September 16, 2025 • 19 mins
Sami returns to the podcast with an honest look at what life has been like after becoming a mom of three through an unexpected guardianship that is now on the path to adoption. She shares the emotional highs and lows of bonding with a toddler, navigating work transitions, and leading a major community project all at once.
This episode unpacks what it means to follow through on something meaningful even when it’s incredibly hard. Sami also tells a powerful story about a simple act of kindness that made a big impact during one of her toughest days.
If you've ever found yourself in a season where you’re stretched thin, trying to do what’s right while barely holding it all together, this conversation will make you feel seen.
What We Talk About
- Parenting a third child with very little prep time
- Balancing family, work, and leadership responsibilities
- The return of TEDxFayetteville and the tension of timing
- Learning to let go of old parenting rules
- The emotional impact of being seen in a hard moment
- Why small kindnesses matter more than we think
This episode is an invitation to slow down, reflect, and find meaning in the moments that often go unnoticed. Whether you are leading, parenting, or just trying to make it through the week, you will walk away feeling encouraged and a little less alone.
Resources and Links
- Learn more at TEDxFayetteville
- Want to learn more about coaching with Sami? Book a free 30-minute call: calendly.com/tbg_sami/30-min
Order Traveling Light wherever you get your books!
Sign up at bfreakingawesome.com to get the latest news, insights, and episodes straight to your inbox.
Follow Be Freaking Awesome on Facebook, LinkedIn, Youtube, and Instagram.
Let us know what questions you want to be answered and discussed by emailing us at podcast@bfreakingawesome.com.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_00 (00:00):
here at be freaking awesome we believe that life is
too short to be anything lessthan extraordinary join us as we
explore what it means to liveauthentically grow continuously
and have a blast while doing itlet's get started so
SPEAKER_01 (00:21):
Welcome everyone to today's episode of Be Freaking
Awesome.
I'm Angela Belford, one of yourhosts, and I am rejoined by
Sammy Kennison.
After some time off, you didsneak in one episode there while
you were wandering into this newseason of Mom of Three Children.
(00:42):
So Sammy, tell us a little bitabout that.
SPEAKER_00 (00:45):
Yeah, so I recently became a mom of three children.
been wanting to adopt for areally, really long time,
actually.
And the story is kind of longand a little bit magical, but
ended up that in July, end ofJuly, we got to bring home our
(01:06):
sweet little girl.
And she is 18 months now.
We had about six weeks with her.
And then the guardianship wasfinalized.
And we are currently on the pathtowards being able to adopt her.
So
SPEAKER_01 (01:21):
That's where we're at right now.
SPEAKER_00 (01:51):
From when we knew that we were going to get to be
bringing her home to when webrought her home and even like
settling out what work's goingto look like while I'm out.
What is our life going to looklike?
How are we managing all of thepieces and all of the things?
It took a lot of logistics.
And I think that my previousmaternity leaves have been
(02:13):
significantly more restful and amore sleep when the baby sleeps
and take care of you and do allthose things.
And I feel like this has justbeen a lot of work.
And that's not necessarily tosay bad work.
It has been attachment andbonding and relationships with
birth family and navigating ourother two children, getting a
(02:36):
relationship with her as well.
While also because I didn'tnecessarily have tons of prep
time, it's not exactly likeeverything at work was ready for
me to just be gone for anextended period of time.
So there still was just enoughwork to feel like I still had to
do work while I was on maternityleave but not quite enough work
to actually have been like ohwell it's not that big of a deal
(02:57):
that Sammy's gone and a lot ofdifferent pieces of it so
overall hard and this has beensomething that we have been
working towards for I meanfrankly years and so it's just
like it's like cool now you getto have this hard as opposed to
the waiting hard physicallychallenging and demanding
SPEAKER_01 (03:20):
yeah because you had made some decisions Yeah, I am
the license
SPEAKER_00 (03:33):
holder for TEDx Fayetteville.
I have helped put on three orfour different events all prior
to COVID.
And we decided this year, thisis the year that we're going to
bring it back.
And we're going to make ithappen.
And so in April, we actuallywere pretty sure that we would
not get to be participating inadoption in this way.
At that point in time,everything was pointing towards
(03:56):
this path being closed.
And we were like, all right,well, we can't keep our lives on
hold for forever just waiting.
Let's go ahead and pursue andset up TEDxFaithville.
It's going to happen on October4th of 2025.
Let's start making all of thosethings moving.
And then come end of May,beginning of June, the story
(04:17):
started to change a little bit.
And it wasn't until July 1stthat it was like, yep, this is
going to happen.
This is what it's going to bemoving forward with.
And it was like, cool.
I'm glad we already started thisother train of TEDx Fayetteville
right in the middle of all ofthis.
So much fun.
It's exactly what I, it's how Iwould have done it all along.
Not at all.
(04:38):
Not in the slightest.
So
SPEAKER_01 (04:40):
yeah.
And the, even the TEDxFayetteville is a little bit of
a waiting situation, right?
Because these were originallyspeakers chosen in 2020.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (04:51):
I don't know it's waiting quite as much because a
lot of our story with theadoption stuff it's like things
that are out of our hands likewe're waiting on other people
whereas with TEDx Fayettevilleit's like so Sammy when are you
ready to get back in the saddleto make an event happen so other
people have been waiting andother people have had things out
of their control but it's verymuch my control which is It's
(05:14):
frankly hard not to feel likethe guilt of that and the weight
of other people's waiting whiletrying to do what's best for us.
And so even now where then it'slike, well, crap, this is
definitely not what's best forus.
it's fine.
We're going to make it work andwe're going to do the best that
we can with what we've got goingon.
SPEAKER_01 (05:33):
Back to parenting.
What wisdom from parenting yourfirst two are you using and
which one are you having tothrow out this time?
SPEAKER_00 (05:42):
I have no idea.
I don't know.
Um, I'm in definitely insurvival mode right now of like,
I'm throwing all the entire bowlof spaghetti at the wall and I
don't, I don't like whateverworks, works, whatever it
doesn't work, doesn't work.
Um, I think a different questionthan this, sorry to
circumnavigate your question.
(06:02):
I saw an Instagram reel earlierthis year that was commenting on
parents of three kids are wildand they are willing to cancel
on a moment's notice and show upon a moment's notice and they
don't care if food's been on thefloor and they don't care if
(06:24):
like all of these big thingsthat parents of two Two kids are
actually just parents of one kidtrying to make the rules of one
kid work for two kids.
And so you're really stressed.
But parents of three kids,you're like, the rules don't
matter.
Like the rules are out thewindow and we're doing whatever
we got to do to make thishappen.
And I wish I, I've tried reallyhard to go back and find this,
(06:47):
this particular video because itreally has stuck with me that
I'm like, oh, I don't have to dotwo parent things anymore.
I am a third, I'm a parent ofthree kids.
You know what that means?
That means that I am allowed tocancel at a moment's notice.
I've got three kids.
It's too much.
Sorry.
I'm allowed to say, hey, Ithought it was going to be too
much, but now I'm going to behere.
Hope you don't mind me and mythree kids and the chaotic
(07:08):
tornado that that might be.
So it's interesting.
I don't know that I have like,here's the specific things that
we are throwing out the window.
It's more of just like, no,we're doing whatever we have to
do.
And I don't really care.
Like, yeah, there are thingsthat with my first two, we were
so crazy strict on zeroco-sleeping no matter what
whatsoever.
(07:29):
I'm now in a spot where I've gota kid who co-slept her entire
life up until she lived with us.
I'm going to transition that.
I'm not necessarily, I don'thave to go cold turkey.
I can give her space and usspace.
I wouldn't have done that withour first two.
We were like, it doesn't matterhow loud you cry, get in your
own bed.
Now I'm like, we're allexhausted.
And if you can continue to cry,then you're going to wake up
(07:51):
everybody and it's going to be aworst day tomorrow.
So you know what?
We're going to do what we got todo.
Okay.
Do what you got to do.
Turn that.
SPEAKER_01 (07:59):
That's interesting, because I've never heard it said
that when you have two children,you're just trying to make all
the rules of one child fit.
Because I joke all the time thatSammy is a firstborn.
Chris, she's married to Chris,who's a firstborn.
And they had Henry, who's afirstborn.
And then there's Peter.
And it's probably why Peter andI get along so well is because
(08:20):
it just cracked.
I mean, I'm a firstborn only,you know, but it makes me laugh
because he just like was thisfly in the little firstborn
ointment that is your family.
Um, and then now kind oftechnically Max is going to have
this, she was a firstborn for 18months and then is going to be a
(08:43):
third child.
So it's, it's fascinating to, tokind of watch their
personalities unfold.
If your three kids today had todescribe your parenting style in
one word, um, do you hate andyou can you can ditch this
question i made me laughthinking about different
SPEAKER_00 (09:04):
what do you think my three kids would describe my
parenting style as grandma lawof my three kids
SPEAKER_01 (09:12):
i don't know let's we can throw it out i just like
made me laugh um Anything thatyou would like to leave people
with, Sammy, as you transitionback in this messy middle season
of your life?
(09:33):
I just didn't want, yourbirthday was last week.
I didn't want to, like peoplehave heard bits and pieces.
If you listen to Mossimo'sepisode, you heard a little bit
about the story.
But I just wanted to take ourlisteners along.
I
SPEAKER_00 (09:47):
want to share a story.
And there's a couple of things.
I had several moments duringmaternity leave that I...
wanted to document the momentand document the feelings.
It's less about what happened,but it was how do I feel in this
(10:08):
exact moment?
And so I probably have likethree to six different videos of
just me on my own describingwhat I am feeling in this exact
moment.
And not terribly sure with thepurpose, like, am I going to do
something with this?
Am I not?
But I felt like I wanted to atthe time.
So I did it.
(10:29):
And I also think it'sinteresting because if I was to
share these videos with youguys, you would see that some of
them, like the first one is sadand hard.
The middle one is like reallyhopeful and uplifting.
Then there's another one that'slike really sad, much sadder and
much harder.
And then there's another onethat's kind of middle feeling
that it's not, I was sad andthen I was less sad and then I
(10:52):
was middle hopeful and then Iwas very hopeful.
It's actually very much, nope, Iwas up and then I was down and
then I was up and then I was waydown and then I was way up and
then I was middle down.
There's one moment that my wayup moment that was right in the
middle.
We went to go get Max a haircutand needed to get her bangs
(11:15):
trimmed.
We're in a little bit of a timewhere it's like, is this, am I
allowed to do this still?
Like, is this, this, is thisactually our child that we can
go cut her hair without gettingpermission from anybody?
Ironically, I took her to acrossthe country on a vacation and I
didn't ask that question when itcame to, can I cut her bangs?
Do I have permission to do this?
(11:36):
I was curious about it.
I do legally have permission tocut her bangs if that's what's
needed, if that's what Idetermined is needed for her in
this moment.
And it had been a reallystressful day.
There had been so many differentthings and different people who
needed something from me.
And so ended up, we picked upthe boys from school.
(12:00):
We went to the haircut place.
And then actually I think wepicked up Henry from school.
We went to the haircut place.
I the manager at pigtails andcrew cuts who cut max's hair did
such an incredible job of seeingme and seeing my needs and doing
(12:23):
being so kind to my children andbeing so kind to max and
engaging with her and making ita fun experience asking what's
your older son's name and i waslike oh that's henry and she
goes henry do you want to comeover here you've gotten your
haircut here before i recognizeyou do you want to show max
where the treasure box is Andlike, oh my gosh, it's just
(12:44):
started school this week.
What grade are you in?
First grade.
Oh my gosh.
Do you just sit at like a deskor do you sit at like a table?
He's like, it's kind of like adesk table thing.
She's like, oh, that's so cool.
Do you do a lot of work on yourown or is it with other people?
And he's like, it's kind of withother people.
And just...
Having somebody see not just me,but my kids and engage with
(13:06):
them.
And then when she gave, when shecut her bangs and then she was
like, do you mind if I like doher hair a little bit and like
put this cute little braid inher hair?
And I was like, can I watch you?
Because I do know how to braid,but I don't want to braid on
somebody else.
And my husband doesn't want tobraid.
And she was like, yeah, ofcourse watch.
And then she was like, okay, nowlet me do it again.
Now, dad, mom over here.
(13:27):
You know, this is how you do it.
You move the hair like this.
And she was like, look at that.
Bang, trim, haircut, tutorial,all in one.
I, like...
I wanted to cry.
I wanted to soak it in.
I felt just this like hugeglowing orb of warmness in my
heart and soul.
(13:48):
And I was like, Chris keptasking me, he's like, are you
okay?
You're like really off.
You're like staring off thedistance.
I'm like, I feel like I havebeen mesmerized by a sunset from
this moment.
There's just this like beauty init.
And somebody just makingconversation with my kids and
meeting a need that I didn't...
Like, you didn't need to teachme how to braid hair.
(14:10):
Like, and she's like, no, comehere, come over here.
Like, let me show you.
All right.
And here's going to be your tipsand here's going to be this
thing.
And can I just show up extra foryou right now?
We don't know each other.
It doesn't matter.
SPEAKER_01 (14:19):
I
SPEAKER_00 (14:20):
don't know.
And it's something where it'slike, oh, so the haircut lady
like talked to your kids andbraided her hair.
And I was just like, it was somuch more than that.
And I, hard to describe howdeeply it impacted me.
And I'm sure that there couldhave, the same thing could have
happened on a different day whenI wasn't in such a low, and it
(14:41):
would have been like, yeah,cool, we got a haircut and we're
done.
But at that exact moment, Ireally needed...
Exactly how she showed up inexactly that same way.
And even Chris was like, youknow, she's been that way
before.
She's cut Peter's hair beforeand that's kind of her MO.
And I'm like, no, I was nothere.
I've never met this woman whenthat haircut happened.
(15:09):
Oh, wow.
It matters.
It matters.
And you have no idea what peopleare bringing in with them.
You have no idea how much theyhave been beaten up on or not
beaten up on or if this is goingto be the thing that says, I can
(15:31):
make it through this weekbecause somebody was kind to me
in this moment.
UNKNOWN (15:38):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (15:38):
I can make it through this week.
You just never know what thatmoment's going to be.
And so go be that for somebodywith whatever capacity you have.
Because we're all hurting and weall have hard things and
everything sucks andeverything's beautiful.
And I don't know, find thatbeauty in that, that moment.
(15:59):
And if you can't be that forsomebody else, seek that out.
Seek that like, I can't evendescribe this warmth.
Like warmth is the I love it.
I don't think that answered anyquestion that you had, but it
(16:19):
was a moment that I experiencedthat has stuck with me
significantly.
I left them a great Googlereview.
I don't even like, how do Irepay this?
How do I repay somebody fordoing their job in such a way
that made me feel so touched?
Pay it forward.
Yeah.
That's how you pay.
You don't pay it back.
You pay it forward.
I do for one, as Sharon McMahonoften says, do for one what you
(16:44):
wish you could do for everybody.
So even if you can't do it forevery single person that you
interact with, do it for oneperson.
Find one person you can be therefor.
So I'm back from maternityleave.
And here I am.
And I'm excited to get jumpedinto this last quarter of the
year.
I am hopeful that, you know, newkiddos and toddlers, they are, I
(17:07):
don't know if you knew this, butThey don't sleep terribly well
all the time and they kind ofare demanding.
And so there's just, there's awhole other human being to keep
alive.
We're going to do the best wecan.
So that's that.
I'm here.
SPEAKER_01 (17:22):
And we're going to put some links to
TEDxFayetteville.com, right?
.com.org.
.org.
Oh,.org.
TEDxFayetteville.
SPEAKER_00 (17:30):
Both of them will actually get you to the same
place.
I can tell you that long storyif you want to know.
TEDxFayetteville.org.
If you have...
A tough season.
And I will say, I'm going to addin a PS, the communication
skills that I have been buildingover the past several years
extremely served me during thisperiod with multiple parties,
(17:53):
with conflicting goals and bigfeelings and all of that.
And I, without sounding toobraggy, I don't know a lot about
the people who would have beenable to handle the types of
conversations that I washandling on an everyday basis at
the level that I feel like Ihandled.
handled them I'm very proud ofhow that went during all of this
time and so if you are in thatlike this is an impossible
(18:17):
situation and I just don't evenknow how to make people happy or
or what I'm supposed to do withthat help let me help you help
me help you all the things Iwould be delighted to have those
conversations about what can yoube doing now intentionally so
that you have built up theskills and the tools that you
need that if or when that hardmoment comes that you're like I
(18:39):
don't even know what to say howto navigate these things you
actually do know what to say youdon't have to feel that way
again I'd be delighted to have aconversation about coaching you
over those things because I havea lot of lived experience in
those types of things so that'sright in the show notes
SPEAKER_01 (18:57):
if you would like Sammy to be your coach then
check out the links in the codein the show notes and until next
time we hope you all go befreaking awesome
here at be freaking awesome we believe that life is
too short to be anything lessthan extraordinary join us as we
explore what it means to liveauthentically grow continuously
and have a blast while doing itlet's get started so
SPEAKER_01 (00:21):
Welcome everyone to today's episode of Be Freaking
Awesome.
I'm Angela Belford, one of yourhosts, and I am rejoined by
Sammy Kennison.
After some time off, you didsneak in one episode there while
you were wandering into this newseason of Mom of Three Children.
(00:42):
So Sammy, tell us a little bitabout that.
SPEAKER_00 (00:45):
Yeah, so I recently became a mom of three children.
been wanting to adopt for areally, really long time,
actually.
And the story is kind of longand a little bit magical, but
ended up that in July, end ofJuly, we got to bring home our
(01:06):
sweet little girl.
And she is 18 months now.
We had about six weeks with her.
And then the guardianship wasfinalized.
And we are currently on the pathtowards being able to adopt her.
So
SPEAKER_01 (01:21):
That's where we're at right now.
SPEAKER_00 (01:51):
From when we knew that we were going to get to be
bringing her home to when webrought her home and even like
settling out what work's goingto look like while I'm out.
What is our life going to looklike?
How are we managing all of thepieces and all of the things?
It took a lot of logistics.
And I think that my previousmaternity leaves have been
(02:13):
significantly more restful and amore sleep when the baby sleeps
and take care of you and do allthose things.
And I feel like this has justbeen a lot of work.
And that's not necessarily tosay bad work.
It has been attachment andbonding and relationships with
birth family and navigating ourother two children, getting a
(02:36):
relationship with her as well.
While also because I didn'tnecessarily have tons of prep
time, it's not exactly likeeverything at work was ready for
me to just be gone for anextended period of time.
So there still was just enoughwork to feel like I still had to
do work while I was on maternityleave but not quite enough work
to actually have been like ohwell it's not that big of a deal
(02:57):
that Sammy's gone and a lot ofdifferent pieces of it so
overall hard and this has beensomething that we have been
working towards for I meanfrankly years and so it's just
like it's like cool now you getto have this hard as opposed to
the waiting hard physicallychallenging and demanding
SPEAKER_01 (03:20):
yeah because you had made some decisions Yeah, I am
the license
SPEAKER_00 (03:33):
holder for TEDx Fayetteville.
I have helped put on three orfour different events all prior
to COVID.
And we decided this year, thisis the year that we're going to
bring it back.
And we're going to make ithappen.
And so in April, we actuallywere pretty sure that we would
not get to be participating inadoption in this way.
At that point in time,everything was pointing towards
(03:56):
this path being closed.
And we were like, all right,well, we can't keep our lives on
hold for forever just waiting.
Let's go ahead and pursue andset up TEDxFaithville.
It's going to happen on October4th of 2025.
Let's start making all of thosethings moving.
And then come end of May,beginning of June, the story
(04:17):
started to change a little bit.
And it wasn't until July 1stthat it was like, yep, this is
going to happen.
This is what it's going to bemoving forward with.
And it was like, cool.
I'm glad we already started thisother train of TEDx Fayetteville
right in the middle of all ofthis.
So much fun.
It's exactly what I, it's how Iwould have done it all along.
Not at all.
(04:38):
Not in the slightest.
So
SPEAKER_01 (04:40):
yeah.
And the, even the TEDxFayetteville is a little bit of
a waiting situation, right?
Because these were originallyspeakers chosen in 2020.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (04:51):
I don't know it's waiting quite as much because a
lot of our story with theadoption stuff it's like things
that are out of our hands likewe're waiting on other people
whereas with TEDx Fayettevilleit's like so Sammy when are you
ready to get back in the saddleto make an event happen so other
people have been waiting andother people have had things out
of their control but it's verymuch my control which is It's
(05:14):
frankly hard not to feel likethe guilt of that and the weight
of other people's waiting whiletrying to do what's best for us.
And so even now where then it'slike, well, crap, this is
definitely not what's best forus.
it's fine.
We're going to make it work andwe're going to do the best that
we can with what we've got goingon.
SPEAKER_01 (05:33):
Back to parenting.
What wisdom from parenting yourfirst two are you using and
which one are you having tothrow out this time?
SPEAKER_00 (05:42):
I have no idea.
I don't know.
Um, I'm in definitely insurvival mode right now of like,
I'm throwing all the entire bowlof spaghetti at the wall and I
don't, I don't like whateverworks, works, whatever it
doesn't work, doesn't work.
Um, I think a different questionthan this, sorry to
circumnavigate your question.
(06:02):
I saw an Instagram reel earlierthis year that was commenting on
parents of three kids are wildand they are willing to cancel
on a moment's notice and show upon a moment's notice and they
don't care if food's been on thefloor and they don't care if
(06:24):
like all of these big thingsthat parents of two Two kids are
actually just parents of one kidtrying to make the rules of one
kid work for two kids.
And so you're really stressed.
But parents of three kids,you're like, the rules don't
matter.
Like the rules are out thewindow and we're doing whatever
we got to do to make thishappen.
And I wish I, I've tried reallyhard to go back and find this,
(06:47):
this particular video because itreally has stuck with me that
I'm like, oh, I don't have to dotwo parent things anymore.
I am a third, I'm a parent ofthree kids.
You know what that means?
That means that I am allowed tocancel at a moment's notice.
I've got three kids.
It's too much.
Sorry.
I'm allowed to say, hey, Ithought it was going to be too
much, but now I'm going to behere.
Hope you don't mind me and mythree kids and the chaotic
(07:08):
tornado that that might be.
So it's interesting.
I don't know that I have like,here's the specific things that
we are throwing out the window.
It's more of just like, no,we're doing whatever we have to
do.
And I don't really care.
Like, yeah, there are thingsthat with my first two, we were
so crazy strict on zeroco-sleeping no matter what
whatsoever.
(07:29):
I'm now in a spot where I've gota kid who co-slept her entire
life up until she lived with us.
I'm going to transition that.
I'm not necessarily, I don'thave to go cold turkey.
I can give her space and usspace.
I wouldn't have done that withour first two.
We were like, it doesn't matterhow loud you cry, get in your
own bed.
Now I'm like, we're allexhausted.
And if you can continue to cry,then you're going to wake up
(07:51):
everybody and it's going to be aworst day tomorrow.
So you know what?
We're going to do what we got todo.
Okay.
Do what you got to do.
Turn that.
SPEAKER_01 (07:59):
That's interesting, because I've never heard it said
that when you have two children,you're just trying to make all
the rules of one child fit.
Because I joke all the time thatSammy is a firstborn.
Chris, she's married to Chris,who's a firstborn.
And they had Henry, who's afirstborn.
And then there's Peter.
And it's probably why Peter andI get along so well is because
(08:20):
it just cracked.
I mean, I'm a firstborn only,you know, but it makes me laugh
because he just like was thisfly in the little firstborn
ointment that is your family.
Um, and then now kind oftechnically Max is going to have
this, she was a firstborn for 18months and then is going to be a
(08:43):
third child.
So it's, it's fascinating to, tokind of watch their
personalities unfold.
If your three kids today had todescribe your parenting style in
one word, um, do you hate andyou can you can ditch this
question i made me laughthinking about different
SPEAKER_00 (09:04):
what do you think my three kids would describe my
parenting style as grandma lawof my three kids
SPEAKER_01 (09:12):
i don't know let's we can throw it out i just like
made me laugh um Anything thatyou would like to leave people
with, Sammy, as you transitionback in this messy middle season
of your life?
(09:33):
I just didn't want, yourbirthday was last week.
I didn't want to, like peoplehave heard bits and pieces.
If you listen to Mossimo'sepisode, you heard a little bit
about the story.
But I just wanted to take ourlisteners along.
I
SPEAKER_00 (09:47):
want to share a story.
And there's a couple of things.
I had several moments duringmaternity leave that I...
wanted to document the momentand document the feelings.
It's less about what happened,but it was how do I feel in this
(10:08):
exact moment?
And so I probably have likethree to six different videos of
just me on my own describingwhat I am feeling in this exact
moment.
And not terribly sure with thepurpose, like, am I going to do
something with this?
Am I not?
But I felt like I wanted to atthe time.
So I did it.
(10:29):
And I also think it'sinteresting because if I was to
share these videos with youguys, you would see that some of
them, like the first one is sadand hard.
The middle one is like reallyhopeful and uplifting.
Then there's another one that'slike really sad, much sadder and
much harder.
And then there's another onethat's kind of middle feeling
that it's not, I was sad andthen I was less sad and then I
(10:52):
was middle hopeful and then Iwas very hopeful.
It's actually very much, nope, Iwas up and then I was down and
then I was up and then I was waydown and then I was way up and
then I was middle down.
There's one moment that my wayup moment that was right in the
middle.
We went to go get Max a haircutand needed to get her bangs
(11:15):
trimmed.
We're in a little bit of a timewhere it's like, is this, am I
allowed to do this still?
Like, is this, this, is thisactually our child that we can
go cut her hair without gettingpermission from anybody?
Ironically, I took her to acrossthe country on a vacation and I
didn't ask that question when itcame to, can I cut her bangs?
Do I have permission to do this?
(11:36):
I was curious about it.
I do legally have permission tocut her bangs if that's what's
needed, if that's what Idetermined is needed for her in
this moment.
And it had been a reallystressful day.
There had been so many differentthings and different people who
needed something from me.
And so ended up, we picked upthe boys from school.
(12:00):
We went to the haircut place.
And then actually I think wepicked up Henry from school.
We went to the haircut place.
I the manager at pigtails andcrew cuts who cut max's hair did
such an incredible job of seeingme and seeing my needs and doing
(12:23):
being so kind to my children andbeing so kind to max and
engaging with her and making ita fun experience asking what's
your older son's name and i waslike oh that's henry and she
goes henry do you want to comeover here you've gotten your
haircut here before i recognizeyou do you want to show max
where the treasure box is Andlike, oh my gosh, it's just
(12:44):
started school this week.
What grade are you in?
First grade.
Oh my gosh.
Do you just sit at like a deskor do you sit at like a table?
He's like, it's kind of like adesk table thing.
She's like, oh, that's so cool.
Do you do a lot of work on yourown or is it with other people?
And he's like, it's kind of withother people.
And just...
Having somebody see not just me,but my kids and engage with
(13:06):
them.
And then when she gave, when shecut her bangs and then she was
like, do you mind if I like doher hair a little bit and like
put this cute little braid inher hair?
And I was like, can I watch you?
Because I do know how to braid,but I don't want to braid on
somebody else.
And my husband doesn't want tobraid.
And she was like, yeah, ofcourse watch.
And then she was like, okay, nowlet me do it again.
Now, dad, mom over here.
(13:27):
You know, this is how you do it.
You move the hair like this.
And she was like, look at that.
Bang, trim, haircut, tutorial,all in one.
I, like...
I wanted to cry.
I wanted to soak it in.
I felt just this like hugeglowing orb of warmness in my
heart and soul.
(13:48):
And I was like, Chris keptasking me, he's like, are you
okay?
You're like really off.
You're like staring off thedistance.
I'm like, I feel like I havebeen mesmerized by a sunset from
this moment.
There's just this like beauty init.
And somebody just makingconversation with my kids and
meeting a need that I didn't...
Like, you didn't need to teachme how to braid hair.
(14:10):
Like, and she's like, no, comehere, come over here.
Like, let me show you.
All right.
And here's going to be your tipsand here's going to be this
thing.
And can I just show up extra foryou right now?
We don't know each other.
It doesn't matter.
SPEAKER_01 (14:19):
I
SPEAKER_00 (14:20):
don't know.
And it's something where it'slike, oh, so the haircut lady
like talked to your kids andbraided her hair.
And I was just like, it was somuch more than that.
And I, hard to describe howdeeply it impacted me.
And I'm sure that there couldhave, the same thing could have
happened on a different day whenI wasn't in such a low, and it
(14:41):
would have been like, yeah,cool, we got a haircut and we're
done.
But at that exact moment, Ireally needed...
Exactly how she showed up inexactly that same way.
And even Chris was like, youknow, she's been that way
before.
She's cut Peter's hair beforeand that's kind of her MO.
And I'm like, no, I was nothere.
I've never met this woman whenthat haircut happened.
(15:09):
Oh, wow.
It matters.
It matters.
And you have no idea what peopleare bringing in with them.
You have no idea how much theyhave been beaten up on or not
beaten up on or if this is goingto be the thing that says, I can
(15:31):
make it through this weekbecause somebody was kind to me
in this moment.
UNKNOWN (15:38):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (15:38):
I can make it through this week.
You just never know what thatmoment's going to be.
And so go be that for somebodywith whatever capacity you have.
Because we're all hurting and weall have hard things and
everything sucks andeverything's beautiful.
And I don't know, find thatbeauty in that, that moment.
(15:59):
And if you can't be that forsomebody else, seek that out.
Seek that like, I can't evendescribe this warmth.
Like warmth is the I love it.
I don't think that answered anyquestion that you had, but it
(16:19):
was a moment that I experiencedthat has stuck with me
significantly.
I left them a great Googlereview.
I don't even like, how do Irepay this?
How do I repay somebody fordoing their job in such a way
that made me feel so touched?
Pay it forward.
Yeah.
That's how you pay.
You don't pay it back.
You pay it forward.
I do for one, as Sharon McMahonoften says, do for one what you
(16:44):
wish you could do for everybody.
So even if you can't do it forevery single person that you
interact with, do it for oneperson.
Find one person you can be therefor.
So I'm back from maternityleave.
And here I am.
And I'm excited to get jumpedinto this last quarter of the
year.
I am hopeful that, you know, newkiddos and toddlers, they are, I
(17:07):
don't know if you knew this, butThey don't sleep terribly well
all the time and they kind ofare demanding.
And so there's just, there's awhole other human being to keep
alive.
We're going to do the best wecan.
So that's that.
I'm here.
SPEAKER_01 (17:22):
And we're going to put some links to
TEDxFayetteville.com, right?
.com.org.
.org.
Oh,.org.
TEDxFayetteville.
SPEAKER_00 (17:30):
Both of them will actually get you to the same
place.
I can tell you that long storyif you want to know.
TEDxFayetteville.org.
If you have...
A tough season.
And I will say, I'm going to addin a PS, the communication
skills that I have been buildingover the past several years
extremely served me during thisperiod with multiple parties,
(17:53):
with conflicting goals and bigfeelings and all of that.
And I, without sounding toobraggy, I don't know a lot about
the people who would have beenable to handle the types of
conversations that I washandling on an everyday basis at
the level that I feel like Ihandled.
handled them I'm very proud ofhow that went during all of this
time and so if you are in thatlike this is an impossible
(18:17):
situation and I just don't evenknow how to make people happy or
or what I'm supposed to do withthat help let me help you help
me help you all the things Iwould be delighted to have those
conversations about what can yoube doing now intentionally so
that you have built up theskills and the tools that you
need that if or when that hardmoment comes that you're like I
(18:39):
don't even know what to say howto navigate these things you
actually do know what to say youdon't have to feel that way
again I'd be delighted to have aconversation about coaching you
over those things because I havea lot of lived experience in
those types of things so that'sright in the show notes
SPEAKER_01 (18:57):
if you would like Sammy to be your coach then
check out the links in the codein the show notes and until next
time we hope you all go befreaking awesome
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