Teri Potter is a trauma informed certified coach supporting individuals, children and families in their quest to wholeness and authenticity. These can be such big topics so in this episode, Teri breaks down for us how we can begin to do the work of truly be-ing with our kids and transforming old ways of doing that may not allow our kids to feel connected to us. Teri speaks to what the world is calling for in the now and how we can help meet our young peoples’ deepest needs - to be heard and seen for who they truly are. It’s what we are all seeking! Teri’s wisdom runs deep and wide - listen in for a conscious conversation on raising our young people in a changing world.

EPISODE TAKEAWAYS:

How our children can be our biggest teachers

Bringing marginalized populations into the light

Why Teri embarked on the journey into Conscious Parenting

Ways of being with your child that you can begin with today

How quiet spaciousness allows our children to develop safety and trust

How simple questions to a parent can feel like interrogations to our kids

The concept of attunement and how we can apply it to relationships with kids

Young people today understand and support each other in new, expansive ways

The privilege of acknowledging the spirit and essence of our kids

Working with young people on a gender journey, ADHD or ASC (Autistic Spectrum Condition)

Holding a young person’s diagnosis lightly and learning about ways of being with a diagnosis

About the Guest: (bio, personal links, resource links)

Teri Potter is a Trauma Informed, Certified therapeutic coach, hailing from the UK where she lives with her husband and son. A long time truth-seeker, Teri is thankful to have studied the work of some of the world's most renowned wisdom teachers and clinicians in the field of mental health. With an extensive toolbox, she weaves into her work a mix of these teachings, to include Dr. Shefali Tsabary-Conscious Parenting, Dr. Gabor Mate-Conscious Inquiry, Dr. Richard Schwartz-Internal Family Systems, Tara Brach-Radical Compassion & Eckhart Tolle’s Power of Presence.

Learn more

www.teripotter.com

https://www.drshefali.com/cpmcp-coaches/name/teresa-potter/

Resources mentioned in the podcast:

Gabor Mate, Compassionate Inquiry https://compassionateinquiry.com/

Keri Bowers, https://the-art-of-autism.com/

Tara Brach, https://www.tarabrach.com/rain/

About the Host:

Maureen Spielman is the Founder of Mystical Sisterhood, a podcast dedicated to bringing more joy, healing and expansion to the world. She is a seasoned life coach who supports individuals through one-on-one coaching, groups and workshops.

Connect with Maureen:

Learn more about her work at www.maureenspielman.com

Want to join our Mystical Sisterhood Membership community? Find out more here: https://www.maureenspielman.com/mysticalsisterhood

Email Maureen at hello@maureenspielman.com to inquire about coaching, podcasting & speaking engagements

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Hi, I'm Maureen Spielman, and this is

mystical sisterhood. I'm a soul Care Coach and lifelong learner

committed to creating conscious conversations around joy and

healing. Each week, I'll host healers, intuitives and other

courageous women doing the necessary work of reclaiming our

worthiness, honoring our intuition and letting the light

in so we can more clearly see the light and others and

ourselves. My intention is to plant the seeds that lead to

insights and revelations. For you the listener, please join me

in building this global magical sisterhood. And thanks for being

here

Hi, welcome back to mystical sisterhood. This is your host,

Maureen Spielman. And I'm so excited today to be sitting here

with Terry Potter. Terry is a dear friend whom I met and Dr.

Shefali is conscious parenting Institute. And Terry is a trauma

informed Certified Therapeutic coach hailing from the UK, where

she lives with her husband and son. And Terry is a deeply

committed coach, supporting individuals, families, children,

in their quest on this path to wholeness and authenticity, and

stepping into who they're truly meant to be here. So today's

topic is talking about our kids, talking about kids now, in the

time that we sit here in 2023, the challenges that are out

there, the the environments that are being called to be created,

for them to learn and grow and thrive, and that same for us as

their caregivers as their parents as their mothers. So

that's what we're kind of setting the stage for today. And

I want to say about Terry as well, that she's informed in

many different teaching styles and modalities and

methodologies. And starting with Dr. Shefali, he's going under

studying with Dr. Gabor Ma Tei. And he does so much work about

trauma and trauma informed therapist and coaches in his

method of conscious inquiry. Internal family systems with Dr.

Richard Schwartz and Tara brach of radical compassion and

Eckhart Tolle. So you count many amongst your teachers, Terry,

but I welcome you here, as also a beautiful teacher, because of

your lived experiences, and, and everything that's occurred for

you in your life. And every certification certification

you've done, but how it's alchemize you into the person

and the coach, you are now and the mother, you are. So welcome.

And I'd like you to just say, hi, and whatever, you know, you

would want to follow up with there to begin.

Wow, thank you. Wow, that was an introduction.

That was beautiful. Thank you so much. It made me reflect a

little, actually, as I was hearing you talk about all of

that. I'm excited for this conversation that we're going to

have. And I'm just really so overjoyed to be here. You and I

began this conversation a year or two ago, I think that we're

going to continue today about the young people in our lives

and in the world. Absolutely, thank you. I mean, all of those

certifications, really, in the end, none of them would have

occurred. But for the one teacher that isn't in my bio

actually is written about him everywhere else. But my young

person, Eden, who really got me on this path in the first place.

kind of nailed me to the wall in terms of learning the lessons on

the fly. And now is my greatest ally in this world. Just super

happy to be here. Thank you.

Yes. And I just thank you for sharing and

just this idea, even when you and I stepped into our first

kind of spaces together, and really just got down to

conscious conversations and the conversations that were that we

were wanting to have. But we knew based on what was appearing

in our worlds like what was happening for us, that it just

required us to kind of study and open up new ways of seeing

things seeing the world. So I mean, maybe we can dive in right

there. I think that you had said that let's just talk about the

children who are in front of us, and they're they've arrived with

sensitivities. With behaviors demeanors, you had you had noted

with me. And so they're here for us, and they're here for our

growth and transformation. But this is the work you do. So what

where do you start with that?

Yeah, I mean, you just you hit the nail on the

head, right? We started this conversation, and we learned all

of this stuff. Because first and foremost, for me, I needed to

just show up, I needed to show up and understand how to be

around my child how to be in this world, which was seemingly

so so different than one that I, you know, had been aware of

before. And, yeah, I mean, there's a lot of expectation in

that in that last line that I use them. And that's something

that I've learned to, to have less of, till I'd like say, let

go of and still have a work in progress. But I've come a long

way. You know, the young people were talking about, I mean,

specifically stay late, and maybe I need to be a little bit

more open and black and white about it. And my son was

diagnosed autistic, at seven years old. And that 15 Now he's

been through every roller coaster that I could ever have

tried for him not to have gone on. You know, his journey is one

that he's very okay with me talking about, because he feels

now he's gone through what he has, in order for me to be able

to help him forward order for him to be able to help others,

he's still very young. So at the moment, I'm the person fronting

all of this, but that, you know, he, he was diagnosed autistic,

he had a lot of school trauma, a lot of behaviors that I had to

get my head around and understand difficulties with

communication, his anxiety got so great. At seven, he didn't

want to be here anymore. And he was attempting to do something

about that. And to be told that you have a suicidal, seven year

old is quite something you don't expect. I didn't even think it

was possible, I'll be honest. And then again at 12. Simply

because the environment, the setting that he found himself in

was just not sympathetic, it was not understanding, regardless of

how hard we tried to put the right thing in the right, you

know, put them in the right places. Often, it's just like to

see, you know, the subtleties that weren't that weren't

working. So we've, we've come a long way, I began doing the

conscious parent training when he was 12 years old. Because we

didn't know what else to do. And, you know, we were in a

catastrophic situation. And then, once we began to do the

work that work, my husband and I on ourselves, and we turned

everything around in our home really quickly, you know what I

mean? The work is ongoing, right. But it was like the

differences that we explored and experienced just by doing the

things that Dr. Shefali recommends, in her work,

conscious parenting, just, you know, so many little subtle,

subtle things. All of a sudden, we got our child back. And it

was really incredible. So we were making huge progress. So at

the end of all of that, and don't get me wrong, that wasn't

about curing his behaviors. It wasn't about trying to get him

to do anything differently. But it was about letting go of

expectations. It was about acceptance. It was about looking

at what's coming up for us and each and every moment. And being

able to show up with him without an agenda. Without some fixing

energy, but just with an openness and a lot of listening,

and a lot of stillness. So it made sense, from that point to

retrain. I went from garden designer to conscious parenting

coach in the course of a couple of years.

Yeah. Wow. Yeah.

Yeah, that we'd really okay. Did it wasn't so

bad. I'd left all my clients behind anyway. So yeah, that's

pretty much where we started from where that might be, you

know, we're talking about these, these young people who are, you

know, the label, highly sensitive, they labeled

autistic, they're labeled ADHD that hold us to account in every

moment, you know, and how they're, I mean, gobble Marty

talks about autism, for example, is he's got his own views on, on

what that is and where it's come from, and I don't dispute them

at all, but his quote is that autism is the child of social

disconnection. And that hand what's happening to the brains

of children, that we need to look at what's happened to the

child rearing milieu over the last few decades, I get that,

right? Because what he's basically saying is, our kids

should be raised by a tribe. And you know, the every adult should

be responsible for every child. And it makes perfect sense in

this day and age where we all go into our homes, and then we

close our doors, and there are little nuclear family of three

or four or even five, you know, the kids, the wiring in their

brains has kind of developed in such a way that it doesn't need

the social connection anywhere else so that it doesn't isn't

able to make those connections in a sphere, it is inevitable

that our neural pathways which adapt over time, but you know,

that he's my mentor, and he's been my teacher for what, two

years now. And I understand informed just how exactly that

makes perfect sense. And yet at the same time, I'm also a parent

of one of these children, right. And as a parent of such a child,

my experience is really personal, directly and

personally informed. And I know that there's way more happening

here than in the formless, as well as the forms. Yeah.

Yeah. So I hear you saying, Terry, you're

just these parts of your journey, and how, maybe at one

point in time, it seemed almost like out of your hands, and

you're escorting your child through the institution through

the system through being labeled through, but not really yet

having the tools to be able to understand it, and kind of know

that when we learn maybe even a few beginning things, we can

really start to turn the tide of the type of interactions that

are occurring in our homes. And I'm wondering, you know, what

were some of those things when you first said, Oh, my gosh,

this is an epiphany, the things I'm learning and, you know, what

were some of the just even simpler, like, what we see is

simpler. But we know there are profound changes.

Yeah, yeah, for sure. I think it's the things

that I add, they're always the first things that sort of tumble

out of my mouth when I'm coaching nowadays, as we start,

I wonder what it would be like if you were able to sort of

approach your child and just be you know, I walked around when I

first learned that one, it was tough. I thought, can I do this?

And I had to then come face to face with all the voices in my

head that were telling me, I wonder how we use and wonder if

he's had a good day? I wonder if he's upset about something. I

wonder if I wonder if he's done his homework. I wonder if he's

wonder if he's hurt himself today? Because we were going

through that at the time. So I learned to do work. You know, I

think it was Shefali suggested just before you walk in the

door, just zip the mouth. Walk in with your mouth shut up. And

I wonder what it would be like to just sit down alongside your

child? No agenda? No agenda, right? If he's, if he's sitting

there looking at his phone, maybe I can look at my phone for

a bit. I'm just sitting right and just sitting or maybe he's

playing a game. Oh, maybe I play a game and maybe then, you know,

some some little synergies will occur. So yeah, that was huge,

because it took a long time for him to realize that I had no

agenda. Of course, I had an agenda in my heart and in my

head. I so needed to know what was going on in his life. I just

couldn't. But I had to take myself out and sit with that. Or

journal about it or write about or phone a friend, a friend and

just vent or in the teacher even ask the teacher what's cope. I

really needed to know what happened at school that day. But

yeah, my child was one that just wouldn't speak. There's

selective mutism never ever would he do he doesn't. He

rarely tells me now what's gone on in his day, but he's much

more open than he was. But before he could have the most

extraordinary of days. I remember one day he was at

school and I was at an open evening, the teacher said, Oh,

it was incredible to see him the other day. He was he was he had

the fireman's hose. We had the fire engine and he'd sprayed the

whole the whole school yard and and then he got this certificate

for for getting an A star and whatever it was, and I'm like,

you know, he was six years old. I don't know what this happened

when he brought this prize home and I hadn't he hadn't given it

to us. He hadn't told us about this fire engine. I mean, it was

just kind of crazy stuff. Right? All the other kids So talking

about it, and he wouldn't tell us anything. So I learned to zip

it because my kid really needed me to shut up. Okay, he wasn't

going to talk to me because there wasn't space for him,

really. So that was the first thing.

Yeah. So Terry, that's, that's a huge, I

can hear you, it's a huge first thing, to be able to, even if

you have the internal agenda, which you're working on all the

time noticing the fears that you might be bringing in any sort of

projections onto him. And to be able to back up and just be in

silence. Is what I'm hearing you say is it created an energetic

shift within the relationship. And also, I always think of that

quality of safety. So for, you know, him to be able to know

that he was being held in a safe space not having things come at

him. Also, that idea of selective mutism, because I

think that whether it is selective mutism, or even I hear

parents say all the time, just a very quiet child, who doesn't

really say much, that that's okay. I always feel like, yeah,

we want information in the here and now. But I remind myself

that is that while we're creating these, the safety and

the container, it is a season we will pass through and come to

the next season where more is able to bloom sort of feels like

Yeah, and what seems like a question to us as

adults is a is an interrogation to the child. Right? It really

is. And then you know, some things, they're just and they're

not ready to talk until they're ready to talk. So yeah, also, I,

I know that my child and he's reflected this to me many times

now is when I'm able to sit with him, and particularly back then

and just sit with him, he feels so valued. Because I just want

to hang out, right, I just want to be with, right? I remember

when the kids was small there being this playful parenting,

when it first sort of got talked about. I remember them saying

five minutes of play one to one without any interruptions, you

don't look away, you know, if your phone rings, you don't

answer it. Just five minutes, it's gonna buy you three hours

with your child with your terms of how they're regulated, that's

just co regulation. Right? So we kind of forget that when they

get to be young people, I think sometimes. And I'm really

witnessing the fear factor and a lot of people when when they

become adolescent, there's a lot of fear in us, you know, as to

how we're going to be met, or understood or overlooked. not

heard, misinterpreted. You know, it's, there's a lot of fear out

there. And we're talking about all of our young people. I think

the reason that these, this particular demographic of this

highly sensitive child, and is I keep using the expression

nailing us to the wall, because it's it's almost like, they've

come here to bring word, but all of the young people and all of

the children, here's what needs to change, because it's not the

education system isn't just not working for these kids. But

these kids are shouting loud about it, these kids are

catastrophizing, but this for real, right? They really,

really, really can't do it. There's a lot of a lot of kids

that are behaving very, very well go in under the radar,

enabling the system in a way, you know, because because

they're just showing up as they're told to.

Yeah, yeah. And I was reflecting on that,

that idea of the change that's being called for directly from

our children. And so you're telling me that, hey, just

sitting down with you, we don't even have to quantify the time

it doesn't. It's really the essence of the quality of the

time we spend with them. But that they're almost I was

thinking about it. They're guiding us like I think the old

paradigm was that either your parents are absolutely there to

guide you. Now. I think of that different lay like that we're

each other's guides. And we're to kind of advance ourselves but

also with the idea of institutions. I think that

schools like we've always put all of our power in the

institution, the school to know how to guide but times have

changed so much and there's just there's the call for change. And

so we've always said out of the mouths of babes. But have we

truly listened to it? Yeah,

so yeah, absolutely. If we're if we're

really going to like, tune to the essence of human being,

what, how moreso than by hearing a child, but really a tuning?

That was the other one, you know, and when you ask about

what are the key things? You know, I think attunement was the

word that Dr. Shefali helped me to account about. And what does

that mean, Terry, tell me what attunement is. And that idea

that we could perceive for a moment, what the world is

looking like, through our child's eyes. You know, if we

sit with that young person, we just observe them just with real

curiosity. I mean, the definition of love, right is an

attempt at understanding the definition of love is an attempt

at understanding. So let's attempt to understand how can we

understand without curiosity, let's get really curious. I

wonder what's going on for him today. I wonder what I look like

through his eyes. I wonder if I walk into that room? I know what

he's going to see. Hold on, let me just check myself. Right.

Then we sit in his seat, let's do a bit of Gestalt therapy, and

we just sit in his deep suits. It's see me coming. Oh, you

know, sometimes I'm so guarded or preoccupied or, Alright, got

a list of questions, you know, I can't help myself. Now, even

with all this training, and all this time focused on a subject,

it's so instinctive because it's how we grew up. It's what it's

what the generations that preceded us, only knew how to do

nobody's to blame here, right? It's just the way of it. So

yeah, that attunement is the is the other part of this. And so

you're talking about it. As with the bigger picture, that idea of

attuning to what it is, these young people that are so who was

so close to their essence, in their in their childhood, and

even in adolescence, they've still got the still so much

closer than we are, there's so much that we need to learn so

much we need to tune into and listen to right.

And that, for them to truly be seen for who

they are. When you're talking, I'm thinking about how our

definition of whether we call it success or thriving, it was

really narrow. And the margins are opening up really wide,

where I think the the children, the kids, the teens who were

marginalized, are being invited to be with the whole collective

like we're all together this true, diversified sort of

collective. So that means we have a lot of work as adults to

open up our worldview of who's included, who's included in the

success who's included in the thriving who's it's, it's for

us, all.

Right, and I think as well, where we've got the

resources and the wisdom to get beneath them, and support them

in what they're creating, because they are creating,

unknowingly they're creating something which is so spacious,

so diverse. So much possibility here, or the collective of our

young people today are so supportive of it don't even see

it as supportive, supportive is not even the right word, because

it just is that way, right? You haven't young person who's

gender diverse, you have a young person who's sexuality differs

from from the next. There is zero judgment. There's this,

it's just the way of it. My son said to me recently, he said, I

just, I just wish that there wasn't such a thing as gender.

And I wish that everybody could just know each other's essence.

I think he used the word Spark, you know, instead of essence

because there's probably the word my my language but but I

thought wow, and I said he's doing and then it wouldn't

matter who showed up as each day you choppers whoever you felt

like being you can be masculine, the feminine, you could be

nothing, you could be everything. And this is what our

young people are doing. They're doing this today, they're doing

this in so many different ways. So I mean, I think the way I

look at it, I mean, I was just going to quote here for are

looking to my left, because I've got a quote here that sort of

seems a bit irrelevant. Now. There's, there's an organization

called pause for kids. It's issues of fact, the founder of

that program is Carrie Bowers and she's the mom to Taylor

cross, who's very much part of this organization they talk

about when we celebrate possibilities in autism. I'm,

and there's a reason I'm honing in with autism at the moment.

But the intention isn't to divide the community, your child

is a light, your child has something to contribute. Their

mere existence is a light, even if the challenges and pain are

significant. Parents need to refrain from placing their own

perceptions and limitations on their children. They need to

process their own shame, guilt and fear. So while I would go

beyond that, and I would say that these young people are like

beacons of light, actually. And they're actually guiding his

home. I think they're turning the world upside down. I think

they're debunking all the institutions. They're only

beginning with this fabled institution of parenting, right,

which is what we're trying to transform right now. But as

their caregivers, I mean, look at all the ways that we're

forced to grow. And to change. I, I wanted to I mean, I've got

a few different quotes here. But I wanted to talk a little bit,

though, about the transformation in us as a result of all of this

is also equally phenomenal, because, well, it's exactly what

you're saying, we can become a cushion beneath them, and

provide them this platform, it's hard for them. But without even

knowing it, unconsciously, they're all coming together. And

they're creating this expansive, new world of understanding and

largely acceptance, they've got a battle on their hands, they're

going to war, these kids, there's no two ways about it. So

with our wisdom and our understanding, I wonder if we

can help to underpin that with education. Because even as a

mom, of a young person who's on a gender journey, who's

autistic, I continue to educate myself daily about the things

that I don't understand, I continue to look my own

prejudices in the eye that I didn't even know existed that

stemmed from wherever I've come from generations and generations

of thinking and being a certain way. And I wonder, you know, how

much we I love this mystical sisterhood, because this is

bringing together people who are all really not just thinking

about these things, but they're stepping into this space of

spacious awareness, right? Of Consciousness of like, okay,

what do we need to be here? How do we need to show up here? We

don't know what this is. So So what's being asked of us? And

how can we bring it and let's all be in it together, this

sisterhood is phenomenal. Because that's so powerful. as

well. One person, I think there's more than two people to

come together. There's a third, right? synergistic effect. I

mean, it's just like, there's there's someone else in the room

when there's two, there's three, there's this. Do you know what I

mean with the energy and what we can do in a community like this

is otherworldly?

Absolutely. It's otherworldly, it's

exponential. And, yeah, I'm soaking in everything you're

sharing about your journey and, and the hardships that the kids

face. And I what I'm thinking of right now, is when children are

working through, you know, being accepted their own self

acceptance, and whatever is showing up for them, we can

begin to work with parents. And I want to I want to talk a

little bit more about that too. But also, we're often sending

our kids into the, let's say, the, you know, the schools let's

take, and we can foster the environment in the home and

really start to work on that. But what's been your experience

with working with schools? Or what, what are the beginning

changes that are, where I'm not talking about the schools that

are, you know, specialized to meet the modern day child, but

the schools that are the public schools are the that are that

haven't changed a lot. They might be bringing in more

programming or social emotional, but we know when you talk, I

sense that it's not about how do we fix it? And how do we, you

know, approach it from the top down, but how do we approach it

systemically from the inside out? And so what have you seen

as possibilities in that realm for our kids within even our

school systems? I know you're in England, but I think that we

probably near a lot of things that, you know, I have here in

the US.

Agreed. Yeah, absolutely. And I think, well,

it asked me that a few years ago, I wouldn't have known how

to answer that call. Often it's taken a lot for me to actually

breathe my way through the education system. My child has

been pretty catastrophic at times, I've, I, you know, a lot

of my friends, and a lot of my son's friends parents had just

been, wow, my goodness, I can't even begin to tell you some of

the journeys they've been on. And it's it's not a very

supportive institution education right now. However, there's a

huge grassroots movement of, you know, well, from homeschooling

to unschooling, but more importantly, than that, people

going into education and re educating, re educating the

institution now, my son is now eventually in a specialist

setting, and it was it was much needed. That specialist setting

you know, what specialist about it? Shall I tell you what

specialist about it, honestly, aside from everything else,

nothing else matters. They're trauma informed. Now, trauma

informed today is a tagline that people have started to get all

excited about in the last couple of years, God Almighty has

become a bit of a rock star, you know, talking about all the

trauma work, and rightly so phenomenal work, because it

informs people as to how to be around these young people, every

young person, actually, but here we go, our kids are pioneers.

So, you know, they go before everybody else. And they they

see that, whether they are highly sensitive, of course, are

going to be traumatized by things that might just pass

another child by, or they might just be a good kid, that's not

going to say they're traumatized. However, this work

is all about acknowledging the spirit, the essence of a person.

It's about listening. It's about a tuning. It's everything we

learned in conscious parenting is saying, You know what, you're

meeting human beings, you're meeting the essence of a human

being, you're stopping, you're looking at them, you're attuning

to them, you're listening. And you're compassionate. Really,

there's lots of tools and tricks to learn in amongst all of that,

because that doesn't sound like very much, but it's everything.

If we can bring that to the education system, we can see

what's working, what's not working, stop ticking boxes, and

actually just begin to understand the trauma work.

Those children are getting traumatized day in day out. We

did as kids, you know. So I mean, everybody's been more

gentle these days. Even with the best of pastoral care, these

kids just are being rushed from one thing to the next, being

overloaded with homework being expected to show up on time. Be

quick, be quick, be quick, you know, what if? What about what

if it was open? What if it was a bit more spacious? That's a word

that keeps coming to me to breathe, and to be and to

notice. I don't feel so good in this situation.

Terry, so many important comments there when

you talk about trauma informed. I've, you know, you've learned

through Gabor Matta and several other teachers. But when I think

of trauma, you know, the old, the old definition was that

something really big and catastrophic happened in your

life. And I want you to talk about that, just how that's not

the definition strictly anymore. But it also when you talk about

honoring the child that's in front of you, it's just like we

are learning to honor one another in our adult form is

that you come to me, and Terry's not just Terry in front of me in

this moment. Terry's been informed by every single moment

of her life. And I honor that and that's the Terry that's

coming to me right now. And that's what it says about just

what you're talking about trauma, like you're really

honoring the child in front of you for all of their all of

their experiences all of and you're holding them when in such

a gentle and compassionate way.

Yeah, and isn't that every human beings God

given right? To be received like that? It's just truth. And when

you when it's truth, you know, there's not a belief, you know,

you know that all of these different techniques and ideas

and ways of parenting and ways of teaching and, you know, I

believe or I've learned or what do you know, to be true? Let's

go with what we know. Let's trust this instinct. This is not

an instinct that need instinct less trust on knowing what's

what's coming up. But we have to be still for long enough to know

to feel to hear it. That voice. There might not be a voice it

might just be a sensation of feeling. She was so squashed

with squashed in teacher land were squashed in parenting them.

Everybody seems busy, busy, busy that there is no room. So when I

say to people, what about, I wonder what it would be like if

you just sat down next to your child and just I don't have time

for that I got to cook dinner, I got to do the washing? I got it.

I know, I know, I know, I've been there. I know. I

understand. I understand. And I wonder what would happen if you

sat down the child and just I just want to gather in your

head, you know, just wonder. Because when you realize when

you know, because I think any one of us can do that exercise,

and just sit and close our eyes and say, I can imagine I'm

sitting down next to my child and not speaking. And imagine

sitting there for five minutes, just imagine, there's a knowing

that comes up that this is the right place for me to be, you

know, you don't have to do together in your head, you know?

Well, time.

I think you too, I love listening to the

conversation right here at hand because it's so incredibly

calming. And the work that you just described in that parents

scenario of a parent saying, Oh, no, I gotta get up, I got to do

this, it almost feels like that's, that's our nervous

system calling to be calmed. And to be reassured that all as

well, even when we stop, we can. And then the conscious parenting

work is so special to me, because in so many ways, it's

allowed me with what, at first may have felt like a threat of

looking at myself. And the way that I showed up. It became, the

more I was willing to look at myself and guide my husband to,

into looking at ourselves in the way we were showing up. I think

that things that felt threatening about it, or that

were going to make me wrong, or that I hadn't done this for so

many years. And therefore that was wrong. When I started to

allow it in, it became more of a compassionate mirror for myself.

So it was a place that I learned and grew. And I think that

that's what I hear from the container you're building within

your own home. But then in your coaching sessions, it's just

like this really soft, it's honest, these new qualities that

are being called for. Now, right just in on Earth, in general,

we're we're being called to more kindness, compassion, softness,

expansion, spaciousness. I mean, we're using all these words, but

there's a lot of there's a lot of shift and transformation

occurring within them.

In the in the kindest way, isn't it beautiful?

Because we're everything, so nothing hurts, right? It doesn't

hurt. I think one of the most liberating things that happened

to me when I understood conscious parenting was when I

look back at all the things that you could, you could label as

having done wrong, right? Oh, my God, I wish I hadn't done that.

I wish I had that. You know, and I look at the younger people now

coming into conscious parenting as parents and starting with

their babies. I'm like, Oh, wow, all that time I missed. You

know, however, what I understood is, everybody is exactly where

they're supposed to be. And when you kind of get your head around

the fact that note, you know, nobody could have done any

better. Everybody showed up the very, very best that they could

with the tools that they have at the time. So how can we have any

regrets? How can any parent have any regret? Every parent loves

their child? If they're just if they're unable to connect to

that love? That's not their fault. That's not their fault.

That's where they are right now. So what's the best way around

this for this time? And how can we help mom? And how can we help

dad because, you know, right now, they're really got their

own stuff going on. And this is, this is real life. And this is

how it was meant to be. Everybody's got their own

sovereign journey, we show up on this planet to be how we are in

every single moment. So rather than say, Oh, I wish it could

have been different. Let's not waste that energy. Let's attune

to Hey, this is where we are. I can see how much you love your

kid. I can see how tired you are right now. I wonder what we can

do to to, you know, to work with? No, because here,

everybody, kindly, zero everywhere. That was really

freeing for me because I suddenly thought, I don't have

to carry this guilt. And I had so much parent guilt, Mother

guilt. Oh, yeah. Right. And I always had so much anger towards

my family of origin as well. And again, when you understand that

everybody's doing the best they can at every given moment, then.

Yeah, I agree with you. I was I was in that

guilt for a long time to questioning everything and

having a lot of anger and resentment, but that was also

pointing to me to what I was being called to heal within me.

And within those relationships, and I think think that the, our

kids are really calling for us to trust them. And so many of us

were led away from what we really knew to be true, that it

is our honor and privilege to be able to know that we can help

kids younger and younger, stay close to their intuition stay

close to their knowing, use their voice to express their

deep needs, wants and desires. Because so many in our

generation and what came before us, we simply weren't really

given that space.

Yeah, we were terrified of big feelings,

right? That was one of my biggest lessons was I had to

learn for myself why I was so afraid that my child was so

upset that my child was so in so much pain. Why was that sending

me into fight flight, you know, I needing desperately to fix

them. When you know, when I really broke that down, I

realized how absolutely terrified I was of having big

feelings myself. And what that would have meant was nobody to

hear them. So as a child, and you just think I'm almost gone,

I'm going to disappear. Because I've got these big feelings, and

everyone's looking at me like you shouldn't have them. You

know, there's no way for you to go as a child. So you're just

left with this trauma response. That's it. So now I can sit with

my child and he's upset and I say, hey, yeah, I can see is a

tricky day. That sucks. Okay, well, I'm here if you need me,

I'm here. I'm not smothering. I'm not sticky. I'm just, I'm

around if you need me, you know, rather than, okay, I'm gonna go

sort this out, or, you know, whatever it was I was doing,

there was a big fixer.

Yeah. And my, I think around strong emotions,

who I used to be really uncomfortable around strong

emotions, and it's still a part of me that I walk through that

is still I have to talk to myself actively when it's

occurring, and be with myself to say, like, it's okay, you can,

you can be in this space, and you can support what's happening

right in front of you. And at the same time, you know, giving

myself just really loving language to it's so

understandable why you want to flee or you want to leave, or

you just want to make this stop, because I was always suppressed

in that way. And so to meet our do you do, like do you do work

around working with the voices and giving compassionate

language for parents to use with themselves.

You know, what I what I really love and I am and

I've got so use familiar with it now that I'm noticing that I'm,

I'm talking about my child. And I'm not even really mentioning

what I do when I when I step away. I've got some wonderful

practices now. There's, you know, one of the one of the ones

that everybody should should know about is rain by Tara brach

and working through the radical acceptance there. But I tend to

do some work with just noticing what's going on in my body. One

thing I was taught very early, was every day, you got to go and

close your bedroom door for as much time as you can muster,

maybe five minutes, 15 minutes an hour, if you can phenomenal

every day. Just be with yourself. And when you're with

yourself, it's not doing, it's just being it's existing, it's

noticing, it's feeling into whatever's happening in your

body, breathing into it, noticing the sensations, not

labeling anything, we don't have to call it anything, which is

feeling. You know, it's really all about getting better at

feeling and being with the feelings, carrying the feelings,

and knowing that they're not going to eat us up, knowing that

they're not going to swallow us whole. Getting comfortable with

the feelings is the most important factor for me. Because

once I learned that I could actually ride those waves and

they weren't going to kill me, I realized I could just do that

all the time. And whenever I got into a panic, I could just sit

with Breathe, allow, you know, whatever practices allow us to

get back to ourselves like that and getting out into nature. And

I know we all hear this. I mean, people used to say this never

went in with me get out. Today, you know, yoga was really good

be meditation. But I didn't really understand what

meditation was until I made it personal. And that making it

personal for me is everybody experiences their feelings and

emotions are different in their body. I have a real strong sense

of the vibration, the sensation, and I can just allow myself to

drop in to that and just be with that. But you listen to somebody

else in their experience might be much more much more sensory.

It might be much more about listening to sounds or you know,

noticing something in the room. So Everybody's got their own way

in. Being in the shower and just being in the shower. That was a

challenge for me early on when I started this work to feel the

water landing. Nothing more. Yeah, I'm in the shower. I'm not

in the shower, thinking what I'm gonna do next I like being in

the water landing, noticing it on my body just like in little

things.

It's so beautiful. Terry, I, when you

say that right there. I'm thinking attunement to yourself.

Yeah, right. And so we were talking about attuning to our

children, and taking the time for the exquisite attunement to

ourself. And so in those spaces really getting to know you're

like you're saying, like, what's occurring for me and my body, I

continue to say that the emote the land of emotions, and the

work of emotions, and why emotions are here for us and how

intelligent they are. And really noticing our discomfort with

certain certain emotions, you know, we have this column that

are good, and this that are, and that's kind of conscious

parenting 101. But I think it's like, for me as an adult

learning that, you know, just a few years ago, it is life

foundations, 101. And I and, and I always say that, and I'll say

that in every episode is that, hey, I'm doing this stuff. Right

now I am working out, you know, actively on all of these things.

Yeah, absolutely. There's no good or bad to me

just to really get my head around that all emotions are

good. All emotions with me more about that we ride a roller

coaster, and it's all good. Even the downbeat. So you're

screaming your head off, this is Whoa, this is the bit and then

you get to the bottom you got I did that, you know, it's all

there. For us. The only the view that we have that we were

brought with to adulthood from childhood is that if we have

these huge, huge feelings, they're gonna overwhelm us and

we could die. That's the sense that we have, it's a child's

view, because the child, you know, just born when the parent

isn't looking at them, and that they're having a real meltdown

and the parent walks out. I mean, that's the truth for them.

They really believe they die. And that's the imprint, and we

carry that imprint into adulthood. Yes, so just spelling

that myth, having a word with Dr. bugaboo articles that are

stupid friend, that part of us that defends us, and protects us

when we're when we're a small child. And so being able to say,

don't have big emotions, because you might die. Well then

introduce that stupid friend to your 4050 year old self, and

just say, Hey, thanks for being there. Or this time, I really

appreciate you. But how about you take a backseat, there's

another job you can do write in a quiet

house, get them to meet your kids the age that you are and

that you don't need that protection anymore.

It's so true. It's so true, Terry. And I'm

thinking to have your experience with not only your own home,

your own family, but the families whom you've worked with

is the thing that I want people to know and I think you can

really speak to is when we begin to do the work whether it's with

ourselves in tandem with with our showing up in a new way for

our children, change occurs, change occurs right in front of

you can you speak to that? Because I think that that's a

message that's really important for parents to hear that that

this you've seen this work in action so what do you see

what I see when a child is heard, whether I'm

coaching them or whether it's a child of my own in my family is

that they they are what's the word I'm looking for? They feel

valued. And with that sense of value, that sense of self worth.

They become

who they are,

let him become who they remember who they are. And

when you've got people walking on this planet who remember who

they are as human beings, then everybody around them has a

different experience a positive experience of that person. And

you know the the knock on effect of that is just forever and ever

right. I know that one particular for So I've been

working with recently, I just got some feedback from mom,

which was amazing. And they said that their child is talking to

them again, the, you know, the more sort of physical contact,

there's more just openness you have people just need to be

heard. There's so much more to this. I know, I'm simply

oversimplifying, perhaps, but But yes, and no, I think we just

need to learn a new language, the effective change. I mean,

there's so much I could talk about here, we've got our young

people that we began talking about, you know, that are either

on the spectrum or highly sensitive that are going through

so many different journeys, that puts them in the minority, you

know, we've got the disability factor, we've got them

loneliness, the isolation, the sort of being gender non

conforming, and, you know, all of those things that, that

stopped them from fitting fitting in the world, like a

jigsaw piece, you know, everyone's expected to be the

perfect jigsaw piece to fit in, in this world. And they just,

they just aren't. And then so the odds of, you know, the sad

the sad part about that is the, you know, the people with these

kinds of in these kind of minorities, you know, I mean,

people with ASD, I think, three times, the odds are three times

higher that they're going to self harm than than somebody

without ASD, you know, autistic spectrum. So it's not even ASD.

Now, it's ASC apologize. But, you know, they're at an

increased risk for suicidality and all these behaviors, but we,

so when we listen to young people like that, the world's a

kinder place. They listen to each other, you listen to one

person, one person listens to another person, everybody's

paying it forward all the time. So I think the world just

continues to change, you know, mental health problems improve

overall. And, you know, this minority stress, that's a real

thing out there. It lessens its communities grow, and people are

hearing each other, acting each other and valuing each other.

Absolutely. Yeah.

So inspirational. You inspire me so

much, Terry. You know, and I think of I know that we're

coming to a close here soon. But, you know, you've mentioned

here and there, you know, just labels in general. And is there

a way that you guide parents to gently hold the label while

meeting their child? Where they where they are? Or is there some

work around there that are any kind of words of wisdom?

Yeah, I mean, for sure. I mean, I work a lot with

young people that are perhaps on a on a gender journey, the early

stages, actually parents a lot, because I know when that was,

first us, it was a shocking situation for us to be in, we

didn't understand it. We were terrified for a child. But the

diagnoses, autism, ADHD, all of those young people that the

children that are gifted these late, gifted these levels now,

that's an interesting term phrase, but I use it because I

remember when Aiden was diagnosed at the age of seven,

that the man who did it he, the psychologist gave me this

diagnosis and said, This is your golden ticket. Now, at the time,

I'm like, I'm sorry, I've no idea what you're talking about.

But it became obvious that this was your pass, you know, so

they're important and relevant. From the perspective that way

the institutions are set up, we have to be able to go with our

ticket and say, I need this, I need this, I need this. But hold

it lightly. That would be my message to myself going back was

hold it lightly. Because there's so much more than the label and

let's talk about the root cause rather than the symptoms of how

our kids are showing up. They why are they so exasperated,

frustrated, anxious, why have they got all of these behaviors

that we're all struggling to work with? Why, why because what

they require from us, is just a different way of showing up and

it is specially tuned.

Yeah, thank you for that. I really enjoy

that. Just holding the golden ticket very, very lightly, very

loosely, very lightly. And just kind of imparting to, to those

who might be listening, that it's all so worthy of our time

and our energy to make space to learn about these ways of being

and you know, whether we call it conscious parenting, we don't

even really need to put a label on it at all. It's just a manner

of intending to, to form deep connections and lasting ones

with our children. and that will, will not only change their

lives but affect the generations to come. And that, if I found

anything is it's a, it's a multi year, lifetime journey that I'm

on in creating change and creating the types of

relationships I want to experience and there's no,

there's no rush to it, there's no. So I'm holding that lightly

to or just just so gently and compassionately to know that

there's not a quick fix. But when we put our energy and

intention into it, shifts began to occur. So I

said that because the lovely Alicia, you popped

into my head after your podcasting of the day, I haven't

had time to comment, but I was listening and I, I, you know,

when you talk about time being nonlinear, this exactly that

because here we are doing this work and the world is changing.

Eckart Tolle calls it a new earth. And here we are showing

up doing this work. Because to do this work, is to meet the new

the new breed of people that are populating our planet. And we

don't know enough. So perhaps we can reframe education as an

institution, what if we were to overtake education as an

institution and begin to talk about all of these things that

matter energetically, kind of in terms of supporting the future

for these young people and a future let's also acknowledge

that we really don't, we really don't know what it's going to

look like, either. Be the people that are setting our kids up for

this phenomenal future when we actually, nobody knows what

that's gonna look like? Because it's so what if we listen, what

if we listen?

Yeah, it's so infused with love possibility.

And the things that I choose to see falling away are the

judgment and the shame that has so close to everything, because

the conversations we're having today are to just open up the

field of possibilities for for our kids for ourselves. And

there's no judgment on what what's occurred in the past.

It's just we are moving with the times, we are not reacting to

the times, but responding to them. And living in New very,

like it's a choice. It's I want to live this way. And I'm seeing

evidence that it is it is helping with the thriving, so

yeah.

Yeah. Utah, right. Resistance is futile. Let's

let's flow. Let's adapt, let's just be with it all, let's,

let's hear what they've got to say. And that's beautiful. I

love this company.

I know it's a beautiful conversation today.

And in just the beginning. I always love to hear from our

listeners, what resonated with them, and I have a feeling this

is going to be really impactful. So if they want to find you,

Terry, do you have an online presence a website? What can you

share with our audience so they can look into your work if

they'd like to? Yeah, it's

real easy. It's Terry potter.com. That's T ri.

Potter, as in Harry potter.com. Yeah, and all of my details,

contact details are there too. And a blog, feel free to jump on

take a read all my socials are on there as well.

Beautiful. Thank you for sharing. I'll put

it in the notes of the episode today. And I just want to thank

you so, so deeply for being here and sharing with us. I love the

conversation and can't wait for our next one.

So grateful for the opportunity, man. Thank you.

Thank you. All right, well

see you next time. Thanks for listening to

today's episode of mystical sisterhood. If you like what you

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