EP 111 & 112: Maintaining Self Care & Personal Interests with Bookish Flights Host, Kara Infante

All right, Kara. Welcome to the Think Happy Podcast. I am so happy that you are here with us. How, how is your day going so far?

It's going good, like you said, it's Monday morning. So just getting back into the swing of things. After a busy week, my son had, they had parent, teacher conferences all last week, so he had a lot of half days and days off. So we're back to our normal routine this week.

I always love getting back to normal routine. Like when we're out of town or like when there's like holiday weeks, stuff like that.

I have so much fun with that stuff, but getting back to normal routine is totally my jam and I feel like for him, he is a very, like not regimented, but he just does really well with a schedule.

So I feel like it just felt like a really off week for us all. So, yes, I am ready to hit, you know, hit the ground running and roll back into routine.

I totally get that. I totally get that my kids were sick last week. They had this like on again, off again, stomach bug and it felt like it, I don't want to say it derailed our entire week but the whole week, like, it never felt like the day of the week that it actually was like, I just kind of felt like I was living in this little, like twilight zone of like, are they gonna wake up sick again. Is it gonna be coming out of the front or the back?

Like we just don't know with this stomach bug because it was a little bit of everything that is motherhood right there.

You like, you just cannot plan for anything, right?

Not even close. So we've already kind of just gone, gotten right into it. So let's back up just a second. Let's start, just introduce yourself. Who are you? Tell us a little bit about your family, your own podcast. I'm just gonna turn it over to you.

Ok. Yeah. So my name is Kara Infante and I am a military spouse and I have three kids. They're 8, 5 and 3. So I have two boys, they're book ends and a girl in the middle and we are a hybrid family now because we, my oldest goes to a brick and mortar school. I home school my middle child and then my three year old is also home with us. So they have a little fun, you know, dynamic between the two of them and with being a military spouse, we moved a lot the past few years, which is why we went the homeschooling route. 

So I never envisioned myself being a homeschooling mom either. You know, I, at 25 I graduated as a physical therapist and I thought I would be a physical therapist forever and doesn't life have a way of inserting itself and just putting opportunities in front of us that take us a different path than I ever thought I would be, you know, at 18 or 25. and so, yeah.

I'm originally from Chicago. I, we're living now in San Diego with the military and it has been so much fun to travel the world and having three kids and staying at home with them. I feel like, you know, we're kind of within a budget but moving around with the military, we've been able to travel and explore the area that we are living in at that time. So it really has afforded us a lot of great opportunities.

That's amazing. Your husband's with the Navy, right? Yes. Ok. Ok. That's right. Because I remember talking about that when we first connected and my uncle is or was in the navy, he's now in the Reserves, but also lives in San Diego. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And so when you said San Diego, I was like, oh, that's right. I'm pretty sure it's Navy. So there we go.

Yeah. So we're here to talk about, you know, creating time for yourself and the importance of pouring into yourself. But with a really fun twist, which is how books play into that. So just to set the stage for the listeners, Kara and I originally connected through the podcast world. She has a podcast called Bookish Flights. We'll talk about it, you know, throughout the show. 

But so when we first jumped on a call just to chat about if there was an opportunity for us to collaborate when we got to talking, we absolutely totally hit it off. And Kara has an amazing story. One that moms pretty much any mother will be able to relate to. 

So to start this conversation, let's begin maybe with just the, the beginning of motherhood for you and how it can be tough to stay you like, quote unquote you when you become a mom. So can you tell us your experience with feeling like you had lost some of yourself when you entered motherhood?

Yeah. So we had, like I said, my oldest is eight. And so when I had, I was working full time as a physical therapist at that point. And I actually, I'm a pelvic floor, pregnancy postpartum type therapist by trade. So I had worked with a lot of moms. And again, I feel like you have this idea of what you think motherhood is going to be like, right? As we laughed at the beginning of this podcast, it will hit you in the face and be like, nope, that's not it.

It'll be totally different than you ever imagined. And so again, working with moms pregnant postpartum, I again had this vision of what I thought motherhood would be. So we had my oldest and I went back to work. I took, I think I took four months off and I went back to work full time. And my husband had gotten, you know, about a year out from when we move, we get an idea of what our next set of orders are gonna be.

So where we're gonna go next and sometimes you get a choice, it's not always your wish list, but you sometimes get a choice and our first opportunity was to go overseas. And we're like, well, we're gonna be new parents and not that we lived near family, but we wanted to have the ability for our family to come. So we're like, we don't know that we really want to go overseas. It's gonna be that much harder for them to come visit us if we do that. 

So we decided to wait for one year and just wait and kind of roll the dice to see what would come up next. So we were like, I, I don't know if I mentioned we were living in Virginia at the time. So we stayed in Virginia, had our oldest son. I remember my mom came for two weeks and like, just being so overwhelmed. I was so glad she was there to help and run errands and like, make sure we had food on the table because it just that first part as a new mom. It's so overwhelming. It's insane.

Yeah, like the craziest.

So I finally got my feet underneath me a little bit and I had a patient that ran a home daycare so she was able to take my son and I had a really good relationship with her. I had seen her daughter as well and, she really helped guide me. She was kind of like my mom on the ground because we didn't have family there. So she really helped guide me and, oh, he should be doing this or he should be doing that.

And just again, things I had no idea about. So I kind of maintained my sense of who I was at that point. I mean, I was tired and trying to get a full time job, but I maintained a bit of who I was at that point. Fast forward the next year, we're up for, you know, looking at orders again and Italy was on the table. And so we're like, well, if you talk to anybody in the military, they're like, go overseas.

If you ever get the opportunity, like, don't even question it, just go right. So we're like, well, ok, maybe this is God's sign of like writing on the wall of here. I'm offering you overseas again. So you should do it. So we knew though with going overseas, the other biggest hang up was I was going to have to leave my job because my husband is a physical therapist too and he wasn't going to be my boss.

So we knew I would be going to a stay at home mom status. And that I think for my husband. You know, he'll tell you to this day. That was like his biggest concern was he didn't want to take my job away from me by doing this. And I was like, you know what we wanted, we knew we wanted to have other Children. So we're like, maybe, maybe this is the time like our son was, he was 18 months old when we moved, this is going to be the time of life to stay at home with them. So we move overseas.

I go to not working. And that was the first time I really experienced this, like, well, who do I say that I am, right. What is my identity now? And I think that our society a lot of times doesn't value the stay at home mom. Right? And before I was a contributing member to society, right? And I was helping people and that feels good. And that was kind of taken away and I not taken away. I shouldn't say that we made this conscious choice together, my husband and I Right.

Right. No, I understand what you're saying.

Yeah. And so it just became ok. Well, in three years when we move back to the States, I'll go back to work. And this was what I was telling myself for three years and I did volunteer, I worked pro bono when we lived there one day a week, just enough to keep up my license. And, but I always had this hard time. You know, we're taught to have an elevator pitch, right? Of like who that you say that you are?

Like, who do you say in a minute of that you are? And I was like, well, who do I say that? I am? Like, I'm a stay at home mom. Like it was really, it took me probably 6 to 9 months just to settle into being a stay at home mom, like, slower pace of life. How do I fill my day? What do I do? How do I maintain my sanity for 10 hours of the day before my husband comes back home. 

Exactly.

Yeah. So when there's no other adults to talk to.

Yes. Yeah. And I also lost, you know, your job gives you the ability to make a community and when, now that we move with the military and I don't go into a job, it is that much harder for me to make a community or I have to put in more effort. Right. Because it's not like fall in your lap. I'm going to a new job. I have coworkers. I can talk to. Maybe they'll become my friends. So there's a lot of that but I, I think that was my first realization of that identity.

And so going from being a working mom to being a stay at home mom is already a huge transition. And then add on top of that, you had just moved to Italy that those are two huge, huge changes that you just served up to yourself, like you said, willingly, literally simultaneously. 

That's a lot. Yeah.

And with the time zone change, right? Or the differences, it's like when you want to call your friends back in the States, you're like, well, we're nine hours apart. So when can I call and even just figuring out that gap of, ok, how can I connect with my people until I can make a group of people here that are mine. Exactly.

I have gone through similar identity, not crises, but just like who am I now? That I'm a mom and I not that I ever thought I wasn't going to love being a mom, but I think I loved it even more than I was expecting to love it. And at the same time, I also love working. And so it has been tough to find that balance and the listeners know, I left my 9 to 5 when I left for maternity leave for James.

So that was about a year ago at the time of this recording. And that, that maternity leave with James was so much harder than my maternity leave with my oldest Eleanor, I think because I knew I had my 9 to 5 that I was going back to maternity leave was tough for me both times because I have, I, you know, my platform, a lot of stuff I talk about is productivity.

And when you're in maternity leave, like the most productive thing you're doing is feeding your baby every three hours. Yeah. And so that already was tough for me. But adding the element of going back to working for myself at a business that I had just started and there is no stability and I had just given up a secure paycheck and routine and all of this I looking back, I wish I had enjoyed my maternity leave with James more.

But truth be told that was a really, really tough time of just like, well, is this who I am now? Like I, I don't know. And sometimes I still honestly don't feel like I know because, you know, we were joking at the beginning of this episode about last week when my kids were sick. I am I find myself being so grateful that I made the decision to leave my 9 to 5 to lean in to think happy as my full time job, especially during this phase of my life because I did not feel guilty about missing work.

Every single meeting that I postponed, you know, the person, it would be like if I had to postpone this conversation with you, I'm not going to email you and be like, hey, Kara, I'm so sorry. Both my kids have stomach bugs. Can we reschedule? And you'd be like, oh no, sorry. Actually that doesn't work for me. You know, like it's just I now and I'm rambling here, but I'm now in this situation where, like, everyone who I get the opportunity to work with is in a similar situation as me.

And it's like you're beautiful and that we lift each other up and are flexible with each other and, and whatnot. But at the same time, there's still this huge part of me that is getting used to like, oh, well, when our kids are sick, like, that's my whole work day that is gone now.

And, I feel like what you're saying is that this type of job, right? It allows us to see the human in one another, right. That we are, life happens. And again, when you're working with a lot of moms, you're like, yeah, we realize things hit the fan and like, your day is just crumbled and that's it. And I would go through the same thing of when I would debate in my head.

I mean, this was pre COVID times people. So, but if I was kind of sick, right, maybe I had a runny nose or I had a cough. I'm like, do I go into work today? And I'm like, well, that's canceling 10 patients off my schedule. If I call in that now, I have to try to figure out how to fit into another day. Exactly. See them, you know. So now it's like, ok, I have the freedom of time to do you know, fit this job into the cracks.

I mean, I'm not recording every day so I'm not letting people down if I have to, you know, quote unquote call in sick. but that was a, I, now, I can't even imagine with my three kids because my husband is the breadwinner. So I'm the default parent just by the nature of that relationship. And I'm like, so I'd be calling in every time and canceling locations all the time because my kids, you know, kids are kids, kids are kids.

I was talking to a friend the other day about how it's this really weird sensation for me when I am calling in or, you know, unable to work for a day because my child is sick because I feel fine, but I am still unable to work. I'm just like, it's so weird because I'm not the sick one.

Yeah.

Yeah. Ok. So man, this is already like such a, a fantastic conversation. So, so we've talked about feeling like we lose, you know, part of who we are. And I think that a really awesome part of this journey is when we get to come around and start, you know, looking for ourselves again, start trying to find that part of ourselves, find, you know, what makes me me type of thing.

So my next question here is how, how do you go about finding yourself or how did you go about finding yourself and then my follow up question to it is how did books and reading play, you know, or how were they part of that journey for you?

Yeah, this is such a great question because it is like the joy, right? Of finding joy for yourself again. And so fast forward, we had two more kids while we lived in Italy. And I remember my whole mantra at this time was I'll go back to work when we move back to the States, right? This was the mantra.

I had told myself and kind of like you were saying, if you know you're going to go back to routine, I feel like your mindset is different. So we're set to move back and it is July of 2020 when we moved back to the States. And needless to say lots of PT clinics are not open because it's now 2020.

Yes, everyone knows what that means.

Yeah. And we were like, OK, so we're moving back. We knew the job, my husband was going to, we were going to be moving three times in two years. And we also, my son was going to be starting school for the first time. It was going to be virtual kindergarten. And I was like, I don't know how I feel about virtual kindergarten. I mean, I'm already staying at home.

What if I just continue to stay at home to support our kids through these next three moves? And that way they're not going to three different schools in two years. Like that just sounds stressful to me and I'm not even the child that has, yeah, like that has to go to a new school that many times. So here I am again, choosing the role of staying at home with my kids.

At that point, you know, I'm 3.5 years into the stay at home mom journey. So I was a little bit more comfortable with that. And who that I said that I was. But it also made me be like, maybe I'm really not going back to work. Like now I'm choosing five years to be at home with my kids, which I realized at this point I now had a new mantra that when I am 80 I will have been so glad I had this time with my kids.

And you know, I would tell myself this on my hardest days, right? Like when the kids are screaming, I wanna scream. Yes. You know, our pets heads are falling off. Sometimes I do scream but I would tell myself that when I am 80 I'll be so glad I have this time with my kids. Not that I went to see Miss Smith for her back pain at the PT clinic. Like that is not what I want.

My values and my perspective and my mind mind really had shifted to my family is my most important thing. This is my legacy, my legacy is my family and I think that's where you start to maybe tease out the busyness of your life, right? And just say what really matters, what really matters here. If I'm saying my family is what is going to be the most important thing to me when I'm 80 are the things I'm doing in my day making sure that that is going to be what's going to happen.

And I still have to check in with myself because inevitably we get busy, right? We let all these things come in and you know, this part of life pulls us here and says, this is important and the other part of life pulls us here and says this is important. But I think that is the beauty of motherhood of slowing down with your kids. 

You truly have the time to think about what matters to you, what makes your heart sing, you know, I mean, if we can be like that and what, what do I need to do to make sure that I get there. And so now I can see how beautiful this time of being a stay at home mom was, is it took out the busyness of having a job and running to the clinic and running here and running there, you know, taking my kids to where they need to be so I can get where I need to be. My mind has had time to sit here and think why I'm feeding my baby every three hours to sit and think about what really matters.

And so now I can take that and say, ok, what do, what do I need to do? And so I'll in 2020 when we move back and I had this realization of like, well, what is the reality of me going back to a PT clinic at this point? I started thinking about, well, what else could I do? You know, I, we had a, we moved back, what was my son? He was five, we had a 5, 2 and like a four month old when we moved back to the States.

And my husband deployed three months after we got back for seven months. So it was like this wild year. So it was not the year to start something. But I started thinking about what I could do and I had seven months to really think about it because I'm like, well, I don't have the bandwidth. I'm so tired. Like, I don't know, I have a four month old, I don't have the bandwidth to start anything and I knew my husband was gone.

So I was like, I don't have a support system. So I need to, you know, I'll just use this time to brainstorm and podcasting kind of popped in my mind. I'm like, that could be something that I could do in my spare time in the day and it gets me back talking to adults, which was one thing and one thing I realized I missed about being in the PT clinic was getting to know people's stories.

I mean, we see people for 6 to 10 weeks to see them for, I saw them for an hour each time and I really got to learn about who people were and I missed that. Yeah, I missed that part and I'm realizing podcasting now that I have a podcast is doing that for me. I'm getting to hear a bit of people's story and we'll talk about more about what my show is in a little bit.

I think. So, I'll say that. But how I kind of got to that is I started asking myself, what do people call me about? Like, if I'm going to start a podcast, what should I talk about? And I'm like, well, obviously people, I'm like an injury clinic. Sometimes people call me and try to triage their injuries and figure out what they need to do. But that just didn't really excite me because I felt like I would run out of ideas to talk about.

I'm like, ok, I could think of like 10 to 15 episodes, but then what would I do after that? So I'm like, the other thing I've always been, has been a reader. I've been a reader my entire life. I read a ton during motherhood, right? Like when you're in the house you've been in the house all day. You can't escape because your kids are napping. But you have a moment of peace. You know, your significant other is not at home and you're like, well, and I really got back into reading again.

I would read in, in my free time during the day I would read at night when my husband would fall asleep with the kids. And I really discovered my love of reading because I could escape through the pages. Right. I wasn't able to leave my house, but I could escape to a different world in a book. And it was such a mental like relief almost.

It kept my sanity or sure.

No, that makes total sense.

So, or I pop in an audio book when I'm folding three buckets of laundry and doing the sink full of dishes. I pop in an audio book and my house is inevitably cleaner because I've, I'm now listening to a book that has me distracted from the mundane tasks of daily life.

And especially so there's a task management strategy that's called pairing. And it's when you pair something that you want to be doing with something that you don't necessarily want to be doing to help, encourage you to do the thing that you don't want to do. And so love it. What that is, you know. Well, I want to keep listening to this audio book, you know, like what's going to happen next. This is a cliffhanger. So I might as well keep on cleaning the house so I can keep listening.

Yeah, I didn't realize I was using such a nice strategy there, but now I have a term for it.

We'll take you there. So sometimes people will use that strategy like when they're exercising or going to the gym or something like that on a treadmill to watch a TV show or whatever it might be. So, it's a good one. It's a good strategy to use. I like that. Yeah. And, ok, so, so something that I think is very unique about this conversation is we are specifically talking about books and how reading is a way that women and moms and really whoever can create time for themselves.

But I think that books in the act of reading can really be replaced with a variety of different outlets for whatever, a mom might be looking for. So when I ask you this next question, I think that really, your answer will probably be applicable to any sort of outlet. So how have you been able to make reading a priority in your life?

Yeah. So I, I feel like we talked about this all the time as a phys as a physical therapist and people to do their exercises, right? And how to take care of themselves. And I truly believe that structuring your day. Right. And I would tell people make it a routine, like, just like you brush your teeth 2 to 3 times a day. You put in whatever that might be, you put that in like a part of your routine.

So, every morning I get up at five, my kids are super early risers, but I know that I'm a better mom if I can have 30 minutes to myself with a book and a cup of coffee. I get up at five and I don't even touch my cell phone. Like, do not go near your technology. And I read for 30 minutes. Sometimes it's a little less, sometimes it's a little more.

But I just make sure that is like the first thing I do and I had to, I had to like, work on my body to get up at 5 a.m. But now I'm, you know, that's not something that you can just start doing literally overnight.

That takes effort because I'm a strong believer that mornings and evenings are like, really go hand in hand because the way that we end a day sets us up for how we're going to be able to start the next day, which in turn goes into how we end that day and so on and so forth.

I like that. So, yeah. So I put it in, in the morning and then sometimes in the afternoon. But, you know, if my kids are napping and dinner started, stuff is done in the day or that's, I'll sometimes try to work out in there. But sometimes I can sneak some reading. Usually, always an audio book though because I am doing some form of, like, prepping dinner, folding laundry, you know.

Yeah, like household chores. So I usually will get an audio book in, in the afternoon and then at, like, when I'm putting my kids down for a nap or bedtime. Thank goodness for airpods these days. Right. I have an airpod in and I'll just listen to my audiobook while I'm sitting in the dark and I'm singing like the same two songs that I know. And I'm rocking my baby to sleep.

I've just, I'll have my audio book in, but I'll be putting my baby to bed and so I'll do that and then I read to fall asleep every night. So I kind of have four touch points in the day that I'm doing that. But again, I think it's, you know, I think if you read, atomic habits, right? He talks about like habit stacking. Like if you do this one task, then you're gonna add 10 minutes of reading or whatever thing you want to add to your life.

And, I think our phones can be so distracting. So that's why I'm like, I just don't touch my phone in the morning. I actually leave my cell phone downstairs when I go to bed at night. So I'll leave it downstairs and then I go up and then only my books are upstairs so there's something to distract me.

Yeah. I, I really like that. I, so the, when I was nursing I started this with Eleanor and then I did it again with James. I don't like reading on my phone. But I found that when I was nursing so much that I was on my phone just like scrolling. And so what I ended up doing that's when I started using the Libby app. Have you heard of it? Yeah. The, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So that's when I started using Libby and then I started reading while I was nursing and that, that was a really great switch for me.

Because I couldn't have a book in there with me in the middle of the night, you know, because you like on and the whole shebang and just, it made getting up in the middle of the night feel less daunting because I knew that I had, like, the book to look forward to and I feel like when you're so tired, you know, sometimes you're, you're, might be a little short.

Right. But if you're distracted by a book, I just feel like it takes out that like, well, I could sit here for 25 minutes and I could reading versus like, ok, I have a, to do list of things to do. Right. Like your mind is going. But if you're distracted with a book, you really can do anything, I think.

Yeah. Yeah. No, I agree. ok. This is a random question. Do, do you read one book at a time or a couple of books at a time?

A couple of books at a time? I feel like I have book ADD I've said this for a long time. So I, in the morning I'll start with a personal development book, a spiritual book. Something that's nonfiction, something that is a, you know, so I need to concentrate more on reading. My audio books can be a mix of things, whether it's fiction or non fiction. It just is what the Libby App really helps me with that. Actually, it really helps me choose my next title.

I put in a bunch of holds and then just whatever comes next is what I'm reading. So, take out the guessing game of that and then at night is when I'll read a fiction, read something that's a lighter story because my brain is so fried by the end of the day that I'm like, I cannot be digesting some heavy material here. I need like a, an easygoing story at the end of the day.

Yeah. Yeah. Most of the time I'm reading two books at a time. A fiction and a nonfiction. But I will say I get through my fun reads a lot faster. Oh, yeah.

But I think that's the point. Right.

I think fiction is meant to be something that's, you're not going to spend a bunch of time, you know, highlighting, taking down, I mean, you might take down quotes but it's not in the form of non, it doesn't have to, I feel like, because I can get through them so much faster.

I feel like, kind of like what you said, you know, when my brain is fried, I'm not feeling like I'm sitting there to learn something and to really take a lot away from the pages of these books. Like, it's purely for entertainment and enjoyment and I personally don't watch a lot of TV. I would much rather, read in bed or something like that. And the only exception to that is when my husband Oakley and I are watching like a show together.

I really, really do enjoy doing that together. but he travels a decent, a bit, a decent amount also. And, when we go maybe through like a lag where we finished one show and we're not quite sure what we're gonna watch next. His way to decompress is watching his TV show at night time.

My favorite way is reading at night time.

So we're the, we're the exact same in our house. But I have found that my days are so loud. That's why I've just stepped away from really watching TV. It started when we moved to Italy because we didn't speak Italian and we didn't have cable, you know, and we like TV recording. So we really got away from watching TV there. but I just like the quiet of the evening after how noisy my day is.

Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Absolutely. And that's actually such a good way to put it. Kara, I was talking with a girlfriend yesterday about how ever since James was born. I have this thing with sounds where it's like when there's too, too many sounds going on. It gives me just like this, this like feeling of anxiety and, and I do struggle with anxiety and this is not like anxiety in the normal sense, but it's almost like too many sounds going on at once.

It's just too much for my brain. And a lot of the times it's even like white noise sounds like if the microwave is going on and the sink is running. So like I would consider those kind of like white noise sounds and then my kids are yelling at me from, from the other room. I'm just like, oh my God, that's too much like something has to give. And so I had never thought about it like that before.

That maybe at the end of the day, the reason I, I prefer reading is because I'm just kind of like tapped out from the sounds we last night, my husband, he's totally a TV watcher as well.

And he was watching a show that we're not watching together. So he was watching on his phone and he was like, he was laying on my lap and I was reading and he had his, he was watching the show on his phone with his headphone in and I was like, this is so nice because the house was silent. It was like the best of both worlds. Like he's getting to do what he wants to unwind. We're together, we're snuggling.

And then I was doing what I love to and like it just, just that connection piece like you're talking about with your adult, right at the end of the day, just like being together but getting to do what you wanna do and what he wants to do.

Yeah. Yeah. I really like that. Oakley will use his headphones to watch TV at night time also. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. So because that's important too. I feel like that connection with your, your spouse too is super important, especially in those younger motherhood days when you're like over touched and over stimulated.

But yeah, just over everything.

So one thing that I really like about your story and your relationship with books is that you have found a way to also connect with others through reading. And I mean, we kind of talked about building community earlier on in this conversation, but I think that finding community and finding friends only gets harder as we get older and then adding kids to the mix, adds in an extra layer of difficulty for you.

Adding in all of these different moves, adds an even bigger layer of difficulty. So how have you found and, you know, created community through books and through your love of reading?

Yeah. So I, I've done this a couple of ways. One, I always try to find a book club when we move to a new place for people that might be kind of introverted. I think I'm a combination of introverted, extroverted. Yeah. I feel like a book club is such a easy way to step into a group of people but not feel like you really, I mean, you need to be there and you need to show up, but you're not going to be like personally on display, right?

Like you can go and you can start to get to know people and your only responsibility is going to be to talk about that book at that level while you are at your own pace and in your own time getting to know people starting to open up and that is different for everybody. How we're going to, you know, sometimes my husband's like, gosh, you, you're really opened up to that person and I'm like, well, you know, I just feel like I'm, that's who I am, but I recognize that other people are not like that. 

So I feel like finding a book club is such a great way. Again, it kind of takes out that pressure of a social situation or like friendship dating of like, are we going to get along. Like, is this, you know, that awkwardness of making a new friend? And so if I can't find a local book club to become a part of, and that doesn't always happen. I have to work a little bit harder because I have to meet people and then I have to put myself out there to ask them if they'd like to be in a book club with me.

So I just actually. We've been here for a year and some change. Now I finally have enough women that I collected. We had our first meeting just Saturday just last Saturday. Congratulations. Was there eight of us? I think there was eight of us. Like, oh my gosh, like, just like I have friends.

That's amazing. and that's awesome.

I pulled them all mostly from our, like, soccer where our kids play soccer. This is our third season playing there. So I've gotten to know people. Yeah. And I, of course I'm talking about books and reading and I know I have a podcast so people that kind of have latched on and talked about books they're reading too. I'm like, hey, would you want to start a book club?

And so now there's eight of us in this book club. We picked our books for the year and what I love to do when I do situations like that is I recognize that everybody reads differently, right? We all read different genres. We all have different topics we like to read about. So, what I have everybody do when we came and this is the second time I've done it this way is I have them come to the first book club meeting and everybody bring a book, they're interested maybe, or a book or two, they're interested in reading because if a lot of people have read it, we won't put it on the list.

But then that way everybody knows that throughout the year we'll be reading a book that's in their genre or in their topip and so that was what we did on Saturday. As everybody brought a book, we did kick off with a local author. Here in San Diego with her book, we did read that to come and have something to start us off.

But then we put, I just mapped it out per month and everybody's going to get the book they wanted to read and we'll read that as a group. And so I'm really excited about it. But yeah, I think the one thing I've struggled with this with being a mother. Let's talk about this is how to host this at my own home when I have young Children. Right? And like you have to ask your partner to be like, can you take the kids? Do you have the kids?

Do we have the space to do this where, like the kids aren't going to be all over the place and there was a little bit of that where I'm like, we haven't always had places to host it, but you will make it work. You can figure it out. Like I've considered like, oh, could we meet at Panera or something? Like our house hasn't been a set up to have a book club. Like, could you meet at the local coffee shop and have, have a book club?

And I think there are a lot of options but that is something I've gone through in my mind of maybe when our house isn't set up to host, like, the logistics of it.

Yeah.

So, but it's been a great way to meet people and find people within the community because you also know, you have a shared love of reading. So that is, again, I think that's one part that takes out the social awkwardness is like, you already know, you have a common ground of being a reader or whatever that might be.

I mean, I think there's local meet up groups you could find of cyclists or hikers. Yeah, exactly. And I think that that is another way you could do that but, you know, you're going in with a commonality of, you know, something you love.

Yeah. I actually have, a former client who I got the pleasure of working with for many, many months and they just moved and she just had her second baby and she just joined a cycling community and they live in an area where there's just like beautiful scenery and there's some mountains and, she's really enjoying it and she has already met the last time I, I chatted with her.

She had already met another woman who they kind of like, hit it off. And so I think, you know, it definitely, whether it's a book club or a cycle group or, you know, whatever it might be, it's going to be a step outside of your comfort zone.

But you have so much to gain so much and I feel like I'm a big believer of the bigger the risk, the greater the reward.

And I read on that so much in my life of what can seem like a really big risk or seems scary. It'll pay back so much with goodness.

I agree. I totally agree. So, do you have any suggestions or words of encouragement for a mom who's listening now and is trying to find herself again or trying to create some more time in her days just to do things like reading that she loves.

Yeah, I think just starting to carve out the time for yourself. and I know that can seem so daunting. Right. Especially if you've got a newborn at home, you've got lots of little kids. I it took me five years to get here. So don't think that like I did this overnight. but just start dreaming, start noticing what feels good for you? What fills your cup?

What takes things out of your cup? And maybe you have a journal by your, by your bed and you just jot down at night. What made you feel good that day? And what didn't make you feel good that day? And then start to pay attention. I think if you have that over time, you will start to notice maybe where, when you have the time where you should start taking your life. But then also knowing what your priority is like for me, mine is to have my family, right when I'm 80.

So I just kind of check in with that. Ok. Is this aligning with me wanting, you know, having a good relationship with my kids to ensure that we'll have that in the future? And just so kind of figuring that out, I think that's something you could do in those early stages of motherhood is really start digging deep to what matters to you.

Yeah. Yeah. I have been on a Mumford and Sons kick lately when I get home from dropping the kids off at school, I'll tell Alexa to turn on Mumford and son. And so they have this song called Guiding Light. And I recently have started to think of, you know, having I call it your why behind your, what, you know, why are you wanting to create time for yourself? Why are you wanting to start on an exercise routine, you know, whatever it might be having that why. 

And I'm like, oh, it really is like your guiding light, like kind of like what you were just saying, Carol with, you know, checking in is, are these decisions aligning with, you know, where I wanna be when I'm 80? Which kind of is your guiding light? You know, it's leading you in that direction of having your family being front and center and creating just those beautiful relationships with your Children. And yeah, I just couldn't help but think of that what you're saying. I love it.

I actually thought you were going to go with because there is, I don't know the name of the song, but it literally goes through my head all the time. It's like where you invest, your love is where you invest your life.

Yes. And sons. I know M drops. I know.

But yeah, I don't know the name of the song, but I've listened to it so much and I'm just like playing in my head right now and I think that I googled the title of it when I stop recording and listen, if you're listening to this and you're just dying to know DM Me because I'm sure at that point I'll know what the title of it is.

Oh, it's such a good song. Yeah.

No, they have some really good stuff. So OK, as we start to wrap up this conversation, the theme of your podcast is for your guests to create a book flight that consists of three books, like in a specific theme or, you know, whatever the common topic might be for those three books.

And so I thought it would be fun for you to create a book flight for the think happy listeners. And then to the listeners, you can hear my book flight on Kara's show, so have no fear you will get to hear mine, but I'm going to turn it over to you Kara and tell us about your book flight.

Yes. Would you, are you up for me giving you a little blurb about the book as well?

Yeah, 100%.

So the first book that I thought of when we had our initial conversation a couple of months back was for the children's sake. And that is by Susan Shafer Mcauley. And this one is more about the education of your child, which so moms, you might be listening like I have newborns, but you will never really get to an age when your child will be, you know, you'll be teaching your child and you're still teaching your two year old.

Lots of fun. Oh, absolutely. But what I loved about this book is it spent so much time about talking about who your child is as a human and it is from a Christian perspective. I will say that But what it is that makes our child and like just the dignity of a child from our perspective as parents, from who that child is. It even talks about it because it's education based.

It talks about from the education system or from the teacher. but it is so practical to just everyday life and how we educate our Children and you know, that joy and that wonder of like awakening their mind to the education system.

But talking about giving them the richness of an education, the joy for living. And there's just so many great themes in there about teaching our child and, you know, growing up as an adult and what you want to give them. And so I feel like I took that book and there was so much practical knowledge about what I wanted to do and she is homeschooling her child.

I read this, you know, as I was home so much homeschooling my child. Now he's going to a brick and mortar. So it's not like a homeschooling manual. Just themes in it were so wonderful. So for the Children, for the children's sake was wonderful. The second book I brought is more for our mama's heart and it's called Gifts From the Sea by Ann Mara Lindbergh.

And she was amazing. She was a mother of five herself. She was actually, this is like Anne Lindbergh, the aviator, like she flew airplanes. but she also was an acclaimed writer. So she did so much with her life and this was written in the fifties. So it is an older book, but it's a short book. So this is a really readable pick up. You can get just gleam so many lessons and there it talks about youth, aging, marriage, love, peace, solitude and all from this perspective of her being a mom, of five. 

Wow. And what's interesting is it talks a lot about, I'll read this excerpt here from the book is the unsentimental eye on the trappings of modernity that threaten to overwhelm us the time saving gadgets that complicate rather than simplify our lives and the multiple commitments that we take on as family. And again, I think if you're kind of looking at honing in to like, what is your, what is your why?

And are you meeting your why? Yeah. Are the things you're doing? Meeting your wife, right? Helping you meet that? It's just such a great escape from your day, but really highlighting the demands that are placed on us as families, as mothers and you can really apply it to your own life. So I that would totally be for the mama's heart. It's just such a beautiful book. It's like filled with so much wisdom and I, I don't even think it's more than 100 and 50 pages.

It's so short. but what I, you know what she's talking about of like, things complicating our lives rather than making it more simple. And like she was writing, writing this in the 19 fifties and it still applies today. Exactly. Yeah. So, and then the last one I brought is actually back to our why a little bit and it's called Man Search For Meaning by Victor Frankl. Have you heard of this one?

No, I haven't.

OK. This is another book. It was actually published in the fifties. It's another incredibly short book. This one might even be under 100 and under 100 pages. But he is actually a psychiatrist and he, but he was in Nazi, he was in a concentration camp and I think I have heard of this book in Germany because his name sounds familiar to me.

OK, you keep talking about.

So like the first part of the book is how he survived the concentration camps and what kept him going, what was his meaning and what kept him going so that he could bear the suffering, he could cope with it and then move on and find a renewed purpose after all of this. And I'll let you read the book to figure out what his why was again, it's really short.

But the second part of the book is actually from his psychiatrist angle and him talking about, that, you know, how he applied this to his patients and how he helped them find the meaning and purpose in their life. So I think it's a really practical way for you to start thinking about your own life and finding your why if you're searching for that, you know, I feel like there's sometimes still, I'm like, well, what is my, why, what, what is my purpose for being here?

Do I have it? Right? I don't know. You know, but you just keep aligning with what feels authentic to you. What keeps making your heart, you know, feeds your soul and feeds your heart. And I think this book is a great, you know, just quick read on starting to find that for yourself. Oh, I love that one.

That might be the one that I start with.

Y Yeah, it's short. It's, I'm not even going to say it's sweet because it does cover a tough topic, right? Of him surviving the constitution camp. But it's really deep in how it'll make you think about your own life.

What a good flight. Why thank you for that. So my second to last question is one that I ask every guest who comes on the Think Happy Podcast. Do you have a life or happiness hack or tip or suggestion that you use in your own life that the listeners might want to try out in their own lives.

So whenever I feel like my day is maybe it's already fallen apart or I feel like I'm going off the rails. We escape outdoors whenever we can. And I, I realize I live in San Diego, so that is a little bit easier. But we have lived in Washington State where it's raining all the time and so you can do this. but it is the instant reset button for my kids for me. again, if you can maybe try to put your cell phone down.

So like life isn't pinging into at the same time. Sometimes I'll bring my journal, sometimes I'll bring a book, or we'll go do a little trail behind the house. I mean, it can be something or we'll go in the, in the driveway and we'll call with, with sidewalk chalk. I mean, it can be really simple. but just getting outside seems to be a good reset for us all.

I think that there's just something innate in us because if you think about it when a baby's crying, one of the things that you can do to help them stop crying is to just walk outside. And I find that that happens so more times than not. 

And even if it's not James my one year old, it's Eleanor, my almost three year old, you know, and like if she's just fussy, if she's just grumpy, we just walk outside and we go for a little walk up and down the street and she's in a better mood. I'm in a better mood. I think there's just something about getting outside of your house, getting a little bit of fresh air. That is, it's so good. It does wonders.

Yeah. And I've started to let go a little bit of the, like, you know, there's a whole pile of dishes in the sink where there's all this laundry to fold. Let's just go get outside for 20 minutes because I'll come back and I'll feel better about all that I have ahead of me.

Exactly. Exactly. Ok. Well, where can we find you? Where can we connect with you?

Yeah. So you can find me. It's at Bookish Flights, that's on Facebook, that's on Instagram and my website is Bookish flights.com and you can see all about the podcast there and, and I do post some personal stuff on there as well with the kids and reading and so you can find me, find me there.

Awesome. Well, thank you so much for hanging out with us. This, I feel like this conversation just really was quite nourishing. So I appreciate that.

Well, thank you so much for giving me the opportunity to come on. It's such a fun time to switch sides of the podcast, mike, right? To like remind myself of what it is to be a guest and what my guests might feel when they come on but I really appreciate coming to talk with you today. I just love what you're doing. Thank you.

All right, my friends, I will be back in your ears next week with another brand new episode of the Think Happy Podcast.