Jaimie: Well, my guest today is Karina Lane and Karina is a certified parenting coach, educator and author. She has spent more than two decades working in the field of behavioural change and emotional intelligence. Before moving into the parenting field, Karina spent 12 years working with inmates and offenders in a variety of settings, running groups on behavioural change, addiction, anger management, and domestic and family violence. This experience helped her understand the importance of parent-child interactions, meeting children's needs effectively, and emotion regulation. Karina now teaches parents and professionals how to connect and communicate with children to build trust, develop emotional intelligence, and guide behaviour effectively. As a mum of four, she knows how demanding parenting can be. And it's this personal experience that helps her communicate with authenticity, warmth, and humour. Now, Karina self-published her first book 'Chilled Out Mum' in 2022. She also has an online parent coaching programme that helps parents build their self-awareness and expand their parenting skill set. And finally, Karina is an accredited parenting educator in Circle of Security. I've done that course. Tuning into Kids and Tuning into Teens; she has delivered early parenting classes for the Royal North Shore Hospital in Sydney, and she's a registered group facilitator for Corrective Services New South Wales and is also one of my favourite PR club members. Karina Lane. Welcome to Pitch Perfect.
Karina: Thanks, Jaimie. Thanks for having me on your podcast.
Jaimie: What a background. I was so impressed reading that and you've really niched in your particular area as a parenting coach. Why did you get into this? Did you kind of fall into this with that background? You were sort of working with jail inmates and offenders and all that sort of thing. And it was kind of like a natural progression. How did you get to where you are now?
Karina: Yeah, I'd say it was quite a natural progression. I didn't set out to be where I am today. I didn't set out to have four children either. That was, we had twins. So we went from two to four children. So that was a happy accident. I guess the thing was working with the inmates all those years was I got to know that early experiences really well. And what and how that kind of early parenting parent-child bond could impact the life path that they take. So I became fascinated from that point. And then I had all these kids. I couldn't actually work full time in that role anymore, but I was just really interested in investing all my time in creating, you know, the very best of the experiences for my kids and enjoying it as well, you know, so I had that going on, but I also had people in the street stop me with my four kids and get like someone seriously said, 'Why do you look so happy?' Right? Because I had all these kids with me and like how do you do it? How do you look happy that's not that hard. But yeah, so all of that combined experience got me thinking maybe I can help people because they I feel like the the jail experience really helped me learn a lot of things that not everyone has access to really about that early parenting experience and how how influential it is on our kids.
Jaimie: Yeah. Do you think that having four kids Oh, how old are they? By the way? How old are your four kids?
Karina: Now my oldest is 14. And my daughter is turning 12 and my twins have just turned 10.
Jaimie: So you went for a third and got twins, is that how it works? Yeah?
Karina: Yeah. Mother Nature laughed and laughed. Because I spent like 18 months campaigning for the third child convincing everyone that would listen to it. It really made sense. We had everything we needed to do three children then we got four children. And so we went underwater.
Jaimie: So, I mean, I'm a parent of two little energetic boys and I'm 41 with a three and newly turned five-year-old and I've done several of security. I've also gone to Tresillian with my second child as well. It was funny when I was at Tresillian and even Circle of Security, it was an evening class we did over a certain amount of weeks. There were a lot of entrepreneurs and business owners there and especially in Tresillian I noticed that both of them I noticed that as well. And do you think, I mean in your line of work, there are a lot of entrepreneurs, business owners who are used to having a goal setting and smashing goals then these little people come into their world and it's a real challenge. Do you find this as a common challenge for people who run their own business?
Karina: Absolutely. And I guess with people who run their own business, they're used to being in charge of themselves and thinking their own thoughts and, you know, feeling that things are generally predictable in their life or that they can put things in place to create what they want to create but children especially if you're very driven and you're very organised, I'm not but for some parents who come in who I guess who have that kind of type A personality like I I want things done a certain way I want control and stability. I need routine. And then you get the child that is not like that at all. They're just not wired that way. So yeah, can be really challenging and it can really throw throw a spanner in the works for that pair. But for me, I kind of see that that's like it's a chance to grow and move out of our comfort zone. So I call that like the gifted child. Whoever comes along and kind of makes you have to step up and expand your skill set and think differently and bend yourself really. But yeah, I would definitely agree that there is that pattern of people who are working for themselves and the entrepreneurs in the world. It can be very challenging, but in truth, I think parenting is much more challenging than anyone's admitting to each other. In terms of the calls I get and the women and the mums mostly mums that I'm speaking to but I know dads are out there struggling.
Jaimie: That's a really interesting point. Do you think that a lot of people hide the fact that they are struggling because it's kind of got this stigma? You know, haven't got it all together? And, you know, they don't sort of open up the fact that they are having a real challenge.
Karina: Yes, yes. And I think that's for a variety of reasons. I remember having my firstborn, my very first one he was just a newborn and a friendly mum who had already done a newborn asked me just really genuinely, really openly how's it going? And I just put a smile on my face. That's fine. It's fine. And she said, Oh, yeah, sure it is. And then then she shared that with my family. When when my first was really little I struggled. I couldn't get him to stop crying and she kind of shared all the struggles that she had and I found myself thinking, Why don't I just say it was fine. It's not that fine. It's actually really tiring. I can't get to sleep. Yeah, but I've always remembered just that instant like I'm putting on the mask and I'm telling everyone I'm fine. And I know I'm not the only one who does that. I think we do that. We do that from the word go. A lot of us but then also as we move further into the parenting journey, we have social media, we have all our mums groups, and I remember my mother's group, continually comparing how my baby was to everyone else. How Why was his mum to everyone else and yeah, I guess I learned along the way like I don't want to share what I'm not good at I yeah, I can't. It's just I couldn't do it for that. You know, that's how I was back then. And I feel like there's a lot of mums struggling with that. Now but then yet then you're adding to social media and what we're supposed to look like as parents are supposed to achieve and yeah, people are just kind of behind closed doors really unravelling.
Jaimie: It's one of those things you don't you honestly do not get how hard it is until you go through it. And I can see I've got a couple of my friends now who hasn't got babies and they just putting all the cute photos up but then when you message them the truth comes out and I probably before I had kids wouldn't think to look beyond the social media photos and actually realise behind that photo was a struggling mum with the you know the sleep deprivation is real you don't know what sort of bait and yet.
Karina: Yeah.
Jaimie: Breastfeeding is so hard. It's just it's our members who well that's why I stopped it too but and so you teach, Karina so many different ways you talk about so many different topics and one of the ones that really piques my interest is the stress proof parenting topic and it's all about strategies for a calmer, happier family life. Is it, I want to ask you about these but is it a one size fits all? Have you got like a set formula that kind of works for everyone or is it you go in and you assess each situation on its merit and differently?
Karina: If I do have a call it it's a one size fits all formula. However, it's flexible. So we're all different, you know, we bring our own characteristics and our personality and we have our own circumstances. So we are all different and our kids of course are all different. But ultimately the approach that I share with parents is based on decades of research really influenced by the circle of security program, which is so beautiful. So I bring that combined with coaching strategies and strategies to kind of to develop a roadmap I suppose for parents to work through so that they can get what they want from it. Everyone can get what they what they want and need from it. And so it is a one size fits all approach and in that sense because it helps to adjust your mindset adjust it helps the parents to work on themselves, in order to be the parent that they want to be and that's where it becomes more unique. They can be whatever parent they want, but they need to. We all need to be looking after our mindset and our self care if we want to do that. So yeah, in some respects, it's very much a one size fits all model because it's based on decades. of research, and based on attachment and connection and emotional intelligence, which is you know, it's highly regarded as, as really important for for that family harmony and for developing those important emotional relationships with our kids. So all of that is really important, but it also recognizes that we're all different as parents too.
Jaimie: Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I remember the circle of security course was so hard to get into and we did it when…
Karina: Really?
Jaimie: Yeah, we want to roll waiting lists. I know a lot of people tried to get onto it, and it was Yeah, I feel like every parent should do that course because it was beneficial. What are some of the strategies like just generally what are some of the tried and tested general strategies that can work for a calmer, happier family life? What would you sort of say your big task?
Karina: Number one is to review your expectations. The expectations is the biggest culprit. Expectations and connection issues really. So when we're talking about expectations, most of us including myself at times, I have to check myself all the time, but our expectations of our kids outrageous. So we expect just because our little person concerned, you know, we can teach them to walk they go to the toilet on their own, they can get dressed independently if they want to. But then we expected to do all these other mature things like think, pay attention, be rational control their emotions, manage their behaviour. And that's way too much to expect for a young person. From this. We're talking about two year olds, five year olds, even 12 year olds, they can't do that their brains haven't finished developing. So we really do once we review all that what we're actually expecting of our kids, because a lot of the time we're because we're so invested in wanting to raise the good kid. We think that if they're if they're not getting dressed on their own, and they're not listening, there's something wrong with the child or there's something wrong with us. So we get really caught up in that. But then if we actually stop, take a moment review developmentally where our child's out we realize, hey, the child's normal. This is actually my problem. This child's perfect. I'm the one that with the expectation problems, and that the expectations also relate to how we see ourselves and what we expect of ourselves, particularly for moms, right? All the things that we're trying to do all the balls we're trying to keep in the air. We have really high expectations of ourselves too. So once we review both sets of expectations, we get rid of a whole heap of guilt and a whole heap of stress because of course, guilt is all tied to the expectations we have. Because we fail to meet the bar we set the standards up here and we continually of course fail to meet it so we get down on ourselves and beat ourselves up. It's not very nice. We're not very nice to ourselves.
Jaimie: In your bio, I'm not sure it was a typo. Maybe it wasn't .I said when I was reading it out. You said, it says “As a mother of four you know how demanding parents can be.”
Karina: That is a typo.
Jaimie: Oh.
Karina: I'm sorry. I'm sorry. We're not demanding as parents.
Jaimie: Parenting.
Karina: Parenting is demanding. Yeah. I wouldn't call parents demanding. I would say that we have problems with expectations and we have problems with thinking that it's the child that needs to change and not ask because 80% of the time the problems are always with us, which is good news. I say that's good news. Because we can work on ourselves. We can do courses, we can read books, we can journal take care of ourselves, all much easier than trying to change a small child.
Jaimie: So true. I'm glad we had a chance to correct that.
Karina: Yes, thank you.
Jaimie: I was thinking about it at the time. I mean, look, parents and kids can be demanding, but parenting is definitely demanding. So Thanks for clearing that up. I would love to talk about your book. Because I know it's no easy feat, writing and self publishing a book. It's a lot of work. How did that come about? And what's the book about?
Karina: So the book is called “Chilled Out Mum”. And it is essentially about stress proof parenting. I call it stress free parenting, ditching guilt and raising incredible kids because we all want to raise amazing kids but we're already stressed out and we're battling guilt and after tons of calls with moms and it's always moms who reached out to me. When I asked them what is it that you want if you could create anything right now what is it they've all said I want to be calm. I want to be chilled out I used to be chilled out and so that's where the hot kind of thing came from. That's why I called it chilled out mom. So it does seem to speak to a lot of mums from from experience in kind of putting up the the ad on Facebook. So it seems to be hitting a chord which is wonderful. The process was extremely hard. I think it's not unlike to conceiving a baby and birthing a baby. I'm serious. It was like the whole process started seeing it through. It was a real hard slog and I kind of didn't want to go back and do another book a long time but I am ready I'm prepared to write my next book. It's it's just like giving birth right? The great reward is okay, you get this baby at the end it's all worth it. So we have to remember that when I do write my next book, but it will be worth it when I get the book out. And of course I've got all the experience of going through the writing process, the editing process and the self publishing to know what's ahead of me now and I can probably do a much better job this time too. Yes,
Jaimie: Great. I mean, God, how did you learn how to write a book did you do courses? How did you kind of get onto that? That journey?
Karina: Yeah, well, I've always considered myself a writer. I always wanted to be an author when I was a child. I even tried to write fiction book. I was trying to write Greek into the chick Linfield. But I realised it wasn't actually that good. I was too impatient to write a decent book but at the same time, in terms of my business, I always wanted to write a book because it's so good for authority and expertise and all that sort of thing true. And also you can reach a whole lot more people with your message. So I knew that I wanted to write a business book, and I came across a force that was about teaching you how to write a really great business book that actually brings leads into your business. And I thought, well, that's the type of book I want. I don't want to spend all that time writing a book that doesn't really hit the mark and doesn't do that much for my business. So I jumped into this course, which was fantastic. It helped me format the book chapter by chapter. So it's really strategically written so I've just, you know, I just wrote it, I applied the formula exactly as as it was recommended to me. And I came up with this book. And so it's been really great to be able to write something that's been informative and helpful for parents. But also it's bringing me it's actually helped me build an email list full of people who have read my book, so they already know me. They like me, they trust me, I hope anyway, and it's been really helpful for building my business too. So it was the best way to do it was a really great investment of money for the course but also investment in time. So it was it's time well spent a lot a lot of time well spent.
Jaimie: That's great. And I guess if people want to get a copy of the book and get in touch with you, how can they find you?
Karina: They can find me probably the quickest way is to jump on my website to karinalane.com.au and there's a link on there to grab my book, ‘Chilled out Mum’ which is only $497 If you want a digital copy, so it's cheapest chips.
Jaimie: Yeah, and we'll put a link to that in the show notes here. Is there anything else further you'd like to add before we wrap up Karina any hot tips or you've already shared so many gold nuggets? But you know, I have a lot of female entrepreneurs and male entrepreneurs who listen to this podcast. Is there any sort of last minute words of wisdom you'd like to share or anything we haven't talked about?
Karina: This this year in particular, I've learned and it's such a boring thing to say but ultimately, if you want parents to be as smooth as possible, and if you want to be the parent that you want to be for your children and show up that way. You have to do self care like that's such a boring thing to say, because a lot of us feel like oh, that's just something else on my to do list. But we have to be we have to apply self care in a way that is a normal regular thing for ourselves. Not a bubble bar, not a massage. That's great if you've got time for that. But really it's about how we talk to ourselves, how we nurture ourselves how where we put our needs on the list. It's all those sorts of things otherwise you really just can't you just like a car with the petrol light on and we all know what happens if you don't fill it up the car right? We're just running on empty. Eventually we'll conquer and then we're really not apparently want to be. So that's my tip. Get the self care in and don't feel bad about it.
Jaimie: I love it . Any excuse for self care, I'll take that. Thank you Karina, thank you so much for coming on to Pitch Perfect today. It's great to have you inside PR club and I'm really grateful for you sharing all these golden nuggets words of wisdom for those parents out there who hopefully are listening to this at the exact right time in their life that they need to hear those words. So thank you so much.
Karina: Wonderful. Thank you for having me, Jaimie.
