Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: You, we're inching closer to those highly anticipated two months of school holidays. This season holds the promise of joy, quality time with loved ones, and a refreshing break from our everyday routines. However, despite all the cheer, it's no secret that school holidays can also come up with their fair share of stress and chaos. So today we're sharing five tips to help you navigate the holidays and sure you make the absolute most out of this time together.
[00:00:32] Speaker B: Hey, we're Kim and Rod, and we're here to show couples how to get the best out of their relationship so they can start living their dream life together.
[00:00:39] Speaker A: We're a West Aussie couple who are living the life of our dreams. We don't entertain the word should. We think about the future as a field of possibilities and we let joy be our compass.
[00:00:47] Speaker B: We've taken the simple idea of working as a team and applied it to our marriage, and it's been a game changer, allowing us to work out what truly lights us up in life and to go after it together.
[00:00:56] Speaker A: From living in snowy Japan to starting our own house flipping business, we've achieved some big dreams. And most importantly, we feel fulfilled and are having the most fun we've ever had.
[00:01:04] Speaker B: Hear conversations from inspiring couples, thoughts from relationship experts, and tales from our own lives as we help you to gain the wisdom and skills you'll need to turn your relationship into a real team.
[00:01:14] Speaker A: These are relationship conversations for real people by real people. So sit back, get comfortable, whatever tickles you, pickle and enjoy living the team life.
You on living the team life. We like to say that two things can be true, and today we're going to talk about the holidays and that's school holidays. And here are the two things that are true. One, holidays are great. You're not at work, the kids aren't at school. You get to see your friends, your family, you get time off.
The other thing that's true, holidays are hard because you still have the pressures of work, even though you might not be there. You're taking a break, the kids are out of routine, they're going crazy, they're on sugar highs from all the Christmas treats or for whatever it is, you've got high expectations.
I think everyone knows that feeling that last term of school and heading into Christmas from work, it's hard to get anything done. You're booked at weekend to weekend, back to back to back. You want it to be the best Christmas ever. You see what the Joneses are doing and the Smiths are doing, and they're doing this amazing Christmas hunt festival thing, or they're going off on holiday to Whistler or NASECO, and you just want to make sure it's great. You got family coming over. You want to catch up with your friends because they live overseas and you never catch them. They're coming home for two weeks. You got to fit it all in. Cost of living is getting more expensive, so babysitters are getting more expensive. Maybe you can't afford to do the things you were going to. Maybe the rotnest accommodation this year was too much. Then there's arguments about division of labor, who gets time off to do when and what, who's going to take care of the kids on this day?
I've got three Christmas parties and client parties, all that sort of stuff. And of course, something that I think we all suffer a bit with, and definitely me, is we over consume. We over consume booze, food, fun, we don't exercise much. And a lot of times those self care things can that keep us together during the stressful work times are actually needed just as much during the holiday period.
[00:03:35] Speaker B: I am literally shattered just listening to your intro.
I did not know you were going to Spiel for that long.
[00:03:44] Speaker A: Yeah, it got big on me.
[00:03:49] Speaker B: I mean, what you're saying is not inaccurate and it is what we're talking about today, which is preparing for the holidays.
And they are really hard and there is a lot involved in that. And that's what the purpose of today's show is, is to really unpack firstly what's hard, but unpack, how we can create structures around the holidays that will support you to have a better holidays.
Holidays mean big change and with any change, we often experience friction and challenge. And the changes on holidays are everywhere across the board. We change in so many regards. We have more time with the kids, which can be taxing, it can be great. Like Roger said, it's not a this or that. Holidays are great and hard at the same time. We can have more time as a couple, which whilst that might sound lovely for couples that aren't actually used to spending a lot of time together, it might feel claustrophobic, it might feel difficult to begin with. Roger mentioned financial pressures. Certainly cost of Living is going up, particularly at the Christmas holidays. We can see a lot of pressure put on people to give their kids what other people are giving their kids to stump up to parties with certain gifts and things and just a continuous ask from the bank.
What else are we going to have to pay for this week?
[00:05:20] Speaker A: Expensive cheese platters?
[00:05:22] Speaker B: Cheese is expensive.
[00:05:24] Speaker A: Exactly.
[00:05:24] Speaker B: I love cheese. So it's something you have to think about other things that show up, that changes, that we experience in that space that can make life really difficult.
If your relationship is already struggling, the changing environment that I've just sort of mentioned can add additional pressure to an already stressed situation and that can make it really difficult on a relationship. If you head into the holidays in a difficult space, we know holidays bring extra stress, so that can really put a lot of pressure on the relationship.
Communication is something that people talk a lot about in terms of relationships. And it certainly is an issue in the holidays. When expectations and routines aren't discussed, and this is the communication piece, feelings of resentment can often grow, frustration can start to arise, and really all of the change that I've just talked about, it can be managed. But at the crux of what the issue is on the holidays, it's not the change. The change adds pressure for sure.
At the crux of what the issue is, it's actually not communicating what your needs, expectations, what structures you're going to put in place to support yourselves, all of these things. It's not talking about them that actually causes the underlying problem on the holidays.
[00:06:59] Speaker A: One of the biggest issues we face is that the whole household is just out of routine. And I think we know that it's tough when the kids are out of routine, but when ourselves we're out of routine, we also feel the stress miscommunication happens. And I think if we take a step back and understand why that happens is well, the beauty of routine is that your subconscious takes over. It does a lot of the heavy lifting around the things that are scheduled in and happen at the same time every day, every week, again and again and again. And that allows you to focus on the things that have to get done and that matter. And that's why you're so much more efficient during work time during the non holidays than you are on the holidays. And, of course, conversely, when we're out of routine, our subconscious brain takes on less of the load and our conscious brain takes on a lot of the load because we have to think more about everything. We have to think more about our schedule. We have to think more about what's happening with the kids and our partners in the household and our friends and our family. And that just takes a lot of energy. When we talked previously about our stress cup, it fills your stress cup a lot faster. And I think one of the big things that people don't understand is that when that stress builds in the household because of the lack of routine, you find you start to take it out on each other. And you find you also maybe not take it out on your kids, but you're less likely to want to guess, be more present with them. So you might revert to doom scrolling on your phone or sort of switching off when really the holidays free. P m vino and Siesta although I'm up for the 03:00 p.m. Rose out on the veranda, but quite rightly, it can be quite difficult to engage with your family when the holidays actually is really all about having more engagement with the people you love.
[00:08:56] Speaker B: Yeah, I think you raised such an important point there, Roger.
The strain it takes on our brain is exhausting when we're out of routine because we are asking so much more of our brain when we're in routine, as you said, it becomes automated. And asking the brain to step up and get out of automation and plan new things, create new routines, that is a lot of work.
And when you ask the brain to do that and you're already on the holidays, you're in the thick of it. So it's already an evolving, changing space. If you ask the brain to do that before the holidays, before you're in the thick of it, before the kids are screaming at each other and there's toys everywhere and you're thinking, my God, it's seven weeks, three days, 12 hours and 54 minutes till they go back to school.
[00:09:50] Speaker A: That was precise.
[00:09:54] Speaker B: You've not had those thoughts.
[00:09:56] Speaker A: A little scotchy? A little bit.
[00:09:58] Speaker B: So let's get to what today is really about. And that is five steps that can support you to prepare well for the holidays so that you can do that now, beginning now, when you've got the mental space and the physical space to get about it in a really healthy way.
Kicking off step one, set your family goals for the holidays. This is about getting clear on what you want in your relationship so as a couple, because you are the head of the family unit and also what the kids want out of the holidays. Because if we give kids buy in to what's happening on the holidays, they take more accountability for their own joy. Did I enjoy what I asked for? That was part of I'm not just being told to do this, I asked for that. So sit down as a family, if it's age appropriate for your children or as a couple if they're little ones and they're not ready for those sorts of conversations, and talk about what you want to get out of the holidays, what you guys value. It might be, for example, you want more quality time.
That might look like saying once a week, we want to spend quality time as a family doing an activity out of the house and you pick the day. And that's what you guys value. That's the quality time. And then you plan it when you're going to do it.
[00:11:19] Speaker A: That's right. I think it's really important while you're doing this is to actually think a bit deeper than just thinking, I want to have the best holiday ever. Well, what does best mean to you? Is it that you want the kids to spend more time outdoors and less on their phones and computers? Is it that you want to spend more time with the kids yourself because they're busy at school and during the weekend, they've got sport and they spend time with their friends?
Do you not want to spend time reconnecting with each other and your partner, which I think is a great one, and we'll talk about that later. Health goals, physical, mental downtime. Do you want to make sure you've both got time to energize and of course as Kim and I always love to do it's making sure you've got time to dream and reimagine the world.
[00:12:04] Speaker B: Oh, I love that last know that's one of my absolute favorites and I think people imagine that dreams just come to you and you should talk about them as they pop up. But scheduling dream time can actually be a really lovely way of making sure that you do end up dreaming together and once you exercise that muscle, that dreaming muscle, it can become a lot easier to do it on a schedule.
Moving on to step two create a visual calendar. Now we are carers as a lot of you know, our daughter is autistic nonspeaking and we use a visual calendar to help her have predictability in her week, in her day, in her month. It's an extremely effective tool for children but also for adults, especially adults who are visual like myself. It's effective because when we know what's coming, we reduce anxiety around what else could be happening. We impact our expectations, they become more aligned with actually what is coming up because we know what's coming. It's a really simple but effective tool to support, as I've explained, the reduction of feelings that can make us feel uneasy on the holidays. That state of being where we're just not really sure what change is about to happen for us.
And it's something you just literally stick up in the house where the family can see it. The visual schedule, very simple tool if you don't know what a visual schedule is, google it. There's a lot of images on Google, you can make them yourself, they don't need to be laminated or anything else. You can just print them off the computer, do some colored squares, whatever it is that is easy and simple. You can find pinterest templates, I'm sure and get the visual schedule set up so that if the kids come to you what are we doing today? Have you checked the schedule? Have a look, you'll see what's happening today, tomorrow, the next day. You'll know generally what's happening for the month, everybody's got as partners you can see and what's coming up. And the other great thing about a visual schedule, if you're having a tough day or a tough moment, it's a really clear reminder that there's going to be other time for other things coming soon. You can see when that time is that you set aside for exercise, when is the time you set aside for your date, those sorts of things which are really lovely softeners when you might be having a difficult moment.
[00:14:39] Speaker A: Yeah. It's so funny how in our lives, in business and at our kids school and stuff, they'll implement things to make their lives easier, to make the business easier, to get people on the same page, and yet we often don't then bring them into the household. And I think a visual schedule is 100% one of these, because most of our kids, in their school calendars, in their school diaries, will have their weekly schedule of all their classes, which differs from week to week. They'll have that for the year in terms of when the holidays are, when sporting carnivals are, etc. And so they're used to using them and even at work, like, funny enough, have a look in your outlook and you'll see that that's actually a visual schedule as well. We're just saying know, blow it up and put it present so everyone in the house can see it. It's just a great way to get on the same page. And in all honesty, Kim and I do this during the school term, at the start of each term because we obviously have a podcast business, we've got another business, we've got to look after the little one and we prioritize things like our health. So scheduling all that in, it can be quite not confusing, but there's a lot to take on. And again, when I talked know, you want the subconscious to take over the conscious so you can use those conscious resources on the things that really matter is Kim will type it up as we go through it at the start of the term and we'll actually put it and pin it up on our wall. So every day we know, hey, these are our recording days, these are our research days. You're taking the little one to school this day, you're picking her up on that day. And I know it really helps. And for school holidays, it's almost a no brainer.
[00:16:18] Speaker B: Yeah, and it doesn't have to be super detailed either. I just want to be clear for people thinking I'm not writing out every activity you can use just blocks, time blocks of what you can be doing and you can get down to the detail closer to the day. It doesn't have to go up on the visual wall, it can just say family activity. That's not a big so you don't have to have all the answers straight up.
Okay, step three. Roger, what have we got?
[00:16:42] Speaker A: Okay, so up front we talked about all the great things about the holidays, including seeing your family and friends, which you might not always see at the time, depending on where you live. But of course what we do find is that it's also your family time. It's time for you and your kids and it's time for you and your partner. And so our friends in our family, even though we want to see them and we want to spend the holidays with them or Christmas or whatever, they can start to encroach on that time. They can also start to cause a lot of stress in the household. Oh, you got to see your friends, you got to do this. Oh, your family's always coming over. Well, you never want to see my mum. And so what's really important is to make sure that you are clear with your partner around what the rules are in the household. What are the rules over the next two months over the Christmas holidays or the holiday period when you can see your friends, when you can see your family, and when is time for the kids and when's time for you and your partner?
[00:17:46] Speaker B: I think you've explained that really well. I just want to tweak something.
[00:17:49] Speaker A: Yeah, go for it.
[00:17:50] Speaker B: Because the word rules, I think for a lot of people is really hard to stomach. And I would say it's more about setting agreements and intentions together.
[00:18:00] Speaker A: I like agreements better than rules as.
[00:18:02] Speaker B: Well, trust me, because we're adults in this. So it's about coming together with your partner and talking about what your intentions are as a couple for the family and for the relationship over the holidays in regards to setting boundaries. So when we talk about those intentions, you really want to get specific to be able to work out what you really mean with what you're saying. And if you talk about this again before the holidays hit in, it's just going to take so much of the bite out of those difficult situations. So, like Roger said around friends catching up or family dropping in or family events, talk specifically about what will you do. For example, if you're invited somewhere and it conflicts with the family activity time. So someone invites you Friday for lunch, you've got Friday lunchtime penciled in for family activity, what's your response going to be? It might be something like we'll ask them to reschedule and if it's not possible, we'll decline because that's a priority for us. We've agreed that's something we value for these holidays and something we want to be doing. And if you set these boundaries up front, you're really going to reduce the risk of the FOMO gremlin overshadowing your holidays as well. A lot of FOMO, firstly, it's just not real. It's created in our mind around something that didn't end up happening or isn't going to happen. So the situation, if we, if we think about it beforehand, can actually be entirely removed. When a friend says, do you want to do this? And you say, can we reschedule? And they say, no, you say, Well, I can't actually do that because I'm busy at that time. There's no FOMO because you made an assertive decision based on your values you've already expressed previously, and you take out that, oh, maybe I should what? No, I'm aligning myself with my values. I'm aligning myself with what my partner and I have agreed on the boundaries. And that's going to work for me. I know that that's really at my core, what I want. So I think sitting down and talking about boundaries and setting your intentions and agreements for how you're going to engage with different things that come up on the holidays, boundaries around sticking to one on one time, boundaries around how much work you're going to do, where you're going to do work, what that'll look like? Having those really specific conversations is really going to support you when those sticky situations arise.
[00:20:32] Speaker A: Yeah, I love, you know, taking a tip from one of our previous episodes, the struggle within laws is real. Know, take accountability for your own family as well, and your own friends, because, again, it can be really hard for your partner to go, I don't want your mum, dad, sister, Ralph, old mate Ralph coming around all the time, or on these certain times, it's very hard not to take that as a bit of a slight on your family. Even after all these years, we get so wrapped up in that. So be proactive and take accountability and say, hey, I'm going to make sure my family doesn't just drop in at 430 when the kids are in witching hour, if you know what I mean, and your partner should do the same.
[00:21:13] Speaker B: I love that one, Roger. And we had a lot of comments on that and DMs around how important that was to people because I think it's created a lot of stress for people in their relationship, feeling like they've had to ask their partner to communicate something to the family. And instead of that partner stepping up to the plate and taking the responsibility for the relationship and the health of that, it then becomes a tussle between the partners.
[00:21:41] Speaker A: Yeah. And that's where that agreement that you were talking about comes in. Because in the end, if you don't make these agreements, if you don't set yourself up for success, you'll have these FOMO or, I should be spending time with my family. It's the holidays, I should be spending more time with my mum, I should be seeing my nieces and nephews. And if they drop over by being a good brother or sister or daughter or son, I should be being a good one. And that means they can come over and I should be welcoming them into my house in a holiday period. But if you make an agreement up front, you have a unified front to say, hey, mum, dad, sister, brother, we have set times that you can come. So you can't come just then, but, hey, you can come A, B and C. And if that doesn't work for you, well, it doesn't also work for us.
[00:22:29] Speaker B: Exactly. Yeah.
[00:22:31] Speaker A: Cool. So step four, and this is a big one, schedule time for your relationship over the holidays. You need to treat your relationship like its own entity. You need to separate it out. Don't miss the opportunity over the holidays to connect with your partner. You might sit there and go, okay, the kids are sorted. I've got my own personal time to unwind, I've got my golf. You're going to see the girls and getting a Manny Petty, we've got our friends because that was a bit generic.
[00:23:03] Speaker B: Assumptions.
[00:23:04] Speaker A: Yeah. So when's yours booked in, and so you've got your friends booked in, and you've got your family booked in, and you go, Great, everything's scheduled for the holidays. And then you get to the end of the holidays, and you haven't actually spent any one on one time connecting with your partner. And the next time you do, that might be another ten weeks, it might be another half year, or it might not be till next Christmas or next holiday break. So that's why it's so critical to actually spend the time and make the effort to schedule in time with your partner over the holidays.
[00:23:39] Speaker B: Yeah, this one's such a great one, because the holidays we're referring to, obviously, are the Christmas holidays. And New Year is such a lovely, exciting time for people. It's kind of an opportunity, I think, for a lot of people to let go where they feel like they actually can. As humans, we struggle to let go of things we feel like we might have failed at or struggled with or had a lot of challenges and stress around. And I think one of the few times we give ourselves permission to let go is actually New Year's. We say, you know what? I am going to let that go, and I'm going to look forward, and I'm going to give myself the freedom to look forward without feeling any of the shame or judgment for maybe what didn't work last year, which is super, super powerful. Now, if you can harness that excitement and that freedom of letting go with your partner, it's a really great space to start to build a connection as a team and start to dream together as a unit, which is super exciting. Because once you have purpose in your relationship, once you know where you're heading together as a unit, there is nothing that can hold you back. Everything will become just a roadblock or a temporary brick wall. Yes, brick walls are there to be knocked over, these things. There's nothing that will stop you. Because once you know together, what you're working on, you've got each other, you will just find a way together. And, yeah, I think when we schedule time for the relationship, specifically, we give ourselves space and opportunity to take advantage of that newness of the new year, that excitement, that hope, and start to step into that more purposeful dreaming together, which maybe you've never done before. Maybe that's a new thing for you. Maybe usually you sit down and do your own New Year's resolutions. Imagine trying that with your partner and what that feels like.
[00:25:27] Speaker A: Yeah, I absolutely love that. Kim all that you really have is the road ahead. And while every now and then it's important to have a glance in the rear view mirror, focus on the future and focus on the future together.
[00:25:39] Speaker B: Yes. All right, step five. This is a really important one, and I think it's one that people skip a lot, and I think they're going to skip it this year, unfortunately, because of the cost of living. I think when things get really tough, our natural inclination as humans is to tighten the belt further. Roger and I try really hard to buck that natural inclination. When things get tough, we actually try to spend more time doing less work and more money on things that are going to support us. So the counter of what you would naturally be inclined to do, you would think, no, work harder, just muscle down. Or people have a million different sayings for it and tighten the belt on the money. Don't spend money. Watch every cent cut out your coffees. To us, the reason that doesn't work is because at the end of the day, the most powerful thing we have is our mindset. And when we go harder on a brain that's already under pressure, that's it. It burns out. And then you're useless. You can do nothing. So we're saying, think of this helicopter up. When you're in a stressful space, give yourself more help, more love, more grace, more kindness. Your brain will thank you for it. It will feel the release and the relief, and it will be more productive anyway. That's what you want. And I know that's a different way of thinking about things, but I promise you it works. So back to step five. We call this a support audit. So when you sit down to talk about your boundaries and what your intentions and agreements are for how you're going to engage as the head of the family, as a couple together over the holidays, we really want you to talk about what supports you're going to put in place. This looks like sitting down together and saying, what are our key pain points? Just go back through the last few sets of Christmas holidays and work out where you guys really struggled.
Then you're going to write down for those pain points what your possible supports could be. Now, obvious ones include things like childcare. They include things like an extra cleaner because you've got so much more mess in the house, or you're so busy looking after the kids that it's not an option for you to be cleaning as well because you are knackered other things that might not be so obvious, they still cost money. This is the truth of this one. It's going to cost you money, but that's so worth it. It's so worth it because what it's going to give you back in peace of mind, what it's going to give you back in connection with your partner and lowered stress is going to be worth it.
[00:28:19] Speaker A: So really what you're talking about is setting yourself up for success. And I liked what you said before about how review what happened last Christmas because it's so important in life that, yes, we look forward, but we need to make sure we take on the lessons learned. From the past. We need to make sure we're not making the same mistakes again and again and again. I think it's really important that we understand it's like, hey, we ended up having arguments about who was making dinner because we didn't schedule that in. So schedule in some Uber eats twice a week. That might be easy. Or a hello, fresh move to some ready made meals, making sure if you know, well, hey, even schedule in. We know it's pizza Thursday and fish and chip Sunday, those sort of things.
[00:29:02] Speaker B: I love that. So as simple as saying what the meals are beforehand can be a support for you, right? Because it's more planning freedom.
[00:29:08] Speaker A: That's it. Organize activities for your kids. Make sure you buy the paddling pool, make sure you go on Amazon now and grab all the things and the activities that the kids that we are literally doing that now before we go on Amazon and search for our parents and friends presents. We're definitely doing that for making sure our little one's got everything she needs over the holidays. Soccer goals because they can be reused, paddling pool because it can be reused, all those sort of things. Again, it's really just about setting yourself up for success. Looking and seeing if there's any babysitters around the corner or in your neighbor who want to earn extra pocket money to give you freedom for a date day during the day or a date day at night. Maybe an extra one than you usually would have. Again, it is extra cost. But what you're doing is you're trying to set yourself up for success during sometimes the most stressful periods when really you want to get as much out of that period as possible.
[00:30:00] Speaker B: Yes, absolutely. Roger. I can't stress enough how important this one is, and I'm not trying to ignore the financial pressure of it.
It's just so important that we give ourselves the right supports. It really is.
I just want to say something overarching about what we've talked about today because there's something brilliant in working together to prepare for the holidays. Not only are you going to have a more successful holiday, you're going to start working as a team. Working as a team means planning, it means preparing, it means having conversations about everything, getting clear on what your thoughts, intentions, beliefs are together as a unit, what you value as a unit. Prepping for holidays is a really great way to start practicing working as a team. The benefits out of this are going to be massive and we don't expect this to go perfectly. I would never expect a holidays to go perfectly. If you had one of these strategies we've given you today, work well for you over the holidays, that's going to be a big improvement from the last holidays. And that's really exciting. At living the team life we talk about improvements should be incremental. Don't shoot for the stars in one shot. You're going to have to take steps 1ft in front of the other to make gains. But one day you're going to sit up and look back and realize you've become a team. Your holidays are so much more peaceful. Your family unit functions together, the kids are happier, it takes time to get there. And on that note, I would say be kind to yourself when you sit down as a unit, as parents, to discuss the intentions and the boundaries and do your support audit. Work out what supports you've got, what additional supports you need.
Be clear with each other. Things are going to go wrong. It's not going to be perfect. Even with all the planning in place.
Show yourselves some grace. Show yourself some love and kindness. Because life is not perfect and it is a challenging period of life.
[00:32:02] Speaker A: That's such a lovely way to wrap up the podcast. Kim, was that your gold nugget or do you want an extra gold nugget?
[00:32:08] Speaker B: No, it is, because for me, self compassion, which is just another way of saying be kind to yourself, is like the missing ingredient for a lot of people in life. It changes your life when you are kind to yourself, when you show yourself the grace that you show all the other humans around you. The love, the care, the nurturing. Our relationships with ourselves dictate so much of our mental health. So, yes, at a time like holidays, being kind to yourself is definitely a gold nugget.
[00:32:41] Speaker A: Yeah, I absolutely love that. And I think it's a great note to finish on and just remembering really what we were talking today was about getting a routine in place over the holiday period where there generally is no routine. You're setting yourself up for success and then you can spend that time really doing that introspection and having that self care and not being so hard on yourself.
You're amazing. You've just spent quality time on your relationship.
[00:33:15] Speaker B: Feel like you're on a roll. If you want more Living the Team Life relationship insights and conversations, head over to Kimandroge.com, where you can find all the show notes as well as tons of other relationship goodies.
[00:33:25] Speaker A: And if you liked today's episode, please hit subscribe or let another couple know where they can find us. It'll make them happy and will make us really happy.
[00:33:33] Speaker B: Until next time, keep on living the team life.
