Tips on How to Create a Harmonious and Joyful Family Life [Episode #811]

This week’s topic is: Tips on How to Create a Harmonious and Joyful Family Life

This show is inspired by my own family and practices and ways that we come together. And I hope that some of these inspire you, motivate you, and spark some ideas for your own family life.

Those of us that run households know that by no means is anyone’s family life perfect. There’s always going to be challenges. There’s always going to be a mix of energies and personalities.

However, through deeper understanding of each other, cultivating more acceptance, and also having family practices that bring us together in deep connection, we can create a very high level experience of family life. And today, it is my sincere intention to help support you in doing that.

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Transcript:

Note: The following is the output of transcribing from an audio recording. Although the transcription is largely accurate, in some cases it is incomplete or inaccurate. This is due to inaudible passages or transcription errors. It is posted as an aid, but should not be treated as an authoritative record.

Kimberly 1: 00:01 Namaste loves and welcome back to our Monday solo cast podcast, where I’m very excited to share our topic today, which is Tips on How to Create a Harmonious & Joyful Family Life. So this show is inspired by my own family and practices and ways that we come together. And I hope that some of these inspires you, motivates you, spark some ideas for your own family life. Those of us that run households know that by no means is anyone’s family life perfect. There’s always gonna be challenges. There’s always going to be a mix of energies and personalities, but through deeper understanding of each other, cultivating more acceptance, and also having these regular call them family, sadana, these family practices that bring us together in deep connection, we can create a very high level experience of family life. And it is my sincere intention to help support you in doing that.

Kimberly 01:14 I think having a family life, which you know, we can define broadly, it could be living with a group of your friends, it can be in, you know, sort of a community setting. It can also be with your literal, you know, kids, your spouse, your partner, maybe your extended family as well, whatever it is. But those around us have a real impact on our energy. And for us to create out in the world beyond the home environment, we need a really steady, solid home family foundation. Because if our home life is unsteady, if it’s chaotic, if it’s rocky, that goes out into everything else that we’re trying to create. It’s a vibration that, you know, can be felt through our bodies. And whether we consciously realize it or not, it definitely has a pervasive impact. So we wanna make sure that, and also for our own fulfillment and joy and love, since our home is our sanctuary, and those close to us that we consider our family are very important to us. We wanna create joy and fun and play and laughter and harmony because that is such an important part of nourishment. This is part of our emotional wellbeing. Cornerstone. If I was to categorize this solocast today, it’s also part of our spiritual growth cornerstone, because those around us are mirrors to each other and they allow us to deepen in our own personal growth journey. And I would also, you know, it also touches

Kimberly: 02:58 The other cornerstones. We’re gonna talk a little bit about food and meals today and our bodies, so it all fits together. So I’m very excited to get into our show. I have, let’s see, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 points. At least 10 points. Another one may pop up, but 10 different tips and tools that I wanna provide you with today.

Fan of the Week

But before we go deeper in, I wanted to give a shout out to our fan of the week, and her name is Island Krystal. Love this name. She writes, I’m so glad I found her. Since finding Kimberly, I am hooked. Her energy, her passion, and her sincerity and who she is, inspires me. I feel connected and drawn to who she is and what she has to say. I don’t feel so lost or alone and as if I’m able to get through these changes and find my true self that I have been searching for. Thank you for your genuine heart, kindness and spirit. Kimberly, you are a breath of fresh air that is so needed and I look forward to Mondays now more than I ever have. Much love to you. Namaste.

Kimberly 04:12 So much love to you Island Krystal., this really touched me your words. I literally have my hands on my heart right now and it gives me so much joy and excitement to know that our show is touching your life and inspiring you, which really is the reason that we have the show and we put so much time and energy into it. Our community is founded on sharing. And so this means the world. Thank you so much for being a listener. Thank you so much for being part of our community. I send you so much love, whichever island you happen to be on. I spend a lot of my time on a Hawaiian island, so I do love island life myself. And again, just sending you so much gratitude and so much appreciation. Thank you from the bottom of my heart. And for your chance to also be shouted out as the fan of the week, please take a moment outta your day.

Please leave a review on iTunes and Subscribe

Kimberly 05:08 leave us a review, on Apple, Spotify, wherever you listen to our show. And it’s just an amazing way to support the show energetically. Thank you in advance. Please also be sure to subscribe to our show so you stay in the flow. As Island Crystal mentioned, our Mondays, uh, Monday show is always solo cast and interviews. And we also have a Thursday show if you’re not aware, which is q and a day. So it’s pulled from questions which are directly sourced from our community. So if you have a question you’d like me to answer, please submit it over on our website, my sauna.com. There is a podcast tab which you can check out. Please also share the show, this episode or others that with anyone that you think would benefit. And that’s another way to share the abundance and the love.

Solocast: Tips on How to Create a Harmonious & Joyful Family Life

Kimberly: 05:57 Okay, let’s get right into our show today, which is about practical ways to create harmony and joy in your family life. And it’s really important that we adhere to this intention, that we are aware of this intention in the first place, and we keep it alive because otherwise, family life and daily life can start to feel very humdrum. It can start to feel like a chore and no way do we want that to happen. It’s such a gift to be alive, and I know it’s easy to get bogged down and there’s a lot of challenges. Sometimes we have different emotions and feelings running through us that don’t feel great, but at the core of it, we are alive and breathing. And it is an amazing gift. It is also an amazing gift to share family life again, whether that’s, you know, with your literal family, your children and your partner or you know, your parents, um, extended family.

Kimberly 07:04 If your family is a group of friends or you know, the greater community around you with your neighbors, however you define it, it really is important that we honor family life. Family life is foundational. It’s grounding. My husband and I talk about this a lot, and at one point we’ll come in here and talk about marriage because we believe marriage is really important. If you’re drawn to it. It’s not for everybody <laugh>, but we’ll talk about that another day. But it it, this family life, this grounding family life that we’ve created has allowed us to excel in our personal lives, in our personal growth. I can say I’ve had the most spiritual growth in my life since creating my family life because it creates intimacy, it creates an ability to see yourself. And you know, when you’re on your own, you can sort of live out the same patterns and not be called out on it.

Kimberly 08:10 And I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with being on your own, because some people in this lifetime, that’s what they need for personal growth. But for me, being in the context of a family creates checks and balances and does feel supportive to my personal growth greatly. So let’s get into some of these tips and practices which have really supported our family. And of course there’s tantrums and there’s, you know, periods and there’s times of arguments. And by no means do we have a perfect life, but we do have a very joyful life. I am very grateful to say there’s a lot of laughter, a lot of play, a lot of joy, a lot of closeness in our family. We don’t hide things from each other. We’re very open in our family. There is a lot of harmony a lot of the time. So let’s get right into it.

#1. Tips on How to Create a Harmonious & Joyful Family Life: Eat meals together if possible

Kimberly 09:05 And the first practical tip is to eat meals at the same time as much as possible. So of course there’s school, you know, coming up again and you know, your kids may be in school and you may be eating at the office or wherever, but if it’s possible to eat breakfast together, if it’s possible to eat dinner together, and especially on the weekends or wherever you can create this, coming together and sharing physical nourishment at the same time is very bonding. Ayurveda also teaches that when the family is eating at the same time, it synergizes your energy. Everybody’s digestive systems are synced up, especially when everybody’s eating the same food, which is very much encouraged. In Ayurveda, of course there’s different fellow body types, but if everybody’s eating the same, you know, general foods, it’s also considered a very positive thing. So of course there’s some differences.

Kimberly 10:06 Me and the kids are plant-based, my husband is not, but usually he’ll eat, you know, some of our vegetables and salads. The kids may eat, you know, a little bit more of what they’re eating. They’ll eat more lentil pasta. I’ll eat a much larger portion size of kale salad. But there’s this synergy and of course it allows for the family to come together and sit without screens and without phones and without distractions and to be together to potentially share about the day or just to be together. We love to say grace as a family, it’s part of our, one of our cornerstone practices. And for some reason, if we started to eat and we haven’t gotten to it yet, my little, my younger one, Moses will say grace. Grace, right? Because kids love ritual, they love regularity, they thrive in it. It’s a really beautiful practice.

#2: Tips on How to Create a Harmonious & Joyful Family Life: Sharing spirituality

Kimberly 10:57 Number two is, which leads me to the next point, which is sharing spirituality. So we recently had a, um, podcast, a q and a show about the benefits of spirituality, which are well measured and documented in research now. And it’s very important, I feel like, to share our values around what we believe with our children and to live it, it creates depth and connectivity. So in my family, we go to temple every week. We go to self-realization fellowship where we pray and we meditate. My kids go to Sunday school and in Hawaii there’s also a temple that we go to. So it may be for you at church or a synagogue or a mosque, or maybe it’s not something formal like that. Maybe it’s, you know,

Kimberly: 11:52 Um, just grace daily practices. We also do a home puja every morning, which is where I light candles and incense and I pray out loud. Sometimes I pray with my husband, sometimes I just pray with the kids. But we do pray together as a family. And again, there’s a lot of bonding that comes in spirituality if this resonates with you. But it has brought our family together so much and it’s really a core part of our life.

#3: Tips on How to Create a Harmonious & Joyful Family Life: Create special experiences together

The next thing that I wanted to bring in is to create special experiences together, memorable experiences, which don’t have to be huge, but something memorable. Ideally at least once a week. So this could mean putting aside time to do some crafts together or going to the park and playing a family soccer game or something that says, Hey, our family’s important, we’re gonna share this experience altogether.

Kimberly12:55 All of us are in this and it’s gonna be, you know, something we all participate in. Again, this could look many different ways. A couple of months ago, my older son Bubby, a k <laugh> Emerson, and my husband built a deck, a little a deck, um, like a platform deck area. And it was really fun and mosey and I sat there with them and you know, he just played with toys next to him and I was there drinking tea and was really special. And then afterwards e was so proud of the deck and they really bonded and it was, you know, wonderful experience. So whenever we see this deck, it reminds me of that. And this could also include playing board games together. I feel that board games are a wonderful game, a a wonderful way to come together and be on the same level.

Kimberly 13:51 So we play a lot of monopoly in our house. We’re going through this huge phase right now, and I’m talking every day, multiple times right now. And, you know, everybody is rolling the dice, everybody’s on the board, you know, regardless of age or whatever. Everybody has the ability to buy these properties, to move their pieces around the board. It really brings you into the present moment. And there’s a lot of fun in games. And of course if you make up games, that’s wonderful too. But just this aspect of being really present, we don’t wanna just create a family life environment that revolves around screens and watching things. And the life that we create now does not have to echo the past. My husband has told me that his family ate dinner together and then they would just watch TV together for hours every night. And he didn’t really have any other experiences

Kimberly: 14:50 With his parents. And so, um, you know, he, we don’t create that in our family. Like no judgment. People are where they are, people are drawn to what they’re drawn to, but that’s not what we’re drawn to. So we can reflect and say, oh, this is what, you know, this is what my life was like, but this isn’t what I wanna do with my kids. And of course, if you like to watch movies sometimes with your kids or screens and that’s fun together, there’s nothing wrong with that. But I would encourage beyond screens to also have interactive activities that bring everyone together in presence and special experiences again, so that these are what memories are made of. When we’re watching something, we’re tuned out to the people around us of, you know, we’re, we’re not fully present, we’re engaged in what we’re watching, and so we wanna make sure that we are consciously creating other times of really being together.

#4: Tips on How to Create a Harmonious & Joyful Family Life: Spending time in nature together

Kimberly 15:48 Another aspect that’s been really powerful for our family is to spending a lot of time in nature together, because nature is healing in and of herself. My kids are barefoot a lot. There are weeks sometimes in Hawaii where I don’t think Mosey puts his shoes on one time. If we go to the store, he’s in the cart or whatever, but we are barefoot a lot of the time at Temple. We take, you know, our shoes are off at home in the field to the farm, the beach <laugh>. And so there’s a groundedness that comes from nature, which I think is really healthy for children and, and people in general. There are negative ions given off from the earth’s surface, which again has been well documented in science, which help to balance the negative positive ions that are given off from modern life and electronics and so on and so forth.

Kimberly 16:41 So it’s really important to be outside and we love picnics. We’re actually gonna have a picnic today after this <laugh> just gathering outside. We love to bring food. And then what naturally happens is that the kids start playing with natural materials around rocks, sticks, they start making their own games. They’re in this simple, powerful rebalancing aspect of nature, which I think is so healing for people and for families. And it’s bonding. Again, it’s taking out this, you know, some of the elements of modern life, which are really helpful in many ways, but we don’t wanna just be on video games and screens, which in excess do create disconnection, you know, glued to our phones and social media being in nature, real simple, but really rejuvenating and enlivening and energizing. Doing that as a family can create great bonding.

#5: Tips on How to Create a Harmonious & Joyful Family Life: Parents to connect away from the kids

Kimberly 17:44 Another aspect of this, and admittedly this is one that of all the tips, this is the one that I need to work on the most personally, is for the parents to connect and to spend time away from the kids. So this would be the biggest grievance of my husband is that we don’t spend enough time together, alone when the kids go to bed, we have time in bed, talking, chatting, stretching, hanging out, but not much more than that, to be honest. And so this is, you know, we’re all works in progress. This is something that I have to work to carve out for us, whether that’s just, you know, going on a walk ourselves or going out sometimes, although I’m really so tired by the end of the day, I am really not drawn to going out very much. But time for the parents to bond is very important.

Kimberly 18:39 And so we do get that in terms of our long talks and conversations and things, but there could be more of it. And in Hawaii we are kind of all in the same bed, so there isn’t too much of it. The stretches were there. So we need to nourish the relationship with the parents or the heads of the family, however that plays out in your particular family because that electricity and that connection runs through all the other relationships, it creates more harmony when the parents are really unified and harmonious and connected.

#6: Tips on How to Create a Harmonious & Joyful Family Life: Address disharmonious arguements

So the next aspect is to, um, make sure to address disarm disharmonies arguments. Um, so things don’t accrue into resentfulness. They don’t accrue into, um, agitation and frustration that builds over time. There are some yogic teachings and teachers that say it’s very important to resolve your differences before you go to bed at night.

Kimberly 19:44 And this is because if you don’t, they can actually imprint into your subconscious. They start to get lodged in your brain, they start to build different patterns and disconnection. So that’s something we practice in our family, you know, really getting grievances out in the open. And there’s a really wonderful, um, book out there called Nonviolent Communication by Marshall Rosenthal, I believe I’m saying his name correctly. And it’s about listening and expressing your needs without sounding aggressive or feeling like you’re attacking the other person. So I really recommend that book has helped with communication in our family, but getting things out in the open and talking about things is really important to bring the family together in harmony, because we don’t want anything to hold us back from each other. We don’t want anything to get in the way of our connection. And so it’s a way to really come together and to be together in this

Kimberly: 20:46 Closeness of not sweeping things under the rug, getting things out in the open, honest, clear, open communication is so healthy for a family to thrive. And again, this is part of emotional wellbeing. This is part of feeling seen and heard and knowing that you are important and so are your ideas and your feelings. Everyone must be respected in the family space for the family to thrive. And even if some of the members are younger, the children, the children need to be listened to as well. And this builds self-worth, this builds healthy self-esteem, self validation, which will only serve your children so much more in life later on.

#7: Tips on How to Create a Harmonious & Joyful Family Life: Healthy touch connection

Kimberly 21:35 So then another aspect that I wanted to bring in is healthy touch cuddling connection. So there’s actually research out there from the HeartMath Institute and other institutes about the, you know, therapeutic benefit of touch. And we know this intuitively, if a nurse gives us a caring pat on the hand or a doctor, it can really influence a doctor’s visit to be not scary, but to actually be comforting and to give us optimism and to feel better. So we wanna make sure that we are, you know, again, this is personal, whatever feels right to you, but hugging and expressing love and affection through touch. We do a lot of cuddling in our family. We read books piled on top of each other and there’s so much love through touch. And again, some people prefer less touch and that’s okay too. Of course, this is so individual, but children especially thrive with some touch.

Kimberly 22:39 It doesn’t feel good to be in complete isolation without being held at all. We know that this is true in orphanages. There’s been studies that have shown failure to thrive from children that aren’t picked up and held enough. So touch is a nourishing component of a really healthy, harmonious, joyful family life. Touch is healing, touch is rejuvenating. And so I encourage you to make that a regular part of your life and all the ways that you may systemize that or keep it more organic, it’s really important to incorporate.

#8: Tips on How to Create a Harmonious & Joyful Family Life: Laughter and play

So then the last aspect that I wanted to bring in is laughter and play. Life can feel really serious out there, right? If we let it, we wanna keep our perspective and our humor, but there’s deadlines and there’s bosses and then there’s the seriousness of traffic and you know, things we see on the news and everything.

Kimberly 23:46 And that can feel really stressful. It can start to, uh, can, you know, strict our bodies and accrue in our bodies. Laughter and play is medicine. I put this in a quote that I recently put out on social media, but it’s healing. It really is. It allows us to let go of stagnant energy. It allows us to just come into this now moment to feel lighter instead of getting heavier and heavier and bogged down more and more. It’s really about seeing the, the levity of life and where else can we really experience that except in our family life. With those close to us, it brings us closer together and it makes our family life a real sanctuary. So this is something that we, I definitely experience with my kids and with my husband. We laugh so much. We play together. We love being together truly.

Kimberly 24:45 And it’s this sanctuary of games and creativity. Sometimes my husband makes up games, he’s really great at it and we just laugh a lot and it’s such a wonderful healing medicine to engage with in your family. So I definitely encourage it.

In Review

So let’s review some of these. And again, I hope and pray and intend that some of these may spark some, um, literal motivation. Some of them may inspire some ideas that you may go forth, um, completely different or related that you may go forth and, and cultivate and nourish in your own family. But whatever it is, I hope that, you know, these tips really do support you in your own joyful, harmonious family life. So the first one is to eat meals at the same time, to share spiritual practices, whether that’s grace or prayer or, you know, taking pilgrimages together, going to temple or church or synagogue or in mosque or whatever it looks like.

Kimberly 25:48 It’s very powerful to share special experiences together, which could be putting aside time to build a Lego set or, you know, play a softball game at the park together, whatever it is, you know, off of screens. And that could include playing games together as well, just to be present and to be on the same level, whether it’s board games or more physical games or whatever it is. I think games are really wonderful for children and families. Next is spending time apart for the parents to connect and to really help ground the family with their own connection. So that never gets lost in the midst of family life with kids, which can feel quite hectic and busy and it can feel like it’s always about the kids. So we wanna make sure that we really nourish that with the parents. We wanna make sure that we get grievances out in the open so we continue to get closer together by working through potential issues and arguments so that they don’t build into resentment.

Kimberly 26:49 Next, we wanna spend a lot of time in nature. We wanna have picnics and play and um, you know, really ground ourselves outside, which feels wonderful. Then we want to laugh together and have lots of time to be light because life doesn’t have to feel so serious. And the family life is a really great place to bring in the humor and to be the sanctuary for ourselves. And then next is to make sure that we are cuddling and touching healthy, caring touch. Whether that’s daily hugs or you know, cuddling up to read books or having special time at bedtime together, whatever it is. Healthy touch is, is a really important part of this as well. And then that also brings in, you know, the, uh, you know, when I was talking about the laughter, it also extends into play and creativity and just, you know, wonder and being together in these experiences and in this way which is special to the family.

Kimberly 27:55 It’s, you know, daily life where we don’t have to interact in mechanical ways or on screens or we don’t have to have this disconnection between us. We, you know, screens and, and all that can be part of it. Of course, it’s practically speaking for a lot of us, we are gonna be on screens part of the time, but to be off the screens to really connect and to establish really healthy relationships with those around you is powerful and deeply nourishing. So hope you enjoyed our show today and we will, um, list some of these tips as well as other shows that I think you would enjoy. Over on our show notes@mysauna.com, we will link other shows, articles, recipes. There’s a lot over there courses I think you would enjoy. And we will be back here next Thur Thursday for our next q and a show. So till then, sending you much love. Much aloha and see you soon.