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Challenge: Perfectly Imperfect Parenting

Need a Glow-up? Take my tiny human’s approach.

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“I’m gonna cut my hair,” said my youngest daughter. Scissors appeared in her hands.

“Don’t do it,” I pleaded. A clump of blonde hair fell to the carpet. I grabbed the scissors from her. She took a satisfied breath, as though she had just given herself a glow up. Then she strolled out of my home office.

I was annoyed, although I also admired her unflinching fashion decision and her contentment with the uneven results. Maybe she has something to teach me. What would my life look like if I adopted her self-care hacks and glow-up routine? I tried it for a week. You can, too:

Say NO and mean it. Don’t want to talk to someone? Just as they open their mouth, interrupt in a firm voice: No! Don’t want to wash the dishes? Point at the sink and say: No!

Change your outfit several times a day. Or don’t wear anything at all. According to my toddler, a clothes-free day is very freeing.

See Beauty, not the Beast. Look in the mirror. Tell yourself how beautiful you are, as you are. Even if a small human had volunteered to do your makeup, leaving your eyelids covered in lip stain and your cheeks smeared with iridescent green eyeshadow. You are a gorgeous thing.

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Move your body like you’ve dropped an M&M down your shirt and need to get it out, asap. That delicious bite of chocolate is a swish or two away. Shake your thing (even when there’s no music, except in your head)!

Forget everything I said. Instead, make sure your scissors are beyond the reach of little hands and teach your tiny humans that a real hair stylist is only a phone call away.

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