MINDFULNESS & POSITIVE THINKING FOR KIDS AND PARENTS | DIANA COLE

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CAMILLE WALKER [0:02]

Positive thinking is something that we're all trying to work more on, but how do we teach it to our children? Today, I am speaking with thought leader and author Diana Cole, who recently released the book Alina the Positive Thought Warrior. She's going to walk us through the steps to walking our children to develop positive thought and how you as well can overcome negativity with practical step by step application. Let's dive in and bring a notebook because this is a good one.

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CAMILLE [0:36]

So, you want to make an impact. You're thinking about starting a business, sharing your voice. How do women do it that handle motherhood, family, and still chase after those dreams? We'll listen each week as we dive into the stories of women who know. This is Call Me CEO.

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CAMILLE [0:55]

Welcome back everyone to another episode of Call Me CEO and I am thrilled to be here with you today because we are speaking with Diana Cole, who is an author, teacher of positive thought, and recently released the book Alina the Positive Thought Warrior. She helps others to develop positive thoughts in themselves and also helping parents teach their children how to have positive thought processes as well. So, thank you, Diana, so much for being here today. I am thrilled to have you.

DIANA COLE [1:24]

Thank you so much. I am so thrilled to be here also.

CAMILLE [1:27]

Tell us a little bit about your journey becoming an author, what that looked like, and also how you got particularly interested in positive thinking.

DIANA [1:36]

Okay. I grew up with a dad who was a human potential pioneer, a pioneer in the New Age movement in the 60s and 70s here in the San Francisco Bay area and I was exposed to a lot of forward thinking, meditation from the age of four and he had friends who were very influential authors and leaders that we all know the names of. And I was really exposed from a young age to these concepts of positive thinking, meditation, self-love and I took it for granted and I thought everybody may have learned those things.

And as I grew up, I decided to go out on my own and have my own life and I didn't need those things. It all sounded nice, but whatever. And I opened a business that I had exercise studios on both coasts of the U.S. and it was a big business that was energetically draining me. And it was so hard for me to go through the ebbs and flows of that business that it got me to the point where I realized I didn't want to do that anymore. And when I got to my lowest low, which was right before that business collapsed, I realized that I needed to go back to what I learned as a child to help pull me out of that. And it worked so well for me that I decided I needed to start writing about it and letting the world know, as many people that I could touch know, that there is a way that we can pull ourselves out of these dark moments and there's a way that we can teach our children to do the same thing.

CAMILLE [3:18]

Wow, what a gift. I mean, what an introduction. I find that a lot of times I've talked with people who have perhaps learned from their childhood in reverse like things that they need to overcome through therapy or shadow work or do different things that they maybe have suppressed, but what a gift to be able to touch back into a wonderful and enlightening childhood. That's incredible.

DIANA [3:41]

Yeah. It was incredible.

CAMILLE [3:42]

Is that something that your parents both prescribed to? How was it that they engendered those values in you?

DIANA [3:50]

Yeah. Well, my mother was not really in this world of the human potential movement. She was just a normal woman having a normal life, not thinking about internal processes too much. But I was closer to my father and I spent a lot of time with him just listening and sitting next to him and travelling while he was giving talks all around the world about this stuff and just trying to digest everything I could, mostly because I just wanted to hang out with him.

But I was absorbing it at the same time, and then as I got older and I started having problems, he was also a psychiatrist. So, as I was having problems, I was consulting him on everything and his answers and the way that he guided me through things were always coming from that place of what I learned, that foundation. He always was consistent with walking the walk and talking the talk. So, I feel like I was really deeply steeped in his teaching and I feel really empowered now to be able to teach others.

CAMILLE [4:55]

So, you're a mother yourself. Tell us about your children.

DIANA [4:58]

Yeah. I have an only child and she is almost 19 and she's the co-author of our children's book Alina the Positive Thought Warrior.

CAMILLE [5:08]

Oh, and is her name Alina?

DIANA [5:10]

Her name is Lucy.

CAMILLE [5:12]

Okay. So, where does the name Alina come in? Just one that you picked and you liked?

DIANA [5:15]

Yeah. She picked it. She just thought that it was a cute name for a positive thought warrior who is going to teach children better thought processes.

CAMILLE [5:24]

That is such a fascinating story. Now, you say that you traveled with your dad. He was doing speaking engagements as an author and a psychiatrist. Okay. And as you were coming back to that, how did you find your way back to creating those positive thoughts and the links to your childhood? What was it that brought you back there?

DIANA [5:48]

Yeah. So, when I feel like my life started falling apart and I think we all go through those moments like our life takes these ebbs and flows where we have these really hard moments we have to get through and these really great moments. Well, for me, getting through those hard moments when they were really hard, it became life changing when I figured out how to pull myself out. I was a single mother with businesses that were failing. I could barely afford my rent. I was just at my rock bottom and I went back and did some of the things that he taught me and was able to really change things quickly and improve my life so drastically that I wanted to help other people do the same thing for themselves. And it really is about how to think your life better.

CAMILLE [6:41]

That's amazing. Take me through the process of creating those positive thought patterns.

DIANA [6:49]

Okay. So, I always say that teaching positive thought, it's hard because what happens is we've all heard positive thinking, think positive and we've all tried that and it hasn't worked. You read a couple affirmations on your phone or you think, "Oh, I'll think some good thoughts for a few minutes" and it doesn't work because it can't sustain you.

And positive thinking and changing your life around positive thinking is a habit and it's hard. It's like dieting. It's like going to AA and stopping drinking. It's like giving up a habit that you need to give up. It's a habit that needs to be developed and it needs to be practiced on a daily basis and you cannot let it go or you're going to feel like it's not working.

So, you need to start first thing in the morning and right when you wake up, I always say that is a very important time because a lot of us will wake up with an alarm. And the alarm goes off and you're like, "Ah! I can't believe I got to get up." And you're trying to figure out what you're going to do first and, "Oh, I've got to do this, this, this." Your checklist starts being created in your head.

But when you wake up in the morning, if you can take five minutes an0d I know that sounds like a long time, but set your alarm five minutes early and just take five minutes to sit and absorb and be grateful that you're alive and that you're here and that you have another day to have a new adventure and that you're grateful for your children who you're going to be seeing in a few minutes and you're grateful for the sunlight coming through your window. And just start thinking about the things that you're so excited about in your day without going right to those things that you wish you didn't have to do or the to-do list or the worry list. So, that's the first thing.

CAMILLE [8:36]

I love that so much because I think that if there's one thing the pandemic has taught me is that taking time to slow down matters and really taking a beat of where we are emotionally just changes everything, so to take those five minutes, I don’t think that really sounds like a long time. I think that for me, when I've taken in the morning to really connect to who I am and what it is that I want from the day and the moment for gratitude, it really changes things.

DIANA [9:08]

It does. And I think most of us are popping out of bed after maybe snoozing a bunch of times and we don't really want to wake up early and start our day of tasks, especially if you have multiple children who are young and you have to get them off to school and you have to get them fed and you have to get them dressed. And it's like you're starting your day in chaos if you just jump out of bed and you're ready to go with your task list and your worry list and the thing is, I always will say that I feel like the worry list goes in tandem with the task list because it means there's a lot you have to do and you might not be able to do it all. So, just shifting your thoughts first in the morning is a really good practice.

CAMILLE [10:00]

Okay. I love that. So, number one, shifting your thoughts first thing in the morning. What's your next tip?

DIANA [10:04]

So, this is around the idea of teaching your children positive thinking, it's so easy to take those moments that I think we take for granted and turn them in teaching moments. So, one of them would be the bathtub. So, you get your kid or kids in the bathtub and I think a lot of us are like, "Oh. We got a second." This is a really good time to start talking to children about what I just said you do in the morning for yourself.

You talk to them about, "What did you enjoy today? What made you happy today? What did you really like? Did someone say something to you that made you happy?" And starting to talk to them about what they enjoy about their day while they're in the bath and what this also does is it establishes a practice for them early on of finding stillness and finding warmth and this could later turn into a meditation process. But it starts with really just feeling calm and safe and talking about the things that you enjoy and the things that you like about your day.

CAMILLE [11:12]

I like that. Associating that warmth and comfort with a purpose. I find for me, I'm in the car a lot with four kids and we'll talk a lot with, this works best if it's just a kid one on one, but I'll turn off the radio and it works best with your oldest kids like teenagers and just talk to them. "So, what happened today and what are you thinking about that?" We also have a practice that we do a "high, low, did you know?" at dinner time where each person takes a turn saying something they loved, something they didn't and "Did you know?" like something curious that happened, so it gets them talking. But I'll have to try that with the bath. I really like that idea.

DIANA [11:55]

That's nice and I do have one around dinner time also.

CAMILLE [11:59]

Okay. Let's hear it.

DIANA [11:59]

Yeah. So, a lot of us grow up praying at mealtime. You give thanks for your meal and that's something I think has been established as not too out there. A lot of people are doing that. Some are. Some aren't. It's okay. But mealtime is a really good time to also bring the focus back to thanks or to happy thoughts. So, it's a really good time to whether you do have a prayer to continue it and if you don't have a prayer, you'll make positive thinking your prayer.

So, one of the things, it's self-talk is your prayer. So, this is a really good time to say things to your daughter to say, "You look so beautiful today. Did you have a good day?" Start talking to her in a way that you want her to talk to herself because a lot of the times children will talk to themselves the way you talk to them. And I don't think that a lot of us really realize that because we're busy and we're trying to get a lot done and there's a lot to do and when we are talking to our kids, a lot of the times we're rushed. And a lot of times I think we're not really talking to children in that extreme way like, "You're so beautiful."

You want your daughter to look in the mirror and say, "I'm beautiful." You want that. That is what we need as people. We need to feel good about ourselves. So, starting their self-talk processes by talking to them the way you want them to talk to themselves at the dinner table is a really good time. It's at time when they're distracted, but also with you. So, they're not really so focused on, "What? Why'd you say that?" They're eating and like, "Okay" and nodding and listening. And so, it's a good time for them to be able to digest the positive thinking while they're digesting what they're eating.

CAMILLE [13:50]

Oh, I love that. I love that you talk specifically. I have heard that the way that you speak to your children is the way that our children think about themselves or that voice they hear in their head. Wow, that's a lot of pressure, which like you say, a lot of times we are rushed and a lot of times we are thinking about the to-dos and the time constraints and that's a really good reminder.

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CAMILLE [14:14]

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CAMILLE [15:03]

Do you have any advice for the parents listening of how to keep that front of mind to remember that that's the connection that's happening?

DIANA [15:20]

Yeah. Well, I think for parents, it's really, really important to be able to take time even if it's five minutes every now and then just to get still and quiet and just like, "Whoo." Just like breath because we have a lot to do. All of us are running around. We all have huge to-do lists and I suspect most of us can't do everything on our to do list.

So, instead of always being behind the list, just decide it doesn't matter for five minutes two or three times a day and if you have to set your phone to know, "Okay. I’m going to go into my five-to-10-minute quiet moment." It's important just to have those moments because when you can't have this stillness, clear thought, clear the chatter, and just get into stillness, you naturally align with kindness. And kindness is that thing that when it bubbles through you, you can share it so much easier and you become I think a better parent because you're not stressed out or as frazzled trying to get everything done.

CAMILLE [16:23]

I believe that. I notice that I've been adopting meditation more into my daily ritual. I do it for myself and also with my son and I think that you're right because when we're present, we are more filled with gratitude for the moment and it puts out of the state of mind of, "What's happening next?" to "What am I grateful for now?" And it just totally reframes everything.

DIANA [16:49]

And it's really great as your kids older. I mean you can't do this with a 1- or 2- or 3-year-old, but as they get older, it's really nice when you take those moments, those five or 10 minutes to invite your children with you and just be like, "Do you want to be with me for my quiet moment?" It's special. And they're like, "Yeah. Okay." "So, here are the rules. You have to sit down. You can do crisscross applesauce or you can do whatever your little position is. You can sit here with me and we're just going to be quiet, no thinking and no talking. And when the alarm goes off on my phone, then we can talk about what we saw with our eyes closed."

Ask them to close their eyes and just watch what happens while your eyes are closed. "See the movie behind your eyelids, and then when the alarm goes off, let's talk about it. Let's talk about how we felt and what we saw." And it's incredible because kids are already tapped into that. So, we call it imagination that they're tapping into, but it's really that internal knowing that we lose that they're already there with. So, it's really nice to invite them to those moments, and then they start that practice themselves.

CAMILLE [17:54]

That's fascinating that you said that that they're already there in that zone and I think that's true. The meditations I've been doing with my son, well, two of my sons, they've been the ones that I've just found on YouTube that are like three-, five- or ten-minute meditation and it's like, "There's a butterfly that's flying around and it lands on your forehead, and then it lands here, and then it lands there." So, are you suggesting that you just go cold turkey and you just, say, lay for 10 or do you feel like it's a good place to start with something more guided?

DIANA [18:26]

Well, if you need a guided meditation, then for sure use it. I know a lot of people need guided meditations, but a true meditation practice is about complete stillness and quiet. It's about not thinking. It's about not listening, not thinking on anything on the external and going inward and being completely quiet. And you can't let your kids lay down because they can fall asleep and you don't want them to think about it as naptime. You have to have everybody sitting up. And you can do it outside. You can do it inside in a little special room or it could be your walk-in closet or wherever it feels special like you want quiet time.

"We're going to do stillness. Do you want to do stillness with me?" And then, they get excited about it and they want to do stillness with mommy. They don't want to be doing something else. And you just ask them to sit down and just clear their thoughts. No thinking. Watch the light show up when your eyes are closed and tell them you want to hear about it when the alarm goes off. You want to hear what they saw when their eyes were closed and it's a form of an adventure.

CAMILLE [19:27]

Wow. I love that. I actually just listened to a book about meditation help. It's free on Audible. I don't know. It's called Your Guide to Meditation and his advice is just to focus on breathing that if your mind starts to wander, just go back to your breath. Do you think that that is a good advice or that it is okay to watch the light show, so to speak?

DIANA [19:51]

Yeah. So, I think it depends on your children. So, I have a daughter who is very Type A for some reason and if I tell her to concentrate on her breathing, she starts feeling like she can't breathe. Do you know what I'm saying?

CAMILLE [20:05]

Yeah.

DIANA [20:05]

So, some of our kids are stressed out.

CAMILLE [20:10]

Yeah, most.

DIANA [20:11]

There's a lot going on. Sometimes, for me, if I put focus on something like that for my daughter and freak her out, I can't think about this anymore. And she would get frazzled by that. So, for me, it didn't work for her to concentrate on her breathing. So, I had to ask her to, because she's more creative, watch what was happening in those moments when her eyes were closed because we all have this little show that goes on when our eyes are closed that we can concentrate on.

CAMILLE [20:41]

That's good advice. I do think you're right that everyone's minds operate a little bit differently. And one thing that I really liked that I've heard in the past about creating positive thought is that we have to think about our thought patterns and how it's like having a pile of sand and our thought is the water that comes down and channels are produced where the water falls. And what happens when you take more water and pour it on the exact same spot? Those grooves get deeper and deeper and they run in the same places.

So, it really does take concerted effort to change those channels and to create a new path. What would you suggest to parents and even we as adults listening, what are some good ways to create new channels and paths when we find ourselves talking to ourselves negatively or coming down on ourselves for something we might have done wrong or even just there's a rehearsal of something that we've heard since we were kids and it's maybe something our parents said to us that we can't seem to shake?

DIANA [21:45]

Yeah. Well, there are a few things. So, first for children, I would say that a lot of children are like I said, worried about things too, just different things. They're worried about going to school or will their friends be nice to them? Or whatever. Going to a new class that they're starting and they're by themselves and it's like, "I don't know if I want to do this." They just get nervous.

So, one of the things that I think really, really helps to start all that is to get them a worry stone or a crystal. So, for me, I would let my daughter pick out a little crystal or a little stone on the ground or whatever that she felt good about and I would tell her to hold it and she'd just know that this was her good luck stone and her special stone that she would take with her whenever she was worried. So, if she had any hesitation about going somewhere or worry about something, I would ask her to hold her stone and just warm it up in her hands and put it in her pocket and know that it's there for her so that she's safe and doesn't have to worry.

Because one of the things is that our worry processes break down our positive thinking processes, so trying to clear the worry first or start thinking of that as a practice makes positive thinking a lot easier. So, as far as positive thinking, I would say, the best way to start that is to make a list. So, instead of a worry list, you make a positive thought list and this needs to be all the positive aspects about you and your life. And you can do noel for yourself and you can help your child do one for them or you can write one for them, but it's nice to get them involved.

And I know it sounds strange I think for some of us because we're not taught to say good things about ourselves even when we're not talking to anybody. In our heads, we're not wired to walk by mirrors and be like, "Oh, I look good or I'm happy with my hair today or I feel so good when I look at my reflection in the mirror." Most of us are like, "Oh, God. There's another wrinkle or I’m fat or whatever." So, if we can start making lists about the things that are positive about ourselves that we like about ourselves and start reciting those lists as often as we have a chance. So, that means either posting it on a mirror or putting it on your nightstand and reading it before you go to bed and when you wake up in the mirror.

And then, helping your child do the same thing. So, if you have a son, you would say, "We're going to make a list of all the amazing things about you. Can you help me with that? Let's do it together," or like, "I think you're really good at drawing. What do you think?" "Yeah. I'm really good at drawing. I'm an amazing artist." "Okay." "Let's talk about something else. You're a really good brother." "Yeah. I'm a really good brother. I am an amazing brother." Make it as an "I am" statement. "I think you're a really handsome boy." "Yeah. I'm definitely handsome. I am a very handsome boy."

So, you're going to ask your child to read that list in the morning and you can do it with them or at night before they go to bed and tucking in, that nighttime ritual is a really nice time to do it. It's when everyone's getting calm and you're putting everyone in bed. It's like, "Okay. Get your positivity list out. Let's read it together." And if your kids share rooms, you can have one do one, and then the other or you could just go to each kid one at a time and have them read their list. And have 10 to 15 points on each list, so that it takes a couple of minutes to get through it. And they feel really good about themselves because you're telling them all the amazing things about themselves that they're telling themselves before they go to bed. And it's a really good time to go into the dream state with feeling good about yourself.

And then, you wake up and you go ahead and read it in the morning or at night whenever you prefer. I like night time for that. And then, if your kids end up getting stressed up during the day or you know how kids have little breakdowns every now and then, you can pull the list out and say, "Let's talk about your positivity list. I think you might need a little help right now, a little pick me up. Let's go through your list." And then, have them read the list and be like, "Everything's okay. Look at it. You're amazing." And you want them to start feeling like, "Yes. They are amazing. We are all amazing and we're all living these amazing lives." And you want them to tap into that as early as possible.

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CAMILLE [26:03]

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CAMILLE [26:40]

Oh, I love that. I've created a positivity list for myself, but I haven't thought to make one for my kids and I haven't thought about doing it at night because I feel like a lot of times that's when the fears come out like, "Oh no. I'm afraid I'm going to have a nightmare." And I've created different ways for them to try to think positively before they go to bed, but I haven't thought to do it that way. I think that's a really, really good idea.

DIANA [27:07]

And you can write a list around nightmares too. So, if your kids have little phobias or fears like that, you can write lists around that. You can write a list that says, "I do not have nightmares at night. I only dream about things that make me happy at night." And just starting having them read that list because putting that thought out there is really what creates our existence and we are in control of this experience that we have in this body that we are in.

So, you can get them starting to think about the fact that you don't have to have nightmares. "You can welcome them or you can say goodbye to them. Let's just say goodbye to nightmares and let's start welcoming, what do you want to dream about?" My daughter would probably have said, "I want to dream about animals that talk. Okay. I don’t have nightmares anymore. I'll dream about animals that talk. It makes me happy. I have happy dreams that make me feel good, so in the morning I'm excited." And you can write all that down and you could have them read that with you almost like reading a book.

CAMILLE [28:10]

I like that idea. I have had conversations with my kids about, "What would you want to dream about and what would that look like? And be thinking about that as you go to bed." But we haven't written it down. I think that would really connect the dots in their brain even deeper to be thinking about it, write it down, and then read it. That sounds like the perfect combination to create that.

DIANA [28:31]

Yeah. I mean, because kids are open. They want to learn. They're like little sponges, just learning everything around them. So, the more tools we give them, the easier it is for them as they get older and they'll remember these things and they'll use them when they're older. They'll use them when they're at college and they'll have a little list that they pull out of their nightstands and read to themselves to feel better. Because that's the thing, we're living in these lives that are hard and we all want to feel better. I mean, that's really the goal. Happiness is feeling good. So, we have to come up with tricks and these habits that help us feel better because we are really the ones that can help us do that.

CAMILLE [29:06]

Yeah. It's true. Our thoughts really paint our existence. There's just no other way around it. That really is what it is. What would you say to the adults who are listening and may need some reframing for themselves? Are there specific tools that you would suggest? Should they create a thought list if they're having bad dreams? Do you think that the exact same rules apply to both?

DIANA [29:28]

I do, but because we are higher thinkers and we've had these lifetimes we have. We start getting this thing called self-doubt. And when you have doubt, you erase all manifestation. So, if you are doubting that you have these wonderful qualities, it's going to be harder for you to get feeling internally like you have these great qualities. So, we have these barriers we have to break down a little bit and we have to just start doing these lists and reading them over and over, so that we can start feeling better right away.

Because here's the thing. When you start reading these lists every day, you feel better for sure. There's no way around it and I will even go as far as when you have a bad experience with somebody or yourself or somebody was angry at the grocery store or whatever it is, and there's small and big things that happen all day that hurt us. Instead of thinking about the pain, go home and write down, if you have to write it down, I think writing it down makes more sense because then I can go back to it, but write down the things that you enjoy about the experience or that you're thankful for about the experience instead of focusing on the thing that made you unhappy or the thing that made you hurt.

So, you start noticing, you're having the same life, but you're noticing the things in your life that are lighting you up, that are making you happy, that are making you feel grateful and you're not looking at the things that were like, "Oh, why did that person do that? What did I do to deserve that? Yuck. Why? What happened?" Instead of going to that place, go to the, "I'm really happy I was able to interact with other people today. I was really happy that I was able to get into my car and go somewhere else. How amazing. I'm so happy I'm sharing this world with other people. I'm so happy I can learn from other people. I'm so happy they can learn from me. I’m so happy to bring children into this world where we're all learning together."

Those sorts of statements. Say them out loud. Write them down and recite them every time you have those moments where you feel like you're having a sticky moment. It can be an argument with your husband or your boyfriend. It can be a really hard moment with your child. It can be anything that makes you feel just kind of not good and write down the good aspects of it because there's always good stuff happening in tandem with the bad stuff. We just don't look at the good stuff when we're feeling bad.

CAMILLE [32:06]

That is so powerful. I love creating that association of looking for the good because, like you said, the day is packed with crummy things that happen, but we always learn something from the good and the bad. I want to fast forward or I guess rewind to your book. You held it up at one point. Can we talk about your book a little bit more and tell us what the journey of your book is about and how it can bless our lives?

DIANA [32:34]

Okay. So, my daughter and I have for a few years been wanting to help children learn some of the things that we learned from my father. My father passed away three years ago, but he was very present in my daughter's life. So, she learned all these things that I learned. A little different, but she learned them too. So, we had always talked about wanting to help children learn some of these things, and then the pandemic hit and we had time because she didn't have to drive to school anymore. So, her school was in our house now and on Zoom. So, she had so much more time where she was doing other outside activities.

So, we sat down together and we wrote Alina the Positive Thought Warrior, which looks like this. It’s a children's book, the first of a series. We have about eight of them that we've written and we're going to start releasing them. Maybe every six months, we'll release one. The next one is a journal to help kids journal, but it's really about just sparking the idea of positive thinking and teaching children that having good thoughts will make them happier, that will make their lives better. And it's saying it in a very gentle like, "Here's a good idea," so that you can have that conversation with your children after reading it to go a little deeper with them.

So, we are going to have a few more coming out on meditation and feelings and all these things that our children all have to experience. But one of the things I can mention and I think we have enough time that would really help too is realizing that when you feel good or not good, you usually feel it in your belly. It's either a pit in your stomach or butterflies. Those are the extremes you feel. Children are really connected to that because they're still living in that feeling world and that fantasy world and that imagination world that we let fall away.

So, it's really, really, really great to be able to talk to your kid like that and say, "Do you feel good in your belly right now? What would make your belly feel good?" And that's how you can get to find out what they need or if they're not feeling good or they're crying or they're having a moment and you say, "Does your tummy feel bad? How's your tummy feel?" And it stops them like, "What?" "How does it feel in your tummy? Are you feeling not good in your tummy?" And they're like, "No. It doesn't feel good." You can say, "Well, let's make your tummy feel better. What would make your tummy feel better?" Talking to kids about that is the way to talk to them about feelings, not just to talk to them the way you would talk to another adult about feelings because it's lost on them. They don't have that same advanced thinking processes that we do. They haven't gone through the ups and downs like we have. They're all still living in this up for the most part, so it's easier for them to tap into that knowing part of us which is the belly.

CAMILLE [35:40]

I love that you just said that because when I talk to my kids about their emotions, I didn't know this until a couple of years ago, that when kids are feeling anxiety or stress or any of those tough emotions that it usually makes their tummy sick. And so, I love that you talked about that specifically because I've seen that in my own life where I didn't know that anxiety ran in our family history.

And it was actually through a brother-in-law that my father-in-law said something like, "Yeah. Remember you used to call me everyday saying that you had a sick tummy and you needed to come home?" But that was actually him saying he was having anxiety. He didn’t know how to say it and that was really telling to me of how I needed to start talking to my kids is understanding that it's the emotion that they're feeling in their tummy and they can understand emotion that way. It's through their tummy. I never thought that it is so clear to them in that way.

DIANA [36:42]

Yeah. I was taught at a young age that the soul lives in the belly. A lot of us talk about it being in the heart, but it's really in the belly. That's our feeling center. Our feeling center is our belly. And we might not see it the same as adults, but it's true for us too. You know that we have problems with digestion sometimes. We have problems with having families sometimes. We have all kinds of problems in the belly when we're not feeling good or we're having a bad series of events in our lives that we feel like we can't overcome them. We feel sick too. We just internalize it differently and sometimes internalizing it is something that becomes a big problem.

When we're happy, when you're newly in love, you have butterflies. You know what that feels like. It can be as simple as buying a new pair of shoes will give you butterflies sometimes. You know that feeling of excitement, that flutter. We have those in more extreme ways when we get older because we start dulling that a little bit but kids have that on all the time. They have to understand that.

CAMILLE [37:51]

Oh, I love that. Well, I can't wait for your other books to come out. This sounds so exciting. I’m so glad that you and your daughter are doing it together and just like what we've talked about in the beginning, the pandemic has been horrible, but it's also given us so many gifts. And I'm so grateful that this is a gift that you're bringing to the world through the time of the pandemic and that we're able to benefit from that. So, thank you so much.

DIANA [38:17]

Thank you. It's been really fun.

CAMILLE [28:19]

Let our audience know where they can find you to learn more about you and all of the projects that you have coming up.

DIANA [38:25]

Okay. So, my website is dianacole.com and everything's there. And then, on social media, I am @thedianacole.

CAMILLE [38:35]

Perfect. Well, Diana, thank you again so much. This has been so enlightening and I know that I am going to be adopting some of these behaviors that we talked about today.

DIANA [38:45]

Thank you. It was so fun talking to you.

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CAMILLE [38:47]

Hey, guys. Thank you so much for listening to today's episode. Every comment, DM, and review means so much to me. Today's review comes from emilyhendy. "This podcast kept me engaged and entertained. Also I felt like I was sitting with my best friends catching up. I loved the content. I loved the direction of the conversation. I usually get deterred by longer than 30 min podcasts because I get bored and distracted. But when this episode was over, I wanted more! I will definitely be coming back!"

Well, thank you, Emily. I cannot tell you how much it means to me to have that support. I truly love each and every one of these women that I get to meet and bringing a group of women together is a passion of mine that I will be doing forever and ever. If you want to join the community, please come join me @callmeceopodcast on Instagram or Call Me CEO community on Facebook. You can also find me @camillewalker.co on Instagram as well. Thank you for tuning in and we'll see you next week!

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