A Penny or Two for Your Stress?

           We often hear don’t give into your child’s behavior or make sure you follow-through if you ask them to do something. But sometimes we don’t have the mental energy to follow through. Picking your battles and knowing when to follow-through or give-in is half the battle.

            Each morning imagine you have 10 pennies in your hand or pocket. With each stressor you experience throughout your day take a penny or more away. This can be from lack of sleep, not feeling well, disagreement with your spouse, kids not waking up and being late for school; your stressors are personal for you and will change each day! The event that occurred can cost more than one penny. For example, you missed a deadline at work, which causes you work late and miss your child’s basketball game. Missing your deadline and working late took 4 pennies from you hand.

           As your pennies start to dwindle, recognize how you are reacting to events, stressful or not, when they occur. Are you less patient, motivated, tense, reactive, exhausted, overwhelmed? By being aware of how your body feels and responds allows you to gauge whether you should take a penny away or not. And ultimately when you should pick your battle or allow it to occur and pass without recognition. Practice daily for stressful events or not, by asking yourself, “How many pennies do I have and will I be able to stay committed?” Gauge how many pennies you have before responding or reacting.

           Deciding how many pennies you have before you get to the end of your rope, will be different for each parent. I’ve worked with many parents who felt like 3 pennies would be the point where they wouldn’t be able to follow-through, so we decided on 4 pennies being the thrush-hold. This allowed them grace on when to have their kids follow-through on simple tasks or not. For example, putting their dishes in the sink after dinner, but not having them clean their messy room before going to bed. Through trial-and-error, learning where their thrush-hold was for handling situations based on how their child would have a meltdown or not, they were able to decide confidently when to give-in vs. when to work through the tantrum and follow-through.

See this blog post on how to apply this same strategy with kids!

           Christine Miserandino originally created the Spoon Theory in 2003. Originally focusing on health conditions such as lupus and only having so much energy in a day, click here to read the original essay. I personally prefer pennies over spoons, if neither work for you, pick 10 of something you identify with! If you’re a visual learn like me pennies can be something you physically can take with you anywhere and put in a pouch or jar when your stress beings to take from your mental energy!