Honest Conversations

Hello, My Friends

Honest conversations are the hardest conversations of all.

There are so many dynamics going on in the deciding of how honest to be.

Weighing up how they (the person or people having to receive the honesty) will take what you have to say. The connotation is that what you are going to say is negative or potentially hurtful.

I was in this situation this week, I wanted to clear the air around some past actions and attitudes with my children.

This weekend was my youngest grandson’s birthday celebration, and most of my children were going to be together, I figured it was a good time to clear the air around some of the decisions I made in rearing children.

My dilemma was in how honest to be.

Yes, my children are adults, they are intelligent people, and they have had their share of life experiences and some of those experiences were due in part because of my choices.

Not all my choices were conscious either, I unknowingly passed on generational beliefs and attitudes that didn’t serve me, and that I can see are not serving them.

The thing about beliefs is that we have held them so long we think they are true, even when the results say otherwise.

Would my children fight for these old beliefs? Would they want to stay in a limiting space because it is safe and familiar?

Everyday we fill our time with activities we believe to be important.

We seldom think to look ahead and project into the future how our daily activities will have an effect on our lives and the lives of those who share our spaces in the long term, even generationally.

Talking with my children, I find it interesting that what I taught with my words, didn’t resonate as loudly as how I lived with my actions.

The anger that was my default emotion while they were little, became their default emotion too.

My ability to procrastinate also trickled into their lives, and also the hard working gene. So many of my character traits have been passed on.

Children learn more by who we are, and what we do, than all the words we can speak. Even the attitudes I didn’t share, and wanted to cover up, to disown. They learn everything.

One of my dad’s favourite sayings was, “Do as I say, not as I do”

Our lives are molded by both words, actions and attitudes. The emotions that these words, actions and attitudes evoke are what shapes the way we see the world. Often we are not aware that it is these very views that are creating the heartache we are currently living.

What words, actions and attitudes have molded your life?

What honest conversations do you need to have?

Even though it was difficult to have these conversations with my children. It was even more difficult to have these conversations with myself. To be honest about my part in how my life has panned out, to be honest about my part in how my children’s lives are panning out, and how that is in turn affecting the next generation.

I want to build a generational legacy of love, hope, joy and peace. This legacy begins with my own family history.

What is your family history? Can you see traits that have been passed down from one generation to the next? Do they serve your family heading into the future?

My past is in the past, I can not change what was done, or what I passed on unwittingly, however I can take responsibility for my part, and warn the next generation, it then becomes their choice to listen and learn or to discover and learn, or not.

Honest conversations when spoken with love and humility can be very freeing.

It is important that these conversations do not become a mud slinging contest, if this begins to happen, then the other party is not ready to hear and you are better to remain quiet.

So this week we unraveled a little of the unspoken generational ties that have shaped and misshaped our lives.

Until next time have an honest conversation with yourself about your unwitting beliefs you inherited.

oxoxox Linda

As a certified Life Coach, I help you to help yourself, so you can create a well lived life your way. 

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