We’re in the midst of a presidential transition. There are some major things we’re facing. There’s a lot of fear, a lot of uncertainty going on in the external world. And we don’t have a lot of control over that. We, you know, aside from voting, we don’t have a lot of control over who the president is going to be. We certainly don’t have control over this pandemic. We don’t have control over a lot of things. However, I want to give us a sense of hope that there is actually a lot that we can control. Now, first of all, I want to talk about our brains for a moment. Our brains are extraordinary and fascinating in so many levels, but one of the main functions of our brain is to keep us alive. So our brain is constantly looking and it’s scanning the world for danger or things that might harm us, all of that kind of stuff.

And it’s always looking out for us, trying to protect us and keep us safe. It’s so magnificent. It’s so amazing. However, now in this world that we live in today, where we’re bombarded by the media, we’re bombarded by news, our cell phones or all that stuff. It’s almost as if our brains can’t contain all that stimuli. That’s coming at us 24/7, especially with so much fear driven media and so much information that’s constantly coming at us. And so also the media understands how our brains work and its goal is to try to get us, to be watching it as much as possible so that it can drive up its viewership and its ratings and, you know, get more sponsors and make more money. So we’ve got all of that. Also kind of working against us, trying to, in some ways, manipulate our brains to be glued to the media, to be clued to the TV and to our phones.

And so this just creates in our brains, our brains start just kind of going crazy and unless we become very aware of it and we become very intentional about getting our brains under control about literally taking control of our brains, taking control of our thoughts and taking control of what we’re exposing ourselves to. That’s when we, as individuals start to feel that we’re spinning out of control, but not just the world around us is spinning out of control, but our own minds are out of control. Our own emotions. Feel like they’re out of control and thus that our own lives feel like it’s out of control. This is what we can change. And I hope that this podcast provides some insights, some hope and some tools on what we can do to take that control back so that we can live the lives that we really want to live and manage our minds in such a way that we have the power that we’re not giving the power over to the media, to the world, to all the external things that we don’t have control over.

Now, I want to go back for a moment when we find ourselves kind of spinning out of control a little bit, when our mind starts racing, when we start feeling overwhelmed with worry and fear, what does it do when we have those thoughts? My world or the world is spinning out of control. It just leads to all these emotions of stress, of overwhelm, of excessive, worry of fear. And then that leads to depression. And if we keep having those same thoughts over and over, it’s just going to keep driving those same emotions. And this is what we have to be really in tune to because when we’re feeling those emotions for long periods of time, for days on end, it forces our brains to look for some sort of relief from that emotional pain. And so we start buffering. Now, what is buffering? Buffering is basically when we, when our brains look to an external stimuli to give us some sort of temporary relief or pleasure or escape from negative emotions.

And oftentimes buffering looks like overdoing certain things, for example, overeating overdrinking overshopping over, you know, or turning to pornography or turning to Netflix and just zoning out for hours. Binge watching things as a form of escape. This gives our brain a temporary relief from all of those negative emotions. But as we know, buffering never works buffering just actually it creates a temporary. Maybe it’s a dopamine hit an instant burst of pleasure, but then we come crashing back down and then we actually ended up feeling worse about ourselves after we overeat or after you overdrink. And then what it does is it leads us to a result where we feel even more out of control. Now, I also want to talk about our children for a second, because we want to really put ourselves in their shoes right now, because for the last year, their worlds in a lot of ways have really been kind of flipped upside down.

For many of them, you know, school has completely changed. A lot of them don’t have nearly the structure in their lives. They don’t have the social interactions that they used to have. They don’t have, you know, maybe access to sports or activities to all of the things that they have really enjoyed. And so our children are trying to deal with all of this stuff as well. On top of that, they have us, you know, they see maybe us spinning out of control a little bit from time to time. They also hear what’s going on on the news and in the media. And they’re hearing all of this stuff. And depending on their age, especially if they’re younger children, even early adolescents, their brains haven’t developed enough that they can necessarily rationalize all of this stuff and deal with it in a mature way. I mean, really we look around the world and most adults right now are barely able to rationalize all the stuff going on and deal with it in their own lives.

So can you imagine what all of this must feel like for our children? And this is all the more reason because I work, I guess what I’m trying to say is I work with teenagers. I work with young people every day, and I am seeing the effects of the stress that all of this is happening. I am seeing them express to me the sense of feeling like things are out of control. And this is what ignites within me this passion to try to help all of us to realize that although we don’t have control over everything, that’s happening in the world, we do have so much power and control over what’s happening in our minds and what’s happening in our lives and how we are creating environments within our home, within our families to really create a space and create our lives in a way that we are counter acting all of the negative stuff happening in the world around us.

So let’s get into this. This is the fun part. This is the part where we take back the control and we step very intentionally into creating our lives the way we want, and then also affecting our families and all of the things that we really do have control over. The first thing is this. And you’ve heard me mention it before, but my recommendation is to turn off, turn away from as much media and news as we can. Before Advent, I started, I turned off everything. I turned off the news. I turned off all the notifications on my phone, and I truly had one of the most peaceful and joy filled advents that I’ve had in years. It was such a game changer for me. And I am just continuing on with that. And I know a lot of people will say, well, literacy is important to know what’s going on.

Trust me, I know, little bits and pieces of what’s going on. I’m aware of what is going on around us, but let me ask you how important really is it that we know all the stuff? How important is it that we’re spending hours watching the news? For me, I have such a limited amount of time in my day that I don’t want to focus on things that I don’t have control over. I want to spend my time focusing on the things that I, that I do have power over that I do have control over the things that I can make an impact on. That’s what I want to focus on. And then I want to turn all the rest of it over to God. So instead of watching the news, I would much rather spend that time in prayer. I would much rather spend that time instead of being on my phone and going to adoration and spending a few quiet moments with God or diving into scripture, that is where I want to place my trust.

That is where I feel that I can make the biggest impact in this world is through my prayers and then through managing my mind. So for me, setting boundaries with media with social media is so significantly important. The other thing is creating a plan right now, especially our kids with, with all, with the lack of structure that they have right now, for most of them, it’s so important that we are going above and beyond with creating structure in our lives, creating plans, having meal plans, planning out when we’re going to eat together as a family, when we’re going to pray together, when we’re going to have fun together, all of that stuff, that that’s the stuff that we have control over and also protecting our children and their little minds from all of the craziness and the media and all of that. That’s going on.

I believe we have a direct responsibility to really shut most of that off. And if we do expose them to it, that we are providing insight and that we are helping to protect them from all of the excessive worry that their little brains just can’t, they just can’t handle it right now for a lot of them. Now. So much of what we do in life coaching so much. What we do in our Master’s program for Catholic moms is really getting intentional about managing our minds, mastering our minds. That’s why we call it Masters and really recognizing the thoughts that we want to have that are going to drive our emotions and, and our actions so that we can create the results that we want in our lives. And so this is a question that I ask myself all the time. I don’t, I don’t want to be feeling like I’m spinning out of control.

So what thoughts do I need to have so I don’t feel like that? So the thoughts that I want to have in my life are, I know I’ve got a plan I want to feel in control, but those are the thoughts. I want to have peace in my life. I want to have joy. I want to trust in the Lord. I want to be a woman who is bringing light into this dark world. And so when I’m thinking those thoughts like that, those are the thoughts that are driving me every day. I wake up in the morning, I think to myself, how can I be a light today? How can every person I come in contact with, see Christ within me? How can I set a plan into place where I am doing all the things that I believe God is calling me to do today?

For me, that’s empowering for me, that’s exciting for me, that is what drives joy and energy and excitement and passion in my life. And I can have all of those emotions. Even if the world out there seems to be out of control. I can be very much in control of my thoughts and the way I’m living my life. And I can live my life in such a way that I am generating joy and excitement and passion and energy so that I don’t have to turn to food or alcohol or Netflix or any of those things to supply me with a dopamine hit, or a sense of pleasure or a sense of escape. I am generating joy and energy and excitement and passion with my thoughts and stepping into that and generating those, those emotions and then creating great results in my life, which is ultimately creating a life where I have peace and joy and all of those things.

And I’m trying to create a life where I’m very intentional with my children and really trying to do a lot of fun things because when things feel stressful or when the world feels kind of dark, and there’s a lot of unknowns and uncertainty, then when we create in our own little worlds and our own domestic church, a sense of joy, a sense of laughter, a sense of like family and we’re together. And everything’s gonna be okay even through hard times, even if we have moments of suffering or even big moments of suffering, we don’t know what the future brings, but we do know that we have control over our thoughts about it. And even if we are going through a time of, of suffering or a time of persecution or whatever it happens to be, if we are trusting in God and if we are offering up our sufferings, and if we are striving to be the saints that God’s calling us to be, and we are taking control of those emotions and of our thoughts, then we will be able to generate the emotions that we want to generate to fulfill the mission that God’s calling us to fulfill.

There’s also one more point that I want to make, particularly in light of our children in regards to the last 10 months with COVID and social distancing and masks and all of that stuff. One of the things that I’ve really noticed is just this lack of connection. So we’re not, you know, when we’re at school, we’re out and about, we’re not seeing people smiling, we’re not seeing the emotions. And then we’re also not able to really be affectionate. We’re not able to hug each other. We’re not able to even really give high fives. You know, maybe an elbow bump is kind of the most physical interaction that we’re having outside of the home. And a couple years ago, I read a statistic that said the average child or teenager needs at least 13 hugs a day, or some sort of a nice physical contact a day to really experience emotional wellbeing.

Now, I don’t know if that’s true or not. I’m sure it varies for every, you know, every person, but I do see the reality of students and teenagers every day. Like I, you can get this sense that this type of stuff is wearing on people. I know that before COVID I was always having students come in and talk to me and I, you know, they’re having a hard day. They’d come to me and say, Mrs. Horn, can I get a hug? And you know, all of that, like we are missing out on that so much. And I believe I feel it within myself. I noticed that it might children and with the students, I work with that, our souls, our bodies, our minds, all of it, like we’re longing for that connection. We’re longing to see someone’s smile. And we’re longing to fill a joy into full laughter.

And so I think as parents, we just need to be really aware of that, that we’re generating, and we’re creating as much joy in our homes right now that we can create that we are making an effort to do more fun things as a family, to play games and to laugh and to watch light-hearted movies and to connect and to hug to Pat our kids on the back to high five, to wrestle on the ground and to do all of those types of things. So we as parents, I know it’s hard, especially if we have big families trying to give that much affection and attention to each kid can be challenging. But again, this goes to really taking control of our thoughts, managing planning, preparing, being aware, and then creating those moments. Last week I was in my classroom and we played a game as a class.

This is this crazy ball game and balls are being thrown everywhere. And everybody’s working together as a team to try to keep these balls in the air and not drop them. And it’s just fun and crazy. And everybody was laughing and there was so much energy and joy in the room. It was, it was electric. And when we got done playing the game, everybody kind of sat down and, and one of we started talking about stuff and life, and then one of the students said, Mrs. Horn, that game was so fun. And I just feel like life is so stressful right now that just playing a game like that just completely releases all that stress. And then all of a sudden, everybody else in the class was like, yes, that was so great. And I wish we had more opportunities for stuff like that. And it really dawned on me how important those types of moments are in our daily lives and how we as adults have to work to try to create those moments and those opportunities.

And really, it’s very hard for us to do that when we are in a state of anxiousness and fear and worry as well. So it’s just one more reason why we want to take control of our brains and control of our thoughts and create the lives and, and the home life that we really want to create. Right now, mother Teresa has a quote and probably gonna butcher it here, but she basically said this, “You are either a light in the world, or you’re contributing to the darkness.” Now we don’t need to talk about all the darkness in the world. There is so much of it, and that’s all the more reason why we need to be the light that we need to be the ones that are counteracting all of the fear and the anger and the division that we counteract that by being in control of our minds, by showing others in our lives, what it looks like to manage our thoughts and manage our minds, to bring joy, to bring light, to bring hope, to bring Christ’s love into this deeply broken world.

I’m not saying that I want to ignore the world. What I’m saying is that I want to be a Saint. I want to be living opposite of the world. And so in order to do that, I have to manage my mind in such a way that I am bringing my very best and that I’m not just contributing to the fear and the anxiety and the overwhelm and all of that. So this is what we can do and really, you know, it’s, it goes back to that whole thing of, are we trusting in God? Are we turning to him? Is he the one that we are placing our hope in? Is he the one that we are clinging to right now, as you’ve probably heard, it said in scripture, more than 365 times, “Do not worry, do not be afraid.” Our Lord does not want us to live lives of anxiety and worry.

And there are so many extraordinary scripture passages that we can go to, to really guide our hearts and to guide our thoughts on this. I want to close out specifically with two of those scripture passages. These are ones that I’ve been going to over the last several weeks and even months. But I think these are so powerful. So this is the first one is Romans 15, 13 through 15. I think that we should be writing these down on sticky notes and putting them up in our house that our eyes can be like, can fall on those and see them and be reminded of the word of God, because these scripture passages are so powerful. So this is the first one, “May the God of hope, fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy spirit.”

My sisters in Christ, this is what God is inviting us to, to trust in him. So we might overflow with hope by the power of the Holy spirit. I just want you to imagine this. Imagine all of us as women of God, as mothers, as wives, stepping fully into our vocation and overflowing with hope. This is how we change the world. This is how we shine a light in the darkness. This is how people like see us. And they look at us and say, what is different about you? What is it that you have? Because I want what you have. I want that kind of joy. I want that kind of peace. I want to be overflowing with the power of the Holy spirit. This is how we take control of our minds. This is how we say no way. Am I going to let fear and worry and stress, anxiety, rob me of the hope and the joy that God wants to give me in this present moment.

And then of course, this next scripture passage. You’ve heard it over and over Philippians 4:6-7. Oh my gosh. One of my go-to scripture passages of all time, “Do not be anxious about anything.” Did you guys hear that? “Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation by prayer and petition with Thanksgiving, present your request to God.” And then this is the promise, the peace of God, which transcends all understanding will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Oh my gosh. It’s so good. The peace of God, which transcends all understanding will guard our hearts and our minds. Listen to this, my sisters in Christ. This is the promise that God’s peace will guard our hearts and our minds. This is powerful. This is better than anything that the media can give to us. And this is the hope that I want to leave with you on this podcast.

We have so much control, so much more control than we realize. We take that control back. We use our minds to, we manage our minds. We master our minds, and then we generate the thoughts that we want to have so that we can drive our emotions, our actions, and get the results that we want to have. Again, my sisters in Christ, as I wrap up this podcast, I really want to encourage you to prayerfully consider joining masters if you haven’t done so already, we have an amazing group of women of like-minded Catholic moms who are committed to doing this important work. And it’s been exciting even in the last three and a half weeks. So we’ve had masters up and running. We are starting to hear the testimonials receiving emails of how this program is starting to really impact the lives of the women that are involved in it in our, in our group.

So please, if you haven’t already done, so check it out, go to www.madeforgreatness.co and check out the site. You can get a tour of what it looks like when you join into the program and all of the good stuff we’re adding content literally every single week right now. And just trying to fill it up with so much good stuff for our extraordinary masters members. So with that, my friends, I hope that you have been able to take something away from this podcast. Let us all go out and love our children and love our lives. And let us remember mama that we are made for greatness, have a wonderful week.