5.32 Joy with Candace Payne

What does true joy look like? Does it look like a life free from suffering or pain? Or does it look like a fight to find and keep joy wherever we can?

Today's guest knows first-hand the realities of joy and the fight for it. 

Candace Payne is an author, speaker and a podcast host, but you may know her best as “The Chewbacca Mom” after her Facebook Live video trying on a Chewbacca Mask went viral in 2016, back before viral videos were as common as they are today. That single video sparked joy across the country and the world and went on to become the most-viewed Facebook Live video to date with over 164-million views at last count. Candace is also a mom of two. 

Today Candace shares with our denmother moms her experience with joy and some practical ways to incorporate a practice of joy into our lives and into our motherhood experiences. 

You can find all things Candace Payne at CandacePayne.fun and don't forget to grab her 7-day Jolt Your Joy interactive journal at the Candace Payne Store! You can also connect with Candace on Facebook, Instagram and TikTok. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:01

I'm Kitty Aki. I'm a mom of three, and I'm a good mom, but I'm always learning and growing, and I bet you are too. So join me on my mission to learn from moms from all walks of life because let's be honest, momming is way more fun when we do it together. Welcome to the Dead Mother Podcast. Hi everyone, welcome to another episode of the Dead Mother Podcast. You guys, I already feel like I'm gonna laugh just talking to this lady this morning. I'm like, she just brings it out of you. Let me read her bio and then we'll get right into it. Candace Payne is an author, speaker, and a former podcast host, maybe future podcast host, but you may know her best as the Chewbacca mom after her Facebook live video trying on a Chewbacca mask went viral in 2016, back before viral videos were as common as they are today. So that single video sparked joy across the country and even the world and went on to become the most viewed Facebook live video to date with over 164 million views at last count. And of course, Candace is also a mom of two. Hi Candace, how are you? I am well. How are you? Oh my gosh, I am well. I follow you on Instagram, and so I'm sure you get it a lot when people feel like they know you. And I just want to like giggle, just talking to you.

SPEAKER_02 1:23

Yeah, I get a lot when I meet people in real life, they're like, oh girl, we could be best friends. We could be best friends. And if you're from the south, people are like, oh, sister. They automatically call me sister. Like we we've grown up, shared a dresser. You know what I mean? Like, like we we share clothes in the same closet. I'm like, we are not that close. You are still strange or danger. You know what I mean? Like back up.

SPEAKER_00 1:45

But as a testament to you, you do have that vibe where it's just like you put people at ease. It's just fun.

SPEAKER_02 1:52

Listen, relatability is underrated. I mean, relatability is so powerful. And I I love that people can see a little bit of themselves in me, or maybe a little bit of somebody else that they loved in their life. You know, I mean, there's a lot of people that they're like, that lady is not for me. And you listen, you don't have to be for everybody. That's fine. Yeah, but I think it's funny when people are like, oh my gosh, she reminds me of dot dot dot.

SPEAKER_00 2:16

You know, you're like take it, but also keep your distance. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Security, security, security, like I have security around me all the time. I do not well, don't tell people that she does, you guys.

SPEAKER_02 2:30

I mean, she has I live in Texas. I I'm I'm fully secure. I think yeah, you know. Yes, exactly.

SPEAKER_00 2:37

So, okay, this is the motherhood podcast, but in a weird turn of events, I want to wait on the motherhood stuff and talk to you first about joy. Because I read after that Chewbacca mom video, and guys, if you haven't seen it, you have to go see it. It's just so funny, it just fills you with joy to this day. But after that video, you wrote your first book, and I was one of the ones who ran out and grabbed it because it was like it was one of those things, and you saw on the news people were like, We we have needed this. This is the joy the country has needed. And so I was like, I want to learn about joy. So I ran out and grabbed your book, and I was flummoxed to realize that you start out talking about marriage problems and money problems, and it's all of the hard work and the hard stuff on the other side of joy. So, can you first of all talk to me about the fight for joy and how you worked to have joy in your own life?

SPEAKER_02 3:38

Yeah, you know, I see a lot of people make an assumption that um when you see a lady laughing in her car for four minutes with a toy mask, that there's a lot of um mental health issues, which there are. I mean, I'm neurodiverse, I won't, I won't deny that, but I see it as diversity and not divergence. I see that I think differently and I enjoy life a little bit differently, um, but I'm not on a wrong path. Uh, you know what I mean? I think I think what I'm doing is right. Um, and then I also know, too, that for me, you could assume that there's some juvenile or infantile kind of mentality that I am rose-colored lenses and that I see everything through just this unreal expectation of what reality is around me. And um, those first assumptions are great because then I get to be a surprise to people. And I love being a surprise. Um, but I will I will say this most people just seeing that on surface level think, uh, what it would be like just to be able to laugh it up in your car for a few minutes and not have a worry or a care in your bank. And my thing is, is every ounce of joy that I have has been a fight to obtain. And still to this day, it's a fight to keep. And what's weird though is the next assumption when you hear somebody like that uh use that terminology, then they go to this phrase that's choose joy. Well, so you're just telling me I need to choose joy. And I actually hate that phrase. I I wish that we would stop saying it. I mean, yeah, because I think it's I think it's really, really dumb of us to water down joy to think that it could be a commodity on a shelf that we could just go pick up and put down at any given moment. I mean, yeah, just go grab it. Just choose it. Why didn't you why didn't you choose that in that moment? Choose joy. And I'm like, shut your face. Have you not heard what life is? Life is hard. It's it's not just a choice you get to make, like it's it's a pursuit and it's a it's a reaction that comes from multiple decisions that have been made, not just one in a moment. And so when I'm talking about joy, it's not it's not this flighty, carefree, although she presents herself that way. You know, if joy was personified, joy is playful, joy is joy is fun, joy is the thing that makes all of your, you know, your senses tingle and get you excited. I like to think of The Office and Michael Scott, you know, whenever the camera would pan to him and he just has that childlike wonder on his face. I I think of joy being those moments that are accompanied with happiness. But real joy is something that I don't think we get the luxury of choosing in the hardest of our moments to fight for and to and to defend. I think joy is built on everyday little simple moments that we embrace and that we we build upon so that when when it when the time comes, we need it. It's a deep well within us, you know, it's it's a fruit, it's a byproduct, it's a muscle. Yeah, it's it's a reaction. It's not a it's not a go pull it off the shelf and use it now. Yes, use it now and then put it back when you're done with it and get serious, and then go grab tragedy for a little bit.

SPEAKER_00 6:52

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. No, I love that you called it a pursuit because I do believe, and that's part of the reason I was so thrown by the just opening pages of your book was like I was expecting, okay, she's she's just full of joy all the time, and she's just gonna tell us all how to be full of joy all the time. And I think this is why you've had lasting power, is because it's not that, because you have experienced the really hard things. And are we gonna lose our house? Are we gonna make it this month? All those things. And you've come on the other side. And so I love that you said it's a pursuit, it's not something you just grab. So that's amazing. When you look back on that video, do you ever cringe or do you does it still bring you joy 10 years later?

SPEAKER_02 7:34

I don't cringe, I don't, I don't cringe about it. I actually um I think retrospection is really hard for me as a person that lives with ADHD. Like there's always a forward movement in my mind. And so um that also means that I deflect pain easily. I mean, like, I'm I'm just gonna be honest with you. I do think there are some things that are just built in innately with neurodiversity in me that give me a little bit of an advantage in the joy market. I'm not, I'm not gonna lie. I think having ADHD is in pursuit consistently of the the next best. And I think that's preserved some of my joy. But for me to just sit back and really look and go backwards and and dive into moments past, I don't see them the same as a lot of people would deal with the emotional response. Um, because I really don't sit with a lot of emotions unless they're necessary emotions, which a lot are. A lot are, I'm not emotionally unintelligent, but I do realize too that my emotions do not govern my uh day. They don't determine my outcome. Like my emotions are indicators. And so for me to go backwards and go, oh, I just cringe when I think of that moment, it really would never happen in that way for me. But when I go back and look, I actually kind of look at the whole of the moment and think, oh, look at, look at, look at 36, 37-year-old Candace. She was just trying her hardest with young kids and look at her with her Star Wars shirt. She was so proud of herself that day. It's almost like an out-of-body experience sometimes. Yeah. And um I was like a different person back then. Yeah, I think for me, I don't cringe and I don't despise, but I definitely can separate the moment for what it was and where I am now.

SPEAKER_00 9:25

That's beautiful. I love that. Especially because it was so important for so many people that you know that you wouldn't disparage something that even if you're like, oh, look, I didn't have makeup on or whatever, you're like, I'm not gonna take away something that was so meaningful to so many people. Okay, so there's a reason I wanted to start with joy and then get into motherhood because for me and people who have followed the show know that I had a really traumatic birth and it was with my first, and now we have three, and it was a long journey of overcoming and fighting to love motherhood and get to that place. I'm curious when you became a mother, what that transition was like for you, and if you had to grab, fight for whatever you want to say, um, get that joy for yourself, or if it was an easy, like falling in love for sight type of thing for you.

SPEAKER_02 10:18

Oh man, my my birth stories about being a mom were were interesting. I actually write about it and laugh it up with you know, finding out I had just stational diabetes and I was very high risk. Um, I was about 374 pounds when I was pregnant with my daughter. Um, and so that also put a lot of stress on my body. So physically, I was going to a specialist every single, I mean, every single week, getting sonograms. A lot of people don't get that many pictures of their baby before they're born, but I did. I got one every week. I got to see their blood flow. I mean, you know what I mean? And then I had a dietitian telling me what I could and couldn't eat and I how to do injections in my stomach for um insulin, you know, to keep everybody healthy. And um then when I was, I had my daughter, it was a long laborious uh, you know, moment. But then on top of that, I went through postpartum depression. And then the first time my husband and I reconnected uh physically after having my daughter, you know, which took a while, but apparently not too long. Then I found out I was pregnant with my son immediately. So we were like so my kids are only 14 months apart. And I was not even really expecting to have one child, let alone two, and that close together, you know. So my world shifted from you thought it'd be fun to have a child and you'd been married seven years, and now you're gonna be a mom. So welcome to this journey, but you're gonna do it all, like you're gonna do it again, real quick. So let's go. Um, and so I had to shift everything I thought about my own pursuits or my own identity into a new role of keeping another human alive and now keeping two humans alive. And I mean, for me, the joy came in like I've always just I've said it over and over again the simple things. It's just the simple joys. So getting to see your kids learn how to talk and eat and walk and sit up and roll and tummy time. And those were moments that ironically, now having teenagers, I see that God give gave those to me as their mama. Like just like that's just for moms, that's just for daddies. Like we just get to see those things because they don't remember. Like, what's funny is they look back at pictures and they're like, I have no clue we even did that. What what was that? You know, and these teenage years, they're like, uh, why'd you dress me in that? And what'd you and I'm like, you don't even know that was the cutest outfit you ever wore. And I love that. It's the only one you didn't poop on. You know, I mean, it's like, you know, there's yes, there's these moments that I just feel like, what a gift that was to see those little bitty things that now I can instantly access when I look into their eyes as these grown young women and young men that I have in my house. I mean, like, like I can see with something they'll never be able to see in themselves.

SPEAKER_01 13:18

Wow.

SPEAKER_02 13:18

And it is it's the thing that gave me the most joy as a mom in the middle of a lot of chaos in those beginning years. It was just the little things I knew. If I blink, I'm gonna miss it. If I blink, I'm gonna miss it.

SPEAKER_00 13:33

Wow, Candace, there is so much there. Like just the you briefly touched on it, the insight we have as moms, and we've talked about this on the show before. It's our job to instill identity because we know them so deeply in a way that they will never know themselves. And so a lot of what's going on in the world today is kids are lost and they're confused and they're grabbing. And a lot of moms are like, okay, yeah, do that, do that, whatever, be whoever you want. Do that. And we have to say, this is who you are, this is what I see. I know you and be that strong tree that they can grab onto when the wind is whipping them around and they're like, I don't know, who am I? You know, and so I think a lot of that we're we're losing that as moms. We're not helping our kids to find their identity and to be that strong root in their lives. So I love that you said you see things that they won't even see in themselves. That's so beautiful.

SPEAKER_02 14:29

You want to know something? I've not really shared this um on a podcast or in an interview yet, but I really feel like this is valuable since you brought up the identity piece. Um I I don't know if you can gain a lot of knowledge from looking at the whole, but I think people our age, this uh zennial kind of like, you know, generation where we're in between um the internet being born and the internet not being a thing or reality, but just this distant hope. You know, we're we're now seeing the consequences of all of our choices that we've built. And when I say consequences, that's not necessarily bad, but when you put the grand scope, this is gonna get to the point. I know I have ADHD. Some people are already tuning out. Tune in. It's gonna make sense, I promise. But when the internet began, I was a junior in high school and we got it in our public school library, you know, and high school library. I went in and I would got on the internet, heard the whole dial up, made it to a couple of sites, you know, yahoo. I was like, woo, love it. Love it. Give me instant message now. And that that noise, the gargle, you know. The gargle. Um, but I did, I did find myself seeing the birth of the internet in the 90s, and then let's go to the 2000s. Now we have pop culture showing us a different thing that the internet needs, it needs data. So if you'll remember on Friends, Chandler's job, what'd he do? We don't know. He was just entering data. A data entry was like one of the top jobs that you could have in the 2000s. And it was because we were literally building the infrastructure for search engines for all the things that the internet's gonna show us. And in the 2010s, we had all of the birth of the social aspect of now the internet. So now we have all of these things saying you get to live on the internet, not just learn from the internet. Now you live on the internet, and now we're past the 2020s and we're in these in the middle of this now generation going, whoa, whoa, whoa, now we need privacy and to realize that we don't need the mask culture of the internet, the worldwideness of it, we need a smaller what's for me. So now we use things daily that are AI that can generate questions about what kind of flower is this that I'm looking at? How do I make a biscuit from scratch? I mean, like the things that we have done within the past 30 or 40 years in our advancing are are if we don't look at it holistically, will strip us of all of our human identity. And I mean this. In our children, if you're gonna speak identity into them and you don't know who they are, even and say you're an adoptive mom or you're or you're a parent that you're like, I don't know the genetic background and makeup of all the things that could be bubbling inside. And I need to research that. Okay, do those things, but let me just go ahead and give you some clarity on where we're living. We're living in a time and space right now where the entire internet infrastructure, they're driving on the highway, they got on the on-ramp and they don't have driver's license yet. They're literally, we're literally entrusting these babies to try to navigate uh a six-lane highway and rush hour traffic. And what I would say about giving your kids identity is remind them the only thing that they can learn about themselves from what the internet or the world at large has to tell them, even AI has what been put has been put in by their parents and their grandparents.

SPEAKER_00 17:51

Oh wow. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 17:53

So if you're already learning from something that seems a little bit more intelligent because it has artificial in front of it, you need to remember that it was put in by the data entry people that were my generation, the ones that gave it how to think, what to say, and how to calculate. And so, do you want something that's been built on the back of strangers to tell you who you are, or do you want those that have known you and held you in their womb or held you in their arms where you were the most vulnerable and couldn't do a thing for yourself to tell you who you are?

SPEAKER_00 18:23

Yes.

SPEAKER_02 18:23

Like I think we as a as a people in our generation and pair of parents need to be able to see correctly with a scope of grandeur that we are not fighting the internet. We're fighting, and we're not just fighting like culture at large for telling who them who they are socially and all these things. We're fighting just to let them see you are known and you are loved on a very, very personal, intimate level by people that can in the same room touch you, hold your hand, and be with you. And I think they need it.

SPEAKER_00 18:58

They need that, yes. And the more we can have those family experiences and close social experiences, the better. And you are preaching to the choir girl. I have started a movement at our kids' school, like let's band together to wait on social till 16. And then I want them on social at 16 so they can have a couple years with mentorship of like, how do I use this? What are some boundaries before they're out in the world? But I'm like, let's do it together because it's the peer pressure of parents more often than kids, because it's the parents like, oh, everybody has that. I don't want my kid to be weird. So if the parents band together, it's a lot easier. But I I'm on board with everything you're saying and to remind them that. And even just to like speak those words, words are so powerful and tell them, this is what I see in you, this is who I see you are, this is how I've known you, to say that as they're growing up, like and to instill that foundation is so good.

SPEAKER_02 19:56

And you're not the only one. My my kids don't get social too until they're 16. So I know, and and like I've had to tell teachers at their school, I'm sorry, but my kid won't be downloading that app. That's a messenger app, because I don't know who can access them and who can't, and and who can privately reach out to them just with their phone number. I was like, that's not safe for us. So can you communicate to them a different way? And I know that my kids have felt like ostracized in some in some ways, but um, I also know too that they are way more smart and savvy for their friend groups when they feel as though something's coming up that's just hits the button wrong. That gut inside of you that goes, that's not don't trust that, you know.

SPEAKER_00 20:37

Yeah, I showed my kids, I don't know if you've seen the video um where there's this kid on a school bus and the school bus driver starts to have a seizure. I don't know if you've seen that video. Every kid on the bus was on their phone, except one kid who didn't have a smartphone, and he noticed and recognized something was happening, and he ran up and hit the brakes, pulled the bus over, and then yelled, call 911. And all these kids were on their phones so they could do it. But he saved an entire bus load of kids from going into oncoming traffic. And so I showed my boys that and I was like, This kid was the only one not aware. And it's not just not being on your phone, it's not having a phone. Your brain gets used to looking around, seeing things, noticing versus being a million places. So anyway, that is a huge tangent. But there's two other things you said in your motherhood story that I want to go back to. Let's do it. Okay, one was you said I had to make a shift. You use the word shift, and I really like that because expectation and comparison are some of the biggest thieves of joy. And so when you when it's not what you expected, and we've talked about that on the show before, where it's like I labored for 24 hours and then had to have a C section, and I really didn't want my birth story to be that or this or that. And when the expectations change, how do we change with those expectations to go, okay, I'm gonna go back? Again and fight for joy versus like this isn't what I wanted and spiraling down. Is there a way to choose when expectations change?

SPEAKER_02 22:08

Oh goodness, yeah. As a matter of fact, this is this is your entire parenthood story. Just settle in, like literally buckle up and get ready for it because your kids are autonomous people. And it's not just even your birth story that gets derailed, it's your hopes and dreams for them that get derailed. It's your hopes and dreams that maybe you've built up since you were a child of when I become a mom, oh, we're gonna be this type of family and we're gonna do this. You know, I'll tell you right now, I had all of those things that I built up in my mind that I was like, oh, I want to have this tradition every year at Thanksgiving, or I want to do this for Christmas, and I want to, I want to do this. And there are some things within my scope that I can do. But I will tell you, finding out for my entire family that we literally are all neurodiverse. There are things that are never going to be in my scope of what I've wanted and dreamed up and built up in my perfect mind that will happen. It just won't. We we have sensory issues where we cannot go and enjoy necessarily a concert altogether because it's too loud for one person or they're wearing the wrong sweater because it's itching them. You know, I mean, like, like there's there's multiple factors that happen when you involve another human life that is different than you. And what you really need to decide, it's not a shift or a pivot, is you need to just settle into the fact that you've got to be unbothered by the fact that they're their own person. Um I know that you can train up a child and you can, you can literally like give them wisdom and you can give them encouragement, and you can give them hope, and you can give them even parts of your faith you can you can share with them and see that. But your children are not your report card. They're they're not your A or B honor roll. Like they are people. And I just feel like the greatest gift you can give yourself for your joy, and the greatest gift you can give your children is the ability to let them be themselves. It's it's just let them find out who they are and and literally make their own choices. And I know that that's not necessarily a popular theology for a lot of my faith-based people that follow me, but I'm telling you, I think the biggest struggles we have in our homes, by and large, with our kids, is trying to force them to fit an idea that you've built in your head for them, or that maybe even you see, like you see this great quality, and you're like, you're so talented. Why aren't you using this? Why aren't you doing this with your life? And oh, why are you with that group of friends? And you can speak into it and you can tell them what your opinion is. But the moment you shift from, I'm going to be unbothered by their choices that they're making because what they're doing is they're learning how to be human. They're learning how to find the things that light them up and give them their own joy and give them their own sense of belonging and community. And what I'd rather be is not necessarily their best friend. I could care less about being my kids' friend. But what I definitely want to be is I want to be a place where when they know good or bad things happen, I've got to share it with mom. I got to share it with dad. I want to be there at the table. I want to be there. I want to come back to this house. I want to, I want to have a friendship with them as we grow old. I, you know, I want to be in their lives. There's so many people right now that they have made difficult choices and probably very, very justified choices in putting strong boundaries with parents. Just because as you age and things change and you become more aware and they don't, I mean, you find yourself going, is that relationship healthy? Is it serving me well? Is it is it helping me be who I know I need to be as I grow? Um, I would say you you don't really need to shift to find that joy in parenthood when things don't match up your expectations. You just realize that your expectations are not the key priority or the paramount concern when it comes to being a parent or a person in just general. Your expectations don't need to bow and cater to you. They're they're just small things that you could hope for and dream for, but there are other big things you can hope for and dream for that you also can partner with, if I can be so bold as to say this to your your group. But I believe the things that I want to hope and dream for that I can partner with God are much more important than the little bitty things that I would just oh, that'd be nice if.

SPEAKER_00 26:48

Yeah. You know what I mean? There's some things that are worth dying on the hill for, and there are other things that you gotta let go. And I've never heard anybody say it like that, Candace, where it's like I've I've heard we've talked about it in the sense of like motherhood will rock you, or motherhood shows you right away that you're not, you know, in control or that you know you gotta go with the flow. But never have I heard someone say it's because you have autonomous human beings with free will. And that's the that's the sticking point that these are human beings. This is not the mom show, this is the family show, this is the kids' show. And so I love that you put that perspective on it. Now, the other thing you said regarding motherhood is finding the small joys. And I just want to marinate in this for a minute because when I talk about gratitude, I talk about the little things. Like it's very hard for me to have a grandiose when people are like, gratitude is the key and just be grateful. I'm like, it's hard to sometimes quantify the big things, but if I can just say, Oh, thank you, Jesus, for this chai tea or my fuzzy slippers, or and things I can touch or see or taste, or like the very, very small things, it takes me into gratitude so quickly. Do you have any sort of a gratitude practice? Does that help with joy? And is that another muscle we have to build?

SPEAKER_02 28:14

So I've heard it said, and there's even like a viral video of a comedian that I follow right now that he has this same philosophy. So this is not original Candace, but maybe it needs to spread to your audience as well. It's the yes, thank you. It's yes, thank you. It's regardless what happens in your life, you say yes and thank you. And the moment that something doesn't go exactly the way that you wanted, or you're finding I'm having a hard time being grateful for this, just go, yes, thank you, and find why you can say thank you for it. Um and listen, that's going to sound very, very shallow, or as though I'm not aware that people are dealing with some massive disappointments right now. Um, and I need you to hear me. You're speaking to a lady right now that I have a mother myself that's in the late stages of Alzheimer's. I have um seen Alzheimer's hit my family since I was an 11-year-old kid. My grandmother passed away with Alzheimer's as well. So I've seen these matriarchs in my family be um completely riddled from who I thought that they were going to be at their final days to who they are. And that is not a small thing. That's not a small thing that I can go, yes, thank you. But I cannot say yes, thank you to the big thing, but to the to the little things of I got to visit my mom today and bring her a blanket that I crocheted her. Yes, thank you. Thank you for five minutes with her. Oh, she she lit up. She didn't know my name, she didn't, she didn't remember me, but yes, thank you. That I saw it in her eyes, a connection for for four seconds. Yes, thank you. Like it's just yes, thank you, no matter what comes your way. And even if it's like you don't get the parking spot you want at the groceries, yes, thank you. You know what? I've been wanting to get my steps in. I've been telling everybody about it. Yes, thank you. Thank you, thank you, person, for cutting me off. I needed to get my steps in. I mean, it's just reframing your response. And I don't think people know how to reframe how they respond. I think we consistently are on this um, just uh it's an inevitable thing that our muscle is used to with either complaint or regret or or frustration or, you know, whenever expectation doesn't meet reality or our perception of something, we immediately have a choice to respond. And we either can respond with with yes, thank you, or we can respond with, well, that's just great. God damn it before just one, just one more thing to add to my plate today. Or when it rains, it pours. Yes, and you know what? Sometimes now that rain, when it pours, I've had those days where not a single thing can go right. And when you say yes, thank you, it turns from yes, thank you to yeah, yeah, yeah, thanks. Thanks, yeah, yeah. May I have another? Thanks. That's great, that's great. And then you just start for me, I start seeing the comic uh capability of this moment. Sometimes you just have to look outside into your own life and think, I'm not the only person here. I'm not the only person affected by this. And really, if you could just do that and say, Yes, thank you, what can I see? Those the little things get enjoyed more and gratitude becomes easier.

SPEAKER_00 31:41

That's so helpful. As you were talking, I was reminded of there's this old, I don't know if it's a fable or a proverb, but it's you know, the you've probably heard it where this man's son goes to war and they say, or do you know that one where it's like he goes to war and they're like, Oh, your poor luck, I'm so sorry. And then he says, Well, we'll see. And then it turns out that the son comes home and is a general and buys him a house and they say, Wow, you bought a house. And he says, Well, we'll see. And then the house burns down. And so it's like all these things where you don't know if this is a good thing or a bad thing. When somebody cuts me off in traffic, yeah, and they're slowing me down. I'm like, are they saving me from a ticket right now? Was I gonna speed and this is slowing me down? Like, thank you, Jesus, because now I'm not gonna get in an accident. Now I'm not gonna get a ticket, you know? And so I love the reframing. I also love to allow yourself to acknowledge this sucks and allow yourself to feel that and let it go and then find the joy. Because I do believe when we bottle up those things and we just try to ignore the bad, ignore the bad, it'll come out in one way or another. So allow yourself to feel sad, allow yourself to be frustrated and then find it, find it. So I really like that. Now, this is something really important. I wanted to talk to you about the video, the video. Yeah. When you went to Kohl's, you were there because it was your birthday. You were gonna buy yourself something and you were gonna get, do you remember? Yoga pants. Yoga pants, because you said, I should get healthy, I should get in shape, I should start working on this. So you were gonna get a should and you came out with a want. And I was like, man, how beautiful is that that this was your birthday and you didn't get something you should, should, should. You got something that made you laugh, laugh, laugh. Do you ever look at that and see that? And then the other side of that question is how often do we should ourselves when we should just enjoy ourselves?

SPEAKER_02 33:40

You know what? I jokingly, I this was the podcast name that I had when we had one. It's called um Shut the Should Up. And I think, I think the thing is is that a lot of people spend most of their life shoulding themselves. And you just and listen back. I said shoulding yourself. Beep, Candace. Right, right, right. No need to bleep. Uh, but I do think that shoulds and what ifs can steal your joy faster than anything else. Um, most of us need to learn how to live in what is and not what if or what can be or what should be. I mean, that shoulda, coulda, woulda philosophy can only navigate your life for so many years without taking and stripping you of everything fun, everything joyful, everything happy. And so um early on, I think I've just learned, well, this is what it is. So where I'm at right now, what am I doing? What what are we gonna do with this? You know? And I I honestly hadn't thought about that. That was a should moment that turned into a, hey, we're gonna make it something fun and you're gonna get something, you know. People were always like, Well, where'd you find that mask? And I'm like, it found me. It found me.

SPEAKER_00 35:00

It was meant to be.

SPEAKER_02 35:02

It found me. And so I I would say this follow fun, follow the fun, the moment that you feel like I should be doing something. Okay, well, right now I feel like I'm I'm building the plane as we're flying it with my family, with so many things, you know. None of us had the knowledge about neurodiversity that we have today. And so we are doing things that do not look normal to the rest of society, even because it preserves our mental sanity, it preserves our mental health, it helps with our recovery when we need to unwind and unmask and get away from oversensory issues and and and places. Um, we've created a safe haven here that it just does not look like what it looks like for everybody else. I mean, especially in the Christian culture. There's a lot of Sundays where we uh uh church online on purpose because what the what the church sees as, hey, let's let's bring a fog machine in here and bright lights and let's put words on the screen, and now we've got camera people running on stage, getting the close-up of the keys, and and then we're gonna switch songs from here to there. It's gonna be amazing because it it makes this beautiful medley, but but for us, we're like, why did you take a left turn? We had a whole other verse, you know? We're we're not doing a mashup, you know? And so there's things that are an onslaught to even our neurodiversity that are within our faith cultures that we're just gonna say, well, you're you should be a church, you should be a good Christian and do X, Y, Z. And we're like, well, we're shutting that should down too, because we also have mental health on the landscape in the forefront of if we don't have that right, we don't have the capability to pray and think and and really dive into the health of our spirit as well, you know. Um, so yeah, we we shut the should up a lot in this house. And I don't I don't feel bad about it. I I actually love that. I think that that's great.

SPEAKER_00 37:00

That's so good. And that goes with a lot of I found joy is saying yes, but a lot of it is saying no. And who am I gonna say no to? Have you had to? I mean, I'm sure since the video, you're getting opportunities left and right. So how do how do you do that? And do you ever feel bad if you're like, no, I'm not putting that on my plate, I'm not adding that to the calendar.

SPEAKER_02 37:22

Um, I used to really, really feel bad about saying no to things because I I do have a lot of that people pleasing in me. I do. Um, and I have a lot of um performance-driven kind of like acceptance that I still work through, where I feel like if I could be better and a better version of me, then I love me more, you know. So why wouldn't the world respond the same way or the people I love in my life respond the same way? But um, the reality is, is that's not the makeup of who I am, and that's not the character of what I want to show my kids and all those kind of things. So as I'm working through that, when I think about saying no to somebody or an opportunity or something, oh man, your no is so powerful to give you space and margin for the things that you really, really want and the things that you really, really, really want to see an outcome for. Like I had to learn too that my no is so powerful that it doesn't just affect today, it affects future. Like it's it affects my future joy waiting for me. Like if I say yes to everything because I can, because I I've got the I've got the space to do it now, why not? I'll just add it in. And listen, you uh every mom does this. I don't care who you are, ADHD or not. If your kid asks for something last minute that you think you could get done for them, what do you do? You work your butt off to get it done. Your son calls or texts and says, I forgot my cleats. Can you bring them up really quick? You know, part of us wants to go, you know, I need to teach him a lesson, say no, and then he'll have to deal with this. But then you're like, but I'm gonna run to the store anyways, and then that's on the way, and I'll just, I'll just do it. I'll just do it. And so, even that simple of a no sometimes, it it governs and builds a whole expectation of I don't have to have a harder conversation with my kid and teach him this aspect of of growing up. I'll do this, and then when they're out of my house, they'll deal with it. Okay, well, you're setting yourself up also to maybe have some adult children that don't know what the answer no is for themselves, even. And so no's are so powerful to not just affect today, but they affect tomorrow's as well. And sometimes you need that extra space because of the unexpected things that hit your day that you need to rearrange to be able to keep your mental health, your physical health, your spiritual health, um, your emotional health stable.

SPEAKER_00 39:55

Yeah. You know, and keep your mind clear. For me, it's like on the calendar, I have space for X, Y, and Z, but in my mind, I don't have the space to prepare for X, Y, and Z and listen to my kids and my husband and all of these things. So yes, I a hundred percent I am on board. I agree with that. What else are we inadvertently teaching our kids about joy or the lack of joy? Do you think?

SPEAKER_02 40:23

Oh goodness. Um I think a lot of times we're not really concerned with our kids' joys because we're not concerned with our own. I would say that joy is probably undervalued, underrated, unappreciated. Um it's the weirdest thing because everybody wants it. There's not a person in my life that I've met that didn't want to be happy, didn't want to feel joy, didn't want to know that fulfillment that comes with, you know, feeling like, oh, there's nothing that gives me more joy than this. And yet at the same time, people walk around almost like zombies, just hoping that joy creeps in the cracks of their living room and and just comes in like a guest that's gonna sit on their couch and maybe we'll interact with it soon. Um, and so the reality is that if you're trying to teach your kids about joy, you gotta teach yourself about it too. Um I think that you can't teach what you don't know. And a lot of people, especially in this weird pool of adulthood, you know, we're out here in the deep end together without the floaties on anymore, trying to navigate big choices. And sometimes we feel like we're still kids on the inside trying to make all this happen. And I feel like if you're trying to now pass on a legacy of a joy-filled life to children, you need to take an evaluation of where you lost your joy to begin with. And you need to make space for you to receive and recover your own joy first. Like you've got to start fighting back for your own joy. You know, you've got it, you've got to defend it and you've got to fight for it. And and once you get it, enjoy it, man. Use it up. It's it's not going to go away and not replenish. It's it's a resource that just is unending. It's so great. It's so great. There's enough. There's enough for you, there's enough for today, there's enough for tomorrow, there's enough for five minutes. It's not depletable.

SPEAKER_00 42:26

Yeah. You know, it's a never-ending resource. I love that because it's um Wayne Dyer used to call it be the orange. You can't get orange juice from a lemon, you can't get it from an apple. If you want to squeeze out orange juice, you've got to be the orange. And I remember my mom, it was like housework, cooking, cleaning, all of these things took precedence over everything. And I'm trying to even Candace, yesterday, like my family went on a bike ride, and my husband was like, Oh, just come. And I was like, Well, I have to do the dishes and I have to make the lunches. And I was like, you know what? Yeah, I'm gonna come. And prioritizing, like, I'm gonna go on a bike ride and watch my baby daughter in her bike seat squealing, literally squealing the entire time. And my boys just like, I get to pick the route and I'm gonna participate in that. And yeah, maybe some stuff is not gonna get done, and that's okay. But I remember seeing that example growing up of my mom doesn't get to participate because she handles everything herself and she does all the work and we go do the other things. And I was like, no, I'm not doing that. You know, I'm gonna participate, I'm gonna be part of this family, and then we're all gonna clean up together, guys. Like, this is not just gonna be mom. So yeah, I think that's a hundred percent like let's find our joy and model that joy because what if we don't, what are we modeling for them? Is that joy waits, everything else comes first?

SPEAKER_02 43:54

Oh, it's that work then play mentality. You know, work first, play second. Um, and I'm not Like, why why did we separate the two to begin with? Shouldn't we have enjoyment when we work? Shouldn't we play while we work? Like, that is instead now we put play with a word therapy, play therapy. And you're like, okay, oh well, play play does heal, but it should also get us to be productive. And and there's not somebody I know that um that's chasing the joy in their life, in their career at the same time, and actually feel it that isn't successful. Like those people are the highest pieces of success because they actually love what they do. And if they weren't getting paid for it, they'd still do it. They'd have to. Because it's part of their joy. And I I know bills need to get paid, and I know that you need to get things done, and you may not have the luxury to be doing the thing that you would dream up in your mind right now. But man, if there's something that could just motivate you to love what you do with your life, with your people, then it becomes way less of a headache to try to find and build joy than it is to just wait for it to come to you.

SPEAKER_00 45:09

Totally. Candace, what brings you joy today? What are some of your small joys?

SPEAKER_02 45:15

Oh, today I would say a good shower, a hairdryer. You know, um, I love having a hairdryer. I've been overseas where I had to let these natural waves come through in my hair and ugh, don't like it. I don't like it. You like a fluffy, fresh. I love, love the feeling of a good straightener on my hair. Um no, the little joys for me are right now just the ability to have a quiet house, um, the ability to speak with friends, the ability to plan and create content. My goodness, if you're if you're watching anything I'm posting right now, I promise you I still am the Chewbacca mom, I still speak, I still write, but you're gonna see nothing but crochet content right now. I am crocheting like it is going out of style. Like I'm starting a new business. And the thing is, is I'm not. I'm not. No, I'm not. But I I have found something about connecting with crochet that I used to do several years ago that is literally. Um, I joked with my husband the other day. I said, crochet helps me unwind so I don't unravel.

SPEAKER_00 46:23

Oh, I love it. Oh, you gotta put that on a shirt. Oh, I know it's coming.

SPEAKER_02 46:28

You wait. Oh, yeah. TM TM, put that trademark behind it. I visit I verbally said it. It's mine. She got it, guys. I got it. I own it. But I mean, really, it does. There's there's something that you've got to find to give you joy to unwind so that you don't unravel. It it really find that thing and and make space for it, you know.

SPEAKER_00 46:49

I love that so much. I do crosswords with it. Used to be chai tea, now it's a coffee, but I'll just like take a minute and have my chai tea and do my crossword. And I'm like, I used to think it was um optional, and now I'm like, oh, this is not optional. I need 15 minutes every day of quiet crossword chai tea, and it it seriously impacts the rest of my day. It's so fun. Unwind so you don't unravel. I love that. Yeah, Candace, do you still have the mask?

SPEAKER_02 47:20

Oh, yeah, oh yeah. I have that, and I have like maybe nine or 10 of them around here in the house somewhere. Oh my gosh. People keep on giving them, yeah. Yeah, they they're like, I brought one, and I'm like, okay, but you know that like like I have I have my own, right? The one for the video. They're like, Yeah, but this one I want to give we have it together.

SPEAKER_00 47:40

And I'm like, okay, cool.

unknown 47:42

Cool.

SPEAKER_00 47:43

The little collection. I love that. Okay, so we are getting to the end. And before we do our fun little woo-woo thing, is can you tell everybody where to find you, where to get connected with you, and everything you have to offer? Sure.

SPEAKER_02 47:56

So the biggest place to go visit is I have two separate websites. One's to just check out what I'm doing and where I'm at. It's candispain.fun, not dot com dot fun. Um, and I love that I could get that extension. So candispain.fun. There's not a single I in my name, not in candice, not in pain. So you just remember all A's, candispain.fun. Or you can go to candispain.store and that's where I do my handmade merch and crochet items that you can buy there. But like I have a new um little seven-day joy junket that I literally print in my house and I assemble them all, and it's like a seven-day mini notebook that has pockets in there for you to collect things and find a way to jolt your joy. So it's called Jolt Your Joy, and it'll literally, if you need a joy infusement, you and you've got one week, it's got assignments for you every single day. And at the very end, I'm gonna spoil, I'm gonna spoil it, but the end of every book, you have your own emergency confetti in like a little packet so that you can take it's so cute. I'm telling you, I cannot keep these books. I made um, gosh, I mean, I've made over 300 of them towards the beginning of this year, and here we are in March. And every event that I go and speak at, they sell out every single time. And what's wild is I'm like, dude, I don't even know if my other books have done this well, you know? And it's and I think it's because a lot of people think I can do this for seven days.

SPEAKER_00 49:28

And so it's terrible, totally. And then you have that emergency confetti, oh, and it's and it's so cute.

SPEAKER_02 49:35

So if you're like a junk journaler or you're somebody like that that likes to put stuff in a book and get messy and have all the bright colors, this is your thing. This is your for you.

SPEAKER_00 49:43

Yeah. Oh, I love it. I will link to both of those websites on the show notes now. Candace, at the end of the show, for each guest, I pray for them the week leading up to, and I ask God. And if there's anything I feel that God wants to share, I share it with them. And I was wondering, I did hear something for you. Is it okay if I share it with you? Yeah, sure. Let's go for it. Let's go for it. Okay. I gotta tell you, I am nervous, Candace, but oh no, let me find my page. Woo! Oh no. I'm gonna tell you, and you just put it on the shelf or you pray about it. But this is what I heard. Okay. You quit stand up because of profanity, but God says, I forgave you for the profanity. I forgave you a long time ago. Comedy is not dead, and I want to redeem it for you. Honor God through comedy. You want SNL, it's yours. Get it. You want stand up, it's yours. Just ask me how and go for it. Okay, that's it. That is awesome.

SPEAKER_02 50:42

I love that.

SPEAKER_00 50:44

He is so sweet. I would love to see you on SNL, by the way. Gosh, could you imagine your lights on that show? Yes.

SPEAKER_02 50:52

So here's the deal. Well, you don't know this, but I was just about to tell you where you were like, and I was like, should I tell her that or would she even care? But I just think God's funny because it's like he was like, No, I need her to say this first. But every Tuesday night here in the Dallas Fort Worth area where I live, I go do a stand-up uh mic night. And so tonight is my stand-up comedy night, and literally it's the worst. It's a joy that I love, but I hate at the same time. So I go into a room where profanity is the only thing spoken. And I'm literally in a group of probably 20 comics that we have five minutes each, and nobody cares what you're saying because they're worried about their own that they're about to perform, and it's all just raunchy. And I get up and I'm the only person there that literally is like, so hey, everybody, you know, and I mean it's like it's hilarious, but I think that I find myself laughing at just the dichotomy of me being in the room because I also get paid to speak on stage for thousands, and I there's nothing in me that needs this, I don't need it. Um, and the Lord has literally been redeeming my joy of stand-up comedy right now for over a year. So I've been doing this quietly for over a year. Nope, nope, a lot of people don't. So that's pretty funny because like I'm serious, I'm almost at the end of my rope going, okay, God, what am I doing? We've been here about a year. Do I keep on doing this or not? Or what are we gonna do with it? So, no, that's great. I love that. Oh, I love it.

SPEAKER_00 52:19

And I love too the dichotomy because my brother-in-law is a stand-up comic, and my sister is so cute. She was telling me, like, he asked if he could talk about our sex life on stage, and I told him yes. And she was like, People come up to him and they're like, You have sex with your wife? You enjoy having sex with your wife and all these things. And she was like, It's such a dichotomy between the perverse, like what's on stage versus what God intended. And I'm like, that light is, I think, what God wants. Like, let's put light in the room, you know, let's put you in the dark places, shine, which you do, Candace. You shine so bright.

SPEAKER_02 52:55

Did you know that Candace means glittering and shining brightly? No, no, it does. That's what Candace means. So that's just so funny. That's so funny. I love it.

SPEAKER_00 53:04

Well, I'm so glad. Thank you so much for taking the time. I know I was like, oh, I gotta get you on this season, and so I'm so glad I got you on. Super cool. Super funny. I'll keep following you, and I can't wait to see when the stand-up gets a little bigger when you let the world know. Let's go! Let's go. No, I love that. That was so cool. Thank you. That's awesome. You're welcome. I'll talk to you soon, Candace. All right, bye. This has been the Dead Mother Podcast. Remember, new episodes drop every Tuesday. If you enjoyed today's episode, please leave a review. It really does help. Special thanks to Jose Cerna for our theme music and Katie Legou for our cover art.