bit more. And the idea that, you know, if we focus the stuff we focus on grows, where we water grows, kind of thing. And if we focus on the good stuff, the things that are working, and there could be many, many moments, then that sends out a ripple, which I'm quite enjoying.

Rachel Richards: 3:49

Oh, I love that. So really kind of tuning into we often don't look at that stuff. You always talk about how we tend to look across the savanna for the danger. And we focus in on that. And actually mindfully focusing on the good stuff. Yes. Can it be the habit?

Susie Asli: 4:04

Because it's the negative biases counteract counteracting the negative bias?

Rachel Richards: 4:08

Yes. So mine's similar. It's not the same, but it's about a New Year's resolution, I noticed that I've been keeping my phone with me. And this is actually quite recent. So I may I may just give up. I don't know. I always take my kids phones away at night. I have done this for quite a while and it's been a relationship that's developed where they're absolutely fine with it. Nobody complains. They all agree that this is really helpful because it means that they can completely tune out. The problem is that I realized that I wasn't doing it and I was a really bad example and I didn't want them to grow up thinking, Okay, well when you're a teenager, you can't have your phone and then suddenly you become an adult and you can so I decided to set an alarm on my phone and it for five minutes to nine and then at nine o'clock and at nine o'clock I just switched it off. and it's been fantastic. If I'm honest, I've realized that I'm not missing anything. And that I think in the past, what would happen is, I wouldn't have it with me. And then I would check something just before I went to bed and then end up in a loop again. And for me, zero tolerance policy seems to work well. Now, having said that, my daughter, I got some messages this morning from my daughter, where she called me just after nine. And I just thought it was fine. Because I messaged it wasn't urgent, am I messaged her back and said, Sweetie, I'm so sorry, my phone was switched off, I switch it off at nine. And she said, Ah, that wasn't a problem at all. And they can reach me they can use the landline, if they need to speak to me, it's not a problem. So I personally for me, I think this is a really, this has given me space to read more, to think more about other things. I'm doing more, and I love it. So it won't work for everybody. But for me, it's

Susie Asli: 5:58

that's kind of nudging me, I need to do that as well. And also, you know, if we're teaching our kids, we can't, can't do the opposite of what we're telling them to do. We can model

Rachel Richards: 6:07

it. Absolutely, absolutely. And then they have more respect for that, why? Why is this important? So I like to kind of also give positive feedback and say, you know, so I've been doing this, and it's worked for me because of this. And you know, it's a virtuous circle. So coming on to resolutions, when we talk about them, we often put signs ahead to say, well, this is where I want to go. Okay, so as you said, quite often, then negative things we want to change or, you know, is the direction we're trying to go in. And the problem with those things is they're quite a amorphous, or they're too big. And I'm going to make this sweeping change. So I'm going to lose weight, or I'm going to exercise much I'm going to the gym, every day, we start punishing ourselves immediately. I'm going to go to the gym every day or three days a week, we come up with these things that are too big a swing.

Susie Asli: 6:57

Yeah, we really ambitious and that can be well meaning we think we you know, we have energy on the first of January think we can do these things. We think we can go to the gym 17 times a week. And then by day three, we're like, oh, that was a bit ambitious Not gonna happen. So then we throw it all away.

Rachel Richards: 7:12

Yes. And there's a book by Caroline Arnold called Small move, big change. And she talks about what goes along with the resolutions like they're too broad or idealistic. And when we relax, our brain goes back onto autopilot. We talked about this system on a system to and from Daniel Kahneman. And the whole thing is you you kind of have to, if you want to change, you need to make it into a habit, because habits are our friend habits are things that then you don't have to actually think about. They just we do them naturally. So how do first of all, the question is how do you come up with a resolution? I love your idea of actually having a resolution that's about positivity.

Susie Asli: 7:49

Yeah. Or feelings based? Because I think often we do we do a resolution. And we think we think we want a particular thing, or we want to be I don't know, it'd be healthier, but how to how we want to feel good, like broaden it out a bit more like, actually, I want to feel lighter, I want to have more energy, I want to whatever the thing is, and that could be a much more tangible goal almost even though it's more abstract. I'm

Rachel Richards: 8:12

not sure that is that. Because the problem is when you say that, you then have to think well, how do I go about?

Susie Asli: 8:17

Yeah, that's step one. And then then how do I come? Then how do I build a structure that gets able to feel that way? But if we only have the structure, and we don't think, oh, I want to feel a particular way, then we're like, day five, or like, what's the point? This feels a bit rubbish.

Rachel Richards: 8:33

I love your point. So the point is, we have to have the intention behind it. And what is it we actually trying to achieve? Yes, rather than to just, you know, say, I'm going to do this, why don't want to lose five pounds? Yeah. Why? So that's, that's great. That leads me on to there are two ways of going about this. You can have micro resolutions, and they are little things that you put in place that are very specific. And those little things lead you on to the big things. Well, if that. So, too, when I say lead you on to the big things, it's by making those small changes, like saying, okay, at nine o'clock, there's alarm goes off, I just put my phone away. But you know, it's very specific. And I just had to create a habit out of it. I might slip the old day. But let's see if we can make it work. And if you make a resolution and it doesn't quite work, don't panic and think I'm a terrible person. You just go Okay, that one didn't quite work. How can I go? Get back into it? Yeah, one of the techniques she talks about in her book is using recognizable cues. So you know, Pavlov's dogs, they would salivate as soon as a bell would ring. Yeah, we have things we do every day that you could try and peg a new resolution to. So one guy I was reading said that he every morning I put his dumbbells next to the coffee machine, which is why finds slightly irritating because he doesn't want the dumbbells next to the coffee machine and tried to move them and he said no, no, no, no, no Do I get up in the morning? The first thing I do is have a coffee. I need the dumbbells next to the coffee machine because while it's brewing, guess what I'm doing? Yeah, brilliant. So we could find things. You know, if you regularly whoops. Let's say we want to learn a new language. Yeah. If you could then say, well, I have a trip every day where I have to pick up my kids. Yeah, I could have that language thing going on that trip absolutely audio.

Susie Asli: 10:23

That's what I say to all my clients for mindfulness is your waiting times, already have to ground yourself to practice mindfulness? So while you're waiting at the traffic lights, or while you're waiting in the Sainsbury's queue, you have to wait anyway, the waiting times the same? Use it usefully? Yeah. So that's not that using your your time really useful? No, that's

Rachel Richards: 10:42

a brilliant tip. So we could be doing that this whole kind of pick a mind from something if you want to be calmer, you know, pick a technique and then just say, okay, every time I'm stuck waiting for something, which is rather multiple times a day, yes. And there's a there's a book by I forget the name of the author, but it's called thank you for being late. And he writes a whole book about how those moments when he had to wait for somebody actually gave him all this time to do other things. Yeah, absolutely. So we're not trying to cram our lives with doing things you could actually cram your life with not doing things can be mindful. And I

Susie Asli: 11:15

also like the idea of the dumbbells next to the coffee equipment based, I read somewhere, if somebody's recommending, they're going to bed in your workout gear. So if you if you had, like, if you really wanted to work out, go for a run in the morning and the whole, you know, the just the extra step of having to pick your running clothes and put them on was stopping you from doing it. Because that seemed a bit overwhelming.

Rachel Richards: 11:36

I'm not sure that would help my marriage.

Susie Asli: 11:38

And it might be a bit sweaty.

Rachel Richards: 11:40

But I read some I read a similar thing, which was, it's the flip side, which is, as soon as you have finished the sort of some of the bedtime routine things. And then you just want to slump in front of the TV or you want it whatever it is you want to relax doing. And then you find that you've fallen asleep. And now you have to get up and brush your teeth. Why not just go and now brush your teeth? Yeah. And if you wear pajamas, put on your pajamas or whatever, and then relax in front of the TV. Because then if you do start falling asleep, you just have to crawl into. Yeah, absolutely. So do all that other stuff before. Nice seeing Lippert Yeah. And you know, the problem is you can say these things and then you don't but there are ways in which we can you just need a trigger. Yeah, to think, Okay, I finished my meal, I'm not going to drink anything. Right now I'm going to brush my teeth. And that will stop me eating after this certain time for example, up. So positive framing, you know, coming back to this positive way of looking at things, which is so much more motivational. One of the things you can do is, for example, if you say I need to lose weight, so I need to eat less at a meal. So I need to choose more slowly. Rather than saying, I've got to do more slowly, you could say, I'm going to allow myself time to savor my food. So you can have the same way of resolution. But the way that you actually talk about it changes it the way it feels to you when you're trying to do it, which will make it much more something that you'll keep going at Yeah.

Susie Asli: 13:03

And then it's it sounds more of a part of a process, isn't it? When you describe it like that, I like that rather than I will or I won't do it kind of

Rachel Richards: 13:11

it's like you say you say I get to do something I get to you know, I've I put my phone away, I get to do all these other things in the evening. Not now I can't go on the end. Yes, it's about the mental framing of it. And it is that positivity really, really works. It's very powerful,

Susie Asli: 13:26

really powerful. It sends a ripple effect into our bodies, which then helps.

Rachel Richards: 13:30

Yes, so these are specific things. So we can have lots of specific things. Like we say, we need a better sleep routine. In our household. Let's sit down as a family and talk about that. So rather than trying to impose it on the entire family say, Okay, let's have a let's have a chat about it. Yeah, and let's try and figure out something that we can all use as little triggers to make sure that we all get into bed at a better time because sleeps fundamentally the foundation of everything and health and you know, whether you function well at school, or work or any of those things. So those are things that you can tackle, you know,

Susie Asli: 14:02

just have a conversation about that. We've just been on an amazing, we went up and we had jetlag, which was interesting, everyone was going to bed really early and waking up really early. And they all you know, independently said, office feels really nice now and getting up early. I don't I don't feel rubbish in the morning and I get time to eat proper breakfast and I was like yeah, Susie that's

Rachel Richards: 14:23

amazing. Well, it's gone again. It's gone. I

Susie Asli: 14:26

remember how you felt last week. Can we get that back? Now interesting.

Rachel Richards: 14:32

These are things you think okay, I need this but rather than saying I need more sleep you have to pull it apart and find a micro resolution that will remind you okay, I've agreed that I need more sleep which means I need to do this at this time. And here's the trigger that will make it remind me make it doable micro but don't panic if it slips a bit go don't go well. That's yeah, that's that for another year. Okay, well, let's try a different you know, maybe that micro resolution didn't work as well. Maybe I can tweak it. Yeah. So that's the sort of going for the tiny sort of, you know, specific things. But also, like you said, you're saying, I'm going for a feeling, one thing we could do is look at a big issue that's happening in your house. So for example, according to a Harvard Medical School study of more than 10,000 teens in their parents, over 63% of adolescents reported attacks of anger that involve destroying property or threatening violence, or, which is actually quite a large number and must be felt a very overwhelming

Susie Asli: 15:32

Yeah, the idea of the violence isn't great. I mean, the feeling of anger, that's totally normal anger is just a signal, as we've talked about ad nauseam. But the following up with with distraction is not so great.

Rachel Richards: 15:45

So the question is, are you struggling with this in your household? And how do you deal with it? So I need to do something about my teens anger. And what you can do, as you said, Is this is this is just a sign there underneath it is helplessness, sadness, insecurity, loneliness, what's something, maybe they're hungry, I don't know every time but just feed them first. And then and then

Susie Asli: 16:08

see why they're throwing chairs through windows.

Rachel Richards: 16:11

But you can make a resolution to stop and listen and try and work out what's happening underneath that anger. Yes. So rather than feeling that trigger, that, you know, your child's got angry, it's used my God, why can't they control themselves? Say right, what I'm going to do every time they get upset, I'm going to stop and try and tune into what's going on believer try and find out.

Susie Asli: 16:41

Yeah, absolutely. And it's always an opportunity. So I love that there's an idea there as a resolution or an intention that something is accurate is out of balance in our families, with our teenagers, we can use it as an opportunity to go actually, I'd like to unpack that a bit more. I'd like to have a bit more awareness around that topic, whether it's anger or something else. And so then it's an awareness point, isn't it? So every time like you say, every time it comes up, we go okay, what's that? And it's an opportunity to firstly look at, why am I so triggered when they get angry? Because anger is really normal? Yes, that could be a whole whole wormhole. Because anger is normal. But we have a difficult relationship to it generally, in our society. So why am I so triggered? Why isn't it okay, that my teen is showing anger? It's okay. That they're showing anger, but maybe not okay, that they're throwing its boundaries?

Rachel Richards: 17:30

I liked that door. Yeah.

Susie Asli: 17:32

You don't need to yeah, do all these things. And then in then, like you say, an opportunity to unpack it. Maybe not in the moment, always, but afterwards, unpack it, you know, what's behind anger is a secondary emotion. What's underneath it? What's the primary? That's usually something like sadness or something else? Something else that we can unpack that way? Yeah. I love that. I use it. Yeah,

Rachel Richards: 17:53

well, it's techniques great well, and one of the other big ones that tend to happen is that when your teen isn't motivated, we see this a lot. And many issues can cause that, you know, like distractions of technology, lack of resourcefulness, and the type of expectations placed upon them by their Absolutely,

Susie Asli: 18:11

I mean, I kind of disagree with with that, I think teenagers are always motivated, but just maybe not motivated by the things we want them to be motivated by. And that's very different. We don't, you know, we want them to be motivated. When we hear motivation, we think of work and work ethic and a job and doing well in school, maybe they're not motivated by that, and I'm not judging that, you know, that can be very problematic for their life. But there will be something they're motivated towards. So again, using that, again, as a non judgmental awareness, okay, there's an issue in my family, there is a lack of motivation, I feel, let's just be aware of that and unpack it as it comes up.

Rachel Richards: 18:56

There was a phenomenological study from a student's perspective by Liberty University, and this was all about middle school apathy. And one highlight of the study was on the topic of self satisfaction. And the data revealed that students who are highly motivated, feel really good about themselves, and they believe they can achieve and those highly motivated students. Also, were saying things like, my parents always tell me to just try my best, or, you know, if I try my best, whatever the outcome is going to be okay. Yeah. And on the flip side, the students who were unmotivated often said their parents required certain grades of them. Yes. And it's really interesting, because so one thing we can do as a parent is make a resolution to think well, what expectations Am I communicating here? And is that a good thing? Yeah. And I, to be honest, I knew about this for I've known about it for a long time, I've known that it's important to always focus on the effort and not the outcome. And you know, I've been very, very specific with Mike kids when they come home with grades I go, Okay, I'm just interested in the upper grades I've, you know, really targeted it. And yet still, I had a deeply unmotivated teen. And it was only when I realized that she still was comparing yourself to other people in the family and what she was wanting to achieve, because she felt that was important, was completely unattainable. And I actually had to go over and above the level of, you know, yes, I'm just interested in your, your effort to actually been very explicit about what it was in her that I thought was so remarkable. And praising her for, like you said, let's find the good stuff. So making a promise to myself that if I saw anything good that she was doing, I'd pinpoint and go, that's great. Yeah. And what a remarkable transformation I've seen makes such a difference. That's really useful. So your your point about looking for the positive? And, and focusing on that, yeah, can come into this as well. Yeah,

Susie Asli: 20:57

absolutely. always says that. I mean, I have a child who's who's similar. Like there's some subjects friends, really, if it's school motivation we're talking about some subjects are really difficult. We've discussed that before, and some are, some are fine. And it really, it does seem that that she's really fine with that, because she knows that it's not this not everything. And I think we have to also be really honest with ourselves about the kind of, oh, yes, I'm only praising the effort. And then when maybe worse grades come in, we're still disappointed.

Rachel Richards: 21:29

Or when you worry when you've got another child who is an extreme in the other direction, and you go, Oh, that's amazing. You tell the neighbor, or you tell that another member of the family, look what she did. And then the one who simply can't possibly try and compete in that way? Yeah. Then feels undermined by it.

Susie Asli: 21:49

Yeah. So as you say, so wonderfully, we have to build them up in other ways, which, which is actually quite easy to do. Because have to change, you know, make sure that you know that everything is valued, not just great.

Rachel Richards: 22:02

So I think it's I guess the whole point about New Year's resolutions is where are we pointing our mind? Yeah. And what are we trying to achieve as? And letting go of the sense that as a parent, you're in control of everything? Yeah. Yeah,

Susie Asli: 22:15

I think that's brilliant. I mean, one of one of my thoughts for the year actually, is, as my teens get older, so I've got an almost 18 year old, I gave him a book for Christmas, which he obviously hasn't read yet called how to how to adults. In preparation,

Rachel Richards: 22:28

I need that book. Yeah, I'm

Susie Asli: 22:30

like, can I borrow? But as they get older, you know, for me the idea of letting go letting go letting go letting what can I let go off this year even more, because every time I let go, gosh, I love that every time I let go, it makes sense. Every time I cling on, whatever that looks like whether it's kind of nudging towards something I think they should be doing or, or whatever it is. It just, just, it's icky. When I let go, as long as it's done with a wholehearted way at rather than I give it up and letting it go, I'm letting you do that. It goes.

Rachel Richards: 23:06

Yeah, so I'm actually I think, for me, what works best is when I'm I consciously tell them so rather than because I think monitoring is important. Yes, but I will say so just so you know, I've seen that you're managing this so well. I don't need I don't need to worry about that. And I have said that on many occasions where I've said, so my daughter's come back with school grades. And I say, I trust you yet. You know, I think you're doing this really, really well. If I hear something needs to be flagged up, then I'm going to start looking closely at what you're doing. But I'm going to trust you.

Susie Asli: 23:36

Yeah. Which is really beautiful. Yeah, absolutely. I've had the conversation with my eldest son, we are going off next year. Not sure what he's going to do he wants to go to university with how do you want to sort of bridge this time? Do you want me to you know, you're almost 18 Do you want me to do more than we still think we should do less like, not wake you up in the mornings every day? Or you know, if you miss the bath, that kind of thing? Because he's very independent in some areas and less than others. expecting him to go Oh, yeah, no, that would be great. Yeah. And I'd like to take responsibility for that. No, he didn't. He was like, no, because I'm going off next year. I'd like you to do as much as possible.

Rachel Richards: 24:19

Basically. Wash like, clean on my bed. Wash everything back.

Susie Asli: 24:25

Yeah. We had we had a further discussion about that.

Rachel Richards: 24:30

That's hilarious. But you know, smart kid, right?

Susie Asli: 24:33

Really smart. Yeah,

Rachel Richards: 24:34

I'm gonna do little as possible. These teenagers who can't wait to leave home on like, get go. I mean, you ask the

Susie Asli: 24:39

question, I'm gonna give you an honest answer.

Rachel Richards: 24:43

So, what are the things to think about it for example, if you're, if you're having trouble with things like anxiety, or self harm, and we know that one of the best ways of dealing with anxiety T is connectedness, and self harm is the inability to be able to identify emotions and how you're feeling. Face to face contact with other people is so important because they learn, they learn, they feel empathy, they learn to read other people's signals, and you can't get that from a phone. So the thing to do is remind ourselves, if we can find a space in every day to be sitting down with our teenager, whether you have a great conversation or not, just over the dinner table, somehow everyone sits down together, we never ever, ever sit in front of the TV to emails. Now, having said that, that can be one of the best evenings that your kids Yes, absolutely, absolutely. And sometimes, you know, I know there are parents who got to a desperate situation, they were exhausted, they couldn't, they just found whatever was in the fridge, and they had a funny evening in front. And for them, they were just coping, whereas the teenagers thought, wow, this is awesome. So you know, I'm not saying don't do that, I'm saying that try and find those moments in your day, where somewhere where you can have one on one time, maybe 10 minutes or something with each teenager, or you know, as a gap family together, you're just talking to each other. Yeah,

Susie Asli: 26:09

or sometimes I find the best, sometimes the best moments are in silence. So sometimes, like, one of my kids sometimes does his homework downstairs, because he finds it difficult to concentrate. So we'll come down, and maybe I'm doing some work at the table. And we sit there in total silence. And it's really lovely. It's really connecting. And then he'll look up and or I'll go join a cup of tea. And it'll be like, Yeah, it's really lovely. So you don't have to have like a deep and meaning no life, but it's just being present with each other.

Rachel Richards: 26:36

Yes, my daughter does the same. She has to be in the room with me, doesn't matter what I'm doing just wants to be there and find your find your tribe, if you're a parent and your kids are growing up and moving on or you're struggling a bit, just see if there are any parents around who can think okay, to this year, I'm going to find someone I like going out with and doing something with whether it's reading a book with them, or, you know, going to the cinema with them or something where I feel a bit more supported. And if if you're finding people are being too negative towards you, move on. Yeah, you know, we don't stop, don't let the judgment get in too much. Really, really, really painful. So that's just some ideas, how to set new year's resolutions, we'd

Susie Asli: 27:15

love to hear if anyone's got any resolution, yes, intentions

Rachel Richards: 27:17

and ones that have worked. So tell us about the new year's resolutions you did last year that worked because we need them. And also,

Susie Asli: 27:23

like I always think like January the first is a bit of an arbitrary date, isn't it? You know, it feels, I guess? Well, it feels really nice. It's a clean slate and all of that. But we can make changes anytime we want. Anytime we want. We can start again every day.

Rachel Richards: 27:37

And I worked on the basis all my life where I'd say Oh, I just This doesn't feel right. And then I would pinpoint it. And then I would just work on it until it became part of who I was. And then I go, Okay, next one. And I my whole life have changed over the years in terms of habits where I eat the way I just the way I do everything. So it's actually it's really, really powerful. Yeah. So tell us anything. Tell us your stories. We'd love to hear about your attempts about your successes and any ideas you have for things that we should be making, you know, in terms of changes. Also, new year's resolution, tell your friends about our podcast. Yeah, tell you a school, subscribe any of that stuff. Give us a review on all of it. You can also sign up to receive all the latest at our website where there's a blog reviews links to every repas episode, I'm going to write more frequently. I'm going to put more on that is that your Yeah, it kind of not yet, I need to actually get action it I need to create a micro resolution tag so that I know that at that time I'm going to write that's what I need to do. That's what I will do that and then I will write more frequently.

Susie Asli: 28:48

Accountability in there. Yeah, but I've done

Rachel Richards: 28:51

that before where I said I was going to write down all the manners that our family should have. And I still haven't done it every night, every now and then I open it up and go, Oh, God. So yeah, it doesn't really work with me.

Susie Asli: 29:03

Okay, fair enough.

Rachel Richards: 29:05

I need I need to tag it to something that reminds me and then because you know, when you have a busy schedule, and lots of things are happening, and it's just easy to push it down. And maybe that's

Susie Asli: 29:13

the point as well is that we're all very very different. So when we make a resolution, which is basically a decision isn't it resolution as a decision to make a change. We're really different in how we can get that done like you. Some for some people, accountability is everything you say if you tell other people then they feel that they you know, they now need to do it for you. That doesn't work. Yes, you need a tag. For others, it might be something completely different. So it's having the awareness How did how do we? How, what, what what works?

Rachel Richards: 29:44

Yes. And my daughter, she needs to have people she has to turn up for and then she'll do it. Yes. Whereas with me, you know that Yeah, perfect. I love that. And that's so true. So know how you work, and then you can do it. Right? That's it for now. Our website is WD WW dot teenager's untangled.com and you can search for episodes and that sort of stuff, Susie,

Susie Asli: 30:06

www a mindful hyphen life.co.uk

Rachel Richards: 30:10

You can find all sorts she's got a fantastic blog on there you can find all sorts of resources and talk to her directly on the website for free.

Susie Asli: 30:21

Is here here more or whether whether

Rachel Richards: 30:24

she can help you come up with your New Year's resolution that's it for now. Goodbye. Bye bye for now.