Yes, you’re doing the best you know how.
But sometimes, your natural tendencies can get the better of you. As a Type 1 mom, you have a gift for spontaneity, adaptability, and ideas. But if those tendencies get out of balance, they can damage your relationship with your children and make parenting less fun.
In this episode, Carol and Anne help Type 1 moms stop losing themselves—and get their sparkle back.
This week’s Parenting Practice
Choose one of the three mistakes that Carol and Anne share in this episode. Use it as an opportunity to make a change that improves your parenting and allows you to live true to yourself as a Type 1 mom. Pick only one! You are a bright light! Make sure your children experience the benefits who you are.
Transcript of the podcast episode
Carol: You just have to go, “You know, I’m never gonna paint my pantry pink and organize everything.”
Anne: Maybe you’d want to. Hey… That’s good for Type 1.
Carol: Welcome to The Child Whisperer podcast. I’m your host, Carol Tuttle, author of the bestselling parenting book, The Child Whisperer. I’m with my co-host, Anne Tuttle Brown.
I want to throw in disclaimer before we get in this topic that I genuinely believe the moms listening to our podcast are doing the best they know how. I don’t think anyone’s waking up and going, “How can I mess up my children today?” And yet there’s things you’re doing true to your Energy Type that you may not understand when they’re out of balance. They have a huge effect, side effect on your children that can actually be a issue for years to come even to their adult years. And when you have a knowledge which is why we’re choosing to broadcast this and say, you know, you might wanna know this. So, when your Type 4 daughter’s 30, she really feel she can trust you as a Type 1 mom. You wanna be able to become conscious of three tendencies you have that can actually kind of mess things up without intention, but they are. So, listen and notice where you fall in these three. Hopefully, you only have one to correct.
Anne: At least start with one. Don’t be too hard on yourself.
Carol: And remember, there’s no sort of, there’s no judgment here. This is all information. The more information we have as a parent that helps us operate consciously to make healthy choices, we experience the benefit of that in our family systems. We have closer relationships with our children, we have a more open, trusted bond with them, and the success rate just shoots up. So, that’s why we’re sharing this because we want you to be successful as a parent. You may not know this is playing out and there are side effects to it. So, the first tendency and that Type 1 moms—and remember, this is your upward light, more random, playful energy that can then move into…
Anne: Random, scattered, ungrounded, flighty, flaky.
Carol: Just too much going on.
Anne: So, this is a lack of follow through or not doing what you say you’ll do. So, like an inconsistency. So, either with promises that you make, or consequences that you don’t follow through on. And these can turn into then judgments of your flake because you don’t keep your word or you’re a pushover because you don’t stand your ground on the consequences.
Carol: So, you’ve really got two categories here. In the heat of the moment, you’re trying to resolve something with your child and you’re going to use some incentive tactic and say, “Well, we’ll do this.” When you really just want to move through and shift the situation so you’re using the promise incentive. But you’re really not going to follow through on it and you don’t really want to do it nor does it fit into your schedule, so your…
Anne: It might sound fun.
Carol: Yeah, and your methodology, you know, in the moment is, “I want to help, I want to create a correction here. I want my child to change their behavior in the moment.” But that’s teaching your child if you use that tactic in those moments as promises unkept, that you’re not dependable. “My mom doesn’t keep her word, you know, she doesn’t follow through.” Now, on the other side of it when you make the threat sort of this is, you know, lay down the law. These are the consequences. Even if they…
Anne: I’m the mom, I’m the one in charge here.
Carol: That’s right. And if you even enroll them in helping create those consequences and yet you’re the authority in the situation to make sure they’re followed through on and you do not, then your children are thinking, “My mom’s a pushover I can get away with this.” I see that with my Type 1 daughter, Jenny, who has had to work on consistency, and follow through, and consequences.
You do, you will experience the consequences. Now, with her Type 4 husband, the dad of the family, the kids don’t get away with anything. They know followthrough is impeccable in his practice as a father. It’s been interesting to observe that and go…
Anne: I’m sure you have that in your marriage or like they always listen to that whether it’s Mom or Dad and look at the Energy Types. Is there one that’s more consistent with the follow through, the details.
Carol: The correction here is I don’t think kids do better with—know you’re adaptable and make sure you don’t set yourself up.
Anne: I’d say take some time to determine where you stand, and what’s really important outside of that moment. It’s like there’s something that keeps coming up that’s like, I’m really passionate about that, I care about that. Are there other things that you feel like you should, you know, care about, but you just don’t? Just let them go and like stand where you stand, and then as far as like promises you make and things like that, just implement that into your life. You need to have things to look forward to and your kids will love that about you.
That kind of leads us to our second tendency which is adapting too much and losing sight of your lightness. You are a light, animated, buoyant person. You have that gift, but in that gift of that lightness, it can move into adaptability. And consider that in your parenting partnership. Are you taking on too much of their energy if they’re more Type 4, Type 2, 3?
Carol: Try to get their way. Or you’re observing others and thinking you need to do it like other moms you know.
Anne: Or your mom.
Carol: Your own mother. Yeah, that’s true. My oldest daughter, Jennifer, have that tendency. I’m a Type 3 and have a much different experience in life than her as a Type 1. And she has learned through the years now that she’s 37, that I don’t do a lot of what inspires and motivates my mother. I’ve gotta do this differently. And it took her some time to kind of sort that out, but she does a great job at it now. And so, especially with the social media influence, you just have to go, “You know, I’m never gonna paint my pantry pink and organize everything…”
Anne: Maybe you’d want to.
Carol: That’s the thing though. There’s a difference between when should or want, and so, because of their adaptable nature, there’s a tendency to fall too often on “should,” to adapt to do things that really aren’t their passion and their love. I remember Jenny saying years ago, “Mom, I know I’m not if I buy all the stuff to do this project. I know now. I’m not gonna make it”. I don’t care that I don’t find any pleasure in that.
Anne: She just decided to let it go.
Carol: Yeah, she was adapting, again, she was making convincing, you know, Type 1s are talked into things pretty easily. You talk yourself into things pretty easily to say, “Oh, I’m gonna love doing that.” You observe your fall-off rate and go, “How many things did I think I wanted to do that I didn’t?” I’m just telling myself now that really wasn’t an interest of mine. Take inventory on that, where are you adapting? And your children then are experiencing this busy mother without productive outcomes that bring joy to your life and your family. Because you just tried too many new things, or adapt to too many practices.
Anne: What can happen to the children when the mom’s not living true to her nature? She’s feeling like she’s adapting someone else’s.
Carol: Well, they’re not learning just to live true to themselves for one thing. And there’s a dependability… it kind of follows the same theme as the first fall out of not following through is, your children need to know in this world of sort of crazy they can depend on their mom. I can depend on my mom to be a certain person, I know what to expect from her. And so, as you use that gift of adaptation to be able to change your mind in the moment for something that doesn’t look like you’re not dependable. See, it has its place, it has its place in your world.
Anne: Expand on that a little bit more.
Carol: You know, something didn’t work out, you bet you gotta be able to say, well, we got to move from A to B. You have the quickest, you know, change-on-the-dime effect of anybody. I can turn on a dime…
Anne: People are very effervescent, they’re natural cheerleaders, they pick up from a hard situation and…
Carol: You can teach your children how to adapt…
Anne: We’ll adapt to that situation, we’ll make the best of it.
Carol: You’re going to have to adapt a lot in life because things don’t always play out the way you want to help your children learn a gift that you have in doing that, and how to see that bright side. That silver lining in the cloud, you know.
Anne: Is the difference that it’s coming from within and not from like the outside saying you should be this, but you’re saying like…
Carol: You have a gift for that, you have a gift to say, “I can always look…” Your mother-in-law, Marcy, to me is the epitome of always finding the benefit.
Anne: Silver lining.
Carol: She’s ca…I mean, no matter what. Anything I’ve ever talked about her that had even some really hard like…
Anne: She’s had some hard troubles.
Carol: She will reference a blessing or a benefit she’s experienced. Always, she will always land in that place. It doesn’t diminish the pain or the issue, but to use this gift of adaptability not to kind of pull you out and go, “I got too much going on, and I’m adapting to too many parenting styles, and I’m trying to find my way.” Use your adaptability to teach your children and like practice that will serve them beautifully through the years. So, you know, one of the best things I learned from my mom was how to take a kind of crummy situation and make it good. Because my mom is like a master at that.
Anne: And that is a natural gift for Type 1s that I really appreciate.
Carol: Yeah, I’ve learned a lot from Type 1s that just have that ability to…I’m like, I wanna like go off and get, you know, crappy about this. And they’re like, “Well, what?”
Anne: Shut up.
Carol: They’re like, “Wow…”
Anne: …Type 3 tendency.
Carol: “I’m not ready to go there yet.” You know, Marcy is talking about, you know, and I’m like, “Really? Okay, I guess I’ll shift.”
Anne: Yeah, they do. They bring you there and it’s like, you know, their lightness is such a fun.
Carol: She especially, she’s a very educated woman, if she’s not doing it kind of superficially. She really has a very insightful way of it. So, use your gift of your own Type…
Anne: To develop that within yourself.
Carol: Yeah, get your wisdom going and really see that you’re not just trying to gloss over something and go, “Let’s not think about it, let’s just make it good. You know, let’s go a little deeper than that, you know, let’s truly find the gift in the situation that might be challenging a child and still validate their feelings. And I know you’re struggling with that or it’s difficult and you’re feeling discomfort and you’re feeling some emotions. And let them have that moment and then teach him how to work with it, how to change on that dime. You know, stay real.
This last tendency is fascinating to me because you would think this is a good thing in a Type 1 experience that tends to be more open, more random, more kind of in that…you turn-on-the-dime approach to life that structure’s going to be kind of this asset.
Anne: Help balance it.
Carol: Yes, it’s like should you have to spend time as you’ve noticed where structure’s not necessarily an effortless trait characteristic built into a Type 1 child, you may have learned through the years you’ve really gotta learn to be structured to the point though that it’s running to an extreme that you’re overly structured. So, interesting. You think we might be telling you you need to get more structure because you don’t have enough. When actually it’s the opposite.
Anne: Don’t become too structured.
Carol: Because why? What happens?
Anne: It’ll snuff out your light, it’ll put you in a box, and you will just shut down in a way or you’ll become the opposite then, where you’re just like that inconsistency…
Carol: You lose your bounce.
Anne: I think it motivates inconsistencies because you come too structure then you’re like, “I can’t do this anymore.” And then…
Carol: That’s true. That’s when the other two, right? And the other two play out, you know, you don’t follow through and you randomly change course.
Anne: I’ve seen this with Jenny, where she’s like, “Okay, I have this great plan, I’m gonna follow through.” And it was when our kids were younger and they needed more structure and it was like meal planning, or, you know, just a day plan and she’d get really detailed into it and like, I think, a week later like, “I changed my mind. I can’t do this anymore.”
Carol: It’s too overwhelming.
Anne: And so, she’s found the balance of what’s the right amount of structure and what sounds fun, what sounds exciting, and knowing that, “I’m gonna stick to this for two weeks and then it’s gonna change. I mean with the new structure that works for me and for my family.”
Carol: Finding a hands-on day planner, I think, is a key here. I’ve noticed with Jenny if she uses that and she can animate it a bit, and the way she’ll fill it in and to find that ability to…even if you take a piece of paper but, do it in a way that supports your natural movement that I haven’t, and where in your life do you, where is a structure the most beneficial and not requiring it in every piece of your life?
Anne: We’ve talked about this, chunking your day rather than like getting down to the hour. Like what’s your morning structure look like?
Carol: That’s in our Lifestyle content. We really, really, really encourage you to join Lifestyle because it will support… It’s like personal coaching for me and my Expert, Energy Profiling and Dressing Your Truth group of women. We’re coaching, inspiring, motivating, educating you how to live true to your nature successfully and be a successful mom, woman in life, with some really amazing content. So that’s a real asset for you to be giving yourself that. Because you’re gonna…
Anne: Dressing Your Truth.
Carol: Yeah, dressingyourtruth.com/lifestyle. And back to this, I think the first to do is where is structure the most beneficial to your family? What few areas of life really require structure? Maybe that morning routine that you have…
Anne: Maybe the weekend when everyone’s home needs more structure. And also in your planning, make sure that you’re scheduling things to look forward to, for your own well-being. As a Type 1, that does wonders to have something to look forward to and we’ve talked about this and other places, in Energy Profiling that doesn’t have to be a big trip to Disneyland, it can be going out to lunch, it can be going to your favorite grocery store by yourself while your husband has the kids at home, it can be somewhere you’re taking the family, or have lunch with your friends.
Carol: It could be a show you like to watch once a week and, you know, like last night I’m not…this is where my Type 1 comes out though. I watch Survivor and I’d had a really full day of work, worked a nine-hour day yesterday and came home and I told my husband, “I’m watching that no matter what.” And I bounced on my rebounder while I watched it.
Anne: There you go.
Carol: I had my little Type 1 moment. Because I needed to just go, let down, and have something fun to do.
Anne: Well, and that’s the gift of Type 1s. As you plan something to look forward to, you are involving others in it and that’s a great gift that you bring to your family is having those fun social outlets, or bringing that lightness and new opportunities into your family. So, make sure that you’re planning those as a part of your overall plan to support you and make sure…
Carol: Structure those.
Anne: Yeah, yeah, that was on your list.
Carol: Your parenting practice this week is to choose which of these three opportunities you have to make a change to improve your parenting experience, and to live true to yourself as a parent, as a Type 1 mom. Just pick one, and what are you gonna do to make a positive change?
And remember, you are doing a great job, you are a blessing and a gift to your family. You are a bright light, make sure they are experiencing the benefits of that. Be true to yourself. That’s one of the greatest gifts you can give your children and role modeling, living the truth of who you are. They know when you are, they feel it, and they will always appreciate you for that.
Thanks for listening. For more support, go to thechildwhisperer.com where you can purchase the book, subscribe to our weekly parenting practice email, and find a transcription and audio of “The Child Whisperer” podcast.
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