Lots to Unpack There
We’re Jess and Lisa, two best friends in our 40s living in Maryland. This podcast is about life, motherhood, leadership, and everything in between. We’re navigating the “messy middle” of personal and professional life and have learned that having someone who just gets it makes the journey less hard.
Each week, we’ll share something real from our own lives and unpack it together in real time. Our hope is that as we process and reflect, it’ll inspire and help you do the same—wherever you are.
Lots to Unpack There
Music as Memory and Finding Your Happy Place
Music creates powerful emotional connections and serves as a unique memory trigger, sometimes functioning as a sixth sense for those who experience it as a full-body phenomenon.
• Music can transport us back to specific memories and moments in our lives
• For some people, music is physically overwhelming and makes multitasking impossible
• Using music strategically to alter moods or validate feelings is common
• Sound creates beautiful visual patterns when visualized through mediums like sand
• Children can develop specific music preferences linked to emotional states from an early age
• Having a personal "happy place" provides mental refuge during difficult times
• Happy places aren't always physical locations but can be emotional states
• Incorporating elements of your happy place into everyday life creates ongoing comfort
• Coffee plays a significant role in many people's comfort rituals
• Finding moments of peace and control helps manage daily stress
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Hey, it's Jess and Lisa. We've got stories to share From our hearts to your ears. Lots to unpack there. Tune in every week you won't want to miss. Dive deep into life with Jess and Lisa.
Jess:We're Jess and Lisa, two best friends in our forties living in Maryland. This podcast is about life, motherhood, leadership and everything in between.
Lisa:We're navigating the messy middle of personal and professional life and have learned that having someone along the way who just gets it makes the journey less hard.
Jess:So each week we'll share something from our own lives and unpack it together in real time. Our hope is that as we process and reflect, it'll inspire you to do the same wherever you are. Yeah, Anyway, I had a friend a couple years ago when I say a couple years ago, it was like over a decade ago who would always give song lyrics ago, it was like over a decade ago who would always give song lyrics I mean always singing in response and offering song lyrics and I kind of missed that in my life. I picked that up from him and then I haven't talked to him in a really long time.
Lisa:Like a song lyric for a situation.
Jess:Yeah.
Lisa:Interesting. This is the second time today I've had an intellectual conversation about songs and how they relate to your life or music rather.
Jess:Oh, I have so many thoughts about this.
Lisa:The other one was earlier today when my husband and I were talking about like songs and like different times in our lives and how different music kind of encapsulates a different aspect of our lives. And what I thought was funny about that one was every time he mentioned a group or a song or something like that, I related it back to a movie. Like every single time he'd be like, well, do you know, primus, for example, was one of his examples, and I was like I don't know Primus, but I know the reference from Primus, from Empire Records, which was one of my favorite movies growing up. And he'd be like do you know? There were like three or four times when he referenced some kind of music or something and it immediately evoked a specific movie for me. Or in one case it was a television show which was 30 Rock, which a lot of roads lead back to 30 Rock for me. But sure, sure, yeah.
Jess:That. That is really interesting and not at all surprising Really to hear about you.
Lisa:Really, I think of myself as more of a music person than a movie person, but this whole conversation would would indicate the opposite.
Jess:Well, okay, so from my perspective, when I think of music and how it has impacted me, I absolutely have those times in my life where if I hear a song, it zooms me back to running on the treadmill on a cruise ship or like that. That's a really specific memory, very specific, like. It's like music, short circuits, whatever sort of memory thing is happening in how I catalog events. And we have talked about my memory. I've never had my memory tested.
Speaker 1:I know that it is fallible.
Lisa:I really should, but I think we have That'd be so fun to find out. Like, are you like a okay?
Jess:I'm actually a super rememberer.
Lisa:Yeah, exactly, there's gotta be some sort of term for that. But yeah, exactly.
Jess:Yeah. So it is actually really interesting to think about this because I think there are a lot of different. I'm just saying this out loud for the first time and so forgive my first draft thinking but there are so many different senses that open up doors to memories. Yes, and, and for me it's almost like music is a sense unto itself where there are certain I would say even more so than certain sounds, smells. I certainly that connects back, but it's almost like when I interact with people they kind of get their own little signature in my brain and now that's a new way to access that information.
Jess:I don't know if it is a cataloging thing, that I just have a very organized memory process, or if it's a recall thing, like I'm recalling more frequently and so because I'm always thinking I've got this little overthinking brain and so I'm wearing those grooves and so it sticks better, or if it's because I have additional channels that activate that memory archiving thing. But music is, it feels like its own channel and I have it's like a sense by itself it is like a sense it is, music is something that I feel.
Lisa:Yeah.
Jess:And that it's like, it is a corporeal experience when I produce it oh totally. I noticed that music. Well, I mean, that makes sense.
Lisa:It's literally a vibration in your throat and therefore in the rest of your body.
Jess:I mean it's yes, and even I'm hypersensitive to some aspects of it, like a very techno beat or electronic dance music I physically cannot handle. It makes me physically uncomfortable to be around it, and it's not just because my ears are sensitive. So it's very strange. And we talked about AJR and how my in-laws, or my brother and his family, are very into listening to music and I and my son sees my little music emblem on the apple car play. He wants to listen. He's very obsessed with Ingrid Michelson's breakable.
Lisa:He wants to listen to it all. I mean, it's a phenomenal record.
Jess:It's a it's a fantastic record and we get. We got to another Ingrid Michaelson song in that record and he was beside himself. He was like, no, I want to listen to the real Ingrid Michaelson and that is breakable, oh singular experience for him, and so then he's like the cracking bones, mama, the cracking bones. I want to listen to the cracking bones, which sounds really weird, out of context.
Lisa:Yeah, I mean, if you were to say it to anybody else, it might go astray.
Jess:Sure, sure, but I've noticed that when he wants to listen to it, every time a new song comes up, I am transported, and it's just so much for me to manage.
Lisa:And then if he tries to talk to me while the music is on, I can't Now.
Jess:I've had that before too where I'm like.
Lisa:I don't want you to like disturb my experience of this.
Jess:It's not about disturbing it. I welcome the interruption. It is that it is I cannot. I cannot process it. Oh, like it's short circuit something, the music, and so in that way I think that's what I mean by a whole body experience, like if I am listening to music, I am listening to music, you're feeling music, you're multitasking, you're experiencing music. I'm feeling it Exactly.
Lisa:Yeah, wow, I did not think we were going to talk about that at all. I mean totally me either, but, like I said, some things just come up multiple times in a short time frame, and this is just that for me. The other thing that I recently saw was a video about the pictures that sound creates. What, yeah, so sound is visual.
Jess:Oh, like the vibrations of the sand on the.
Lisa:Exactly, and there was. It's named after a scientist who discovered this. And just watching the vibrations from a single music note and how different the sound vibrations are depending on the note, I mean they're wildly different. They're completely different. Pictures, yeah, on the note, I mean they're wildly different. They're completely different. Pictures, yeah, and they're these like beautiful, intricate, almost stained glass looking, perfectly symmetrical images. And what it is is the sand, although in the video I was watching it was actually dried couscous, same sort of thing. It actually the the sand sticks to the places that aren't vibrating they traveled to. It's a yeah, it's a negative, yes, it's a negative image, exactly, yeah, everything that's moving doesn't have any sand on it, which makes sense. If it's moving, it's not gonna, the sand's not gonna stick to it, it's only gonna stick to those bits that aren't moving. But it's just, it was just insane. So, anyway, I think sound and music it's just like it was just insane. So, anyway, I think sound and music it's just like. It's just like.
Jess:That's kind of what's going on this week for me not to jump right into it, but yeah, yeah, Well, I mean, it's so interesting to think about, because one of the things we talked about a few weeks ago was when you went.
Lisa:maybe it was a month ago when you went outside and you laid under the tree listened to the shins, the shins, yes, yes, a very lay under the tree type band Mm-hmm.
Jess:And it moved you in a way that felt so peaceful and calm and awe inspiring, and I have that reaction to music too, but so often we don't reach for music when we, when we're feeling down, to make it an active part of how we cheer ourselves up.
Lisa:Yeah, I lean on music. I think similarly to how people who have a dependency on substances, substances use substances. Oh so, like I, I specifically seek out music for either mood altering or mood uh substantiating, like if I want to feel a certain way I guess, yeah, um, like validating even in that same way, uh, interesting.
Lisa:So I do use it and I don't think there's anything. I'm not really worried about myself psychologically or mental health wise for using this substance in this way. I don't think it's forming, but and I've always, I've done that since early high school. I can remember times of like I need this. Right now, this is the thing that I need, and I have very specific things for very, very specific music, for very specific circumstances that I will go to, and I feel my kids having this less so, my three-year-old, but definitely my five and eight-year-olds I see them absolutely gravitating towards music in the same sort of way. Year olds I see them absolutely gravitating towards music in the same sort of way.
Lisa:My five year old in particular is well known for being the only five year old that I know that prefers classical music to all other types of music. That is her go-to and I think it started as a ballet thing, but it's really just become. She feels calm, feels centered, she feels and like all of that was her. I don't, I don't, I mean who's to say. It's really hard to know as a parent. If you're the, if you're like, you know putting things in nature.
Lisa:Yeah, yeah, it's really hard to say, but like, um, I don't think that I put that on her and like, oh, don't you feel calm when you listen to classical music? But maybe I have been part of that influence. But she certainly like, if she is feeling down or if she is feeling like she needs to get into a certain headspace, she will select very specific music for that purpose.
Jess:That is so cool. Yeah, I feel so, knowing that music is it really is. I have been involved in music for longer than I can remember, and so it feels very much a bodily experience and at times overwhelming, which I think is where that the gates come up. I feel a little bit guilty that I haven't well hold on. Let me replay this as I'm saying it out loud, because I used to sing to my babies all the time, especially when I was home. Oh yeah, all the time we were making up songs, I was going to say are you?
Lisa:making up songs or are you singing known classics or something like that? Okay, all the things. Do you wish that you could remember all of the songs that you made up for your kids?
Jess:I do remember the songs I made up for my kids.
Lisa:I don't think I can continue this podcast.
Jess:I don't. I don't remember all of them, but like the big ones, I mean, I've made hundreds and hundreds of songs.
Lisa:Oh, I don't think I've made that many, and some of them I literally finished like composing them and I was like damn, I know I'm not going to remember this in a week and it's just going to be gone.
Jess:Yeah, well, maybe there were more songs that I can't remember, but we used to sing. Yeah, we used to sing the same songs, you know, the same made up songs.
Lisa:Yeah, Did you just change the lyric for each kid, or do you just keep all the lyrics the same too? No, okay, just kept them the same.
Jess:I did expose them to quite a bit of music. They just when we're in the car, we're just. We're not really listening to music all that often, though if we were, it would probably be our classical music station NPR, weta, nice, wow. Though there are some songs where I'm like pieces, they'll come up, I'm like we got to change this.
Lisa:Like, I'm just not in a Bach mood, right. You know, and I think that's the funny thing that I find about classical music too is that, like, just like modern music, there are some that I really like and there's some that I'm like nope, this is just not my jam. Not my jam. This is the you know miley cyrus of, you know classical age. It's just not, it's not my, it's not my thing or whatever. Not to say that it's bad, it's just, it's specific, it's unique to a person and a person's experience.
Jess:So right, right, so yeah, so music pretty much always down for chopin like I love. Oh yeah, I love chopin.
Lisa:I'm a WC kind of girl.
Jess:Oh, wc is all right. Middling, yeah, I could see. I could see that We'll call it medium. But I would say WC is one of the like I get in the mood. Some like I'll I'll be in the mood to listen to it, or like not, yeah, but I feel like Chopin I could listen to even if I wasn't craving it.
Lisa:Now I need to listen to more Chopin, I think. Oh my God, chopin just referenced a movie for me, really, yes. So when you said, chopin, okay, there was a movie I'm a 90s kid In the 90s called it Takes Two with the Olsen twins, yes, and they switch. It's kind of like a parent trap situation, but not.
Jess:Right, that's what I was remembering, because they're actually not related but they're identical twins.
Lisa:It doesn't really make a ton of sense, but anyway, one is a very, very fancy, fancy girl and the other one is like a street ball, New York City kind of girl and the other one is like a street ball, New York City kind of girl and the New York City girl goes to the house where the other girl is living and sees the piano and sees the piano music and says I think I will play Chopin Because that's what it said on the music.
Jess:Oh my gosh, I remember that scene.
Lisa:Yes, exactly. So as soon as you said Chopin, like that's what comes up for me when I hear it, I'm telling you, everything comes back to a movie for me. This is just in action. Live as we go.
Jess:Oh, that is so interesting. This is that I do vaguely remember that movie and it is kind of like a parent trap. Slash city country mouse story. Yeah, exactly.
Lisa:Yeah. Yeah. It doesn't make a ton of sense, but it's wildly entertaining. At least it was for me when I was like 12.
Jess:I can, totally I can see her face as she's saying it.
Lisa:She's like chomping, and then everyone kind of like grimaces, like oh geez. And then she like plays with her elbows and stuff.
Jess:Yeah, yeah.
Lisa:Oh, wow, yeah, See, wow, I'm glad that I was able to bring this home in real time, as we spoke Me too.
Jess:Yeah, I wonder if maybe in the way that music opens up like a memory channel, if maybe movies do that for you.
Lisa:Maybe I mean I think they both do Maybe I'm just like I don't know, know a multimedia experience kind of person.
Jess:I don't know I like that for you.
Lisa:Yeah, yeah, multimedia experience type of person but like I hardly could consider myself a cinephile, I saw the godfather and didn't really like it, like I don't, I don't. Is that what we're using to define cinephile? I mean kind of Isn't it considered to be the best movie of all time?
Jess:I don't know. I would have to call my high school boyfriend, who is truly, truly into that.
Lisa:Get him on the phone, let's go. Yeah, so I mean, I don't watch a ton of what is considered to be critically acclaimed movies. There's no way I could stand up in a room and say that I'm a cinephile, but I can say that movies and music are incredibly important to me in the way that I experience them, which is however I experience them. You know, I mean, baby Mama is going to be infinitely more interesting and visceral for me than any Oscar winning movie probably could ever be. And just I'm sorry, that's just how I'm wired. So every person who has ever considered themselves as in a file has just said thank you very much, lisa and Jess. I think I will. I think I will leave your podcast listenership now and you know what, speaking of things that are not for me.
Jess:Yes.
Lisa:That is perfectly okay. Oh my goodness. Yeah, I did bring a topic to unpack and I have since forgotten it and then remembered it and then forgot it again. So I'm going to try to do my best to remember it yet again.
Jess:Okay, Can you think of what movie you were watching when you thought of it? I haven't watched a movie in a while. Well, while you're thinking, I'll tell you about my week, because it's it's had some milestones which is pretty exciting, lovely, yeah. So the big milestone is that, that big goal that I've been working towards with my coaching work. Yes, I submitted my application, so that is super exciting. Oh my God, it's so feels like a very big monkey, yes, big monkey, off my back.
Lisa:And I mean you've been working towards this for a year, but really in like in a sprint capacity for the last, like four months three months three months, yes okay.
Jess:Yeah, I have been working towards it since January of 2023, okay yeah, like, but it is the last milestone.
Lisa:Was that in 2023, or was that last year? That was last year okay, so that's what it's cumulative yeah, yeah, so correct.
Jess:yeah, that's correct. I mean technically. I yeah yeah, great, so correct. Yeah, that's correct.
Lisa:I mean technically, I guess you had like a, like a rest, stop.
Jess:Yeah, last year, okay, yeah, yeah. So it was just under a year ago that I got that I reached that first milestone, and then the next and and really the last one that I'm interested in pursuing at this point is this one Okay, and what is the most?
Lisa:I think there's a lot of exciting aspects to this, so my question to you is what is the most exciting aspect of achieving this particular milestone for you? I have like a couple in my mind and I want to hear from you before I say anything about them.
Jess:Yeah, I think one exciting aspect of it is yeah, I think one exciting aspect of it is my stick-to-itiveness that comes with it, in that sometimes it's hard, when there are really far off goals, for me to feel like I'm making tangible progress towards them. It reminds me of a conversation I had earlier this week where I had earlier this week where this person said within the next 365 days, I would like to have one of these things and and there is incremental progress and at bats and it's like a successful transaction. We'll just use that as the example. And in the conversation with that person it was like well, if, if that's the goal by 365 days, then there are 364 days in which you are not doing that thing because you're working towards that thing, and so it's sometimes hard for me to remember the incremental progress. Yes, and so I'm really proud of that.
Jess:I think the other thing that's most exciting for me is that now my level of education matches my credential or will as soon as it's awarded. What do you mean? When I graduated from my coach education program, I had to submit a recording and that recording was graded as a level two, which is the credential that I just submitted the application for, which is the credential that I just submitted the application for, and so I feel like I've had this big butt in my mind, and not the Sir Mix-a-Lot kind that we like, but like the like. I'm an ACC but I'm certified to level two.
Lisa:I'm just awaiting my hours or just building my hours? Is everyone who graduates from your coaching program certified at that level, or is that just because you're a badass?
Jess:Everyone who graduated from my program, who achieved certification, who submitted the recording and passed, is certified at that level. And everyone who wants to get the level two credential the PCC has to have the 500 hours, 500 coaching hours.
Lisa:It's so interesting that they do it like that You're operating at this level, but you haven't done the work to say that you're operating at this level, right? That's so crazy. That's so weird.
Jess:It is so weird. So in a sense, I've had in my head I'm a PCC level coach for almost two years and now, finally, I'll have the credential, probably by the time this airs. It can take several weeks for them to review my application, but by the time, you know, it'll match and then I won't have that kind of incongruence. I think it. Yeah. So I'm excited about that. And maybe the biggest thing that I'm excited about is that there was so much growth in this process where, like, if I was certified at that level two years ago, well, I have grown so much as a coach in the last two years and so in that way, I'm like, well, I don't know.
Lisa:Was.
Jess:I a certified Was I? That's a really good. I mean that would be my question too.
Lisa:Or if you were certified and truly operating at a level two level, but you didn't have the hours to sort of back it up, what does that make you now Like I don't know how much higher it goes than level two, but like, does that mean?
Jess:that you're like a four now or something. No, I mean, I think the skills were there, like I could ask the questions, I could provide the space, but now it's integrated. Now that's what the 500 hours does.
Lisa:Is it really?
Jess:Ah, it solidifies it Solidifies the practice, okay it all congeals.
Lisa:Not everyone loves the term congeals, but I feel like it especially in regards to your brain.
Lisa:I feel like your brain's kind of it's probably not jello-like, but I imagine it to be jello-like. So, yeah, so all of the knowledge that you now can tangibly point to and say like, yes, I was very well educated and I think there's a big difference there between educated and skilled, or educated and experienced, and I think now all of those different aspects of your professionalism are come together in a nice like tight way, unified way that you can bring to your clients, and so it's. It's so interesting to me that you're the most exciting part is a very intangible, more of a feeling rather than I expected you to say that it opens so many doors for you to do other kinds of work, because I am excited about that too.
Jess:Yeah, and I and like I'll get there. If you ask me in a month, I'll probably be like oh well, now. I now I get to take the PCC marker training and I can officially mentor other coaches and all of the things that come with that. I am excited about those things but I right now, in this moment, what is exciting to me is the journey that I've been on and getting like, but I think that's so wise.
Lisa:That's what I'm, that's what I mean by that. Like I don't know why it surprised me, but I think that's incredibly. Like it just speaks to who you are as a person and that the growth it matters more than you know, the money or the network or the I don't know how, what else to say about it, but like it, the notoriety or the ego Prestige.
Jess:Yeah.
Lisa:The ego of it, I guess.
Jess:And there I mean that's that's there too, but it's like I think that's that's kind of. The second thing that I was excited about is that, like the credential matches, the way I've been thinking about myself yeah, maybe, or like whatever defensiveness that comes with that of like but and I'm just building my hours- Do you feel like it validates your skills?
Jess:maybe in some ways Maybe and I was thinking about this because I hung up with a client recently who will not be continuing in my as a client and and we I mean we've talked about it it was, it's fine. I mean I think the growth is going to continue and I can be a quote good coach or like a highly credentialed coach and also still not be the right coach for everybody, and so I think I'm I don't know I there. There are a lot of different aspects of that, but that's where I'm at today.
Lisa:Well, I'm so excited that you have reached this milestone. I know that we have talked about it a lot on the pod and our listeners and our friends and your you know, everyone who's in your corner has been so excited for you to get to this point and for you to feel like you were able to cross that finish line. I really do feel like you got to, like you know, hit the tape and break it on your way through and like that's just such like it is so worth taking a moment's pause in your life, or even a big pause to some degree, especially with how hard you've been working, and really recognize and like I think we don't in our in our busy, hectic lives, don't take enough time to eventize things. And this is something that I know, you know that I have really, really tried to work on in my life is to eventize things, because we just don't. We just don't take that time.
Lisa:And it's so important to recognize to your point incremental, like this goes back to what you're talking about like incremental progress, like incremental progress in the timeline of our existence, which is altogether not very long, but still like we tend to really eventize certain things and to bring it back home for me like birthdays, where you literally have achieved nothing other than just not dying for a year and we really downplay huge achievements because they're not some sort of I don't know end goal. I mean, this one might even qualify as an end goal for you in some senses. You know, I just I really, really love taking a moment to recognize success and resilience and stamina and all of these gorgeous, yummy qualities.
Jess:Yeah, the stamina, I think that's what I was worried about, I mean I think we've talked about. Sometimes I feel like I'm in a hurry to get there because under the hood, somewhere, there's a story of like, if I don't keep going, I'm never going to do it, like I just have to. I have to sprint until I get there, and I didn't want that to cause, you know, to overemphasize the destination instead of looking at that growth. And so, yeah, I'm, I'm feeling a lot of different things about it and I do want to eventize once I actually receive the credential, because it's not set in stone, like they might tell me. I have to take the test again, I might need to take and pass the test again. We'll see.
Lisa:But I'm excited. Let's hope they don't do that. That would be kind of bogus.
Jess:Let's hope they don't, it would be. That would be kind of bogus.
Lisa:Let's hope they don't it would be Well now that it's immortalized in a recording on our podcast that you will celebrate once you receive final word back from the powers that be that you have achieved this specific credential, then we are going to make a bigger to-do of it. Yes, I have a chilled bottle of champagne, all ready to go. Yeah.
Jess:Yes, I have a chilled bottle of champagne all ready to go. Yeah, I, I, I assure you and our listeners there will be a celebration, excellent. Did our talking about that help you remember what you wanted to unpack?
Lisa:No, it didn't, and I really wish I had some kind of shower principle item to pull from right now where it would just are you familiar with the shower principle? Not at all, oh really, oh, okay, no, the shower principle is, once I tell you, you're going to be like oh, that's a dumb name. Basically, it says that different people have different things that make them remember, and one of the main ways that people have is getting in the shower. It's something that distracts your brain to the point where you remember the thing that you're trying to remember, but your brain can't focus on it unless it's distracted, but it can't be too distracted. So, like you and me talking about PCC, it's too distracting because I care about it and I want to be involved in this conversation. Now, if you're in the shower and your mind's just wandering, it's going to pop right in. Putting is another one that people do. Or like fidgeting, like putting with a putter, putting on a golf yeah Like in a putt, putt, yep, okay, yep, yeah, so the shower principle.
Lisa:Yeah, I don't have one of those right now. I can't just hop in the shower, although podcast from the shower might be a first Actually, probably not there's like millions of podcasts.
Jess:Probably somebody has done that at this point.
Lisa:Yeah, I'm trying to think of where we might, because it came up in our conversation and then disappeared again in our conversation. So shower principle me See if you can walk it back.
Jess:That's what I was hoping to do by telling you about this thing.
Lisa:I know and I'm so glad you did talk to me about it.
Jess:I mean, I have another thing that's maybe interesting. This is not like an unpack unpack, but it is something that has been on my mind.
Jess:I don't know how much I've told you about how we do morning drop-offs and pickups and the division of effort between me and my husband, and my husband is now going into the office several days a week and so on those days he takes my son to school because it's on his way and he's already out, which has been wonderful. You love that. I love that because I get to walk my girls to the bus. I'm home at nine, I am in a better like I can go for a walk. I'm just, it's just.
Lisa:I appreciate it, and so you also have an inordinate amount of traffic and like construction on the route to drop him off. It's been so weird and I just find that very aggravating too, unless I was going that direction.
Jess:Yes, and one day last week maybe I so I take my son to school on Tuesdays and Thursdays typically now and I remembered that there was road construction on one aspect of the drive, so I chose a different path, only to encounter the exact same kind of road construction on the other, exactly.
Lisa:It's just an infuriating. It's only like an eight minute drive, but it's just like it's just one of those that's like mired in issues. I feel like yeah, it's.
Jess:It was more convenient when his school was a mile away, but there were other issues, and so it is what it is. Anyway, one of the things that I have noticed when I take him to school on Tuesdays and Thursdays. You know, we have a very distinctive car, there are multiples of them, but they are not everywhere, and every time I take him to school I pass another blue Mach-E going the other way and that blue Mach-E goes down the main street by our neighborhood and then turns onto the street that our cul-de-sac butts into, and so, depending on what time I'm leaving, this person holds a very routine routine, because I know where I'm going to see him based on what time of day it is.
Lisa:And it's a marker for you to know how early or late you are comparatively to this other person who drives the same car that you.
Jess:Yes, but I would say I always see him between, like right outside the cul-de-sac and around the corner to the library, like in that mile. He's always there. Sometimes, if I'm a little bit earlier, I see him farther down that that road. It's so cool and when I am driving the blue car we wave because we have this like connection. You know, like we have the same car.
Lisa:It's of like yeah, whatever and uh yeah, that's really funny that you actually have acknowledged each other we have.
Jess:Yeah, wait, does your?
Lisa:husband do that when he drives your son to school? I think so.
Jess:so like this is now a pact between the three of you, and I think this person has a wife who sometimes also drives, but, but I'm not sure because there is a third blue Mach-E that drops at the school right next to our son's school, and I only know this because I've been keeping like.
Jess:I see this guy every day, every time I drive my son to school and we rave, and I noticed him keeping, like I see this guy every day every time I drive my son to school and we rave, and I noticed him like oh, I saw a blue Mach-E dude. I waved hello and then, as I pulled, as I was going, you know, across the street, another blue Mach-E turned in front of me and was like two cars ahead of me and went into the school that's next to my son's school. Weird, so it's. So, it's so interesting and and like there's that. The word for it I'm pretty sure is Sonder, where you kind of recognize that you are an extra in everybody else's life, that everybody else has their own full main character story. Yeah, and.
Jess:I don't know. I think that the phrase main character energy was popular right now I don't totally understand it because I'm not hip with the lingo also same for me.
Lisa:I think you're on to something, though.
Jess:I think that is that you are acting in a way that shows that you're in control of your own story sure, yeah, but it's like, I mean we're it's, it's like the opposite of that, because, right, we our paths only cross for this, this like, and you're almost happy to be this like extraneous background performer yes, yeah, but it's like so obvious now that it's, it's like it's not just any extra.
Jess:Right Each other's life, right it's like the same person that you keep running into a different place. It's, it's almost like the setup for a meet cute.
Lisa:Yes, If we were looking at our lives as movies there is a very famous extra actually, who is very well known for being Is it Kevin Bacon?
Jess:No, he's main character energy.
Lisa:Wait, the very famous A-list actor, Kevin Bacon. Are you asking me if he's?
Jess:an extra in a bunch of movies. Well, you know Six Degrees of right. He's that guy. Go on. Who is this famous extra? I?
Lisa:cannot remember the person's name, I could get it for you, but he shows up in lots and lots of very famous movies, very well known for being this like amazingly extra, extra, like extra in the modern sense and extra in the movie sense background performer sense. I think they're actually supposed to be called background performers now. But yeah, so I can look that up. But it's funny because you guys are almost entering into that level of each other's lives where you're fully not in the background anymore. You are in the forefront because you have this thread of a car in common with each other and it's making you stand out and be obvious even though you don't.
Lisa:I think you need to figure out a way to like, I don't know, yeah, conference of the Blue Mockeys, I monkeys. I think we could get a better name than that, but that can be the working title, like what, if you like? Put a sign in your window as you drove by. That was like monday six o'clock, and then the next time you wrote the place, I don't know. I feel like. I feel like we could really make a thing out of this. I mean, it is, maybe it's the kind of thing that a local newspaper would just love to get their hands on and write a story about.
Jess:It just reminds me. You know, we all operate in these ways in which we might have seen each other somewhere.
Lisa:Oh, for sure.
Jess:You know we're in the same places and we keep running into each other. Oh for sure, whatever, I would work in Panera's for like six hour chunks. I mean I would. I was there and they were always different, but I went to like three or four different Panera's that were all kind of in my area Really loyal to the Panera brand.
Jess:There's probably more there, but they have my favorite tea and, and so it's a thing. Yeah, and they give free refills on tea, or they did so. But there was this couple, this elderly couple, that I would see three out of five Panera trips and I was always a different Panera.
Jess:They also were very loyal to the Panera brand Different times of day, and I and I recognize them because they had these very distinctive shoes. I called them the bacon shoes because the sides of their shoes had like the extra cushioning on them that kind of looks like a cartoonized slice of bacon. But it's that kind of thing. It's like I've run into those people Like what are the chances right? Like if they were spying on me They'd be really bad at it. Well for sure. But but also like I don't know that it just seemed so improbable that I could see them on so many different days at so many different paneras, yeah, and be able to pick them out. But I guess did you notice?
Lisa:any pattern was it like tuesdays at the 11th street location or anything like that.
Jess:It was just and I was random it was complete and I didn't have a pattern right which paneras I was going to right. I just remembered their shoes and they're like oh, bacon shoes are here, wow some would say that the simulation was very lazy, and I know I'm feeling a little truman show about yeah, actually, now that I say it out loud yeah that's, that's where my brain goes is like oh, sim's getting lazy.
Lisa:Um need to come up with some new algorithms for faces and, obviously, shoes, footwear in general.
Lisa:Um yeah, yeah, that's where that's never meant to notice, exactly, exactly like, like you've glitched yourself just by being too observant. Oh my God, I just remembered my thing. Let's unpack then. Okay, it's a little bit of an unpack and more just like a thought exercise, because you know how I love me. A thought exercise, same, exercise, same. I wanted to know do you have a specific idea? When somebody asks you to go to your happy place, do you have a specific concept of what your happy place is and why, or why not, is and why or why not?
Jess:Okay, so this is interesting because I kind of do and I kind of don't. Okay, it ties into there's this values mining exercise for peak experiences, and the preface set the stage for it is remember a time when you thought life just doesn't get any better than this, but life just doesn't get any better than this, and you go deep into that memory hole of that time and what was important to you, what was present.
Lisa:I do feel a lot of similarities with that. As I'm just letting myself dig into that question. I feel like there's a lot. It might not be similar in the exact vision of what that place is, but I think the feeling is very similar.
Jess:So yes, yeah, so what's really interesting is that I just refound this notebook that has been lost for some amount of time and by lost I mean placed somewhere by my three-year-old, no doubt and in this was the last time I did that exercise and I referenced this specific page earlier today, so it's a little bit front of mind for me.
Lisa:Oh, also very. I'm just saying.
Jess:Yeah, I wrote. Life doesn't get any better than this. And then I have a little squiggly line and I say the sun is out for the first time in days. I wake up after my alarm, but not frantically, after I feel refreshed. I'm not groggy, I'm not anxious, I'm not rushed. I sit with my coffee, my kids snuggled up with me. I smell their heads, I feel their heartbeats. I don't let go first and like that is what my happy place is. Yeah, I would say.
Lisa:But you said no to that question when.
Jess:I asked you Because it's not really. It's not really a place.
Lisa:Yeah, it's the feeling. Oh so when you heard happy place, you meant like a physical place you go to, where you're like this is physically my happy place.
Jess:Right, exactly.
Lisa:Oh, okay.
Speaker 1:But my happy place is not a place.
Jess:Yeah, Mentally I would say it's when I am just super present with my kids and I can feel them close to me and I feel love. Love is present there.
Lisa:When would you use that that happy place? Yeah, when would you use that mechanism like that happy place? Yeah, when would you use that mechanism in your life? I feel like I don't use mine enough, like I feel like I should be using it more because it is such a good lever to getting to like a positive space, mental space, but I don't really use it that much. Like the only time I have to be in pretty significant dire straits to be like must, must, like hit emergency eject button and get to happy place or else something bad will happen, and even then, like there's probably a lot of times when I could do that and I still don't.
Jess:Well, I wonder if you can even get to your happy place if you're in that space.
Lisa:I feel like it would require like a move away from whatever the situation. You'd have to physically and maybe mentally, like close your eyes. Do all of the things to like get out of whatever you're in.
Jess:Yeah, that's how I feel about it too. Yeah, I think it's. For me, the happy place is a call to remember what's most important Really and to be grounded my happy place is not at all.
Lisa:Mine is the most frivolous thing you can think of. Yours is like, very important and very meaningful and has all of this deep seated like maternal connection, and mine is nothing like that.
Jess:Well, so, yeah. So I'm curious. When you asked a very direct question, which was do you have a? If somebody said what is your happy place? Like would you have an answer for them? And I described it's not really a place, but it's a feeling, and like yes, so what about you? What is a? Tell me about your happy place.
Lisa:My happy place is being alone. Oh, so interesting. It's always being alone in a public setting, but it's not busy. So my mind goes coffee shop almost immediately because it's public, but it's usually unless it's like 8.30 in the morning or something like that. We're talking about a slowish sort of pace where I am alone. Mine also involves coffee. So we do have that connection with our happy places. Like there are uppers involved and I'm either reading or writing or doing something creative completely by myself, probably with music, okay.
Jess:So first, I don't believe that that is frivolous, but I am really curious.
Lisa:Frivolous compared to like hugging my kids and smelling how yummy they smell. I mean, that's so much more like meaningful, I think.
Jess:The meaning that's there is the meaning that we make of it. So I'm wondering what is it about your happy place that makes you feel happy?
Lisa:I think it's close to a memory. Right, it's not exactly a memory, it's an amalgam of memories of the times when I have been the most internally satisfied.
Jess:So it's a symptom of a greater sense of existent peace for you?
Lisa:Yes, yes, yes, I think that's what makes it such a good, happy place for me. Is that like that is so it's such an easy point to get to, where it's like that feeling of satisfaction and peace is so readily available, which is like when it comes to my kids, satisfaction and peace are definitely in the mix, but they are certainly not the only thing in the mix. Typically, yeah, there's usually a lot of other things involved, and so for me, if I want to get to that place of peace and relaxation and and calm, I'm gonna be alone more than likely right, kids usually bring some amount of kids with them.
Lisa:Yeah, exactly, in a beautiful, wonderful spectacular way, but like, yeah, that's not. Usually the thing that I'm feeling when I'm around them is like oh, I'm so relaxed.
Jess:Yeah, in my happy place they are. We are not doing anything aside from being snuggled up Like they're yeah, exactly.
Lisa:It's probably a maximum amount of like seven minutes or something For sure, there are probably breakfast cartoons on in the background. You know they're just up against, but that can be part of your happy place too. Like I get that, I know that time too, but for me that's complicated. Yeah, it makes me think of, okay, everyone. I'm going to get a little nerdy for a second.
Jess:I love. I know that's a shock to everyone. Give it to us.
Lisa:But in Harry Potter, when Lupin asks Harry to think of a happy memory and it has to be a really, really happy memory Uh-huh, and Harry goes well, I have one, but it's complicated, oh. And Lupin says is it strong? Mm-hmm, and Harry says yes, and then he's able to cast the spell that he needs, whatever. Like it's more dirty from there, um, but I feel like that's what it would be with kids. It's like I have one. It's the happiest, truly, I've ever been.
Lisa:It's with my kids, but it's complicated, it doesn't. It's not straightforward in the same way that like a very solo, calming, fully controlled environment. Because I feel like if I'm sitting in a coffee shop and I have the thing that I'm doing there and I have my music, it feels very controlled. I've controlled the auditory, I'm controlling my taste and my smell and my activity, my physical touch, like I'm controlling all of the different things, and it's exactly as it's supposed to be in that bubble. Now, that would get very boring very fast if I was doing it for days or weeks or anything like that, but for a moment, for a span of short amount of time, that's the pinnacle.
Jess:That's really interesting, even just the idea of control, because when you described that, that was not even on the top 10 list of words that I would have used me neither until I was actually describing yeah, yeah, so interesting. So what, what meaning do you make of that? Like, what is it about your when you're able to access that place and it's representative of your? What else is going on in your life, like what is present for you there that enables you to act, to be in your happy place?
Lisa:Yeah, and I think what I try to do in my moments of not being busy or harried or anything like that, I try to at least take pieces of this. So, for example, when I was preparing for an interview process with one of the companies that I was interviewing with, one of the things that I did was go to a coffee shop, put in my music, have my laptop and work on it. Now that might not sound like the most exciting day for everyone and truly wasn't exciting, but it did give me a piece of that. Now, I wasn't being particularly creative, I was doing a thing. I was working essentially, but some of those pieces were there and it gave me a really, really nice, yummy feeling. And then the other day I worked on watercolors for the first time in a long time, and even though I wasn't at a coffee shop and I wasn't listening to music, working with my hands and creating something interesting in my own, that gave me some of that.
Lisa:So I think what I try to do in my life is get as many aspects of that happy place and then put them into my everyday, even if they can't be together right so it's very rare that I would be able to be, and also this implies that there's no feeling of guilt that I should be doing something else other than this thing, and so, like that's where it can get a little bit complicated. But I try to inject pieces of that into my everyday and know that, like when you list all of those pieces out and that becomes the totality of your happy place, like those are the things you should be seeking on a regular basis, and similarly to the sitting under the tree with the music, that was another aspect of that. It wasn't in a coffee shop, I wasn't doing anything creative, but I was. I did have that sense of peace and control that I would get in that happy place environment.
Jess:Yeah, Peace, control and spaciousness, it sounds like, are the three things that really?
Lisa:make up and maybe creativity can be in there although I think it is less, because it could also be reading or doing something like that but having that space to do, it's really the space to do whatever Right Name the thing, whatever you want to do in that moment. And then the moment I was under the tree, it was I want to be laying under the tree and looking at the clouds go by. Yeah, so that was what I was unpacking and just like how lovely it is to have a place in your mind's eye that you can go to should you need to.
Jess:Yeah, even, like you said, just to bring in elements of that. I mean, I think in my case and your case, the presence of coffee is like there are so many senses that come with that.
Lisa:Yes, there is no happy place that does not involve coffee. I'm sorry, I couldn't possibly design. Yeah, I am with you.
Jess:I uh, I forget I was talking with somebody and he said I love, I love my caffeine fueled friends or something like that. And it reminded that happened this morning also. And it reminded me of a conversation I had with an employee once early when my husband and I were starting to date and I said, and he likes coffee, and she's like, yeah, how else would you know that you could trust him? I do not. I do not take this as a personal belief. I know many people who do not drink coffee and I love them.
Jess:Yes.
Lisa:But I know many, many people that I know and trust and it does make me question them a little bit. But I mean truly, there's lots of them.
Jess:Yeah yeah, it just cracks me up. So when I think about when I embrace my coffee love's that always pops into my mind in fact, whenever I just to put a button on this.
Lisa:I had to do a lot of um scavenger hunts for my nine-year-old and his friend this week they wanted to do I kind of created this little universe. They have all these spy kits and so I was like I'll take these gems and I'll hide them and then you guys can do a jewel heist in your spy outfits. And they were super down with this idea. But my point is to say that almost every single time there is some clue regarding the coffee maker and the clue involves some variation of mom's favorite thing to do, or drink, or sip or whatever. That's usually the clue. And then my son knows immediately, like, does not have to question himself, immediately runs to the coffee maker and then starts inspecting different aspects. I have hidden it in the coffee beans, in the mugs, in the maker itself, coffee beans in the mugs, in the, in the maker itself, like. Like he always knows that's gonna be what mom's referencing when she says her favorite thing yeah, yeah.
Jess:Well, I know we're. We're now at time. I think we have quite a few bloopers that we'll cut out and add to the end and it'll be in this one might be a heavily edited possible.
Lisa:Uh, I think it's possible.
Jess:But I'm wondering so you have this awareness of your happy place and that there are elements like it doesn't have to be all or nothing. How do you want to use that strategically in your life?
Lisa:Now I mean so much of what I. I started with the concept of like do you have a happy place? Do you use it? But really, like most of everything else that I talked about today, I was not really conscious of Including, breaking it apart and doing it in different ways throughout my life, like that was something I have just found in this conversation. So really being conscious of that and finding those bits and pieces and trying to inject them into everyday scenarios where I can feel that little bit I think is, and maybe even expanding to different happy places, maybe even more complicated happy places, and finding the aspects that are common within those to overlay into my everyday life, would be great.
Lisa:I think that is such a fabulous thought exercise because in each of those complicated elements I think you're bringing in more of your values and it's showing you really what's most important and maybe there's even an opportunity to kind of induce some of those good feelings either by to go all the way back by listening to the music, even just to know yourself better or know yourself enough to know like in this scenario, I'm going to feel this kind of way and let me be the orchestrator of a scenario in which that will happen, naturally, if I know I'm walking into something that's going to make me feel a little less, a little stressed, or it's going to not, that's going to make it hard for me to access my happy place.
Jess:Maybe I need to access my happy place first, by savoring the first sip of that cup of coffee or, you know, bringing in the warmth or the light or the spaciousness, and I think it gives you a sense of non-negotiables If you want to live a happy life, you need to give yourself space.
Lisa:Yeah, yeah, I need time, time with me.
Jess:Oh yeah. Thanks so much for unpacking all of the things today. I'm so proud of you.
Lisa:It's such a big week for you. I'm just so proud and I'm so glad you've achieved so much. So thank you for unpacking, thank you for being you, thank you for everything.
Jess:That catches us All right.
Speaker 1:Love you From our hearts to your ears. Lots to unpack there. Tune in every week. You won't wanna miss. Dive deep into life with Jess and Lisa. Tune in every week. You won't wanna miss. Dive deep into life with Jess and Lisa.
Lisa:I was thinking like body out of yada, yada, yada, yada, yada. You know that song? No, you don't, of course, I don't know that song so, but it's Yeti, so it's Yeti.
Jess:Yeti, Yeti, Yeti, Yeti, Yeti, Yeti. I still hear Yeti's Yeti. So it's Yeti, Yeti, Yeti, Yeti, Yeti, Yeti, Yeti. I still hear Yeti, Yeti.
Lisa:To be fair, I don't actually know what that song is called or any of the other lyrics, but I know that part. So there you go, there you go. It's gonna be like a thing like where Lisa's outtake is going to be singing in every single one, which is actually right on it, for me, and when I made baby food I made little jingles for some of the flavors.
Jess:Okay, let's hear one Carrots and apples and black beans. Carrots and apples and black beans. Carrots and apples and black beans. Carrots and apples, and black beans.
Lisa:That's one of them, that's one of them it's very catchy, it's kind of good, so catchy, yeah, yeah, it would make me want to eat that combination more, which?
Speaker 1:I was, that was good because, I really don't want to eat that combination so.
