When the dog bites and the bee stings, do you know how to find gratitude?

I'm your host Kara Stein-Conaway and this is The Business Mamas Podcast.

The Business Mamas Podcast is made for women who know they should be doing more self-care and practicing more self-love but are overrun with balancing at all. This podcast provides the tools and support you need so you can have a successful career while also being a present and loving mom.

With this season of the podcast, I am sharing a song that I sing to my children at night when I'm putting them to sleep. After I share the song with you, I'll tell you the lesson that I hope to be teaching both myself and my children with this song and I hope it's a lesson that will resonate with you too.

My Favorite Things

Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens
Bright copper kettles and warm woolen mittens
Brown paper packages tied up with strings
These are a few of my favorite things

Cream-colored ponies and crisp apple strudels
Doorbells and sleigh bells and schnitzel with noodles
Wild geese that fly with the moon on their wings
These are a few of my favorite things

Girls in white dresses with blue satin sashes
Snowflakes that stay on my nose and eyelashes
Silver white winters that melt into springs
These are a few of my favorite things

When the dog bites,
When the bee stings,
When I'm feeling sad,
I simply remember my favorite things,
And then I don't feel so bad.

My Favorite Things was sung by Julie Andrews in The Sound of Music, and it is one of my favorite songs to sing at night to my kids when I am putting them to bed.

It has been really fun to allow them to adapt the song with their favorite things. So, we adapt the lyrics to include whatever Jackson and Cameron's favorite things are . We have definitely sung songs about Legos and about other things that have fallen into their favorite things category over the years.

It feels really nice to give myself this time right now to reflect on why this song is special to me. Why is this a song that I go back to and that I want to share with them during that precious evening time when they are getting ready to let go of this day and enter into that sleepy dreamy state?

When we lay down at night, and we're getting ready to go to sleep, we slow ourselves and in that slowness, I think it's natural that it's a time where concerns can come up or things that are troubling you can come to the surface. They find that space, in that stillness that is being created by the night time ritual of slowing down and of getting ready to sleep and getting ready to rest.

When those concerns or worries have come up for my children, as I am getting them ready for bed, one thing we have done is to use this song to identify their favorite things. We swap out the words, so that we're singing about something that really resonates for them.

I think it’s really important, and something that I work on with my kids, that we identify and acknowledge those things that are the dog bites and the bee stings and the things that make them feel sad. Because by identifying what those things are and voicing them and discussing them and naming them, it gives us the ability to release those worries.

This song teaches us that when the dog bites and the bee stings are happening, then we can also think of our favorite things. To me, what this really means is coming back to gratitude.

Coming back to gratitude is not the same thing as ignoring our feelings. It’s really important to acknowledge our feelings, to give space for our feelings, to be with our feelings. If one of my children is feeling worried or concerned, I always want to create a safe space to help them feel those feelings, to give words to what my children are feeling, and to acknowledge those feelings and make our home a safe place to feel those feelings.

Then after they've had space, after those feelings have had time to be heard, they can experience a shift in their bodies of knowing that their feelings were acknowledged and validated. Having experienced acknowledgement and validation, we are in a place where we can choose to think about our favorite things and be intentional about what those favorite things are. For my kids, it could be to acknowledge that they have gratitude for getting to build something really fun and creative with Legos.

Putting our energy back into gratitude, back into our favorite things, back into the appreciation of how much we really do have to be grateful for, is a freeing practice.

I hope that this feels like a tool that you might be able to use for yourself or for your children. When you use this tool, you will know that when turbulence is happening, when those big feelings are coming up, or when those big feelings are clearly under the surface but are not allowed yet to bubble up and to be exposed and heard yet, that this song can be a positive tool for creating a space to safely feel and acknowledge those feelings. After being with those feelings, as free from judgement as possible, then that moment is ripe for moving into a gratitude practice.

You can ask:

What is it that we are grateful for in this moment?

What is one thing that we can think about right now that we are grateful for?

We can let our energy and our mind, and our hearts be directed towards that gratitude.

Sometimes, we just need a little reminder to remember some of our favorite things, and to know that those favorite things are here for us and that we can turn to those favorite things when we need a little extra care and a little extra nurturing.

I think it's a beautiful lesson for our children to know what's available to them and to be able to come back to that place of gratitude for their favorite things when they are processing challenging events or challenging emotions.

I hope that feels like a tool that you can use in your life too.

If you enjoyed Episode 31 and this blog post, I would love it if you shared the blog or the podcast with someone you think could benefit from them. I would also be incredibly grateful if you could leave an honest rating and review of The Business Mamas Podcast on Apple Podcasts as that helps more people find the show and it helps me in sharing this message of practicing self-love and self-care with more people whose lives I know could be enriched by hearing it. Sign up to download my Morning Routine Guide and receive my twice-monthly newsletter at The Business Mamas Podcast. Until next time and with gratitude, Kara Stein-Conaway, @karasteinconaway on Instagram.