Nurturing Habit

• an overview of the KonMari method and why this applies to more than just your closet
• some of the ways it feels in your body to feel joy
• other places in your life you can ask “does this bring me joy” and edit what doesn't
• why developing the skill to recognize your joy will allow you to unhook from the weight of things that make other people happy - but not you

• Why you being turned on is important
• Prompts to figure out what your personal turn ons are
• 8 ways to get yourself turned back on

• the secret to how I menu-plan
• how I’m building my village
• questions to ask yourself to find out what you really need
• ideas about how to build your own super personalized self-care practice

• How to approach your child about a hard topic - whether they are 3 or 13. 
• Why you don’t actually need to know all the answers.
• The most important part of any hard conversation, with any child. 

1. Welcome to being human during a pandemic, so give yourself some grace.
2. You don’t have to be stuck here. Doing your own personal work - increasing your awareness, mindfulness, and self-care - can change everything about how you parent.

• Why this pandemic is happening now and what we can learn from it
• Why the global scale and interconnectedness of this experience is so important
• How to support yourself and how to support your children in their experience during this time.
• An exercise in softening your anxiety

1. permission to be ok with choosing her self-care time over chores
2. identifying some hidden inequality in her partnership that she could address
3. unearthing and questioning her expectations of herself and her definition of “good moms do…"

• How what’s going on on the surface might be masking the real issue
• How to identify subtle inequalities in your relationship
• Why you get to define what an “organized mom” actually does (not Pinterest)

• a simple system that you can use to help you adapt during this challenging and changing time
• why a morning routine is so important for you right now
• what intentional stress management looks like

• why writing a song is a metaphor for finding your voice
• why performance is such an important part of this process
• how finding your voice can shift everything in your life. 

• How to make clear and confident decisions when you don’t feel clear at all
• The three steps to take before you make any decision
• Several free resources from me to support you in this uncertain and stressful time.

• Why listening in on someone else being coached can be so valuable
• An example of intentionally shifting your thoughts to feel better right away
• An exercise to reconnect with what lights you up (even if you think you don’t know)

• How Erika found herself again after being swallowed by motherhood.
• Why roller derby is a great sport for finding your strength and determination.
• How being in a community with people with all different kinds of bodies can really shift your relationship with your own body.
• How to sell your work without feeling sleazy.

Guest Melissa Camara Wilkins, award-winning blogger, speaker, author of Permission Granted: Be Who You Were Made to Be and Let Go of The Rest, talks with me about the ways we can give ourselves more permission to be our whole selves, and what that can do to expand our way of living.

What you’ll hear in this episode

• Why the discomfort of showing up as your imperfect self is worth it
• What to do if you reach decision overwhelm in IKEA
• The kinds of permissions I’d like to give myself and my clients, after reading Melissa’s book
• Several questions you can ask yourself when you’re stuck

Links for this show:

Complete show notes for Episode 52

Connect with Doña on Instagram

Get the Get Back In Control Of Your Life workbook and get regular updates about the podcast

Work with Doña - email me a note with what is currently frustrating you and how you'd like your life to feel. I'll reply with the next step in the process. 

It is so easy to make friends when you are 4, or 8. Right? “Hey, do you want to play with me?

Yet it feels so hard when you are 33, or 48. “Um, hi, I think you might be cool and I’d kind of like to know you.” 

AWKWARD.

This episode is all about making it feel a little easier to make those first connections with new people. Because what I’ve discovered is that we can actually learn a lot about how to make friends from how our kids do it. Our adult brains just want to over-complicate the whole thing.

So check out Episode 50 now for some ways to un-complicate making friends as a grown up, and get more confident about saying hello to that cool-looking chick at the park. And then have the courage to try again if that connection doesn’t work out.

What you’ll hear in this episode:

• Ideas for where to meet interesting new people.
• How to start a conversation with a stranger.
• How to to make an impression as a good friend.
• How to keep the connection going - without being creepy.

Links for this show:

• Complete show notes for Episode 50
• Sign up to get notified about the upcoming self-care class.
• Connect with Doña on Instagram
• Get the Get Back In Control Of Your Life workbook and get regular updates about the podcast
• Work with Doña - email me a note with what is currently frustrating you and how you'd like your life to feel. I'll reply with the next step in the process. 

Does your home feel chaotic, overwhelming, and like there’s constantly too many small things to keep track of, so you aren’t making any progress on any big goals or dreams?

Yvonne Marcus teaches Agile project management methods to moms, so they can more efficiently run their homes.

In this episode, she tells us all about what that means, the basics of how to do it, and the kind of results that her clients are seeing - like drinking coffee hot every morning, saving money, and watching their kids help solve their own behavior struggles. I mean, wow. And what I love about this is that it takes the weight of household management off the shoulders of the mom, where it usually sits. It increases communication and engages the other family members, even young kids, in taking ownership of personal and household responsibilities. And doesn’t that sound amazing?

What you’ll hear in this episode

• what the heck is Agile project management and how can it be used to make your home life more efficient?
• How Yvonne manages to drink her coffee hot every morning
• Some ideas for functional chore charts for kids of all ages
• Why functional over pretty is so important
• how to handle big goals vs. small goals and goals at different ages
• how and why you need to delegate a lot more work to your family - and why that is so hard
• how Yvonne schedules her self-care on the family schedule every day
• how to identify values and a mission statement for your family
• the two questions Yvonne asks her kids to get real insight on their day

Links for this show:

Complete show notes for Episode 49

Sign up to get notified about the upcoming self-care class.

Connect with Doña on Instagram

Get the Get Back In Control Of Your Life workbook and get regular updates about the podcast

Work with Doña - email me a note with what is currently frustrating you and how you'd like your life to feel. I'll reply with the next step in the process. 

How do you feel about weekends?

At various points in my parenting journey, I have dreaded them, looked forward to them, and felt entirely undone by them.

A friend of mine admitted recently that she’s been watching the clock on Sunday afternoon, counting down until bedtime, because in the morning she can send her kids back to school. And she feels kind of terrible about that. Another friend has been feeling bad about not focusing enough on her kids on the weekend.

Here’s the truth: We’re all experiencing different things on the weekend, but a lot of us are feeling bad about our experience. 

So in my mission to create more happy moms, I have some tips to make your weekends happier, no matter what kid season you are in. Let’s banish that Monday guilt, OK?

In this episode:

• Why weekends might feel hard for you right now.
• 3 tips to make weekends feel better, no matter what season you are in.

Links for this show:

• Complete show notes for Episode 48
• Sign up to get notified about the upcoming self-care class.
• Connect with Doña on Instagram
• Get the Get Back In Control Of Your Life workbook and get regular updates about the podcast
• Work with Doña - email me a note with what is currently frustrating you and how you'd like your life to feel. I'll reply with the next step in the process. 

How often have you wished you could just do something without being afraid? I know in my own life, fear is often the root of why I hold myself back, why I do not take that action or say the things I want to say.

Enter Kate Swoboda, who has literally written the book on this topic. Kate is author of The Courage Habit,creator of YourCourageousLife.com and Director of the Courageous Living Coach Certification, where I received my coaching training.

Kate firmly believes that the absence of fear is not the goal. The goal is to live comfortably with fear, and know how to work with it, and take the action you want to take anyway. It is because of Kate’s training and wisdom on this topic that I have braved so many of the very hard circumstances that have appeared in my life in the last few years with some amount of grace. 

To learn how you can be more courageous and navigate the hard stuff in your life with much more ease, check out this week’s bonus episode with Kate Swoboda now. 

In this episode:

• Courage is a habit; it takes practice.
• If affirmations don’t work for you, try reframing instead.
• Do more than talk about Brene Brown’s work; really learn how to practice vulnerability.
• What’s your kryptonite? Think about where you get stuck over and over - that’s where your work is.
• The best way to find your community.
• Kate’s On Fire and On Purpose practice.

Links for this show

Complete show notes for Episode 47

Connect with Doña on Instagram

Get the Get Back In Control Of Your Life workbook and get regular updates about the podcast

Work with Doña - email me a note with what is currently frustrating you and how you'd like your life to feel. I'll reply with the next step in the process.