Episode 74: Living Your Best Mom Life with Parenting & Sleep Coach Dana Stone

Disclaimer: Transcripts were generated automatically and may contain inaccuracies and errors.

Welcome to the kids sleep show, where we help tired parents from around the world to get their children to fall asleep independently, sleep through the night and build healthy sleep habits for life. I’m your host, Courtney Zentz. Now let’s sleep together.

All right, thanks so much everybody for tuning in. I am here today with a personal friend, who I studied with almost six years ago to become a sleep specialist Miss Dana stone. And I am joined by her from Huntsville, Alabama, where she’s going to talk all about her new venture, live and rest.com alongside of the sleep work she’s doing and all the great things that she is doing to help families be the best version of themselves. Thank you so much for joining me today, Dana.
No, I’m so excited to be here, you are definitely one of my sleep sisters through and through. Amen. Sister,
I know, it’s fun, you know, just in doing this for so long. Now, I look back at all the folks that we trained with, and how many of us are still doing it. And it’s cool, because we’ve built this awesome friendship, you know, alongside of the training, which I think is amazing. And it’s so cool to see everybody taking such different paths with where we were and where we are now, you know, I got into a lot of relaxation work. And, you know, kind of focusing on the sleep side of things. I know that now you’re moving into a lot more of the life coaching as well, which is what I want to chat with you about today. Because I’m so fascinated by it. I feel like now that my kids are getting a little bit older I can use so reset on my own, you know, my own situation in some cases and just go all right, am I am I where I want to be? Am I the best version of myself now that I’ve got a little bit more time to focus there. So thank you so much for joining me Tell me all about life coaching, talk to me a bit about, you know, some of the things that you’ve been doing the past couple of years, because I’m super fascinated with the certifications every time. You know, we’re kind of chatting, there’s something new and fun that you’re doing. And I just love watching your career grow and watching the folks that you work with kind of expand into supporting all those wonderful families. So tell me a little bit about well, how did you get into this? How did you decide, hey, I, I’m passionate about this, I want to go forward with this. What does that look like?
Well, I’m, you know, as we we were in the baby sleep realm, right? And I’m sure you came across this quite a bit too. I would get parents we’d get the baby sleeping. And the parents would be like, Okay, well, what can you do to help me? Like, yeah, baby sleeping, but I’m still not sleeping, like, What do I do? And so I would just be like, Oh, sorry, I’m like a one trick pony. This is all I got. Right? Yeah. And so eventually, you know, it just got me thinking and it was something you know, I there was a lot of inquiries about it. And I thought, you know, what, people would find out that I was a sleep coach or a sleep specialist, and they would literally pull out their like Fitbit app to show me like, here’s my sleep cycles. Is this weird? You know, and so I decided to do some adult certifications, right? Well, it didn’t take me long on that path before I realized, you know, what’s keeping babies up is not the same as what’s keeping adults up. Right. And it’s, it’s really that mix of what’s going on during our day, our lifestyle, what we’re stressing ourselves with, what we won’t let go of all these perfections that we just don’t want to be the perfect mom and the perfect wife and the perfect employee and all these expectations. And, and I realized, you know, that, to me, was life coaching. And so I decided to kind of lean into that, and I got my life coach certification so that I could really dig into those things with the people that I was working with. And and then we kind of talked a little bit about the enneagram. And so for those of you that don’t know what the enneagram is, it is it’s a tool that you can use, like inside life coaching, there are enneagram specific coaches. And what I’m using it for is as a tool to kind of help inside the life coaching to kind of see, okay, well, what are those core drivers? What is making me feel like I have to spin at this high, high rate of speed, like how do I slow myself down? How do I live in the moment? How do I focus on what it is that I’m doing right now and not worry about the 3000 other things that are going on in my background? I need to take that. Yeah, and so that’s how I kind of landed here. And I love it. You know, mostly I work with women. I do actually have, you know what, I can’t even say that anymore. More and more. I’m having more male clients come in. But I find that a lot of times women really struggle with being everything and being everywhere. Right? So my idea, some people will fight and say that there’s no such thing as life balance. Right? And if you look at it as like a real scale, like one hour here, one hour there, that’s what I have to be doing to be balanced. Well, yeah, that that doesn’t exist. But in my perception, life balance is the freedom to focus where you are, and know that you’re giving each of the areas of your life the attention that they deserve, and the attention that you want to give them. Right. Would you agree?
Yeah, no. Amen. to that. Amen. Because I think it’s hard. I, you know, I keep seeing the statistics about all the women who, because of COVID, have left the workforce and are trying to be all things and be the teacher, even mom and be the home, you know, caretaker, if you will. And I think I mean, I don’t know the number offhand, but it was like a record number in the millions, I think of women who have decided to, like leave the workforce just to manage the chaos that we’re in right now. And who knows what it’s gonna look like post chaos, right?
And these high achieving women, right. And they, they’re VPS, they’re, they’re, you know, high up there in the executive ladders, right. And, and they’re coming home because they realize, like, it is just crazy, like, trying to be a teacher while you’re working. That is hard.
Well, and I think you shortchange the children, and you shortchange the employer side of things. And then I think it leaves you a bit unfulfilled in all areas, right. Last summer, I, you know, had a moment where I was like, I am not the best version of myself, right now, I’m not a good teacher, I’m running my own company. I, you know, I don’t want to, frankly, be here all day teaching my kids. It’s not like, I’m just not made for that, like I, you know, on week two of maternity leave, I was like, No, I mean, I’m cool to go back to work, you know. And so, like, I think everybody’s kind of built and wired differently for it, some people are totally leaning into it. But I think the stress and overwhelm of the past year has probably made a lot of people sit and look and go, gosh, I’m not spending a lot of time with my kids, you know, or I want to spend more time with my kids like I selfishly, the past few weeks have been changing my own boundaries, even with my consulting business, because I used to be all the time kind of accessible. And that doesn’t make you any more or less successful. I was equally as successful when I didn’t talk to clients on the weekend as I am when I talk to clients on the weekend. And you know what, that takes away from the two days a week that I get to actually see my kids. So I’ve started to put some boundaries in it works like all right, Courtney, you’re allowed to work, you know, this amount of time on Saturday morning, and then you’re done. Right? Yeah. Cuz it’s hard to put those boundaries in place and to stick to them to your point like, and I’ve seen such an uptick in women who feel like they’re failing right now.
Oh, gosh, across the board, they feel like they’re failing. And they feel frazzled, and they feel burnt out. And you know, we have a choice, we have options. And that’s one of the reasons so my podcast winning at the mom life, that’s a lot about what we focus on, right? It’s about, you have the choice to design the life that you want to live. A lot of times, if you don’t, it’s just gonna happen by default. And that means somebody else is deciding for you. And I challenged that because I lived for a long time doing all the things that I was supposed to do write big air quotes around that. What is it that I’m supposed to do? Am I am I? Did I go to college check? Did I start my corporate career check? Am I you know, the Girl Scout leader check? Am I doing all the things for my children check. But really, if you dig down deep, and you start to be honest with yourself, it’s a lot harder than it sounds, right? Being honest with yourself. When you put on a front for a lot of other people. Sometimes you’re like, no, that is the truth. And subconsciously you think it is, but really got to dig past that and say, Okay, what is it that I really, really want my life to look like? Yeah. And I, I’ve heard you in some of the conversations that you’ve been talking about with, with certain coaches and things. It sounds like you’re really starting to challenge that, like, what is it that I want?
Mm hmm. Yeah, absolutely. I think there’s that, you know, when I was in grad school at 23, getting my master’s check in the box check. And, you know, one of the assignments was your thesis, right. So I did a thesis on essentially the kaleidoscope career type is what it was called. And so it basically characterizes women into balanced, challenged or authentic right as you can Imagine in your 20s, you’re in your 30s, you’re balanced. And in your 40s you’re authentic, right? So everybody in their 20s is hustling trying to climb the ladder, do the things, right? And then in your 30s you’re like, well shoot now I have a kid and I got a husband and I’m, you know, I got to work like, what am I doing with this right? And I want balance in my life. I want to enjoy them, but I still enjoy my career. And then in your 40s, I’m 40. This year, we just planned a girls trip to Amelia Island in October, I’m most excited. Where is that? It’s right outside of Jacksonville. It’s like a fancy little island, right? Oh, and so we’re going to Amelia Island for a long weekend, my poor five girlfriends and myself. So there’s six of us. And we’re we’re doing all the things my girlfriend’s like, what spa appointments do you want? Like, I don’t care, we’re getting sweet buying first class like see down there. So we all got first class together. And so it’ll be fun. But it’s just one of those worst, like, I want authenticity in my life, right? And I want some balance, like in your 30s you’re trying that balance and then in your 40s you go nothing I’m doing is authentic, right, which is why even I had a I don’t want to say I’m a quarterlife crisis. But when we shifted from careers to working in pediatric sleep and with families, like I felt super alone on maternity leave, which is where tiny transitions was born, frankly, I’m like, this sucks. There’s no support for parents. They feel lost and overwhelmed. The best you get is a nurse making sure you strap your kid in the car seat, right? And then they’re like good luck with this baby. Hope your milk doesn’t come in and rock hard boobs, we know cause you to fail at everything right? So it was one of those where I don’t know. Like as I’ve sort of changed over my own years. I’m laughing because at 23 I wrote this paper about challenge balance and authenticity. And now I’m living it because in my 40s I’m like, What do your point like? I meet with my business coach and um, she has me doing these exercises. What do you love and makes you money? What do you love? What makes you know money? What don’t you like to do? And what can you delegate like, because I want to do stuff that’s fun. But at the same time, like I run a business, I have 13 consultants like I got a lot going on, you know, and I don’t know it’s like trying to be authentic with myself. Last summer I started reading minds that books and mindfulness and subconscious stuff would you probably get into you know, oh, it’s that’s my jam girl. It’s It’s amazing. Like, tell me about the subconscious side of things. Because I’m working really hard on like, I have my index cards I heard on clubhouse where I am on I’m not sure. Are you on clubhouse yet? I haven’t know, okay, I’ll have to invite you. It’s fun. But there’s like a business coaching thing. And she said, if you write mantras on blue index cards with blue marker, it, it does something where it rewires the subconscious. It could or could not be true. I have not researched it yet. But what I did it because I had them from my son learning his sight words. And I was actually curious, but you know, how would sleep blue light is this typical, right? So for kids, we say like, Don’t come near a TV for an hour, because that blue light is going to trigger the spot of your brain that stimulates you and you won’t be able to settle for sleep. Same with an adult on your phone at 3am. Right? Why can’t I sleep? Put your phone away? Right? And I’m so I’m curious if things like that actually work and have some correlation with the blue and the blue light, but just about rewiring the subconscious, like I’m trying to be positive for my kids and teach them positivity and like mindset work where you sort of rewire I’m reading that this book, The Power of Habit. It’s like a yellow book I got probably 10 years ago, I think that’s what it’s called. And it’s awesome. But it’s talking all about like the rewiring the subconscious. So talk to me about that from what you do in the life coaching, because I’m super fascinated by it.
Yeah, absolutely. Well, and I, I don’t know about the blue, per se and the subconscious. So that sounds amazing. And something that I need to check out. But I could be completely false. It was. No, you heard it here. First guys, I want to test this theory,
not googled anything about it. But this is what she said her mentor told her that if you write with blue marker on blue index cards, you have a better chance of, I don’t know, absorption, rewiring. Now whether the blue makes a difference, or if it’s just that mantra based kind of mindset work that shifts it. I’m curious to kind of test the theory but
well, and so even if it has nothing to do with the colors, if you’re literally writing it down, and you’re reading it to yourself, like the subconscious. The thing about it is like you have 1000s of inputs at every single second of the day, right? If you really started to think what all is my brain processing just right here as we sit together in this moment, what is really going on in your brain, like there are I mean, you’re breathing, you’re digesting most likely like we’re right after lunch, right? You’re, you’re you’re feeling the air on your body, you literally can feel it all over. But you have learned to filter things that you don’t need to pay attention to you and plus, like there’s things that automatically happen. You don’t have to say Breathe in, breathe out, breathe in, breathe out. heartbeat, heartbeat, heartbeat heartbeat, right? Those things just happen. But our brains, they don’t know the difference between the subconscious mind anyway, it doesn’t really know the difference between fact, opinion and limiting beliefs, right? I’m sure you’ve heard limiting beliefs before. And so when you are trying to rewire your brain to think a different way, because it’s really true, if you continue to do the things that you’re doing, you’re never going to get to where you want to be. Because you would already be there. Right? Because the way that you react to certain situations are based on how you have been conditioned previously, right? It could be your upbringing, it could be your education, it could be, you know, there’s lots of things, your relationships, right, past girlfriends and boyfriends, your marriage, your children, all these things play a role in the way that you react to things, even so far as to how much sleep you got last night, right? We know that people that aren’t sleeping well, super irritable, right? That amygdala that controls our emotions in the front of our brain doesn’t talk to the, the prefrontal cortex, all these things, they, they disconnect, right? So it’s all this big system, it’s all working together. And so when you’re trying to rewire that, you literally have to teach yourself to think a new thought. So I really like the activity. I’m the type of person that so you know, we hear people talk about affirmations. And personally, I have always thought affirmations were a bit like, wow, you know, just like, Oh, god, they’re gonna tell me, I’m bold. I’m beautiful. I’m amazing. I’m going to stand in front of this mirror. And I’m going to tell myself all these things. I feel that vision board. Yes. I mean, it’s it’s corny, right. But the science behind it is that it does work. You have to find a way that speaks to you, though. Right? So on the enneagram, there are nine different personality types, okay. And even within those nine, you get this mix of different types that create your unique personality. And what drives you your core motivations. So typically, like there, it’s an indicator of your core fears and your core longings, right. So there’s always something that you’re moving away from you make decisions to move away from this horrible thing that you fear, and you make decisions to move towards this wonderful idea that you have, right? So there’s the spectrum that you’re always you’re running from this fear, you’re running towards this longing. And at the at the root of these cores, that what causes people to have these different personalities. And so as you’re trying to really understand, like, subconsciously, what’s going on, you have to dig deep. And you know, people always blame it on our childhood, right? It’s always it’s my mom, my mom, and my dad screwed me up
their fault. And what am I doing to my children? What can I do to not screw them up? The truth is, and I heard this in one of my enneagram classes. The instructor, she said, children are fantastic observers, but they are horrible interpreters. So while ultimately everything goes back to your childhood, it’s all your parents fault. It wasn’t because they had some motive and they were doing something wrong, like really good parents. But a child can interpret it in a weird way. And it leads them on this path. They’ve set something in their brain. There was a funny story that I have with my my parents. So I think I’m like, eight, eight years old, maybe. And we’re going on our very first camping trip. And we’re headed off and we’re driving and we’re driving and we’re driving and we’re driving and it is pouring rain. So there’s some other families that they’re camping with that had gone ahead and set up the the tents and everything, and they were in charge of getting the alcohol I had no idea At the time that this was what was going on this is this is post observation, right? And so we’re driving and we’re driving and we’re stopping at all these places. And I’m just like, Can we please just go to the, to the campsite? And they’re talking on CB radios? Okay, so if this like, ages me, like, but I just remember that they’re talking, and they keep talking about this dry county that we’re in. And they’re going on and on about the dry County. And I’m finally from the backseat. I’m just like, Can we just go camping? And what are you talking about? It is not dry. Here. It is anything but dry. Right? And I’m just, I’m mad. I have no idea the interpretation that I had going on? Well, apparently, we were in a dry County, they were in charge of alcohol, they were stopping at every place they could trying to find somewhere to get alcohol. And, you know, that was their camping trip. Yeah. And so like they were they were actually being really good citizens. They were part of this camping community. But I had no idea. And so my interpretations were completely different. So you got to think of like, what? I would never have known any of that at the time. Right? Yeah. And so we’re terrible interpreters. And we have to challenge what we have. money grows on, doesn’t grow on trees, you know, some of the time things, right? All the balance. I even remember talking about relationships with my parents, and my mom and dad didn’t have a great relationship. And so she would give me some pretty bad advice around relationships that I know now. I’m like, bless her. She was trying her best. But she was miserable. Yeah, right. And so it all comes into play. And so when you get to the root of why you’re making the decisions, the way that you are, it really starts to open you up and free you up. And so for me, I’m a three on the inia gram. Okay? This is the achiever that cheevers need to be achieving. And if there’s another, you know, now I can see this, but if there’s another certification, I have to go get it, right, I have to get all of them, I have to be achieving, if I’m not achieving, who am I? And if I’m not like, I need to make my parents proud of me, I need to everyone around me needs to see this image of me. What that does is, it’s hard for me to be my authentic self. Yeah. And so you were talking about how important authenticity is. Right? And so I love that. And so that’s kind of where my, my practice has been shifting helping people see what is your true authentic self? So I love that you were talking about that, you know, I just celebrated my 40th in September, you know, during COVID, and all the things, but you’re right, the challenge, the balance, and the authentic. I love that. But you know what, it doesn’t have to be in those areas, right? It doesn’t have to be in those decades. What if we could get to a 20 year old and they could, like really start to self reflect, and they can get to some of that authentic? Now, wouldn’t it be amazing?
Oh my gosh, I wish like I so wish I started to do even the stuff with the entrepreneurial journey I went on six years ago, taking the leap down with all of you. And, you know, it’s one of those were like, I mean, I grinded much like you in corporate America. Like, you just grind and I always felt like something like, I gotta be perfect. I’m gonna do a great job. And no matter what I did, I always did a good job. So I think like, it’s hard because, you know, I was picking up my son at a playdate yesterday. And the mom was like, keeping you’re doing the HSA stuff. And then you’re running like the neighborhood stuff. And then you’re doing your business like you never seem stressed out, like, how do you do everything that you do? And sleep, you know, and I’m like, I go to bed at nine o’clock every night, and I wake up every day at five. I mean, I plan but is the world gonna end if I don’t plant the pansies at the front of the neighborhood. And I totally just last year had like this moment where I was stressing myself out. I was trying to be the perfect everything and do all the things. And like I even say to my husband now I get up at 5am and I work from five to seven because my kids are sleeping COVID weird. My kids are in school, but they’re home at two, I got to pick them up from Caroline because Isabella can’t take the bus because she’s only in pre K and blah, blah, blah. So it’s like I kind of work from five to seven. And then between seven and eight I get them to school. I’m usually back on my laptop at eight. I worked till two that I have to do Coraline and then I bring them back at three and they either go play in the neighborhood or that there’s 100 kids here sometimes I get lucky and they play outside. Other times I can work and not And it’s like, that’s my day. And I just said to my husband the other day, like, I feel guilty because every morning when the kids wake up, I’m working. And then I’m working. And then I work in the afternoon when they get home from school sometimes. And then, you know, I work at night sometimes. And sometimes I’m working on things for like their sports, or I’m coaching an event and I’m on with other coaches or something, you know, but they don’t see it. They just see mommy working all the time. Meanwhile, Daddy leaves at five and we don’t know what he does in the morning, because he leaves at five and then he gets back about 630 every night. And then he plays and it’s fun, Daddy, and I’m like, Man, you’re fun Daddy, and I’m mommy’s always working. Right? And so, you know, I just said to my husband, like, do you think I should stop working at five when they get up at like, six or whatever? And like, play with them? He’s like, no, Courtney, like, you have a job. And they have to understand that like, you’re working and they should be proud of mommy for having a job where she’s working. But like, I feel like no matter what, there’s like this mom guilt that comes in. Oh, like, you want to mic. Right? All right. Well, the mommy’s gonna work. You know, my daughter’s birthday is tomorrow. And she’s like, I want you know, I’ve skateboard I want a dog like, Okay, well, mommy has to work to hide this stuff and pay the mortgage. And you know,
yeah, right food in your mouth, the lights over your head. It’s all the things right? And you don’t want to just beat that into them. Right? You’re not you just don’t want to be Money, money, money, money. But like, if you were to describe what the perfect day would look like to you, how would you want that to be working?
I love I love like, people say to me, you don’t relax, you can’t you don’t have a hobby, you know, my hobbies working. But I actually like I like working. So for me like relaxing is screwing around on my website, playing with the copy, you know what I mean? Like I enjoy them. So I do like gardening. We’re just getting back into that. So the outside a lot more. That’s my forte of like true chillin. But aren’t if you saw Facebook, like I just built a wood farm table last week, I did want to get into the hobby all the time. One is in a white calm, you know, and I was like, I can do this, you know, and she puts out these great plans that are free. But like, I don’t know, the hobby. So for me, like my ideal day is kind of wake up, work a little bit, have breakfast chill with the kids when they’re not in school, have them go play me work a little more. And then you know, kind of early afternoon, call it a day and do all the things go for the walks, go for the hikes, go to the park, you know, just have fun with my kids and my husband and enjoy quality time together, like COVID has brought out a sense of family here. And I’m sure it has for you as well. Like we play board games at night. Now we play war, we just learned how to play war with the kids. So they love that bingo spinner. We tried to include that they cheat and they don’t really know what they’re doing because they’re young. So we just Yes, it was a hard one. conservatory right. But, you know, it’s just I don’t know, I I enjoy working as I know you do when it’s hard because I think as a parent trying to balance like your own personality type to wake up feeling fulfilled. And at the same time, do all the things right?
And I don’t think there’s anything wrong with your hobby being work. Like there’s really nothing wrong. But guess what, there’s even guilt associated with that. Like, you know what, because you can’t say, My hobby is blah, blah, blah. It’s like you almost feel like, Oh, well, what am I doing wrong? Because I don’t? And so then you have you have this little loop running in the background? I kind of I kind of describe it as imagine that you have this web browser open, right? And all the little tabs that you have open, these are all the loops that you have going on kind of simultaneously in the back of your mind. And what does your browser look like? Do you have like tons of tabs open running all the time? What does that do for your CPU? Yeah, usage, right. Even if you’re not actively engaged on one of these pages, it’s using up some of your memory, right, it’s using some of your resources. And so a lot of times having all of these open can start to drain you on your energy. And I think that this is one of the places where we really start to feel out of balance, right. And so say, this is the time that you’ve designated to be your family time and you’re out on your walk and you’re out doing fun stuff with the kids. But then you think about that client that you needed to send a message to. And so you get your phone out, and I’m just gonna send this quick message real fast. So now you’re feeling guilty that you’re not present with the children. You’re feeling like you didn’t you forgot to do something with this client, right? So you’re pulled in these different directions. Your browsers are spinning on your your tabs are spinning on your browser. And this is where you have to start to isolate and recognize And you talked about it earlier, those boundaries,
those boundaries are huge. I just bought a book on boundaries. Oh, that’s a little one for girls, I found that at the dollar store for my daughter, goodness, create your movement and empowered journal for girls. So that one’s not the one I was talking about. But this one, I got a five below be happy 35 powerful methods for personal growth and well being. And I was like, I need that. But there’s a whole section here on boundaries, right? Like, I am not good at boundaries, because I feel guilty. Like, I know, it’s a Saturday at three o’clock at my daughter’s birthday party. But it’s just a quick sleep question. And I feel bad because they’re a paying client and I want to make sure that their nap goes beautifully. You know what? Yeah, okay.
But how could we communicate a boundary so that they are not expecting? I respond?
They don’t expect it. I respond. You know, we have a call on Fridays. And I make sure all my clients have a call friday so that they know, here’s our goals for the weekend. Here’s how we’re set up for success. Here’s what to do. Like, they’re very clear and very aware. I break the boundary. Right? Yeah, email comes in that says, I don’t expect you to answer this till Monday. I just need to get my thoughts out while I have 20 minutes while little Billy’s sleeping. And then I’m like, oh, respond. Like you don’t have to respond. Like,
I don’t know, I so how can you not see the email? I know, the email that triggers you, right? It is
I honestly, I have a watch an Apple Watch. But I only wear it when I have a client who’s paying for extended support. Right? Really, who basically says like, who they have access to me at nights or weekends during our coaching and such. And that’s it like otherwise, I turn the notifications off, I shut the app off on my phone. Now I no longer get WhatsApp messages. I have like an out of office. And so because I think to your point, like just this week, I’m like, I gotta set some boundaries, because it’s driving me crazy. You know, just always feeling guilty, even though there’s nobody expecting me to.
Yeah, yeah. Right. And and I think that it’s such a really good point that you’re bringing up because you’re not the only one that feels that way. Right. And honestly, I think that you do have some really good systems in place, that kind of help there. But think about somebody who is new on this journey, and they literally have no systems in place to help kind of keep these boundaries in place. And so that is where it does start to come in handy to talk to a coach. You know, I think that people just like in asleep, baby sleep world? Is it that we know everything about it? Is it that the parents know nothing about it, know, that they just need someone to help keep them accountable.
And I think that that the accountability of it even in what we do, like, you know it, I mean, most people out there you can google a sleep training method, guess what, you’re still gonna have failures, you know, why? Yes, that’s an eighth of the puzzle. And you’re not putting it all together, you know, and I think to your point, hiring someone like yourself, to, to work through those other components, like I could know that I suck at boundaries, I can know that I have the all these things I gotta lay out into my leg, don’t like want to do don’t want to do stuff. But like, if there’s nobody holding me accountable, it’s always gonna go away,
you’re gonna gravitate back to that. Remember that core longing and that core fear. It’s always going to go back to that. And sometimes I’m guilty of this. I know. But you know, the all or nothing approach to things. Like we do this to ourselves all the time, I’m going to eat healthy. I’m never going to have another carb in my life. I’m going to I’m all in right running. Okay, yes, I’m going to run every day. And I am going to strength train, and I’m going to do all the things. And you know what, you might start out pretty good, right? willpower does have power, but it only gets you so far. And then suddenly, something happens, you slowly creep back in. And somehow you find yourself back where you started. Sometimes you’re usually a little bit better for it. Hopefully, something has stuck. And so a lot of times what I talk about with clients is the 1%. Now, if you’ve never read atomic habits, that is an amazing book. And it talks about what is your 1% instead of rewriting your entire life, rewriting your entire morning routine, what is one thing one small change that you can make that takes you 1% closer to what you want. Right? So like in my world, so laundry has been an issue. Okay, so it piles up. And then like at the end of the week, you know, I have the two children that live with us and then my daughter, my oldest daughter is kind of in and out. Then we have us and like But laundry just accumulates, right? And so we would do it on the weekend. But then we got tired of doing it on the weekend, because this was supposed to be our time not just recovering from the, the shit show of the week, right? And so it’s so I thought you it, I could tie this to me getting in the shower, I know I’m going to shower every morning, right? I know, without a doubt, I’m going to shower. That’s what I do in the mornings. And so now when I get into the shower, I think, oh, let me go. I’ll put a load in the washing machine. And I’ll delay it for one hour because I don’t want it running while I’m in the shower. Right? I don’t want to be competing with water pressure. And so I’m late work. Yes. And so I’ll delay it. But I know now that it is started. And so my husband has a habit. Now when he comes home from work, he sees that the lid down, that means change it to the dryer. So now we have it washed and dried. And then we’ve got one load that we can fold while we’re watching a show or something. And that load that laundry pile up isn’t happening anymore. With that one small little change. And I didn’t do it perfectly from the start. It was kind of hit or miss. I was like oh yeah, I remember to do it today. Oh, dang, no, I didn’t remember to do it today. But now I’m on it. And I’ve got it and it’s worked in. Instead of when I get up, I’m going to do a load of laundry I’m in and make sure all the dishes are done. I’m going to make sure I’ve kissed in all the kids and that I’ve made all the lunches and I’ve done all the things right starts.
Yeah. I love that. I love that. And I know you haven’t come in in a little bit. So yes. Tell me a little bit more about how folks can reach out to you how they can connect about like, I’m ready for a coach. I need accountability in my life. And I want to talk to Dana. So what does that look like? How can they find you? How can they reach you?
Well, so I spend a lot of time on Instagram, you can find me at the Dana stone. And then live and rest.com spell it out live and AMD rest. And then you can get connected with all kinds of stuff. I’ve actually got a five tips to reducing overwhelm on my site that you can go download. It’s just quick and easy download takes you through just taking it out of your brain, putting it down and just starting to relax and take a deep breath. So this has been so fun, Courtney, I’m so glad that I got to join you today.
I miss you. I wish I ran a girls trip post COVID worlds, and I will get some more warm with margaritas.
Yeah, we need to celebrate our entry into the 40s.
Amen, sister well, awesome. Thank you so much for joining me today. Thanks everybody for listening. And, as always, if you need anything reach out to Dana check out all of her sites as well as my facebook group summer Made Simple where I will put all of the links as well. So I hope everybody has a beautiful rest of the day. Thank you so much for tuning in. Until next time, bye for now.

Hold on one more thing before you go. As a valued listener of the kids sleep show. I want to help you build a great sleep or not just in the times you’re listening to the show. But all day every day. Every week of the year. I have a new Facebook group called slumber Made Simple. It’s a place to gather with other parents looking for sleep support, laughs and the latest in sleep research to build a family that is rested and at their best day in and day out. If you want to be part of the community where you can get free sleep support, weekly training sessions, unbelievable content and so much more. Head on over to tiny transitions.com forward slash community that’s tiny transitions.com forward slash community or head over to Facebook and search slumber Made Simple. drop me a note and let me know when you join. I can’t wait to see you there.