You're listening to the Rise Up And Shine podcast with Claudine and Ashley as an empty nester and a mom with young kids. We have both shared very similar and very real struggles from chaos to coaches. We now help other women live an authentic and meaningful life. So, tune in weekly for girl talk and tips on how you too can rise up and let your light shine bright. This is the Rise Up and Shine podcast. Welcome back listeners today, I'm gonna start us off with a scripture from Ecclesiastes three and it says for everything, there is a season and a time for every matter under heaven, a time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to pluck up what is planted. And I'm gonna add our own little version of this scripture and there's sometimes a time to take a pause and that's what Ashley and I are talking about today when it's time to take a pause.

And there could be a lot of reasons why we might need to take a pause. We might be busy doing a lot of worthwhile things. A lot of great activities. A lot of us are parenting, young Children like you, Ashley. And I'm an empty nester, but I'm chasing my grandchildren who live in another country. So that involves a lot of travel. And sometimes we just have to take the time to pause and it could be for a job, a relationship on your degree, maybe something you're studying for or commitment that's been so hard to keep doing and so hard to lead. So that's what we're gonna talk about today. Should you stay or should you go? Is it time to push the pause button? I like that. Yeah. There are many times. Right. I like that scripture because there's seasons, you know, seasons come and go, they change. And I also like to think of when we think of seasons, sometimes those seasons come back around. Right. Just like the four seasons in a year. But there are times when we find it may be necessary to push that pause button and it could be in very varying different.

It can be, it can be in varying. Ok. I'm losing it. Hold on. I know. Skip that word. I had to rerecord like, five times last week. I couldn't see it. I know. Oh, and by the way, I hope it doesn't bother you because let's just roll with it. But you said your grandkids are out of the country. Let's start this all over again. So great. Ok. They, they are gonna be out of the country you like. And it requires a lot of travel. Yeah. Ok. That's so funny. So, with this it happens in many different aspects of life. Right. And really, when we think about what do I need to push a pause on? I mean, what, what areas? Because we don't always think about this. We just go, go, go and run on default until we're burned out. We're overwhelmed. We're stressed, we're getting irritated and frustrated or exhausted. Um, but when we really take a deeper look and think what areas might I need to push pause. It's really for our well-being, it's really to preserve our mental health, our emotional health, sometimes our physical health and even relationships at times.

So some of the things that we put down could be even social media, you know, sometimes pushing pause on social media. I know some people take a social media fast and they might take a month off or three months off and because it's good for our well-being, right? Maybe it's starting to affect us. Maybe we're starting to compare, it might not be serving us in our lives. And so maybe it's time to push, pause on that. It could even be working out. It could be certain goals we might have. Right. Maybe I know I remember one time or several times I would be in a good routine and habit of exercising and then I get sick and I feel out of it for like, two weeks and I, I would get so frustrated because now I have to build the habit up again. Right. But sometimes even, maybe there's an injury, maybe there's a lot going on in our schedule or there's some other challenges that we're dealing with in life. Sometimes when we put that pause, we think it's done, it's over. We're never going to be back in that routine or that habit. And just remembering that a pause is not necessarily in, you know, forever.

It can, we can resume whenever the time is right. Uh It can be in our schedule. Maybe there are things in our schedule. Maybe we have too many kids activities, maybe we have too many events that we're going to throughout the week and we're just kind of getting run down. Maybe there's times to push a pause on that. But again, looking at different aspects of your life and seeing what areas are serving me. What areas may I need to reevaluate and examine and perhaps push the pause button? Yeah. Yeah, I really like what you said too, that pausing is not quitting. I mean, that's such a great point because just because you take a pause doesn't mean you're never going to do it again. And that's, there's an important distinction between saying I'm quitting this, I'm terminating this and I'm taking a pause and some of the things that happen and you mentioned one of them, but burn out I mean, when we keep pushing, pushing, pushing, without taking those pauses to, to replenish, we will get burned out. You and I have both talked about this before. We've struggled with it. Another thing is sometimes we're doing something really good, like maybe even volunteering or charitable work.

But if you keep pushing, it leaves you with a negative emotional residue, right, if you're doing good, but then there's so many other factors that you're not feeling good after it because you're maybe letting go of other important things and it causes unnecessary stress. I mean, we do not need to run around like little stress bunnies which, you know, we both have also struggled with and I stress myself out so much for so many years, I ended up in the hospital with it. So, you know, there is downside to pushing through and always feeling rushed. I think that was one of the big ones for me. I always felt rushed. It was like going from one event to the next event to the next event and there was like no white space in between to just breathe to let it take deep breaths and go, ah, or to even consider anything. It was just go, go, go. So there are downsides to when we don't push pause and when we push through, which in our society, I believe we value, we value those who push through and who keep at it.

But, um, there are some downsides to that. Yeah. Absolutely. I mean, really, I know looking into my own personal life, there's times where the pushing through has affected my relationships, my, with my kids, my parenting, my marriage, um, friends, family, you know, there's been times where I don't really hear from you anymore. What's going on and it's so totally unintentional. It's just, there's so much going on and so much on my plate that I'm trying to balance everything and I can't, it's impossible. We can't do it all. We try, especially as women, we try to do it all. We try to hold all the balls in the air, but we tend to drop, you know, something one to all of them. But it really, I was thinking too, as you were saying about how it leaves a negative emotional residue. I was thinking also at times when we start burning out, we get, we're getting to that place. We lose the passion for whatever that is, whether it's career, whether it's working out or exercising, maybe New Year's resolutions, maybe it is even, I know for myself, even in my parenting, I would get burned out.

And so I lost the passion of, you know, and the joy of motherhood. I wasn't able to see and feel just the positives because I was getting to that place of burnout and really understanding that the whole reason why there are times that it's good and beneficial to push pause is because we just need to regain balance in our life. We might be a bit off kilter. Maybe we're stretching ourselves too thin, maybe we're stretching our family schedules or, you know, too thin. And so there's so much going on and again, like, you know what we were talking about earlier that it pause does not mean quitting. There is a time and a place for that, of course. But also when it's something that is beneficial that you love, that you're passionate about that you enjoy sometimes just taking a little pause a little break for a moment or however long then and regaining that, you know, it doesn't mean it needs to be gone forever.

So I think that's really important to look at that. We're just trying to regain balance in our life because we do, especially as women tend to take a lot on a lot of responsibility, which adds more unnecessary stress, you know. Yeah, absolutely. And I think another benefit along with that is that it gives us the opportunity to focus on our other priorities during one particular season. Right? It's like the seasons change, like you said before and sometimes something in our life, maybe it's our Children like you and I are in different seasons. You have young Children still at home. So you have different priorities than I do. My Children are, you know, a couple of them out of state, not out of country but out of state and So, um it's just different. I don't have the day in day out responsibilities of raising Children that you do. And so pushing a pause sometimes on some worthy endeavors allows us that freedom and the opportunity to focus on other priorities. And studies have shown that when we do push pause, our productivity actually increases in those other areas.

I mean, it's kind of like the magnifying glass, you know, if you're trying to light six fires with it, it's not to get that focus attention is when you just put it on one leaf, you know, and then it just burns right because we're spread so thin. But when we concentrate that attention, our pro productivity actually increases. So that's a good benefit of pushing, pause on what might be a worthwhile activity or endeavor. But, you know, maybe not for this season again, not quitting. It doesn't mean it never will be, but just maybe not right now. Right. So, Ashley, why don't we share a few Practicals with our listeners? Yeah. OK. So first one, give it a chance, whatever it is that you're contemplating, pausing in your life, just give it a chance. Sometimes what happens when things get hard. We're tempted to give up, attempted to quit. So our brain likes to keep us safe and comfortable. It doesn't like to do the hard things. It likes to stay in what's familiar or easy.

And so just remembering that sometimes we're up against our own brain right where it's like, stay safe, stay safe and easy and comfortable no matter what. So, but making sure we give it a chance and making sure that whatever it is we're not wanting to quote unquote pause just because it's hard, you know. And so really take an in depth, look at that is really important. Yeah. I mean, I love that. I, if I just listened to my brain the whole time, I think I would have paused on everything in my life, my marriage, parenting, anything worthwhile that I have now, I'm sure along the way, I would have pushed pause, like for long spurts, especially in my marriage, I probably would have pushed a five years pause button, but I'm so glad I did it. I'm so glad I gave it a chance. That's a good one. Number two, make sure that you've identified the real cause of your unhappiness. So this is a good opportunity to really evaluate what is causing the stress, the burnout. Is it really the very thing that you want to push pause on?

Or is that kind of the scapegoat? Are you using that as a reason? Well, if I just pause this, then I would be happy. If I just quit this, then I wouldn't have stress. And it does take a lot of self awareness and a lot of reflection really to make sure that whatever it is we're thinking of pressing pause on is the actual cause of whatever is creating the negative emotional residue. Because a lot of times we want to blame shift and we think, well, if I just quit this or if I just pause this, then I'll have more free time. But if we don't deal with the root or what's actually, you know, the cause of our negative emotions, it's, it will not fix it. So make sure you identify that. That's an important thing to do before you proceed and push that pause button. Yeah, absolutely. The last one, make sure you try other solutions. So I thought of a couple of examples actually for this one, for one when our kids were born and this was unintentional. But looking back, we realized we did it that we essentially pushed pause on spending time together as husband and wife as easy.

It is to do, right? With young kids and you know, infants and just toddlers. But it, what happened is that we pushed paws on it for so long that it caused challenges going forward in our marriage, right? Because we got so used to putting the kids first and not prioritizing time on our own. And of course, we think, well, this is just kind of the nature of the beast. This is the stage we are in life right now. And so this is what we have to work with. But really what we didn't do is get creative, think outside the box, right? We're not thinking of, oh, let's set up a co-op and let's change, you know, have several families that we can rotate. So it gives us time to go out. It can also be dates. Don't have to always be going out. Dates can be in, you know, it could be watching a movie inside just prioritizing that time together. Um, another area that could happen to or show up in our lives is say especially and I'm talking from a mom who still has kids at home that if we have our schedules overpacked, you know, we have kids with a lot of activities and we think, oh my gosh, I can't, I can't drive everywhere.

I can't do all this. I can't manage work or family or the home and all these activities, the activities for the kids are a great thing. But sometimes we have to look ok, why do I feel like I need to pause this? Is there another solution I can find, can I find car pooling? Do, can I meet up with other parents and try and work something out so we can share that burden of bringing the kids to practice or whatever activity they have. And so just try to think outside the box more to exhaust any, any possible solution that you have before making that decision, you know, to push the pause on that. Yeah, that's a great one. I know we had four kids in sports and activities. One semester and we about lost our minds. And so we pressed pause in a big way when they were young, younger and we decided that no more than two Children at a time could be in an extracurricular activity because there were only two of us and we couldn't get them to all their games and activities on the weekends. It was way too much stress. So, I don't know if we looked for other solutions.

I have to be honest, I think we just made a decision like that's it. Two at a time. Two, at a time, I'm done with this. It's done. It was a pause but it was only a semester, pause per two. So that kind of worked out well. Again, this is a great topic because we're all gonna have seasons where we need to just pause on something valuable and worthy in our life to regain balance and focus and just to manage our well-being, our emotional well-being, mental well-being, physical well-being, spiritual well-being. I mean, that's what we're all about here at the Rise Up and Shine podcast, really being our best self. So we can rise up and shine and pushing the pause button, can help Do that. And speaking of pushing a pause, Ashley and I will be pushing the pause button on this podcast. This is our 175th podcast. We have been recording for almost four years weekly. We've done that through the pandemic. We've done that when we lived hundreds of miles apart from each other. And our lives are in a place now where we've had changes.

And for me personally, I'm getting ready to go out to Europe for almost two months with my husband, which is a dream, something we've dreamed about since the kids were young and now that they're all adults and grown, we're finally doing it. We're going to be in different time zones and our schedules have been that we couldn't prerecord 8-10 episodes. So we are pressing a pause here. We're not quitting and we don't know when we'll be back, but we are pressing the pause button. Yeah. Uh, I'm so excited for you to go on your trip. I know you've been talking about it for years and planning it and just dreaming about it. And, yeah, again, there's a time for everything. Right. So, there's a season where, you know, you, we want you to enjoy your wonderful trip without trying to figure out what equipment we have and how can we record and how can we meet up and as for myself. Exactly. And as for myself, I've gone back into teaching, you know, because it was a season in my family to help out financially and help, help in that area.

Um, and so I've been back teaching T K so little four year olds, which I've been loving. But, yeah, especially near the end of the school year. And, you know, sometimes life just takes a little transition or a little adjusting and sometimes we do need to take a pause. It doesn't mean we're giving up, we're quitting, you know, we're Claudine and I are still here, you know, if you want to reach out to us for sure. But, and this podcast has been a wonderful thing. I know it's touched many women's lives and men. I've had both give great feedback on the podcast episodes and we've really enjoyed it. And it's been such a blessing in our own lives and love being able to chat with you every week. That's always a bonus. But yeah, I know this is, we're just going to take a little pause, you know, and see what transpires and you get to enjoy your trip and I'll finish out my school year and reconvene at a later time. Yes. That's absolutely right. So, we want to thank you all from the bottom of our heart for listening almost four years and there's plenty of podcast episodes to go back through.

I know we relisten to them, we go back and hear them, but we just want to thank you for being our listeners and we are here for you. We still have resources and are here for you. If you need coaching or need help or want chat, you can find Ashley at mind over chaos dot com or myself, Claudine at Claudine Sweeney dot com. Until next time. Take care. All right, everyone. Thank you for joining in on our conversation today here on the rise at Beine podcast. If you haven't already, please take a second to hit that subscribe button. So you never miss an episode. And while you're at it, share this episode with a friend who, you know, it can bless today if you want to visit us as well. On our website, you can catch Claudine over at Claudine Sweeney dot com and Ashley at mind over chaos dot com. Our links are in the description. We also have some free resources there for you as well. So remember ladies, no matter what you are facing in life, it is never too late to rise up and shine and live your best life.