Hi there,
I love to run, but for the past year, I couldn’t.
And considering everything else that happened this year—losing my job, an unexpected move from Tennessee to Michigan, starting my own business and this podcast—you’d think not being able to run wouldn’t matter much.
But if you’d asked me what my biggest problem was, I wouldn’t have said “career” or “moving.” I would have said: I can’t run.
I never talked about it. If you didn’t ask me directly, you wouldn’t know. But I thought about it all the time.
Have you ever asked your parents what their biggest problem is? What keeps them up at night? You might be surprised by the answer. It might be the very thing you assumed they were ignoring—like a spouse’s cognitive decline, losing the ability to drive, or climbing the stairs to reach their bedroom. Sometimes what we see as denial is really just fear and silence.
Every run I tried last year ended the same way: unbearable hip and back pain. I became very problem-aware. But solution-aware? Not even close.
Then a friend suggested something I hadn’t considered: maybe the issue wasn’t my hip or my back at all, but my IT band. That one perspective changed everything. With a foam roller and some patience, I found
my way back to running. I became solution-aware.
Pointing out problems to your parents only agitates the issue. Collaboration towards creating a solution can create a sense of empowerment. For me, solution-awareness meant the joy of running again. For your parents, it could mean creating an estate and life plan they understand, trust, and feel confident about.
I recently joined
Sara Ecklein on
The Legacy of Love podcast to talk about the difference between being problem-aware and solution-aware, and why that shift matters so much when it comes to planning with
your parents.
Check out this short video clip from our conversation: