What's on Your Bookshelf?
“What’s On Your Bookshelf” is a personal and professional growth podcast exploring the intersections of passion, potential, and purpose - featuring multi-certified coach and leadership development consultant Denise R. Russo alongside Andy Hughes, Scott Miller, and Samantha Powell.
What's on Your Bookshelf?
82 - The Happiness Project - April
Picture this: you're juggling work, chores, and trying to be the perfect parent, and it feels like you're drowning in responsibilities. Denise Russo and Samantha Powell bring some much-needed lightness to this scenario as they dive into "Lighten Up" from Gretchen Rubin's "The Happiness Project." With honest reflections and personal stories, they explore reducing self-imposed pressures and embracing a more joyful approach to parenthood. Sam shares her battle with the quest for perfect parenting, while Denise contemplates her mother's legacy of unconditional love.
Ever wondered how to turn your child's constant whining into moments of joy and humor? That's exactly what we tackle next! Denise and Sam share practical strategies for transforming mundane complaints into opportunities for laughter and connection. By reframing negative responses and acknowledging feelings with empathy and humor, they show how to create a positive atmosphere that respects children's emotions. This approach not only enhances family happiness but also teaches essential life skills, highlighting a refreshing generational shift in parenting styles.
Balancing personal commitments and family priorities is no easy feat, and we've got some insightful stories to share. From regretting missing a family wedding for a science competition to the joy of baking brownies with your kids, Denise and Sam discuss the importance of aligning actions with core values. They emphasize the value of shared experiences and highlight the stages of experiencing joy—anticipation, savoring, expressing happiness, and recalling memories. Wrapping up, they express gratitude to their dedicated producer, Scott, and tease next week's topic on the significance of play. Tune in for a heartfelt and engaging episode of What's on Your Bookshelf.
Order The Happiness Project
Connect with us on our LinkedIn page School of Thoughts . We also value your reviews, subscribing, and sharing our podcast "What's On Your Bookshelf?" on Apple and Spotify.
Subscribe to our new YouTube channel.
Welcome to what's on your Bookshelf, with your hosts Denise Russo and Samantha Powell.
Speaker 2:Hi friends, Welcome back. It's another episode of what's on your Bookshelf. This is a life and leadership podcast where we're living out loud the pages of the books on our bookshelves. My name is Denise Russo. I'm here with my friend, Sam Powell, really looking forward to having a discussion today on the Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin. We are in chapter four of this book and it is a chapter that both of us experience in our daily lives. Sam, I'm looking forward to talking about this chapter with you today.
Speaker 1:Me too, me too, and I thought that was interesting. So this is April for her and the title of the chapter is called Lighten Up. But that's her. This is her chapter on parenthood. She has two children and I thought that was such an interesting goal for parenthood, and especially like, right, she's coming from this perspective of she's already a happy person, she's trying to make herself happier, and so the way she's coming from this perspective of she's already a happy person, she's trying to make herself happier, and so the way she's doing that inside of her parenting journey is to lighten up. And I love that.
Speaker 1:And I was like, well, couldn't we all probably do with some lightening up in the parenting space? And I laughed as I was thinking about this because it reminded me of a conversation I had with someone one time that was like oh, oh, if I could just like figure everything out about myself and like get myself right, then I could, you know, like basically ace this parenting thing right, Like there is a right way to do this. And the person looked at me and they're like I was crazy. And they're like that is so much pressure to put on yourself.
Speaker 1:And I was like, yeah, they were telling me I needed to lighten up a lot and I feel like that's in my parenting journey, something that's been one of my big lessons is you got to lighten up. And my husband it's one of the things he tells me all the time. When I'm like stressed out about something or worried about you know some crazy something that's going on in our kids' lives, he looks at me and he's like you got to lighten up. I'm like yeah, you're right, I really really do. So. I I loved that. That's the theme for parenthood for her.
Speaker 2:I have a very, very hard path to follow on this one, because my mom is the very best mother, I think, that was born onto the earth ever, and so and maybe other people feel that way about their parents too. But you're wrong, it's my mom. So if you've met her, you know it's her. And so being able to walk into the footsteps of my mom as a parent myself has always been for me a challenge of something that I think I need to lighten up on myself about, because I often put a lot of pressure on myself that I'm never going to be as good of a mom as my mom was to me and my brother, or still is to me and my brother. Listen, I'm over 50. My brother's over 50. My mom still treats us like we're five, and yet she does it in such an endearing and loving way.
Speaker 2:My mom will meet somebody Sam at a restaurant within minutes, wanting to adopt them, and so she's gone from wanting to be their mom to wanting to be their grandmother. And in fact, there was I've told this story recently on a couple episodes that my mom broke her hip a couple of months ago and my mom adopted I don't know every nurse, every orderly every person that came into her room. She would get to the point Sam, by the end of them getting ready to leave her room, she would tell them she loved them. And so when my mom was getting ready to be released from this like nursing care facility place, the nurses came in and gave her gifts and cried when my mom left. It was like the most bizarre but really cool thing to see that my mom's expression of love which I know we talked about a couple chapters ago my mom's gift in this world is the way she loves hard. She loves hard.
Speaker 2:And so, with this lighten up for me was like, oh man, maybe I should lighten up on myself that I think I do an okay job. I don't know, you'd have to ask my kids to validate that, but Olivia and Vincent, if you followed any of our episodes up to this point since we started this series, you know they're my two most absolute favorite human beings of all time. They're my kids, and so one of the things that she has in the margins that Sam often talks about is what is the theme of the chapter. So, sam, I'll tell you. You can read these themes, but I think that I focus on all of them subconsciously, because of the way I love my kids.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, the month of April, which is all about lightening up in the parenthood department, is sing in the morning, acknowledge the reality of people's feelings, be a treasure house of happy memories and take time for projects. And I like those and I don't know. As I explored them in this chapter, I was like it just there wasn't. There's such a lightness about these four things that she chose that I just really, I really did love, like it just just made me happy, made me smile to I don't know. Listen to her Well, read her journey about her going through this.
Speaker 2:And it's not all positive right, like we're talking about again. This is a book pursuing, elevating the happiness that she already had. I love the first one about singing in the morning, because I have spent my whole life fascinated and enamored with music and I recall when both kids were little, especially Olivia. She's my first, and so I would sing everything to her, like what's in her diaper, let's put on the socks, it's time for a bath was always in the form of a song. I mean, she still knows the songs to this day and they were all songs we just made up.
Speaker 2:And Olivia went on in her later years of being a young adult to learn over 14 instruments and even go on to studying music partially while she was in college, and I have to believe that part of that came from instilling a love for music in her when she was even still in my belly. I would play music for her before I had her and Vincent Vincent's the same we will. He'll hear a song and maybe there will be some lyrics in the song that would spark your heart somehow, and I just love when he sends me little clips of that. There's one particular song that was written by this artist named Ben Rector, who's one of Vincent's favorites. He introduced me to this artist, and there's a lyric in one of the songs that says take the time to call your mom. And so, instead of calling me, vincent sends me the clip of the guy singing call your mom. And so then I usually will reply back and be like hello, are you going to call me, or what.
Speaker 2:So the author, though, does go on in this part of talking about this piece that sometimes the song coming out of your kids' mouths isn't a happy song. It sounds like whining. It could be like why do I have to do this and I don't want to do that and why are you waking me up? And I hate school and I hate my friends and I hate my teachers.
Speaker 2:And so the way she turned that around for her kids is just to be able to stop reacting to their whining and be able to respond to it with some other kind of happy or funny response to lighten up the mood of her kids. And I don't know that it happened and worked the right way every time, but she has some great stories in this part of the chapter that talk about watching her kids grow up, and I think for me, the one takeaway in this piece was that she ends this piece of the chapter saying the days are long, but the years are short. And I don't know about you, sam, but I long for the days that I once felt like were long, meaning those days of like, oh my gosh, would you please stop complaining, because when the phone doesn't ring and my kids are away at school sometimes I just wish the phone would ring.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I'm, I'm in the. The days are long section of my life, Like I'm in the, where we're running around constantly, it's you know. I think I drove my son to like five different places yesterday, like you know, it's you know. So I'm, I'm in the throes of that, that part of it. But I had somebody tell me that I think it was in my baby shower.
Speaker 1:One of my really good friends, a good mentor. She was a boss of mine at one point, you know she said that. She said that specifically in relation to maternity leave, because I was like, oh my gosh, it's like it feels like it's going to be like I'm stepping away for a long time. But on the other hand and she was like the days are gonna feel long, right, like just going through having a newborn, doing all the things she's like, but the time will feel really short. And you know, and I think that that's so true.
Speaker 1:But if you can add in, like for her it was singing, singing in the morning. It was that just bringing lightheartedness to the day, that really I don't know. I think it one brings you into the present moment but also just brings a lot more joy into it, like my son and I always are giggling about something funny together. Right, it's like it's part of the joy that I experienced with him is just these goofy little things. We, you know, we say like and you know, and I see him bring me stuff that he's like oh, you'll like this joke I heard and it'll be completely ridiculous and it's like yeah, I did, like I do, I absolutely love it.
Speaker 1:But it's a light heart. It's bringing this light-heartedness into it even when it's whining, it's complaining, you know she turns around and makes like rhyming jokes with you know the things that her kids were complaining about, like not wanting to go to activities, and she's like I don't want to go to Taekwondo, right, I don't give a snap about going to tap, like that, I don't know, living in that space for me just feels so fun. And it also deescalates, right, it helps bring people back down into like, it's not that bad, like, okay, I don't feel like it, but you know, those are just so good, such good skills to be teaching kids too, which I get a big fan of.
Speaker 2:As she went through this experience in the month of April, she was finding intentional ways to sort of lighten up, like doing those rhymes, and so she said that one of the things she needed to focus on was to acknowledge the reality that her little people had feelings, and so she read a whole bunch of books about it. She recommends a bunch of books about it, but then she had to actually do something about it. So what she did was similar to what we do with the podcast, was she extracted things that she felt like were the most important out of reading the book she read and then she applied those things. So I was curious, as you were reading the list of the things that she decided to do, I think there are five things. Was there any of those five things that she did that really stood out for you?
Speaker 1:My favorite one and it's funny, this is one I actually learned from being in customer service and customer support for a long time was the don't say no or stop. So it was always if you have to turn someone down for something, don't say no, say find the yes that you can say. So, like in her example, it's hey, like I want to do something, and so instead of her saying no, not until after lunch, she says yes as soon as we're finished with lunch. Right, like reframing things into that more affirmative statement and you can do it with literally everything. I have yet to find an exception to this rule, but it's turning it around into, you know, like let's do this, and I like I was a lifeguard in college and this is the difference between yelling at a kid right, blowing your whistle and saying stop running to walk. When you say walk, it's much more effective. Kids immediately stop doing it, whereas, like the no running, you have to process the no, and we don't process no very well actually, and so it's that flipping things over to the affirmative like this is the one that really stood out to me, because I've just seen it play out and I've used it so much in my life already. But I I think that this, you know, acknowledging the reality of people's feelings is one of the biggest challenges that we go through and I think this is one of the things we're actually seeing a big generational shift in, like gen z is really good at this, in a way that boomers, gen x are millennials, are cognitive, like learning how to do, like they're deconstructing a lot of things. To figure this out, like as a as a whole of a generation like I.
Speaker 1:I follow a lot of TikTok content on parenting, on parenting in this way that really does acknowledge kids feelings and I've noticed a big difference in my shift with my son of acknowledging the fact that he is his own person, his feelings are valid. I might disagree with them entirely, I might actually know exactly why I think they're wrong or whatever, but to him, to his reality, that is the experience, that is the feeling and it is valid and validating that as the parent, right, like you're upset right now. This is frustrating. Sometimes she's talking about, like putting socks on. Enough, it's hard to take socks off.
Speaker 1:Sometimes, right, like as I forget that experience, like how annoying is it when I grab my sock? It doesn't come off all the way and I have to pull it again. I'm like, oh god, right, like, right, it's this little thing. But like your kids are experiencing these things for the first time, it's harder for them and so validating that and living in that space of acknowledging the fact that their emotions are real and it is their reality can change the entire tone of how you react right, how you show up to the conversation, and it's so powerful. I think when you do that and you know I liked her things and for me that the big like stop, no, like don't say no, don't say stop was, was the uh, I don't know, the one that most resonated with everybody wants to be heard, everybody wants to feel valued.
Speaker 2:I remember one time when Vincent was little and my mom is an amazingly good listener, okay, so when this happened it was almost it stuck out as a core memory when it happened, because when it did happen it stuck. It just was an unusual experience. And I can recall this time when he was talking to my mom about something and I don't really think she wasn't listening. I think she was listening, but Vincent was probably in elementary school and he grabbed my mom's face with his hands and he pulled her face towards him and he said Nana, listen to me. And he held her face in front of him while he said whatever it was the thing that he was saying. So now, years later, we always joke that when we really want someone to listen, we say Nana, listen to me, and so. And then, vincent, when are you going to let that go me and so? And then, vincent, when are you going to let that go? But it's just one of those core memories that has has stood the test of time, and so I think for me, what I was reading through this is that you want to have those core memories and you want to treasure happy times and perhaps be able to let go of the ones that weren't as happy. But we all have this mix of emotions. In fact, at this time of this recording, it hasn't come out till next week but we all have this mix of emotions. In fact, at this time of this recording, it hasn't come out till next week, but it will have come out by the time you're listening to this recording.
Speaker 2:Inside Out 2, of course, I have to reference Disney at some point in this episode.
Speaker 2:So Disney, pixar, has the part two of Inside Out coming and it's this mixture of how we deal with our emotions and it's about the story of a girl who's about to go through puberty and how she's having additional emotions come into her space.
Speaker 2:And when I was reading this particular chapter, I started thinking about what are the treasures that are in our mind and in our hearts and are they happy? And so she does talk about in the book, about treasuring up and storing up this house of happy memories. For me, what I think is fun is I don't know for you listening friends, but if you have a tool like Facebook, you can always look back on what was the memories from the former years on that day, and so sometimes I'll send a picture or a quote or something to my kids about something that was a great memory, because usually you can use that tool to store those great memories. But if you lose sight of the memories, what are you doing to kind of keep them alive? It's not to say live in your past, but those happy times and happy memories hopefully can project into your future to build upon and have even more.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and we talked about this with the how of happiness. That was one of the one of the tools, and I'm forgetting which chapter it was in. But one of the activities that you can do is to reminisce about things that made you happy in the past. It brings that happiness back into your future. And so, with her, she was trying to be really purposeful about being, you know, a house of these measure of these happy memories, right, of really finding ways to capture them and to be purposeful. And we all have, you know, a lot of things. We do this through family traditions, right, every year. We do this right On this occasion. This is what we do, like all that kind of stuff, and I think being purposeful in that space, right, really does give us some lightheartedness, some, you know, just some ways to connect to what's making us happy.
Speaker 1:And you know, I found too and she talks about this in like a story right, she had she was talking about her putting her daughter to bed and one of the things that was part of their, their, her and her daughter's routine in the evening, and she told her husband about it, right, because she's trying to be conscious about being this, you know, storehouse for happy memories. She told her husband about her husband's. Like I didn't even know you were doing that right, and so it's like, even by bringing that consciousness into wanting to keep that. This is where I think storytelling is so powerful. But tracking all of that, keeping those memories in that space, it allows you to then share happiness out into the world right like this is one of my.
Speaker 1:It is one of my absolute favorite things to do is to tell my friends, my family, whoever, some funny anecdote about what's going on in my life, my, you know the life of my family a lot of like what you know Austin growing up and things he does and stuff like that. And there's just so much joy in being able to store those memories, to be able to share them, to be able to reminisce, to be able to use that, because they can always bring those bits of joy back into your life and they can also give you that looking forward. If this is something we do every Christmas, every year, every whatever holiday, it's that I can remember all the good times and project that happiness onto a future thing and that we know also drives happiness.
Speaker 2:I want to encourage anybody listening don't just wait for a holiday to create some sort of a memory. Try to create some sort of a core memory with the people you love the most. And I will say that I was guilty of this in my past, where I would be so caught up being busy at work or busy with people that really didn't matter in the scheme of things that that I lost opportunities to be present in some instances. In fact, I remember there was a time, years and years ago, that my kids are in middle school, and this is where you don't want to hold on to bad memories, but it's sometimes. You need to learn from the bad memories. And so we were at this science competition out of town, and it was the same day that I had a relative who was getting married, and so I knew there was a certain time I had to be at this wedding and the science competition was taking so long, sam, but Olivia was about to win second place in the entire state for the science competition. So we're at the competition. We know she's going to win and Olivia, being the kind-hearted, sweet kid that she is, said don't worry, mommy, we don't have to wait for the award ceremony. I know that I'll get the award and they'll give it to me at school. I don't want to be late for this wedding and I can remember Sam feeling so rushed and like running to the car with my kids. While we're driving down the highway they're changing from sweaty clothes into wedding clothes. We were late for the wedding.
Speaker 2:The people that were having the wedding ended up taking that against us and it turned into a complete disaster which created a very bad core memory and I've often regretted the fact that I didn't just stay at the event for my kids to be honored for the work that they did. And I vowed after that event and that experience with people that were like secondary to my kids, I'll never not put my kids first again. And I recall that years later there was another time where I was going to have to choose between doing something with my kids or doing something for a work related thing. And I knew that if I said no to the work related thing, that it could impact my career and I had to say no and guess what? That it could impact my career and I had to say no and guess what it did impact my career at that particular time. But I don't regret it, because the thing I did for my kids will outlast the fact that I don't even work at that company anymore.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I think that, like, I think that's such a valuable lesson of like, if you know your values, if you know your value system, what's important to you, you, those decisions where we feel so pulled become a lot one, become a lot easier, right, they? They steal less joy from us in the moment. Right, like I like my guiding principle is this right like I will put my kids first, I will be doing that, and then there are. There aren't the regrets? Right, it's. I know I can't do it all. I can do anything I want, but I can't do everything I want.
Speaker 1:And so when we've got those guiding principles, when we've got our value system and we're clear on those things, it makes the decisions easier, it lessens the regret and I think it just increases our, our happiness overall and it lets us create these spaces where we are creating these memories that we do love. Right, where we know we're engaged in the place we want to be engaged in and we're purposeful in that, and I think that that's such a good. It's such a good. It's a hard lesson, I think we all screw it up through life and you know, then we get back on track, but you know, it's one of the reasons when I sit down with coaching clients, it's tell me what your values are, tell me what's important to you, tell me about where you spend your time and where you want to spend your time, because we need to design whatever you're trying to do around that right, around those guiding principles, around those guardrails that you've got.
Speaker 2:What you just shared is about time I know we're almost out of time, but let's talk about the time that she talks about into doing projects. This is about doing projects with your kids, and so I'll tell you a recent example. Vincent wanted some brownies the other day and I could have easily just been like, ok, fine, while you're playing your video game or doing whatever it is you're doing, I'll just whip them up real quick and be done with it. And I said to him hey, why don't you come into the kitchen and I'll show you how to do it, so that way, when you get back to your dorm, you can do it yourself? And at first he was a little resistant. It was like why can't you just do it for me which is pretty much everything he asks me to just do for him anyway but he kind of really got into it. When I would, I was teaching him you know what's the best way to. You know you don't just crack the egg in the bowl where all of the powder already is, because you could get shells in it or something simple, silly like that. That you know, as a mom, you know how your routine would be to do that. And so, after he was done making the brownies, he actually said, okay, what can we make next? I want to make something else. And so it was kind of interesting and fun that in those short moments there's like these little glimmers of time when he actually does want to spend time with me doing things that are fun for me. That became fun for him as well.
Speaker 2:And the way that the author talks about it is in these sort of four stages to elevate your happiness, Because, remember, the book is not just about loving your kids, it's about elevating your happiness. So she talks about these four stages of experiences, which is you have to first anticipate it, then you have to savor it as it unfolds. You have to express your happiness in the moments and then recall a happy memory. And so I think for me, in sharing that story about Vincent and the brownies, was that I was excited about being able to have that time with him in the kitchen, and while we were doing it I wasn't rushing him saying hurry up, hurry up. You just got to stir it and dump it in the bowl and put in the oven. Let's go.
Speaker 2:It was savoring the moments about. Isn't it interesting to see how this mixes up this way and what do you think it's going to taste like? And we were having a conversation and then having the expression of happiness. In those moments I recall like I get this look on my face, probably, and he'll look at me and be like, oh, are you going to cry now? And I probably did. I probably did cry because I just love him so much and I love every moment with him. But then now to be able to recall that memory with you on our podcast today, it's almost as if it awakens what was just such a good core memory of time together.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I think in doing those projects together, right in spending time together, where you're trying to accomplish something with someone, you learn a lot about them. Things come up right, like you know, those are always the moments where, like Austin gives me some like crazy insight into his life. Where it's like we're baking cookies together, we're, you know, doing whatever. Where it's like he comes up with something that it's just like it gives me more insight to the little person that he is and the person that he's becoming, and things that like just bring so much joy. Like I remember our my husband replaced our light in our kitchen. It was like there's this boring, you know, like what you would see in a school, like those flat white lights, and so we're like we'll put a hanging thing in Right see in a school, like those flat white lights, and so we're like we'll put a hanging thing in right. And he was like Austin, do you want to help me? And this was a few years ago. So like how much help can like a four-year-old, five-year-old?
Speaker 1:really do right with electrical work.
Speaker 1:But Austin was like yep, and he went into his playroom and he came back carrying his little toolbox, wearing his little hard hat.
Speaker 1:He was like ready to go, and so this memory pops up in like my google photos every year and I'm just like, oh my gosh. He thought like right, I would have never thought of that. But he was like I have the tools to make this happen, right, and he's handing things you put his safety goggles on right, like he did all the things, and I was like it was just such an insight into how his brain works, like by engaging in these projects, right, and then it's like that excitement of like well, what else can? Like we baked brownies, what else can we make right, like what else can we do? And I think that that, like that exploration I think especially in today's like very technology, connected world, where it's like we spend all our times on our phones, we spend all our times on our video games like breaking that pattern and breaking ourselves into a project that connects us is is really important, and those will be the things that you know, we do carry with us as we go.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think maybe, in closing for this chapter for today, I would say this, is that, even though love was the chapter for February, this book in a, this book that we're in now for April, is about parenthood, and what it's showing me is that we're taking the word love and turning it into a verb. It's not just about saying it to someone, it's about doing something with them. I love being with my kids. There is nobody else I would rather be with more than to be with them. I love other people, too, but I love being with my kids. Not every day is a lovely day, but so I think this chapter was so important for me. Next week, though, we're going to talk about how serious it is to be playful and to have fun, because sometimes I do take it a little bit serious. You mentioned that at the beginning of our episode, too about just not being so serious about things, so it'll be interesting to see how we grow from that next week. Anything you want to leave our listeners with for today.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I love what you said about. This is really about turning love into an action, and into a lighthearted action, right Into something that is. You know, the topic of parenthood is so serious a lot of times, right, the stakes are so high that I think this lightening up and bringing the love into action, like you said, I love that. That's such a great way to think about that and that makes me smile. So I loved our time together today and can't wait to be serious about play next week, yep.
Speaker 2:All right friends. Thanks for joining us. Hey, please share and subscribe this podcast. If you have friends that could listen to this, that would get value from it. Please share. We'd also love you to share your thoughts about what you're hearing. You can do that with us on the links that Scott shares in the show notes. I am very thankful to Scott, who many of you don't ever get to hear or see. He's our producer. So, scott, if you're out there listening, thank you for everything that you do with and for us Friends. Next week we're talking about being serious about play, but for today, my name is Denise Russo, on behalf of my friend, sam Powell. We are thankful that you've been with us for another episode of what's on your Bookshelf.