Podcast Transcript
Attendees:
Joshua Boswell, Margie Boswell, Marielle Melling
Transcript:
Joshua Boswell: Hello friends, welcome to the happy family Club podcast. We are so excited to have you here today. And what an awesome treat we have with our latest guest expert. And I'm actually gonna let Margie introduce you, Marielle. So fire away, babe.
Margie Boswell: Marielle Melling, we're so happy that you're with this. Thank you for joining us.
Marielle Melling: Thank you.
Margie Boswell: Marielle is a parenting expert, Mother of five. That makes you an expert just in and of itself, doesn’t it?
Marielle Melling: Right!
Margie Boswell: And she's got her personal experience that she's mixing with her professional background in health education and holistic health coaching to bring so much more to the table of parenting and helping us understand how to juggle the chaos that happens in all those different roles that we play as parents. And…
Joshua Boswell: Is there chaos in parenting?
Margie Boswell: Uh, well…
Joshua Boswell: Every now and then, right?
Margie Boswell: But I love how Marielle has created these effective systems to help us find a lot more peace and just influence the mindset that we have in regards to Parenting and our children.
Joshua Boswell: And I love the name of her brand, her site, Loving Life with Littles, right?
Marielle Melling: That's right.
Joshua Boswell: Awesome!
Margie Boswell: So great!
Joshua Boswell: So many parents complain about their little ones and it’s not… It's a fast time that goes like that. And it's a beautiful thing. So your title’s spot on. Anyway. Sorry to interrupt. Go ahead.
Margie Boswell: No, that's great. That's wonderful. I love that. And just all the resources that she has are amazing as we've been going through and reviewing them. The newsletters and her book… Her book is Peace Amidst Mayhem, right?
Marielle Melling: Yeah. Yep.
Margie Boswell: Yeah, I love that. That's a great title. And it just helps parents to simplify their lives and really focus on what is the most important. And so we just really appreciate you being with us, Marielle, and look forward to your words of wisdom.
Marielle Melling: Thank you.
Margie Boswell: Yep.
Joshua Boswell: Cool. So, I would love to hear your insights on Happy Families. But before we dive into that, I love hearing the background and the reason why people do what they do. Because we talked a little bit before we hit the record button, and it's not every day that people wake up and are like, I'm gonna change the world, and impact thousands of families and be a mom expert. Or a parenting expert.
Marielle Melling: That's not how it goes. No. At least not for me.
Joshua Boswell: So I'd love to hear a little bit about your background and your reasons why. I mean, what got you to where you're at right now?
Marielle Melling: Yeah, absolutely. So many years ago, it was really a busy time, I would say, for my family. I had a lot of responsibilities at that time. We had four kids, I was pregnant with our fifth. My husband was working really insane hours away from home for our family. So the home, the meals, everything was on me. And besides business and responsibilities, we had a lot of other family challenges. I was working four part-time jobs, trying to juggle that. And in the midst of all of these things I was working on this thing and it kind of just dawned on me in this moment of clarity, like… I have so much peace right now with my life.
Joshua Boswell: Mmm.
Marielle Melling: I love my life. And from the outside looking in that’s probably not what people would assume at that point in our lives. And I just started thinking about this and realizing… this is not for me. What I'm experiencing right now is not just for me. I need to share this. And so I started really researching, diving deep, finding for example a dear friend whose husband had just passed away from cancer and left… You know, they had three little kids at the time.
Joshua Boswell: Mmm.
Marielle Melling: Another woman whose husband left her with the kids and then their home was taken out by a tornado. And all of these situations that were far more difficult than what I was going through, and these individuals were still experiencing this really deep sense of peace.
Joshua Boswell: Mmm-hmm.
Marielle Melling: it became so clear to me that peace has so much to do with what is going on inside of us rather than what is outside of us.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: And so that's kind of the start of where we have come today. It started there and then it has grown into how do we help parents simplify in a way that they can access that peace and that they can feel that through every stage? Because like you said, I believe life is way too short not to find joy in every season of life.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: So that's where we started and we've grown a lot since then. I've learned a lot since then, but that's where we come from.
Joshua Boswell: That's amazing. That's a beautiful place to start. And it's awesome that you recognized that you had that peace. And I really wonder… I really wonder what was the precipitating thing that drove you to start sharing that? Because a lot of people experience awesome stuff, but they don't feel compelled to share it. And I just wonder what was going through your mind and to start this crazy adventure?
Marielle Melling: Yeah, so it was…
Joshua Boswell: Because you had a few things going on in your life before that!
Marielle Melling: Yeah, and what is crazy to me is that I think part of it was a calling, right? You don't have all of that on your plate and then decide that now is the time to write your book…
Joshua Boswell: Right.
Marielle Melling: …without a deeper sense of like, NOW’s the time to write your book, right?
Joshua Boswell: Yeah!
Marielle Melling: So part of that was a definite what I felt was a calling. Like I said, this wasn't meant for me. And almost my responsibility and my joy was going to be to share that with other people. And that I needed to do it right now because I was in the mayhem. I was in so many ways. I was living it out right then. And I didn’t realize this till after, but had I waited two or three years, a lot of that mayhem had reached its conclusion. And so I was able to really lay the foundation and put so much into writing and start creating these courses and things in the middle of what parents were actually going through with me.
Margie Boswell: Mmm.
Marielle Melling: And so I think that was a piece of it. The other part I'm gonna say was my mom. My mom was like, you need to do this. She's like, this is something you can do. You have the skill set to do this. You need to pursue this.
Joshua Boswell: That’s awesome.
Marielle Melling: So those are, I guess the two big “Why now?”
Margie Boswell: The two big…
Joshua Boswell: You know… good for you for listening to your mom.
Marielle Melling: That’s great.
Joshua Boswell: We should always listen to our mothers, right?
Margie Boswell: There you go.
Joshua Boswell: So fun and I love that you also felt a calling. You felt a higher purpose behind that.
Marielle Melling: yeah.
Joshua Boswell: And we have found that with so many of the experts that we've dealt with, and… I think especially right now in today's world that has so much… there's so many stressors for families and for parents. We interviewed someone before and they said that the infant mortality rate is rising because moms are struggling so hard financially, socially, emotionally, and just…
Margie Boswell: Their health, and everything… Yeah.
Joshua Boswell: And their health. And it's sad, right? And there's all these other stressors that are going on. And I think that God is really reaching out to a number of people and saying, Look. Other people need help and you've got the ability to do it, so go. So thank you for responding to that prompting, that push…
Margie Boswell: Yes.
Joshua Boswell: from inside, from the Lord to just do more. Because we've looked, there's lots of families who've been blessed because of what you're doing. So, it's really cool. Yeah.
Marielle Melling: Well thank you.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah. So talked to us a little bit about happy families and finding that peace and that joy in the midst of chaos. What's something that we can do to get to that spot?
Marielle Melling: Yes, so my tagline is Parenting Life Simplified.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: And so as I have really tried to do that, like parrot back like, what do families really need right now? What do I really need right now? What were the things that actually made a difference for me in my craziest times? And I continually come back to the same thing over and over and over and over. And that is… it's backed by decades of research. It's backed by scripture. It's backed by the wisdom leaders in every religion. And that is that our relationships matter most.
Joshua Boswell: Mmm.
Marielle Melling: And we do a lot of things really well when it comes to relationships, especially in parenting. I think that our parents love their children so well.
Joshua Boswell: Yes.
Marielle Melling: I am constantly amazed at what parents are willing to do for their children. And at the same time I think there's still a lot of room for us to grow as far as how we spend our time, and what we let into our lives, and how do we love in a way that our children understand it as far as their emotional development goes and their individual needs and things like that. But at the heart of it, it is becoming a parent who can continually come back to, What I care about most right now is my relationship with my kid.
Joshua Boswell: Hmm.
Marielle Melling: Because there's so much that we could care about, right? From the day-to-day, I have to get food on the table and I need to clean up and have a semblance of sanity around here and all those things, to the deeper, maybe more challenging things like resentment, or childhood wounds, and all those kinds of things. And so a lot, like everything, that we do comes back to being able to be in relationships better.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah, by the way, Margie and I wholeheartedly, emphatically agree. It's amazing because the relationships… You know, our relationship with God, our relationship with each other, our relationships with our children. It impacts everything that goes on inside of our life. You're so spot on with that. It's really cool.
Marielle Melling: Yeah.
Joshua Boswell: So, simplifying it down to that, what are some practical ways that we can…? Actually, first of all, I want to start with the practical thing of the simplifying part of your tagline, right? Because we know to focus on but you know… Getting… shoveling stuff off simplifying down…
Margie Boswell: Saying no.
Joshua Boswell: Saying no is not easy!
Marielle Melling: It’s not. It’s not.
Joshua Boswell: Especially, again, there’s so many wonderful things in our world. I mean, we live at a time where never before there's been so many opportunities for us and for our children to grow and get knowledge and have personal growth and greater… everything. It’s just amazing. So…. good, better, best. Where do you focus? What's your insight on that simplification process?
Marielle Melling: Yes, that is such a good question. So there's a lot of things that can go into that. If I'm looking at kind of the general big picture, like I want to, I think I need to simplify, right?
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: I think it’s really helpful for us as big hearted parents to recognize, like you just said, there are good, better and best. And if I spend all my time doing good, and never get to the best, I'm missing out, right?
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: And my children are missing out. And so it gets down to, and this is what I realized in that really hectic time of life it is ruthless prioritization.
Joshua Boswell: Mmm.
Marielle Melling: In a sense that I have to come to peace with what I'm doing right now. And what I often tell parents, because we have this mom guilt, right?
Margie Boswell: Totally.
Marielle Melling: It’s real. I think that there's dad guilt as well. And I don't think, I know, that there is Dad guilt as well, but we've termed it Mom guilt. The sense that I can never do enough. The sense that whatever I'm doing, it’s not enough. I'm not enough. When my kid messes up, it's my fault. I don't sign up for the parent teacher association. Like ahh… it's so heavy. And so what I often encourage parents to do is to say look at what you are doing.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: Look at the thing you are doing, go through those things and say, is this a best? Is this a best? Is this a best? If the things that I'm doing feel good, if they're aligned with what I feel is best for my family, then you let go of all the rest. Right?
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: And if you look at something and you go, you know… this isn't the best. I don't like arguing. I don't like 50,000 hours away from home because we don't have time for that home. I don't like whatever it is. That's where we make shifts.
Joshua Boswell: Mmm.
Marielle Melling: And so then we say, I feel like… so I'll often ask friends, Where is your pain point? Where are you feeling frustration?
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: Where are you feeling angst? Where are you feeling not at peace about your parenting life? And if it's something as simple as, let's say cleaning. Like, my house is always a mess. I never have time to organize like I want… We'll just talk about the way things are and then we say, Okay, what is the bare minimum that you would go to bed and feel like I did a good job cleaning today?
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: Right? Because we don't have that as a society. We are constantly reaching for more. We are constantly… In fact, we went to this really great event the other night and I was talking to my dad and he said, You know, this event has been going on for years. And for many years the event coordinators were trying to one up themselves, right?
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: It was like every year they had to add something new and every year it had to grow a little bit. And at some point it got ridiculous. There was so much time and money going into it when the purpose of the event was met years before that.
Margie Boswell: Mmm-hmm.
Marielle Melling: And so the leaders in a very wise way said, Let's draw it back. What is the purpose? And how do we do that? And so with parents that's what I like to encourage. What is the purpose of keeping a clean home? Right?
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: It's not too much to ask to have a clean home. Even with little kids. But what is the purpose of that thing? What is the purpose of your kids doing after school activities? Because I think it's great, if you have the means, to provide some of those things. What is the purpose of…? Go back, ask yourself, Really? Why are we doing this? And then at what point could that bare minimum be met? And if you want more than the bare minimum you can get there, but start with that. Start with that.
Joshua Boswell: Awesome.
Margie Boswell: So good. That’s a good point.
Joshua Boswell: I mean, it's really what you're talking about, it seems to be this focus of, Okay, look at our life… and I think at the core of it's making this decision about what is our priority? And what are our core values? And bumping that up against the activity and saying, Is this the best activity to meet those values, those…
Margie Boswell: Criteria.
Joshua Boswell: Those criteria? And if not, I love this about like, Okay now I have permission to just let it go.
Marielle Melling: Let it go. Yep.
Joshua Boswell: It's like… Remember…
Margie Boswell: There's a really great quote we like about if you put God first then everything else will fall into place or just fall out of your life, you know?
Marielle Melling: Yeah, yeah.
Margie Boswell: And we always thought, It's okay if things just kind of fall out. Even if they're good things it's okay to just let some things go and focus on what's the very most important.
Marielle Melling: Mm-hm.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah. I know when we were new, young, married… Well yeah, we were pretty young. We had five children at the time?
Margie Boswell: Our oldest was six.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah, so we had six? Anyway. We had some children. We felt new, young married. The long and the short of it is, we started getting to that age and we're looking, like, Oh, to be good parents, our daughter, she's got to play violin, and she needs to be in ballet, and she's got to do new piano lessons, and her brother wants to do some sports stuff. So they ought to be in sports together, and then he wants to be in running and the five year old wants to be in t-ball and…
Margie Boswell: So we started all those things.
Joshua Boswell: We started all of it. And…
Margie Boswell: It was crazy!
Joshua Boswell: It was crazy, and not that there's anything wrong with that. But then we started multiplying, because we still wanted more children, and we thought, Okay if we just multiply this even by six, okay…
Margie Boswell: Not gonna work.
Joshua Boswell: We're gonna lose our minds.
Marielle Melling: Yep.
Joshua Boswell: And the guilt, and it was kind of hard to let that stuff go because we were like, Ahhh…
Margie Boswell: We had to do like you said, simplify and say, Why are we doing this? What is the purpose?
Joshua Boswell: Right.
Margie Boswell: What do we value as the Boswell family? And what are we going to put priority first?
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Margie Boswell: And then let everything else go, which we did!
Joshua Boswell: Just out of curiosity… Do you have… I mean in any of your resources do you have a workflow to move people through that decision-making process?
Marielle Melling: Yeah.
Joshua Boswell: Because I think it's hard for people to make… It’s like, Well, what is my priority? And it's kind of dissecting it.
Margie Boswell: The self inspection.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: It is. Yeah, so I have… I call it the APE process for creating home systems that work.
Joshua Boswell: Okay.
Marielle Melling: And when I think about systems, the thing that is really powerful about systems and why I keep coming back to this is we are creatures of habit, right?
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: And when we're tired and when we are and strapped for time, all those kinds of things. What is going to last our habits, our systems. When I'm away, what are my kids gonna do? They're right now doing the systems that we have in place, right?
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: That's the norm. So it's really powerful when we intentionally create these systems that align with our values.
Joshua Boswell: Mmm.
Marielle Melling: And so this process walks people through, number one appreciating where you are.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: It’s so easy for us to… as humans we are wired to notice the negative. And as parents to again go to that not good enough place. So number one, we appreciate where we are. And we appreciate what's going well. And we appreciate the opportunity that we have to choose. Because we live number one in a culture and age and state where we have so much opportunity. And number two, as humans we have opportunities to choose. We have that agency. And just sitting in that and being like, I am not a victim.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: I have choices. I can say no if I want. I'm doing these things because I want a family, because I chose children, right? Finding that place, starting from there, is really powerful. So we have some questions that kind of help people work through that. And then second we look at the plan. We're gonna plan, what is the system gonna look like?
Joshua Boswell: Hmm.
Marielle Melling: That starts with simplifying. Some of those key questions: What's the bare minimum? Do I actually have to do this? Did we even ask that question? Right?
Joshua Boswell: Right.
Marielle Melling: Am I just doing this because my parents did it? Or because my neighbor’s doing it? Or because some expert on Instagram said I should do it? So do I actually have to do this? Is there a way to do this once and not do it again? So when it comes to home maintenance and things like that, there is so much that we can make automatic or set up the system one time and not have to make those decisions over and over again. Things like that. And then I'm gonna plan how, actually, is this system gonna work out. And we look at how do habits develop. We have our cue, our routine, our reward. So a lot of times we don't intentionally put rewards in place. I see that a lot.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: Like… we just expect everyone to do it because it sounds like a good thing.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: But it's hard to follow through on for more than three hours or three days. So we have a process of saying, Ojkay, this is what I want to include in it. This is what it's gonna look like. We pull from other people, somebody who looks like they've got that figured out. I'm gonna go learn from them. I don't need to reinvent everything, right? I ask my kids. Especially the older they are. I asked my spouse what does this look like for you? What are your ideas? What would motivate you? What do you think is important here? We get some buy-in from everybody. We put a plan in place and then our goal is to actually execute that thing.
Joshua Boswell: Mmm.
Marielle Melling: To try it for two weeks and say, okay, was this worth it? How did it go? And then we can refine that process and go back again.
Joshua Boswell: I love that process and I love the reward.
Marielle Melling: Yeah, right?
Joshua Boswell: Years ago I worked with a guy and then studied the book… He had a book, his name's Coonradt. He had a book called The Game of Work, which is such a fascinating concept. So I got… all my early business successes were all based on setting time frames on something and then a reward for getting it done.
Marielle Melling: Awesome.
Joshua Boswell: And it was simple stuff.
Marielle Melling: Yeah!
Joshua Boswell: It was like, I get a bowl of ice cream or I chase Margie around the house and give her a kiss, or we gonna walk together or I play a board game with the kids. It didn't have to be like this huge expensive thing.
Marielle Melling: Right. It's not a big vacation. It doesn't have to be monetary.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah. Yeah.
Marielle Melling: Yeah, it's just something that feels like fun or feels like joy or feels like… yeah.
Joshua Boswell: And it was nice when business started going better, the rewards did get a little bit bigger. On some of them.
Marielle Melling: Good for you. We often forget play is an innate human need, right?
Joshua Boswell: Totally.
Marielle Melling: We need that. So I love that you Incorporated that into…
Joshua Boswell: Well I love that you've got that baked into your system. I hadn’t thought about it for a while and it's so important, especially to the people listening... It's like, two things that you've talked about here are so powerful. Number one is, start with the joy of where you're at. What are you doing good? And how is it benefiting you and your family? How does it meet goals that you had at one point? It's like… we volunteered for this. We wanted it. I wanted to be a Dad!
Marielle Melling: Yeah!
Joshua Boswell: And it's good to start with remembering that. So that's an endorphin hit right there. I mean it’s like, Oh. That's cool.
Marielle Melling: It is, right? Gratitude is our instant gratification.
Joshua Boswell: And then I love how you've got the baked in rewards along the way as you execute stuff and review them. And then it's like let's have joy in this. We tried something. Even if it failed, we had the courage to do something different. We're in the hunt of trying to make our family better and look. We're doing it!
Margie Boswell: We’re doing it!
Marielle Melling: Yes, yes.
Joshua Boswell: So cool. So when you get that system down… I’ve got another question for you.
Marielle Melling: Sure.
Joshua Boswell: So you look at those priorities and you get that down… How do you get buy-in from family members? Right? Because that's a… Especially let's just take this scenario of…. You know, there’s two different scenarios there. One is you've got younger children who, they're… We figured out, it's like, we could teach our children when they were super young, like two and three, how to sort silverware. But getting them to buy in on it on a regular basis took a little bit of psychological… manipulation? No, that's the wrong word for it. Persuasion, right?
Margie Boswell: Encouragement?
Joshua Boswell: Encouragement, consistency. And then you move up the ladder and then you've got teenage children still in the house…
Marielle Melling: Yes.
Joshua Boswell: Well that's a whole other ball of wax. So what's your thoughts on buy-in on some of these systems as you start making some changes to bring more peace to the family?
Marielle Melling: Yeah, that's a huge and really important question. And as you've nailed on the head, it is going to really depend on what stage our children are in. The overriding principles are going to be the same though. Number one, it starts with our relationship right?
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: And I don't just say that because it's simple or because it's easier… Because we already said it. That is genuinely what makes people care about what you have to say.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Margie Boswell: Hmmm.
Marielle Melling: So if we have a relationship in place… and I'll start with younger kids because they’re the easiest…
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: You just do it together. You… just part of what you do as a family. You just start whether that thing is, Hey, we're going to clean up after we play a game. Or we are going to help our neighbors. Or we are going to be lifelong learners. Whatever that thing is that's important to you, you just do it together as a family.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: And it becomes something that they see, that they hear and that they do right? See, hear and do. And that's super easy because we really control our children's environments.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah, totally. Right.
Marielle Melling: As they get older, it's those same principles, but we need to take into account what does that look like for this individual? And typically that means asking them, right?
Joshua Boswell: Hmm.
Marielle Melling: Hey, it is so important to me as a family that we have a home that everybody feels comfortable in. Okay, for me that includes being able to walk through a room without tripping on stuff. What does that include for you? Right?
Joshua Boswell: Minor details. Right.
Marielle Melling: Yeah. Minor details. And I promised parents who say, my kids don't talk to me? That's okay. When you ask, they're thinking about it. When you ask they're saying, Hey, maybe she actually cares. Especially if you let it be quiet or you say, Let me know when you think of something. If you don't fill in the blank for them.
Joshua Boswell: Mm-hm.
Marielle Melling: They're saying, Oh, mom and dad really do care about what I think. And they're thinking about it and they'll bring it up later if they care about it. We create that environment where their input is wanted, right? When we do that, human nature, when it's our idea, we care about it more. We’re more likely to do it. We're more likely to follow through. So that's the easiest way to buy-in is to help it be your kids' idea. So you bring everybody together, say this is what's important to me. What’s important to you? What does that look like for you? What could that be? What are, like we said, what feels like it would be rewarding for that? All those kinds of things. And then we try to be really consistent.
Joshua Boswell: Mm-hm.
Marielle Melling: Because that is how we build our muscle memory. That's how we build habits. That's how we build skill sets, is we need that repetition.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: And then a third piece of that is I would say… And this is especially true when it comes to, let's say we want to make service a part of our family value, right? But we are playing to our kids' strengths. So we all have things that we're good at. We all have things that we're working on. And it's often easy for us as parents, I would say especially with the oldest child, to recognize where are our kids lacking. What do they need, right?
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: But the more that we say, Hey this kid is really good at being efficient, or this kid is really good at connecting with older people or this kid is really good at helping with younger kids. All of our kids don't have to do everything every single time.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: And if we let them play to their strengths and let them grow in that. And then maybe make an invitation that extends that just a little bit, you know? And it could be as simple as, This one kid is always in charge of taking care of the other kids because they're good at that and they enjoy that and we recognize that as a meaningful contribution. And then we say, once a week will you clean the bathroom? Or once a week… it's okay for things to look different for different kids.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: And the more we understand them and their strengths and play to those strengths and help our kids really like… how many of us want to hang out in the things that were bad at all day? Like, we don’t choose that for a career. We don't choose…. like, that's not kind, and yet so many of our kids, we put them into schools where that's maybe not a good fit and then at home we're asking them to do these things… And so instead we can say, Find their strengths, let them be in that, and then extend invitations to build on that.
Margie Boswell: Mmm.
Joshua Boswell: I love that. Awesome.
Margie Boswell: That’s great.
Joshua Boswell: You know, it makes me think of… it's like you see some kids and they go and they just do excellent math and then others are terrible at math.
Marielle Melling: Right.
Joshua Boswell: But we live in an environment where it's like, look you have to conform with the full set of criteria.
Marielle Melling: Yeah.
Joshua Boswell: And if you don't you're a loser, right?
Marielle Melling: Yeah.
Joshua Boswell: I was so blessed to be able to memorize my times tables. My 12x12 grid.
Marielle Melling: Right. Was that a piece of cake for you, Joshua?
Joshua Boswell: And that took me about three years in elementary school, and that's about the last I've addressed math in my whole life. And so, it's like wow, I'm so glad I got through that because I can do addition, subtraction, division. Yeah… I don't know. But multiplication, I got my 12x12, so. And I don't feel like a loser for it. I mean, I'm sorry, I just don’t.
Marielle Melling: Well yeah, and… Oh, go ahead.
Joshua Boswell: No, go ahead.
Marielle Melling: I just say that that is a great perspective for us to help our kids see, right?
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: What we want for them are skill sets that allow them to succeed. That doesn't mean that they have to be good at everything.
Joshua Boswell: Right.
Marielle Melling: Contrary to what… even this college pressure. I mean, I've talked to people who are worried about their second grader’s chances of getting into college and they need to have a well-rounded transcript. I'm like, no that… You're okay.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: You're okay. There's a lot of pressure on us. And again that idea to let go and say, okay, What really matters here? What really matters is is my child learning how to be kind?
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: Is my child learning how to handle failure? Is my child learning how to pursue goals? How to work hard? How to care about other people and other things, and then do what it takes to get there? Not… they do not have to be good at everything.
Joshua Boswell: Totally. So I love that individualized approach. So wise.
Margie Boswell: So great.
Joshua Boswell: On a side, funny note, I forget how many children we had at that point, but at one particular point we had three in diapers and…
Marielle Melling: Bless you, bless you, bless you.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah yeah, anyway. But our fifth child has a really dominant personality and he just loves to be in charge of stuff. And when you're the fifth in a family of strong willed children, that's a tough spot right?
Margie Boswell: Never get a chance to lead.
Marielle Melling: Don't get to be in charge. Yeah.
Joshua Boswell: So Margie came up with this brilliant idea to put him in charge of two things. Diapers, so he monitored all three diapers and changed them and they made sure they were handled. And he was… how old was he at the time?
Margie Boswell: He was seven or eight.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah seven or eight. And then he was also put in charge of monitoring laundry. So he kept track that the laundry baskets were done and that people got their laundry done. And…
Margie Boswell: He loved being in charge!
Marielle Melling: He loved it, yeah.
Joshua Boswell: He didn’t care that it was diapers and laundry. It was like, I get to dominate something.
Margie Boswell: Tell everyone what to do. It was great.
Joshua Boswell: But I think that what you're talking about there is just being aware of our children and allowing them to have input and do things where they're strong. Now… that's a side tangent on something that I want to go back to, but thank you for bringing that up. I just wanted to emphasize that.
Marielle Melling: Yeah.
Joshua Boswell: Because my goodness, I think as parents, and maybe you'll agree, but I think as parents when we recognize our children's strengths, and we give ourselves and them permission to play into those strengths…
Marielle Melling: Mm-hmm
Joshua Boswell: And drop the other stuff. I think that's a key point of bringing peace in the family and in developing our relationship with them.
Marielle Melling: Yeah, absolutely. And I think it's okay to ask our kids to do hard things. To go outside of their comfort.
Joshua Boswell: Sure. Totally.
Marielle Melling: We absolutely need to. I was actually just talking about this recently. We have a society that doesn't necessarily require that anymore, right?
Joshua Boswell: yeah.
Marielle Melling: Like… A lot of us have the capacity to provide really well for our children or to… you know, meet their needs, provide all the opportunities they want. And so sometimes we have to… be intentional about inviting them outside of their comfort zone.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: Or teaching them to work, or teaching them to earn.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: And so it's okay to do those things, but it's almost like a proportions game, right? Like, the majority of our time and our effort and our focus is on what is going well. It's the old John Gottman's five to one rule. In strong relationships we have five positive to every one negative. It's not that the negative isn't there. It's not that we in any way think anybody is perfect or anything like that. Right? But we put so much more into what's going well and into the positive. I speak with a lot of teenagers who tell me like, you know what? My parents don't even notice all the good things I'm doing.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Margie Boswell: Hmm.
Marielle Melling: I do a lot. I show up to class. I work hard and instead all they can talk about is this one thing that is bothering them. And that's why it feels to a lot of our kids.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: And so yeah, absolutely. If we can sit in that space more it's gonna do more good for our kids.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah, and I like the caveat there or the addition of we let them play it out to their strengths doing hard things. And even sometimes if it's not in their strengths, it’s okay for them to grow and learn new stuff. I mean I wrapped my head around geometry for a little bit in high school. I passed the class. And I hated it.
Marielle Melling: Yeah.
Joshua Boswell: But you know what? It was okay. I figured it out. So it's awesome.
Marielle Melling: Yeah.
Joshua Boswell: So let's come back to… Actually, is there anything else you want to say about strengths because that's a really important topic. And then I got another question.
Marielle Melling: That's a good question. One other thing that came to mind, I think it's a fundamental human need, is this idea that I matter. I matter.
Joshua Boswell: Ahh yeah.
Marielle Melling: I'm here for a purpose, that it matters to other people what I do and who I am and how I show up. And I think that we do that for our kids when we let their contributions matter.
Joshua Boswell: Mmm.
Marielle Melling: Whether that is in the way that they serve, or like your son, knowing look, if I don't do the diapers, this thing gets lost. This doesn't happen.
Joshua Boswell: Oh it's a mess. You get three diapers going… Yeah.
Margie Boswell: All day!
Joshua Boswell: You gotta make sure those are handled.
Marielle Melling: Yeah, so I think that helping our kids know that they matter, because they do, is one of our vital tasks as parents. And that's one way to just talk about it is helping them play to their strengths. And that's where a lot of fulfillment in their life is going to come is putting those strengths to use for other people. Another piece of that, and I don't know what your next question is if you want to go there or not. But it’s just that quality time that's one-on-one. That helps them know, I know you, I see you as one person. Especially for all of us in big families, right? I care about you as a person and I like you. I like being with you.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: So when we put that one-on-one, a system for that into our routine, that's really powerful.
Joshua Boswell: I think that's awesome. It is so powerful. I was able to serve for a number of years, almost two decades, in various Church leadership positions. And I had an opportunity to counsel with and visit with a lot of youth. And I remember visiting one day with a young lady from a good size family, I think they had seven or eight children. And we are talking about some serious struggles she was going through. And she made the comment. She said, I don't remember one time, ever spending one-on-one time with either of my parents. And she was 18. And I was like…. I had to really wrap my head around that.
Marielle Melling: Yeah!
Joshua Boswell: It was like, wow, really? And I saw this struggle that she had. By contrast I've seen others that have had just parents have made great effort to spend that quality time with their children. And it's impacted them significantly. So what you're saying, I mean, I've seen it play out in super powerful, real ways with children and then later with adults.
Marielle Melling: Mm-hm. Mm-hm.
Joshua Boswell: Awesome. And you're super intuitive, because my next question was gonna be, Share some more insights on this relationship thing. I mean, everything's in the relationship container so far. Even though we’ve run into rabbit trails.
Marielle Melling: Yeah.
Joshua Boswell: But I would love to hear some more elements of what constitutes a strong relationship and how we get there.
Marielle Melling: Absolutely. So I teach what I call the hand method for strong relationships. So the thumb is the me actions.
Joshua Boswell: Hmm.
Marielle Melling: Number one, as the parent, I need to figure out me, right? Am I bringing wounds from my childhood? That's very common. Am I afraid? Am I doing things in a way that's not purposeful, but possibly focused on me instead of my child's needs? We see that popping up sometimes. Am I feeling loved? Am I feeling fulfilled? Because when I am coming from a place that is rested, that is whole, that is healthy, that is connected with God… How much easier is it for me to be patient and to be loving? And do all these things that I really want to do as a parent? So that is one piece of it is giving ourselves, recognizing that as crazy as life is… And this is the number one thing that I recommend for parents if they're not already doing it is some daily, quiet, one-on-one time with God.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: And for parents and people who aren't Christian, it's still that daily quiet time where you're connecting with your priorities. Where if you meditate, you're meditating. If you pray, if you're praying. If you’re learning and saying, I have no idea what to do about this kid, you're giving yourself a chance to actually learn about that kid.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: Like to study right and to say, this is what brings me joy. I know it brings me joy. So many of our parents have lost touch with what brings joy. And so that’s the thumb is like taking care of me and understanding me better. Do you want to talk about each one, or do you want me to run through them all?
Joshua Boswell: You better run through them all because I'll run down rabbit trails and we’ll get stuck on number one… Then we’ll be like… we’ll never get there!
Margie Boswell: But I'm excited to hear all four… about the other four, so let’s hear it, yes!
Marielle Melling: So the second one, the pointer fingers, is understanding our kids better.
Joshua Boswell: Yes. Yeah.
Marielle Melling: And that is from a developmental perspective. Because a lot of times what our kids are going through is very normal, is very natural, is very healthy.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: And we don't get it so we freak out about it. I would say that's particularly true with our toddlers and teens where they have really and a lot of brain growth happening during those stages.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: And it's a shift from where they were before.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah, I will interject a comment there. I saw… I’d never seen it quantified, but I saw an amazing study showing the number of emotions that a child is physically able to experience versus what a teenager is. And I’ll get the numbers wrong, but it's like 8 versus 86 or some crazy thing.
Marielle Melling: Amazing, right?
Joshua Boswell: And I mean WOW. Just parts of their brain develops, and all the sudden a whole new set of hormones, chemicals, synaptic gap stuff firing. It's like, Oh… you now go from eight or ten emotions that you can experience, period…
Marielle Melling: Yes.
Joshua Boswell: To over 80 that's like, no wonder your brain's going hog wire, right?
Marielle Melling: Right!
Joshua Boswell: It's like, Oh… got it. This is normal!
Marielle Melling: And it's totally normal. And what is the process to figure out again, oh, this is the first time I'm feeling this or thinking about this emotion or experiencing this? Like.. that can be scary for our teens, right? And then that adds to the stress. Like, I don't even understand what's going on with me. Why am I so emotional? Why is this so big? So when we understand developmentally what's happening, it lets us take a deep breath.
Joshua Boswell: Mmm-hmm.
Marielle Melling: This is a good thing. This is allowing them to transition from…. This is the analogy I usually use: From that simple, our kids who show up on the playground and their best friends in five minutes, to a really complex and really fulfilling relationship.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah. Yeah.
Marielle Melling: And that's what we want for them. Right? But they need that. They need that social maturity and a lot of that happens in the specializing that happens in their brain during adolescence.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: So part of that understanding them is understanding the developmental stage that they're in and then also understanding them. Understanding their perspective. And then this is a huge piece of it is helping them feel really comfortable being themselves.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: We know from research that one of the greatest times… And this is our relationship again, right? It's all about relationships. One of the best times that we find, or that we strengthen our bonds is when we're in a bad place.
Joshua Boswell: Yes.
Marielle Melling: Then we see who we can count on. It's then that we can see who's gonna be there when I'm grumpy or mad or angry or when everybody else seems to have forgotten me. During those hard times, that's who we build strong bonds with. And so we help our kids see, no matter what mood you're in, no matter if you agree with me or disagree… I often say you protect your child's dissenting opinion
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: You protect whatever they are, whoever they are. This is a safe place for you to be you. So that's our pointer finger, focusing on our kids.
Joshua Boswell: Cool.
Margie Boswell: Love that.
Joshua Boswell: Self and child. Good.
Marielle Melling: Yeah, number three, the tall man, is what's most important, and that is just continually bringing it back to the connection, to the relationship. And I usually in this part talk about when it's hard to do that. So when in those moments of, I've lost it emotionally, in those moments of burnout…
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: That's when it's most important to bring it back to connection.
Joshua Boswell: I want to get a doctorate on that particular thing because I'm the master losing it in an escalating stuff. So we'll have to talk about that part a little bit later. So go ahead.
Marielle Melling: Okay. We'll come back to that.
Joshua Boswell: The tall man.
Marielle Melling: Okay, the fourth one is a little bit of a stretch but it totally works for me because it's the ring finger. And so I just imagine that my ring is a watch and it's all about quality time. It's arranging our lives to have quality time. And that's where those systems come into play, where simplifying comes into play, where ruthless prioritization comes into play. Learning how to say no, learning how to let go of guilt, learning how to let go of people pleasing. A lot of the things that we do as parents I believe are coping mechanisms when we say yes, when we say yes, when we say yes. It's trying to support that I matter question, right?
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: And so if I have to prove that I matter, it's really hard to say no to other people.
Joshua Boswell: Yes, yeah.
Marielle Melling: Right? But if I am sitting in that place where I know that I matter, I have clarity about what the Lord wants from me and it’s not everything.
Joshua Boswell: Right.
Marielle Melling: It's not everything. It's everything that I have. So when I sit in that place, that kind of gives me the power to say no to these lesser things. So a part of that is mindset and part of that is our nuts and bolts and figuring out more effective ways to do things and all that. But prioritizing that quality time together.
Joshua Boswell: That's awesome. Well, the question about mattering. I mean, I really relate to that. In fact, I think I've spent about $150,000 on coaches getting to that understanding. I could’ve just had this call with you, but… I coulda given you $20,000 and have been way ahead of the game.
Marielle Melling: Yeah I’ll take it. Not too late.
Joshua Boswell: Right? But the point is I grew up not understanding that. I mean I really thought it was like my value was based on how much money I was making for the family…
Marielle Melling: Yeah.
Joshua Boswell: What I was contributing to society, how I was serving in church callings and positions, how many friends I had, making sure they were happy. If I did something… the food I could for them. I mean the list goes on and on of all the stuff. It's like all of that is my worth, right? And it was interesting marrying Margie because Margie is one of the individuals… Can I brag about you for a second? Sure I can. So Margie is one of those individuals that just has a super deep, secure understanding… And a lot of this is credited to her parents, but it's like, Oh, my value is infinite and unchangeable. I'm just a worthy, super amazing person. And that's just the reality of it. No questions asked right?
Marielle Melling: Yeah.
Joshua Boswell: And so it's been so refreshing to deal with her because I came from the world where it was like… value is always connected to performance. And Margie came from world where value is connected to essenc. Just because she was a daughter of God. Done.
Marielle Melling: Yeah. Yeah.
Joshua Boswell: And it's been fascinating trying to get me going from mentally to emotionally. And I think there's a lot of parents that deal with this right?
Marielle Melling: Absolutely.
Joshua Boswell: And it's a crazy struggle. And I'm not exaggerating when I talk about how much I spent on coaching and counseling to get to that spot. But it's… and I say the number because it’s very hard and I wrestle with it still sometimes. It's like… Oh, I didn't close this big deal or this happen or that happened. I must be a terrible person. I have to remind myself, hold on… No actually.
Marielle Melling: Yeah, yeah.
Joshua Boswell: No, that’s not… Anyway, thank you for bringing that up. The quality time is so powerful because it communicates, what I hear you saying is that it communicates to our loved ones that, Oh, actually, we love you, we want to spend time with you. And holding that safe space for them and defending their position to be them is really powerful. So Marielle, thank you.
Marielle Melling: Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. I think I'm gonna add one thing too.
Joshua Boswell: Oh yeah…
Marielle Melling: Because I see this in the world of parenting… it’s that if we haven't already figured this out, it extends to our children. And our children's behavior becomes a measure of our worth and a measure of our success.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah. Yeah.
Marielle Melling: And then it gets really messy because instead of worrying about the relationship, we're worrying about their behavior. And we're worrying about their success. And this is often subconscious.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: This is often, I'm not intentionally doing this. But it pops up. So it's really big. It's really big.
Joshua Boswell: So is this why… I mean, I'm just calculating with you here for a minute. You probably have deeper insight on this research. But is this why we see… Say you've got a parent, we’ll use a dad for example, that played football in high school. Wanted to play college ball. Didn't.
Margie Boswell: Didn’t make it.
Joshua Boswell: And so now his oldest son is like… they just ride herd on him…
Margie Boswell: Pressure him to play.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah, and just… I'm thinking out loud here but it seems to me maybe they're just saying, I was never good enough to play. But if my kid is, then I have value, right?
Marielle Melling: Yeah, yes. I think it's twofold. I think sometimes it’s that. And it is that deep-seated, that vital question: Do I matter?
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: And it's playing it out through our children. Because we feel like our children are extensions of us, right?
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: They came from us. They're one with us. We give them everything we have. Literally blood, sweat and tears. And it does feel like they’re success is our success and their failure is our failure a lot of times right? So I think it is that. And I also think it is sometimes we just lose sight. We just get so wrapped up in the emotion and the excitement that we forget like, they’re a 17 year old kid, right? Like, this is the high school football stadium.
Joshua Boswell: Right!
Marielle Melling: Because emotions are powerful and big I think that's a piece of it, too.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: From the little moment and then also the big, this whole thing is exciting this whole… What if they do that? And I want this for them! And all that kind of thing.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah, and so even if it's not this, you know, sports, I mean, it's just analogy I thought of.
Marielle Melling: Yeah, anything.
Joshua Boswell: I think you’re spot on in that if our value is wrapped up in our children's behavior, you said it gets really messy.
Marielle Melling: It gets messy.
Joshua Boswell: Amen to that. Because, news flash, we don't actually have control over our children's actions.
Marielle Melling: I learned that real early. I learned it real early, but how long does it take to accept it, right?
Margie Boswell: Accept it, yeah.
Joshua Boswell: Right, right. We need a system for accepting that our children's behavior is not attached to our value.
Marielle Melling: Yes. Yeah. And you look at the classic, kid having a tantrum in the grocery store.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: A lot of people feel embarrassed by that.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: But why? Why in the world would we be embarrassed that our kid is being a kid?
Joshua Boswell: Right!
Marielle Melling: Right? Like, that is totally developmentally normal and expected. And if not, we all have bad days, like what in the world? But instead we internalize that and we have this unstated belief that, you know, If I was a good Mom, I'd be able to control their emotions. And if I was a good Mom, I'd be able to at least keep this private.
Joshua Boswell: Right.
Marielle Melling: But no, no. You have worth. You have value.
Joshua Boswell: It's okay, I actually saw this played out probably two days ago. And the parent, bless her. Everyone's so human, but the mom just lost it on the poor kid. It was like… that's not helping.
Marielle Melling: Yeah! Well and I think if you're that Mom, right?
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: And you have this added… It’s always… not always. It's often triggering when our kids have big emotions because our job is to take care of them, right?
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: Our job… Like, we are wired to help them. And if they are… I even say, I think the whine is a gift of nature. When kids whine it's like, mommmyyy, help! and you're like, ahhh!! But it gets our attention. Right? Crying, all of those things. So when our kids have these big emotions, we want to soothe, we want to help, and we should.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: But the healthy way to do that is to co-regulate.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: If I am coming from a place of, I'm embarrassed about this behavior, or I don't understand this, or I don't have my own… I don't have my own emotional stability, to be able to find my calm even though this is triggering, now I just want the behavior to end.
Joshua Boswell: Yes.
Marielle Melling: And that's my focus instead of co-regulating and being there in a healthy way to help our kids.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah. Wow, I hope you have an entire course on that point you just talked about.
Margie Boswell: Co-regulating. I like that.
Joshua Boswell: Getting yourself in a state of peace and calm and then co-regulating.
Marielle Melling: Yes. Yes we do.
Joshua Boswell: So, what's the pinky?
Marielle Melling: So the pinky is the Playful Pinky.
Margie Boswell: Awww.
Marielle Melling: We just need to have fun, right? We need to put fun into our lives. So many of us are so stressed out and burnt out and we forget that we're created for joy.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: And so make your family fun. Make your work fun. There are times and places that we get those teens… I love our teens. And I see so much good and so many powerful things happening in that generation. And sometimes the parents are missing out on it. Completely.
Margie Boswell: Hmm.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: Because of worries and stress. And yeah, there are hard things that are going on, but step out of that into a new neutral zone and do something fun.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah. And that right there bolsters our relationship. Like, I remember at one point thinking… And I don't know what triggered the question, but I just said, Would I want to hang out with me right now if I was them? And it was very clearly, no, I would not want to hang out with me right now.
Joshua Boswell: It’s like, no…
Marielle Melling: So we want our relationship to be a place where our kids want to be. That we want to be. And bringing purposeful play, whether it is scheduled outings or even just playful parenting, right? Like going out the door and you're three year old wants to pretend to be a dog. Well what if you got on the floor and pretended to be a dog with them? What would that look like? And so that's our playful pinky.
Margie Boswell: Wow. Love that!
Joshua Boswell: So fun! That is awesome. And it does make such a difference when you just connect with… Especially your example of getting on the floor and playing with that three year old. It is so incredibly powerful to just be down there with them. We have a new grandbaby. She came over…
Marielle Melling: Fun!
Joshua Boswell: They were here for Thanksgiving. And she's almost a year old. And it's amazing when… so they live across the country. She has not spent much time with us physically. And when they first came over it was like she'd do this death stare at you. Like, I don't know you.
Marielle Melling: Yeah.
Joshua Boswell: What do you want me? And she was really reticent. But we just got on the floor and played with her. And tickled and chased around.
Margie Boswell: Sang songs, walked her around.
Joshua Boswell: Sang songs… and immediately, we were best friends.
Marielle Melling: Yeah. This is a safe place. This is fun here. Yeah.
Joshua Boswell: They love it. Yeah. But there's still plenty of wrestle time and tickle time and play time even with our teenagers. It’s just… what you're talking about there is really, really powerful. In fact, years ago, we had some friends. They had three autistic children. Severely autistic, really struggled.
Margie Boswell: Nonverbal and… Yeah.
Joshua Boswell: Nonverbal. And it was amazing. Those parents, they brought those children from totally fairly functioning to fairly functioning. And the way they did it was just spent time mimicking them in their space. And just being with them. And it was so fun… Again, my friend, his name is Mark. And it's just so incredible to watch how he connected with them, but did it all on their level. So he was just playful with them and just interacted with them.
Marielle Melling: Good.
Joshua Boswell: So I've seen the power of this. It's very very cool. So the playful pinky. Awesome.
Marielle Melling: Yeah, yeah and for our kids, that is their way of learning right? That is their way of being and discovering the world and exploring in a safe place and all those kinds of things. So creating time for play with our families is a big deal and it's fun.
Joshua Boswell: And it's fun.
Margie Boswell: We enjoy it too, yeah!
Joshua Boswell: I'll take all the endorphins I can get in a healthy way, right?
Marielle Melling: That's right. That oxytosin going and dopamine drops.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah, I'll take it anyway I can get it in positive ways.
Marielle Melling: Yep.
Joshua Boswell: Cool. So any other insights on that? An by the way, the five things? So powerful for relationships.
Marielle Melling: Yeah.
Margie Boswell: Thank you!
Joshua Boswell: Thank you for sharing that with us. Anything else on relationships that you want to share with us?
Marielle Melling: I guess that if we have an understanding of why relationships are so important, it helps us cater our lives to them.
Joshua Boswell: Hmm.
Marielle Melling: And if we think about our infants, when they are born, they’re survival mechanisms. They're not given the ability to hunt. They are not given the ability to run away. They are given the ability to attach.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: That is how I survive. Literally, that’s how I survive is I attach with a safe other.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: And that doesn't end as we get older, right? All of us, we thrive in these safe attachments. That's what the research for decades is telling us. And so when we see like, this isn't just a matter of, I want to feel good about it. I absolutely want to feel good about it, but it is also the most important thing for their survival, for their well-being. If they feel like… when our children feel like they are in a safe relationship, that is the best brain environment for learning and for growth, right? The second they feel like that relationship is under attack, it becomes stressful and now all of a sudden they're working from a place of stress, which is an entirely different brain region than those forward thinking goals and logical, and all that kind of stuff. Right?
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: And so when we create a relationship that feels really safe, where they feel seen, where they feel known, safe to be themselves, we are providing for them in a way that is incredibly powerful. And I hope that that comes across to our parents. And I hope that they feel like when I am there listening to their venting, I'm doing them a service, right?
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: When I am their calm in their storm and I say it's okay to feel all these things, I am doing them a service. Like all of those kinds of things, know that that is the best gift that you can give your kids, truly. It’s that type of relationship and showing them what that looks like as you get older, right? It doesn't change. We still need that. And I think about the number one thing for us as a humanity is that relationship. And how powerful is it when that most important relationship is with a God the Father?
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: Who is infinitely loving, who is always there for us, right? Like, every time we falter, He's the example of what it looks like to be infinitely loving, infinitely secure, infinitely safe in that relationship.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah, that is beautiful. I'm not even gonna try to top that. That was amazing.
Margie Boswell: So wonderful. Yeah. Thank you.
Joshua Boswell: So I think that we oughtta wrap up on that. Very wonderful. And I love this focus on relationships, and I love how you concluded with why they're so important and how we attach to people. So thank you so much for those insights. It's just really good. Now… Kind of in conclusion, I guess I will ask for one other thing, and that is, I guarantee you that there's people who are like, they're struggling. Maybe they're like me and they're looking for their self-worth somewhere in their child's behavior. Maybe they just need that calm space, they've got chaos going on. Maybe they're trying to figure out how to walk across the floor and not trip and kill themselves because there’s so much stuff, right?
Marielle Melling: C’mon kids!
Joshua Boswell: I mean, whatever it is. But how do those people go deeper into your world and what are some resources that you have for them?
Marielle Melling: Awesome. So the easiest way to hang out with me is go through my website, which is www.LovinLifeWithLittles.com L-O-V-I-N, no “G” there. www.LovinLifeWithLittles.com
Joshua Boswell: Yeah.
Marielle Melling: And as I mentioned, we have a lot going on. And so you can kind of browse through the website and see, you know, do I want to work on systems? Do I want to work on my personal development? Do I want to work on my relationship? Find something that speaks to you. Anytime you sign up for anything, whether it's a free class or a guide or anything like that, you'll get into my email world. And that's where you'll hear everything that's going on.
Joshua Boswell: All the stuff. Good.
Marielle Melling: Yeah, if you want a lot of connection and community, our Mom Spot Membership is the place to get that.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah, and is that Mom Spot, is that also found just in your www.LovinLifeWithLittles.com site or is that on a separate domain?
Marielle Melling: There is a link for it on Lovin Life With Littles, or you can go to www.MomSpot.com
Margie Boswell: Okay. Yeah.
Joshua Boswell: Cool. Awesome. Well, it would be cool… I'm not even a mom, and it would be cool to hang out with you.
Margie Boswell: Yeah!
Marielle Melling: Yeah, you're invited. In our larger email community we have lots and lots of dads. So come on in, Joshua.
Joshua Boswell: All right, good. I don't feel discriminated against.
Margie Boswell: I’ll come hang out with you.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah we’ll send Margie over to Mom Spot. I’ll hang out in the email.
Marielle Melling: Yeah, you can hang out in the background.
Margie Boswell: There we go.
Joshua Boswell: Yeah I'll be lurking in the background. Well awesome. Thank you so much for your time.
Marielle Melling: Yeah. Thank you.
Joshua Boswell: And for all you guys listening to this, obviously Marielle's got incredible stuff here. And just strongly encourage you to go and check it out. There's things on personal development, on parenting, on systems. Mom support group like we just talked about membership. So all of these things are resources for you. And if you're in that spot where you need any of that stuff, obviously there's way deeper wisdom here and insights, so go check it out. That's my encouragement.
Margie Boswell: Yes.
Joshua Boswell: All right, thank you again so much for your time. And… we’ll have to do this again. I have other questions for you.
Marielle Melling: Anytime. Thank you guys.
Margie Boswell: Awesome! Thank you, Marielle.
Joshua Boswell: Thanks. Take care.
Marielle Melling: Thank you guys.
Joshua Boswell: Bye.
Margie Boswell: Bye!