Unlearn to relearn [23]

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Learning to unlearn and choose a better option is critical to becoming a conscious parent. So that you can give your best to your kids. But how do you learn something that you were never taught? And how do you unlearn if you never knew any other way? That's up next. Let's go.

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Hey you, pull up a seat. Welcome back to From Surviving to Thriving for Parents. This is Episode 23. I am Raymond Bourcier, and if you are a parent or soon to be parent who wants to give their kids the best start in life that you can give them, then you're in the right place. This show is all about you because we're about transformation and taking unwavering action so that you can be the parent you always needed and the parent that they need you to be.

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What is the goal of being a conscious parent? We'll come back to that question a little later. I want to share a quick story with you about the Scorpion and the frog. As the story goes, a Scorpion wants to cross a river, but it's a Scorpion, so it can't swim. So the Scorpion asks a frog to carry it across.

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Now, the frog hesitates and rightfully so, because the Scorpion could sting the frog. The frog shares its concerns with the Scorpion, but promises not to sting the frog because if it did, then both of them would drown. The frog thinks it over and believes that it's a sensible argument, and it decides to help the Scorpion out. Midway across the river, the Scorpion stings the frog anyways, dooming them both. And as the dying frog asks the Scorpion, Why did you sting me

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despite knowing the consequences? The Scorpion replies, I'm sorry, but I couldn't resist the urge. It's in my nature. I don't know about you, but when I think of that story, I can find a few instances where I've been that frog in my life being stung by those Scorpions. There may be times in your life when you desperately wanted nothing more than to be the frog, to want to help others, and over and over again they sting you. Does that hit home in any way?

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If so, I understand. It's even worse when it's the family that does the stinging, and we willingly allow it to do so. I share the story with you because while I believe in helping others, serving others, and supporting others, I learned in my life through my journey that no matter how much love, support, and respect you can give people, there will always be Scorpions among us. Now, this doesn't mean that you should be scared. It doesn't mean that a Scorpion is a bad person at heart. But it does mean that you need to learn the lessons that keep you from being stung repeatedly by those who are toxic to your life. Which means you have to unlearn what isn't serving you.

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Scorpions are toxic people. You want to believe that in their heart they aren't bad people, and many of them aren't. But Scorpions are toxic because of two things. Number one, they grew up in a toxic environment themselves. Number two, they refuse to take ownership, step up, and unlearn their toxic behavior, and as a result, they refuse to see themselves in any other way other than a victim. Do you know someone who fits these criteria?

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Maybe like me, you had more than one of these Scorpions as you grew up or along your journey. Maybe like me, you were raised as a Scorpion because that's the environment you are forced to grow up through. As kids, you learn a lot of the traits that you go through in life through the actions, words, and behaviors of those around you. How the adults and even other kids in your life acted would be how you learned to survive. Understand that it's not your fault and you're not to blame.

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But what separates you from the Scorpions is your desire to unlearn what isn't healthy, unlearn what is toxic, and grow to replace it with something better. What separates you from being a Scorpion is that you're taking ownership and no longer being the victim. You're taking back control of your narrative. It's madness to expect a Scorpion to teach you the things that they can't even provide to themselves. Let me share a story with you from my journey that I hope will help to give you an example.

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Forgiveness. This is one of the lessons that I never learned early in life. And remember that in life, there's what we know, there's what we know that we don't know, and there's what we don't know that we don't know. Through my youth and teen years, no one active within my life demonstrated this ability, so I never learned it. There was no one who this "troubled child" could learn from.

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So what happens when you don't learn something? You don't know it. So let's say as a kid growing up not knowing forgiveness, how would that show up in their friendships? How would that show up in their relationships? And more importantly, how would that show up with their relationship with themselves?

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Do you see where I'm going with this? How can anyone expect a person who never learned forgiveness to forgive others and I mean truly forgive others, let alone forgive themselves? There are Scorpions out there who would at the drop of a hat, point fingers at you without looking in the mirror and realizing that the things that they tried to condemn you for are the same faults that they have within themselves that they haven't healed. But because it's hard to look within, it's easier to point fingers and sting because it's in their nature. Scorpions are toxic.

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They never did the work to learn a different way, a better way. They kept doing what they've always done, so they always get what they always got. But not you. You are putting the time and effort in to become the parent that maybe you always needed, the parent that they need you to be, the partner that you want to be, chasing the dreams that you want to pursue, doing all these things. It requires you to do things differently.

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Let's stick with forgiveness for a few more moments. It's quick to point fingers and be told to give a blanket forgiveness for those who've hurt you. But the reality is that forgiveness, it's not easy. It's not easy to learn, especially when your internal environment has so much garbage that was dumped into you without your permission that it prevents you from knowing what forgiveness is.

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Anyone can say that they forgive another person. Anyone could throw out all of these apologies and say that they forgive you, but words mean absolutely nothing, because the next thing you know that same person is lying to themselves and to you, telling you that they tried to forgive you. But their actions, it speaks otherwise. So how do you go about learning forgiveness if no one has ever taught you through their actions? Well, forgiveness.

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It isn't out there. It doesn't start out there with another person. Forgiveness. It starts within you. It starts within your internal environment, because forgiveness.

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It isn't about forgiving the other person or the Scorpions. Forgiveness is about compassion for yourself. First and foremost. There's a quote by Buddha that I absolutely love that goes "holding on to anger is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die." Forgiveness is about giving yourself compassion and empathy to no longer drink that poison because it doesn't do you any good.

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And it doesn't matter where you've come from or what environment that you grew up in. You can latch on to whatever excuse you want to make for yourself. You can hold on to those excuses for dear life, but understand, it is possible to unlearn the things that don't serve you. It starts with you wanting and willing to do the work, whatever it takes. And just like to become a better golfer, a better artist, a better hairstylist, a better attorney. It all takes practice and experience.

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So where do you begin? If you're like me, many of the things that negatively impact you are rooted in your subconscious. A lot of that programming started in your youth and your teens. So to move forward, you need to slow down and give yourself the compassion, the empathy, and the love that maybe you always needed when you needed it most. This works for anyone, whether you had active parents who did the best they could, because if they could have done better, they would have.

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Or if you had absentee parents and everything in between. To become the parent you always needed or the parent that they need you to be. It first starts with you having to unlearn, unprogram, and unconditioned the garbage that you've been holding onto for so long. And it starts by no longer judging your younger self. Your Inner Child. Your Inner Child bears a heavy burden. You have to let your Inner Child off the hook. What you know now at age 29, 39, or 49 is much more than what you knew at age 5, 10, 15. You couldn't have possibly known then what you know now.

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And if you're like me, your inner child bears a lot of the burden for things and the people that were entirely outside of your control through your journey. If you're like me, your inner child learned to constantly be the victim of everything and everyone because of the toxic environment that they were in. And at the time as a child, you likely were a victim, or at least a victim caught in friendly fire. But understand that things are different now. You can't drive forward while always constantly looking in the rear view mirror because, you'll crash.

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Scorpions are those who refuse to grow and always find excuses or lies to be the victim because of their past, which is where they get their toxicity from. Scorpions are doomed to repeat the same things and the same behaviors in life repeatedly because they aren't willing to look inside and see that it's not their heart that's the issue. Instead, it's their internal environment. Learning what serves you, your kids, your relationships, your dreams, and your best, starts by unlearning what doesn't help you and choosing something better. So giving your inner child permission to be let off the hook is a great start by providing the younger version of you the love, support, and empathy that you always needed at that time. Everything starts from within you, as below, so above.

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Earlier, I asked, what is the goal of being a conscious parent? My answer to this is being conscious of the four things that we can control and understand how these things impact our children. As a refresher or if you're new, Hi. The fourth things we can control are our thoughts, our actions, our reactions, and our inactions. And even after working with our inner child, the goal is to be able to learn something better even if we were never taught, because this is how we positively impact not only our lives, but the lives of those we care about. Unlearning and growing to become a conscious parent requires you to catch your thoughts without judgment and consciously ask yourself: "if I give permission to this thought to guide my actions

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will it help to create the life that I want?" It's essential that you not cast any judgment about the thoughts themselves, because when you do, what will happen? Most likely you may cast shame and guilt on yourself, and even having the thoughts in the first place. And by doing this, you're attaching energy to this feeling and making it become truth. But the truth is that it's not your fault and you're not to blame.

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Your subconscious was programmed and conditioned along your journey without your permission, and as a result, they left a lot of garbage inside your internal ecosystem that you've been forced to swim around in for far too long. So rather than feel guilt or shame when you catch yourself having these negative or unhelpful thoughts, you need to train yourself to feel proud of seeing them. Before, those negative and unhelpful thoughts had a free pass over the bridge. Now, feel proud for being the Gandolf blocking its way and telling them that "you shall not pass." Being conscious of the programming that you're running is not easy, since the human brain wants to spend most of its time on autopilot. So learning to ask yourself this question and checking in when a thought comes unconsciously to you, choose a different direction and learn something better.

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And the only way to truly learn is to put it into practice and do the work. Knowing and not doing is the exact same thing as not knowing. And it may not be easy at first, but actions will always speak louder than words. Remember that Rome wasn't built in a day. Neither is the process of unlearning and learning. And when you develop this ability, this new programming that you chose, you will find that even in the most frustrating, the most impactful situations, you can still choose to take a higher road and not let things bring you down.

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You can still choose to focus on your higher self and not get dragged into a race to the bottom. This way, you not only give yourself what you may have needed a long time ago, but you give them the best version of you that you can be. And for me, that's what being a conscious parent is all about. That and keeping Scorpions out of your life because their toxicity is not worth your time and energy. So the next time a Scorpion comes to you pretending to be something they're not, just swim away.

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I promise it's much less painful than being stung. If you found this or any other episode helpful, please consider leaving us a five star review on Apple podcast or a five star rating on Spotify. This will help us take another step closer to our goal of transforming the lives and impacting the worlds of 11 million people. And as a special thank you to those who do leave a review, we'll read it on air and give you a special shout out at the end of an episode. And that's it for today's show.

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Thank you for showing up for you here today. The best investment you can ever make is in yourself, and time is the most valuable commodity in the world. So I'm honored and grateful for you to spend your time here with me, and I hope I was able to give you the value and impact you need on your journey. I'll see you next week. Until then, you're just one unwavering action away from a completely different life. To the journey.

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Much love.