In today's episode of the Becoming the Big Me Podcast we have another special guest for the Becoming the Big Me: The Great Conquest section of our show. Your host Djemilah Birnie has the pleasure of interviewing Tanya Milano-Snell. Tanya is on a mission to break the cycle of generational trauma within families.

Tanya Milano-Snell is a mindfulness and yoga instructor who helps parents holistically heal from the inside out. She grew up with parents that were stressed out and always on the verge of snapping. She ended up trapping stress in her body. After learning the tools that helped her on her healing journey she became passionate about sharing this knowledge to other families through her work. 

Her journey hasn’t always been easy, but she has continued to get up time after time. Each time learning new tools to help her on her journey. Tanya uses the tools that she has learned in her own healing journey and shares them with others through her work. 

This is Tanya’s story.

Connect:

If you would like to connect and learn more about Tanya Milano-Snell you can find her at www.tanyamilano.com

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To get out her new book visit bit.ly/greatconquest

To Connect More with Djemilah Visit www.djemilah.com

>>Learn more about the Becoming the Big Me: The Great Conquest book visit www.thegreatconquest.com 

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Becoming the Big Me: The Great Conquest is a collection of empowering, motivating, and educational stories that will tug at your heart strings while empowering you to step into your own Big Me potential. From addiction, illness, lack of confidence, loss of loved ones, PTSD, and more the contributors of this book have walked through darkness and emerged victorious.

The Becoming the Big Me: The Great Conquest book has been brought to you by a collection of leaders paving the path of the future in their given fields. Within its pages you will find insight from Djemilah Birnie, Sharon Lechter, Nick Wingo, Dr. Frances Malone, Jenny Emerson, Russel Creed, Jennifer Aube, Valerie Fischer, Cory & JoJo Rankin, Peter Neilson, Kiki Rae, Tanya Milano-Snell, Dannah Macalinga-Pedrigal, and Kira Birnie.

This book was envisioned and brought together by Djemilah Birnie, the founder of Becoming the Big Me.

After overcoming many obstacles that could easily break a person, Djemilah has become passionate about helping others face their glass ceilings and break into the expansiveness of their potential.

Djemilah believes that we are all on a journey... There is never a point in which you have "Made It". Becoming the Big Me is about choosing to step into your greater potential each and every day. It is about learning and sometimes messing up but always getting back up.

This book has been compiled to showcase the journeys of overcoming. However, through this journey it becomes so much more. As each author told their story Djemilah noticed a common thread- something that made all of these amazing humans stand out even when faced with adversity.

Through the process of this book Djemilah discovered what she calls "the secret to overcoming obstacles and Becoming the Big Me." The greatest secret is the steps are simple and we have all heard them before.... the greatest secret is in the actual doing.

This book features; Djemilah Birnie the best selling author of Luna's Balloon: A Little Book About the Little Things, Sharon Lechter the author of Think and Grow Rich for Women, co author of Rich Dad Poor Dad, and an ambassador to the Napoleon Hill Foundation, Nick Wingo the founder behind building Grit, Dr. Frances Malone the founder of Malone Pediatrics and the Intuitive Parents Collective, Valerie Fischer the woman behind the trademark of Brain Science Selling, Peter Neilson the "Hybrid Guy", Jenny Emerson licensed therapist, Russell Creed the founder of Invictus Life, Tanya Milano-Snell who is on a mission to break generational trauma, Jennifer Aube best selling author of the book Naked Wealth, Kiki Rae the founder of Quantum Creatrix, Cory and JoJo Rankin founders of RFamilyStrong, Dannah Macolinga-Pedrigal VA and mother, and Kira Birnie the daughter of Djemilah Birnie and kid behind A Kid's Perspective.

To learn more about the book you can visit, www.thegreatconquest.com

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Hi! I am your host Djemilah Birnie the founder of Becoming the Big Me. I have been building businesses online since the age of 17. I am passionate about discovering the "secrets" of our world and what is the true difference maker. Why is it that some succeed and others do not? What is it that allows people to get back up and keep going even in the midst of hardships? What truly is the power of purpose? These are the questions that rattle my mind.

I love to write and have published some books, some of them have even hit some charts 😲 You can check them out here: http://bit.ly/djemilahbooks

Ready to start playing BIG and step into your Big Me potential by harnessing the power of your mind? Then make sure you join the free Rewire challenge to get all the tools you need! https://www.djemilah.com/rewirechallenge

Do you want to fall asleep faster, rest deeper, and release the stress of the day? Then it's time for you to experience your best nights rest with the Dreamland Meditation Pack! Over 200 minutes of bedtime meditations to quiet your mind, connect your mind to your body, and bring you to your sleepy time bliss.https://www.djemilah.com/dreammeditation

Don't forget to check out the little lady's podcast "A Kid's Perspective" where she answers your questions on all of life's most pressing issues, in her eyes, a kid! ‎https://akidsperspective.us/

In addition to my online offerings I am extremely passionate about giving back to the local community while cultivating community growth. I am the organizer and host of the Wimberley Women's Circle https://wimberleywomen.com/ , where we gather monthly to learn and heal from different community leaders.

I am also the visionary behind Wimberley Moonlight Farms, a small family owned farm and nursery located in Wimberley, Texas. This is a journey that will take many years as we continue to develop, follow along at https://wimberleymoonlightfarms.com/

My partner and I have also put together a local directory for our town in the Texas Hill Country in which I have been having so much joy going to all of the local hot spots to photograph! Learn more at https://www.wimberley.info/

Let's Connect! #allthelinks ⬇

Website: www.djemilah.com

Blog : www.becomingthebigme.com

Podcast : www.bigmepodcast.com

Books : http://bit.ly/djemilahbooks

Facebook : https://www.facebook.com/djemilah/

Instagram : https://www.instagram.com/becomingthebigme/

New Book: Becoming the Big Me: The Great Conquest Book: | A Collection of Empowering Stories | By Djemilah Birnie, Sharon Lechter, and Contributing Authors https://www.thegreatconquest.com/

Unknown Speaker 0:08

Hello divine souls, Jamila Bernie here with becoming the big me. I'm so excited for this special segment of the becoming the big meat podcast. This section of the podcast is dedicated towards sharing the stories of conquest for some incredible individuals. They are also featured in my latest book, becoming the big, the great conquests. In this section of the podcast, we will dive deep into each of their stories and their journeys and their hardships from addiction, PTSD, loss of loved ones and children. This segment of the podcast is dedicated towards sharing their stories and in sharing their journeys not only of the hardships but sharing how they overcame. To learn more about the author's behind the stories that you're going to hear, go to the great conquest.com And if you would like to purchase a copy of the great conquest book, you can go to bit.li/greatconquestandwithoutfurtherado Let's dive into the amazing journeys

Unknown Speaker 1:37

Hello, hello, welcome back to the becoming the big me podcast. I'm your host Djemilah Birnie and I am so incredibly excited because I have an amazing guest with me here today. Tanya Milano Snell is a mindfulness and yoga instructor who helps parents holistically heal from the inside out. She grew up with parents that were stressed out and always on the verge of snapping, she ended up trapping stress inside of her body. After learning some tools that has helped her on her healing journey. She has become very passionate about sharing this knowledge to other families throughout her work. Her journey hasn't always been easy, however, but she has continued to get up time after time. I'm so excited to be able to share with you guys Tanya story. Hey, Tanya, thanks so much for coming on. Let's go ahead and dive right in. Can you give everyone a little bit of your backstory?

Unknown Speaker 2:34

Sure. Thank you for that introduction. Um, yeah, you describe the backstory of that I grew up in a stressful household. I was the oldest of five children. Working class, my dad was a stonemason, he kind of forged his own way. My mom wanted to be the best mom, she could be. And that was really her dream is to be a mom. And stress, stress took over income, low income was really difficult. My dad had struggled with alcoholism. So as the oldest I took on a lot of the pressure of taking care of the peace taking care of my siblings. And I really just did not see that as much of a problem growing up until I became an adult and realize that the stress doesn't really go anywhere. And it's always there in my body. And after I went through a series of deaths, as an adult, it resurfaced in a really big way for me. And that's kind of that trauma that is in the body, it kind of resurfaced through the death of my mother in law first, and then the death of both of my parents within six months of each other to cancer. I had a one year old, and a five year old at the time, I was the oldest, right, like I said, so I went through all of the steps of taking care of their what they needed to take care of, with their health, and then with the death and all the things that come with taking care of what needs to be done after their death. Um,

Unknown Speaker 4:32

yeah, and that's a lot too. That's a lot of stress to take care of all of the final paperwork and having to go through all of their files and all of their bills. That's a lot to take on.

Unknown Speaker 4:46

Yeah, and you know, when you're in that survival mode, which is kind of where I was as a child, it was very familiar to me. That driven responsible one that's that That's very familiar. So I plowed right through it. The unfamiliar part came after probably a year or two after when the emotions surface that I didn't allow myself time to deal with. And that my husband became very, very sick with an autoimmune disorder. And having him be really, really sick in the hospital, I, you know, kept that kept that I'm familiar way of I got to get the things done, I got to take care of the kids, you know, the house has to keep going and running smoothly. And that day, he was coming home from the hospital. I broke down, I had had my body had had enough, I realize things were gonna have to change we were going to have, I was going to have to take care of myself in order to make sure the family is taken care of. I took on a lot of guilt for my husband's illness. And realize, you know, Mama's don't need to hold this guilt, and that I need to start putting myself first. So that was a real turning point for me.

Unknown Speaker 6:17

And so up until that point, you had been really sounds like serving everyone else, except for yourself. Since you were a child.

Unknown Speaker 6:26

Yeah, and we're taught, we're taught that as children, right, you put other people's first, nobody tells you to be selfish, no one tells you to take care of yourself. And that's just kind of our culture is to teach kids to put other people's needs first. And as a teacher, I'm a preschool teacher. For years, I was developing, I was helping kids develop their self awareness that they do have their own needs. And I really feel that that's been a part of me, from an early age, but because of life's like journey, and stress and, and ups and downs, it got really clouded until it was like, in my face, I got to deal with it, or I'm not going to be okay.

Unknown Speaker 7:20

And that was that was when you were dealing with the loss and your husband's diagnosis. Yeah.

Unknown Speaker 7:31

I kept going through with the work, you know, as a mom. And i Mom is really important to me as well. I value that attachment, parenting, gentle parenting, social emotional development. And so I saw the need to be with my kids as much as possible. However, I really enjoy having my passions and my purpose, my career. And I was having a hard time juggling the two of those. So I left the teaching field. Kind of mid year because I was becoming a really angry mom, a really angry teacher. I did not like that. And it was a part of me, I kind of stuffed down for years and years. And realize I needed to change. I went down the path of teaching yoga to kids. Hmm. after that.

Unknown Speaker 8:37

And was that what what sparked that idea? Was it just kind of like, okay, I just need a drastic change, or?

Unknown Speaker 8:44

That's a really good question. I, um, I had been teaching yoga in my classroom quite a bit because yoga is something I discovered at the age of 18. And I went to college, I was always curious about yoga, mindfulness, I developed a practice. And it really changed the way I related with my mind and my body. And it became something that I knew I needed throughout my adult years. And if I had learned those skills earlier, even awareness of your breath. I found that if I had learned those as a kid, I would have had a bit better time dealing with stress and started introducing it to my students. And then when I knew I needed a shift out of the classroom, I looked into teaching kids yoga as an option and got a I got a certification in a weekend. It's really really fun teaching the Kids do yoga, and videos I've made and have a yoga club as well online, like a family club that people can join into.

Yeah, and just the connection of getting to know your own body. I feel like for children, especially children that are dealing with some amounts of trauma, I know I attract a lot of that trauma in my body too. And yoga is such a powerful tool to move the energy.

Yes, for real, and until I went through my, you know, like you said, trauma from childhood, it's real, it's there, you and you don't know, anything to compare it to. Because that was kind of your normal growing up. And then as you if you have another traumatic event, like I did, as an adult, it's certainly like, Me, you, you've read about post traumatic stress or complex, traumatic stress, it, it kind of exists, it exaggerates that stress response in your body. And I had to kind of dig deeper in that moment and realize, I need a daily practice, I need daily connection to my body, and you read about, oh, just do your deep breathing exercises, right? Everybody knows, oh, just do your breathing. And it's kind of become this cliche thing. But really, there are so many breathing exercises out there, that can be so beneficial. And it just takes some intention setting, like you said, to be aware of our body and never have done it until adulthood. It can be really tricky to start a practice like this. Isn't it wonderful that the kids can just become more aware, my kids are already aware of their breathing?

That's amazing. I'm curious, Tanya, when you were really diving into this practice? Was it uncomfortable? Was it hard? Was it uncomfortable for you to sit through a practice to sit through a session?

Um, yeah, I mean, I've got it's, it's like building a muscle, they, you know, we call it yoga practice or mindfulness practice for a reason. You have to practice in the first. I mean, even after going, you know, a week or two without practicing, sometimes, it's very difficult to get back into the body, because we are very much in our mind, right. And so for me, I'm an over thinker. I, you know, if you tell me tell me to sit down and meditate, I actually have to have something to focus on, there are so many different types of meditations out there. And to get back into the body is my easiest way. So awareness, you know, just bringing my awareness to my breath, breath, or the feeling in my feet. And that that's really where kids are to is. Let's think about our hands for a minute, you know, like, how do you how many people do that? Throughout the day? Oh, I have hands. Let's think. Um, it really is more simple than we make it out to be. Yeah. And

is that something that you kind of realized as you were implementing the practice, because I know when I first started, I was like, I have to, you know, meditate for half an hour every single day and I got myself like, caught up that if I missed it, then I was stressed out even more, did you find yourself through any of that at the beginning of your journey?

Yeah, I have a tad perfectionist in me. So I, I was beating myself up, over not practicing on the mat, right? Like, I need to do it every day, or I'm gonna, I'm gonna, you know, not feel good. And yoga doesn't need to be a, you know, 30 minutes on the mat doesn't even have to be five minutes on the mat. We can do it anywhere we are. And in my I made a 90 day challenge on all these little things that we can do that or not on the mat. Because like, like moms, we just, we don't have time every day to really devote to a full practice. So even doing The dishes you know, sometimes I remind myself of Mountain Pose and grounded feed and tuck tailbone and rolled shoulders. You know, it takes 30 seconds of checking in with myself, or tree pose, this these little things that we can do throughout our day if we're if we're intentional, and that way I wasn't beating myself up for not practicing, is that is a practice.

I love that. And I think that's something that everyone needs to hear all new moms out there, you know that this is something I talk about a lot. But if even if that means, you know, you hide in your bathroom for an extra minute or two, it is okay. So, oftentimes in life, you know, life teaches us the best and biggest lessons through the hardest and most difficult obstacles. Um, can you share a little bit about the lessons that that you learned in your journey of dealing with, you know, being the caretaker for your family's health, and while also realizing that you weren't actually being the caretaker for your own health?

Yeah, so um, I just recently became a parent coach. And this, this has been, I mean, becoming me, like you said, and you're, you're probably the the name of your podcast is, I didn't realize that this was a thing, parent coaching. It was like, the biggest aha of my life. When no one teaches us how to be a parent, we learn it through watching our own parents. And it's just been such a journey to realize. So I went to school to be a teacher, I read all the books on behavior management, and gentle parenting and positive discipline and all these things and trying, just trying and trying and trying. And when you become a parent, you don't, you you try to implement these things, but you have this conditioned parent inside of you. So I just went through that, the certification and realize there's this other parts of me, that I didn't know existed, this little, little one in me, the vulnerable one, not the responsible, driven, take care of everybody one. But the vulnerable child in me that didn't have a chance to feel everything, all the emotions. And now as a parent, coach, I'm, I've been working through a lot of my own emotions, things that get triggered through my child, my children's behaviors, and how do I sit with those more and more? How do I sit with all that emotion that comes up more and more?

Do you have a piece of advice for those listening on how they might be able to sit with that emotion themselves.

So in my coaching, we have a practice called Safe seating. And if you think of the game of tag, where everybody's running around, like having fun and the tagger comes and comes to tag you, there's a sense of panic at first that you're about to get tagged, we feel that stress response, this safe seat practice is like going to the base in tag, we need to find that safe place in us so that we can look at our parenting from a place of safety. Oftentimes, our kids with their behavior, were feeling tagged, we're feeling stress and anxiety. We're not sure what to do with their behavior if we can go into this safe seat practice. And my mindfulness has helped me so much with this, to kind of look at the situation from this safe base, and then re enter in a different place. Yeah, that's really where the work is. And it takes so much practice, like I've said earlier, and that's what that's what it's really great to have a coach for. If this is something that's really difficult to be doing, it takes time. It's not like we just decided to do it one day. It's building that muscle of awareness in, in our, in ourselves and in our parenting.

Awareness. My favorite word?

Yes.

In every in every area of life awareness is the key. Because if you don't know, how can you you make adjustments, how can you move forward in the right way, taking that time to just sit, but to slow down to speed up, that's what I call it.

And as a teacher, we were teaching the kids to do it, right. Um, we had like, calm down areas, or the peace corner or whatever you want to call it. And I tried to implement that in my house, that didn't work for me. Because it was like, I was pushing and pulling my kids to do a certain thing for, you know, what I read in a book, go to calm down, go Calm down, this is the stuff you can play with and, and breast or read a book, I needed to do that for myself first, right and, and it was just such a huge self awareness that I had, I was like, wow, we are not taught to do this for ourselves as moms or teachers, we're trying to teach the kids all the time.

And did that really start clicking for you once, once you did start some of these practices for yourself, or when you realize that you just were didn't want to continue down the path you were going down.

Um, you know, we always see that as an option. That's what what we're told, put on your oxygen mask first, or calm your own storm first, and then help your children when you're in a triggered state of emotion. And like we said earlier, the body sensations are coming before the mind. Right? So like, I was being really reactive with my children. And when I started seeing the anger more, and being rough, like I never wanted to be a put hands on my kids. That was never going to be part of my parenting. When I started realizing that part of me, I knew I needed something else. I had I needed coaching through that, like, how do I leave my children in that moment and take care of myself? That felt like a foreign concept. And that it's not leaving, it's not leaving them. It's taking a moment to collect yourself to check in with yourself to be aware. And then come into an adult capacity. Because really, that anger was my little one in my like my little child inside me.

Yeah, I call them some the Big knee is the big higher voice and then the little means the little, the little voice like like you're saying yes. Right? Wow. Man. So if you could, if you could tell a parent who or yourself you're yourself before you started going on this journey, and I know that having a coach and having support and having that those kinds of resources is going to be the best way. But outside of that, what is what is one piece of advice for those who are who are feeling like they are living in that state of stress and anxiety and, and pushing that on to their kids and in turn transferring their trauma to their children? What is just one thing that they can do maybe today?

Um, well, first of all, taking a moment when you wake up to check in with yourself that that awareness piece checking in, how am I today? How do I want to show up today? Did I sleep well? Am I gonna be you know, tired? Do I need to give myself grace? Is it going to be a day that I need extra rest you know, checking in with yourself so you know how you're showing up that day? With what enter whatever energy you have. And then what is the most important thing is that we Just need to tap into the love, the loving kindness for ourselves. Because everything that we come to in our life needs to come from a place of love. Right. So when we are showing up with our children in a place of judgment, we're either thinking about their future, or their past. And we're not fully being present in the moment in a loving way. Right? So we're trying, we really, really want them to be successful in the future, or, you know, we're judging a past mistake they may have made or the way that they usually handle things, if we just look at every moment, from the present with love, we can really show up in the way that we want to show up.

That is something that I have found to be true too. And when you look through the lens of love, at least I've noticed this, but you're able to identify the root of the problem a lot better, at least what I've noticed with my children, because a lot of times your kid might be having a tantrum. And if you can just be a little bit more present, you can pick up what's going on, maybe the concrete is hot beneath their feet, and they don't have the verbal ability yet to tell you that so they're yelling, you know, I've seen instances of this all the time.

Yes, for sure. And yeah, there's these these underlying beliefs that we have that we need to we need to help we need to solve this or fix this right away. And that's our role. And oftentimes, they just need to feel something I mean, not the not the hot not the heart hot payment, but they might have to feel some strong emotion before they're ready to move on. Yeah,

man, so can you tell so, so you started your kind of parenting journey? Can you tell me how long ago that was?

Um, my daughter just turned nine. Okay,

so are your parent coaching journey I Paulo okay.

So, um, I just started this year my parent coaching journey. However, as a teacher, talking to the parents was something I love to do. I would write you know, newsletters kind of help you know, parenting tips or behavior tips. Talk to them whenever I could pick up drop off or parent conferences. I really enjoyed working with the parents because it was really hard. Like, it needs it needs like collaboration, right? It's it does, it takes a tribe. Like they say it takes a tribe to raise a child or takes a village.

Take the village. It does it does.

collaborator with the parents? Yeah, and that's, that's really important to me. Yeah. So

you kind of have you've told us a little bit about where you are today and kind of what you have going on helping parents right. But I want to hear hear more about your personal parenting journey let's let's bring it back back to where you are. I saw your little guy come on earlier on the screen, how have how have you felt? Maybe since it sounds like you have a nine year old and I saw a younger guy there as well. How has the shift Ben on with parenting then since you have been working more on healing yourself?

Um, it's been a really great shift. So my little guys five Yeah, my daughter is nine. And as when you want your children to show up in their own self awareness and all the glory all the emotion I I knew that was a priority in my life, but I didn't know that I didn't have the adult capacity to really deal with all the emotion they were gonna bring for me. So as you know, I could go back to baby infant, so easy for For me to stay present, they have such needs. It's not, it's everybody, every parent has different stages that they really connect to, or they can stay present with. Babies were one of them, because I knew I was going to give as much as I could. And that was easy for me. toddlerhood, when they start to fight back, they start to have major desires, right? They show you all their needs. Oh, I did not sit well with me because I wasn't. I wasn't owning my own desires and needs. So when they came to me with theirs, oh, it was really hard, the really hard emotions that they showed. And to shift now to this early childhood area, I was ready to I was ready to work again, like more work, that they're moving into more independence. And it's been, it's been really quite tricky, because I want to put my own values, my high values are, are my are my work, and it's one of them. And I had to own that. Wow, I do value my work in that I can do that and be apparent at the same time. And that doesn't take anything away from them. And so I've been happier. So they've been happier. You know? Um, that really trickles down?

I mean, because you have to, I know, it's so cliche, and you brought it up before but the whole oxygen mask thing if, if mama isn't taking care of herself, do your babies feel it? Everyone in the household feels it?

Yeah, for sure. And it's, it's been difficult to navigate the change, I still it still comes up for me, I have to use my safe seat practice. And then in coaching, when I have a need, like even this interview, right, like I have this need for work. And it's even hard for me still, it's a trigger for me to ask for support and help from my husband. So all these little things that I have to daily moment to moment, sit with and awareness and show up in my love right now my judgment? Oh, you should you should just be able to take the kids when I say or, you know, who am I? Or who am I to ask for help? You know, I'm the mom. And you know, all those things we tell ourselves or we beat ourselves up for I should be the one taking care of them not working. I have to be aware of those all the time to continue to live in my highest value.

Know, and honestly you guys awareness, it truly is like the biggest key to success in everywhere of your life. You know, taking that time to take inventory of what are those thoughts? Just as Tonya is explaining here? What are those thoughts that are going through her mind when she has to do those things? Do those thoughts serve her? Are they going to move her in the direction and her family in the direction that she wants it to go? And it sounds to me like that has been your greatest conquest has been just learning the art of awareness. Not saying you got it right all the time, not saying you're never going to be stressed out and maybe snap at your kids. But you're just you're learning the art of awareness. And that is truly the greatest gift that anybody can can achieve because it'll help them grow. And that's what life's about.

I love that the art of awareness. Yeah. And I was I was really trying not to own my anger. Like I packed it far, far away. But when I am aware of my anger, that's where I can do the biggest healing work. If I because I tried to ignore it for years I'm gonna be a positive parents. Angry anger is a normal emotion. It's, uh, you know, it's got to come out sometimes.

I love that you just said that. Thank you Thank you for saying that you guys see someone else agrees with me. The power of the dark side, we are human, we have all of the emotions and and I love that you are teaching children that it that as well. But because children need to be able to understand what that angry emotion is, because it's confusing.

Yeah, it feels it felt unsafe to me to feel it.

Yeah. How are they going to learn? Unless there's adults? Showing then how can we safely express this feeling?

Yes, and that the more that I am aware, and I am safe in those feelings, the more I can sit with my kids in those feelings, and not be so uncomfortable. It's still really tricky. I have a heart I get real triggered my daughter is what is very, um, she just has a lot of big emotions. And I feel them because I not feel them as a child. But it does not mean that I that it's easy, or I'm perfect. I still fly off sometimes and say things that I regret. And then I have to be aware of the feeling, you know, the feelings that I have after that? Yeah, we're not going to always do what we hope we think we're going to perfect. There is no perfect mom.

I'm curious. Tanya, I would love to know, um, when you do, you know, fly off or when you do have a quote unquote, bad parenting moment? How do you how do you handle that? Or what do you do afterwards, once you have the awareness that that wasn't the way you wanted to handle this situation.

So, um, I'll tell a quick story, because we were outside the other day, and my daughter loves to perform and sang. And she's directing. And she sets up the music, and she wants it to be a certain way. And my five year old son wants to be a part of it, and not the way that she has envisioned. So he came over to dance beside her. And she said, You need to be on the grass over there in the audience dancing, not next to me on the stage, he did not like that, of course, there's a, there's a quick impulse reactivity for my daughter to hit him or push him then he's hurt. My instant reaction is to soothe the hurt one. Right? He's got hurt, he was hit or pushed. She had her own needs. But I sued the little one, he's hurt. Of course, she runs away screaming and crying, because he got the attention. And that I let her cry it out or not let her but I give her time to do that. And I go and check with her. And she's not ready to talk. She's in the feeling part of her brain. There's no critical thinking going on. She's like, No, I don't want to talk, you know, get an angry and I'm not taking it personally. Of course, I'm going into my breath to calm myself down. And then when she's ready to talk, finally, I tell her, you know what, I come from a place where I was the oldest and you know what, I had really high expectations for myself. And I think I had high expectations for you as well in that moment, that you I really expect that you're older and you're not going to hit somebody and that's not really fair, because you were really feeling you know, whatever she told me she was feeling I don't like to tell her what she's feeling, right. We don't like that. Um, but just coming from a place of like, this is where I'm at. I'm really sorry, I should have given you a hug too. Are you ready now for your hug. And so we hug it out. And it just takes so much time which a lot of time we don't give right. We're just like ready to move on. And she was able to process the emotion in her way, not my way. And it's just about asking questions. We we read about active listening, we just have to listen to what they're saying rather than I know, I said I came with my backstory, but I really listened to her first and then I was like, Yeah, I was unfair because I think of you and the oldest and I think of you this way and that's not fair.

I love that. That was beautiful. for you guys. Tanya is amazing. So, Tony, I want I know that people want to hear more about you and and what is motivating you right now what like to help out these other parents, you just what's your biggest motivation? Witness? You

know, I've been thinking a lot about this recently. This is, today is my Wait, no, it's tomorrow is my mom's birthday. And she died. Her death anniversary was a few days ago, she died four days before she would have been 60. My mom is like, a really big motivation for me, because she didn't take care of herself. She wanted to be the best mom, she could be she loved so hard. She went through phases of trying to, you know, exercise trying to eat healthy, but she didn't take care of herself. And ultimately, colon cancer, took her life before she turned 60. And on her, you know, deathbed, whatever you call it, she was still talking about mama guilt. I'm so guilty, I'm leaving you guys. And you know, yada, yada, yada. Nobody should be feeling mama guilt, like, we need to be showing up in whatever we have with our kids. And so that was really my driving forces. I wanted to, you know, heal my own my own things, and I worked through it. And there are going to be times when I don't, I'm not happy with the way that I acted with my children. But I'm learning to process that so that it's not held as guilt in my body. So it's really not healthy. Yeah, and I want to share those processes with other parents, especially moms.

Yeah, and when you've when you have felt I know that this is that's like one of my driving factors, as well as when you have experienced the pain of that of that scenario. And that problem, and you find some things that have helped you, if you want to share them with everyone else.

Yes, and I want to end this generational stress cycle. Like, if we start with moms, you know, our kids are going to the advocate for themselves, and they're going to have that awareness. So it's gonna start to trickle down and through the generations, we're ready to put an end to this. The stress cycle that goes through the family.

Yeah, and and it is generational and, and the more people that are out here doing the work that you were doing, to help heal their own families. And in turn, that ripple effect is so much beyond what we can even imagine every child that you're children interacts with is going to feel it. You know, everyone that you speak to is going to feel it. Everyone that sees you in public interacting with your children is going to see it, the ripple effect is just absolutely massive. What can happen and that change can happen inside of yourself, starting in yourself rippling out into your children and your family and your community, and everyone else who interacts with you. And it's beautiful.

Yes, the ripple effect. And one of my favorite quotes Be the change you wish to see in the world.

All right, we're getting close to our time. But Tanya, if there is one final thought that you could leave with our listeners today, if they're only able to get one thing out of this entire hour. What do you hope that people take home and can sit with right now?

There is only one you in this world and you have to put yourself first which means you need to find love for yourself. Yeah, and that that can be really hard. It takes a lot of inner work but love loving yourself compassion for yourself.

Compassion, that's a beautiful word as well. So, Tanya, where can everybody find you? You've been talking about all of your amazing stuff that you've got going on. She teaches family yoga, she has her parenting. And she has a bunch of free resources on her website. I know for parents and a 90 day challenge, where can everyone find you and keep up with you and all the good stuff? Oh, yes.

So my website is www dot Tonya molano.com. You can get into my Facebook group from there where all these free challenges are, yeah, 90 days challenge is really great for body awareness, we go through 90 days of different different techniques, and there are so short, you know, five to 10 minutes, and you'll take them for the rest of your life, they'll build them into your life. I have courses on my website. Reclaim your body transform your mind is a wonderful one for for parents to start with. It's a five week guided course, through a lot of these things I've been talking about. If you don't know where to start with mindfulness and yoga, it's a really great introduction to that family yoga clubs there. It's a year full of yoga for the family, to separate two separate courses combined into a club. So I do a monthly phone class for the adults, it's all in there and kids yoga with nature themes. It's everything is so

that's, I'm going to have to we might have to try some of that out with my daughter. We did some yoga, kids yoga before, but we need to find some new ones. So I'm gonna have to check that out. And you guys, as always, all the Tanya's links will be in the description down below. So make sure you check it out, sign up for her yoga classes, join me in my daughter, because I'm going to sign up and, and go ahead and go and give her a follow on her social media channels as well. I'll drop her links her social handles in the comments below or comments, the description below.

And I want to say one more thing about coaching. I have group coaching available. And I'm developing a parenting course that's going to have all of this into one parenting course. And it's going to be awesome lifetime access to weekly coaching with me and all these gentle strategies and lots of experts are coming in parenting.

Beautiful. And you'll have an additional information about that coming up on your website. Yeah, so

the next few months, I'm gonna have a waiting list and it's gonna be Yeah, starting in the fall sometime. So yeah, the basal ages. The really the Facebook group is really where I really announced everything. So find my Facebook group Instagram as well.

Yeah, you guys go and follow her so you can keep up to date with all of her yummy, amazing resources and goodies coming out for parents since it sounds like she's just Tanya is just getting rocking and rolling with her offerings to the world. So I'm excited to see what else she has to come make sure that you are subscribed following all of her channels, join her group, and check out her website for her free resources. Thank you so much Tanya.

Thank you so much for tuning in to today's episode of The becoming the big me podcast. I know that you found value in hearing this story today. And I would love if you could show your support by going and grabbing a copy of our book and you can do so by going to bit.li/greatconquestyoucanalsogotowww.thegreatconquest.comformoreinformationabouteachoftheindividualsinvolvedinthisprocessthanksagainfortuningin