40: How to Work Through Emotions

Andrea Liebross |

www.andrealiebross.com |

Episode 40

Speaker1: [00:00:08] You are listening to the Time to level up podcast, I'm your host business life coach, Andrea Libros. I helped women in business commit to their own growth personally and professionally. Each week I'll bring you strategies to help you think clearly, gain confidence, make your time productive, turn every obstacle into an opportunity, and finally overcome the overwhelmed so that you can make money and manage life. Let's create a plan so you have a profitable business, successful career, and best of all, live with unapologetic ambition. Are you ready to drop the drama and figure out the how in order to reach your goals? You're in the right place. It's time to level up.

[00:00:57] Let's do this.

Speaker2: [00:01:05] Hello, my time to level up listeners, and welcome back to the podcast. So I believe you are listening to this if you're listening to it when it comes out at the end of August 20 21. And I just wanted to remind

Speaker3: [00:01:24] You, if you don't

Speaker2: [00:01:25] Know about it already. That my

Speaker3: [00:01:30] Friend and client, Michelle and I

Speaker2: [00:01:34] Are creating a two night, three day experience or calling

Speaker3: [00:01:42] Your spark,

Speaker2: [00:01:43] And that is you are as in Robert

Speaker3: [00:01:48] Spark

Speaker2: [00:01:50] All one word and you can follow us on Instagram at underscore

Speaker3: [00:01:55] Why our spark

Speaker2: [00:01:57] All capitals. We would love to invite you to join us with a friend in Hilton Head from November 4th to 6th,

Speaker3: [00:02:09] Your spark is

Speaker2: [00:02:11] An experience for you and a friend. So you need to come with someone in this. Someone is probably going to be someone

Speaker3: [00:02:20] Who creates a spark

Speaker2: [00:02:23] In you, who ignites you, who when you're together, you have fun, you are creative, you're motivated, you're inspired and someone you like to be with, but maybe you don't see them a lot. So instead of taking a girl's trip where you only lie on the beach, we are inviting you to take a girls trip to have an experience together where we are going to lie on the

Speaker3: [00:02:48] Beach, have fun,

Speaker2: [00:02:50] And you're going to get some coaching

Speaker3: [00:02:54] And some creativity.

Speaker2: [00:02:57] So you're going to get coaching from me and you're going to get creative from Michelle. Michelle is

Speaker3: [00:03:04] An artist. So if you haven't registered and if we're not yet sold out

Speaker2: [00:03:10] Because there are only limited spots, we are staying in a huge house with a private chef right near the beach with a beautiful pool. If we're not sold out, go check out underscore. You are SPEEA R.K. on Instagram to get the link, to learn more and to register for your Sparke

Speaker3: [00:03:34] Twenty twenty one. So the reason we're doing this, there's lots of reasons.

Speaker2: [00:03:39] But Michelle and I are friends, but we live. I don't know, maybe six hundred miles apart. So we don't see each other very often. We talk all the time. Who's that friend that you talk to all the time that you feel like you can don't have to start from the beginning. Can pick up a conversation in the middle no matter what time or day. Who is that

Speaker3: [00:03:59] Person that you really

Speaker2: [00:04:01] Enjoy being with,

Speaker3: [00:04:02] That you are energized

Speaker2: [00:04:03] By ignited and sparked by that person, your friend? It could be your family member to find that person. And together we want you to

Speaker3: [00:04:12] Come to your spark. Twenty, twenty one.

Speaker2: [00:04:16] Ok, now for today's episode. So today's episode is going to be a little different than the last thirty plus episodes that I've

Speaker3: [00:04:26] Recorded in that I really have not written

Speaker2: [00:04:30] Anything out. I got up this morning and I knew I wanted to record a podcast and I have a topic and I even had some notes prepared. But what happened to me this morning I think is way more important to

Speaker3: [00:04:43] Share than anything

Speaker2: [00:04:45] I have previously prepared or prepared ahead of time. I wanted to share the last,

Speaker3: [00:04:52] Say, seven hours with you.

Speaker2: [00:04:57] It's the beginning of August when I'm recording this, and today was my daughter's first day of school, and she is a senior twelfth grade this year and

Speaker3: [00:05:12] She next year will be going

Speaker2: [00:05:14] Off to college. And as she likes to say,

Speaker3: [00:05:17] I am going to college. She doesn't know where, but she is going. So we don't need

Speaker2: [00:05:22] To talk about it a lot, according to her. But this morning I said to her, I said, listen, please plan an extra two minutes into

Speaker3: [00:05:32] Your rushed

Speaker2: [00:05:33] Morning so I can take my first day of school picture. So she was compliant and out we marched. First we go to the mailbox and we take some pictures in front of the mailbox, like we've done

Speaker3: [00:05:44] For the last 12 or

Speaker2: [00:05:45] 13 years. And then we go to the front door and we take a few pictures there. And then we go and we stood in front

Speaker3: [00:05:51] Of her car because

Speaker2: [00:05:52] She drives herself to school now. And we took a few there. And she was very agreeable. And she smiled and stood there like she usually does. But then

Speaker3: [00:06:03] She did a few poses

Speaker2: [00:06:04] On her own, which to me looks pretty sassy. And then she was off and I even took a video of her driving down the driveway. And after she drove down the driveway away, I actually started to cry. And anyone who knows me on a personal level knows that I really don't cry. Doesn't mean they don't have emotions, but I just don't cry. But I cried, tears came out and I went back inside and ironically, until yesterday, today, I had a full day of clients. I actually was supposed to meet a client for what I call my Deep Dove VIP sessions, which are

Speaker3: [00:06:48] Half days, four

Speaker2: [00:06:50] Hours. Some of the time that's all wrapped up.

Speaker3: [00:06:53] It's about five

Speaker2: [00:06:53] Hours. And then I had another client this afternoon, but God must have been watching out because yesterday all of that got canceled and removed from my calendar due to some health issues, my client's health issues. So I had a day or I've had a day

Speaker3: [00:07:11] With

Speaker2: [00:07:11] No clients, no structured work, which is very unusual. So I had the luxury of sitting at the kitchen table for another half an hour with my coffee.

Speaker3: [00:07:22] And I went

Speaker2: [00:07:22] Through all of the first day of school pictures that I have taken over the last 12 years. And thanks to our friendly iPhones, it was really easy for me to locate 12 first day of school pictures. And I then got creative, which again, not necessarily my forte in this sense of the word. And I made a slideshow of first grade to 12th grade, first day of school pictures and

Speaker3: [00:07:53] Apple's super kind.

Speaker2: [00:07:54] And they put music

Speaker3: [00:07:55] To it

Speaker2: [00:07:56] And you can put a title page

Speaker3: [00:07:58] On it.

Speaker2: [00:07:59] So I titled it. With her name, first day of school grades one to 12 and I watched it and then I watched it again and then I watched it a third time.

[00:08:14] And I cried.

Speaker2: [00:08:17] And I sat back and I said to myself, Andrea, why are you crying, why are you crying? So with my coach brain

Speaker3: [00:08:27] On, I thought, OK, well,

Speaker2: [00:08:29] Crying is an action. I know I can't get away from coaching myself. Crying is an action. So feelings trigger actions and thoughts trigger feelings. So I think the fact was that today was the last first day of school, the action was crying and I sat there trying to figure out what was in the middle of that model and in the middle of the model. First, I kind of tackled my feelings and

Speaker3: [00:08:58] I felt all

Speaker2: [00:09:00] Sorts of things. I felt sad. I felt relief. I felt joy, I felt excited, I felt disappointed. I felt guilty. I have lots and

Speaker3: [00:09:18] Lots of feelings, and then I kind

Speaker2: [00:09:21] Of tracked those feelings one by one back to what my thought was,

Speaker3: [00:09:28] And that was triggering that that feeling

Speaker2: [00:09:30] In my thought. The thought, the prevalent

Speaker3: [00:09:34] Thought, which I think was

Speaker2: [00:09:36] Really leading to the sadness, which was creating the tears. My thought was that I am losing something. I am losing something. Part of me is about to leave, part of me is about to go out on our own. And although I can easily go to the excited place in that moment at eight a.m., I really was feeling a huge

Speaker3: [00:10:04] Loss and loss

Speaker2: [00:10:06] Is a stage of grief, really. But then I thought, OK, you know, today I was going to record this podcast in my podcast topic, which I still will do, is about

Speaker3: [00:10:17] How life is 50 50,

Speaker2: [00:10:19] 50 percent of our emotions are positive and

Speaker3: [00:10:22] 50 percent of our

Speaker2: [00:10:24] Emotions are negative. And although maybe the sadness could

Speaker3: [00:10:29] Be counted as

Speaker2: [00:10:31] A negative emotion

Speaker3: [00:10:33] And I was feeling loss.

Speaker2: [00:10:37] I was also thinking about how hard it is to parent. How hard it is.

Speaker3: [00:10:45] And this particular

Speaker2: [00:10:47] Child of mine has had a bunch of challenges and.

Speaker3: [00:10:54] I feel like with my daughter, the challenges come in big spurts or big rocks drop, she's not

Speaker2: [00:11:03] Someone that's kind of always on edge or always has

Speaker3: [00:11:07] Something, some drama

Speaker2: [00:11:09] Going on. She's the kind of kid that when there's something wrong, when there's a problem, when there's drama, it's big, it's not little. And all the other, you know, there's nothing big going on, then everything's fine. But there are big things in those big things were really, really hard to parent through. So along with the sad,

Speaker3: [00:11:30] I also felt the sense

Speaker2: [00:11:32] Of, oh, my gosh, I can't believe we made it through all of those things. Like and I was thinking about things like I I've talked about this before. She had scoliosis and had to be in a back brace for multiple years. She at one point

Speaker3: [00:11:46] Had something they like. They thought it

Speaker2: [00:11:47] Was a brain tumor and she had double vision for 90 days. She's also had her fair share of getting into trouble. OK, so lots of big things and. What I quickly realized in that life is 50 50 is that even when I was feeling all of those negative emotions, when she was going

Speaker3: [00:12:10] Through those

Speaker2: [00:12:11] Particular challenges, if I reflect on it now, there actually was. Happiness in some of those, and maybe I didn't see that 50 percent in that moment, but I can see

Speaker3: [00:12:25] It now, I can see that those

Speaker2: [00:12:28] Trips we took to get the five back braces to California, we made those trips fun. And I can see that in that moment where she had that double vision for 90 days.

Speaker3: [00:12:42] We had fun with her

Speaker2: [00:12:45] Coke bottle glasses, and I can see

Speaker3: [00:12:49] Sometimes, too,

Speaker2: [00:12:50] How those really hard moments

Speaker3: [00:12:52] Were actually

Speaker2: [00:12:53] When we learned the most, there was a stronger connection through those.

Speaker3: [00:12:58] So then my

Speaker2: [00:12:59] Brain went to, OK, well, what's my connection? What's my opportunity for connection moving forward? And I thought about the fact that as our children become adults, our connection with them changes

Speaker3: [00:13:14] But actually grows

Speaker2: [00:13:16] Stronger. So, you know, I've connected with my kids in supporting them. I've gone to the games and the tennis matches and I've sat on the sidelines.

Speaker3: [00:13:27] And that is a

Speaker2: [00:13:27] Way of showing them love and

Speaker3: [00:13:29] Connecting.

Speaker2: [00:13:30] But that kind of connecting,

Speaker3: [00:13:31] That that

Speaker2: [00:13:32] Connection sometimes is a little fuzzy. When you're in the bleachers, you're not right there with them. You're close, but you're not right there. So the connection is fuzzy. But I've noticed even with my son, as he's gone off to college, that my connection with him is not necessarily fuzzy. It's stronger because when we do talk, we're talking about different things. We're talking about issues. We're having interesting dialog. And that's just going to be a different kind of connection, and that connection is in my future with my daughter. So although I can be sad. But I will watch my last lacrosse game this year. I also can

Speaker3: [00:14:18] Be happy that I'll be able

Speaker2: [00:14:19] To connect with her in a different way moving forward. So, again, there's kind of like the yin and the yang, the negative emotion and the positive emotion. I also thought that about the different stages that she went through, looking at that little first grade face to her 12th grade sassy face. Sophisticated, I want to call it, too, and then I thought, oh, my gosh, there were so many stages and I thought, oh, I'm going to miss the stages. But then I thought, OK, in adulthood, there's stages, too. There's your first job. There's your first

Speaker3: [00:15:01] Maybe really serious marriage type relationship. There's your first

Speaker2: [00:15:06] Child. There's your first house in all of those things. Those are stages, too. And I have that to look forward to. And I thought about also. There are different ways of having fun. With my kids, maybe fun used to be pushing them on a swing. In fact, I watched my neighbor do this a lot, push her two year old on a swing. I can see them outside my kitchen window. And that kind of fun is over, but there's lots of fun in store. I even got to the place this morning through the tears of thinking about how do I want to show up for myself and how do I want to show up for her over the next nine months. I mean, she's still her senior year. And I want to show up ready and willing to have fun. And she's actually a lot of fun to be around. Probably more fun

Speaker3: [00:16:06] Than when she was 11 or 12.

Speaker2: [00:16:09] And I have the privilege and honor

Speaker3: [00:16:12] Of having that more adult kind of fun with her this

Speaker2: [00:16:17] Year and moving forward, and then I thought, OK,

Speaker3: [00:16:21] Well, how is that going

Speaker2: [00:16:22] To happen? Like, how am I going to have fun? And I thought, you know what? What I need to do is I just need to show up and be willing

Speaker3: [00:16:30] To be in the

Speaker2: [00:16:31] Flow of things, just kind of be OK with the process of how things unfold. Just like I've done for the last 12 years, because in looking at that little fourth grade phase, which I did, that was the picture was taken in August. I thought, you know what, she had no idea during that fourth grade year that she was going to get gold first place in a dance competition for her solo. She didn't know that was ahead of her. She didn't know

Speaker3: [00:17:12] That she also would get

Speaker2: [00:17:14] That scoliosis diagnosis during fourth grade. She didn't know that she would have a fabulous summer being in a new bunk at camp and it was the summer, I guess that was

Speaker3: [00:17:29] Going to be her second

Speaker2: [00:17:31] Full summer at camp. So she didn't know. What was ahead of her? And I don't know what's ahead of me, so nothing's really changed, nothing's really changed, so. Although I was trying to put myself into the future. I recognize that we don't really know what the future holds, it's OK to dream,

Speaker3: [00:17:57] But that little fourth

Speaker2: [00:17:58] Grade face, even as she put herself into the future and dreamed of winning that gold medal, she didn't know that was going to happen. So that was just another

Speaker3: [00:18:08] Kind of revelation.

Speaker2: [00:18:10] I had about different stages. And I think another thing is that. I recognize this morning that the loss I was feeling,

Speaker3: [00:18:25] I was feeling the loss

Speaker2: [00:18:27] Of her presence, her presence disappearing. And her loss, as I don't want to say necessarily

Speaker3: [00:18:38] My she's been

Speaker2: [00:18:39] My buddy, right? We don't you know, your kids aren't necessarily your friends when they're little. But I was thinking, you know what? She's going to become more of a friend. That's going to be a game for me. She's going to become more of a friend.

Speaker3: [00:18:54] So I'm not really sure exactly

Speaker2: [00:18:58] What this podcast is about.

Speaker3: [00:19:00] But I felt

Speaker2: [00:19:02] Really compelled to share with you how I was feeling today, and I felt really compelled to share with you that there were so many

Speaker3: [00:19:14] Tears earlier

Speaker2: [00:19:15] On today. To the point where I kind of felt like out of control with the tears, which was just so shocking to me because we do have a whole year of school ahead of us. But I think it's really important to recognize that those feelings that I had this morning were all feelings that

Speaker3: [00:19:36] I want to have.

Speaker2: [00:19:39] I didn't squash them down, I didn't move on with my day, I just kind of sat with them and I not to the point I know I've talked about indulging in emotions. I don't think I'm indulging. I think I'm just OK with feeling the way I'm feeling. And maybe if I record this podcast or look back and listen to this podcast or record another one a year from now. I probably will have some similar feelings as she goes off to college, but I will have had the practice of going through this August and I've also had the practice of going through this with my son. So I honestly think that I'm getting better. Feeling this way,

Speaker3: [00:20:31] Because I've had some practice

Speaker2: [00:20:34] And I've had practice knowing.

Speaker3: [00:20:37] That life is 50 50.

Speaker2: [00:20:41] Fifty percent of our emotions are positive

Speaker3: [00:20:44] And 50 percent of our emotions are negative, and that is just the way life is. That is our humanness.

Speaker2: [00:20:54] I don't know if dogs feel 50 percent positive, 50 percent negative.

Speaker3: [00:20:58] I don't think caterpillars

Speaker2: [00:21:00] Feel that way. But I do know that as humans,

Speaker3: [00:21:04] That is our gift. That's a gift

Speaker2: [00:21:06] That we have. To be able to feel an array of emotions and I want to just leave you with this last thought. I was trying to describe to myself. The kind of up and down roller coaster feel of emotions that I was having and I thought, I think what's going on is that I am just experiencing a

Speaker3: [00:21:33] Lot of color.

Speaker2: [00:21:35] But her last 12 years from first grade to 12th grade have been very colorful. They've been colorful. And some of colors have been pink and some of the colors have been red in some of the colors have been blue in some of the colors have been green. And all those colors, there's still available to me and to her as we move forward, you know, the rainbow never ends. So the colors are all still going to be there and there's going to be an array of colors moving forward, but when I thought about my emotions as colors, it actually gave me a sense of relief, because I know that in order to live this human life, we're living. We get to experience. All of the colors, so. If you have someone that is closing a chapter, you've got a child that's closing a chapter or opening a chapter. I really encourage you to sit with how you're feeling and really ask yourself what name the feelings were and then ask yourself, what are the thoughts that are creating those feelings? And do you not necessarily

Speaker3: [00:23:03] Want to feel those

Speaker2: [00:23:05] Feelings forever, but are you OK with feeling them for now? Because all of this is just growth, it's all growth. So my friends feel free to share this episode with anyone that you know who is experiencing what it's like on the first day

Speaker3: [00:23:25] Of school of senior year

Speaker2: [00:23:27] As a parent or anyone that's sending their kid off to college or whatever is going on.

Speaker3: [00:23:33] I would love for you to take

Speaker2: [00:23:35] A screenshot and share this episode with them and tag me so I know you're sharing it. If you want to talk about this more, message me. I'd love to chat about it with you. And reminder, if it's time for you to

Speaker3: [00:23:52] Get away and get away with a

Speaker2: [00:23:53] Friend.

Speaker3: [00:23:55] And walk away

Speaker2: [00:23:56] From that weekend not asking yourself, what did we do all weekend, but saying I know exactly what we did and it was amazing. I really encourage you to join us in Hilton Head, November 4th, three six.

Speaker3: [00:24:12] Check out underscore you. R as in Robert, Spark, your spark

Speaker2: [00:24:19] On Insta for all the details, I promise you, you may have a few tears that weekend like I did this morning, but you will have way more

Speaker3: [00:24:31] Smiles, laughs and joy.

Speaker2: [00:24:34] And here's a little piece. If you want to catch the slide show that I made,

Speaker3: [00:24:40] I will put a link in the show notes

Speaker2: [00:24:43] So you can see grades one to 12. OK, my friends, until next week. Remember, it is always a good time to level up. See you soon.

Speaker1: [00:24:58] Thanks for tuning in to today's show. If you're ready to commit to personal and professional growth, move forward, make money and manage life. Head to Andrea Libros Dotcom. That's a and DARPA l i e b r o. S s dot com. To find out about the ways we can work together until next time, go level on.