Comedy Through The Chaos: Parenting Edition

Good morning Cadre Sphere. Happy Saturday to you. If you are joining me on a Saturday, if you're watching this in a replay, happy whatever day it is, wherever you are and wherever you are listening, I am Ms. Shannon Paul. I'm a comedian and a corporate speaker and a voice actor, an event emcee and I happen to be the proud parent of an adorable 17 year old boy who happens to be high supports on the autism spectrum. That's him singing over there. And I'm always happy to be joining you here in the Cadre for Good morning Andy Mac.

Grand Rising to you. Grand Rising. I hope that you are having good day and if you are not, shame on the day, not shame on you. So my song is a very he's in a vocal singing mood today so I will probably go and help him sing in a few minutes. But I wanted to hang out with all of you first. Good morning Speak Wonder. Hello my lovely friend. I hope that you are feeling better and are continuing to recover from whatever had got you down. That laryngitis sounded terrible so I already had to deal with that.

So I will have some oil of oregano with you in mind and we'll do that. So. Hello. Hello. Hello. So it has been a very chaotic few weeks for me even like trying to like li get into the live stream. It's been a very chaotic few days. So I am happy to be sedentary right now, like sitting with you, having a moment to hang out with all of you and have this discussion. So thank you very much for joining your this morning. So yes, yes, I'm glad you're on the men. Speak Wonder. I'm glad you're on the men.

And so as we continue through the tail end of October, it's always a time of year where I start thinking about a lot of the transitions because as I've mentioned before, throughout the month, October is one of my busiest months. So even just trying to keep track of normal things, chaotic is my branding and chaotic is my life. That is what it is. So. And it's, it's, it's inevitable. It's one of the my favorite things about mindfulness practices is being able to rest in the inevitability of change and chaos and going.

That is why I appreciate the moments that I have because they are all we are guaranteed is this particular moment. And so that is very important to me. And so throughout the week there have been continual reminders of how chaos is going to be there but does not need to take over. It can be something that you swirl in and you navigate and then you move through it. Hence again, my brand, Andy. And so this week, it's not only been chaos in my life, it's deadlines, it's getting through all of these events.

There's event going on here in Minnesota called the Twin Cities Film Fest that I partner with as well. So I've been there a lot and I've really had to get better about reminding myself that just because I'm being busy, I still have to remember to communicate. I personally have not been doing a very good job communicating with my sister, who helps me out all the time with my son, my other caregivers, thinking that we've had conversations or I've fully explained something when I haven't, and so reminding myself that I have to sit down and rest in that moment, do a good job communicating, sometimes spooling back, sometimes giving people a heads up more intentionally than just saying, hey, it's a busy time.

And I think we do that a lot as caregivers and parents. And regardless of what situations we're in, sometimes we forget that everybody can't be inside our head and see all of the things we have going on. So you end up accidentally sabotaging some of your relationships, some of the seeds that you've planted before, and showing and not showing up the way that you really want to. So for me, it's been a moment of apologizing, stepping back, telling my sister I'm sorry that I been moving so quick and really making assumptions on what her schedule looks like, what my schedule needs to do, and being more honest with myself and saying, do I have to say yes to some of these things?

Or is it something that I felt, some sense of obligation, some sense of guilt, something that that was actually encouraging me to take it other than, hey, this is something I want to be a part of or something that I have to be a part of. So it's letting some of those shoulds creep back in. And I've mentioned before that the shoulds in your life really need to be your lowest priority. There's the have to's, there's the wants. Those shoulds need to remain secondary. And I personally, full disclosure, have not been doing a good job of some of those managing those shoulds in my life.

And so I am also reminding myself that this is a good time for me to in a position of harvesting some of the progress that I've had with my son, with my career, being able to really evaluate some of those things and go, hey, you've had some cool stuff and you've had some milestones that you can see year over year. Yes, buddy. Year over year that have gotten and improved and gotten better. I can remember, like, us even having this conversation when I first started with Cadre, when would not have been as chill as it is.

Yes, buddy. You want to come say hi? Let's go say hi, everybody. Deep breath as we move around. Do you want to say hello? No, no, no. Hello. Yes or no hello? Oh, you want to say hello? What? What? What? What? Okay. All right. I'm going to talk for two more minutes and then I'll come see you. Yes, those shoulds will creep in. Speak, wonder and the shoulds have a really, a really a way of making themselves seem more important than they are. Like, shoulds are very insidious. Like, shoulds can really put sparkle and shine around themselves or add a little exclamation point to themselves and make themselves look like have to's and they are not.

And it takes a lot of managing of the shoulds in your life. So that is what I encourage us to do for the week. A couple of things. I encourage you to reflect on some of the progress that you've had. Harvest those wins, allow yourself to go. It maybe seems like a small win, but the fact that I was able to go check in with him and then come back and hang out with you, that's when in our house. And so, hey, good for us. Give ourselves a little round of applause. So I encourage you to do that as well.

The other thing I encourage you to do is reevaluate your shoulds for the week when you're really looking at your last. Make sure that you're looking at those shoulds. So on how you're. Thank you. Otherwise, you are. You are. So look at those shoulds. Determine with full honesty with yourself if they need to be priorities or if there's something that you're hoping, hoping will turn into or manifest into something that you are now now attaching an outcome to something that is not a guarantee. Are you saying if I do this, I should go to this because it could turn into something?

Are you really wasting actual time on something that could turn into something instead of working on something that already is? Which is the other reason why those shoulds need to be put in the back of the. The back of the bus? Just put them back there. So I encourage you to do that. What I'm going to do is because my teenager decided that he was going to get up late today, he's now waiting for breakfast. So I'm gonna go do that, and then I'm gonna go hang out at the Twin Cities Film Fest later this evening.

And then the rest of the weekend should be almost normal for me. Almost normal, which I'm looking forward to. I'm looking forward to that. And a little surprise. I got something. My sister's birthday is tomorrow, so I'm gonna be celebr well, because she is a wonderful human being and I'm glad that she has a another circle around the sun and I got to be a part of it. So I'm also very happy to be a part of your day. I will be back here next Thursday at 2pm Central as we continue to talk about all the chaos that we are navigating together and how you can make sure that you continue to move through it as smoothly as possible and if nothing else, maybe get a couple of laughs on the other side of it.

So I encourage you to be encouraged this week. There's a lot of very difficult things that are swirling around in the world, and we are all navigating it together. And you're doing the best that you can. And that's wonderful. That is wonderful. So enjoy the rest of your day if you can. Everybody take a deep breath, if nothing else, and let the day progress the way it needs to progress. And I will see you back here next Thursday.