206. Maximizing the 18 Summers Before Your Kids Grow Up with Jim & Jamie Sheils

Today, our expert guests are Jim and Jamie Sheils, who help busy professionals create deeper, more connected, more meaningful relationships with their families so they can have the life they’ve always imagined.

As successful entrepreneurs with a household of six, Jim and Jamie speak all over the world, guiding others in igniting their family life and their business life in tandem. Through their best-selling book “The Family Board Meeting” and their entrepreneurial family-support organization, 18 Summers, Jim and Jamie are helping transform families and show them how to make the most of their limited time together.

The Sheils are a blended family, and Jim’s desire to connect with Jamie’s boys after they united led to the formation of The Family Board Meeting. After they began sharing their rhythm and lives with one another, things were so good between them that people started asking how they could achieve the same for their families. Their book holds the answer.

Jim took the ideas and concepts he wished his family used during his childhood and pieced them together to form The Family Board Meeting. One of those ideas was one-on-one time. It’s important to focus the family in this way, as it strengthens the whole group. It’s easy to make it happen; you just need to make finding the time a priority.

Obviously, the pandemic this past year has made everyone’s home situation more stressful, but The Family Board Meeting structure helped the Sheils retain some sense of normalcy. You never know where a child’s head may be, but when you make space to allow everyone in the family to share their thoughts and make a point of asking questions or opening honest discussions, a lot of real healing happens.

A study found that the average person will spend 85% of all the quality time they will ever have with their child by the end of their 18th summer together. After that, they fly the nest and become independent adults. This inspired 18 Summers to push entrepreneurs to get the most out of that precious time with their children.

If you’re ready to start your own Family Board Meeting, here are some tips:

• Don’t change a million things at once. Start with one or two changes that really matter to you.
• Implement some simple rhythms throughout the day, such as a two hour tech-fast.
• Take the pressure of perfectionism off the table. There is no such thing as perfect, so just do what works for your family and try to bridge those gaps of imperfection to the extent that feels comfortable.

The Biggest Helping: Today’s Most Important Takeaway

“There is no substitute for quality time, but you have to start somewhere so make the most of whatever time it is that you do have. We’re 18 Summers, so we have that natural math equation built in. But just make the most of whatever you do have. If you have five years, if you have 18 years, whatever it is, make the most of the time you have.

Whether you’re a single mom working 10-hour days and you just get two hours at the end of the day, or whatever it may be, whatever your life looks like, start somewhere. Think of that difference between quality time, that differentiation of what is quality time, and just start wherever you can.”

“Be quick to apologize. Entrepreneurs out there, we wear our pride on our sleeve and we try to justify or give immunity to ourselves since we’re working hard or doing this, you know, for being impatient, for being short, not keeping a promise.

We’ll almost try to override the responsibility of a sincere apology, and what I’ve learned is: when I apologize quick and sincerely, it takes a ten minute problem to a ten minute problem instead of a four day problem.”

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Thank you for joining us on The Daily Helping with Dr. Shuster. Subscribe to the show on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or Google Podcasts to download more food for the brain, knowledge from the experts, and tools to win at life.

Resources:

• 18summers.com
• Instagram: @18summerstribe
• Read: “The Family Board Meeting”

The Daily Helping is produced by Crate Media