Marco Polo

Last year I had the amazing opportunity to meet Vlada Bortnik, the founder and inventor of Marco Polo. She has an amazing passion for sharing goodness in the world and keeping people connected. She told me that when she started out, she wanted to create something that could change the world. Here's how she's changed mine.

 
My brother introduced me to the app. I was trying to send him a goofy impression of my mom on snapchat, but it wasn't going through. The short video clips were all in the wrong order and my brilliant comedic routine was ruined. How annoying. So my brother told me to download this new video chatting app he'd been using. Marco Polo.


I'm not great with new technologies, but this app was so intuitive that it took me about 4 seconds to get the hang of. My brother encouraged me to get the rest of our family on the app as well, and shockingly it worked! My siblings aren't great phone communicators. I think it's a brother thing-I'm the only girl. But, this app got my brothers and I talking a lot more regularly. Now we have a big group chat so anytime I want to impersonate my mom I can offer it to a much wider audience! Don't worry, mom approves.

Then I got my friends on it, and it has truly been a lifesaver. Well, really it's a sanity saver, so maybe I should just say that it's a *quality of* life saver. You see, I don't live where I grew up. I was born and raised in Utah, and I have spend basically my entire married life bouncing around the midwest. I have made great friends locally, but it's not like any of them move with me when my family relocates. It can get pretty disheartening have friendships that mean so much to you, and then just slowly fade as life's circumstances shift and rearrange. Being able to reconnnect with distant friends means so much to me. I need my best friends in my life, and I've been lucky enough to make many of them in my lifetime. Who says you can only have one best friend? What a ridiculous notion! Whoever decided that a person can only have one best friend doesn't get to enforce it in my life! I have many best friends! My childhood besties that played dress up with me, my college roommates that introduced me to my husband, my midwest best friends who taught me how to be a mom-and survive it! There are so many incredible people in my life who have made me the person I am today. I love those women dearly. But distance has too often robbed me of continuing to grow those friendships.

I know it seems silly to give so much meaning to a simple app. But, truly, Marco Polo has given me my friends back. Talking with old friends is like rediscovering the dusty old parts of myself that I sometimes worry have disappeared. The daily Polos I share with my girlfriends while folding endless piles of laundry reminds me that I'm not all alone in the challenges of motherhood. Chatting with my brothers and their families has kept me close to them when it feels like we're worlds apart. I get to be with them even though I'm not with them.

Marco Polo gives me the people I love. Even the ones who have moved away from me, or who I have moved away from. I get to keep those people in my life now. How could one blog post ever adequately articulate how much that means? It simply means the world to me.

Positive Parenting

I don't think I've ever met a parent who didn't have a struggle with at least one of their children, or with one area of overall parenting. If you know me, you know that I have one child who simply does not agree with the parenting style I've used for my other children.  It's a frustrating and humbling road to travel when you know that you are not getting through to your child-that they need something from you that you don't know how to give.

I asked parenting advice from everyone. For years. I read books. I took my child to therapy. I tried everyting I knew how. Eventually, I stumbled across an instagram account called @simplyonpurpose. At first I dismissed anything this impossibly perfect woman had to say. Ralphie, the woman who I now realize is a parenting genius, was teaching us all how to be a peaceful parent, something I had completely given up on.

The first time I watched her, she was coaching parents how to get through a three day no-yell challenge. Hard pass for me. No way. No how. Impossible. I swiped past her. Obviously I know I shouldn't yell at my kids, but being a perfect parent isn't an accomplishable goal. I don't need more failure in my life.

But something about the way Ralphie spoke kept playing in the back of my mind. She was so gentle and yet passionate about her message. So I tried again. And then swiped again. And then tried and swiped several more times before I realized that she was right about all of it.

Tentatively I attempted to impliment her techniques. And they worked. And I am forever changed because of her.

She taught me to look for something to praise rather than focusing on correcting bad behavior. She said to ignore any behavior we don't want to reinforce. She said it's important to offer incentives for good behavior. She said that most of the time when we loose our cool as moms, it's due to our own false narratives about unrealistic or incomplete expectations we have for ourselves or our kids. She offered research to support her claims and advice.  She reminded me to be patient with myself as I attempted these new skills, and to focus on staying safe as a parent as often as possible instead of flying off the handle.

She bridged the daily-expanding gap I felt between what my child needed, and what I was capable of delivering. I am so grateful for Ralphie. If there is anyone who can identify with the struggle I was facing, I plead with you to give @simplyonpurpose a chance.  It changed my life. Maybe it will change yours too.