Episode 156: When Joy is Contagious with Anastasia Aruz

In this episode, DJ and guest Anastasia Aruz talk about the importance of finding joy and playfulness in everyday moments with children, while also identifying and nurturing their interests and passions. Listen in as they discuss the need to manage media consumption to protect mental health, and create a healthy family system by acknowledging and addressing parenting mistakes. And stay tuned as they explain that by prioritizing joy, playfulness, and mental well-being, parents can foster a positive and loving relationship with their children.

TIMESTAMPS
4:32 - Anastasia shares tips for shifting one's outlook and attitude, such as unfollowing negative sources on social media.
8:48 - DJ & Anastasia discuss parenting and teaching children to cope with stressful events through positive thinking and emotional intelligence.
11:05 - DJ emphasizes the need to process emotions away from children, as they lack the capacity to fully understand complex issues and may internalize adults' emotions, leading to anxiety or fear.
20:03 - Anastasia shares tips on how to make household chores fun for kids, such as turning them into games or involving them in the process.

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Transcript

Children  0:00  
Imperfect Heroes Podcast is a production of Little Hearts Academy, USA.

DJ Stutz  0:06  
You're listening to Imperfect Heroes - Insights Into Parenting, the perfect podcast for imperfect parents looking to find joy in their experience of raising children in an imperfect world. And I'm your host, DJ Stutz.

Everybody, thank you so much for being some of our heroes and heroines that are going to be spending the next few minutes with us here on the podcast. And we have just such a great topic and a great guest. But before we get started, I just wanted to remind everyone, Roman is Bigger. My book is still available on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, even Walmart's website has it. And so it's a fun book. It's about vocabulary, because Roman is Bigger than mad and he is bigger than happy. And he's trying to find the right words to express how he's feeling. You know, the next book in the series is going to be coming up soon, where Roman gets to find out that he actually is bigger than his baby brother. So he gets to have a new baby brother, and what all that brings to him. So get the first of the series Roman is Bigger. And leave us a review. If you get it on any of those websites. Be sure and leave us a review. Tell them just how lovely and wonderful the story is. Because it's a lot of fun. 

All right, let's get going. This month, we are spending the whole month and we're talking about finding joy in every day. That is something that we need to do as parents, we need to teach our children how to find that joy. In teaching kindergarten, I had so many times where they would come into kindergarten and they're already defeated. And everything's already bad and sad. And I'm not good, or I'm not this and they just have that negative attitude. And it's just would break my heart to see that. And so it also affects them in every aspect of their life and in your life do. So today we have just a fabulous guest, Anastasia Aruz, and Anastasia, just talk to us a little bit about like your kids that you're raising and what you have going on. And then we'll get right into our topic. Yeah, of course. So

Anastasia Aruz  2:24  
I have a 10 year old boy. And I have two step sons that are oh my gosh, they're 20 and 18, which is crazy. I've been with them since they were three and five. So I've been doing the parenting thing a long time now. I've also been in education just like you I worked in schools for about 14 years. And then I've had my own private practice and coaching practice for about, oh my gosh, since 2018. So about five years now. So this is what I've been doing forever and working with parents and kids and even in my own family, just trying to do the best I can.

DJ Stutz  3:04  
What we're all doing, we're all just trying to do the best we can. Yeah, sorry, I interrupted you. But keep going.

Anastasia Aruz  3:13  
Oh, now I'm just trying to do the best I can where and I love this topic and finding joy. Because sometimes when things are really hard, it is hard to find the joy in it. Because I think the world is a little goofy right now there's so much happening. And it's just tough. A lot of people and so what can we do to find joy, like what are like the little parts of the day that we can do it with our kids, I think is really important.

DJ Stutz  3:36  
Well, and I love that you brought that up what are the little parts of the day, because that's really where we're going to find that lasting joy, that habit of joy, because it really is a habit that you can work yourself into or out of. And we see people who are going through really some difficult circumstances in life. And yet they're the ones that are building up others, whether it's from having cancer, to having a spouse die or a child die, or all kinds of really big, terrible things. And yet, they're the ones who seem to be lifting up the others that are around them. Because they seem to have that foundation of joy in their whole outlook in life. And some people it seems no matter what happens, they're always going to find the negativity of it. And don't we love being around people like that.

Anastasia Aruz  4:32  
I think what that said about like the attitude or their outlook, I think that's the key to it is figuring out how you can flip the switch on your outlook and your attitude and that can be hard to at times

DJ Stutz  4:42  
it can be well into joy. It it really affects like when you look at some of the other topics that we're going to be talking about for the rest of the year. And once a when we're talking about like even resilience and sticking with something perseverance, it's your ability to find joy Even in the failures that happen, are going to affect your ability to persevere, to be kind, to be brave to show gratitude, Joy is connected to every piece of that. And we know and I'm sure you saw that in your practice or in teaching well, and your practice as well. But that people who are able to look at a tough situation and find a positive outlook are going to be so much more successful.

Anastasia Aruz  5:28  
Yeah. And I think it's hard sometimes because you could be in a really tough situation. And so finding those small shifts. So one, I had a parent the other day, actually, that just having a hard time. And so we started talking about just social media, this is random. But in your social media, if there's things in there that are making you mad, that gets you in a bad mood, then unfollow it, unfollow them, and you can unfollow family members without them knowing like, if you're worried like I can't defriend a person and my family, just you can go heading, and you can find where it's, like, unfollow, and then they will pop up on your feed. And they don't know that you've done that. But if they're a person, a lot of times our family is what's really hard sometimes, because they are the ones that we talk to the most the closest, they're the ones that have programmed us through life. And so if you have a family member, that is really you're trying to change, you're trying to switch, just unfollow or if you're on Instagram, unfollow the influencer, that you that gives you that negative, right.

DJ Stutz  6:27  
And I love the way that you're talking about being really purposeful, and how you're interacting. And there's study after study after study. And you know, this, how social media has affected the mental health of us as human race, honestly, because it's all over. It's not just the US. But all over that we're seeing so many things, one of the things that I've seen that's really affected us is that we are so afraid now of everything, because any kind of disaster, anything that's bad that happens is interphase, bam, bam, bam, all of a sudden, where I know I'm super old. And when it was the station's we were getting UHF or VHF, I don't know, whatever that thing is that with the extra channels, you're messing with the rabbit ears and all of that, but it wasn't in your face all the time. Yeah. And if it really didn't have anything to do with you, or your area, you could watch the national news with Walter Cronkite or whoever was there. And they would give you the overview of it. But they didn't have this 24 hour cycle. And we've got to make it scary to keep their attention 500 ways your child could die in their bedroom. It's so in our face all the time, I'm hearing more and more people just shutting it out.

Anastasia Aruz  7:42  
Yeah, and I think parents, a lot of young parents, like the millennials that have the younger kids, they're doing it so different, because I'm part of the generation before them. And I grew up with like the news on every night while we were eating dinner, and then even into the age of like the MSNBC and the CNN and the fox. My dad was like obsessed with those channels. And when we would visit him with my little one. We're just not used, we turn it off now. Because we it's just I know, it's, it's not good for me, because like you're saying, I started thinking about all these things. And I'm not saying don't not know what's going on in the world, it's important to

DJ Stutz  8:18  
write the balance that needs to be found. Yeah. But picking

Anastasia Aruz  8:21  
a time of the day where you're doing that specifically being very conscious of when you're doing that with news or with social media, because it's really, really easy to get sucked into it, especially if that's something that you're used to doing daily, or how you grew up. Yeah.

DJ Stutz  8:37  
And I'm someone who likes to be up on top of things on what's going on in the world and in politics, and all of that. But it is so easy to get it just drained. In fact, I had a friend. We lived in Las Vegas for 20 years. And that's mostly where my kids grew up. No, well, our youngest spent, I think from eighth grade on we were in the greater Denver area. And I was very active. I mean, very active with school things and with legislative stuff. And there was even one of the governors, I would travel with him talking about education issues. I mean, super active, and I knew a lot of the political players that were there. And there was one friend of ours and he was on the county commission. And Clark County takes up it's a huge County in in Nevada. It's not just Las Vegas, it's a lot of areas. And so he's in politics. He's in doing all of this. And he found that it was just beating him down listening to that all the time. And he was listening to it in his car and he finally decided nope, if I'm in my car, not doing it. And so he had it on music and we put it on a music station that was uplifting and happy to him and improved his spirit. And he said it made all the difference in the world to him just even having just that time in the car and at home with his family.

Anastasia Aruz  9:56  
Not doing it. It's interesting that because for the past since COVID, really, and since my son's gotten older, we've really gotten into audible. And podcasts, if you don't know Audible has the books, right. And so we right now. So for example, we're on the way to schools, we live sort of out of town. We live in eastern North Carolina. And so we're out of the town, and it takes us like 30 minutes. So instead of listening to this music, or the radio, we listen to a book. So right now we're doing Harry Potter, for example, love it. So we're just doing it and it's fun, and it's happy. And then we'll stop and we'll talk about it. So even doing little things like that, where your eat that is great and connecting to because then the two of us are hearing the same book. And I had never read it before, surprisingly. And so we're both we're both nearing the book together. So that's been a really fun thing that we brought in just, it just happened randomly, because I had listened to some podcasts. And then I had audible and he was like, do they have kids books, I'm like they do, let's find a book that we can listen to. And so that's something that we've done recently, to help switch the whole social media news out of our car.

DJ Stutz  11:05  
Yeah. And to kids are looking to us to how we're reacting to some of this, it's like, and your mom, you've seen this, a million times your kid falls down. And the first thing they do is they look up at you to see if you're going to panic, and then depending on your reaction, whether they fall apart, or whether they're like, whatever. So I'd be like, Oh, crash and burn, are you okay? You know, just trying to whatever. And they would get up and they would be fine. Where we do that same thing with, like, national and world events. You know, all right. And we know there will be more because yes, it goes on and how we react. And so when we see when I hear about kids who are having nightmares about global warming, well, why are they have these nightmares are scaring them. Right? And when COVID hit and when people became super, super fearful. And when I was getting students coming back into the classroom, after that, it was just interesting to see the different kids and the different reactions that they had to other peers, other people. And so when we're looking for the positive, and to be calm, and not to be stressed out, our kids will pick up on that, don't you think?

Anastasia Aruz  12:14  
Totally. And I used to tell that to the teachers like how you respond as a teacher, then is how your class is going to respond. So anything even like to any event, really, that if the teacher or the parent responds in a way that even if they're not necessarily being like completely organic, and how they feel, or if they're really upset about something, process it somewhere else with someone process it with your spouse, or a friend, not with your child, because they don't have the capacity to understand in their brains just aren't ready for it. Like sometimes I think we forget that kids are humans, and they're people just like we are but they haven't had as many experiences and their brains are still developing. And so it's really hard for them to be able to process COVID, or all the huge things that happen every day on the news, like all the murders or whatever's, and it's just too much, it's too much for them. And you think they get it, they understand. But they get anxiety, they get fear, they have all these things that happen if they're seeing things when they're too little. So that's my take on it just from all the experience I've had working with families when I see kids that have had a lot of experiences with older siblings or whatnot, but just add to issues you're gonna have with them later down, or you can fix them a lot of times, but it just adds to things later down the road for them.

DJ Stutz  13:26  
It's true and that and you bring up such a great point in that the earlier we can do these things and get them going on it and looking at the positive or the maybe a negative situation, the earlier we can get them doing that the more ingrained it is and it becomes more part of who they are. And every kid's different. Every kid has a different personality. Some kids are naturally just happy go lucky. Yeah, whatever. Some kids are, like more stressful, very rule based very. And so you really need to look at your own child, and look at where they are. And just because your oldest child is one way, boy, did I learn that? Because my five it's like, oh, and so you think you've okay, we've got this set, and this is what we're doing. And then you have another kid and they're like, oh, no, this is this, we've got to approach it differently. So being aware of that and taking into account those elements in those things as you're teaching your kids, you know, the better off then I guess Yeah, gonna

Anastasia Aruz  14:25  
be. It's interesting. So some of the things that one of the things I do with some of my kids that do get anxious or do get very worried or fearful, and I share with parents this is one of the things is doing mindfulness, which also helps bring in joy, some mindfulness training, or however you want to call it like meditation. There's some great apps and things you can find online to do little meditations with them. And you can do them with them, like just body scans, or just little meditations that help them calm their body. The kids love it. It really helps them It works great for the parent too, because if you're doing it together, you're both taking that moment in being very present, which helps everyone in your family. So that's another really nice thing to do to help bring a little bit of joy is just taking time and be present and bringing in some mindfulness or meditation. And doesn't have to be long. Because if they're little, like, could be two or three minutes with like little little ones, to like a 10 minute one with like a teenager, and they do not have to be the kids love it once you get going with them. First, they might be kind of like, what are we doing, but it's as with practice, and if they see you doing it, they're gonna be more inclined, and excited to do it with you. Yeah,

DJ Stutz  15:32  
you're exactly right. No, it's so interesting. I was working with a parent, this was maybe a year or so ago. And they were dealing with this negativity with their kids, and one in particular, and he's only three or four years old, he was just a little guy. And just he seemed like down and super angry all the time, and super, whatever. And it took us a while, a few visits to kind of asking questions and trying different things. But I could hear one time when we were talking, I could hear in the background, some music playing. And this was very angry, that interface kind of music. And I said, Oh, wow, what are you listening to? And she told me who it was. I was like, Oh, okay. Let's think. Yeah, exactly. You know, and what do you ever play with little kids songs are Oh, they're so stupid or whatever. I'm like, Yeah, well, let's try this just for a week. See what happens. And just changing the music the next week, we you know, because we would meet once a week and she comes back she goes, Okay, I get it.

Anastasia Aruz  16:40  
Good. Oh, that's awesome. Yeah,

DJ Stutz  16:42  
she didn't change it all the time. But like when they were in the car together, or when dinner was playing, or to she started noticing, and I asked her to, I'm a data person to do that, don't we? And so I'm like, Look, let's look at when things are happening, what's going on. And so for that week, I said, when they're having a fit, let's gather some data on what are the sounds, what music is going on in the home right then. And that was the only data I had her get for during the week, because it really helps to evaluate how things are going. And so she said that she really did notice that when she had her music playing, there were more temper tantrums, so to speak, than when they put on good bopper, whatever station or whatever you can get. And the nice thing is with things like Pandora, and Spotify and Apple Music, or whatever, iTunes, that you can look for things that are happy kid music, and it'll pull up a ton of stuff for you. Anyway, it's kind of interesting how there are little teeny tweaks that you can do in your home. They're not that big of a deal. And yet they produce some really interesting positive changes. And it can be interesting how quickly, especially when they're young, how quickly you can start seeing those kinds of results.

Anastasia Aruz  18:01  
Yeah, I agree. I mean, it's really important, like just the playfulness with your kids, and just really being conscious of when kids can be so playful, even like my 10 year old, he's not little anymore, but he'll still do some crazy, I'll be cooking dinner. And recently, his new thing is like, he'll throw himself on the ground and be like, you're hurting me. You're hurt. I'm like, What are you talking about? I'm hitting things that are just bizarre. And so then we'll turn it try to turn it into something, I'll be like, how do we flip it? I'm not hurting you. How about do you want to hug. And so we'll like just play in the kitchen. It's very silly kids do very silly things. They'll do things that are very just out of the blue. And so trying to be just playful with them, and trying to not just ignore it, but play with them, even as they get older because they need it. And they love that connection.

DJ Stutz  18:53  
Yeah, even as they get older, and I mean, it's gonna evolve and change. And it's going to be different with different personalities and stuff. But I talk about how so my dad grew up in the country club world, his father was a professor at Oregon State go beavers. That's where I was born. And his mom was an English teacher. And they remembers the Country Club and the socialist societies and all of this. And my mom was raised by lumberjacks literally, like Paul Bunyan. So that's like one step up from wolves. So the clash of the cultures was really interesting. And I think a real benefit for me growing up just being able to see but my mom, like, it was my mom that we get I have five brothers and then one sister, and it was my mom who would get out and wrestle with voice and, and do all of that. And we'd be doing dishes and all of a sudden she'd grab like a table knife or whatever. And she'd start like this sword fight during dishes. Yeah, until she did one time with a fork and I got stabbed in the leg. She felt so bad, but you know, it worked out well. For me. I was treated very nicely for She, she felt so guilty. And

Anastasia Aruz  20:02  
they'll do stuff like that. It's funny because the kids like when you're busy cooking or doing things in the kitchen, kitchens, always a place where they're gonna flock to. And it'd be even not in the mood to play, like when I'm cooking, or when I'm doing, you can like your mom would do. I think that's amazing. I love that and paying attention when you can bring those playful moments in. Because I think it's really not realize or ignore them, and connect with them. And love it, they absolutely love it when you're silly. And

DJ Stutz  20:31  
they do. And even when it's a chore, like, you've got your things that you have to do, whether it's yard work, or whether it's cleaning the house or making a bed, or whatever it is, if you can bring that element of fun and joy into it, instead of that dread. Got to do Yeah, gotta do this data. And then you know, and if you're doing it, especially when they're younger, but do the work with him, don't tell them to go clean their room. Yeah,

Anastasia Aruz  20:56  
or break it up we did. That's a huge one, it gets so overwhelmed by big tasks. So making a game. So doing things where you make it small, like go put your socks away, or go put your underwear away, or go put your certain or go pick up all the red toys, go pick up all the blue toy, whatever it is so mainly Gosh, and making it like,

DJ Stutz  21:19  
yeah, you can even make it fun. Where's that, okay, we're getting all the red toys, and then maybe they get a blue toy. I know it's a lie. By you know, you get all silly with that. And don't you dare put that one away. It's yellow, and being silly. And when you can exhibit that,

Anastasia Aruz  21:37  
they are gonna pick up on it. They're just having more fun with it. And then as they get older, it's easier to be like, Okay, you need to go put your clothes away. And then they get it because they've done all the little ones for all the years and you've made it fun. And even still, now my son will be like, I'm gonna go put everything away, and you have to put the socks away. Okay, I'll put the socks away, you put everything else I'll just still do one thing, I'll put your socks away. So I just think it's fun to really promote that playfulness and making games out of anything, if possible, especially when you have kids because they love that kind of stuff. So joy with kids is it's easy if you're looking for it. Exactly.

DJ Stutz  22:16  
And then I think there's two noticing. Okay, I don't know if you've ever been to Vegas and living in Vegas. Yes, it gets dreadfully hot, but they have some of the most beautiful skies. The clouds that come in are unbelievably gorgeous. And there were times when I'd be in the car. Sometimes I was alone, sometimes I had the kids with me. But I'd have to pull my car over. So I could just sit and watch the clouds for a little bit and talk about how beautiful it was. And there were times that we'd be like laying, you know, laying back on the front lawn or the back lawn. And we'd close our eyes and count to 10 and then open our eyes and see how it had changed. Because the sky would be moving so much with the clouds. And it's also finding joy and like the nature that yeah, around us. I

Anastasia Aruz  23:08  
love that like being outside and getting outside with your heads. And there's a huge thing because it is so organic. We need to be outside we need to be in the dirt in our in our bare feet. Like that's I mean, that's just for all of us to observe the surroundings and see what's there and paying attention to that. Yeah,

DJ Stutz  23:27  
yeah, that it's funny. I just got back from Hawaii. And we had our anniversary and my daughter and her family came along with us. And she has two kids, an eight year old and a five year old. And their son, the eight year old. He has a thing about dirt. He loves dirt. And she's even a video of him they'll have a playdate and you'll have a few friends over and his friends Off Plan or messing around in one corner. And they're Sylvan on the other side, just doing snow angels in the dirt. You know, it's his thing. And he would climb and get into the sand and he'd put palm fronds on him and just lay there so still, and a lot of people are like, out of the dirt, you know, and I said no, go get in the dirt. That's how close things are for. I can remember he was really interested in ladybugs and this went on for like three years he was so into ladybugs, and it first started when he was like three years old. And so Rocky, my daughter went and you know, if you go to like a nursery, you know, a plant store. You can buy these things of like 3000 Ladybugs or whatever. Yeah, you can buy them and then you let them loose in your backyard and it's a natural way to get rid of like the aphids off your flowers and yeah, so you can go and they'll have these things and you just by him. So she went with Sylvan and they went and let the ladybugs out in their backyard and and here's this little three year old and he's just watching them closely and and paying attention What? She was doing a video of Sylvan and he's just so intent watching these ladybugs and they were doing what ladybugs Do you know? And he's just so intense about it. She's like, Silvan, what's going on? And, and then she got up, she saw she's doing a little video thing. And she's like, wow, what do you think they're doing? And he said, I think they're wrestling because he would, she goes, No, actually, they're working together to make new baby ladybugs as he put it in and he goes, Oh, that's so cute. Three years old, explaining, I would go visit and he like, could tell me about the larva and where the end he'd show me where eggs are and where the larva were. And the whole backyard became this science project. And he was so excited and thrilled. And when we can help our kids find that joy. So if we have different places that they can look to for joy. So maybe one place isn't working so well for them right now. But I can go and look at the ladybugs, right? Or I can stop and watch the clouds or there are things that other places, like what their instincts are,

Anastasia Aruz  26:09  
yeah, like what they're interested in. So letting them really find their interests in what they develop when they're little and what they enjoy and listening to them when they tell you and so doing even if it's things you might not like, but maybe doing it with them, maybe they love the ladybugs and you get interested with them on it, and maybe watch a YouTube on it with them or whatever it is like finding their interests and what brings them joy, and really learning it with them. So my son right now is really interested in fortnight, which does not bring me joy brings him a ton of joy. It's not a very joyful thing to me, but he loves it. So I have really been very conscious of learning more about fortnight and the characters and the different packs of things he can buy. It makes him so happy when I pay attention. Or when I watch or when I am with him, which then builds the connection, which then brings even more joy at home because he's happy that I'm there. And I don't have to do it for a long time, just maybe like 10 minutes or something. And then he'll come and tie later. And so really learning what their interests are, and expanding on them. And you had said you go to Hawaii, and we went to Hawaii a few years ago. And one of the things that we did a lot of was hiking. And so we were trying to do things that the kids we knew that they were interested in and what they were really focused on at the time, being the older ones really wanted to see the waterfalls or whatever. And we did too. But we really focused on planning the trip around the kids even just to make sure that we were doing things that really focused on their interests.

DJ Stutz  27:45  
Exactly right. And even taking turns. So one of the things that I've done like with my workshops and stuff that I've done on traveling with kids, yeah, so we've talked about letting everybody pick because you're not going to be able to see everything depending on how long you have or whatever. And so before you go, what is the most important thing that you want to see. And so it may be that this isn't their day or their afternoon or whatever to go see what's important to them. But we can find joy in going and seeing what Suzy was really excited about. And then next Johnny is going to get to see his and so

Anastasia Aruz  28:23  
I love that like everybody can helping with that. You're not just doing it on what mom and dad want like really thinking about only as excited about doing

DJ Stutz  28:32  
I love and get that get to have a thing to write. Yeah. Everyone gets to have it. And so you try to get it so that everyone gets at least their number one. Yes. I love that. Whether it's Disneyland or the beach. Yeah, trying to get that in. One thing. And I don't know how psychologically sound this is. I'll tell you something my mom dad will say, but we all turned out okay, so whatever. But my mom was really big on if I saw my brother Don with a cookie. And I ran to my mom and said, Hey, Don, as a cookie, I want one. No, you don't get one. Right. But if you just came in said, Hey, Mom, can I have a cookie? Yeah, sure. Go get a cookie. Do you see what I'm saying? That was her thing. And then she would go shopping. If you can imagine the shopping that took place for seven kids. And we'd be putting things away and she would have one candy bar and she'd be like, Oh, it's Sonny's turn to have the candy bar. And if we got mad about that, you wouldn't have a candy bar for a long time. But if you're like hey, it's Sunday's Jan's yay, then you might be the next one. But I'm just trying to teach you to find joy in other people's successes as well as maybe they got a windfall on something. I said I don't know how psychologically appropriate that is, but it seemed to work out okay for us and we learned the game really fast. So it got to a point where so I have brothers that are identical twins and they You both are huge in sports loved it and all of this. Well, they both went out for the basketball team in high school. And one twin made it and the other did not. Wow, that's been hard. Yeah. How hard is that? Right? And so the twin that did not went to the coach and said, Well, I didn't make it. But I don't want to miss my brother's games, can I be the manager and at least travel and take care of stuff. And then I can make I can go to all the game and the coaches like, okay, and so that's what Chuck did. And so instead of being all angry about it, I don't so for me to say, I don't know if mom's strategy was psychologically all that there. And yet the results were this. And

Anastasia Aruz  30:42  
it works for your family. And it worked for you, for my family. And it worked for everybody. And yes, and I think that's the most important thing is it worked for you guys. And it worked for the system that you had. And yeah, find what works for your system is so so important.

DJ Stutz  30:58  
And that's it, too. And I thank you for bringing that up, because that is so important to continually be evaluating. Is this working for us? Is this getting the results that we're looking for? Do we need to tweak this or there be because what works for one family may not work at all for another family? Or like we said with kids? So it's all very important, but that yeah, that's a little insight into the craziness of my all of us. That's it. That's it. That's it. So Anastasia, how if our listeners want to learn more about you and connect with you see what's going on? Can you let us in on some of that? Yeah,

Anastasia Aruz  31:39  
sure. I am on Instagram. And you can find me there you can find everything about me and my my website and everything. So just going to Anastasia dot Roos. And if you send me a message, I'll write you back. But yeah, everything on Instagram, I do. So yeah, anytime or anything you need. I focus really on trying to help parents create that healthy family system, create that calm instead of chaos in their phone, in their homes, for sure.

DJ Stutz  32:03  
And you do such great work. And so we're gonna have all that information in the show notes. And so if anyone's wanting to get in touch with you, or whatever, we'll just have the link to your Instagram down in the show notes and they can get a hold of you that way. We Awesome. Thank

Anastasia Aruz  32:17  
you so much. Oh, no

DJ Stutz  32:18  
problem. So Anastasia, I always ask my guests the same question. So imperfect Heroes, it's because there are no perfect parents. But parents are heroes, and so are most of the ways. But how some parents are just more successful than others, though, it seems. How would you describe a successful parent, I

Anastasia Aruz  32:40  
think knowing when to know you have made a mistake and being conscious of it. And knowing how to just repair it, kids are very easy to accept when you do something wrong. And so knowing it's okay to be making mistakes, not even just getting it and going with it and being conscious that we're not going to be perfect. We're always going to make mistakes. It's just part of what a parent is. And when you do it, know that it's okay. And to give yourself grace and just to take responsibility. repair it. And yeah, it'll be okay. I love

DJ Stutz  33:17  
that. I love it. So true. And just really being aware of when I'm making a mistake. There were times when I would stop for a minute and say, When did I start yelling? I find myself yelling at my child. And I have no idea what I started. Yeah. So you ever been able to take that step back and say, oh, what? Oh, I'm making a mistake here. And so let me use it. Yeah. So

Anastasia Aruz  33:46  
I'm like, Oh, my God, I'm so sorry. Not the yelling right now. Or I should talk to you like that. I'm just like, give me a second. It goes a long way to timeout. Yeah. And the kids get it. They really get it and they will then understand and they don't feel like you're hurting them. Then at that point. You're just like having them. And they'll they'll respect that. Yeah,

DJ Stutz  34:07  
yeah. Because they get that having a moment like they do too. Sometimes. Yeah. They give us so much grace, don't they? They're just Yeah, it's amazing. 

Well, so thank you so much for joining us. And for our listeners. We will be continuing this whole month with helping ourselves and our children find joy, just in everyday things. And so until next week, let's find joy in parenting. Bye, guys.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai