Maya and Patrick come to you weekly on the The Laurent Collective podcast where they go deeper into exploring everything from family, business, creativity, culture and faith. They will take these discussions beyond just the surface talk and into a vulnerable and open look at each topic.

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We’re ending our rest season with one last replay of a popular episode. In this episode we chat about how to say that difficult word “no.” Saying no to new opportunities is so hard because we want to be helpful and to help others. However, we can’t say yes to everything. Saying yes to it all leaves us exhausted and unable to help in a positive way. So how do you determine what opportunities to say no to and how do you say no in a kind way? We discuss this by taking you through some questions to ask of each opportunity and some kind ways to say no.

Revisit: How to say no to opportunities not meant for you

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We’re revisiting past podcasts as we take a rest break. We have so many questions about living in the UK in this episode we touch on what we’ve learned from living here.  We’ve lived in the United Kingdom for six years and have experienced and learned so much from the culture here. There are things we have ingrained into our lives now or are at least working on making them part of our lives.  We talk about how time is different here, the importance of holiday time, an appreciation for food and travel accessibility.

Revisit: What have we learned from UK culture

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We are revisiting some of our most popular past podcasts and this business podcast on figuring out what to focus on in your business has been a favorite.  These past two years have provided small businesses with ups and downs that have not followed normal trends. When you look back on your numbers to make informed decisions for the future, it’s hard to know what to focus on in the year ahead.  There is one thing that will help bring in some focus for you even if the data isn’t helping you. It’s understanding why you are in business. This will help direct you as you make decisions going forward. We chat about how this has looked in our business and how you can take decisions back to this why and purpose.

Revisit: Are you confused on what to focus on in your business?

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We’re revising a past podcast on how we get our kids to help around the house. We’ve had so many questions on this topic and thought it’d a great episode to come back to again. It can be difficult to get your kids to be on board with helping around the house. You want to help them understand responsibilities but it just seems too hard to get anyone to do anything. We’ve had some years under our belt and have found a solution that has really worked in our family. The kids understand their responsibilities and we work together as a family team to keep the house functioning.  In this episode, we share these ideas and how you could take them into your family.

Revisit: How we get the kids to help around the house

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We revisit this episode of how we got rid of almost everything we owned when we moved to the UK from the states.  In 2016, we moved from the states to London and had to go through every single item in our house. It was hard to look at every item in our house in a new way and make decisions on what to keep and what to sell or give away. In this episode, we share our experience to help you, whether you’re just trying to declutter your home or whether you’re moving houses. We take you through a set of questions to ask about each item and share how freeing the process can be for you.

Revisit: What it’s like to get rid of almost everything you own

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We revisit one of our most popular podcast episodes about fostering creativity in your kids. Does it feel like you are battling technology in your house and you’d just love to see your kids do something creative? We talk with our eleven-year-old son about what he likes about being creative. He shares the types of things we have in our house that he uses to be creative (clue: it’s nothing fancy). We also have a little chat about why we turn off the technology as parents to enable creativity to begin.

Revisit: Fostering creativity in your kids

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We all need seasons of rest in our life and in our businesses. As we prepare to enter a season of rest, we thought we’d share why we make space for a more restful season.  It’s about being intentional as you look ahead and realizing the areas you may need to pause for a season. A season of rest prepares you for new areas to step into and to come back to your business and life with renewed energy.

We’re entering a season of rest

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It’s important to teach your children about how to manage finances as it’s part of everyday life once they enter into the adult world. But how to teach them at the different stages of childhood can be confusing.  We discuss a method we use to “pay” our children for work they do in the house. It’s a method of paying them their age in money but then putting percentages into savings and other areas to help them understand some simple finance concepts.  We hope this inspires you to not shy away from talking about money with your children and instead be an active teacher to prepare them for the future.

How we teach our kids financial literacy

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Inspired by Katherine May’s book “Enchantment,” we explore how stepping out of your past and into the present of creativity is beautiful. It’s an act of trust, uncertainty and stretching yourself. We chat about how we’ve had to let go of some of our past creations and step into the scary part of creating again. It’s worth every step into creating as the best part of the uncertain act of making is what you learn in the process.

The uncertain act of making

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Walking the United Kingdom is part of life here. Walking is important to people whether you live in a city and walking is your main means to get places, or whether you live in the suburbs or countryside, and walking is for pleasure.  We found the idea of walking to be much different when we lived in the states than it is here in the UK. There are systems that make walking in the UK much easier too, including public pathways. In this episode we chat about the great British walk and how it’s ingrained into the culture.

The idea of the UK walk

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Family traditions provide something for everyone to look forward to but also serve as a time for bonding. Traditions don&#39;t have to be too complicated or be to a large scale, instead they can be simple and still be meaningful. We share some of our family&#39;s traditions and how these simple moments have become moments the whole family looks forward to having together. Family traditions provide a unique opportunity to create lasting memories and strengthen family bonds.

Family Traditions: How They Strengthen Bonds and Create Memories

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Perfectionism is a struggle many creatives feel on a regular basis. If you can embrace imperfection in your creativity, it can break you through feeling stuck or getting caught up in a perfection loop. There are three questions you can ask to help you step out of perfection:- When do you find yourself getting caught up in perfection?- What are some practical ideas to help you step past perfection?- When you think about failing, how does it make you feel? How can you put a positive spin on failing? By recognizing the problem with perfectionism, embracing creativity, embracing imperfection, and putting it into practice, you can break free from the limitations of perfectionism.

Breaking Free from Perfection: Embracing Creativity and Imperfection

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Setting boundaries is essential for your well-being and relationships, but it can be hard to establish and maintain healthy boundaries. First you have to define what boundaries you want to put in place and then figure out how to implement them. Often boundaries need to be set in the areas of our life that are causing stress. We chat a bit about how to communicate your boundaries, how setting boundaries can be an example to others, and how to pay attention to changing boundaries in different life seasons. By understanding what boundaries are, setting clear and effective boundaries, and maintaining them the best you can, you can improve your overall well-being.

Drawing the Line: The Importance of Setting Boundaries in Your Life

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As a business owner, you&#39;ll inevitably face tough situations and seasons that can be difficult to navigate. In this episode, we&#39;ll discuss strategies for overcoming challenges and thriving in the face of adversity. It&#39;s so important to identify challenges and to acknowledge them. We share how we&#39;re navigating some challenges and financial dips in our business and how we&#39;re implementing changes. Running a business is never easy, but challenges and tough times are a normal part of the journey. By identifying challenges, creating a plan of action, and testing new things out, you can navigate these challenges and emerge wiser, and hopefully have a stronger business.

Navigating Challenges in Your Business

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Traveling with children is just different and it&#39;s important to manage expectations. In this episode, we&#39;ll discuss the importance of setting realistic expectations when traveling with kids. There are some challenges when traveling with children but that doesn&#39;t mean you can&#39;t have fun and really enjoy exploring as a family. Traveling with kids can be a rewarding and memorable experience. By setting realistic expectations, you can enjoy your holiday in new ways with kids part of the picture.

Managing Expectations when Traveling with Kids

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What do you do when you feel like your creativity has run dry? We chat about the importance of building creative stamina and how it can help fuel your creativity over the long term. We discuss how creative stamina can help you stay motivated and inspired, even when facing creative blocks or setbacks. We got through a set of questions to ask yourself when you feel like your creative stamina is running out. These questions involve how you feel rested, how to build rest into your routine and how to explore other creative outlets. This episode will be helpful for anyone wanting to look to sustain their creative energy.

Building Stamina to Fuel Your Creativity

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In this episode, we delve into the topic of making mistakes in parenting (because it will happen all too often.) We discuss the importance of acknowledging our mistakes as parents and making amends with our children when we fall short of our expectations. We share how we&#39;ve navigated imperfect parenting from toddlers to teens. We&#39;ve found it important to be open with our children when we&#39;ve messed up and it helps them be open to us when they have made mistakes. It&#39;s all about communication and openness as we prep our children to launch into the world.

Parenting Imperfectly: Navigating mistakes and making amends with our children

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AI seems to be everywhere right now and you might be wondering how you can start to use it in your small business. We&#39;ve been testing out some different uses for AI to help increase efficiency, productivity, and profitability. In this episode, we chat about how we&#39;ve tried out AI for SEO, Pinterest, creative ideas and for social media. We had some positive test results that made us think about how we&#39;ll continue to use AI. We hope this equips your small business to try some AI tools out for yourself and see what works for your brand and business.

How to Leverage AI for your small business

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Do you have an area of your life that you never had the closure you hoped for? It&#39;s so hard to know how to navigate life without having the closure we desire. We discuss the benefits of forgiveness and how it can help individuals find closure and move forward. We also chat about some ways we found helpful even if we aren&#39;t able to directly communicate our need for closure. This is a lifelong journey as we all will run up against relationships and we felt it was important to begin to chat about unfinished business and how it can affect our lives and relationships moving forward.

Unfinished Business: Navigating Life Without Closure

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Becoming a new parent is challenging, beautiful and confusing all mixed up together. When we became new parents we learned some things quickly that we wished someone had told us before bringing our baby home. Each family and each baby is different, but we&#39;re sharing what worked well for our family. In the podcast we chat about the five things we wish we knew as new parents. The five things we wish we knew as new parents are:1. You&#39;ll have little sleep but somehow you figure it out.2. A schedule for the baby makes a world of difference.3. It&#39;s okay to ask for help.4. Everyone&#39;s child is different.5. You don&#39;t need all the gadgets. These will make more sense as we explain them in the podcast. We hope they are helpful things to hear as you step into new parenting. You&#39;re doing a great job...you have entered into the beautifully challenging and rewarding world of parenting. --------We&#39;d love to hear your thoughts and questions over @laurentcollective on Instagram. You can find past podcast episodes and resources at <a href="http://laurentcollectivelearning.com/" rel="nofollow">laurentcollectivelearning.com</a> and shop our products at <a href="http://laurentcollective.com/" rel="nofollow">laurentcollective.com</a> If you enjoyed this podcast please click the subscribe button so you don&#39;t miss future episodes. We&#39;d love for you to leave a review too if your podcast app allows. We appreciate it!

Five things we wish we knew as new parents

Maya and Patrick come to you weekly on the The Laurent Collective podcast where they go deeper into exploring everything from family, business, creativity, culture and faith. They will take these discussions beyond just the surface talk and into a vulnerable and open look at each topic.