The Spiritual Parent: Mindful Tools for Raising Spiritual and Conscious Kids

Breaking Free from Perfectionism: A Soul Recovery Journey with Rachel Harrison

• Carrie Lingenfelter, CCC-SLP and Rachel Harrison • Season 1 • Episode 75

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Perfectionism isn't really about being perfect—it's a shield we create to protect our wounded hearts. When we obsessively clean our homes or micromanage our children's lives, we're not striving for excellence; we're desperately trying to avoid the discomfort of judgment, criticism, and vulnerability.

In this soul-stirring conversation between host Carrie and Reverend Rachel Harrison, we journey through the complex landscape of conscious parenting, spiritual growth, and what Rachel calls "soul recovery." As a metaphysical minister who raised two neurodiverse sons through addiction and recovery, Rachel offers profound insights that transcend typical parenting advice.

"Our children are not ours," Rachel reminds us. "They come through us to have their own experience." This simple truth revolutionizes how we approach parenting, especially when raising highly sensitive or neurodiverse children. When we stop seeing our children as extensions of ourselves—as projects to perfect—we create space for their authentic souls to flourish.

The conversation weaves through Rachel's personal journey of alcoholism and recovery, revealing how her own healing transformed her family. Her now-adult sons have emerged from challenging childhoods with remarkable self-awareness, demonstrating that our parenting "mistakes" often serve deeper purposes in our children's development. As Rachel's son told her: "If I hadn't had all that stuff when I was younger, I wouldn't have the mindset to know how lucky I am."

For parents currently in the trenches with young children, this episode offers liberation from the crushing weight of perfectionism. You don't need to control everything. You're not responsible for everyone's happiness. And most importantly—give yourself a break. There is no perfect way to parent, only the beautiful, messy journey of souls growing together.

Ready to recover your soul from the grip of perfectionism and codependence? Listen now, and discover how releasing control might be the greatest gift you give yourself and your children.

Connect with Rachel Harrison:
*Website: https://www.recoveryoursoul.net/podcast
*Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/recoveryoursoulpodcast/
*Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/recoveryoursoul.net/

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Connect with Carrie:
*Website: https://hearttoheartlife.com/
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**Please remember that the information shared on this podcast is educational in nature and does not constitute licensed mental health advice. If you need such advice, you should speak with a licensed professional about your unique situation. Thanks so much happy listeners.

© 2024-2025 Heart to Heart Life LLC

Rachel Harrison:

Yeah, perfectionism is actually a protection of your own woundedness. So if you think about why do you want it to be perfect? We want it to be perfect because we're trying to keep ourselves from being uncomfortable. So it comes back to that discomfort. If I have my house perfect, then someone won't come in and snide me for having a messy kitchen. It's this gentleness to ourselves.

Rachel Harrison:

I think the key in what I call soul recovery is this, always coming back to yourself, and this gentleness to yourself, because these protectors and this is part of the language from internal family systems and gestalt therapy, which is we have these parts of ourselves that have pain, and then there are protectors that come and try to figure out how to keep us to never feel those difficult feelings again. This is how the psyche works. Perfectionism is a protector. If I do it just right, I'll be accepted. If I do it just right, I won't be challenged. If I do it just right, everyone will be okay. If I do it just right, I won't be challenged. If I do it just right, everyone will be okay. If they're okay, then I'm okay. It's constantly coming back to us trying to regulate our own pain. Hi, conscious.

Carrie Lingenfelter:

Parents, it's Keri here, and I am here with a little info about raising our mindful kids. I've got some tips and tricks about breaking free of the box and becoming who you are and teaching your kids how to do that along the way. Join us, hi there, happy listeners. It's Keri here and I'm so excited. I have a new project called Conscious Family Travels on YouTube. It's all about mindfully traveling with our highly sensitive kids. We love to give tips and tools about how you can pack, how you can prepare Traveling with dietary restrictions. That's a huge piece of the puzzle that we have in our house. We love to share in-depth guides of certain areas that we are traveling to, as well as some of the actual items that we use along our journey. So join us on this Conscious Family Travels journey. Hi there and welcome back. It's Keri, your friendly, intuitive mama, here, and I am so excited.

Carrie Lingenfelter:

I have a guest who I have connected with in the real world, which is unusual, I feel like, in this podcasting world. So I'm really excited to have Reverend Rachel Harrison here today. She's an inspirational spiritual coach and she's the host of Recover your Soul podcast. She works to help others seeking positive change and she has this gift of I was just telling her she has this gift of spreading messages that really helps people to connect with themselves and helps people to grow in a spiritual way. It also helps you to seek out more spirituality in your life. So, rachel, I'm so excited to have you here today.

Rachel Harrison:

Thank you, Keri. I'm super excited to be here today. I just love everything that we have to talk about. It's everything that I think about.

Carrie Lingenfelter:

Yes, I love it, and you raised your own spiritually seeking neurodiverse I guess if I can share neurodiverse kiddos and have been down this path. So you've been here in my shoes a few years back and so I love hearing your insight and I was really drawn today to talk about the spiritual journey as a parent, the spiritual journey as a woman and as a mom, and I've really been driven towards seeing some of these challenges as opportunities for healing and growth and spiritual connection. So I wanted to ask you you work with so many people that face challenges in their lives. It's part of what you do in your program and on your podcast and what are your thoughts on when we dive into our mindsets and using these challenges to grow?

Rachel Harrison:

Yeah, that's a big question.

Rachel Harrison:

I you say I raised my kids in the same as you.

Rachel Harrison:

But, man, if I had just half at the age that my kids when your kids the way that you are now, if I had that, I think there's this interesting piece that we're all on the journey that we're on, that the journey that we're on and the fascinating piece is I was raised Buddhist and I was raised in this really beautiful spiritual environment and I still went down a road of addiction and dysfunction and control and fear and unhealthy, dysfunctional family and have come out the other side.

Rachel Harrison:

It's been seven years since I put down alcohol for myself and stepped into this journey and my kids are 28 and 25 years old. They had us mostly addicted, mostly addicted, and so I think one of the things to really think about in terms of us on our own spiritual journey is that it's complicated for everyone, that there is no exact way, and that you know what I was thinking about, that I wanted to share with your audience and your community. You know what I was thinking about, that I wanted to share with your audience and your community is your parents are in it?

Rachel Harrison:

Yeah, they are in it, and I remember when I was in it and how overwhelmed I was and how much I wanted to do it perfect and how afraid I was. My kids were born in a time where they got diagnosed with ADHD in elementary school and nothing changed. They weren't treated any different. As a matter of fact, my oldest son, who ended up having the most quote unquote problem, started getting suspended and pulled out of school for getting in trouble and everything that. Nowadays they look at a kid and they go, oh, maybe this kiddo needs some extra attention. Go, oh, maybe this kiddo needs some extra attention.

Rachel Harrison:

He just got highlighted as being a problem, and so, of course, my job was to fix and change and try to save and I just think about how complicated it is and ultimately, soul recovery, which is what's come to me over the last years is recover your soul. It's about recovering your soul and understanding that whatever we go through, it is okay, not only for ourselves but for our kids too, and through that we come out the other side and we'll talk about a million things and this will go in a million directions, but my kids are both sober right now and they're both self-supporting through their own contributions, and they're both doing things in their lives that are passions that they found when they were younger that I could have never imagined. So this process of us as women, we generally think that we are responsible for everyone in our family's happiness and well-being, and it's a load that's really too heavy to carry and through that we can move into some unhealthy behaviors, which is what happened to me. I didn't want anyone to be uncomfortable. I needed you to be okay, for me to be okay.

Rachel Harrison:

If I had an unhappy child, I was an unhappy mom and those experiences are normal. So it's really about giving ourselves a lot of grace, I think, and through that we're learning, and they're watching us learn, and that circle of us always coming back to ourselves actually teaches them to come back to themselves. So that's a wild story of my experience, but really grounding into yourself, I think, is really what I've learned through all of it. Okay.

Carrie Lingenfelter:

So grounding into yourself. I'm trying to think what that might look like for a person like, say, for myself I have a six-year-old daughter and a nine-year-old son, and sometimes it just feels so overwhelming in intensity in our house. What do you suggest for a mom like me going through this and feeling is it going to get better? Did I choose this journey wrong? What should I do? What do you say to moms that are in it, that are in it thick like that?

Rachel Harrison:

I think it actually comes back to that piece that says we're responsible for everybody else's wellbeing. Ultimately, recover your soul is recovery from codependence. And it's fascinating how, when I look at the depths of despair that I would go through in trying to make sure everyone was happy, if I had just recognized that sometimes people are unhappy, sometimes kids don't feel good, sometimes they get their feelings hurt, and actually the success that I think that we had in our lives, which is so interesting to look at now, was because there was so much like chaos, in a way that was uncontrollable chaos. I couldn't keep everybody from being uncomfortable, and you know what they learned? They learned how to be uncomfortable. Yeah, they learned how to maneuver through that, and my greatest effort to keep everybody from harm or from hurt didn't keep them from harm or hurt, and the more that I learned how to just witness it for them instead of fix it for them, how to empower them instead of tell them that they couldn't. Every time you see a kid and you try to do it for them, what you're really saying to them is I don't think you can do this for yourself, yeah, and when we say you've got this, you can make it. I know that I believe in you. What are you going to do about it? When we say you've got this, you can make it. I know that I believe in you. What are you going to do about it?

Rachel Harrison:

Even though I was messing up in so many other ways, I was successful in those ways. Both my kids tell me that all the time Bodie I have. So my two sons are Alex and Bodie, and Bodie's 25 right now. And he called on the phone the other day and he was talking about how we had this truck payment issue and it was a lot of money, right, like this huge amount of money and I'm thinking I'm supposed to fix it, and he just said he goes. No, I, actually I've got it. He said you taught me something that I've used in my life. He said you taught me, because I had ADHD, to be kind and patient and to always ask for help, and patient and to always ask for help. And he said I've used that so much because people will be much more tolerant of my ADHD if I'm, if I'm being kind, if I'm asking for help. And so he went to the whatever, the lone people and we're being kind instead of aggressive, and they reversed all the stuff and he's this is one of the greatest gifts that you gave me was to really notice that how I show up is how other people are going to show up.

Rachel Harrison:

For me, part of this allowing them to process even at 25, I'm thinking, oh, how am I going to fix this truck payment situation for him?

Rachel Harrison:

But just to be gentle, that grounding really comes back to minding ourselves and checking in with ourself and touching in that feeling, because feelings are everything.

Rachel Harrison:

Feelings teach us something and we're trying to manipulate the feelings of others and at the same time, we're manipulating the feelings of ourselves, when truly a feeling is the GPS that says if this doesn't feel good, it's telling you something, and if it feels good, it's telling you something else.

Rachel Harrison:

So when we allow our kids to trust that, because we are trusting it, because we're stepping into how we feel with ourselves, and then I do a lot of self-talk, just really being inside of my own head and saying, ooh, that feels a little bit uncomfortable right there.

Rachel Harrison:

That's okay, they've got this. You can let them be uncomfortable, you can let them deal with this very sticky situation, whatever it is, and then it's interesting how it just soothes away whatever it is, and then it's interesting how it just soothes away and over time I've learned to be okay even if my children aren't okay, even if my husband isn't okay, and then that, as the mother, as the wife of the family, is one of our greatest lessons. Can we move into a spiritual space that says Spirit is indeed caring for everyone here, caring for me, caring for them, and as I became a metaphysical minister over the last years, these teachings that had always been within me, but that had been lost in my desire to control and fix everything, really allowed me to release and let them all be on their own journeys, instead of thinking that I personally was in charge of everybody's life.

Carrie Lingenfelter:

Yeah, Wow, that's such a beautiful way to describe all of it and as you're telling the story of your kids calling you and asking just telling you stories, it makes me think of even as a 41 year old mom. When I call my mom to tell her like oh, it's been. I'm battling insurances and trying to get this OT covered or whatever, and she's have you tried this, have you tried that? And she's trying to fix it. No, I know how to fix this. I'm just working through the frustration. I just need you to hear me. You don't have to fix it. I'm an adult. I'm an adult raising little kids now, Like I, you don't need to fix it for me.

Rachel Harrison:

So I love that and the little kids are the same Ultimately, what I think is so powerful when we look out like bigger right. So the more that I do the spiritual work, the more I'm having this expansive vision. And if I thought that I was in charge of everybody, right, one of the reasons why I thought I was in charge of everybody right, one of the reasons why I thought I was in charge of everybody was I was rewarded as a little girl for being a problem solver, because I had parents who allowed me to be my own problem solver, and so it's interesting that they gave me that breath to understand myself, to figure it out for myself. And we all come out of childhood with something Nobody escapes childhood without stuff, right? And so here's on one hand, my parents did this great job of giving me this independence, but then I also got such reward for being good and figuring it all out. My belief system became that that's my job and that I must know best for everyone, right? And then I stepped into that role in my family and they all were not on the same page of how that was going to go.

Rachel Harrison:

And this is our journey. This is the beautiful piece of us giving ourselves grace and giving the family members grace and giving our kids grace. We are all souls that came here to have our own unique experience. Our children are not ours. Our children come through us to have their own experience. And yet we want to have that connection so that when you call your mom, she's your mom forever, and what you just really want is someone who knows you and loves you, to hear you. And yet all of the conflict that ends up happening is this who's right? Who has all the answers? And we all have our own answers within ourselves, even as children. Yeah.

Carrie Lingenfelter:

Yeah, yeah, I love that and I love the way you did that self-reflection for yourself. I was hearing so many similar things for me as a child and as a mom and trying to control, and I think part of my spiritual journey myself has been looking at what am I trying to control? Why am I trying so hard to control my kid's environment, to control my kids? I used to try to control my husband when I first met him and he was like no you are not my mom, do not treat me.

Carrie Lingenfelter:

I'm like, oh yeah, you're right, I am not your mom. What am I doing? And looking at what in me feels this need to control everything, and I realize highly sensitive mom right here, highly sensitive person, and it's really intense feelings for me when they're dysregulated or having a meltdown or having something that's going on in their lives that I want to fix for them. But the kids they don't want you to fix it for them. It's learning.

Carrie Lingenfelter:

What is the root cause of those feelings that I'm having as a mom? How can I heal that for myself so I can stop putting that onto my kids? And, as you said, it's like that facilitator role helping to facilitate life for our kids, helping them to shine and learn and grow in their own way, instead of controlling it for them and letting them be uncomfortable is huge. That's really hard for a sensitive mom, an empathic mom. Watching them in pain, watching them in emotional pain, physical pain, any type of pain, right, that, just that is hard on our hearts.

Carrie Lingenfelter:

Yeah, I think I've. I've been hearing it so strongly from the universe about these kids coming in with these superpowers I like to term it as superpowers and I'm really working to help people, to raise our kids, allowing them to be empowered and have those superpowers, while also learning how to be uncomfortable in the world, because when they are coming in so sensitive, it can be so easy for them to put these layers of protection around themselves as they're growing into adults, when they're so sensitive. Do you have any ideas?

Rachel Harrison:

I have. So my oldest son is a highly sensitive, which I didn't know at the time. Again, he's only 28 and already there's been so much more advancements in how we see kids. But I can see now. You would say one thing to him and it was like a stab in the heart. You'd say the same thing to Bodhi and Bodhi's let's go play. Like he didn't care.

Rachel Harrison:

And there really is this movement the more you get into some pretty far out spiritual stuff which is becoming less and less far out. The concept is that children are coming in with a higher level of consciousness already and that higher consciousness makes it so that when they step into their bodies they're already uncomfortable, because it's very difficult here on Earth. This is considered earth school and again, take what you want and leave the rest. But when you look at our souls coming in to have an experience and these higher consciousness beings and souls are coming in to help earth, to help humankind, to bring love, to bring light and we don't learn without adversity there has to be agitation. And if we cloister our kids so much and protect them, we're actually encouraging them to build the walls and the protections which will end up keeping them from their full life. In the end we want to give them the strength to know that they can handle anything. Now there's this you have to learn how to be in the world. There's always this pendulum swing in parenting. Right From my husband's parents got the belt out, which to me, even if Rich ever said the belt, I like freaked out and I was like there's none of that in this house and there never was. For him he said that was normal and in my family there was no need for any kind of discipline because I just was good. I was just good Carrie's raising her hand, and then it swings to being way too permissive and then it's so, this piece of us that were as human beings, we're just trying to find the medium. But if you begin to really trust that your job is actually just to live in your consciousness and your being in your strength, you're actually giving the kids exactly what they need to learn, because they're watching you.

Rachel Harrison:

Now, on the hard side, I was an alcoholic and so what did my kids learn? How to learn, how to deal with their discomfort. They learned that checking out was the way to deal with it. And for my husband's genetics, they have addictive genes and there's so much sadness in me sometimes that what I taught them even though I had this whole unbridled love, unconditional love, all these beautiful teachings that I was giving them I was also teaching them that the way to check out from feeling uncomfortable was to drink. And they both started using drugs at 13 years old and that was what they were taught.

Rachel Harrison:

And then we put all the energy that said, oh, this one in particular, our oldest one, he has the problem. It doesn't matter whether you have a kid who's got ADHD or addiction or whatever. When we label them as a problem, we're denying them their experience. And the more that I look now, the more I can see that he was modeling the only way that he knew how to deal with uncomfortable feelings, not feeling comfortable in his skin, not knowing how to relate. He was getting in so much trouble at school and thank God, I got sober and I've modeled for them a healthier way of being. Now they're both sober too, not because I forced them to, but because they're recognizing they want that in their life.

Rachel Harrison:

That 28-year-old found his way. He found his way. Part of that is because I stopped thinking it was my job to make that happen for him. I started seeing him for this beautiful soul, this superpower, this already higher consciousness, enlightened, being that they both were when they came in. And when we stop seeing anybody in our lives our children, our spouses as broken or as wrong, and we just start seeing the complexity of what it is to be human being, I think we can give ourselves a break, as a parent that says so daughter was having a stomach ache this morning.

Rachel Harrison:

Alex had horrendous physical symptoms of the feelings that he was having, but we didn't know how to handle it, instead of saying, oh yeah, that must be really. There must be a lot of feelings going on inside when it comes in your stomach. Yeah, that's. I feel that. Feel that then they've got to go to school and have a stomach ache, they've got what they can do.

Rachel Harrison:

And the more that I do these spiritual studies and recognize the value of giving everyone the space to have their experience, the more that I'm watching the people in my family thrive, every single one of them, all these people that I was trying to herd like wild cats, right, and they're each just becoming their own unique people. Now, do my kids look like what I thought they were going to look like in the lives we're going to look like? Not at all, not at all, not at all. But I love them for who they are. Alex is all tattooed up and lives in California and is an artist. He never paid attention to school. He always drew and now he's a full-time artist. And now he's a full-time artist. Bodhi had so much energy and was always jumping and playing and doing sports, and now he's a professional one-wheeler in sports. So they've found their way to be their person and I could have never guided it to what I thought it was going to look like.

Carrie Lingenfelter:

I love that you were talking about their, their superpowers, and it's really cool.

Carrie Lingenfelter:

Society is on the verge of empowering these neurodiverse kiddos. There's actually like a movement, or a piece of it, called neuro affirming I don't know if you've heard of it. So it's looking at the positives and the strengths while also thinking about supporting the challenges that can come with being neurodiverse. But being able to look into a classroom and it used to be as a speech therapist we would try to teach the kids that were neurodiverse how to blend in, because we wanted to look in a class and have everybody look the same so the teacher could give her message for teaching. And now we're neuroaffirming. We're writing goals to represent the child and who they are, so we're not teaching them to always mask and look like every other student, but seeing them for who they are, accepting the challenges that they have and trying to support them, but also accepting the strengths that they come, and looking at some of these things that we used to think as challenges, maybe as personality and strengths, and I love where we're going with this. I'm like can we just keep going, please, humanity?

Rachel Harrison:

This is the raising of the consciousness that is indeed moving us into the new earth. Like ever since it's probably been about two years since I started you hear something and then it pops right and what is the new earth? And I never understood what Eckhart Tolle's book was about. Anyway, it's. What is this new earth?

Rachel Harrison:

anyhow, very difficult to read, but now that I've heard the term and the level of consciousness, information, the hundreds of books and I do channel which has been a wild journey on my own to really recognize that I am indeed channel it's all saying the same thing, which is move to this new, higher consciousness. Trust this, these superpowers within these children. Trust the superpowers within ourselves. Recognize that this shift from being the same as everybody else, being small, being quiet, being held back is actually not who we are here to be. We are being called to be even more and that is happening at this very specific time. This time, with these kids coming in, is one of the most important, powerful times in our history of this raising of consciousness, when you see your kids as not labeling them as broken versus in empowering them as being unique and special and wonderful. That gives them the strength to be able to walk through their life and handle whatever comes.

Rachel Harrison:

And, having been through the life that I had with my family for like the 15 years, that was really hard and I'm looking back now it all was on purpose and it was all okay. Would I have done some things different? Absolutely I would have done some things different. I would have not made my son go to school the way that he did. He never finished high school because he just was not a school kid in the way that they taught just didn't work for him. And so what did he do? He did drugs to check out, right. So I would have done a different thing for him, but even then, he's who he is. And so I think, man, if I could have given younger Rachel, mommy Rachel, a break, it would have really benefited me and them and at the same time it all had its own purpose. And if I hadn't had it so hard, I wouldn't have had my own personal break. That would have made me search for my own spiritual journey that has brought me to the place where I am today. Now I am a metaphysical minister and a spiritual coach and lead a whole community around codependence and letting go of control is one of my main things of how to release the need to control everything so it all works out right. So it all works out right and my kids, who you know are still just young men, have so much more awareness than I did at those ages. They are so in tune with their heart, they're so in tune with how to be present in their bodies and in relationship, and part of that is because they went through a really difficult part of their life. I'm just thinking of this.

Rachel Harrison:

Alex said we went through a lot with him. We went through legal issues and schools and residential rehab so we've been through it and he did everything before he was 18. And so anything that happened is not on his record. And it was a couple years ago that he said if I hadn't had all that stuff when I was younger, I wouldn't have the mindset to know how lucky I am and how much power I have to choose the life that I want to have, and that I don't have to test out a whole bunch of kind of wild behaviors, because I know where that takes me and I don't want that.

Rachel Harrison:

And that was a really profound thing for him to say. And he said that a lot of his friends who had these sort of like perfect upbringings which we were not one of, are right now experimenting with their wildness and he's watching them have more trouble, whereas he went through that and he's never going to be in trouble again. That was no fun and you just look at how it all happens. However, it's going to happen and it lets you let go a little bit.

Carrie Lingenfelter:

Yes, 100%. I think there were times when I was trying to be the perfect mom and sought out different therapies and counselors and psychologists and what do we do with this? How do we help this? And we would go by the book so often and for a while we would have a therapist that said once we had a therapist that said you need to let her cry it out. She needs to cry it out, she's too attached, you can't all of these things. And I was like, no, we're not gonna do that.

Carrie Lingenfelter:

My kids consistently would tell us no, we don't want you to do some of these American versions of disconnection. Growing a thick skin early on. That was what a lot of people would tell us we needed to do with them. But my kids would come up very loud, even at one years old, two years old no, mom, that isn't what I need. And I could hear that, hear it in my heart nope, we're not doing that. And there were times where I would try something and then feel guilty about it, like why did I do that? I heard my heart told me not to, but I thought I had to do that to be the perfect version of mom. This is what the book told me I had to do.

Carrie Lingenfelter:

But I think in my life I've learned, like you said, that growing piece of I am growing. If I hadn't have had that thunderstorm, I wouldn't now have the rainbow, if I hadn't had reached that point of like. Why did I listen to that person even though my heart told me not to do it? It didn't. It felt sticky and icky in my body and I hated it and it didn't turn out right. My kids want the connection I wouldn't. I wouldn't have grown and healed to become this version of. We are now where we listen and we understand that our kids want to be seen and heard and have connection and that's what grounds them and brings them back to their heart and helps them get through the hard body part of being a human so they can be back in their heart space that they want to be in. So I was going to ask you, rachel, what are your thoughts on perfectionism?

Rachel Harrison:

Yeah, perfectionism is actually a protection of your own woundedness. So if you think about why do you want it to be perfect? We want it to be perfect because we're trying to keep ourselves from being uncomfortable. So it comes back to that discomfort. If I have my house perfect, then someone won't come in and snide me for having a messy kitchen. She's raising her hand again. It's this gentleness to ourselves.

Rachel Harrison:

I think the key in what I call soul recovery is this always coming back to yourself, and this gentleness to yourself. Because these protectors and this is part of the language from internal family systems and gestalt therapy, which is we have these parts of ourselves that have pain, and then there are protectors that come and try to figure out how to keep us to never feel those difficult feelings again. This is how the psyche works. Perfectionism is a protector. If I do it just right, I'll be accepted. If I do it just right, I won't be challenged. If I do it just right, everyone will be okay. If they're okay, then I'm okay.

Rachel Harrison:

It's constantly coming back to us trying to regulate our own pain and when we recognize that we are indeed powerless over every single thing outside of ourself and that doesn't mean that we don't have power. It actually means we're taking our power back by saying I am going to learn how to be okay even if everything else around me is falling apart. And the more that I stand in my center, the more than I'm offering groundedness to everyone around me to do the same if they so choose. So it doesn't mean that if you like having a tidy house, you have a tidy house because it might feel good to you. But when you do it from a level of perfectionism, you're actually doing it out of woundedness and protection and pain, versus saying I love beauty, I love organization, that feels good to me, and if things are askew, okay, they're askew this idea of owning each of our superpowers and allowing ourselves to be exactly who we are as parents and as kids. I love that you allow your kids to give you information, because it's really your intuition that you're listening to, and the intuition is not control.

Rachel Harrison:

The intuition is your connection to your higher self, and that is really where our greatness is and and when you can really allow everybody to be who they are, which, for a lot of parents that are probably like me, I wanted, like Rich, to be on the exact same page as me on everything and there was some stuff that he did that wasn't all that great, to be honest, because of how he was raised. But my getting my sticky little fingers in there and being pissed at him and trying to manipulate what he was doing only made things worse. Versus showing up more firmly in myself and having clean, honest, direct communication that would allow us to actually have worked some of those things out and then letting him be the parent that he is probably would have alleviated a lot of the stuff that we went through because it's control. I wanted to control how he was, but when we take our power back and we work on ourselves and we stand in that groundedness and we let go of perfectionism and we allow everyone to be uncomfortable and we allow ourselves to be uncomfortable, we're actually giving everybody their power back and we're connecting to our intuition.

Rachel Harrison:

And when we connect to our intuition, we're giving our kids permission to connect to their intuition and we're in a space right now where people have more permission to be different and that in the end, I cannot wait to see, like where your kids are when they're 25 and 28 and where we grow, because it's changed so much in such a short period of time. What are the books anyway, right? So everything's changing so quick that there's no book that can be written. That's already outdated.

Carrie Lingenfelter:

Yes, where are we going to be in 20 years? I don't know. I'm so excited to see where is the shifting toward. I love this conversation, this conversation, rachel. I wanted to ask you one last question, and I'm not sure I feel like you may have already touched on it, but if you could tell the parents in this era parenting nine and six year olds now, if you could tell us one thing that you would like to say in the place that you are at, what would it be?

Rachel Harrison:

Give yourself a break. Give yourself a break, man. There is no perfect. There is no one way Like just be kind to yourself If they're having a day you are not responsible for how everyone feels in your family and just to be kind to yourself.

Carrie Lingenfelter:

You don't have to fix everything. I love that so much and I don't want to show you the table behind the computer, although I would show you. I'm giving myself a break today. So thank you so much for being here, Reverend Rachel. It's been such a blessing to have you today.

Rachel Harrison:

It has been my pleasure. Thanks, Carrie.

Carrie Lingenfelter:

Well, that's a wrap. Thanks so much for tuning in. Changemakers. This is Keri, and if you haven't done a review for us five stars and a little few words about what you've enjoyed in our podcast episodes, we would really appreciate it. If you guys would like to ever message me, I would love any questions you have or any feedback at info at hearttoheartlifecom. We also have a brand new website which we're super excited to share. It's heart to heart lifecom. Thanks so much for tuning in and happy life. Happy times. Change maker families. Bye.