The Beauty of Predictability and Why You Should Break It!

Nellie Harden: 00:00:04

Hello and welcome to the 6570 family project

Nellie Harden: 00:00:08

podcast. If you are a parent of a tween teen or somewhere on the

Nellie Harden: 00:00:13

way, this is exactly the place for you. This is the playground

Nellie Harden: 00:00:18

for parents who want to raise their kids with intention,

Nellie Harden: 00:00:21

strength and joy. Come in here all the discussions, get all the

Nellie Harden: 00:00:25

tactics and have lots of laughs along the way. We will dive into

Nellie Harden: 00:00:29

the real challenges in raising kids today how to show up as

Nellie Harden: 00:00:33

parents and teach your kids how to show up as members of the

Nellie Harden: 00:00:36

family and individuals of the world. My name is Mellie Hardin,

Nellie Harden: 00:00:41

big city girl turn small town sipping iced tea on the front

Nellie Harden: 00:00:45

porch mama, who loves igniting transformation in the hearts and

Nellie Harden: 00:00:48

minds of families by helping them build self love, discipline

Nellie Harden: 00:00:52

and leadership that elevates the family experience. And sets the

Nellie Harden: 00:00:56

kids up with a rock solid foundation they can launch their

Nellie Harden: 00:01:00

life on all before they ever leave home. This is the 6570

Nellie Harden: 00:01:05

family project. Let's go Hello, everyone. Welcome back to a

Nellie Harden: 00:01:14

another episode of the 6570 family project podcast you guys.

Nellie Harden: 00:01:20

I can't believe we're on episode 19. Already, this has been such

Nellie Harden: 00:01:24

a fun adventure this year. I can't wait to have 1000 episodes

Nellie Harden: 00:01:27

out here. But right now we're in Episode 19. Which sounds so big

Nellie Harden: 00:01:33

and such a baby at the same time. And I love it. Thank you

Nellie Harden: 00:01:36

for being here. If you've been here since episode one. Thank

Nellie Harden: 00:01:39

you. Thank you if this is your first episode, thank you, thank

Nellie Harden: 00:01:41

you. Because if you are showing up here, it means you are

Nellie Harden: 00:01:45

stepping up and stepping in as an intentional parent. And if

Nellie Harden: 00:01:48

you do that, and we're raising our kids within the 6570, that's

Nellie Harden: 00:01:53

how many days are in 18 years. If we step into that zone, and

Nellie Harden: 00:01:57

we are training and helping and equipping them in that time, you

Nellie Harden: 00:02:01

are helping them build the foundation that will be their

Nellie Harden: 00:02:05

foundation for the rest of their life, they'll be able to stand

Nellie Harden: 00:02:08

on it lean on it when they need to and launch from it time and

Nellie Harden: 00:02:12

time and time again. And that's what we're doing here. We are

Nellie Harden: 00:02:14

making are helping our kids and training them up to be self led

Nellie Harden: 00:02:19

leaders with self led discipline. And we're having a

Nellie Harden: 00:02:23

whole bunch of fun along the way too. I am a huge believer in big

Nellie Harden: 00:02:26

belly laughs kitchen dance parties, being goofy and being

Nellie Harden: 00:02:30

fun and teaching leadership and discipline.

Unknown: 00:02:34

So let's dive into today. You guys, today is called

Unknown: 00:02:39

the beauty of predictability. And the beauty of when you break

Unknown: 00:02:43

it right. And why is this because? Well, I had a recent

Unknown: 00:02:50

break of this last weekend I'll tell you about in a little in a

Unknown: 00:02:53

little while. And it reminded me of this beauty and with my

Unknown: 00:02:58

clients, a lot of times I help them develop what their routines

Unknown: 00:03:01

are going to be right. Because if you have a routine, you have

Unknown: 00:03:05

a schedule, you have a schedule within a schedule maybe. For us,

Unknown: 00:03:10

for example, I have many parts of my day, right I have my

Unknown: 00:03:14

morning and I have a morning routine schedule, right and then

Unknown: 00:03:17

I have school I home, I still homeschool three of my kids,

Unknown: 00:03:21

three of the four of my kids. And there's a schedule within

Unknown: 00:03:25

that. And then I have my work schedule, which is a schedule

Unknown: 00:03:29

that within that, and then we have family time. And guess what

Unknown: 00:03:32

there's a schedule within that. And why our schedules are so

Unknown: 00:03:37

important. It's because they have that predictability. They

Unknown: 00:03:41

have that flow. Everyone knows where they stand. Everyone knows

Unknown: 00:03:44

what's coming up. Spontaneous is so cool, so awesome. And that's

Unknown: 00:03:49

where we get into breaking it but you can build in

Unknown: 00:03:52

spontaneity, for example. My family time is from six to nine.

Unknown: 00:03:59

Every night, right? Monday through Friday, six to nine the

Unknown: 00:04:02

weekends. You know, they we have family time, of course, but

Unknown: 00:04:05

we're doing different things, what have you but Monday through

Unknown: 00:04:08

Friday, six to nine. That is our family time. We don't have

Unknown: 00:04:12

phones where we are just focused on each other, we're going on

Unknown: 00:04:16

walks, we're you know making dinner or cleaning up or doing

Unknown: 00:04:21

whatever. And so that is flexibility, flexibility in

Unknown: 00:04:26

there, whatever we do, but that is our time. And then, for

Unknown: 00:04:31

example, every Tuesday and every Thursday, we have one on one

Unknown: 00:04:34

time with our kids so that our kids can can know that every

Unknown: 00:04:38

week they're going to have time just in a room by themselves

Unknown: 00:04:43

sitting one on one with a parent and we just goof off. We have

Unknown: 00:04:47

serious talks if they need to be we play a game if we need to be

Unknown: 00:04:52

we play with durables, because all of our all of our daughters

Unknown: 00:04:56

have animals dribbles or fish. You know we do these things, we

Unknown: 00:05:00

have that one on one time at nine o'clock from nine to 930,

Unknown: 00:05:04

on Tuesday and nine to 930 on Thursday. So again, we are

Unknown: 00:05:09

having that schedule and predictability. But within that

Unknown: 00:05:12

schedule is where the spontaneity can happen. I hope

Unknown: 00:05:15

that makes sense to you. And with me in the morning, because

Unknown: 00:05:22

I have all of these different hats that I put on, I, you know,

Unknown: 00:05:25

with business and entrepreneurship and homeschool

Unknown: 00:05:28

mom and parent, and just myself and what I do, I need to be more

Unknown: 00:05:34

rigid. So I have very specific things that I do every single

Unknown: 00:05:38

morning that starts with moving my body, and I get a lot of

Unknown: 00:05:42

reading in, I get some journaling in, I obviously, get

Unknown: 00:05:48

a shower and get ready for the day in there. And I check to see

Unknown: 00:05:52

what's coming up for the day. And I make a list of what my day

Unknown: 00:05:54

is going to look like so that I know, okay, I don't need to

Unknown: 00:05:58

freak out, there's nothing that's going to come up and, you

Unknown: 00:06:00

know, bite me and be spontaneous and not such a good way. And I

Unknown: 00:06:04

know what's coming up. And with school and with vacations, right

Unknown: 00:06:10

and different things like this on our board, which I have an

Unknown: 00:06:13

entire board system that I taught my home, way, way back

Unknown: 00:06:18

when I was teaching, how to teach your kid and homeschool.

Unknown: 00:06:23

Because it was much less about what curriculum to use and all

Unknown: 00:06:26

of that I could care less what curriculum curriculum you use,

Unknown: 00:06:29

that is your, your decision and what feels right for you. But

Unknown: 00:06:34

what I was teaching was, how to actually teach in a home, and

Unknown: 00:06:40

what functionalities mindsets and tactics we can use for that

Unknown: 00:06:45

using discipline and leadership. And that's what I do for whole

Unknown: 00:06:48

families inside and outside of education now, but with that

Unknown: 00:06:54

they know when a test is coming up, how many of you, I mean,

Unknown: 00:06:58

raise your hand silently, wherever you're raising

Unknown: 00:07:01

eyebrows, wherever you're listening to this, you still

Unknown: 00:07:03

have those nightmares of showing up to school and you're like,

Unknown: 00:07:07

there's a test today. And I had no idea, right? We don't want

Unknown: 00:07:10

those we don't want you know, need that fear in our kiddos or

Unknown: 00:07:14

ourselves anymore. I'm in my 40s I still have that that

Unknown: 00:07:17

nightmare. And so we have that predictability. This is what is

Unknown: 00:07:22

coming up. And then you know, eventually as they're getting

Unknown: 00:07:25

older, they have their own planner, like we're passing over

Unknown: 00:07:29

the reins, right, we're passing down that 6570 foot rope and

Unknown: 00:07:34

handing more and more over to them along the way. Okay, so

Unknown: 00:07:37

that is why those are all the reasons why a schedule is so

Unknown: 00:07:43

good, right? You have predictability, you add

Unknown: 00:07:46

significantly lower stress, right? You know what's coming

Unknown: 00:07:49

up, you have free time built in to your schedule, so that you

Unknown: 00:07:55

don't have to think, Oh, I'm always working, oh, I'm always

Unknown: 00:07:58

studying, oh, I'm always doing this. I have no free time. Well,

Unknown: 00:08:02

if you build in the free time, then you will have free time,

Unknown: 00:08:05

right? I can look at your family's calendar, if you give

Unknown: 00:08:10

me two weeks of any of the year, probably outside of the

Unknown: 00:08:14

holidays, because that's always crazy, right? But if you give me

Unknown: 00:08:17

two weeks of your calendar, I can definitely tell you what

Unknown: 00:08:21

your priorities are, where you're stretched, then where you

Unknown: 00:08:25

you know, could use some guidance and mentoring and where

Unknown: 00:08:28

you're really strong to, if it's on your calendar, that's where

Unknown: 00:08:33

it counts. Right? Okay. So awareness, predictability, all

Unknown: 00:08:38

the good things, but some times, you need to be reminded of the

Unknown: 00:08:44

benefits of that routine, right? As good as as good as it is. And

Unknown: 00:08:48

think about this, right? Every single year. This is the best

Unknown: 00:08:52

example every single year when school gets out. Everyone's

Unknown: 00:08:56

like, Oh, we're free. We're free. We're free. And then every

Unknown: 00:08:59

single year when school gets back in session, it's like, Oh,

Unknown: 00:09:03

we're back. We're back to a routine we're back settled

Unknown: 00:09:07

again. I know what's actually going to happen tomorrow, right?

Unknown: 00:09:10

And that's exactly what I'm talking about. Right? A routine

Unknown: 00:09:14

is so good, but getting off routine is also so good. And

Unknown: 00:09:19

it's kind of this whole mentality of absence makes the

Unknown: 00:09:22

heart grow fonder, right. And think about this though, in our

Unknown: 00:09:27

crazy hooky world that we've been living in for the last

Unknown: 00:09:30

couple of years. With COVID. We had more all together time. We

Unknown: 00:09:38

had sometimes more schedules, sometimes less schedules,

Unknown: 00:09:42

sometimes just trying to figure out what was going on. Right and

Unknown: 00:09:45

so it's COVID has really thrown a wrench into every aspect of

Unknown: 00:09:51

everything. But especially when it or not especially but also

Unknown: 00:09:56

when it comes to scheduling and predictability. Right. I mean, I

Unknown: 00:10:01

still know I talked to kids in my community. And my oldest is

Unknown: 00:10:06

in a school outside of our home too. And they still have this

Unknown: 00:10:10

this, I wouldn't call it a fear, but a little bit of anxiety of

Unknown: 00:10:13

oh, it's fall break. I don't know, if we're gonna come back

Unknown: 00:10:16

after fall break, you just never know, because it was in 2020.

Unknown: 00:10:21

That March 13. I remember it clear as day. It was a Saturday,

Unknown: 00:10:25

it was the first day of spring break, and they never went back.

Unknown: 00:10:31

And they had no idea the parents, I don't want I don't

Unknown: 00:10:34

even know if any of us knew what was going to happen. I don't

Unknown: 00:10:37

think any of us thought, Oh, the entire world is going to shut

Unknown: 00:10:41

down for the next several months. I don't think that was

Unknown: 00:10:44

on many of our radars. But for the kid that really just moved

Unknown: 00:10:49

him sideways, wait a second, we're just on spring break. And

Unknown: 00:10:53

now we're not going back for the rest of the year. Right. And so

Unknown: 00:10:57

there's still some of that anxiety going in. All that to

Unknown: 00:11:01

say COVID kind of threw a wrench into some things, but I want to

Unknown: 00:11:05

give you some ideas of what you could do for yourself. And one

Unknown: 00:11:09

of them is a modification, dedication type thing. I

Unknown: 00:11:14

actually first saw this. Some of you will probably laugh at me

Unknown: 00:11:19

for this. But I used to watch back in the day.

Unknown: 00:11:23

Goodness, I'm I don't know if I was in high school or what but

Unknown: 00:11:26

Seventh Heaven anyone remember seventh heaven. And it was

Unknown: 00:11:30

actually I found out not too long ago was the W bees first,

Unknown: 00:11:34

like hit show that they had it was seven, seven. And the mom

Unknown: 00:11:38

who I think they had like 38 kids or something I don't

Unknown: 00:11:42

remember? No, it was like, I don't know, seven or something.

Unknown: 00:11:45

And she got to this point that she was breaking down. Don't ask

Unknown: 00:11:51

me what season this was in or what have you. I've no idea. But

Unknown: 00:11:54

I just remember she was getting so stressed and so broken down

Unknown: 00:11:58

that she left for a few days. And she said I'm I need to go

Unknown: 00:12:02

and be by myself. She went to the beach and she had this. And

Unknown: 00:12:07

I remember thinking then she waited too long. She waited too

Unknown: 00:12:11

long. Imagine if every year she had like two days or so maybe

Unknown: 00:12:18

even just one day that she could go and just be by herself

Unknown: 00:12:21

recoup, you know, journal, just walk without all the questions,

Unknown: 00:12:26

right? All these things. And this isn't just for moms. This

Unknown: 00:12:29

is for dads too. And but I do have to say and I'm a mom. So

Unknown: 00:12:35

I'm probably biased, that I think moms get the brunt of much

Unknown: 00:12:41

of what comes with family life. Not always there are certainly

Unknown: 00:12:45

exceptions. But if there was a teeter totter, I think moms are

Unknown: 00:12:49

a little bit heavier on that. And don't hate me, don't send me

Unknown: 00:12:53

the hate mail. If you are a super active dad out there I am

Unknown: 00:12:57

high fiving you and I think I am married to a super active dad

Unknown: 00:13:02

too. I'm just saying in the grand scheme of things. I think

Unknown: 00:13:05

moms get the brunt of the Mom, mom, right? You all you're

Unknown: 00:13:10

probably all nodding your heads right now. But having that time,

Unknown: 00:13:15

that time not waiting for you to absolutely needed or you're

Unknown: 00:13:19

going to implode, but do using it more preventatively and

Unknown: 00:13:23

breaking up that scheduled breaking up that every day

Unknown: 00:13:27

predictability can be really good. family vacations also do

Unknown: 00:13:32

the same thing. I cannot wait to go to Disney World. I cannot

Unknown: 00:13:36

wait to get home from Disney World, right? All the things and

Unknown: 00:13:40

that comes from we moved to our vacation spot. The place that we

Unknown: 00:13:44

live right now. We vacation that for 17 years, over and over and

Unknown: 00:13:51

over again. We first came here. Our sophomore year of college

Unknown: 00:13:55

for spring break. We came back again, junior year, we came back

Unknown: 00:13:58

again the year after we graduated, we just kept coming

Unknown: 00:14:01

back and back and back. All of our babies put their toes in the

Unknown: 00:14:04

ocean for the first time here. We renewed our vows for our 10

Unknown: 00:14:08

year anniversary here. All the things and finally, in 2014 we

Unknown: 00:14:14

were here with a group of people we have brought so many people

Unknown: 00:14:17

to this area of coastal North Carolina. And we're walking down

Unknown: 00:14:22

one of our favorite little roads and my husband just looks at me

Unknown: 00:14:24

and says why do we keep leaving, like, let's just stay and I was

Unknown: 00:14:30

so blown away. I never even thought of that as a

Unknown: 00:14:32

possibility. But lo and behold we waited another year to just

Unknown: 00:14:37

see if it was a passing thought it wasn't we waited another year

Unknown: 00:14:40

and we came back for three weeks to make sure this wasn't just a

Unknown: 00:14:43

vacation spot like we could actually live here. Turns out we

Unknown: 00:14:47

could all six of us voted even though my youngest was five they

Unknown: 00:14:51

were let's see they were they were 577 and 10 at the time and

Unknown: 00:14:59

all six have us voted yes. Even though it was going to be really

Unknown: 00:15:02

hard. And we sold everything moved here and all within 100

Unknown: 00:15:08

days, it was insane. But that was our decision. And we were so

Unknown: 00:15:11

happy for both. I mean, talk about jostling up the schedule,

Unknown: 00:15:15

that was a jostle. But what about, and just a small thing.

Unknown: 00:15:19

So what I was referring to earlier today is earlier in our

Unknown: 00:15:23

talk, is last weekend, I just felt this weight of this,

Unknown: 00:15:28

schedule this, okay, wake up every day and do this, this,

Unknown: 00:15:32

this and this, and then this, this, this and this, and then

Unknown: 00:15:34

this, you know, you get the point. I just felt so encumbered

Unknown: 00:15:39

by it. And so last Saturday, a friend of ours, a wonderful

Unknown: 00:15:43

friend of ours loves to take our girls, they went all to a corn

Unknown: 00:15:48

maze and had so much fun. And it was just my husband and I and we

Unknown: 00:15:52

were like, what do we want to do today, we could do, you know, we

Unknown: 00:15:55

could clean up something, we could do the things that need to

Unknown: 00:15:58

be done. Or we could just go have fun, right? So we went to a

Unknown: 00:16:03

town about an hour away, we had a fantastic lunch at this

Unknown: 00:16:06

wonderful place. And then we went Axe Throwing, which was

Unknown: 00:16:09

something new, neither one of us had ever done before. very

Unknown: 00:16:13

cathartic. Also, by the way, if you haven't tried it, it's so

Unknown: 00:16:17

fun. And it really was just the thing that I needed to break up

Unknown: 00:16:22

the predictability chain that was happening, even though we

Unknown: 00:16:26

have that built in time. So there really is beauty in having

Unknown: 00:16:31

predictable schedules, and it serves you and there's also a

Unknown: 00:16:35

lot of beauty in breaking them up either big time or a little

Unknown: 00:16:39

time, just go away for an afternoon, whatever that is. But

Unknown: 00:16:42

breaking up that schedule can be so beneficial for you to help

Unknown: 00:16:47

you realize,

Unknown: 00:16:48

you know what, I can go do this. And you know what a schedule,

Unknown: 00:16:51

that schedule is also really nice to get to. And I was

Unknown: 00:16:54

thinking about this. And I was like, you know, it's kind of

Unknown: 00:16:56

like, if you know, kale is great, spinach is great. And it

Unknown: 00:17:01

makes you function better. It makes you do better, it makes

Unknown: 00:17:04

you think better. But that chocolate chip cookie, that

Unknown: 00:17:08

chocolate chip cookie reminds you of the adventure of life, if

Unknown: 00:17:11

we're just sticking with food metaphors in here. I mean, a

Unknown: 00:17:14

good hike reminds me of the adventure of life too. But just

Unknown: 00:17:17

sticking with food. This is what I'm talking about kale and

Unknown: 00:17:20

spinach. Great, great, great, great, great. That cookie that

Unknown: 00:17:24

you have every once in a while is going to remind you that is

Unknown: 00:17:29

so good. By the way, I need to get back to eating kale because

Unknown: 00:17:32

I feel kind of crappy now. But right. And so that it's the

Unknown: 00:17:38

predictability is great. And the breaking it is great. You can't

Unknown: 00:17:41

live in one place for too long, right? You have to stir the pot,

Unknown: 00:17:46

you have to stir things up a little bit. Okay, you guys, I

Unknown: 00:17:50

hope this helps you a little bit. I would love to know about

Unknown: 00:17:52

your schedules. Do you have a morning routine? Do you have a

Unknown: 00:17:56

school routine? Meaning, if you homeschool, maybe you have a

Unknown: 00:18:00

routine for that? Or when the kids go to school? What is your

Unknown: 00:18:03

routine for that? What do you do during the day? And then what do

Unknown: 00:18:07

you guys do for family time? Do you have any sort of schedule

Unknown: 00:18:10

for that? And what do you do to break it and bust it open? So

Unknown: 00:18:13

you remember, hey, we can do this. And hey, the schedule is

Unknown: 00:18:18

awesome. I want to hear from you. We are always building

Unknown: 00:18:22

wonderful self led discipline and leadership in this group and

Unknown: 00:18:25

I can't wait to hear what you're doing in your family. Thanks so

Unknown: 00:18:29

much for being here. You're helping your family you're

Unknown: 00:18:31

helping the world. Happy building you guys. Thank you so

Unknown: 00:18:38

much for listening today. And I hope you were able to take

Unknown: 00:18:40

something from our discussion that you can use to build the

Unknown: 00:18:44

foundation of self led leadership in your own family.

Unknown: 00:18:47

If you are a parent with children 17 or younger, and

Unknown: 00:18:50

especially those around nine and up, I would love to extend an

Unknown: 00:18:55

invitation to you to the best club in town. The family

Unknown: 00:18:59

architects Club is a private club where intentional parents

Unknown: 00:19:03

go that want to love support, connect or reconnect and really

Unknown: 00:19:08

truly help guide their kids and teach them how to self lead in

Unknown: 00:19:12

discipline and leadership. This is an online community and the

Unknown: 00:19:17

you are welcome to it. Parenting is a project and you are the

Unknown: 00:19:21

architect of this one. You plan you design and oversee the

Unknown: 00:19:25

construction of the beginning of someone else's life. And that's

Unknown: 00:19:29

what goes into these first 6570 days. And it will be the

Unknown: 00:19:34

foundation for the rest of their lives. So come join the club.

Unknown: 00:19:38

You can find your invitation on the front page of my website

Unknown: 00:19:42

Nelly hardened.com that is n e ll ie H AR D n.com. Thank you

Unknown: 00:19:49

again for being a part of this conversation today. And if

Unknown: 00:19:52

something really resonated with you, or if you have a question,

Unknown: 00:19:55

please don't hesitate to connect with me. You can find me on

Unknown: 00:19:58

Instagram at Nelly Hardin. And lastly, if you love the

Unknown: 00:20:02

information, please please leave a five star review and a comment

Unknown: 00:20:07

so more and more families can be impacted by harnessing the

Unknown: 00:20:10

strength of these ideas and tools in their own families. So

Unknown: 00:20:14

thank you so much. Happy building you guys and I'll see