One of the things I love, love about this community, is how thoughtful and how kind you are to me, to each other. This Dare Greatly community is special. We are women who are committed to overcoming the hard things life hands us, and to grow from them, learn from them, and find beauty for ashes.

As some of you know, this summer got particularly hard, my cute dad recently passed away. And it happened quite fast, once it happened. He went in for an outpatient surgery, and was gone a week later. He had a series of domino events happen in the hospital that were just too hard to overcome in combination, and I’m so grateful we had that week with him to say our goodbyes and watch the hallmark channel with him, those Christmas in July shows with him, which are his favorite. 

My dad is a lover of all things Christmas, he even played Santa Clause over the years. Who can actually say in real life they had Santa Clause for a dad? That’s what me and all of...

I read a quote that stopped me in my tracks, it said, “Ten years from now, you’d give anything to be this age again, this healthy, this cute, and have this time again. Go do something that makes you proud of yourself today.” If you’re a mom whose children are starting to become more independent, you might be wondering what life will look like ten years from now. It can be hard to imagine when you’ve lost yourself in mothering. But if you’re interested in still finding purpose,  maybe it's overcoming loneliness, or setting yourself up for success with coping with empty nest syndrome, and embracing life to thrive after children leave, then you’re going to love this episode.” 

Stevie Nicks said it best… “well i’ve been afraid of changin’ / cause I built my life around you / but time makes you bolder / even children get older / and I’m getting older too…”

These...

You’re listening to the Dare Greatly Podcast with Danielle Vaughn, episode # 58, How Getting Support for Your Marriage Works

[transcript]

Hey my beautiful friends. How are you doing? It’s been a minute. Well, longer than a minute, as I’ve had a very full winter and spring. Lots of neat things have been happening. It’s been a time of growth, a lot of growth. Since I’ve last talked to you, I did a virtual book club that might be one of my favorite ways I get to connect with you in person. 

We had an amazing group this go-round, and it was inspiring to see the topics you brought to your personal coaching around habits - we read the book Atomic Habits by James Clear, which is one of my top five favorite books, I re-read it every winter in January and use it as a guide for self-assessment and areas I want to improve on moving forward. So working with you with that book as our guide was magical. I loved it.

One of the things I did...

Welcome to Part 3 of this 3 Part blog series that highlights what I learned about parenting in my Marriage and Family Sudies degree. I'm hoping to give you the most condensed but impactful lessons from my studies, that's what this blog series attempts to do.

A common concern that comes up when I'm helping parents in my coaching practice is teen depression and anxiety. Many of the teens I coach ask for my help in those areas too, and the first area I ask questions about are the teen's media usage, whether a cell phone, tablet, or computer.

There is a high correlation between media use and teen depression and anxiety. A study published back in 2017 from San Diego State University psychologist Jean Twenge acknowledges the correlation, though is cautious to prove causation (Twenge, 2017). Even so, the study raised a big red flag to parents.

Between 2010 and 2015, Twenge's findings indicated the biggest increase was among girls who were six times more likely than boys to report...

Welcome to Part 2 of a 3 Part Series on Parenting. My hope in writing about these fundamentals is to help set you up for more self-trust and confidence and enjoy your motherhood journey more.

I've been intrigued by the concept of Motivation ever since I was a little girl with my piano practicing and later with my music teaching studio.

A personal story

I was told my whole life I am 'talented, gifted at music,' etc., and while it felt good to be told those things, it also built some anxiety inside of me if I didn't perform well.

I started competing in piano competitions in the fifth grade. At first, it was fun because I won all the time. It was easy. I was praised a lot by my teacher and my parents and my grandmother. I loved all the attention, and I loved those ribbons and special certificates. One of my piano judges wrote the words, "I can tell you mean business when you sit down to play the piano..." and I took those words to heart. I loved getting praise.

But somewhere in the...

When I was a young mom, I was confused about discipline. I second-guessed myself a lot and was worried I was messing up my children for life if they were mad at me.

I took upon myself to learn what healthy marriages and motherhood looked like when I signed up for my Marriage and Family Studies degree as a young mother.

And maybe you're a little bit like me, you might feel guilty for not enjoying motherhood more sometimes.

It was so important to me to be a good mom!

But how? Where was the 'Good Mom Manual' that all the other moms were using?

This 3 Part blog series helps answer those questions. If I had to boil down what I learned about parenting in only three take-aways, and give you the most condensed but impactful lessons I've learned from my studies, that's what this blog series attempts to do.

I hope it helps you believe in yourself a little more, trust yourself a little more, and most of all, enjoy motherhood a lot more.

Effective Discipline

I know there is so much...

I have so many friends and some loved ones who live with chronic conditions, Shelby knows a lot about this and has so much wisdom to share. Her perspective will be a gift to you if this is something you relate to or have a loved one who is going through it. And so when I invited her onto the podcast and she said yes, I knew you would love to meet her and I was so excited to share her with you. 

She’s doing some important work with others out there. And I think if you are looking for a coach who specifically can help you with managing chronic illness and still live vibrantly, then she’s your gal. I love how her message is to live vibrantly, you’ll learn more what she means by that. 

Shelby has such an amazing life with so many hardships. In the podcast she goes a little bit more in detail about it. Her insight about chronic illness and supporting loved ones with chronic conditions is something you don't want to miss. She had to have a kidney transplant at...

I want to talk today about jealousy and creating your own opportunities. And many of us experience this, I know I’m not the only one, we see other creators and wish we were doing what they’re doing, and then realize - hey - you know Danielle, you can always go and create that thing for yourself in your own way. 

And every so often some of my creative friends, my musician friends will say to me things like, 

• I wish I had a holiday album I could share every year. 
• Or I wish I had done a music video when I released that one song
• Or I wish I could be brave and do a podcast.

And I feel so much compassion for that feeling of wishing, because I SO get it. I’ve always tried to figure out that part of me, that part of human nature that wishes we could do what other people do, because it’s fascinating when we break it down, what it is that holds people back, or what it is that makes the difference between creating your own opportunities and those of...

Growing up, your man may have never witnessed an adult who could regulate their emotions. I hear this more often than not from the men I’ve coached. Maybe they saw yelling, maybe the silent treatment, and maybe even complete avoidance.

What happens is we learn the way to deal with uncomfortable emotions is to well, not deal with them. 

Often, if this is the childhood experience the man in your life has had, he will view small situations as a crisis and complete chaos. He may have saw shame stop him from speaking up about the realities going on around him, and never feeling like he could trust that his emotions were safe.

He might have learned that what people thought and that the intellect was more important than how he felt.

If so, then He learned codependency, enabling, and overachieving, and overprotecting was love. 

There comes a time when he will want to try a different way of living for himself and the family he’s creating. But he won’t know...

Have you ever hit a season in life where you just feel… flat? Like your bucket is empty. Your inspiration is non-existent. No matter how hard you try, you can’t seem to summon that flow of energy and passion like you used to? I’ve been there. And I want you to know — you’re not broken, used up, or “past your prime.” 

Your creative spark is simply suffocating beneath the weight of all your responsibilities.

 Because — let’s face it. Especially if you're multi-passionate like me, life can get overwhelming, fast. Between work, family, friends, health and just getting the basics done, it’s A LOT. We wake up. Survive. Sleep. Repeat. It never stops. Especially when you’re in the trenches with young children.  But deep in my heart, I know I’m a creator.  And I’ve had to learn how to honor this instead of dismissing it. I now know how to create. I’ve...