I stay focused on my priorities of what I think is important. By knowing and focusing on the ones that I value, I feel confident and secure in my parenting which enables me to not care about the things I don't value. I re-evaluate my priorities from time to time to make sure I am keeping up with my kiddo's life and developmental needs, how the priorities fit with other goals and needs in the family, etc. You know, view it as a spectrum - I don't want to care so much that I obsess but I also think you shouldn't excuse bad decisions in pursuit of being "chill."

So for ex, I do care if my kid is being noisy or annoying in public. I think it is important (a) to respect others in public places, and (b) to guide and teach my son to do the same. Do I worry and freak out and get upset about this? Nope. I have standards for public behavior and I enforce them.

So, I have a kid who is really well behaved in public. We get compliments on his behavior. As a result, it is way easier not to care if his hair is messy or his outfit is dumb or whatever. We have identified a priority (behavior), we are acting in a respectful way, who cares about the rest?

So similarly, there are educational goals I have for my kid which are mostly curiousity-based and conceptual. We're growing with those constantly, so do I care if other kids in pre-k have neater handwriting or can "read" the word cat? Hellllllllll no.

So anyway, I think it comes from a place of knowing your values, working towards the things you value, which builds confidence and you can easily let go of other things.

And, at a certain point, you have to question if all this worrying is anxiety, which it sort of sounds like to me, and maybe think about what you can do to address that if so.