heidigkarlsson

Do you ever have a decision to make, and no matter how you turn it over in your mind, either way it's going to be bad? I have. And I wasn't prepared for it.  I grew up thinking that there were right and wrong answers for everything.  There were rights and wrongs for every choice.  And now I get here to parenthood and marriage and being a grown up having to make all my own choices... and there are some choices that I've been forced into, and I've HATED my choice, but when I go back over my decision, I can't see any other way!  We love good vs evil. Hero vs villain. Our brains like to categorize things and put everything and everyone in their proper places. You did this. You are bad. You did that. You are good.  Brooke Castillo said something that really helped me. She said sometimes there are no rights or wrongs, you just have to like your reasons.  Yeah, I know. Say it again.  Sometimes there are no rights or wrongs, you just ha...

REMEMBER THE URGE JAR? I didn't forget.  I just wanted a bit more time to try it out. And I did. I think I have 5 urges in there. And 2 more urge jars popped up over the weekend because the kids asked me what I was doing.  So Brooke Castillo came up with the idea. It's completely hers. It was originally a weight loss idea. I've made it my own.  When we are learning a new discipline, for example, trying to stop eating jelly beans, when we get an urge to eat them but find a way to say "NO I WON'T EAT THOSE JELLY BEANS" and walk away, it doesn't FEEL like victory (even though it is) it just feels like DENIAL. It FEELS crummy.  Which means needing to use more self discipline. Will power. Which is NOT sustainable.  Enter the "Urge Jar."  So I eat when I am stressed. So that means when the kids come home from school and are fighting, when I get a phone call about something that's not going well, when I look at a bill that's n...

I was reading a little bit of Brene Brown today.  She said "vulnerability is having the courage to show up when you can't control the outcome." Daring is not saying "I'm willing to risk failure." Daring is saying "I know I will eventually fail, and I'm still all in." That's a bit crazy isn't it.  But have you ever met someone who is like that? Someone who is what they are and you can feel it. They make feel valuable but there is no manipulation in it - cause you can tell this is how they treat everyone. They don't want or need anything from you?  Someone who you know would never gossip TO you OR ABOUT you.  Someone who would stand red faced, but stick with whatever it was, because that's what it was and that's who they are?  I think we could all handle bringing a little bit more vulnerability to relationships.  I can't even count how many times I have pushed someone out of my circle, disqualified t...

Do you? It's really important. To you and the people you are "not quitting" on.  For the last couple of years we have had someone doing some fairly significant work for our family. They were doing their best and it totally wasn't working. TOTALLY. WASN'T. AT ALL. NOT WORKING.  Our situation has changed and we have now found someone else with the appropriate skill set and they are now doing a fantastic job.  I was reflecting today on a conversation we had a year ago, and this person said, "we ain't gonna quit on you Heidi."  The truth is, though, they should have. It would have caused us a lot less pain and heart ache. Not to mention we moved away from instead of toward our goals. Now there is a lot to un-do.. and then re-do.  There is something beautiful about taking an honest look at a situation and saying, "you know what - this thing is bigger than me. I'm not the one."  I have so much respect for that.  But in o...

I've never really thought of myself as a business person. I still don't. BUT....When I was little, I did come up with a plan just in case the economy failed and we went through a Great Depression.  I decided that everyone POOPS no matter what, so if worse came to worse I was going to sell toilet paper. Well, at first I thought maybe I'd cut hair because everyone's hair grows.. but then I thought actually if you are poor you would just let your hair grow. So toilet paper was the plan for me.  Yeah. I was thinking it through. Thanks.  Money was never really something I knew how to get. I sorts of thought that there were rich people and then there were the other people, and if I was nice to the rich people, or if I could find ways to work for rich people, when I needed money, they would give it to me.  I had no sense of power or capacity to create wealth.  And that's how I've lived most of my life. I've had big dreams, but they've always been...

I like things to happen in an ideal way. Like, lets be win/win, no negatives, power through, no issues, come on lets go.  And life? Not so much.  When our son was first diagnosed with autism, I was like, “Yeah ok that’s fine. But I’m going to work so hard with him that he’s going to meet every milestone just like every other kid. It might take longer, but he’ll get there.  I’ll push, I’ll pull, I’ll love, I’ll teach, whatever it takes. This kid is going to succeed.”  And all my kids will succeed. But …. maybe on a different success scale than what I thought. My pushing and pulling created so much friction and frustration and anger between me and my son. Frustration with me. Anger at him. It just made more pain.  So often we have problems or difficulties and instead of taking the time to look at them and learn about them, we just want to power through.  There’s this word out there called “acceptance.”  Some of us thin...

I was thinking today about suffering.  Many people have said to me, "Wasn't it great to know God was with you and feel his presence when things were so hard." Actually, no, no it wasn't great. It was the opposite.  It was confusing.  How could we, my family and I, suffering so profoundly and something as simple as a healing could change everything- and yet God never did it.  How could my family just about be torn apart, but God's close and watching and ... doing nothing - was supposed to make me feel good? Thanks for... watching us be in pain?  I don't know much about life. Not like I used to.  But I think suffering has to do with beliefs.  If I believe my life is supposed to be easy, suffering will be shocking, devastating, and I won't be prepared for it.  If I believe hard times happen FOR me and I can USE them as a school for change, then I can endure suffering and let that sucker work transformation in me. It wi...

Thinking some more about pain because I think we are all in pain on some level.  If I wake up with the thought, “I can’t do this” OR “this is too much for me” it’s a pretty bad set up. The TRUTH might be that you are not going to handle everything easily or perfectly.  In my case, a couple of years ago, waking up meant I was going to have to deal with screaming, safety issues between kids, lots of fighting and all day would be spent problem solving - how to create a peaceful  situation in my family when chaos ruled the inside of my son’s mind.  I don’t think there was any win/win there.  But when I woke up thinking, “I wish I didn’t have to live today” or “I can’t do this” - my energy and hope and capacity to deal with the day was already diminished. I usually woke up to someone screaming. That was enough to trigger a lot of negative thoughts.  But what if I changed my thoughts? What if I chose to think, “I don’t need to control this situation...

I don't believe in self discipline as a rule anymore.  When I was in high school I would go to school early every day to shoot hoops. Practice. Hard. Alone. In the gym. No one told me to. Then I'd do drills in the driveway at home. I'd read books, I'd watch videos, I'd earn money for basketball camp, I'd skip events with friends because I'd want to basketball games, basketball events... ok, you get it.  Point is, I did it for love. People would ask me how I could be so discip lined?!!???  And I was like... no discipline here. It's love.  That sort of set me up for the rest of my life. It's good and bad - in the sense that if I couldn't find a way or reason to love something, I couldn't do it very long.  So if you were looking for someone who stuck to something out of a sense of duty, you wouldn't see me there ( I was also motivated by fear... so there's that. Another reason to learn the way of love).  Since I start...

Do you have obstacle thoughts?  I used to think laundry took hours to do. Turns out, it takes like less than 10 minutes to fold a load. Ok, maybe even 8.. or 4... especially if it's towels.  But I would spend all day dreading doing it and staring at it and feeling guilty for not doing it... and ... IT DID TAKE ME HOURS!! You know those bobble head toys? Big head, small body? That's how my brain has felt my whole life. Heavy. Hard to carry around. I try to do something and my head would drag my down. Doubts. Fear. Questions.  I know a lady with 8 kids. I stayed at their house for a while. She would make lists, and then execute. Done. Done. Done.  I'd watch and I'd be like "BUT WHAT ABOUT THINKING ABOUT IT? WHEN DO YOU DO THAT??? "  Turns out she didn't think about it. She'd already decided and there you go. Totally baffled me - but also showed me that there was another way.  Thoughts are like the water we are swimming in. Some people...