Courage to be Honest: Defining Your Role & Purpose as an Alienated Parent

you are listening to the Beyond The High Road podcast with Shelby Milford episode number 97 stay tuned hey guys how you doing so if you were listening last week um we were talking about if you heard the edited version which was anything after the first 24 hours that it was dropped then you remember that we were talking about putting things off um in your everyday life and your as it relates to your situation of alienation and also maybe not feeling motivated or purposed then I shared with you mark Manson's take on finding purpose and by asking yourself what are you actually willing to struggle for your focus becomes a lot more constrained my comparison was like

going to the gym you know when you go to the gym or when you're doing any exercise regimen if you feel the burn in your muscle then it's working you're doing it right you know that like all right if you don't feel the burn then something wrong something's off like you know you already have the mindset that in order to get the results that you want you have to feel the burn you have to feel struggle through it and suffer in a way in order to achieve the great results you want of the bikini body or the speedo body that you might be going after so we already know that we're conditioned for that we know that in order to lose weight and to look good the way that you think that you want you

have to go through some physical torture in order to get there and then that torture doesn't seem so torturous right it doesn't seem so bad because you already expect it it's the work ethic mindset that you have about going to the gym if you're doing that on the regular and you've made that decision for yourself you've got a lot more tolerance in that area than maybe you have in some other areas like for instance if you're in a job that you don't like maybe you're work ethic there like your literal work ethic is not as pointed and directed as it is when you go to the gym or pick any other interest that you have the same is true like let's say if you want to go back to school you want to

get your degree whether you want to get your Masters your undergrad degree when you go back to school you make the decision based on the knowing that your time there isn't going to be anything like hanging out like on a jungle gym playing it's not going to be all fun and games instead you are going to have to sacrifice likely going to have to sacrifice maybe a little maybe a lot in order to get yourself to the goal ultimate goal of getting that degree right you know in the beginning that you are going to spend some sleepless nights studying cramming for some tests it's just part of it it is just the name of the game it's going to suck while you're there but at the end you're going to be

the person that has the degree and it's all worth it the same thing with alienation like for me what I was sharing you sharing with you the last part of that episode is that I decided long ago that and I'll tell you what happened before that today too but I decided long ago that the struggle in all of the things that happen all of the hiccups and the rejection and the not no calling and all the things that my daughter does and doesn't do that I would otherwise lab as negative or bad or Define our relationship as us being further apart from each other I now just accept and think of it like the muscle burn when I go to the gym this is the strugle that I choose like when we were

meeting on Zoom weekly when that was our schedule and the times that she wouldn't show up this was just part of it that way I'm not making each little occasion that we were supposed to meet every time she doesn't call for my birthday or Mother's Day or whatever I don't make that Define us moving forward as like oh she didn't call so that just means we're more alienated than we were you know what I'm saying does that make sense I don't make any of the Little um occasions or lack of occasions lack of time spent together mean anything in the long run because ultimately when we look at it like pull back on it from a bird's eye view from the sky view at our situation all of these little occasions

at one point will seem so small in comparison to the whole picture right and when I was at that point like back in the day looking at my situation it all seemed so dark and gloomy I was making each one of the the things that happened or each know that I got each um court appearance and attorney not doing something all of these little disappointments I made mean something about me and her and my relationship and that really screwed me in the long run you know it caused me to and even when the good things would happen and I would try to make those mean something for us it always brought me to let them right all of it did because I was placing these expectations and like setting myself up

for these mile markers first and mentally jotting each noow or no call down in my mind and making that mean kind of like Rainman remember that book that he carried around and he would write down his serious injuries any time that he felt like somebody ascended him kind of like that that's how I kind of picture me back in the day like filing quietly filing that away for all the evidence and reasons why things weren't going well for my case or why I needed to feel more urgent and anxious around whatever upcoming thing was happening right because she didn't do this she didn't do that this didn't happen that didn't happen and what that was really doing was putting the focus outside of

me and causing me to feel entirely helpless right and I know we talk about a lot of this a lot of the time but it really is it all boils down to how you are thinking about your life in your situation of alienation and what you are making it mean for you moving forward that really is everything when it comes to you feeling happy sad anxious content at peace it all has to do with the way that you're thinking about it not really actually what's happening outside of us it's how we perceive it all deciding what it is that you're choosing to struggle for deciding like what is worth it to you I think is a very worthwhile task here way to look at your life because when you

decide it yourself like no no no this is me deciding that this is my walk this is my struggle this is my purpose here and it is supposed to be hard not Parenthood in general like if I was another person in another situation but my situation and what it is it is what it is right is actually supposed to be this way that's how it is right now so this also depends like what I'm saying right now applies to all situations but I could see how what I just said there might turn somebody off like if it was me back in the beginning of my situation of alienation I think everybody's situation is different and not everybody follows one path like you must go to a b c d and e places in order

for you to have walked through it and that's how your story is going to go not everybody um goes through all these stages of it right and so if you're just learning that you've been alienated or you're just in the beginning stages of court and what have you I just want to let you know that I'm not saying and I don't believe it's true that every parent and every child is alienated forever or has to go through all of these stages that I've been through in order to come out the other side and maybe be reunified I've seen many of my clients and also others out there who have reunified with their children successfully rebuilt the relationship with their children at all

of these stages so just know too that you know every case every family is different but I do think it's important and I think it applies that like let's say you're actively in litigation right maybe you're doing interrogatories maybe you're whatever is going on for you maybe you're still hiring a lawyer phase um I still think at the extremely important for you to decide that if you are going this journey that you choose it on purpose and you choose the struggle like the hardest parts of this you're choosing on purpose decide that before you go in so that you're not struggling for no reason and suffering unnecessarily hopefully that's making sense like you going

into just like I was saying for the gym let's I like to simplify it you know you going into a new exercise regimen you know that you're going to have to sustain some injuries on each one of your muscles in order to build them to where you want them to be there's going to be some pain same thing with getting a degree you know that you're not just going to go in and they're not just going to hand you the degree there's sets to take and those steps can be painful and you're going to be sacrificing some stuff so with your Situation's avation no matter where you are decide on the sacrifices like decide to sacrifice on purpose beforehand so that you don't you're not see feeling

surprised and taken back in the moment when you're faced to make those sacrifices so that's a sort of a recap of the last part of last week's episode I think the reason why so many of us are stuck in that stuck place is because it seems like all it's been is Strive strive disappointment strive strive disappointment to the point where we don't even know what for anymore this is where I want you to pose a second part of that question so what are you willing to struggle for choosing the struggle ahead of time I could say okay I'm always willing to struggle for my daughter and whatever that entails I'll just leave that open-ended for our situation I do leave it open-ended

because a lot of my purpose there isn't up to me right I can't say My ultimate goal is to reunify with my daughter because that I can't just make things like that happen part of that involves her so that's never been my goal it's more open-ended my goal is to love be present for and always look and find Opportunities to model to her and be there to support her when she wants and needs it and is open to it okay that is more my goal and it's a lot less definitive that is ongoing I choose that struggle every day now I don't even think about it anymore because it's just become part of me and that way when any hardships come up that's okay this is just what I do it said fine we just take

care of it and keep on rolling make sense but now when it comes to like for you guys depending on what phase of this you are in whether you have just found out whether you're in the port process or whether you are choosing to model from afar drip love however you want to call it or the last space and there are lots of different iterations of this and interpretations and again this is not a path that everybody follows but another phase would be alienated and now I don't want to say a strange because if you're alienated first you can never really be a strange but you can contribute to it by closing yourself off to the idea of y'all so there's that there's that

extreme all the way to wanting needing doing everything you possibly can to get your children back in your world I think it's very important for you to be extremely brutally honest with yourself no matter where you are on your path about what you're struggling for like why like what is your ultimate goal like I told you that what am I willing to struggle for it will always be my daughter that is first and foremost also I have some business struggles and some personal struggles with my own that I've already chosen I don't just have one purpose I think it's too limiting I keep them pretty much open like I want to always be an example of what is possible to other alienated parents that is

another one of my purposes now throughout my situation I lost sight like my uh focus on what I really wanted to happen in each and every fight if you will um because I was so caught up in the fight I was so caught caught up in the Injustice being done and that the fact that a mom should be able to parent her child mother her child be present for her child especially if she's right there willing and able and nobody should get in the way of that and I got so caught up in the Injustice of it all and trying to prove my worthiness to parent her to her and also of course without even realizing I got caught up in it I was actually trying to prove it to my ex because because well

let me just tell you a story it's easier to tell you so back in I believe it was 2018 when the last court hearing was and during that hearing was a three-day the judge made it very clear that she didn't want to be there in the end of that three-day hearing she basically reordered the last order that had been put in place a couple years before that the problem was the reason that we were going back to court to begin with is because because that order was not clear that as I'm sure if you've been through the court system before family court you are painfully aware how not clear like poorly written some of these orders are and that causes so much pain Agony moving forward because if the order is

not written clearly then the person that's alienating your child from you is definitely going to find the loopholes they are going to utilize those loopholes to further alienate them from you and you will then in turn have to spend money you didn't have in order to go back to court right I we're all clear on this painfully and it was a nightmare for me in fact the reason it took me so long to get to this the last hearing back in 2018 was because of that reason exactly is that I had already spent hundreds of thousands of dollars and I didn't know how I was going to get back to Port hence me selling my house in 2017 July of 2017 so by the time we finally got support after I was able to

pay 2018 comes around it took forever right and she the judge at the time just reordered this poorly written order from back in a couple years before so there's a bench order the judge gives the order when they're sitting on the bench it's called a bench order and then that's what I call it anyway it's usually up to the judge will appoint if you will I don't know what the term is for that one of the attorneys responsible for writing that order up taking exactly what the judge says and putting that on paper and submitting that after they readed line and passing back and forth and then the judge signs off on it right well what the judge's bench order was and what was

put into order were two entirely different things and so in the end like if you're watching me I'm smiling now um it's not funny and it wasn't funny then it is comical in a way that this continues to happen in the court system there's transcripts readily available to refer back to and see what is written and to take what was spoken from the bench order and put that into a written order but for some reason it's not done I don't mean to be bringing this up to R anybody up here it is to me comical that it's not there's not a better way to do this maybe now with AI the AI could be better than the opposing attorney having said that there was a stepup plan as you guys will know for me

this won't last long you guys I just want to make a point here so there was a stepup plan and within three months Judges Bench order was listen I just want to make sure that you are like not prioritizing drinking I forget how she said that but I need you to show that you're not drinking that you don't have the alcohol problem that they say you have so please prove that you're not drinking within 3 months you can start having unsupervised visits with your daughter again and so I was like let's go let's start this yesterday and so they put me on this blowy device and here's where it gets funky is that the other attorney did not follow sober length guidelines which is what was said

in the in the order right to follow the the guidelines of the alcohol monitoring device company but instead they made a testing schedule that was nearly impossible to follow I tested like up to 10 times a day sometimes 12 times a day I'd wake myself up in the middle of the night I test blow and then go back to sleep just so I could make sure that they knew that I wasn't drinking because under the bench order the bench order says I just need you to prove that you're not drinking and so that was first and foremost not whether I could perform like a monkey and test within these windows right now I understand that there is a degree of let's be able to have some discipline and comply when

necessary right but I anyway I went above and beyond trying to comply and I would lo and behold I would get like all the way to the point and then one day I would be over by one minute or something and my ex would knock me right back to the starting point like I'm anxious even talking about it right now thinking back about it because I constantly felt that sense of urgency right in the center of my chest like oh my God did I test did I forget to test I would wake up in the middle of the night after I'd already tested right like did I forget to test I'm freak out and so that constant state of stress this went on for a long period of time during this whole testing

schedule in which time I know on the other side they were you know leaning back arms up feet kicked up like yep let's we're just going to keep this up they never had an intention to you know to start anything other than keeping her away from me and so it was a very frustrating experience for me not only frustrating it was it was stress inducing I went through a lot of pain during that time and in fact during that time is when I really went into that depression like before that I was doing all the drinking right and then I stopped and I wasn't there was nothing but also I had to deal with all my feelings my emotions then and so that was really on the cusp of when all this

other stuff and I started go getting really deep into my own coaching for myself and then of course on to being where I am today right so in a tiny way I do say that that experience actually brought me to who I am today but back then that whole testing period I lost my way I lost my focus it ended up this the testing and complying it became more about me proving myself and proving that I was good enough to be her mom proving that I was not the person that they had been making me out to be and less about what my desire was for doing what I was doing for going jumping through all these hoops I did I felt like a circus monkey that had to jump through hoops and that the the

goalpost keep kept changing on me so I kept having to do more tricks and more and more all with a smile on my face throughout in doing that and not refocusing on my myself on what my goal was and what was important I lost myself and that is when I think I shared with you a long time ago that I was really questioning my desire to be on this Earth because in my eyes back then he pushed me to such a limit like I was doing everything that was required of me and by the way I didn't need to ever prove myself to begin with because hello I love my daughter and I have always been present for her and shown her I love her and provided her a stable and lovy atmosphere environment to grow up in

right and so hearing it from him from the stepmom and then of course from this judge that I needed to to prove this from her I was like okay let's go let's do this right but then each time that I got reset my ex was the one that was sending me picking me up like a game pawn and sending me back to the start Point picking me right back up again and sending me back to the start point so I felt entirely defeated no matter how hard I strived no matter what Hoops I jumped through no matter how well I did it how much extra how much I overd delivered right and and showed the track record I remember um doing this on several occasions spending hours upon hours before they got their data

Reporting System updated which was right back at the end of 2021 but soberlink used to it was awful data reporting that they did you had to do it manually so you'd have to print each day out and look at all of the tests as opposed to just having one big summary so I would spend hours upon hours organizing and graphing my results and like the times and all of that and like what was considered missed and how far out the window I was I did hours upon hours of graphing that and trying to show my ex look here it shows here I've tested 12 times per day 10 times per day eight times I'm clearly not drinking the judge said that that's what she wanted me to prove and now you're holding me to

different standards right and so I was in essence my whole goal there what I was striving for my purpose was to have him deem me as Worthy enough to parent my child and I tell you that was going to be a very unfruitful Venture I think there's a lot of you out there that may not be going through this exact thing you know you may not be testing you may not be on supervised visits but it could be something else related to you constantly striving to have the person who's alienating our kids from you deem you good enough worthy enough to parent your children to co-parent with them and I tell tell you if they're alienating your kids from you it's not going to happen you know um it's the chances of

it happening are are low so I was so distracted by trying to prove myself and prove my worthiness to parent my own child to my ex that I lost sight of what my goals were I didn't even just lose sight of them I forgot that there was even a goal other than take your test take your test don't forget to take your test make sure that you test that was constant 247 in my brain right like I was if I was not just coming off of a test and then because I was overachieving and taking the tests off of schedule like taking extra tests I would think that I had already tested when it came to test time because I just tested off of the schedule that I would miss the actual test time which would

cause him to tell me that I was going back to zero again so it was this constant like stress response it was awful awful feeling two and a half no almost three years finally it wasn't until I moved to Florida three years of over and over and over and over completing the requirements so were set out on that bench that day by that judge right and never ever achieving it day in and day out taking thousands upon thousands of tests submitting these breath tests the whole process caused a lot of pain I caused myself and the way that I was thinking about it the whole situation and the way that he was behaving and what I was depending on him to do for me which I knew he wasn't

going to do it was a [ __ ] mess I was I drove down here from Texas to Florida with that device and when I would leave when I left one time zone to another it was supposed to record and I called and let them know yes I was still off an hour because of their error at soberlink you know what I'm saying like things like that happened all the time but I was always trying to think ahead and trying to test double time triple time quadruple time just to make sure that I was covering all basis and then I always ultimately still fell short because it was so much right that stress response that constant whatever after so long of using your own mind power brain power to

try to problem solve it does blow up and of course you're going to forget you get disheveled it's like um you know it's the constant stress response it caused me so much suffering and it was also the way I was thinking about it because I felt like this testing and this and and he my ex had so much power over me I did wasn't able to see it in the way that I'm see it today and today if I were to do that again I would feel so much less pressured by it I I expected somehow for this testing unit and for him to like I that I was supposed to master it and it was going to deem me worthy that it was going to give me my daughter back and that was really never going to happen

you know and I don't mean to say that that's not going to happen with you but I was placing way too much power in the hands of some device who was ultimately being controlled by my ex you know and so it is what it is my point of this goes further than my testing and my little story here I think if you don't get clear on what your purpose is you will find yourself in a two years threee stin of doing the same thing over and over expecting different results you know sending yourself in that sort of Tail Spin and expecting something different to happen but how can you expect something different to happen if you have not yourself gotten clear on what your goal is if I'm honest with

myself no of course nothing they should never have stood in between me and my child all of that wasn't right you know and because of it when my daughter went over to her dad's house from that point on my life like basically when the [ __ ] hit the fan my life blew up you know and I start started I went into this spiral of you know I cracked under the pressure I was fighting the fight to fight it because it wasn't what they were doing wasn't right my right shouldn't have been taken away from me I'm a good mom and I look at all the things that we do together and you know trying to prove myself to them it seemed like a noble fight and like the right thing to do but

if I was really honest with myself back in those times there were a few periods of time during that fight that I was not necessarily ready to provide for my child the way I was before she was taken from me I was so hurt and sick distraught struggling malnourished emotionally I had done that actually to myself because I didn't know how to handle it that I wasn't going to be able to I would have been fine and my daughter would have been fine but I really truly was n up for that challenge back then and and I didn't get it instead I spun my wheels in suffering right but I was still fighting a fight that was actually pointless fruitless and I spent a lot of money doing it just because I needed to

prove and and fight against what they were doing that was bad but that I guess what I'm trying to say and I sound like I'm repetitive but it was the wrong fight just like me taking the tests over and over you know some you know a couple years after that was also the wrong fight now I would ALS I would take those tests over again but I would have done it with a different mindset I guess my point is do you remember what's coming to me now in the simplified way of saying this is like do you remember um The Karate Kid when Daniel son can't believe I'm using this this is the first thing that is coming to mind right now and it's I think it's going to work so remember when Daniel said was

getting so frustrated day by day like with project there was like four projects He had to do so he did the first one he was all excited and he was like yeah and so he was you know paint the fence paint the fence up down up down and then he went to the next day or the next week whatever it was an entirely different struggle and he didn't he thought at first that he was repaying back Mr Miyagi for what Mr Miyagi was going to teach him so he thought all right I'll just paint this fence and then then he'll teach me all the good stuff and then the next day or the next week he was you know waxing on waxing off and then it was the the sand the floor right and then it was paint

the house he grew more and more angry and resentful because during that whole time he had no idea what he was struggling for he had no [ __ ] clue what he knew was that he was [ __ ] weary he was tired he was sore and also he was no better off than what he started from in his own mind right he wasn't learning karate like he set out to do so what the [ __ ] was all this for you know what I'm saying so that's kind of how I compare our struggling when we aren't clear with ourselves about what our end goal is so yeah what do you want to struggle for is like what is your purpose but what is your end what do you want the result to be like your purpose is what you do and then I'm asking you

with this is like what are you expecting in the end what is the result you want to create purpose is I am absolutely willing to struggle for showing up as the mom and becoming the mom who loves her child unconditionally and is modeling to her and creates closeness even from afar until the day that she is ready to reconvene reunite right whenever that is like everything has a purpose a car its purpose is to drive you places but now that we know what you're willing to struggle for you can ask this before or after what is the end result that you want to create and and be honest with yourself too about whether it's what you want I see so many parents just like I was when I didn't know like I was

telling myself that I was fighting because what they were doing was wrong but I was in the fight trying to get my kid back when I was not actually ready to prepared to mother her and pro provide her with the things that I was providing her with before she left hopefully that makes sense you know what I'm saying I wasn't there were times periods of time in this fight that I wasn't prepared to give her what I was fighting for in the end like I was fighting to have her back fulltime but I wasn't even prepared for that because my life had become something different than when she was in it all the time after she left I [ __ ] I my life was of a person that was living alone and was

their life was in shambles and I was depressed and I was living you know I wasn't caring for a child for a good period of time but I was still fighting to have her in my life but I wasn't in the same spot I was back then does that make sense so I was fighting this battle pointlessly uselessly and let me might I add unsuccessfully yet I really I didn't even know why I was doing it I was not clear I was not prepared for the end result of getting her back okay also in the last six eight months or so six months I've had a lot of previous clients when I say a lot like more than five or six or seven clients clients and then other people that I've heard from just in

conversation and comments and stuff like that who have recently reunited with their children and they have this whole new bag of chips new bag of challenges that they are learning to overcome or wanting to learn to overcome now that their children are in their lives again right and that looks all different ways some jumped right back in and feel like they're right back to where they were and about 80% have voiced in some way that they were not prepared for the pain on this side of things on the reunification and what that looks like that they had not mentally emotionally prepared themselves for this result and as a result they are now suffering and doing the work sort of faced with forced

to become brutally honest with themselves about where they each stand and what work is ahead of them then there are those of you who have been alienated and now I don't want to say a strange but like have been living apart from your children for many years now and you are so hurt that now in your mind they need to do a lot of work to get back into my life they have really screwed me over they have been uh disrespectful they have been downright nasty and rude and I'm not going to let them into my life like you draw a boundary nobody behaves like that to me that's rude that's wrong children shouldn't act that way to their parents so then on the other side of things in the name of

self-preservation you are telling yourself that you don't want them back in your life that you're not interested that they are disrespectful and they need to do a lot of work in order to get back into your life but I just want to tell you with all the love I have in my heart I mean maybe maybe it's different for you I'm not going to say that I know how you feel but I am pretty sure that the whole purpose the whole what what we as humans really crave for and want always is to love and be loved to feel understood to know that we're a part of and that we mean something and also we strive to create meaning in other people's lives right that is just what we as humans really thrive on is love

now self-preservation and ego and hurt can tell us try to convince us that we don't need that in our lives yeah but it's different you don't know our history and we're not going to put ourselves in that position anymore for anybody to hurt us them our children to hurt us they have trampled on our hearts and blah blah blah but I just want to remind you too that nobody tramples on your heart nobody hurts you nobody can even disrespect you without your permission like you have to take offense in something in order to feel disrespected right so you can actually look at with like again I'm saying this with all Liv my heart you can change your perspective on who they are to you

and how they're behaving you know what I'm saying like it's might be the tone with which you're looking and what you've labeled them as if you think that they're disrespectful then everything that they say you will think has a dis respectful tone but anyway I digress I think it's very important that you be honest about what it is you want for like out of life and from this situation and your relationship with your kids be aware that if you're telling yourself that I don't want any more from them and they are awful and blah blah blah I'm sure you know that when you're doing that you actually create the opposite of the result that you really truly want deep within which

is always to love and beloved if you are telling them that they're disrespecting you that they are mean and they need to stay over there because they rejected you for so long you are actually in turn doing the same thing back you are rejecting that and so you're not going to create the result you want you're always going to feel like you're suffering like you're striving to try to get somewhere and that you have to keep enduring right but the only thing you really have to endure is the story that's going on in your brain if you let go of the story that's happening on the inside about whatever you think you're suffering for like loosen your grip on that story stay open to other

perspectives and decide whether this is a fight that you want to be fighting anyway you'll find that you don't have to endure nearly as much you know what I'm saying like you might just be fighting and spinning your wheels for something that you don't want anyway is what I'm saying or that you're not ready for anyway like me when I was fighting to get my daughter back home when at that certain point I wasn't prepared to have her back home yet because i' have been in shambles because of what had gone on with the alienation but I had cracked under the pressure and during that time frame I was not ready to bring her back in the home like I was before she left you know what I'm saying

and so be really honest with yourself because when you face that and there's nothing to be shameful for and I'm not saying that all of you are like not ready to have your kids back not at all we're all at different spots but I want to share where I was during each time that I was lying to myself or not even asking myself the question oblivious to what the answer was because I think it might help you to refocus yourself so that you can get to the place you want to be and then start working for and start that that battle to fight for your children does that make sense like you're going to be spinning your wheels in the meantime and that's why maybe you feel so tired weary and like it's been a

constant struggle because maybe you have to refocus where are you placing your focus and do you like that Focus this is from my mentor with any decision you make any any purpose you set out to do any goal that you have know your reasons for making each decision you make and then like your reasons know all of the choices in front of you and then like your choice for doing whatever you do and that way in the end looking back on your life or looking back on whatever you've just accomplished or not you don't beat yourself up for the choices that you made because you know in the moment that you made those choices liking your reasons liking your your whole mindset around it so then you

don't go back and shame yourself for not knowing better because you knew better because you took in ventory at every chance you had does that I know that sounds like really vague but I hope I'm making sense like are you good with where you're placing your focus right now I was not good I know I wouldn't have been good back then when I was placing my focus on trying to get my ex to see that I was worthy of being a mother to my daughter that wasn't a very productive Focus that was going to keep me chasing my tail for a very long time and it did three [ __ ] years I that's ultimately I just want to save you guys the time that I spent that I can never get back you know and help you guys to

address this stuff ahead of time I feel so passionately about that I I don't want you guys to suffer in the way that I have and maybe you already have and keep suffering in the same way maybe keep knocking your head up against the wall I want to help you to address that now and the way that you do that is you become brutally honest with yourself at each step why am I doing this is this contributing to my ultimate goal and every little task you do as you go along keep asking yourself those questions and do do I still like this goal do I still want to set out for this goal is it I don't want to say is it realistic because I think if you can think it it's realistic but is it in the Cs for you at

this moment like if you're wanting your kid back but you know you have steps to take to get yourself in the place where you can be the parent that you want to be then be honest with yourself about that so you can get there but if you're not acknowledging it you won't ever get there you'll keep putting that on the on the in the back of your mind like I did back then because I had really let myself go okay so is this what you want and how can I bridge the gap like if you're not to where you want to be yet which fight do I want to pick in the interim knowing that my long-term goal is whatever it is does that make sense like be very pointed and constrained with your focus throughout your whole

entire life really but especially when it comes to your situation of alienation I basically pick your battles and pick them smartly with purpose knowing that every step that you take isn't just another way to busy yourself and spin your wheels because it will cause you to suffer and sometimes for years on end without you even knowing until you become aware of what you're doing and where you want to go okay I hope that came out okay because I just see so many parents like you and I who have haven't aren't being honest with themselves about what it is they want and so they they suffer as a result because things aren't getting done on time things are not being reciprocated your children

aren't loving you or they're not calling you on holidays or birthdays or whatever they're not showing up in the way that you think you want them to but what I want to ask you is are you sure you want it that way I'm not doubting anything that you're thinking but what is it that you do want Define that because so often we make it so ambiguous that anything is going to disappoint us that they they're always going to fall short because we haven't fully defined that for ourselves you know I mean you could never setting goals setting expectations on them is never going to do you well but you can set like a bar for what you will accept and what you won't like I'm not going to

accept my getting on the phone with my child if they are going to curse at me or my kid didn't call me for my birthday I'm so UPS that this is a very common one and I keep bringing it up because I see it so often like three times a day lately they haven't called they haven't written I haven't I didn't get to meet my kiddo's teacher for meet the teacher I don't know who their teachers are what their schedule is what their life is like for this new year ask yourself is that in the cards was that in the cards sometimes what our brain likes to do is present evidence our ego too likes to present evidence like look see you don't even know what's going on with their

school you don't even know what's going on on with them athletically you're like you know extracurriculars you just you don't know anything about them and it does that to you like your brain does that to you partly to keep you like keep you safe to protect you right but in the end it ends up causing you so much more pain and that feeling of striving and like you're not you're being screwed more but have you taken the steps to go to the school or you just feeling intimidated like I know what we're dealing with and I know it's a struggle but also too you have to empower yourself as much as you possibly can and so if you're setting yourself up for failure by like saying oh what's the

purpose why should I even bother going to the games or going to meet the teacher or doing whatever and then at the same time you're telling yourself that you C you haven't you don't even know who the teacher is or you haven't seen any of their games they haven't given me the the game schedule well there are some things that you could do in order to get there and like exercise The Authority that you do have to get there schedule to go to the games right if you do want to go to the games then actually follow through and take the steps in order to go to the games don't complain that you're not being invited to the games so anyway just look at what you're telling yourself that you

actually want and expect from your children or from any other area in your life or relationship in your life and what are the ways that you're setting yourself up for that is it a now reality for you is it or is it something that you want to work forth or is it something that you want to put on the back burner here's the deal is the reason why is because if you stay in this indecision and not really knowing and never really addressing it you're going to keep working towards like the Karate Kid you're going to keep working and striving towards something that you think is nothing you know what I'm saying and you're you're going to feel exhausted tired because you're like what

is this all for and because you don't have a purpose a goal in mind as you're doing all of this busy work you don't you don't get anywhere you do end up spinning your wheels there's no Direct you lack direction if this is you I feel you i' mean I was there for years and years and years but give yourself the direction start working toward setting yourself up for wins by focusing on the things that you do have control over and being honest with yourself about what those things are you know and what it is you truly want don't just like say that you want something because it sounds like what you should want well of course I'm fighting for my kid I want my kid back

because of course because I'm a parent and they took my kid for me and it shouldn't be that way and that's why I'm going back to court listen it's not going to go well for you if that's where you're at and I mean that with all of the care and love and compassion I have in my heart for you but I also want to help you to refocus and find your true purpose so that you can get to that goal but if you are just fighting against somebody and not for yourself you are going to to lose 100% of the time makees sense because you're never going to be satisfied don't give into just fighting for a cause because you should and and also too I just want to encourage you to have compassion for

yourself just because you think you should doesn't mean that that's actually what you really truly want you know and when you follow what you truly want as opposed to what you think others want for you or what you think you should want when you follow what you truly want your heart is going to be in it and it's not going to be the work and the struggle that you've been going through thus far so sometimes that just means a refocus mental refocus in your mind like what am I doing this all for and sometimes it means pulling back on the work and taking a full assessment of what you're going to do moving forward but I promise you if you do this work you're going to create so much more joy

and you'll be so much more productive as a result in this whole thing this whole fight for our children for um you know ourselves even that's what I think is that um for me anyway it's been a pathway back to me to knowing developing the relationship with myself the one that I never really had or if I did have it it been you know since I was a little kid I'd always been I'd been from a pretty young age separated from myself um and so this has been a huge coming home to me and um developing This Love Story with myself you know and I I really truly um I wish that for all of you because when you do develop that love and compassion that like oh for yourself like really enjoying yourself

and being okay with all of your wants and desires even if they seem counterintuitive to what you should want as a parent honoring your true desires will always bring you to the most productive um successful like most productive and best most evolved version of you so just be honest with yourself be honest with yourself um first and just remember there's nothing to fear no matter what it is you want for yourself now it's okay and there's nothing wrong with that like I'm saying that if some of you were like yeah you know what I think I'm actually a little scared to have my kids back right now like I'm not sure that I've done the work yet to get there I get you I feel

you and if I had somebody tell me that back then I think it would have saved me a lot of Shame and a lot of striving I could have relaxed a little bit into myself and really started doing the work to to heal years before I ever started that so it doesn't mean that if you say that you don't want that right now because you or you're not ready for it right now it doesn't mean that that's not ultimately what you want it just may mean that you're choosing you first which is how it works anyway and I think for me like that's why I got myself into this boat to begin with is because I would never chose me I chose to accommodate the world before me you know the world meaning like my my ex and my

daughter and whoever else before me I didn't know how to care for myself so I think that this is an opportunity for for parents like us who were all giving out and delving out and doing all the things for everybody else instead of our ownselves this is time the time that you really truly can use to to honor you in the highest possible way to serve yourself and not like um you know selfishly or self-centered I mean yes it's selfish like you are doing it to serve yourself but you ha we all must serve ourselves before we're able to serve anybody else you know that's cliche like help yourself where you can make yourself Co before you can go you know you know what I'm saying all right

I'm going to set up now just just be honest with yourself having the brutal honesty will lead you to the most productive version of yourself and it will help you to to my point last week is to stop procrastinating and stop spinning your wheels in this place of hell you know get you on the on the on the track to to to creating the life that you deserve your children deserve to see and the life that you love you know even while experiencing the effects of alienation okay and you yeah okay that's all I have for you bye