The More You Notice Grace, The More It Appears (Even in Caregiver Chaos)

Grace might seem like a lofty concept, but for caregivers, it's the lifeline we desperately need when drowning in overwhelming responsibilities, emotional turmoil, and crushing self-expectations.

Drawing wisdom from Jamie Kern Lima's book "Worthy," this episode explores how caregivers can transform their relationship with mistakes, imperfections, and regrets. That argument with your loved one where you said something hurtful? The stress-induced cookie binge? Those moments of isolation when depression takes hold? These aren't just failures to beat yourself up about – they're potential turning points in your caregiving journey.

"We are our mess or we can become our message," Robin Roberts wisely notes. This perspective shift allows us to see our struggles not as evidence of inadequacy but as the very experiences building our strength and resilience. The episode dives deep into how our setbacks often become setups for what we're meant to do next in life. The challenges that seem unfair or senseless today might be preparing us for something we cannot yet see.

The reality is stark: no caregiver can do it all perfectly. When we hold ourselves to impossible standards, we miss the grace already present in our lives. Through vulnerable personal reflections about body image struggles and weight gain during her caregiving journey, Kathy illustrates how self-compassion creates space for healing even amid ongoing challenges.

Want a practical way to invite more grace into your life? Place a sticky note with the word "grace" somewhere visible or set it as your phone's lock screen. This simple reminder can interrupt self-criticism when it arises. Consider journaling moments when you notice grace or practice forgiving yourself. Because the more you acknowledge grace, the more it appears – surrounding you, going before you, standing beside you, and lifting you when you fall.

Chapters

• 0:00 Introduction to Grace for Caregivers
• 2:02 Understanding Grace in Difficult Moments
• 6:11 Turning Setbacks into Lessons
• 9:24 Releasing Perfectionism and Self-Criticism
• 13:07 Embracing Grace as a Daily Practice
• 14:31 Closing Thoughts and Call to Action

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

Well, hello, my friend, and welcome back to another episode of the Caregiver Cup podcast and welcome to anyone new that's listening here. I welcome you to the Caregiver Cup podcast and I hope you find this episode and other episodes beneficial. Let me just jump right into today's episode. It's Kathy here. I'm going to start with a quote. Tony Robbins said the more you acknowledge grace, the more grace appears. Grace, let's talk about it today. It's something that I've been working on continuously probably all of my caregiver time granting myself grace, being patient, cutting myself some slack, whatever you want to call it. And I'm also reading the book Worthy from Jamie Kern Lima and I highly recommend it.

Speaker 1: 0:54

And when I got to page 92, I became uncomfortable and actually closed the book for a while, and then I opened it back up days later and, yes, I didn't want to read this because grace triggers me. It's something I don't practice well, no matter how hard I try, but I pulled out the book again the next day, like I said, and read it. She had said in the book grace is real and it's all over our lives, yours and mine and the more we notice it, the more it. I can't read that. The more we notice it, the more of it there is to notice. Grace surrounds you, it goes before you, it's behind you and beside you, and beneath you and above you. I thought that was so interesting because it is something we can grasp and grab, but for me, I don't do enough of it. I don't know about you, but I don't do enough about it. Here's where the book talked to me even more. She said it's in the whisper that tells you to watch out and in the moments you've felt unconditional love in your life. It's the protection that didn't let you stray off course for long and kept you safe when you did. It's the butterfly sharing its beauty with you and the warmth of the sun rays on your skin. It's in the closed doors you tried so hard to pry open, only now to be so thankful it didn't. Oh my gosh.

Speaker 1: 2:35

As a caregiver, grace. We need to think of it as the gift we need to give ourselves. It was eye-opening for me when I read it. So instead of being so hard on ourselves, especially as caregivers, we need to give ourselves grace and grant ourselves grace. We get thrown in as much as you know. We get thrown so much as caregivers. We get all these things thrown at us. The challenges can be overwhelming, the tasks every day can be overwhelming, and we are human and we will make mistakes. We will get emotional, we will have feelings and actions we are not proud of. That's just the way it is. Have feelings and actions we are not proud of. That's just the way it is. Our stress levels and the things that get thrown at us are hard.

Speaker 1: 3:32

We all have a story and we're all the author of it. We can't always choose the characters or the narratives that come into the handout of the story, but we can always decide the meaning we attach to each of them. Let's think about it. This could be an argument you had with your loved one and said something you regretted. Yeah, I've been there with my mom. This could be stress eating and the whole box of cookies, and I am so guilty of it. Even in high school, I would eat a whole box of those powdered sugar donuts, but when things are stressful, I notice that I don't even realize I'm eating and I love my sweets. This could be avoiding family and friends and isolating yourself because you feel stuck and depressed and you don't want to talk to anybody. What is your story when it comes to not granting yourself grace. I want you to think about it.

Speaker 1: 4:38

Robin Roberts says we are our mess or we can become our message. I love it. We are our own mess or we can become our message. I love it. It makes you stop and think, doesn't it? We can decide. If they were the and I'm reading from my notes again, I'm like I'm stumbling today, so bear with me, because you can tell that grace is something that's hard for me we can decide if they were the worst thing that happened to us or the best thing because of what we learned, because of what we learned and the resilience that we built. So it's kind of looking at it of what we learned, because of what we learned and the resilience that we built. So it's kind of looking at it. We can look at that moment of you know, a blow up moment that we had, or the fumbling that we had. We can just keep beating ourselves up, or we can look at it as a lesson learned and build a resilience from it. Lesson learned and build a resilience from it. We can decide to be the victim, or we can turn into a victory for ourselves because we've learned and we've grown from it, or we are making it through the painful journey and become a better person. So, yeah, we have to figure things out as we go.

Speaker 1: 6:04

Going back to what Jamie Lernkema said in her book Worthy, she said our setbacks are almost always set ups for what we call to do next in our lives. Even when the setbacks and the struggles don't make sense right now or they don't seem fair, we are going to go ahead and build something and learn something out of this. The mistakes, the outbursts, things we are ashamed of, things we regret and are embarrassed by. They truly help us to be a better person, if you look at it that way, and we can lean into grace and saying, yep, I screwed this up, but you know what I learned so much from it. Just think about anyone trying to succeed. They are going to make mistakes. Somebody that's in that uncomfortable space they're going to have to figure it out. I mean, I think of just something simple, as a baby, a baby that's learning to walk for the very first time. Well, they're not going to be able to take those 10 to 15 steps without falling, and falling on their butt or falling down in front or wobbling along the way. But you know what? They don't have that built-in shame or regret or uncomfortableness, because they're just going to go ahead and explore it.

Speaker 1: 7:36

As a teenager, I made so many mistakes. I rebelled with my mouth, I rebelled with my actions and I made some terrible mistakes as a teenager. But I wouldn't be the person I am today if I didn't test my parents, if I didn't have that rebellious stage. Think about some of the mistakes you made, and if you didn't make those mistakes, you probably wouldn't be the person you are today. Maybe the things you've been feeling shame around aren't even shameful at all, and you have the power, my friend, to decide if you want them to be shameful moments or learning moments. Our past or our present even the parts we're embarrassed by or ashamed of, truly helps us become the person we're destined to become, with unique skills we only develop because of what we went through. Think about it, yeah. So I just think that I want you to think about those days where you get so down on yourself because you made a mistake, or you couldn't get everything done, or you just couldn't take it anymore and you had to say something. And it wasn't pretty, but you had the courage to say something. What are you learning from it? Going forward, courage to say something. What are you learning from it? Going forward and learning to go ahead and saying I forgive myself, I grant myself grace.

Speaker 1: 9:17

So, before wrapping up, let's take a moment to talk about the reality of being too hard on ourselves. As caregivers, we often set sky-high standards and these unrealistic expectations, believing we must do it all right or we must know everything or be perfect in every single day. But here's the truth. We need to embrace that you simply can't do it all. We can't simply do it all. We can't show up as our best self every single day. We're going to try. We're going to try to go hard and be there and do everything that we possibly can, but we're human. When we hold ourselves to these impossible standards, we risk missing the grace that already is present in our lives. Instead of letting self-criticism weigh yourself down, try cutting yourself some slack. Be patient with yourself and celebrate every victory, no matter how small. Each day, each step forward is a testament to your strength and your resilience.

Speaker 1: 10:36

You know, I have to preach this to myself because I look at myself and there are so many things that I've ever been in my entire life, in 2017. And now, here I am in 2025, 30-ish pounds overweight, and I look at myself and I just am so frustrated. But I have to just be proud of the fact that I'm staying active, I'm eating healthy and I'm doing the best I can. A lot of it is because of stress, and I can say it, and I'm just. I want you to be my friend right now. I can say it.

Speaker 1: 11:35

But there's times I don't believe myself. There's times that I'm not proud of myself. There were times that I wouldn't even want to go out of the house because everything was too tight and people could see the rolls on my back and the roll in my belly and that kind of stuff. But I have to keep reminding myself that we are going through an unprecedented time in our life. I sound like a news person, something that we've never experienced before. That's what I'm thinking about, this unbelievable journey that we're going through. So we have to hold ourselves. We can't hold ourselves to these impossible standards. Remember you and I your imperfections don't define you. They enrich your story.

Speaker 1: 12:28

The moments when you stumble are opportunities for you and I to grow. By embracing self-compassion, you and I not only nurture our spirit, but we also create more space for grace to work its magic. So let's remind ourselves it's perfectly okay to be human. Honor our journeys together. You honor your journey, I'll honor my journey, and we're going to be kind to ourselves along the way. I think that's the big thing.

Speaker 1: 13:02

So, friends, I want to close by saying grace isn't just a lofty idea, a fluffy idea. It's the lifeline we throw ourselves when we're drowning in daily demands of caregiving. You don't have to be perfect, you don't have to have all of the answers. You simply have to notice the little moments, the whispered warnings, the unexpected kindness, the closed doors that keep you safe, and say thank you. Be saying thank you to yourselves, you know, to yourself, because every time you acknowledge grace, you invite more of it into your life. So today, let's promise ourselves together here, when we stumble, we won't beat ourselves up. Yeah, I'm going to have to continue reminding myself of that. We'll reach out for grace, reminding myself of that. We'll reach out for grace when we feel overwhelmed. We'll pause and notice the beauty that's already here. And when we look back on our journey, we're going to celebrate every step, every growth that we went through, every hardship that we did. We did it with grace, no matter how small, that brought us closer to who we are becoming. Grace is your gift. Let's unwrap it together.

Speaker 1: 14:31

So I hope you enjoyed this episode of the Caregiver Cup podcast. It's a little bit shorter, but I think it's a little bit more impactful. Today for you to go ahead and reflect on today, and I want you to do yourself a favor. I want you to take a sticky note or put a screensaver on your phone and put that word grace or put something that reminds you to grant yourself grace. And when you get hard on yourself, I want you to embrace grace, embrace the gift of grace. Maybe it's journaling your grace and saying I'm proud of myself because of this, or I forgive myself for burning the soup today. Whatever it is, I want you to do that. Or saying I'm doing the best I can and I'm proud of myself for going ahead and taking care of my loved one. So until we meet again, my friend, next week, take care and remember you're putting grace in your cup this week and hopefully you'll continue to do it from this point on. Bye for now.