Birthday book rituals
The highs and lows of parenting when the world is in conflict
There’s a lot in this update as I share the shame I felt after making a mistake at a birthday celebration, birthday book rituals, the power of words and thoughts and the importance of doing fewer things.
Alcohol infused extroversion
One of the skills I learnt from working for an alcoholic beverage company for over 10 years, from the late 1990s, is the ability to hold my liquor. It’s something my husband used to enjoy telling people about me, until I suggested it was not a fun fact I want to be remembered for.
It was a skill I developed as a way to navigate work situations in an environment where everybody drank alcohol. I expect I once used alcohol to help me embrace an extrovert persona at a time when I did not know I was an ambivert. Perhaps I felt it provided me with the courage I needed to socialise in work situations.
In this recent update I shared that I’m getting better at navigating my birthday celebrations by investing time in smaller catch ups, versus having one big party. Despite this, I did not get the timing quite right for my son’s 19th birthday celebration with his friends at our place on the Saturday night prior to our joint family afternoon tea catch up the following day. His last friend left at 2am and twelve hours later we greeted 35 family members who joined us for afternoon tea to wish us both happy birthday.
As my beautiful family arrived at our home, I sat in my reading chair in our lounge room and observed the flow of people. I felt a bit like Queen Charlotte, receiving the potential diamonds for the season. I was ‘holding court’ while feeling a little dusty with the physical and emotional load of champagne regret.
Sometimes I prefer not to drink at all at social events where alcohol is served. I like that version of me. When I do choose to enjoy a celebratory glass of bubbles, I’ll normally stick to my two drink limit. On the rare occasion when I drink more than this I become extremely talkative. Alcohol lowers my inhibitions about what is an appropriate topic to talk about. Rather than just think something, I am more likely to say it out aloud. And my voice becomes louder than usual.
I decided to quote the recent report about the increase in frequency of domestic violence against women in Australia, after there was a scuffle in the laneway outside our home between two of the young men attending the party.
“Your Mum was quoting statistics and talking about feminism”, was how my son’s barber described my chattiness. As I processed how I felt about this description of what I talked about at the party, I reminded myself that my sons and I often talk about these types of issues around the dinner table, and it may not be the topic of discussion in other households.
A woman is being violently killed in Australia every four days this year.
On that particular Saturday night, after a few too many glasses of bubbles, and witnessing a heated scuffle between two young men, I chose to talk about my disbelief and sadness about this statistic out aloud with 18 and 19 year old men and women.
And while it may have been something they needed to hear, the impact of my message was diluted by my decision to exceed my self imposed limit.
Mistakes are necessary reminders of the type of person I do not want to be.
Listening to the News
As I drove Master 16 to school last week, I wondered if listening to the news is a good or bad thing. My default station is ABC Melbourne, and I flick between this, ABC Classic and Gold 104.3. As the newsreader announced a bombing in Gaza, I instinctively lifted my left hand from the steering wheel to turn off the radio.
“Don’t turn it off. I want to listen”.
He’d commented on the news the day before. “War in Gaza, more deaths and someone’s been stabbed in a shopping centre. Why is it always bad news?”
“You can choose your good news. On the ABC App you can choose your favourite news topics”, I tell him, and explain that I selected the good news option when I set it up, and make a point of reading articles in this category when I scan the news. In a five minute sound bite on the radio they highlight the main news, and there never seems to be time to include the good news.
This is the best I could offer him on this late Autumn morning.
Books worth mentioning & birthday book rituals
For part of this month my reading came to a grinding halt, and has only just restarted with Julia Baird’s latest book, Bright shining. Scattered thoughts and the pain of local and world events may explain why I have not been reading more than a few pages of the books next to my reading chair. Or perhaps it’s because of the family celebrations and catch ups surrounding my 50th birthday last month.
I’ve been watching more TV than usual, including Loudermilk on Netflix, The Luminaries on ABC iview. I’m one season into watching Borgen on Netflix. I’m telling myself Borgen is part of research for my trip to Scandinavia, later this year. I’ve seen The Fall Guy and Golda at the local movie theatres, I went to a Readings event to hear Hugh Mackay talk about his latest book, The Way We Are and travelled by train to enjoy the Paris exhibition at Bendigo Art Gallery.
Master 19 and I are both May babies. Up until this year, one of the rituals I’ve followed since he was born is the purchase of a carefully selected book as part of his birthday present. I’d wrap the book and give it to him, along with his card, on the morning of his birthday. This year I decided we would visit our local bookshop together as part of his birthday celebrations. “Choose a book you’d like for your birthday”, I said. The two books in the photo below are what he chose.
As I’ve reflected on these books it occurred to me that Buy Now is for his future self. An aspirational choice based on the type of person he wants to be. He saw Where the Wild Things Are at the counter, as I was paying for Buy Now. “Remember that? Can we buy that one too?” He then reminisced about reading it as a child.
I love that his past self, the young boy I read to for so many years, is still within him. His Inner Child. I am enjoying all parts and stages of watching him blossom.
The power of thoughts and words
Part of the joy of parenting is being curious about what your children believe, versus telling them what to believe. Or perhaps there’s a general joy in that for all humans, if we choose to really listen to our loved ones and take a curious, rather than combative, approach to our conversations.
Master 16 is a deep thinker who will sometimes share his profound observations about human behaviour. I love the way he thinks. Master 19 is faster paced and tends to blurt out his beliefs as sweeping statements. I like the way he thinks too, and encourage them both to talk about the ideas and thoughts they share with me. It helps them think through what they really believe, rather than repeat what they may have heard from others or seen on social media. I will sometimes respond to their soundbites with “Really?” or ask them to please explain. “What do you mean by this? or “That’s interesting. What encouraged you to form that opinion?”
When Master 16 was in early primary school, he returned home one day and shared his concerns about unkind words spoken to him by a classmate. My reflex reaction was to repeat a saying I’d heard as a child. “Sticks and stones will break your bones, but words can never hurt you”.
“But Mum, you’ve also said words are powerful.” I paused, smiled to myself and nodded. We agreed words are powerful and can hurt.
I share this story with you because I’ve been thinking about the words I use to describe myself. If you are a regular subscriber to Confessions of an Ambivert, you may recall me having a ‘Veruca Salt’ moment in my last update, wanting my worlds to collide. After a recent journaling session with
, I sat with the emotions associated with this desire for my worlds to collide.As a I created the space to sit with the discomfort associated with feeling impatient, I realised that what I really wanted was a more consistent approach to how I was showing up in my working life and my writing life. They are both me, and I’ve been putting too much energy into separating them. To help me work through what this insight was helping me uncover, I returned to an exercise I first did after reading Atomic Habits, by James Clear.
What sort of a person do I want to be?
Deciding “I was the sort of person who reads a lot of books” is how I achieved a personal reading milestone for myself in 2023. I read 40 books, which is 12 more than I read in 2022 and 23 more than I read in 2021. The overriding self belief that I was the sort of person who reads a lot of books was the encouragement I needed to help me say no to certain activities and spend more time reading.
I’m keen to embrace the power of this exercise once again so I can achieve what my heart really desires; to feel whole when I write, not split or emotionally compartmentalised.
To help warm up for this exercise, I brainstormed with me, myself and I, and thought about the words I use to describe myself. In my journal I wrote:
Educator
Writer
Mentor
Thought Partner
I then thought about what I wanted. I wrote in my journal:
Make it consistent.
I want to be the kind of person who reads a lot of books; writes stories, takes photos and talks about ideas I’m learning as a pathway to healing (for myself and others); challenges the status quo; helps quieter and thoughtful folk reach their full potential and loves their family deeply.
I then turned my journal sideways and created the grid below.
You’ll notice from the column on the left that I ‘show up’ online in a number of different ways. Perhaps too many. I’m using this exercise to help work through adjustments I can make, once I think more deeply about ‘the type of person I want to be’.
Here’s what the items listed in the left hand column refer to:
KH website: This is my personal branding website that is a work in progress.
Think Bespoke website: This is my company website that houses my ‘body of work’ and the top blogs I’ve written since writing a regular blog to attract and help clients since 2010. This showcases my focus on being a LinkedIn expert and content marketer.
Confessions of an Ambivert: This is the title of the manuscript I have written and am currently pitching to publishers. I’ve also referred to it as Next Steps in previous updates here on Substack.
Substack: This is my Substack site where I house what you are reading now. And, yes, it is also called Confessions of an Ambivert. Please read Maiden Voyage to learn more about why I started writing regular posts on Substack.
E-Insights: This is my monthly newsletter, written in my capacity as a LinkedIn Educator & Trainer at Think Bespoke. Side note - I’ve written Rebrand? with this description as a prompt to review the images and copy on the opt-in page.
LI NL - KH: This is my monthly LinkedIn newsletter, The LinkedIn Marketer, that is published via my LinkedIn profile. It’s a version of my e-insights suitable for individuals who follow me on LinkedIn.
LI N - TB: This is Think Bespoke’s monthly LinkedIn newsletter, LinkedIn Thought Starters, that is published via Think Bespoke’s company page. It’s a version of my e-insights suitable for marketers who are responsible for their organisation’s LinkedIn presence.
LIM Podcast: This is one of my podcasts, The LinkedIn Marketer, and I have 80+ episodes under my belt and am in season 5.
HTB Podcast: This is the podcast I co-host with
, called Healing through books. We’re launching this podcast in Sydney on 6th August thanks to a One Roof Ambassador for Sydney who offered to help us organise this event.
Do fewer things
Writing these explanations for you has highlighted why I need to streamline my writing, or at least get smarter about how I create my body of work. It’s revealed something that has been hidden in plain sight for quite some time - I am doing too much. I need to follow the first principle of slow productivity, do fewer things.
So here’s what I’m trialing for this month.
Write this Substack update first. I normally write it last, after the Think Bespoke and LinkedIn newsletters are created, the LinkedIn Marketer podcast is recorded, the blogs are updated and the associated social media posts are created and scheduled. This explains why you are reading this update earlier than usual.
Include a version of this Substack update at the start of my other newsletters so my worlds do collide! I am in control of this component of my journey.
Decide the specific operating procedures for the content I create each month (e.g. how often I record a podcast and refresh a blog and when I tim block writing and recording across the month). Perhaps if I do less podcast recordings for The LinkedIn Marketer and obsess over quality, the third principle of slow productivity, I will find a way to integrate Confessions of an Ambivert with The LinkedIn Marketer. It’s certainly worth a try!
Group these activities and create templates for myself so I can be in my flow more easily when I am writing and recording. For example, for my Think Bespoke and LinkedIn newsletters I could pre-write the headlines I want to discuss in advance based on the 12+ years I have been writing a newsletter for my community. e.g. what I am writing, what I am recording and what I am reading. I could keep a Google document open on my desktop and drop in ideas and updates across the month. Now we’re talking!
Create a flow for how I communicate what I am writing and recording and delegate the social media and LinkedIn posts and scheduling related to this to a team member so I can focus on my core writing and recording projects. I started this with a new tile on Instagram last month (this one for my blog and this one for my podcast) and could take it to the next level by creating an excel spreadsheet for Mel (my super woman who does lots of things for me) and include the Canva template, content calendar and copy.
While this sounds straight forward in theory, let’s see how I go! I’ve started humming the Vera Lynn song, Wish Me Luck as You Wave Me Goodbye after writing that last sentence.
With love & gratitude,
KPH
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I acknowledge the Traditional Owners and Custodians of the lands on which I live and pay my respects to Indigenous Elders past, present and emerging. Sovereignty has never been ceded. It always was and always will be, Aboriginal land.
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