Today we dive deeper into childhood beliefs around being “good” and your “goodness” as a person. I share more stories from my Telluride adventure with my parents and what I’ve been able to uncover since. From this trip, I’ve been able to connect the dots between my performative goodness and my real goodness. I have since realized that as a pastor’s daughter, it was vital to my dad’s appearance and success for his family to be a reflection of his goodness. Growing up in this space, there was a deep understanding or expectation of showing “good” behavior at all times. When we did this, and did it well, we had more validation, and more connection, and it felt like we had more value. So in my brain, the neurons that fired together were “goodness / worthiness,” and they became deeply wired.  Fast forward to a trip with my parents and my kids. My kids weren’t performing to the same level of goodness that was expected of me as a child and so my wiring was going crazy. My value, my worth, my goodness felt in question because my children were not acting in accordance with my childhood expectations. I reacted from that place and did more to preserve the connection to my father, than I did to stay in connection with my son. This is a heartfelt discussion on external validation and I hope it brings light and clarity into areas within you that feel tricky and sticky when you are with your parents and your kids at the same time.