Episode 17: Stop Waiting for Life to Get Better Before You Let Yourself Be Happy

What if happiness isn't something you find — it's something you remember?

In this episode, I sit down with author, speaker, and life coach Terry Bean, creator of the children's book Abracadabra, to explore a simple but powerful idea: every child arrives in this world with an inner magic — a natural state of wonder, curiosity, and joy — and somewhere along the way, most of us trade it in for productivity, approval-seeking, and seriousness.

But that magic never actually left. It's just buried.

Terry and I explore why children are the least empowered demographic and what we can do about it, how happiness is a practice not a destination, the emotional scale and why healing isn't a straight line from pain to joy, the one morning ritual that can pre-pave your entire day, Terry's "emotional sunscreen" technique for walking into hard conversations with more calm and confidence, and what it really means to reconnect with your inner child.

This one will hit differently if you've ever watched your child light up with pure joy and quietly thought — I used to feel that way too.

The magic is still there. This conversation will help you find it.

About Terry Bean: Terry Bean is an author, speaker, and life and executive coach with over 14 years of work behind Abracadabra — a children's book about the power within every child to choose happiness, create mantras, and build a life they genuinely love. Find her at https://terrybeanauthor.com/.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome back to the Life Vision Lab podcast. I want to begin with something personal today. I've always believed in magic. Not the stage kind, you know, with rabid out of the hat, but the quiet kind. The kind you notice when the morning light hits the kitchen floor just right, when a child laughs from their whole body, or when the sky shifts colours for no reason except beauty. I look at the world with awe and wonder. Well, at least when I'm not running pillow to post trying to get through my day. Because let's be honest, between emails, responsibilities, and schedules, one that can get buried under to-do list. But when I slow down, when I actually pause, I remember there's magic everywhere. And children, they don't forget this. They live inside it. You know that phase when your child asks, Why is the sky blue? Why do birds fly? Why can't I stay up forever? Why, why, why, why, why? But here's what I realized. They are not trying to exhaust us, they are awestruck. They're discovering the world for the first time. Curiosity is their joy. Wonder is their natural state. And somewhere along the way, many of us trade curiosity for certainty, wonder for efficiency, and magic for productivity. Today's conversation is about remembering the magic inside every child. The magic inside every one of us. We are exploring a simple but powerful idea that happiness can be practice, that our thoughts shape our experience, and that children can learn they have the power to create a life they genuinely love. Because our cadavra is not just a word, it is a reminder. We all have an inner wizard. We all have the power to choose our thoughts, our feelings, and our path. And we all have the ability to create something beautiful. I'm so happy to explore this today with Terry. Terry, welcome. When you hear the phrase inner magic, especially when we think about children, what does that mean to you?

SPEAKER_01 2:19

Well, first of all, can I just say thank you so much, Wethas, for having me? Congratulations on your thousand. That's phenomenal. I'm sure there'll be so many more. You're just a pleasure to speak with and be part of your audience. So I hope they appreciate everything I have to share today. I think that Abracadabra is quite a poignant message. And we do, quite frankly, lose that inner joy, that ability to kind of be silly and keep our silly, to have the ability to know, really know and be grounded in the fact that we have the ability to create our own lives, that we can choose happiness. And I think that's really my message here, and to be able to share that with little ones who, quite frankly, children are the least empowered demographic. That is why I'm choosing to direct my message to them, even though, by the way, it's 14 years in the making. So it's just a poignant time that it's coming out right now, that you know, the world's a bit chaotic, and children are feeling it. They're definitely sensing it. I hear about it all the time.

SPEAKER_00 3:44

Amazing. I love that, Terry. And so now a proper introduction. Terry is an author, speaker, a life and executive coach. And if you haven't guessed it already, she is the creator of Abercadabra, which is a children's book. And we are gonna dive deep today to really understand what was behind the book. And you heard Terry say it was 14 years in the making. So we're gonna get right in, Terry, and I'm very excited to chat more with you on this. Like you said, children arrive with wonder, right? Curiosity, with presence, the smallest of details, they laugh easily, they imagine freely. But somewhere along the way, many of us forget how to do that. Um, so Terry, when do you think we begin to lose the sense of magic?

SPEAKER_01 4:35

It really depends on the child, how they're trained, in what way they're trained to react, right? As adults, we start learning to be proactive, to not be reactive. But many of us learn that way late in life. I mean, I was speaking with a woman the other day who had not learned any of that until she was 50. There are many, many people they're not brought up like that. Now, for me, I was not. I was actually not brought up like that either. Yet, somehow, through the way the dynamics of my family were, and I can share that a bit with you, that I think that that put me in a position within the family of being the person to try and create a happier family life. The short of it, I was brought up by two parents who had been previously married and they brought in children. So back in 1963, now today we call that a blended family. But in 63, the word blended wasn't even spoken. We didn't know that word. So here I am in a very unusual situation very early on. And I had my parents who both had uh divorces that were very upsetting to the family and the kids and all that. And here I am now, I'm their child. So I'm the product of them. So what happens? I'm like their sunshine child, I'm their child that wants to mediate and create happiness because there's a lot of turmoil in the household. And Danny, who's my character in the book, is literally running from parents that are arguing. And we can all kind of tip our hat to that and understand pretty much most of us have been through that. And I realized only about a month ago or so, believe it or not, that the book was really about me. So when I would run away, I'd step out of my elevator. I live in Queens, New York. I step out of the elevator and I'd hear the arguing, and all I wanted to do was run right into my room and just create my own space of happy. Well, Danny runs down to the lake. And when she runs down to the lake, she finds that she's staring at a reflection, and her reflection starts to talk to her about the power within her. The power within her to create a happier life, power within her to react differently, to make choices on how she feels, to create a mantra, which kids don't know what that word is, mantra, but I introduce it here as a learning curve for them that parents and teachers could actually teach. So I have a very powerful mantra every day, which is everything's always working out for me. And truly I step into a life where things work out, or if they don't, I'm still looking at it and deciding to create a gift out of it, somehow, some way. Right. I mean, some of you have heard you're late for an appointment. Well, maybe there was an accident along the way that you just missed, right? So there's always a way to spin things. Book came about 14 years ago when I was surrounded by people who are a bit more cynical, right? Yet I didn't realize it was actually more so about my own experience. Right. Uh and it was always there. It was always something I shared with people. It was always a book that I knew would come into fruition. And then wonderful experience with my illustrator who did an incredible job on these illustrations. I decided to also create a coloring book. So the coloring book has all of the magnificent sketches that we can draw in and have fun with and color in. It has a short blurb of the story. So people aren't lying. And then it has two very important exercises. One is for kids and adults, it doesn't matter to dream about what they want to do or be or have. And the next is little bubble blurbs, I call them, where kids can write or write in the affirmations. Six to nine-year-olds don't know what that is.

SPEAKER_00 9:17

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 9:18

Right. So again, it's a learning tool and it's a place where they can write in what they want to say when they wake up in the morning to pre-pave a great day ahead. So my vision with this book is to create a kind of world in a nutshell. Because if you have children who understand that they have the power within to create lives they love, unlike 86% of us adults in here in America, they will step into happier, more connected adults, connected not only to themselves, but to others around them, hence happier and kinder.

SPEAKER_00 10:05

I love that, Terry. And and I love that you want to start with the kids because, like you said, they are the most underserved population, and yet they're the ones who are going to be shaping our futures. But to me, I think when I read your book, and thank you for sharing it with me, it helped me understand you better to meet you today and ask you questions about it. I think it made me look, it's so simple. Like your book. I love the flow. I love how simple it is. But yet, as an adult, I realized, wow, like we make it so difficult to look for happiness in little, little moments in our life. I remember a few years ago when I think I've reached a breaking point, and um my therapist said, you gotta start finding happiness in the little things you do. Everything is not about productivity, everything is not about having a material outcome. It's probably you just doing something because you want to have fun. And I swear, Terry, I didn't even know what she was talking about because that's how far along you are in your life where you forget what it means to be happy, right?

SPEAKER_01 11:17

So what's incredible about that is that for some reason or another, we are trained early enough that when we become an adult, we have to be serious. It's very serious to be an adult. This is more serious than you think, right? So all of a sudden the joy of life is actually pulled out of you, right? Because of the expectation that other adults that are bringing you up have. The other thing that happens too is that we're we're looking outside of ourselves for approval. And that happens a lot in families. There are some parents that live vicariously through their children. The children are not grounded in understanding that the approval has to come from within, first and foremost, right? And so when they step into adulthood, they're always looking outside of themselves for approval. And again, through ABR Cadabra, I feel that I'm able to give this concept and create this concept for a child to understand that they're whole, they're beautiful and whole right now, and they have the ability to create phenomenal lives. Right. And you're not out there to make other people happy, right? And in fact, if you're super happy, some people may actually kind of be a little bit jealous or intimidated. Yeah. Because everybody, misery loves company, right? It's not, it's not what I don't know if you want to call it God or source or the universe. It's not what we're here to do. We're here to actually enjoy and love life and love the beauty all around us.

SPEAKER_00 13:13

They are not challenges, they're a journey that you're if you actually look at it with curiosity and wonder like children do, then it's just it's just the process of you enjoying every step of the way.

SPEAKER_01 13:25

Joy is in the journey, we've all heard it before, but do we really live it?

SPEAKER_00 13:30

So, how do you live that? I love that. And so, shifting gear a little bit, happiness is a practice because everything you're saying is it's a practice. It's us reminding ourselves repeatedly that there is happiness now, in this moment, right? And so many people believe happiness arrives when everything is perfect. I have the perfect home, I have the perfect garden, I have the perfect clothes, but children show us something different, right? Like joy exists in tiny moments, in puddles, in silly faces, in butterflies landing nearby, in scribbling on paper. I think, Terry, like how do we continue that? Because as much as your book is for children, I think adults have a lot to learn from it too. And as a parent, I've realized because I am so serious that I didn't know how to find happiness because I had forgotten. Although my child brought that in me when he came into our lives, I think slowly he was like, hmm, am I the odd one out here? Why am I the one who's always excited and happy? And I don't see the theme with my parents. So can happiness be taught?

SPEAKER_01 14:41

Is my question. So I think about that with a child who's looking at their parents and the adults around them and seeing that there's they're so impacted the adults are by so much negativity that's going on around them, that all of a sudden the child thinks that they're the ones that are the odd man out. Yeah isn't that interesting, right? So yeah, I do believe it can be taught. I do believe that because happiness is a feeling, right? So it's a feeling of joy, right? So the minute we understand what that feels like, typically we don't want the other side of the stick. So we're all trying to get to happy, but happiness is right here, right now. It's always in the moment. Right. So it's what I've learned in my years is that it's all a matter of perspective. Every single second is a matter of perspective. And how do you want to feel? If you want to feel good and you want to feel lighter and you want to feel happier, then what's the thought that you could think at this point that could kind of steer you in that direction? Now, sometimes you have to take baby steps, sometimes it's not so easy to go from A to B. And I'm not saying that. Okay. But what I'm saying is that with practice, you actually get into a mode where you're, if you're gonna react, you're gonna react in a way where it's lighter. You know there's a saying, and there's also a knowing that laughter and fun and a response where it's creating that kind of laughter, not only is it healthier for us, but it puts us on that track. The reaction is different. I could give you a great story. I was on a plane, right? I'm on my honeymoon, and the plane gets hit by lightning. And I saw that lightning go through the plane, and everybody was on that floor. I mean, freaking out, absolutely freaking out. I wasn't on the floor, but I was pretty freaked out. And this was instinctual. I just screamed out, hey, Pedro, lay off the tequila. By the way, we were in Mexico. So and everybody just broke up and left. And I am telling you that that was an important moment to just kind of break it. Because I think about things now that I've done in my history to use levity to just kind of seek out the angst in life.

SPEAKER_00 17:29

And such a good example that you shared, Terry, because I think when you break that moment, you stop getting into the loop of what-ifs, and we naturally get into the negative what-if loops. Um, and I think, like you said, human beings are wired to think negative because there's just so much negativity, and you feel like there's always company when you're negative, versus when you're happy, you're looked at like something's wrong with you. Like, why are you so happy? It's sad that we've come to that point in life, right? And so we decide we gotta go to a retreat, two months to find happiness. No, it is right here, right now. And so I love that, and I love that you say that it can be taught. And I think we need to teach ourselves that every day by reminding ourselves, what can I do? Something silly. And I remember when I had to tell myself that, Terry, I would judge myself. Oh my god, this is so silly. Why am I doing this? What is he gonna think? What is she gonna think? There's a point, then you just break that, and then when you see the child having fun with you, or even you having fun, you're like, oh my god, this is amazing.

SPEAKER_01 18:39

It's the most freeing feeling, it's very freeing. And I think that's something that we're all looking for, a sense of freedom. And the sense of freedom that we get is the in in the non-judgmental the peace that we give ourselves when we give ourselves the permission to do whatever we want to do. See, even if it's even if it's something that's not silly or not, just be in the presence of that and and give yourself permission to be who you are. If you're crying, you're crying. It's okay. It's okay to cry, yet catch it. Catch it soon enough where you can switch it quickly. And when you start learning how to do that, life flows a lot better. You're you're attracting some magical things in life because truly, the power that be, that's what they want to be right there with you, presenting and and providing the path and the way through people and experiences that you have to live the joyful life that you came to this planet to live.

SPEAKER_00 19:45

Yes, I agree. And I can think of when you said this wonderful gentleman came on, where he talks about how our bodies produce tears that last 20 minutes. And 20 minutes is enough to release all the stress in our body. So all the cortisol and all the stress hormones and all of that put together, I think having a good cry is when they say is a good release. So he said, your body just has a capacity to cry for 20 minutes. That's it. The fact that we keep reliving that thing keeps making you cry over and over again. So get the cry out, release the stress, and then just move, right? Move to the next thing. How do I find happiness in this moment? I'm done. Yes, it's a crappy time. I felt horrible. How do I move? Because children learn more from what we embody than what we say. So if we practice that in front of them, and that's where your book I love that you've created it for children, but I think, Terry, we adults need to first become children ourselves to realize it. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 20:52

I coach on connecting with your inner child because I think that's so important. I feel like I'm still four inside. It's just a way of being, it's a way of choosing to be. You could be 12, it doesn't matter. Just don't lose the sight of keeping the silly in. Keep the silly and keep shining bright, just like a child shines so bright. That's why us adults are so attracted to little children. Yes. And little babies, because they want to light that we miss that in ourselves. So all we want to do is be filled up with it and hold them and love them and enjoy their presence, right? Yet being present with a child is all we need. We could do that every day within ourselves. I have a practice where I do actually do a visualization with my inner child with little Terry sitting across the street, and I'm just sitting right next to her and just kind of asking her questions or having a conversation or saying, I'm sorry. I have a beautiful piece about dear inner child and how you're really almost apologizing to that child because most of us have abandoned the little child with. And I think some of us are in pain over it, but we don't realize that that's where the pain is, and that's where what needs to be healed and brought back into life and accepted, and again giving us the permission to do so. I love that.

SPEAKER_00 22:16

Because one of the most empowering lessons we can offer children is thoughts influence feelings. Feelings influence action. And action shapes our lives, right? So when you're like serious, serious, serious, you gotta be strong, you gotta be resilient, you gotta then you're faced with a life exactly like that. There's no happiness then, which which is pretty much, I think a lot of us have had sort of t tough childhood, right? Like growing up. I have and Terry, you shared you've had your share. But we were not really, I guess, taught or given a lesson that it's okay to have all those problems and challenges. At the same time, it's okay to be happy because you'll find a way out of the problems when you're happy. And I think that's the piece that that's the biggest takeaway during our conversation today. So I love that. And yet, children are rarely taught how to understand their inner world, right? I'm guilty of this too. I tell my son, you don't understand how the world is, you gotta be serious, you gotta get this. Because that's literally what we're told and what you see outside. But I think it's time to make a new world out there. So glad it took 14 years, because I think the world today needs it more than ever to read Abracadabra. So, how can we help children recognize that they're not their emotions, Terry? But they can learn to guide them.

SPEAKER_01 23:43

So then the inner strength, I think it's first understanding that they truly have that power to do so. Because right now they give up a lot of their power to their siblings and their parents and the people around them who are who are either making decisions for them, or we start giving giving kids the permission to understand themselves. Because we've never really done that. We're always just the trajectory, the trajectory, whether it's through school, homeschool, doesn't matter where, but giving them the freedom to be themselves. So if your child at 11 is acting silly like a five-year-old, so what? You know, let them just let them have fun. I think we have to be that way with each other as adults as well. So it's it's a matter of acceptance of oneself as an adult and also as a child, and then really understanding the power of emotions that you can allow yourself to be where you are, but what's the next step, right? So let's say you have someone who is extremely despondent, right? Or really very negative and about life and depressed, etc. Typically, the next step up from that is anger. If we can allow ourselves to go through that, so again, we're not gonna go, we're not gonna be depressed and happy within five minutes. You got to go through the scale. There's an actual emotional scale, and people could look, they could look this up. And some people have shortened it, some people it's longer. But when you're in that place of guilt and this and that, you go from kind of jealousy, you go to anger. And that anger is really important to get out. It is very important to get out.

SPEAKER_00 25:41

Now, with that becoming yeah, so people can see those emotions are and how you graduate up towards happiness. Because, like you said, Terry, it doesn't happen like A to B because that's when you start getting critical of yourself, is what I'm supposed to be happy, then that's where the whole toxic positivity comes in.

SPEAKER_01 25:59

Taking the judgment out of yourself is so imperative. So you're either you have a situation that you don't love, right? So you're either going to accept it and create a gift, whatever that gift is, whatever it means, because life is really about the meaning we place on it. Or the third thing is we're gonna stay in judgment. And when we stay in judgment and despond it forever, it is it is mentally and physically unhealthy. This is where a lot of dis-ease comes from. As we say, and we've heard it's dis-ease. We're not, there's no ease in our life, right? And we create bodily things. I know for me, I was going through a horrible time at one point in my life, and literally the side of my face went on. It's like I had Bill's palsy. And I went to a neurologist saying, I don't know what what's wrong with me. And he said, What's going on in your life? And I told him, and he took out the box of tissues, put it on the table, and said, No wonder. Our bodies speak to us. Yes. We have to do is listen. Then we can communicate to them. Once we understand that, we have the power to do that, then we're communicating to our bodies, we're communicating to each other with more openness. So I wanted to get into a little bit of a couple of things. One is social media is one thing, and we all know it's got its positives and negatives. Yet what it's really affecting our society in is again looking to the outside for approval. And that's what's happening with our kids. So imagine if they're seeing it online, they're seeing it in their home, all they want to do is be better, be more, and they're not sitting and accepting for what is. And that doesn't mean that you're relinquishing anything, you're just enjoying the moment. Yes. Right? So I think if we practice that as you and to your point before, as adults, we set the example, and setting the example is absolutely key. So hopefully, adults will read ab or cadaver too and truly get that message. And it's a powerful message at bedtime or any other time. There was a reviewer from Reader's Favorite that people will see that was really powerful and saying how her child read it, chose the book, read it, and immediately knew that the choosing how she would feel whether she was gonna play first or do her homework first. She was literally basing it on that. And that that was a huge hurdle for her and for children in general.

SPEAKER_00 28:58

So but let's make this practical, right? I love everything you shared and the where this conversation is going, Terry, because as you say, magic lives in these small repeatable moments, and here are some simple tools families and educators can begin using, naming the emotions, like you said, um, practicing gratitude before sleep, encouraging imagination, visualization, like you said, using affirmations that build taking wonder walks and noticing beauty. If Lifnas tried just one practice this week, what would you suggest? Just one.

SPEAKER_01 29:35

Gratitude when you wake up in the morning and just stepping off your bed and saying thank you as you're putting both feet down. The affirmations and prepaving that day ahead will help you create a great day. So I don't know if you've been through this, but I have where I've spilt a glass of water and then at least five things happened from my day that are like, right? Okay, so what we can do is circumvent that by building the the good positive feeling about how that day is gonna go, even if there's nerves and let's say a big meeting or whatever it is, where you say to yourself, I've got this. Yes, I've I was terribly bullied as a kid, and it was really rough for me for a few years in elementary and into junior high. I learned a lot from those times of deciding not to necessarily care what other people thought anymore. How do I want to feel? Do I want to try and try and try to be accepted or really stand on my own and know I'm I'm really okay. All are beautiful beings that have something to give. And this beautiful world is where we get, where we enjoy. And I like to call it it's the word awe AWE, it's in the word awesome. Amazing space of gratitude and awe in what we do have versus what we don't have, you will get more of what you want.

SPEAKER_00 31:18

100%. And I think when you say the gratitude practice is so important, Terry. I think for me, going through some really difficult times, now it's become a practice every morning. The minute I put my feet on the floor and I look out and I'm like, what an amazing day to be alive, right? And even that just changes the whole energy where you even while it just feels so wholesome. Like every experience just feels so good. The reason I'm mentioning it is let us not wait for something to go real bad to get to this, right? You don't have to do that. There is there is magic in awe in every moment, and so you don't have to be going through something terrible to get to this point. Just start today. It's just so simple to start today. Wake up. Something must be right in your life to be grateful for. So I love that. And children do not need perfect adults, they need present ones, they need regulated nervous systems, they need permission to feel, they need to see joy modeled. Terry, what shifts when adults reconnect with their own sense of wonder?

SPEAKER_01 32:28

I think I was gonna give your listeners another another exercise to do that they will feel very grounded in themselves when they do this. Uh, and I think that's the key. The key is acceptance and feeling whole, right? That you don't need anything more than what you have right now. If you're if you're healthy, we're always on that wheel to spin. And I think health is really number one. So, but if we have our health and have all of this, it's what else do we need except for the present moment in love for each other? Yeah. So I so let's say we people in the audience who are like, Terry, give me a break. I've got to go into this conversation with my mother and my father, and I take care of my 91-year-old mother. So, guess what, guys? There's a lot of these conversations. So, and let's say you're gonna go into it, you're really you're starting to build up this wall and all of that, right? Instead of doing that, go in with intention, decide on what you want to happen in that conversation, then just let it go. Don't stick with it. Then the second thing is when you're walking in to anything, any kind of conversation, even a group of people, because some of us are very empaths or we're very we take on other people's energy intensely. What I do is I take both hands and I call this emotional sunscreen, by the way. And I take both hands and I literally wipe my body, my entire body. I take at least a minute and I do this. And when I walk in, I feel stronger, I feel more centered, right? I feel more confident in whatever conversation's gonna go my way.

SPEAKER_00 34:24

Right.

SPEAKER_01 34:25

And it's a really great tool, by the way, that I hope your audience appreciates.

SPEAKER_00 34:30

Yes, that's lovely. Thank you, Terry.

SPEAKER_01 34:32

Where can we find the book? Okay, so go to my website. It's terrybeanauthor.com. So Terry with a Y, T-E-R-R-Y, and then bean like a jelly bean or any bean you like, B-E-A-N, Terrybeanauthor.com. It's really the best. And just go to the books, and I've got different pictures and videos and such and podcasts like yours, which will absolutely be there as well.

SPEAKER_00 34:59

Amazing. And I'll drop the link in the description box below. Thank you, Terry. And so coming to the closing, Terry, thank you so much for being here. Like you said, children do not need fixing. We adults actually do not need fixing. We just need to remember that we still have the child in us and we have the power to find happiness here and now, remembering that we're capable of it, creative and resilient and deeply powerful. Magic does not live in perfection or you don't have to orchestrate it, right? It lives in attention, in kindness, like you said, in presence, in the choices we make each day. So tonight you might ask yourself, where did I notice magic today? Where did I notice a happy moment? And if you're listening with a child nearby, you might ask them the same question because the magic has always been there, waiting to be seen, waiting to be practiced, waiting to begin. Thank you, Terry, for this beautiful conversation. And thank you to everyone listening. Please go ahead and buy Abracadabra. I read the book, I love it. It really brought me to a point where I realized I need to practice this every day, let alone my child, because if I model this, my child will follow me. So let the magic begin. Thank you.