EP155: Raising Humans, Not Checklists: Five Keys to a Flourishing Childhood

Interview with Sonia Bestulic / Founder of Flourish with Sonia

HOSTED BY PAUL SULLIVAN

What if the biggest challenges facing kids today aren’t about behavior or performance - but about how disconnected we’ve become from ourselves? Drawing on decades of work with thousands of families, globally recognized thought leader, speech pathologist, and author Sonia Bestulic has built a framework for raising empowered children through self-leadership, intuition, and trust. She shares why so many parents feel stuck in guilt and self-doubt, how traditional systems often miss a child’s true brilliance, and what it really means to build strong foundations for lifelong flourishing.

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Transcript

00;00;00;03 - 00;00;26;06
Sonia Bestulic
There's various, I guess, principles that all link to raising empowered humans. And again, it's that multi-dimensional approach, but it comes into those categories because obviously foundations is number one. Obvious reasons. Like that's that's the root system. That's the ecosystem we need to nourish. Without that, there's no point even looking at the other keys too much. Right. Got to have the foundations in place.

00;00;26;08 - 00;00;46;21
Sonia Bestulic
Then from there, if we kind of use the analogy of, of a tree, you've got the root system nourish. The ecosystem is good. So then you're looking at the trunk and you're going, okay, well how do I how do I develop a strong trunk to then branch out?

00;00;46;23 - 00;01;18;13
Paul Sullivan
Welcome to the Company of Dads podcast. I'm your host Paul Something. We're focused on lead dads, working moms, and how small changes at home or work can have a big impact on their lives. Each episode promises to deliver actionable advice on some area of concern at home or at work. Short. Direct. Again. Actionable five questions. Five answers. Today we're talking to Sonia Bestulic, a globally recognized thought leader and speaker, award winning children and adult author, holistic speech pathologist and life coach.

00;01;18;15 - 00;01;41;27
Paul Sullivan
In her 20s, Sonia founded and led a Sydney, Australia based speech pathology company for over 18 years, during which time she had about three children in just two and a half years, all while writing, speaking and hosting a podcast chat about children. She is the founder of flourish, with Sonia, delivering training, coaching and consulting services, and is currently a creator of Transformational Entertainment in Education.

00;01;41;29 - 00;02;09;29
Paul Sullivan
Intent to awaken heart led self leadership in childhood and beyond. We're here to talk about Sonia's latest book, The Five Golden Keys for Raising Empowered Human. Subtitled is great. Unlock kids, self leadership and lifelong flourishing. Her book offers a groundbreaking fusion of science, spirituality and practical tools. Sonia. Welcome to the company Dads podcast.

00;02;10;01 - 00;02;13;29
Sonia Bestulic
Hey Paul, thank you so much for having me. It's an absolute delight.

00;02;14;04 - 00;02;29;29
Paul Sullivan
You know, before we get into the question, what people don't know is you and I were you and I connected years ago for research you were doing. And then you and I have been trying to get, connected for this podcast for months and months and months. But the, New York Sydney time zone, different is is a little challenging.

00;02;29;29 - 00;02;38;09
Paul Sullivan
And you're a great sport because you're actually in New York today and barely awake, half awake, mostly awake.

00;02;38;12 - 00;02;43;09
Sonia Bestulic
I would say about 20% awake right now. All right, all right, well.

00;02;43;12 - 00;02;47;21
Paul Sullivan
20% awake. But I know you're going to get 100% on the podcast, so.

00;02;47;22 - 00;02;50;02
Sonia Bestulic
Absolutely. Absolutely.

00;02;50;04 - 00;03;09;08
Paul Sullivan
All right, so five questions, five answers. Let's start. You know, you've had a great career, you know, helping kids, helping families. Being a parent yourself. Question number one. You know, what was the inspiration behind writing the book that we're talking about today?

00;03;09;11 - 00;03;34;19
Sonia Bestulic
Yeah. So I would say the inspiration has been it's been decades, as you said, that I've worked as a speech pathologist. So in that time, Paul, I've worked with thousands of kids in their families, both nationally and internationally. So really quickly I could see themes emerging. And one of them was that a lot of families were coming to me feeling really disempowered.

00;03;34;21 - 00;04;08;08
Sonia Bestulic
And although they were looking for a speech pathology approach per se, the work I was doing was so much more than just speech pathology. And so what I mean by that is, yes, I would tend to like the surface level, aspects that they would come in with concerns about. But then there were always other things at the deeper root, root cause level, whether that was, you know, low self-esteem or feeling, you know, kind of parents feeling guilt and feeling like they weren't enough and couldn't help their kids.

00;04;08;08 - 00;04;32;07
Sonia Bestulic
And so there are all these other barriers coming in that I had to chip away at. And so my approach became very I call it multidimensional and more holistic. Because really to make change, I had to address the ecosystem. So that's, that's kind of the inspiration behind the book is that, you know, the stats today are crazy with youth mental health.

00;04;32;10 - 00;05;00;14
Sonia Bestulic
And I've always been someone that's gone. What's happening on the root cause level? What's happening with the relationship people are having with themselves? Yeah. That's then catalyzing into all these other symptoms and difficulties and challenges. And that's why I felt like I had to write five Golden Keys because it was like, I've got to just bring a lens to this that is more 360 degrees and help people to just come back to basics of what's actually going on.

00;05;00;17 - 00;05;16;09
Sonia Bestulic
For me, and how can I make some change that really empowers me as an individual, whether you're a parent, an educator, or a kid. We've got to come back to our relationship with self and how we're leading ourselves, and then kind of moving from that place.

00;05;16;11 - 00;05;17;23
Paul Sullivan
That's fantastic.

00;05;17;25 - 00;05;19;20
Sonia Bestulic
I'm wondering, you know.

00;05;19;22 - 00;05;38;09
Paul Sullivan
When you think about this, was there a moment you'd be doing you had been a speech pathologist for quite a long time. Was there a moment that you remember, a particular family or particular child and said, you know what, now I've really got to, you know, put all of this into something bigger, something that people can take with them.

00;05;38;11 - 00;06;00;08
Sonia Bestulic
Yeah, there's a few moments, I would say one personally. For me, that was it might be a simple example, but it caused like this inner conflict for me. And if I draw on that moment, it was it was when I was doing a formal assessment, within the speech pathology clinic, and I was doing a formal assessment of a child.

00;06;00;11 - 00;06;25;22
Sonia Bestulic
And during this assessment, you know, it's very strict in terms of when you give a question and you receive an answer, you can only score it based on, you know, what that assessment says is okay. And not. And with this particular child, they were giving responses that they weren't marked correct because they didn't fit the criteria of the assessment responses that were deemed appropriate.

00;06;25;24 - 00;06;49;03
Sonia Bestulic
But technically they really were logically still correct. This kid had an incredible way of thinking about the world, an incredible way of, I guess, problem solving, that his responses were not going to come up in a book like an assessment manual. Right? So yeah, no one was wowed because I was like, those responses are actually they make sense to me.

00;06;49;03 - 00;07;11;21
Sonia Bestulic
They're great. But I can't make you correct. That created that moment, created in a conflict for me because I'm like, how can I now I've got to present this clinical, I guess, results that doesn't really demonstrate his his true brilliance and his uniqueness in his way of thinking. And that's where I started to struggle personally, because I'm like.

00;07;11;28 - 00;07;12;07
Paul Sullivan
Yeah.

00;07;12;14 - 00;07;16;25
Sonia Bestulic
I can't give the full story and this is going to paint a picture that's not accurate.

00;07;16;26 - 00;07;33;24
Paul Sullivan
Not accurate. Yeah. I say, all right. Question two as we promised. Or five questions five answers. Question two the obvious one that that everyone listening is going to want to know, what are the five golden keys? Describe them to us. And tell us. You know what they mean.

00;07;33;26 - 00;07;38;10
Sonia Bestulic
Yeah, well, gee, Paul, what are the five go to? That's the whole book. I know, I.

00;07;38;10 - 00;07;44;29
Paul Sullivan
Know, I'm not going to ask you to go through each one. People are going to want to know. You got a list of. And then let's go buy the book, because then they'll say, well, I want to know more about that one.

00;07;44;29 - 00;08;07;08
Sonia Bestulic
Oh, gosh. So look foundations they all start with f one. So yes. So foundations is the first one. And when I when I look at the five Golden keys, this is really coming back to what it means to be human. So foundations fulfillment fan freedom and flourishing. They're the five golden keys. And then we.

00;08;07;08 - 00;08;09;28
Paul Sullivan
Say that say that again. So everybody gets it. Say that again.

00;08;09;28 - 00;08;15;05
Sonia Bestulic
So foundation foundations, freedom, fun fulfillment, flourishing.

00;08;15;07 - 00;08;18;06
Paul Sullivan
Right. And then you said within each one of those and I call you.

00;08;18;09 - 00;08;42;24
Sonia Bestulic
Within each one of those, there's various, I guess, principles that all link to raising empowered humans. And again, it's that multi-dimensional approach, but it comes into those categories because obviously foundations is number one obvious reasons like that's that's the root system, that's the ecosystem we need to nourish. Without that, there's no point even looking at the other keys too much.

00;08;42;24 - 00;09;04;07
Sonia Bestulic
Right. Got to have the foundations in place. Then from there, if we kind of use the analogy of a tree, you've got the root system, nourish the ecosystems. Good. So then you're looking at the trunk and you going, okay, well how do I, how do I develop a strong trunk to then branch out. And that's where things like the fun key comes in.

00;09;04;13 - 00;09;26;00
Sonia Bestulic
The fulfillment key comes in, the freedom key comes in and the flourishing is really, you know, obviously what it sounds like the leaves, the flowers, the etc. that comes in. So it's it's kind of it's bringing us through those stages. If you like. But I have to say it's not necessarily in that order. It starts with foundations.

00;09;26;00 - 00;09;38;00
Sonia Bestulic
But then we've got things happening that are, you know, kind of catalyzing the flourishing tree all the time. So hopefully, I mean, that sounds a little bit abstract, but there's a lot within it.

00;09;38;00 - 00;09;53;17
Paul Sullivan
Well, let's just drill down on, on the first one. So, so listeners understand what you mean specifically by foundation. We can all visualize the foundation of a house. But what does that mean when it comes to a child or when it comes to a child within that that family says, yeah.

00;09;53;19 - 00;10;21;18
Sonia Bestulic
So I would say some of the few principles in there is nourishing intuition. That's a big one. That's a big one that gets overlooked a lot. And it's a really important one because this is when we're looking at self leadership. It's all about how do you tap into your own innate wisdom, and how are we embodying that ourselves as parents and professionals, so that our kids feel more safe and comfortable to tap into their own intuition?

00;10;21;20 - 00;10;48;23
Sonia Bestulic
So nourishing intuition is is one of the key and core foundations. That's what I call our sacred GPS. We've got to come in and tap into that sacred GPS so we can move in the world, discerning what is aligned with us or not, and trusting ourselves. Paul, like there's so much external like not just validation, but this insecurity of I need everyone to tell me what I need to do and what's right and wrong.

00;10;48;25 - 00;10;59;19
Sonia Bestulic
When we flip that and we're nurturing our own intuition, we're we're checking in with ourselves, with our higher wisdom to come from that place, to make those decisions.

00;10;59;23 - 00;11;22;04
Paul Sullivan
This is so good. And this is actually did this was going to be my third question anyway. And that is when you talk about that practicing presence and that inner trust, if somebody has not been, I guess, trusting in that, having that inner trust, how do you specifically help them gain it for themselves as a parent or for the child or how they can work?

00;11;22;04 - 00;11;25;21
Paul Sullivan
Yeah. How do you help them gain that inner trust if they haven't had it?

00;11;25;23 - 00;11;48;17
Sonia Bestulic
Yeah, I, I would say if we if we want to keep it super simple checking in and I say checking in with your heart, we do so much thinking and we try to put logic to stuff. But for a lot of kids when we say this, that they're intuitive as it is, it's not like they need training. What they need is a space to feel safe, to check in with their heart.

00;11;48;17 - 00;12;07;16
Sonia Bestulic
So even parents saying, what is your heart? Say so when they when when a decision needs to be made and you say, what does your heart say about this? Was your heart feel about this? And then you tap into I want to say tap in. It's just it's literally just going, what do I feel? My heart. So it's quite it's quite fascinating what comes from that.

00;12;07;19 - 00;12;23;17
Sonia Bestulic
And the same with adults and say, what does your heart say about that? And often the heart says something different to what they had been saying. Yeah. So that would be the most simple way to kind of start is checking in with what is my heart say and kind of leading from there.

00;12;23;19 - 00;12;42;06
Paul Sullivan
This is amazing. You know, question four and this is where I always think, you know, while you're a parent, it's really that you're a speech pathologist. You've seen thousands and thousands of kids and that's been able to inform you and give you a level of knowledge that most of us parents, fathers, mothers do not have. I have three kids.

00;12;42;06 - 00;13;02;21
Paul Sullivan
I have three kids who are all all daughters, all girls. But there are three completely different kids, so I don't know if I would could stitch, you know, a through line there. But you know, and therefore, you know, we have a family where if we have a question, well, we'll lean on experts because you have a larger sample size, you have a, you know, better ability to say, okay, no, this is fine.

00;13;02;21 - 00;13;35;15
Paul Sullivan
This isn't fine. But when you, you know, question four, when you think about, you know, and I think you use the term parenting your own evolution when you talk about how parents comparator and evolution in a way to raise more empowered humans, how do you help them do it in a way that is ultimately productive when they're leaning into their strengths as a parent, not in a way that is perhaps reductive, where they're thinking, well, you know, when they just have bad information.

00;13;35;15 - 00;13;54;05
Paul Sullivan
I mean, there are, you know, good people make bad choices, all the time. So, so question for how do you really help people parent their own evolution and to understand that these are the correct skills that they should be leaning into. And these are, you know, the incorrect skills that they might want to just leave behind.

00;13;54;07 - 00;14;16;12
Sonia Bestulic
Yeah. And and I think, Paul, when we look at parenting your own evolution, it's always coming back to relationship with self. Do I have unconditional acceptance for myself am I? And this is and this is a tough one because for parents, guilt like the energy of guilt is so huge. The energy of not enoughness and am I doing the right thing?

00;14;16;12 - 00;14;37;15
Sonia Bestulic
And look, I was there to I was trying to get parenting right, like and I just couldn't because it just, you know, and that's what I mean by the whole yes, we can lean on external, as a point of reference, but then coming in and checking in with ourselves to go, look, I made that decision and we didn't turn out the way that I want it.

00;14;37;15 - 00;14;59;14
Sonia Bestulic
So can I have unconditional acceptance? Not guilt and shame, but can I be open to say I gave that a go and it didn't go the way that I want it, but I'm going to lean back and I still trust myself. I still love myself. I still honor myself. And from this place, what's the next decision? What did I learn from that and how do I move from that?

00;14;59;17 - 00;15;15;25
Sonia Bestulic
Because a lot of the times as parents and professionals, we get stuck in the shame and the guilt, and then we go, oh my gosh, I made that decision. It was awful. I did the wrong thing. And then you get stuck there and then you're in fear and then you really can't make decisions. Then you lose trust in yourself and then you you've lost yourself.

00;15;15;25 - 00;15;16;01
Sonia Bestulic
Yeah.

00;15;16;01 - 00;15;17;26
Paul Sullivan
This is circle. Yeah.

00;15;17;28 - 00;15;38;25
Sonia Bestulic
And I know it because I've been there. Right. So how do you how do you come out of that is even even it's what you tell yourself. So what you're thinking to yourself, that's number one. Because from there, if you have the thought of yourself to yourself and with yourself, know that no matter what I love and accept myself.

00;15;38;28 - 00;16;01;05
Sonia Bestulic
And if you keep saying that, then you're allowing yourself to feel safe in your own body. And this goes for kids too. But when we actually practice that, and we're not suppressing our emotions and trying to pretend we've got it all together, you know, it's it's more about I'm flowing with what's going on. I'm going to have unconditional acceptance of myself.

00;16;01;08 - 00;16;21;29
Sonia Bestulic
I'm going to be kind and compassionate, and I'm learning. Yeah, sometimes we base ourselves to the point of illusion. Right? But if you just get real, I just go, I completely screwed up and that's okay. This is what I've learned from it, and this is how I'm going to bounce back. Kids learn so much from us saying, I actually screwed that up.

00;16;22;02 - 00;16;38;11
Sonia Bestulic
And what I thought to myself, I thought it was going to go this way, but it didn't. So now I'm going to make this decision. And if you verbalize, if you speak through your process, your internal process that is so powerful for kids, they don't want perfect parents. They want real parents.

00;16;38;13 - 00;16;48;14
Paul Sullivan
I know you're also showing them that, that they're going to fail too. So if they see the person that they look up to, their mother and father admitting a mistake, it's going to help them when they make their own mistakes.

00;16;48;16 - 00;17;07;18
Sonia Bestulic
Yeah. And how you relate to yourself. Because kids, that's what they're going to emulate from they're going to learn from those processes. So the more that we're aware of our own processes and it's not about perfecting the processes, it's about being present to, oh, that surprised me. I didn't think I'd have that reaction. And then you kind of yeah.

00;17;07;18 - 00;17;09;26
Sonia Bestulic
And you're recalibrating. Does that make sense?

00;17;09;29 - 00;17;37;18
Paul Sullivan
It does. It does this all of it. So question five, the fifth and final question. You know when you look at, you know, the world writ large and individuals and children writ large, I mean we're healthier, wealthier, living longer, more connected than ever before. Yet there is this mental health crisis going on. You know, families are exhausted.

00;17;37;20 - 00;17;57;01
Paul Sullivan
You've talked about this conflict between intuition and external expectations. And, you know, the education system at times, you know, trying to fit children into a, you know, a box, you know, question about how have we gotten to this point and yet how do we get out of it?

00;17;57;04 - 00;18;20;17
Sonia Bestulic
Yeah. And I believe in this comes back to foundations, but it's actually chapter one. O'Neill create or shape. And what that is, is, I guess the strong underlying message is what does it mean to be human? We've got this far where I don't know that we're so connected. We're more disconnected from the truth of who we are, which is we're all creators.

00;18;20;20 - 00;19;02;23
Sonia Bestulic
So when we are disconnecting ourselves from our true nature, which is to create, I mean, that's that's what we do. And when I say create, I don't mean like paintings and drawings. That's part of it. But it's just it's just creating an idea about something or. Yeah. So when we're disconnected from our innate creative power, our ability to make decisions, our ability to explore and play and learn about the world and learn who we are when we don't have that freedom, then I call it it catalyzes a crisis in our spirit because our soul and spirit is like, this isn't our true nature, and we keep trying to force ourselves into all the things we

00;19;02;23 - 00;19;26;04
Sonia Bestulic
need to force ourselves to survive the day to day. So coming back to create or shift is coming back to listening to who am I? Silence. Having some stillness and just going, what do I feel like doing? How can I be spontaneous today? You know, rather than that over scheduling kind of pushed into different things we need to do.

00;19;26;07 - 00;19;44;08
Sonia Bestulic
It's coming back to, I mean, nightly a creator. And I'm comfortable with silence, like so many people just cannot handle not doing anything or having silence. It's like, oh my God. I mean, I panic, you know, and it's beauty in that there's so much beauty in just being still for a little bit. I'm not talking about meditating.

00;19;44;08 - 00;20;23;13
Sonia Bestulic
Meditating is fantastic, but it's not necessarily that. It's just what I just sit here and watch the waves. Why don't I just sit here and enjoy just, you know, doing nothing, watching people walk by, you know, those simple yet very powerful moments bring us back to, you know, our humanness, an appreciation of just the moment. So again, I know that sounds quite kind of huge and really simple, but it is the most powerful coming back to our creator ship and just our uniqueness and playing with life a little more, I love it.

00;20;23;15 - 00;20;36;21
Paul Sullivan
Sonia Bess Tillich, founder of flourish with Sonia and author of The Five Golden Keys for Raising Empowered Humans. Thank you so much for joining me on the Company dad's podcast today.

00;20;36;24 - 00;20;39;00
Sonia Bestulic
Thank you Paul, I really appreciate it.

00;20;39;02 - 00;20;43;27
Paul Sullivan
All right. Now now I'm going to sit with silence. I'm not going to talk. I'm going to stop. Right.

00;20;43;29 - 00;20;49;03
Sonia Bestulic
That's it. You got the hardest part. You know. Suicide. I want to talk.

00;20;49;06 - 00;20;51;06
Paul Sullivan
Thank you again, son. You.

00;20;51;08 - 00;20;53;26
Sonia Bestulic
Thank you for all.

00;20;53;28 - 00;21;14;06
Paul Sullivan
Thank you for listening to another episode of the Comfort of Dads podcast. Really appreciate you tuning in week after week, trying to use this moment here to thank the people who make it possible. Number one, of course, Helder Moura, who is our podcast editor. We also have Skip Terry Home, so many of you know from Lead Diaries, he's taken over our social media.

00;21;14;06 - 00;21;34;28
Paul Sullivan
Terry Brennan is helping us with our audience development. And Emily Servant is there, each and every day helping with the web development akin to any of this without, an amazing board, of advisors. So I just want to say thank you to all of you who help. And I want to say thank you to everyone who listens.

00;21;34;28 - 00;21;38;11
Paul Sullivan
And, hopefully you'll tune in again next week. Thanks so much.