Michaeleen Doucleff, HUNT, GATHER, PARENT
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[1:38]Michaelne Dukleff is the author of Hunt Gather Parent what ancient cultures can teach us about the lost art of raising happy
[1:45]helpful little humans
[1:47]Michaelne is a correspondent for NPR's science desk in
[1:51]2015 she was part of the team that earned a George Foster Peabody award for its coverage of the Ebola outbreak in West Africa
[1:57]Prior to joining NPR
[1:59]Dukleff was an editor at the journal cell where she wrote about the science behind pop culture
[2:04]She has a doctorate in chemistry from the University of California Berkeley and a master's degree in
[2:09]Viti culture and analogy from the University of California, Davis
[2:13]She lives with her husband daughter and German Shepherd Mango and San Francisco
[2:17]Welcome, Michaelne. Thank you so much for coming on mom's don't have time to read books to discuss Hunt gather parent
[2:24]What ancient cultures can teach us about the lost art of raising happy helpful little humans?
[2:30]Thank you for this book. Oh
[2:32]Thank you. Thank you for having me and thank Rosie for going on this world tour with you to help other
[2:39]destroy their own kids
[2:42]Yeah, you know, I think she probably had the most fun of all of us with the book writing
[2:50]How old is she now?
[2:52]She's five. She's five. She's in preschool right now. Yeah. Oh my gosh. Well, she basically like wrote a book in age five. So that's pretty cool
[3:00]I mean, it's really interesting because like, you know
[3:03]I travel a lot for my job and it started to be this time when I was writing the book proposal and she was starting to get mad at me
[3:09]She was like, well, why aren't I going with you? And I was like
[3:12]All right, you come with me
[3:15]And we'll do this thing and so it's like her idea completely to go. So wow. Well, that's like your first
[3:22]Lesson in parenting right like yeah
[3:26]Exactly, you got to take their ideas like they have good ideas like sometimes they're like totally off their rockers
[3:32]But every now and then she comes up with an idea and I'm like wow like that's a really good idea and
[3:38]Before I wrote the book, I wasn't listening at all for those things. I was just ignoring basically everything she said
[3:43]So wow even still I don't know that I would bring I can barely bring my kids like, you know in the car for an hour let alone, you know
[3:50]all these
[3:53]I have just to say the first trip to the eucatan was like a hot mess like a hot mess and by the time we went to Tanzania
[4:00]She had really like it kind of works with what I talked about in the book like just practice and training like it really
[4:07]She got so much better at it and yeah, so okay
[4:11]In case people don't understand what we're talking about
[4:15]Sorry, so I sure I kind of just jumped right in there
[4:18]So why don't you explain the voyage you and Rosie went on why you did it and what you learned and that will basically be a book synopsis
[4:27]So while I was on assignment from PR, I'm a correspondent there
[4:33]I was sent down to the eucatan to a small Maya village and I was doing a story about attention and children's attention
[4:40]But when I was there I was just like whoa, there's like a much bigger story here
[4:44]Just about parenting in general the moms I met there
[4:47]One of them Maria Tomborgas who's you mean in the book is was just incredible to me the way
[4:53]How skilled she was as a parent and her the relationship that she had with her children
[4:57]She has five kids three that were still in the home four to 12
[5:01]But she just had this relation. She has this relationship with them. That's their very little resistance
[5:06]There's no yelling or screaming or negotiating
[5:10]She's very calm, but she's also very confident
[5:12]So she's clearly like in charge and then yet the kids across the whole village the kids are just incredible like very kind and generous and super
[5:21]super helpful. So the first day the third day I was there
[5:24]Maria's oldest daughter who's 12 and Hala
[5:27]She was on spring break and she had stayed up the night before watching a movie and she was sleeping in and she woke up around 11
[5:33]And she walked past me and her mother in the kitchen that you know this strange white woman in the kitchen
[5:39]She didn't say a word and she just started washing the dishes from breakfast like completely
[5:44]Nobody asked her to do it and of course
[5:46]I was like what just happened? Like oh my god, that's incredible
[5:49]And Maria wasn't even very surprised at all and she told me like you know
[5:53]She's 12 she at this age knows what she needs to do and so she does it
[5:57]You know, she's like it doesn't happen every day
[5:59]But and I was just I was I left there like just completely
[6:04]Like son. I was like is you know
[6:06]I want to raise a child like that
[6:08]You know my child at the time was too and she was just like a complete hell yeah
[6:12]Like there was just constant yelling and screaming and
[6:17]And I so I tried to read about it in parenting books and I couldn't find
[6:20]Because I'm very little
[6:22]But then I actually went on another I kind of left it
[6:24]I did some stories and kind of left it
[6:25]And then I went on another trip up to the Arctic with an anyway families and
[6:29]This story was about anger
[6:31]But again, I saw the same very similar thing where these very calm confident parents
[6:37]Interacting with children in a way that was was you know just incredibly
[6:42]Conflict-free and and I started reading more about it
[6:45]And I realized like oh that this is like a common way of
[6:49]Communicating and interacting with children around the world and we in America
[6:52]We westerners are like the exception in this very conflict-ridden
[6:57]Existence between parents and children is is not super universal and not actually really common at all
[7:03]There's a different way to do it that's easier
[7:06]I love how you describe this in the book
[7:08]You said so while I raised worry with essentially a single tool a really loud hammer many parents around the world
[7:14]We yield a whole suite of precision instruments such as screwdrivers
[7:18]Pulleys and levels that they can bring out as needed in this book
[7:21]We'll learn as much as possible about these super tools including how to use them in your own home
[7:26]Yeah, it's kind of true like we think that we can like we think that we can change do everything with words and often repeated words or loud words
[7:35]Right in fact though, there's just all this incredible huge set of tools that are you know some with words
[7:43]Some with physicality some with looks, you know action
[7:47]And they tend to be much more effective with kids
[7:49]I think because they tend to lead to less arguments and less negotiating
[7:53]You know, I talk about the look in the books
[7:54]And this is super common around the world that parents can just like shoot a look at a child like across the room and the kid like knows
[8:01]Exactly what the parent thinks and it's actually easier than you then you can imagine like once
[8:06]I do it like Rosie knows like we were in the grocery store once and she picked up the candy bar
[8:11]And I just shot her the look and like she just like dropped it
[8:15]Show me the looks do it right now, so I
[8:19]I mean you just have to channel all the anger you have to I'm like
[8:23]Oh, yeah, you know
[8:25]Big eyes
[8:28]Okay
[8:30]You just put like whatever you're gonna say to them like I would say like no way since they're dropped that candy bar
[8:36]This is way more than a look. This is a full-on face shape shifter
[8:40]Yes, exactly. It's like it's as if a child says
[8:44]You know, what does an angry face look like the face that a child would make themselves
[8:49]Yeah, exactly right especially if it's from a distance you want to like
[8:53]You know, but I would even give them to my husband now
[8:55]Like I'll say something. I just see like
[9:00]And he knows and he can't the thing is you can't negotiate with a face
[9:05]Right you can't like you can't wait talk back to it because it's not talking to you
[9:10]Interesting, you know, it's so funny because my husband is step parent is the step dad to my four kids
[9:17]So before he even met them he's like yeah, you know when I was going up
[9:22]My dad would just give me a look and I would know and I was like yeah
[9:26]What are you talking about?
[9:29]And so he like tried that a few times on my kids like
[9:33]You know this look and it did not work at all
[9:38]Did not fly they were like why is he looking at me like that like what on earth?
[9:42]So maybe you have to start it really early like is this something you can actually add in because
[9:49]Once you've already you know spoiled them with like you know the yelling or whatever
[9:54]Whatever other either tactics you have
[9:57]But it's interesting. That's very interesting. I wonder
[10:00]I think it also has to do with who gets the love, you know, like how much power you
[10:05]weld over them or, you know, the history, you know, it definitely works with adults.
[10:10]I try to my mom too.
[10:12]I think the thing is is I think kids are, besides the look, I think kids are, are, there's
[10:17]good evidence in psychology and that kids are built for nonverbal, especially younger kids
[10:22]who are built for nonverbal communication, right, there are a lot of words can be like
[10:27]we think they're understanding us, but I don't think that they do, especially when
[10:31]they're little, right, we say all this stuff to them and we try to like, I say we, we try
[10:35]to like have this logical conversation where I'm trying to explain, you know, electricity
[10:39]and why you have to close their refrigerator door and like, you know, all this really complex
[10:43]things to a three year old.
[10:44]I mean, like how, how is she going to get that, you know, one of my friends says, yeah,
[10:50]we'd like have these conversations with them, like as if they're like, you know, 30, but then
[10:55]we want like to give them a plastic knife to cut something with, you know, or like, so
[10:59]we treat them very like this weird, we have this, we kind of haven't flipped around, like
[11:03]I say in the book, we underestimate their physical abilities, it's like, hugely, that
[11:08]is something that I think could really change a relationship if we start to have a little
[11:13]bit more confidence in their physical abilities.
[11:15]And yet we over really estimate their emotional abilities and their, like, intellectual
[11:20]abilities to control their emotions.
[11:22]And so I think all the verbal input is one of those things where we're over estimating
[11:27]kind of their mental capacity to understand it and, and then act on what we say.
[11:32]I remember when I had little, really little guys, some expert saying, you're going to
[11:38]say, like, you know, don't put this there, but did it, and all they're going to hear
[11:41]is sink, you know, like you, they'll hear one word that you say, yeah, so I try, although
[11:49]of course, I forget to think about that when I can hear myself, you know, it's like
[11:52]when they ask you, like, what does this word mean?
[11:54]And I'm like, well, I already really mean so did it.
[11:57]And I go off, they need one word, they're like, like, that's enough, got it, right?
[12:03]Yeah, exactly, exactly.
[12:05]And I think that that's another, another really good tool that I think you can definitely
[12:09]add in.
[12:10]I think you can add in all of them, but I think you can add in is the action tool of like,
[12:15]is doing what you want them to do, you know, or just like, instead of like, okay, it's
[12:19]time to take a bath, okay, five minutes to a bath, okay, it's time to, you know, okay,
[12:23]now we're going to take a bath, like this kind of, all this, like, bleed up to it, are
[12:26]you ready to take a bath?
[12:27]Do you want to take a bath?
[12:28]Like, I saw one of the moms when we were in the Arctic, she just went and drew the bath.
[12:33]You know, and then the three-year-old just walked into the bath, right?
[12:37]There was no meet-up, there was no, it was just like, you know, why am I near, I mean,
[12:43]I know why I'm doing it, but it's like, why do we need, we don't need to do all this
[12:47]narration.
[12:48]Kids are built to do what we do, we just, we just don't give them the opportunities
[12:52]really, I think.
[12:53]So it's more than modeling, it's, it's basically just like, but like, I don't know, because
[12:59]if I'm like, if I run the bath, sometimes they don't even end up in the bathroom at
[13:02]all.
[13:03]Do you know, like, I mean, then you start to wonder, like, do they need to take the
[13:05]bath?
[13:06]Right, yes, I've actually been wondering, because one of my kids has been like, I don't think
[13:12]I need to take a bath every day.
[13:13]I'm not that dirty.
[13:14]Why can't we do every other day?
[13:15]And I don't really have such a great reason, like, no, there's no reason.
[13:18]In fact, if you look at the science behind it, I mean, this gets to this idea that we do
[13:22]all this stuff that we don't need to do, that like, somebody has convinced us that we need
[13:27]to do all this stuff.
[13:28]Like, bath has a great one.
[13:29]And actually, if you look at the new, like, new science-owned skin and everything, it's really
[13:33]hard on your skin to take a bath every day, and like, especially if you soak.
[13:37]And so what could argue that it's like, healthier not to, but there's a whole list of things
[13:41]that we do that we think, like, that good parents do and that, like, nowhere else in
[13:46]the world, people have ever done this.
[13:48]And throughout history, you know, we didn't do it.
[13:51]You know, Western European Americans, European heritage people didn't do these things.
[13:56]And now we feel like if we don't do them, we're like a bad parent.
[14:01]So, Rosie, after we went on these trips, you know, she was right around around age three
[14:08]and a half.
[14:09]I was just like, all right, it's up to you when you take a bath.
[14:10]I don't care.
[14:11]And like, you know, sometimes she's kind of stinky, and I'm like, I think you're kind
[14:15]of stinky.
[14:16]You just take a bath.
[14:17]And she's like, yeah, I'm kind of stinky, I just take a bath, you know?
[14:20]But I just, I cut out, like, 90% of the stuff that I felt like I needed to do.
[14:26]And what that did was to it, like, cut down on conflict, right?
[14:30]Because I wasn't trying to force her to do all these things.
[14:33]But to it, and there's a lot of good evidence for this, it teaches her the initiative.
[14:38]So there's like evidence that like, everything you do for a child, you know, over and
[14:43]over again, clearly when they're little, you have to do things.
[14:46]But, you know, everything that you kind of like do until they're like 12, 13, 14, can
[14:51]see that responsibility to you, right?
[14:54]And so they don't learn the initiative to take initiative and take responsibility
[14:58]for it.
[14:59]So like in that book, I talk about sleep and how, you know, a three-year-old can just put
[15:03]herself to sleep fine, you know?
[15:05]And one of the psychologists told me, it's like, because the parent has never taken that
[15:09]responsibility for the child.
[15:11]The child has always determined when she goes to sleep, how long she sleeps.
[15:15]And so the child takes responsibility for it herself.
[15:18]And as a kid that just has somebody telling them when to sleep all the time, they never
[15:22]learn that skill of like, I decide when I sleep when my body tells me or they never
[15:27]take that responsibility.
[15:29]I don't talk about this a lot in the book, but I think it's a big part of like, where
[15:32]we have this like failure to launch kind of problem, right?
[15:36]It is because parents aren't giving children their like responsibilities to learn what
[15:41]it is to be an adult and learn and take initiative with things.
[15:45]Okay.
[15:46]So action items for me, which is what it all comes down to.
[15:50]I'm running bath.
[15:51]I'm going to have like bath tubs all over the place filled with water for whoever they're
[15:55]not going to drown.
[15:56]They're very, I shouldn't even joke, but they're much, my kids at least are older.
[15:58]So younger kids, parents should not do that.
[16:01]What else?
[16:02]I just like wait till they're hungry and be like, we're not having a family dinner.
[16:06]What do you think about that?
[16:07]So how old are your kids?
[16:09]I have a six year old and a seven year old and then I have twins who are almost 14.
[16:13]So I think it's a wow.
[16:14]Wow.
[16:15]You've got four.
[16:16]Wow.
[16:17]But the older the older kids, they take showers and go to bed on their, I mean, they do
[16:20]that stuff now.
[16:21]I don't know.
[16:22]Yeah.
[16:23]I'm like, I mean, I think it depends on what you want as a, you know, what, what's your
[16:28]goal with the kids, right?
[16:29]It really is about that.
[16:31]Like, you know, do you want your kids to, you know, do chores easily without being asked
[16:35]and, you know, like Maria's kid, you know, do you want your kids to get along?
[16:39]Do you want to be kind or generous?
[16:41]I mean, it's like, what are you, I mean, all those things sound great.
[16:44]Do I have to stick?
[16:46]No, you don't have to pick.
[16:48]You know, but some people are like, well, I want my kid to go to, you know, Harvard.
[16:51]I'm like, okay, well, I also want my kid to do the dishes.
[16:55]You know, no, I mean, I think that the idea in the book is that whatever you want a child
[17:00]to do as kind of easily without having to nag them or bribe them, you start welcoming
[17:09]them into that task as early as possible.
[17:11]And it, people always ask me, but does it work for like an older kid?
[17:14]Absolutely does.
[17:15]It just takes a little bit of time and it's, you need to be a little more gentle with
[17:19]it and not.
[17:20]So forceful, I think with the little kids, you can be a little bit more hands-on.
[17:24]But so for instance, if you want your kids to, you know, help clean up afterwards with
[17:28]the dishes, then make them part of the whole meal, right?
[17:31]Like get them, have them come over why you're, why you're cooking and come, come help
[17:35]me cook.
[17:36]And I mean, if you have four of them, you guys could like, you guys could clean up, cook
[17:40]and clean up so fast and be incredible.
[17:42]Like think about if you were all working together actually during the pandemic, we had
[17:46]the opportunity to do that many, many times didn't work was a good way.
[17:51]We had like the chores going and, you know, everybody was doing something.
[17:55]I'm like, you know, they're, they like want to play with me after dinner.
[17:58]And I was like, I could do all this, but you're going to have to wait like five times
[18:01]as long basically.
[18:03]If we all do this, I'll be ready to play with you really fast, dude.
[18:06]So yeah, that's exactly what one of them, the my mom says in a study, like, you know, things
[18:10]get done so much quickly when we all work together.
[18:13]And that, that's exactly what you need to do is like, instead of, I think we tend to like
[18:18]break things up into like, okay, now Tuesday, it's going to be your turn to do this.
[18:22]You know, Thursday, it's your turn to like make the bed and like these, but if you actually
[18:26]want kids to want to do it and enjoy doing it, then you've got to like all do it together.
[18:31]So like the emphasis on like a shared responsibility.
[18:34]So just like you say, like, we all clean up together the dinner and we'll get it done
[18:38]faster.
[18:39]You know, we all work together to do the luck.
[18:41]Like every Saturday, we all do the laundry together, including the husband, like it's
[18:45]a shared task that everybody is doing as a family because everyone lives in the family
[18:51]and everyone needs clean clothes.
[18:52]And so it's kind of a shifting of a mindset of like individual tasks versus this is like
[18:58]what all the fit all the family does.
[19:00]So yeah, so it's actually gotten a lot better in terms of like my husband and I don't
[19:05]fight over chores anymore because we're all working, you know, it's a shared, it's a shared
[19:09]responsibility that we're all doing.
[19:11]I feel like I should put you in touch with Eve Radsky, do you know who she is?
[19:14]She wrote a book called Fair Play and she designed this whole system for parents to divide
[19:18]chores, but it's you're both essentially saying the same thing to not fight about something.
[19:25]Someone has to just have the responsibility for it start to finish.
[19:29]So like if I'm going to tell a kid that bath time is up to them, they can be the when
[19:34]they want as often as they want, they can decide when to turn it on and drain it and
[19:39]whatever.
[19:40]And I'll like never bother them about it again, you know, my fear is that they are just
[19:44]not going to do it.
[19:46]So it's not just, so that's kind of like you've turned it into like the free range
[19:50]bath, right?
[19:51]And that's not what I think, that's not what I'm saying, there's somewhere between, right?
[19:56]So it's this idea that like one way we think is...
[20:00]like, okay, every night before it's like this very strict schedule.
[20:03]And then the other way is like, okay, I'm just going to have anything to do with it.
[20:05]And I think what I'm arguing in the book is that there's actually some other way where it's like,
[20:11]the child decides, but you can still guide them. Right. So, I mean, you could,
[20:16]we're talking about baths, but this could be anything. Right. Like from, you know, hitting the,
[20:21]the sibling to like, whatever. Right. Where then, where you're, you're not taking the choice,
[20:27]or at least a sense of choice away from the child, but you're not also seating complete
[20:31]responsibility to the child. So it's like me talking about, okay, you're kind of stinky.
[20:35]I think you need to take a bath, you know. And if I really wanted her to take a bath,
[20:38]I would be even heavier with it. Like, I'm going to go draw the bath now. You need to get
[20:42]in the bath. And then like, or I would, or I just go draw the bath and then like take our hands and
[20:46]walk her to the bath. Right. So like, I mean, so I think that that's what we kind of swing between these
[20:53]two, like very strict micromanaging and like very free range, but I would argue that most of
[20:59]the world sits between where it's like, the child is involved in the decision and involved in it.
[21:05]And you're, you're paying attention to what the child's doing, but you also have some goal
[21:09]in mind. Right. And that the two goals are like trying, trying to meet here in the middle.
[21:16]I don't know if that makes sense. It makes sense. I like it. Now, I do. I like it.
[21:21]I think with each subsequent kid that I've had, I've become more like that than in the beginning.
[21:26]Interesting. Yeah. Because it's like less conflict. Yeah. And just like, I don't have time.
[21:33]Yeah. Like the other night my kid, my little guy, I shouldn't, I mean, he just would not put
[21:38]on his clothes. And he would not be dinner. And I was like, well, I've got to like we all have to eat.
[21:43]Like I'm, I can't in all the days, I would have been like on the floor and trying this tactic
[21:48]sitting with him. And I would be like, bribing him. And I would be like, you know, getting upset
[21:53]myself, I would be like, ah, you know, and I would like ruin the whole dinner. Right.
[21:56]That's like, right. I'm going to sit and enjoy the night with my other kids. Like who cares?
[22:02]He's going to miss it. And I guess if he's really hungry, he'll eat later. And you know, exactly,
[22:07]you've like weighed the consequences of it. Right. Like, and one of the, one of the moms in Alaska
[22:12]told me she's like, just go to the relationship, like always think of the relationship. Like,
[22:17]how is this going to affect my relationship with my child and the relationship with the family?
[22:22]Right. And so if you made this big deal and had this big argument, was that going to help
[22:25]things that that helped the relationship? No. Right. Like I think sometimes we get these like
[22:30]blinders on because we think we have to do these things. We have to all sit at the table. We have
[22:34]to all take a bath. And we sacrifice like peace and we sacrifice time. You know, when we don't
[22:42]really need to, right? When like, and PS at eight o'clock, we were trying to eat at six. And I ignored
[22:48]the whole thing. And he like sat, you know, with no, like in the next dream, like having a fit
[22:54]about it. And then like maybe half an hour later, he put on his clothes. And then by eight o'clock
[23:00]that night, he was like, I'm hungry. I'm like, oh yeah, you ready for dinner? And then he ate the
[23:04]dinner. Oh, so you saved it for him. That's true. Yeah. I didn't feel like it was right. I
[23:09]feel like I did a terrible job as I have like a naked child. You know, like riding on the floor
[23:13]and you know, my husband's like, I like to leave him. So I don't know. Oh, I think it sounds like
[23:19]a masterclass. Oh, thanks. I mean, I mean, because I mean, what harm has it done? You know, I don't,
[23:26]you know, like the child's perfectly fine. He came to dinner the next night. Like it didn't happen
[23:31]again. It's not like it became a pattern because that's always the fear, right? If I let
[23:35]not to, you know, I don't know. But this didn't happen again. So I mean, that's a very weird thing too.
[23:39]Is this an idea that like we're going to ruin them at any moment? Right? Like, or the window of
[23:43]opportunities going to close. Like, oh, you have to do this before they're for when they're babies.
[23:48]It's like that. Right? You have to do it for four months or they're never going to sleep by them.
[23:54]This is crazy. I mean, that's just craziness that like nobody else ever, the planet thinks
[24:01]such things. It's very strange. Well, tell me for two seconds about the actual writing of this book.
[24:06]How long did it take you to write? Like, after you did all your research and did you enjoy that
[24:11]process? I loved it. I think it's the best part of the, I mean, I love traveling, but I love writing.
[24:16]And it took about a year, almost exactly. I took a year off from NPR to we traveled a little bit
[24:23]before that. And then yeah, about a year. And then I didn't realize how much work has to be done
[24:28]actually like after you turned the book in, you probably know. Like, I thought I was like,
[24:31]I turned the book in and I'm 10. And it was like the opposite. It was like, I think I turned the
[24:37]book in and then I was like, okay, now I worked more, you know, but I went back to my regular job. So
[24:40]I don't have time either. I'm with you. I don't have time to deal with nakedness. It's like, fine,
[24:44]be naked, you know, because I, you know, especially during the pandemic, I had very little,
[24:49]if any child care. So it was, while I was writing a lot of the book, it was, it was really hard,
[24:55]you know. And I mean, I think that that's when I really started doing the things in the book
[25:00]was when I didn't have child care and I still had to finish the book. And I was like,
[25:04]I can't parent the way like I've been taught to parent and still work and still like have like,
[25:10]still have my mind, you know? And so I was like, I'm just going to have to really embrace
[25:15]what's in this book. Like, because I have to parent like 12 hours a day with this kid now and right
[25:20]in like walking the walk. Yeah. And I was just like, and I thought I was embracing it. But then
[25:26]I like realized I wasn't completely like at all, you know, like she's going to have to entertain
[25:30]herself. And she's going to have to step up and make lunch and she's going to have to like do all
[25:35]this stuff. And it took a couple weeks. There was a lot of screaming at first, but she didn't she
[25:39]did it. You know, there was something on the other side, you know, of that screaming. And so
[25:44]that was a long answer to your question, but I loved it. I loved it. I loved writing. How
[25:48]much you did you like writing your book? I love writing. I love any any chance I get.
[25:56]What advice would you have for aspiring authors? You know, somebody told me that it's the best
[26:00]advice I think I've ever got was, you know, just go right. Like, I mean, right. Like, there's the
[26:05]only way you're going to get better is to write enormous amounts. And there's so many places
[26:10]now to write. And so, you know, just start, just start writing and start sending things to people,
[26:15]you know, figure out the place you want to write for. And then write a piece and like send them
[26:20]to them. Like you just writing is all about for least for me is volume, right? The more like
[26:26]I will write like 4,000 words before I really understand what the chapter is going to be about. Like,
[26:31]you know, I have this kind of sense, but then I'll like write into, you know, I'll actually
[26:35]write my way into the point of the chapter or the real narrative structure of it and stuff,
[26:40]which sounds crazy, right? You have to have this real confidence in yourself that some things in there.
[26:44]But yeah, it takes time. I've, I've been professional writer now for like 11 years. And before
[26:49]that, you know, just trying, but it takes, it takes a lot of time. Well, thank you so much for like
[26:55]my parenting session. I really appreciate it. I don't know if I helped you sound like you were,
[27:00]you were a master, you're a master. You had the words master class and my parenting at the same
[27:06]sentence. And so that's it for me. Thank you. Let's see what happens in dinner tonight. Anyway,
[27:13]thank you. And thanks for the wonderful book and for all the journeys you went on to help the rest
[27:19]of us and get us out of our own heads a little bit and back out into the world. So yeah,
[27:23]exactly. Like, if it doesn't feel like it's worth it, it's probably not worth it.
[27:27]We got it. Naked dinner is all around. Naked dinner is all around. Thank you so much.
[27:33]Thank you so much. All right, bye. Thanks to Kira and Dina for sponsoring our episode with
[27:39]their raising adults podcast future focus parenting dot com. Thanks for listening to this episode
[27:45]of moms don't have time to read books. Don't forget to follow me on Instagram at zebi Owens
[27:50]and at moms don't have time to read books. Also sign up for my newsletter at zebiowens.com
[27:55]and sign up for my virtual book club and meet lots of authors on zoom every other week.
[27:59]Thanks so much to Steve and Ryan at Textures Sound for the Sound Editing. And thank you to
[28:04]Morning Moon Productions for providing this fantastic intro and out trim music.