Claudia Chan

I found this post a while ago, and I was called to share it with my client today, so I thought I’d share it with you too. 

The Letter Your Teenager Can’t Write You

by Gretchen L Schmelzer 

Know that the teenage years are going to be tough, there will be a lot of storm. 

No matter how much you do or how little you do, your kids are going to find something to blame you, and fight you with. And it’s nothing against you. 

They’re just growing, finding themselves. 

That is why I do my part to expand my capacity to hold myself, so I can hold my kid. 

If you’re watching this video, know that you’re already a good parent. 

And whenever you’re ready to learn how to walk this journey with your kid, book a time with me, so you and I can do this work first and foremost, so you can also do this with your kid. 

Sending you a lot of love. 

One of my beliefs is that, when we are brought into this world, we have chosen a life lesson for ourselves. 

And we come across people in our lives that are meant to be the obstacles, so we can learn the lessons. 

For example, while growing up, I constantly want to be able to make money outside of the traditional path, studying, and then working for someone. 

But whenever I shared my ideas with my mom, she would say things to discourage me. 

“Don’t sell things, people are going to stop being your friends.”

“You’re not smart enough, articulate enough to be a business woman!”

Constantly stopping me. 

It was only when I finally stood up for what I wanted, that was the first step for me breaking free. 

That’s when I realize, yeah.. my mom IS supposed to oppose me. Because I needed to believe in myself, hold onto my dream. And if she believes in me right from the get go… I wouldn’t have to learn this lesson. 

It’s a difficult concept to wrap our heads around, because.. why would the people closest to us do something like this? 

But if we can take a step back, and look at our lives from a Birds Eye view perspective. 

And block out the labels, “mom” “dad” “significant other” “son” 

And just see them as points of connection. 

How is this person my lesson? 

What is the lesson I have to overcome? 

Because here’s the thing, there are people in this world where they may run away from home because their parents are abuse. 

And yet once they run away, they still come across human after human who did the same thing to them. 

Same lesson, different faces. 

So the lesson will keep popping up until they’re willing to face it, to learn it. 

If you’re facing some struggles in life, and if you wonder why it keeps happening.. then I invite you to figure out what is the lesson? 

Not quite sure and want to have someone figure this out with you? Book a time with me. 

Sending you lots of love. 

Sometimes when our family lineage is experiencing some sort of pain, that gets passed from one generation to another. There will come one person, who is born into the family, to break the family free from this cycle. 

Now how do you know if you’re one. 

For example, you’re asked to support your family’s financial burden, to the point where it is extremely unfair to you. 

Or you are yelled at or hurt by your parents, and yet you are demanded to cast aside your feelings to show your parents respect. 

Or you are expected to sacrifice your desire to make your parents happy. 

All in all, it seems like you’re in constant conflict with your family, feeling a lot of pressure to do something out of expectation or obligation. 

If you have a huge urge to stand up for it, and yet, it seems like you’re all alone, everyone is against you. 

You’re probably in this role.

I know it may be difficult for you to see it, because you’re in the midst of it. And it’s so painful and difficult to endure. 

And yet, if you’re to ask yourself… if my daughter or son is put in this exact same position as me… what do I want to show them? 

Because here’s the truth, if you succumb and don’t stand up for yourself.. your children will do exactly what you do. 

Because children tend to do what they see, not what they hear. 

So be the example for your kids… break the cycle. 

I know it can be difficult. So I have a lot of free resources. You can check them out in the link below. 

https://www.reddit.com/user/Claudia_Chan/comments/1jautq5/free_resources

Or book a time with me. This can be a lonely journey, and yet, you don’t have to do it alone. Let’s do it together. 

Sometime, we may believe that our parents “should” love us, have the patience for us because they are our parents. 

And because they don’t… we somehow believe that it’s because we didn’t do enough, we are not worthy enough. 

But what if they actually don’t have the capacity for it? 

What if, when we stand up for ourselves, they make us feel guilty, because they personally were made to feel guilty? 

What if, when we do something amazing, and we turn to them hoping that they will celebrate us.., but they brush us aside… make us feel disappointed, because they are disappointed in themselves? 

What if all these guilt, disappointment, pain that they give us… is not ours to carry? it’s just simply a reflection of their lives? 

One of my mentors talked about the concept of ice cream machine. 

You stand in front of an icecream machine, hoping that it’s chocolate. But when you pull the lever, it gives you vanilla. 

And when you look at the label, you see vanilla.  You don’t pull the lever again to expect chocolate… 

So the question is, how long are you going to stand in front of the icecream machine, hoping that it’ll give you chocolate? 

Similarly, how long are you going to stand there, expecting your parents will give you the love, the support, the affection… when they don’t have the capacity to? 

How long are you going to keep holding onto the guilty, disappointment, pain… when these are what they’re personally carrying… and it is not yours to begin with? 

It is a deep concept, and at the same time, when you are ready to let go… you’ll be so much freer. 

Ready to do this work? Book a time with me. It’s time to live your life according to you. Let’s do it together. 

The one most important thing I learned from being married for 10 years, together for 15, is the art of communication. 

The two parts are 1) how to connect so we can initiate a conversation, and 2) to validate the other person feelings, without feeling attacking or without taking it personally. 

And we have to keep remembering that we’re always a team. We’re here to work together to make things better for us. 

We’re always choosing each other. And we choose to choose each other. 

Sometimes we believe that our emotions is based on what other people do to us. 

Oh  because they keep saying I’m a bad daughter, I’m selfish. Because they keep yelling, or they keep giving us the cold shoulder, so I feel guilty, I feel bad. So I have to change myself to make things better. And I feel so powerless. 

So we need to build our own emotional independence. 

When other people are having their storm, and causing us to feel a certain way, we can do the following three steps.

1 take a moment to notice, “Hey I’m feeling guilty, or upset”

2 Then we can process the feeling. Calm ourselves down.

3 Then we can ask ourselves, “what is the best thing I can do that is most aligned to me?” 

Once you can calm yourself down, without needing other people to change, this is how you take back your control. Thus gain emotional independence. 

Which is extremely powerful, because they can try to rattle you, but you can always come back to yourself and what you stand for. 

So whenever you’re ready, book a time with me, and let’s build your resilience to take care of any emotions that come your way.

Today I’m going to touch on some of the signs of emotionally immature parents. 

One of the meaning is, they treat you as an adult when it’s convenient for them, but treat you as a child when it doesn’t serve them. 

Some examples for treating you like an adult: they keep asking you to take responsibility for your younger sibling, or pay bills, or translate for them. 

Anything that passes their responsibility off onto you. 

Some example for treating you like a child: maybe you want to give less money to them because you want to build up your savings, or you no longer want to put in as much effort to take care of the household. 

Or anything that inconvenience them, and they say things like, “You’re selfish”, or “I know what’s best for you.”

Now of course there is a spectrum. And yet, emotionally mature parents will still try to do their best and put in a lot of effort to take care of themselves as much as possible. And when they really need help, they will ask for it. Or they understand that the parents’ job is to raise our kids to become independent. 

And of course, we are all humans, so we’re not pointing the fingers at them to blame them. 

Yet there is a balance between putting in the effort into the collective household, verses ourselves. 

So this is to raise the awareness, to take ourselves out of the relationship, so we can examine what is happening, and recalibrating where we stand within this. 

So we can say, this is the amount I am willing to give. Vs, this is too toxic and I need to remove myself entirely. 

This is definitely a difficult situation to be in. So whenever you’re ready to go on this journey, book a time with me, and we’ll go on this together. 

You’re not alone. Sending you lots of love.