Casey Palmer is an amazing blogger, father to two, husband to one, second to none, and part of the Toronto Bloggers Collective.  I have had some interesting conversations with him over the last year and he has some amazing insights into being a Canadian Dad.

Casey my brother, welcome to my blog. I have been looking forward to discussing, faith, food, family, race, and mixed marriage. Let’s start by telling me something important about you?

Hey Jerry, thanks for having me! Something important. Hm.

The older I get and the more I write, the more I figure out what I’m really about as I carve out all the fluff.

Repping for interracial families when our individual cultures don’t always really get it. Or support it. Telling stories better than anyone expects, using all the resources I have to do it. I’m a perfectionist, I’m ambitious, I’m hustling… but this all looks more and more different the longer I keep doing all of this.

I love your blog. How did it start? What is it about? What is your message here?

Thank you very much!  I’ve tried writing different blogs over the years since I first started on LiveJournal in 2002. One about making extra money on the side. An art blog with a group of other friends. But nothing ever seemed to stick until I started getting into Toronto’s Twitter scene in 2010. Back then, I’d hit events five or six days a week, get around the city, and I wrote about them all so much that a blog just followed.

In fact, I almost stopped blogging when I was about to have a kid! As I’m sure most men feel the first time, they’re becoming a Dad, I thought it’d be their end of everything I knew. I was checking off lists, tying up loose ends, and getting ready to start a new phase in my life.

But when a friend pointed out that the number of Dad bloggers out there were few and far between, I stuck around and figured I’d tell my story since no one else was really doing it.

So long story short, what is my blog about? I like to say family, food, fashion, and faith. And travel. And tech. And all the other random things that make up my day-to-day life as a Dad trying to balance his family, his job, and a little something on the side. I’ve worked long and hard at it, and it’s still evolving, but I think there’ll still be plenty of stories to tell in the years ahead.

Casey, is race still an issue in the GTA in the 21st century? If so how?

kisses his teeth

You know, I really wish it wasn’t, but it most definitely is.

I mean, Toronto’s perhaps the most diverse city in the world, but we’re talking about a city that’s 50% people of colour in a country that’s closer to 20% overall. To put that in numbers, of the 7.5 million people of colour we have across the country, 1.5 million of them—a whopping 20%—live inside the 630.2 square kilometers that Torontonians call home. In a tiny space that’s almost a hundred-thousandth of the land, this country has to offer.

So as diverse as Toronto might be on the surface, there’s a whole lot of Canada that still influences it in a very different direction.

As a huge economic driver for our country, people come to Toronto to visit. They come here to work. Toronto isn’t a magical island where people of all colours and creeds can simply live in harmony, separated from the rest of the world. The complex fabric that makes our city what it is constantly shifts and reshapes itself, and we can never be so naive as to think that we live in a perfect post-racial utopia.

But, it’s home. It is a city where we have access to all sorts of races and people, and that’s what I want as part of what my children have around them as they grow up.

Race is an issue in the GTA just like it is anywhere else, but at least we’re slowly willing to have a conversation about it.

Talk to me about how marriage has changed you as a person?

I was a very different person when Sarah first met me in 2007, still deep into my art and unsure what exactly I wanted from my life. Before Sarah came along, I was just a shiftless youth whose only goal was to enjoy the here and now without even thinking about the future.

But more than eight years into our marriage, I’ve learned how to be responsible. I take care of my kids, keep our home somewhere we can be proud of, and do everything I can to measure up to the man Sarah expects me to be.

Marriage isn’t easy—you can go from being deeply in love to wanting to kill each other, but if anything, it gives you some solid insight into who you are and why you do what you do.

Fatherhood is an amazing experience. What surprised you about it? 

Hands down, the thing that’s surprised me most about fatherhood is how much more complete it’s made me in such a short time!

Life was good prior to having kids, but my priorities were all out of whack. Spending too much time at the office so I could meet intense deadlines. Spending more time out partying than at home with Sarah. Fatherhood’s been very grounding, and while I missed out on my pre-kid life at first, I eventually found that I got so much more from spending time with my kids, choosing the times I was away from home much more carefully because so much of it just wasn’t worth it.

I don’t know who I would’ve become without the responsibility of parenthood on my shoulders, but I doubt I would’ve been a better me.

What do you like about Toronto? What can become better about this city?

I’ve always lived in the Toronto area, with me moving into the city proper from Mississauga next door when Sarah and I married in 2011.

And I love it! There’s never a shortage of things to do; you can find Japanese, Mexican and Ethiopian cuisine all on the same block; and it’s woven itself so deep into my being that I couldn’t imagine anywhere else as home. Anytime I’m away from this city for an extended period of time, I feel the itch to come back. The smells. The sounds. The tastes. All of its part of my city, and you can’t find a place quite like it anywhere else!

But it’s not perfect. There’s homelessness everywhere. We got into the real estate market at a good time, but the cost of living here is prohibitive for almost everyone who lives here. It’s not an easy place to be, but I wouldn’t trade it in for the world.

And yes—the offer has come up before!

I know your faith is important to you. Help me understand a little about it and how you use it in your daily life?

I didn’t start going to church until Sarah asked me to in our first year of dating. Funny enough, she worried that I might be resistant to it, but deciding to go’s proven one of the best decisions I’ve ever made!

So, we currently go to an Anglican church—The Church of the Resurrection—and our family are all grown in our faith in the few years we’ve been there.

I’ve served on leadership. Sarah’s started a Ladies’ Night to bond with the women around her. We teach the Preschool Sunday School together, have lunches with the other members of our small group… we get up to a lot. But all that time with our fellow church folk manifests itself in so many other ways in our everyday lives. Like in the Bible studies we do with our coworkers on our lunch breaks. Or in doing what we can for our friends not because we expect something in return, but because it’s just the right thing to do.

I didn’t think this would be the road I walked down all those years ago, but I’m happy I’m walking it!

Give yourself some advice at 15 and 25?

15-year-old Casey Palmer. It’s 1998, and I moved from my third to my fourth year of private high school. My girlfriend at the time had moved on to another school, and I split my time between track, work, school, and volunteering.

My advice? Slow down. You don’t know it yet, but you’re a year away from a massive nervous breakdown, something you’re going to need nearly a decade to work through. You don’t need to accomplish everything under the sun to get on some 20 Under 20 or 30 Under 30 list—everything happens in its time… so take it slow.

Like they say, it’s about the journey, not the destination!

25-year-old Casey Palmer. It’s 2008, and I’ve started a fairly new career as a bureaucrat after finishing school and my time as a banker. I’ve just started dating Sarah, and I’m about to end my year at twenty-five with a stint being unemployed due to making an unwise career choice more for the money than anything else.

My advice? Pick yourself up, bro—this is not the end of you. It’s the first time you’ve been unemployed after twelve straight years of working, but I want you to know two things:

You’re about to get hired in a couple of months by some of the greatest people you’ll ever get to know, and

You don’t know it yet, but you have the capacity to build some very marketable skills. You only started your Twitter this year, and Facebook’s only a few years deep, but trust me—all that time you spend on the computer is going to change your life.

Keep working at your interests—they’re all going to come in handy eventually.

Mix marriages is a recent phenomenon? Tell me something funny that has happened in your marriage?

A story that I think best captures the difference in the Dutch and Jamaican cultures that Sarah and I put into our relationship is our first Christmas with her family, and a tradition the Dutch call “Sinterklaas”.

So just like we have Santa Claus and his elves over here in Canada, the Netherlands has Sinterklaas and Zwarte Piet—a helper who helps him deliver the gifts in time for Dutch Christmas—or Sinterklaasavond—on December 5th.

Except… he’s a slave. At best. A white guy in blackface because he’s “dirty from all the chimney soot” at worst. And I knew none of this going in.

So, there we are on Christmas Eve with Sarah’s family, and her parents are doing another Sinterklaasavond tradition—handing out chocolate letters to the kids: the letters of our first names in solid milk chocolate. I remember it like it was yesterday:

Mother-in-law: “Here you go, Casey!”

Me: “Thanks so much, Mrs.—WHAT THE HELL IS THIS?!”

You see, right on the front of the box was Sinterklaas… and Zwarte Piet.

365 days and one long conversation on blackface later, I found my future in-laws had changed brands—to one without the questionable potentially Moorish slave on the front.

Differences in culture. In experiences. In parenting styles. There’s so much we’ve had to navigate—and so much we’re still figuring out—but all that is an entirely different story.

How do you balance food, faith, family, and finance in the 21st century?

It’s said that we should approach illnesses through prevention rather than treatment, and I kind of feel the same way about money.

Many of us start thinking about budgeting and saving only after we’ve dug ourselves into a hole, desperately trying to see what we can do to get ourselves back out.

But I’ve never been the type to solve my problems through sacrifice—I’ve said that the solution to dealing with one’s financial constraints is to make more money, and that’s precisely what I’ve tried to do with the multilayered life I’ve built for myself.

It works like this—I treat my salary from my day job as family money, and anything I make on the side as my discretionary income so I can continue living my life the way I see fit. What this has meant is that I could still feed my family well while tithing to church and giving my kids every experience under the sun. It’s meant finding the capital to invest in my business without risking my kids’ savings accounts or our mortgage payments.

Does it involve more work? Yes. Am I learning to be smarter with money over time? Sure. But ultimately, I’m finding the path I walk lets me create my best work possible while also giving everyone I care about everything that they need.

And as a husband, father, brother, and son, isn’t that what I’m supposed to do?

The post Casey Palmer: Canadian Dad appeared first on Four Columns of a Balanced Life.

Anu Bidani is the CEO of STEM MINDS (a BCorp certified Social Enterprise) and Inno-Hive, an Innovative Learning Community – Not-For-Profit), two companies that focus on shaping the future of education by transforming learning experiences for both children and adults. STEM Minds is on a mission to empower youth to become fearless leaders by developing agility and a love of learning through STEM (science, technology, engineering, math). She believes in creating our future leaders, game changers, and problem-solvers to build a better, more agile society for future generations. With a dedicated teaching staff, a state-of-the-art learning environment, research, and development center, and a network of strategic partnerships, she has built both these businesses that are successfully expanding the reach and impact of education to all children!

Inno-Hive, an Innovative Learning Community, is a not-for-profit focused on supporting communities to innovate for skill-building regardless of age or geographic boundaries.

She is a passionate innovator, leader, revenue generator and entrepreneur with solid experience as a corporate executive where she witnessed the evolution and impact of accelerated technology changes on business processes from a Corporate lens. Her passion for innovation served as the catalyst for repeated successes in optimizing emerging business models to deliver agile profitability and value. With vetted expertise in the areas of strategy, product development, solutions development, project delivery, information security, and audit, Anu has built a solid foundation for her two entrepreneurial ventures – STEM MINDS and Inno-Hive, an Innovative Learning Community. She is also an SHEEO activator and supports other women entrepreneurs in their journey of following their passion.

Anu welcome to my series on entrepreneurs and entrepreneurship. Tell my audience a little about you.

I am a mom of 2 boys who inspired me to embrace my entrepreneurial venture Stem Minds after a 20+ Corporate career. I enjoy traveling, cooking, and challenging myself to new intellectual possibilities. I consider myself a fearless learner where the glass is always full. I believe in the power of positive thinking so miracles can happen. For me, integrity and authenticity are two ingredients that make me who I am and what I do.

You had a successful career as an executive in one of the banks. Why start a business?

After a successful career as a senior executive, I wanted more out of life. Everyone talks about their purpose and calling and I needed to find mine. When I left my job in 2015, I didn’t want to do the same. So, in search of my purpose and challenging myself I decided to solve a personal problem of inspiring my children to love STEM. In this journey, I have found the joy in inspiring children to love STEM. My business STEM Minds caters to this passion through a holistic STEM learning experience with hands-on activities. I have a state-of-the-art facility with 3D printers, laser cutters, robots, drones, virtual reality, and much more which makes learning fun, impactful, and sustainable.

Talk to me a little about STEM?

Science, Technology, Engineering, Math – STEM is a very important field to build skills in for the jobs of tomorrow. These fields enforce critical thinking, problem-solving, and many other 21st century skills that are innate to digital competencies that are required for success. These cannot be optional in a child’s learning portfolio but mandatory so they are prepared for what will be expected of them as they grow.

What are the future goals and expansion plans?

I am very excited about launching our Online platform – SMOA with gamification, virtual reality, and AI so children can enjoy formal learning at school and home through various toolsets. We are launching SMOA both nationally in Canada and in the USA. We are also working on some strategic partnerships to bring our programming into more school boards. We are working on academic research on our approach to blended learning through online tools in the classroom as well as accessibility in STEM for visually impaired youth. So, lots of exciting things happening at Stem Minds – stay tuned for the evolution!

Help me understand the good, bad, and ugly side of being an entrepreneur?

The good side is – I love the freedom and picking what I want to do when I want to do with no submissions of business cases! I enjoy the freedom to try things out without fear of failure.

The ugly side is that there is no segregation of work life and home life. Sometimes it interferes with the quality time I want to spend with my family but I also have to balance the responsibilities of running a business and supporting a team. So, time is always premium.

What are the skill sets required to be an entrepreneur?

In my mind three most important characteristics of being a successful entrepreneur are:

• fearless learner – you need to keep pushing yourself to learn new things whether it be about your product, customers or markets
• resilience – you need to know that you can get up and move forward every time you fall
• grit – courage to take risks without fear of consequences

My daughter is 14 and sometimes scared of math, science, and engineering. What advice would you give her?

I would tell her to be a fearless learner as we can learn anything if we put our minds to it. Even though math, science, engineering may seem scary, just remember that fear is only in your mind. Give yourself the opportunity to try building skills in these fields in your own way. If you enjoy fashion then wearable tech may be something to explore which combines fashion with coding. If you enjoy art then digital art, graphic designing are options to consider. There are lots of choices you just need to be open to learning.

Walk me through the steps of opening a business, like bootstrapping, business plans, market, competitive advantage, core competence, increasing footprint, and finding a niche?

For me opening a business requires planning and thought if you want it to be sustainable. Plan your finances – you may need a 3-year runway before you get a paycheque. Planning conservatively creates less chaos and panic.

New businesses generally have to be self-funded as there is not much financing available. So, plan to be lean and optimize your resources. Investing in automation to simplify processes is impactful.

You need to know the drivers behind your business, what pain points are you addressing and who is your real client. Understand the competitive landscape and find your unique value proposition.

I am a planned entrepreneur so I spend time building my business plan, financial models, key metrics for monitoring, documenting process flows, and procedures. I invested in these processes so I can grow without dependency on a few people, including myself. My staff can run my business without my presence. If you plan your business that way you have time to be a real CEO with vision, strategy, and forward-thinking.

It is important to find mentors, coaching, and other help to keep you on track. How did you achieve this?

I think mentoring and coaching are important. Having someone to talk to you about your ideas, being held accountable allow you to be better at execution and performance.

I did this by having a leadership coach when I really needed to push my performance. I joined network groups like SheEO and GroYourBiz to connect with like-minded entrepreneurs. All of this gave me a safe place to grow and be my best.

Talk to me about your hiring process and what you look for and how you motivate your staff?

I hire based on potential. I have an awesome team, who is passionate about what they do. I motivate them through empowerment and trust. I know they will always do their best and if mistakes happen it is okay as this is part of growing and learning.

Give my viewers advice on balancing the family? 

Balance is all about deliberate choices. I don’t think there is anything like balance. It is setting your priorities and making choices.

The family should always come first so always make time. Time flies by fast so you want to make the best of it and cherish the moments.

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Single parenting, co-parenting, helicopter parenting, authoritative parenting, controlling parenting, and permissive parenting are the different styles of parenting.

If you think you have arrived in life, try getting married. A spouse is like a mirror, a lot of your faults get exposed. If after marriage you still think you have arrived in life, try having a kid, and become a parent.

Parenting is one of the most challenging things I have done in my life, and also the most rewarding. It requires unconditional love, being unselfish, investing emotions, energy, time, feelings, and lots of forgiveness.

Betsy Kerekes is the author of Be a Happier Parent or Laugh Trying and coauthor of 101 Tips for a Happier Marriage and 101 Tips for Marrying the Right Person. Her professional experience includes public relations for Franciscan University of Steubenville, proofreading for Patrick Madrid’s Envoy magazine, and contributing to Aleteia, MercatorNet, Catholic Lane, Catholic Exchange, CatholicMom.com, The Southern Cross, and Creative Minority Report. Kerekes serves as editor and director of online publications at the Ruth Institute, where she writes weekly newsletters and manages the blog. She telecommutes from her home near San Diego, where she homeschools her four children and blogs about her parenting adventures.

Betsy offers her Top Ten Parenting Tips from her book Be a Happier Parent or Laugh Trying

One

There are as many different ways to parent as there are parents. You do what works for you, and don’t worry about what everyone else thinks. And by all means, don’t compare your child to others. A mom who had a baby around the same time as I had my first made a comment about teething. I mentioned that my daughter had four teeth coming in at once, only because I thought it unusual. The other mom seemed upset by this news and got defensive — over teeth, as though the rate at which children sprout teeth somehow determines who will go to a community college and who will go to Harvard. Don’t stress over supposed milestones or how your kid measures up. Do your best, and don’t worry about the rest.

Two

Because parenting is hard, cruddy stuff is going to happen. It just comes with the territory. Taking a deep breath and moving on after an unfortunate incident will help you maintain a happier demeanor, inside and out, especially when it comes to things you have no control over. Some days your children are just going to be fussy like they’re taking turns or have it scheduled on a secret calendar. Keeping a sense of humor helps. Once I asked a friend how her kids were. She responded: “For sale.”

Three

No sane person thinks parenting is easy, but focusing on the blessings in your life, even if your house is a mess or the laundry is piling up, is the antidote to the parenting pits. Clearly, your kids don’t mind those messes since they enjoy making them, and rolling around in a pile of unfolded laundry is the rainy-day equivalent of jumping in a pile of leaves. Why deprive your children of that joy? Instead, maintain an attitude of gratitude by focusing on the positive. Your children have enough clothes that they can get dirty. The dishes stacked in the sink prove that you have ample food for your family. Ice cream exists. And the list goes on and on.

Four

If you’re a perfectionist, having children may be particularly difficult, especially if you’re the type who tries to maintain a spotless home. You can be happier if you adopt this principle: Let it go. Embroider it on a pillow if necessary. Here’s a scenario: after breakfast, the floor under your table looks like the leftovers at the carnival in Charlotte’s Web. You want to sweep it immediately, but you’re unable because you’re wrangling tiny people all day. Lunch happens, and now the floor looks like the streets of New Orleans after Mardi Gras. You want to pull your hair out, but you still haven’t found time to clean. The solution? Make like Elsa and let it go. I don’t mean go a week without sweeping under the table. If mice move in to clean up the mess for you, well, that could be a win or a loss. The floor is getting clean, but if those mice start building temples to their gods complete with statues made from food scraps that impressively resemble your children, you may have a problem. Get out the broom and destroy a civilization. But for those everyday things that put the perfectionist in you on high alert, remember that the world won’t end and your house won’t fall down around you if you don’t get to it right away. Take a deep breath, do what you can, when you can, and don’t stress over it unnecessarily. I saw a meme that said: “Once you stop caring that the Play-Doh colors are mixed together, the second part of your life begins.” I totally get that. It took four kids, but I’ve finally arrived.

Five

Keep your negative reactions in check. Imagine you’re potty training your child. (Did you just shudder? My apologies.) Now imagine you take your child to the potty, but she doesn’t want to go. You try again later and still nothing. You ask her if she needs to go. She insists she doesn’t. Next thing you know, her pants are wet. You, frustrated by the whole experience, kind of lose it. “Look what you did! You wet your pants! I tried to get you to go on the potty. I sat you down, you said you didn’t need to go. Then I asked again, and you still said no. One minute later you’ve wet yourself. Now I have to wash you up and find clean clothes and…” etc. Unbeknownst to you, this reaction is teaching your child to lie in order to avoid seeing you angry or be yelled at. You can express disappointment, sure, but remain calm and patient. You want your child to feel safe coming to you with the truth when she ran a purple marker across the back of the white couch or when he threw a ball indoors and knocked over a lamp. If such incidents happen and you fly off the handle, don’t be surprised when you’re met with tight lips after asking who swirled a magnet across the computer screen.

Six

Related: Model not making a mountain out of a molehill. When my kids hurt themselves, I’m kind of like, “meh.” Yes, I’ll tend to the wound, but I won’t make a bigger deal out of it than it warrants. When I was a school secretary, kids would sometimes come to me asking for a Band-aid for some microscopic cut. When I couldn’t see anything, they’d squeeze until the tiniest drop of blood was visible. My favorite kids were the ones who came to the office with blood I could see from several feet away. I’d say, “Whoa, let me get you a Band-aid,” but they’d be like, “Nah, I’m just going to slap a paper towel across it and head back out.” Those kids were all from the same hardy family of goat owners. I loved them. The kids, not the goats. Maybe both. Baby goats are kids, so I guess both. These children didn’t try to make a huge fuss in order to get attention. They dealt with the problem simply and moved on. They were tough, and that’s an attitude that will get them far in life. I recommend encouraging that in your kids, goat, or human. For the more sensitive children, you can always point out that each passing moment gets the owie closer to being healed. You can also remind them that tomorrow they’ll feel so much better (or by bedtime, or in like one minute, depending).

Seven

Younger kids might be bothered that they can’t do the same things as their older siblings, like check the bear traps or drive the Batmobile. At a playground, a little girl was crying because she couldn’t swing across the monkey bars like her big brother. The mom assured the girl that her brother was able because he’d done it more times. “Practice makes progress,” she said. I found that interesting. We can’t promise our kids they’ll become perfect at something, even with lots and lots of practice. No one is perfect at everything, despite what you see on Pinterest boards. By using the word “progress,” this mom helped her daughter realize that though she may not be great at something now, she can improve with repeated effort. The less obvious message is that the popular trope of “you can be anything you want if you just try hard enough” is false. Despite this “good parenting” mantra of our modern culture, not everyone who wants to can become a Nobel prize winner, or an astronaut, or Adele. If your kids discover their big fabulous dream isn’t coming true, it’s an opportunity to point out that God might not mean for them to cure a common cold, build a better mousetrap, invent a new ice cream flavor, save an endangered species, and all those things on the Game of Life “Life Tiles.” Of course, you should encourage your kids to reach reasonable goals, but remind them that if things don’t seem to be working out, it may be because God has another, a better plan that will take prayer and time to figure out.

Eight

Sharing is good, but don’t force it. Even though “don’t forget to share” is a common parental phrase, we shouldn’t make our kids give up a toy or the swing for someone else all the time. Sharing is no doubt important, but only when the child does so from his own initiative. We can model sharing by doing so ourselves and then encouraging our kids to follow suit by pointing out how sharing has made another person happy. For them, you could say, “How nice of you to let the other boy play with your ball. See how happy you made him? Thank you for sharing.” However, sharing isn’t always appropriate. What if your child wasn’t finished on the swing? Instead, offer him advanced notice that soon it will be someone else’s turn. “Five more minutes on the swing then let someone else have a go.” Another option is playing together. “How about you kick the ball back and forth to each other?” rather than making your child give up his toy entirely. Being nice is one thing, but we don’t want our children to feel like sharing is a punishment when they haven’t done anything wrong.

Nine

Strive to make family dinner the norm. Being together strengthens the familial bond, builds positive relationships among siblings, and generally keeps teenagers out of the usual teenagery troubles. Younger kids learn new vocabulary words (for good or bad) and proper table manners. Everyone is more apt to eat healthily and therefore be healthy, and you’ll have a better idea of what’s going on in your kids’ lives. To get the ball rolling, you can play the high/low game where each person names the best and worst part of their day: “We bought a new carton of ice cream! That carton is now empty.” It’s a great way to find out what drives and motivates your kids.

Ten

You might think you’ll be truly happy if you could just have a girl, a boy, your dream home, a new car, a better job, or an ice cream shop to open up within walking distance. Perhaps you feel you’ll be happier when the kids are older and easier, or when they’re no longer teenagers, or when you have an empty nest, or when you can finally retire. But if you continue thinking that way — waiting for that next thing that you’re sure will make you happy — you’ll never be happy. Instead, find the joy in your life as a parent today.

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Casey Palmer is one of Canada’s most influential blogger and the creator behind Casey Palmer, Canadian Dad – Consistently Inconsistent. Casey has included Four Columns among his list of Canadian Dad Influencers – The Dads Out There Telling Their Stories.

I am grateful to be on this list, grateful to be a dad, and will persevere to be real, vulnerable, and authentic.

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The responsibilities of being a husband and a father are the two most challenging responsibilities I have faced in my life. It is the most difficult thing I have done. However, the most gratifying. No matter of money, goods, or achievement cannot replace my wife and daughter. As I enter my 20^th year of marriage and raise a 16-year-old, people ask me for formulas.

The truth is that there are no formulas. Just like instant noodles and fast food, there is no instant marriage or parenting. It is hard work, self-denial, and considering the other person better all the time, maintaining boundaries.

I am learning that I am not responsible for making sure that my daughter is happy all the time, getting the approval of others (Jean has always been her teacher’s favorite), controlling her, or doing things for her that she is responsible for. I tell her that I am messed up, broken and will make mistakes. I hold her accountable, allow her to function as an independent person, make tough decisions, but also empower and inspire her to achieve her best. There are many sacrifices along the way, but worth it.

Adriane Thompson runs a blog, Raising Kids With Purpose. I want to dig a little more into this purpose.

Adriane, what is raising kids with purpose all about?

My mission at Raising Kids With Purpose is to help parents find their purpose in parenting by learning how to take care of themselves and connect with their kids. It’s about building strong relationships in order to raise self-reliant, competent, and emotionally healthy individuals.

Why should we read it? 

You should read it because I heavily research topics in order to make parenting a whole lot easier. Often times, we, parents, unintentionally make our children’s behavior worse which can make life really hard. But by taking care of ourselves through mindfulness and self-awareness, in addition to understanding emotional and brain development, we can save ourselves a lot of headaches and conflicts.

Who is your audience?

My audience is parents (mostly moms) of children ages 3-12.

Adriane, what kind of purpose are we talking about? 

The purpose we are talking about is being intentional with the way parents communicate, treat, and connect with their children. 

Helicopter parenting. Do you believe it?

I do not. I believe that it exists but I know for a fact how detrimental it is to a child’s development.

Talk to me about raising kids with an attitude of gratitude? 

Gratitude is such a powerful practice. Helping kids reach connective gratitude has so many benefits. Connective gratitude is far more than saying, “thank you.” It’s a deep appreciation for things, people, acts of kindness, etc. The appreciation is then reciprocated out of intrinsic motivation.  Having this attitude of gratitude increases happy hormones, redirects kids’ attention from toxic emotions and feelings, decreases feelings of envy and depression, it often leads to generosity, and it can foster healthy strong relationships for a lifetime.

What impact does social media have on kids and what can parents do?

I think it has a detrimental effect on kids. There is no need for kids to be on social media. I think parents should delay allowing their kids to have social media accounts for as long as possible. Also, having open communication as to why is also key.

Peace, patience, kindness, gentleness are universal qualities that need to be taught to our children to make them better citizens. Any tips?

The best thing a parent can do to teach all of these attributes is to model. Kids learn more from what they see, not what they hear.

We can talk a lot about kids, but it starts with the parents. The fruit does not fall far from the tree. So, what advice can you give parents in terms of behavior?

Again, start with connecting first. Parents have a lot of self-work to do as far as how they were parented. Many have to gain self-awareness as to what their triggers are or why they react the way they do. Then, by becoming a rockstar at self-regulation, they can remain calm and connect first before correcting or teaching. Once the child is in a regulated state, then the parent can discipline (NOT PUNISH), and give options and use those moments to teach very important life lessons. Our children’s brains are so underdeveloped that it’s almost impossible for them to stay regulated if we are not. It starts with us. I also strongly suggest staying away from extrinsic motivators or empty praise. Instead, focus on your child’s strengths instead of weaknesses, and typically the behaviors then dissipate. Teaching a growth mindset and allowing your child to experience emotions and failure also helps the brain grow and learn.

I am a big believer in creating memories and spending time with our kids. Kids want our time and attention do you agree?

Absolutely. Spending even five minutes of uninterrupted individual time with your kids will go a long way. Children are born to want to feel connected, love, seen, safe and hear from their primary caretaker.

Give my audience some advice on marriage, motherhood, balancing faith, family, food and finance in the 21st century?

That’s a lot! I have found that true balance does not exist. Instead of focusing on perfection, strive for progress and connection. Talk about your values and live them out. Strive to have the marriage you want your kids to have. Make family dinner a priority. And don’t worry about what others are doing. Focus on you and your unique children God blessed you with.

Talk to me about something challenging you have been through and how did you deal with it and come out on the other side?

A challenge I walk through every day is parenting a Twice Exceptional child with self-regulation and sensory processing integration challenges causing him to be explosive whenever his stress response is triggered. Thankfully, I am able to keep my brain from being hijacked by his but we have had some very hard days. Gaining as much knowledge as I can about what is going on in his brain and body has really helped become a much better parent. I have no other option but to connect and stay gentle and calm.

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