Mama Wisdom: Give Permission to Interrupt a Foul Mood

Personal Check-In:

I was pretty tender when I recorded this vlog. No makeup, exposed heart. Glad to be with you in this way, especially because I share a difficult moment with my son and what it taught me.

TL, DW (Too Long, Didn't Watch)

1. Sometimes I'm grumpy. As a mama, I can't always take a break when I feel grumpy about doing care practices. What I need is an "in the moment" intervention that can shift my mood while I'm with my children. And it needs to be nearly guaranteed to work because I'm a caregiver with responsibilities.

2. The same is true for leaders. We can't always separate from our teams when we need a bit of care or when we're in a foul mood. We may have one time a week or a month with the whole team to set the tone and inspire. Having an "almost guaranteed" way to ensure we show up well for those moments is helpful.

3. I use "Joy Discovery" as a practice for these moments. Once a week, I set aside time to search for things so hysterical that I can't help but laugh or smile. It could be a song (I have PLENTY of songs from my past that evoke specific moments of joy), funny videos, etc. I pull them out when I need to give myself a dose of dopamine.

4. A key to this practice is giving others permission to ask you to use Joy Discovery at the moment - I give my son permission to ask me to listen to specific "happy songs." After sending this email, I'm going to re-commit to this specific practice with a couple of members of my team (who know they can interrupt me in a grumpy moment, but they don't know about my private Joy Discovery practice@).

So, this is one I'm taking on with you - I'm committing to giving my team permission to use Joy Discovery to interrupt my foul moods if they see them. Want to take it on with me and do the same?