Deep Dive: Lauren Bush Lauren of FEED on Cultivating Gratitude and Thoughtfulness

You're listening to good inside with Dr. Becky. I have an exciting guest on today, and we're talking about a really important topic. So tune in right after a word from our sponsor. Hi, I'm Dr. Becky, and this is Good Inside. I'm a clinical psychologist and mom of three on a mission to rethink the way we raise our children. I love translating deep thoughts about parenting into practical, actionable strategies that you can use in your home right away. One of my core beliefs is that we are all doing the best we can with the resources we have available to us in that moment. So even as we struggle and even as we are having a hard time on the outside, we remain Good Inside. In today's deep dive, I talk with Lauren Bush. Lauren, the founder of Feed and a mom of three. In 2007, Lauren founded Feed, a social action business that provides meals for children in need. In this episode, Lauren and I discuss a new framework for how to help our kids develop into compassionate and active citizens in the world. One thing I want to discuss before we go further, I want to own the privilege I have in discussing topics like poverty and hunger. Lauren and I talk about how to raise awareness, perspective, and gratitude, which inherently means that we're not experiencing the very life stresses we are discussing. With that in mind, let's jump into this conversation. Hi, Lauren. So happy to have you here. Tell me a little bit about you and kind of what's bringing you here today.

Thank you so much for having me. I'm a follower of you on Instagram and I get lots of parenting nuggets there, so I really appreciate that. My name is Lauren. I am the founder of Feed. Feed has been around for, gosh, almost 15 years. We are a social business with the mission to create good products that help feed the world. So was inspired, actually, when I was even a student in college and traveled the world with the World Food Program, and through that was exposed to the realities of poverty and hunger that one in eight people globally face every day not knowing where their next meal is coming from. And specifically was very inspired by the plight of childhood hunger. So in, you know, traveling and seeing kids just because of where they're born, are born into a life of poverty and hunger and came away from those experiences and trips wanting to do more and love design and fashion and sort of was able to fuse those things together to create Feed. So that is my little backstory, but I'm also my side hustle as a parent, a mom of three.

How's that working out for you?

That Side hustle, it's a juggle, as I'm sure you know, three little boys, so ages almost six, three and a half and six months. So things are very busy. I'm thankfully not working from home today, so we can have a quiet chat, which isn't always possible, but life is full and very good right now.

So I guess one of the things on my mind as we talk is kind of your business side. You do a lot around giving back and noticing the world around you and things that other people don't have and kind of basic needs and speaking to those. And then you said your side hustle, right, is you're a mom of three where it's not a concern. Right. Where your kids are getting their next meal. And so tell me a little bit, I'm just curious like how that all comes together for you or how that even impacts your day to day with your kids and what, what you're thinking about.

You know, I would say even before having kids, I, you know, was very hard to wrap my head around the fact of what I was seeing in visiting with our giving partners on the ground, you know, abroad as well as here in the U.S. you know, literally lacking something as basic a human need as, as food and nutrition. I think it's about 13 million kids here in America are food insecure and live in food insecure houses. So all that to say now, having kids? Yeah, I think I, you know, struggle with and really want for them to live in a way that is, you know, being good citizens and being conscious and being generous and being empathetic. And I would say we've just, you know, started as parents, especially with our oldest one, you know, trying to expose him to certain realities and talk to him a bit more. Um, but anyway, it's one reason I'm very excited to talk to you today because I don't think I have all the answers at all. And I think we can do a lot more because I want them to know, you know, not in a guilty way, but just how lucky they have it to, to be able to eat good, healthy food every day and that, that isn't, you know, a given for so many kids.

Yeah. And I, I find this really kind of tricky too. And the line between appreciation and noticing and, and having a sense of the world around you and guilt or shame for having things someone else might not have is tricky with kids. Right. And I think if you're raising kids, let's take this as an example, in a home where you don't have to worry about where your next meal is coming from. So it's not a food insecure home. How do we teach our young kids that this is so common while still allowing them to feel okay about the fact that they do have a wide range of options? Because I know one of the things I think about is I don't think guilt and shame are great motivators for like any positive behavior. Right. For anything. Um, but sometimes it feels like the quickest route. I know, me, myself, I've been in plenty of situations with my kids where I've just gone off like, do you know how lucky you are? And there are kids who do this and this percentage and that percentage. And it's. It doesn't really lead to that much positive change. Except for my kids shut down and, you know, I don't know, start crying or. And I feel like a bad mom. Right. So nobody doesn't seem. Nobody wins. But what. What can we do? And maybe this is something we could really think through together. What can we do? Probably slowly. Right. Because no one has an appreciation of the world overnight. And how can we respond to the moments where our kids appear to be ungrateful or unaware of the world around them? How can we respond to those moments in a way that actually speaks to our goals of having kids who are kind of global citizens rather than just layers on kind of words like spoiled or unappreciative.

100%. I really struggle with that because I do think it's that knee jerk reaction at times as a parent to be like, don't, you know, kids, don't. You don't have food. Eat your food.

Right.

I grew up personally with some of that shame and guilt at times from my parents. Yeah. And it doesn't ever lead to you feeling good about yourself or taking action. Like, I don't think it's a positive way to get kids involved. How do you a educate in a way that's like, developmentally something they can wrap their head around and not a super scary, abstract way? And then. Then how do you even, you know, push that a step forward to then empower kids to do something and feel that they can do something, you know, even if they are little people. I love that.

So. And I think it even gives us a little bit of a framework for our talk. How do we expose kids? Because I always think the first step is exposure. Exposure has to happen before kind of activation. Before I want to do something, you have to become aware. And maybe for you it happened more quickly. But for our kids, you know, I think they need time to be exposed and also to process their feelings around that. So I think that that's really helpful. Let's think about how to expose kids to these kind of realities of the world. And I'd, I guess I would say I'd ask everyone who's listening here, like, I really think it's like a two things are true moment that we want to help our kids feel okay with the fact that they might have things that other kids don't. And we want them to be able to notice the world around them and hold those two things side by side. Right? That the fact that someone else doesn't have something doesn't mean you're a bad person. It doesn't mean, right, that you have to change, right what you have. And on the other side, I can have things and notice that this is not something that other people take for granted. And just noticing that helps me really broaden my vision. And I'm even curious how you introduce your kids to feed. How do you just kind of expose them to these realities?

For me and feed. I would say my 3 year old and I mean he sees mommy's bag every day and that says feed. And we talk about that a little bit. But with my five, almost six year old, we were able to take him. I actually started, I'm involved with the Food bank for New York City. And so with that I started a Families for New York City basically because of the conversation we're having. And so many friends kind of came to me, you know, have kids, you know, similar ages, my, my oldest son and said, gosh, I want to get them active or being involved in giving back somehow. How do we do that? And so I went to the food bank and said, gosh, this is like a ready audience of, of you know, food bank supporters who want to help out and also want to educate their kids and expose their kids to realities that are not their own. So put together a group called Families for Food bank. And, and this was again, Covid kind of got, got in the way of some of this. But we were volunteering together almost every month in different sites around New York City with our kids. I definitely plan to continue that. And as my kids get old enough to, to partake more, I feel so lucky. My parents did that with me. Growing up was maybe four times a year. It wasn't a constant thing, but it was enough to really open my eyes. And we went to shelters for homeless and abused women. We went to a hospital for underserved families. Families we were at, you know, Soup kitchens and food banks, like giving out Thanksgiving Day meals. And that just was so impactful. So I do. I mean, I think there's nothing better than when kids again, are of a certain age. A lot of charities and nonprofits don't actually let kids below a certain age come because they're more of a liability than they are a help. But as soon as kids can be of an age to do that, just for me personally, being one of those kids, it just was so eye opening and so meaningful. And some of that was like giving out gifts at Christmas, which really makes you think differently about than the gifts that you're about to receive.

I think there's so many things you're saying that are so important, and I want to kind of extend them. I feel like there's some lessons here, right, where first we learn through experience. We don't really learn through lectures, we don't really learn from hearsay. We learn by doing. Because when we do something, our body registers an emotional experience. And that emotional experience becomes encoded in how you think about food. If you're at a food bank, how can you think about gifts? If you're picking out one gift to give a child and you're used to receiving many that experience and the emotions you have around that are now really next to your gift experience in your body or next to your food experience. So if we want kids to kind of really be thoughtful and have a wider perspective, we have to give them those experiences. And so maybe someone listening to this is thinking, I don't know if I have a food bank right there. But it could be a different experience, right? It could be, where can my child actually be exposed to reality that's different than the reality they're living in now? I think with that comes a different responsibility that I think is hard for us sometimes as parents is, then how do I prepare my child for this different experience? Because if you take your child to a food bank and you haven't talked to them about it before and they don't know what's going on, it could be very overwhelming. Not because they're an ungrateful child, but because it's just so different from what their experience has been. And I think if all of us are honest with ourselves, if you ever go into an experience that's totally different from what you have been accustomed to, your body feels fearful because it's new. And so we want to really prepare our kids for that. Before we expose our kids to experience, we can actually start by exposing them just to different ideas. Right. Because I think we want to lead with the answer sometimes with our kids. Do you know that some kids don't have food? That's awful. That doesn't lead to our kid actually creating a circuit of thoughtfulness. For our kids to be thoughtful, we have to allow their thought process to happen. So I often feel with my kids that posing questions is the best way to help them generate thoughtfulness because they actually become more thoughtful. So instead of saying, some kids don't have breakfast, asking your kid a question like, what would that be like? Or, look, right now there's nothing on the table. What would it be like to come to the table if you were living in a house that didn't always have something? Right. Or I can picture, you know, going to the grocery store with my kids. Right. And, you know, usually I don't think that much. If they say, hey, can we get this food? Or can we get this for the house? It's usually, yeah, we could do that. Right? But especially if you have a kid who has, let's say, some understanding of math. Let's say we only had $10 to spend. Let's go around the store. Let's. Oh, wow, that item is 8.99. Oh, I have $1.01 left. Oh, my goodness. Wow. Hm. Right. And again, we're generating an experience inside of our kid that could never happen. If I just said, some kids only can spend $10 at a store.

Oh, that's such an unlock. That is brilliant. 100%. Yeah. Let them do the questioning and the thinking and the pondering. I love that. I think as a parent, you do feel the responsibility to give answers, but. But in fact, that sort of shuts down their own thought process and grappling with certain things.

And I really believe that it's the asking of questions that generates action rather than the assumption of an answer. Right. And if we want our kids to be agents of change, then we wanna create situations for them where they start asking questions. And if we lead with just some truth or some lecture. I think we all remember some lecture we were at in college. I don't know, you tune out. You're like, I don't know, someone else will give me the notes. Right. But if you're in a small conversation and someone wonders with you, they really wonder. You wonder yourself. And I think that's what really we want to be doing with our kids.

So beautifully said. So it was during COVID and yeah, our kids are seeing a man sleeping on. On the sidewalk and said, is that. Is that person Dead. You know, it's a jarring experience for any person of any age to see a human in that type of condition. So we, you know, tried to explain, you know, no, he's not dead, he's just sleeping. Like, some people don't have homes, so sometimes they have to take a nap or a little rest. There's no proper way to just to explain that. But fast forward then, I don't know, maybe a week or so later, he and I were walking and we saw again another man sleeping on the sidewalk midday. And he stopped and the guy was actually sort of awake. And he said, hey, do you have a home? Like, he was trying to question this guy about, you know, what his situation was, which on one hand I was, you know, to the point of asking questions and being curious. I was like, of course you're curious. Like, this is such an anomaly. And you're just, you know, again from the last. He's just wrapping his head around what it was. And I, you know, kind of, I would say, hustled him along and tried to do my best to just say, okay, we gotta go. I think he's trying to rest. So on one hand, I guess I appreciated the curiosity and the inquisitiveness. And he is an outgoing guy, so I get how he was like, let me just go ask this person about his situation. But I don't know, I felt again, a lack of answers in that moment. And I just didn't know what to do. What would you have done and, or suggested in that moment?

Right. So what would I have done? I don't know. But I can tell you what I would have liked to have done. Right. Because I don't always use my own guidance either when the time comes. So I think it's amazing, like you said that your son's asking questions, right. Because we were talking before about exposure. Right? Right. You have to be aware of things to be curious about them. And I think actually so often we shut down Kids Awareness through our own discomfort. Don't say things like that. Don't ask. Right. Or, oh, you're not old enough. Right. And then what ends up happening for kids is like, oh, I did something wrong. Maybe I don't notice things correctly. Maybe my perception actually was incorrect because clearly I had a big reaction from my parent. We don't wanna shut down Kids Awareness. And when awareness comes to the surface in the form of curiosity, we have to protect that. We really have to protect that. So I think off the bat, one of my favorite lines to say to my Kids is. That is such a good question. You are really trying to figure out what's going on in the world around you, right? And even I can imagine, let's say your child says this, do you have a home? Excuse me? Do you have a home? Right, whatever. And you're thinking, oh, this is a complicated situation. I can imagine saying to my child, that's a really good question. And here's where I think we can double down on their awareness and exposure. You saw someone sleeping outside, you know, you don't sleep outside and you're trying to figure out what's going on. That's. I would even go further. That's really awesome that you notice different things around you and you're asking questions. And in our family it is always safe to ask us questions. And we actually love when you ask questions, right? Because we really want, if we want our kids, when they're younger, to learn kind of the real skills that help them become global citizens who care. I really believe all those skills come from awareness and curiosity and noticing. And so we have to be willing to enter into, into that state of curiosity with them or else not only does the curiosity get shut down, the awareness gets shut down. And then I think as a next step, I think the question, what was it like for you? When is a question we want to ask our kids way before they can actually answer that question. So you're back home. What's it like for you to kind of right now be in your bed knowing an hour before we saw someone sleeping who wasn't in their bed? And I hear myself saying this and I picture, I don't know, some unknown person saying, do you really think a 5 year old can answer that question? And I would say, no, I actually don't. That's actually why I'm asking it. I want to have my kids practice hearing questions and asking themselves questions before they're able to articulate an answer. Because again, I do think kind of caring about the world comes from asking really hard questions, not from having profound, really simple answers. So let's say my kid says nothing. I might just say something like, yeah, it's really just kind of tricky, right? And we'll keep talking about it. Or, huh, I don't even know if that feeling has a name. It just feels like something, right? Yeah, well, we'll keep speaking about it. And then I think when you're alone with your child, maybe even hours after, to bring those topics up, right? To, to talk about these differences, to then make that a conversation that doesn't only happen when you see something, but you're literally bringing it into the fabric of your home.

Totally. I felt really stumped in that moment. And then yet I don't want to stifle that curiosity because it is the foundations, like you said, of that awareness that then hopefully will in his life translate to real empathy and action for others.

I want to bring up something with you. I want to talk about something that I know is probably on both of our minds because we're going to the holiday season and kids and gratitude and being aware of the world around them and, you know, being aware of things that really matter. I feel like this is on family's mind a lot with holiday presents. And those moments that, you know, your kid gets them present, they're like, I don't like this. And just like all of your shame comes up as a parent. Right. And thinking about, like, what. What is going on for kids in that moment? Does it mean I have a bad kid? When they kind of say things like that and maybe even. And this is something I think about a lot. What is a precursor to gratitude? Because if we all want our kid to be able to turn to their aunt and essentially say, oh, thank you so much for thinking of me, even though, you know, oh, my God, why did they. What, they don't like that present at all? Curious to hear a story if you've had a situation like that that was like, oh, my, oh, my goodness, what have I done wrong? Moments.

Yeah. My older son's birthday is end of November. And so we go straight from his birthday into Hanukkah, into Christmas. So it's basically a month and a half of, like, gifting, gifting, gifting, and it's very damaging. And come post Christmas, it's this real, like, drop off. It's very challenging. Yeah. And it's hard, not in those moments as a parent to be like, oh, they're so ungrateful, like, they shouldn't get anything anymore. You kind of go to, like, one extreme. But, you know, I. I agree. I think it's.

I don't know.

This is an area. Again, have a lot more questions than answers because it's a definite pain point.

So come January, your son might be like, where are my presents? Like, kind of just because he just came off a month.

I've been, like, used to getting a gift every week now.

Totally. This is one of my favorite things to. To think about with kids, because if my kid looks at me and says, that's it. After they open 20 holiday presents or come January 4th. They look at me and say, wait, where. Where's my wrap gift today? And you're thinking, oh, my goodness. If that's the best they can do in that moment, and if they're a good kid inside, what. What is that? Right? Because ungrateful. We all say that. I often think we don't have unfeelings. Like, the ungrateful isn't a feeling. Like, we don't feel unsad. We. We. We have something else. But I think that's a powerful way to think about the word ungrateful. It's not really a thing. Something else is happening that's crowding out gratitude. I actually think it's a powerful image that if there's gratitude inside a kid somewhere, well, what would prevent that feeling from coming to the surface? I don't know. It would be overwhelmed by some other feeling. But the feeling that overshadows it isn't ungratitude. It's something else. And then I go further, think, well, if I know what that other feeling is, and then I think about how to help my kid regulate that feeling, then maybe there'd be room for that gratitude that's in there. Cause we're all good people inside. To surface. So here's my theory. If I told my husband I wanted a new necklace for a holiday gift, and he got me a slow cooker, okay. I can't imagine I'd be like, thank you for your thoughtfulness. Like, I don't know.

I just.

Would you say that to your husband? No. Right. Especially if you've been dropping hints. If you're like, here's kind of the necklace I want. I don't know. Like, look at, oh, I love my friend's necklace. And then he was like, I got you a slow cooker. I think I'd be like, what the heck were you thinking? Like, right? And if he looked at me and said I was being ungrateful, you know, I'd probably be like, I don't. I don't know if that's exactly what's happening. I don't know about you. I would feel very disappointed. I'd feel disappointed. I was like, oh, I thought I was gonna get one thing. And gifts are so hard. We all. We've practiced getting the gift we want so many times in our head that if you don't get it, it's such, like, an injury. And I think kids for birthdays, for holidays, they've practiced so many times. They picture the Xbox, they picture the leg, they picture the new art Set, they've imagined getting it. And then when they don't get the thing they want, or they get the small LEGO set instead of the massive LEGO set, or they get to the end of kind of. We all know what's the fun of opening gifts. It's, we watch kids open many gifts. You see, it's not even about the gift. It's just the expectation. What is it? What is it? What is it? Oh, it's that, what is it? What is it, is it? And then the end of that process. Right. Can be disappointing. Maybe you didn't get what you wanted, or maybe you just loved the excitement of not knowing and then that's over. Right. So if we don't look at that as ungrateful, I think we could think about it as my kid might feel disappointed. Disappointed that they didn't get the thing they wanted. Just like I think all of us would be disappointed if we got a slow cooker instead of a, you know, necklace, if we wanted a necklace. And they really didn't have the skills to manage that disappointment. So it became so big and any gratitude that might have been inside their body got totally crowded out. It can't even be reached. And then if we take that a step further, I think we can say, well, how can we help our kids manage disappointment? Because disappointment doesn't have to cancel out gratitude. Right. I think adults, we've learned how to have both at once. Right. You get a present from someone you don't really like and you're a little disappointed. You're like, oh, I thought this was going to be something I really wanted, you know, and yet you're able to access, oh, it's really nice that my friend thought of me. But it having disappointment doesn't make you ungrateful. Like, you can be disappointed at something you got and you can be grateful for the fact that someone thought about you. Although that is, I would think, a pretty sophisticated thing to hold. Hold at once. Like, I get that our 5 year olds like can't do that yet, but I really think the pathway to gratitude starts with the regulation of disappointment.

Totally. I mean, one of my questions was gonna be around that sort of like forcing of manners. Want that to manifest as authentic gratitude. But in fact it's like, thank you. You get like a snappy thank you and you're like, well, that doesn't sound grateful. Yeah. How to cultivate in your kids. Yeah. Authentic expressions of gratitude and is sort of saying the manners teaching rather not the way to go. Whether it's in a Gift giving scenario or just in like an exchange with a bus driver or, you know, everyday people your kids interact with, where you want them to be mindful of them and aware of them, and say thank you if they open a door, blah, blah, blah. But can that be overkill in the way we're just talking about where it actually makes kids angry and rebel against authentically expressing gratitude?

I think our kids learn so much. Again, it's another version of experience. It's through the experience of watching us, like, they really absorb so much. When we say thank you to the bus driver, when we say thank you to someone who holds a door for us, we really don't have to turn to our kids and say, see, that's what manners looks like, right? And I can say that. Cause I do that too with my kids when I'm frustrated, but just to really trust that they're absorbing from us what matters and our values. So that's one. But the other thing is when we talk about something that might happen in advance, getting a present you don't want or huh, what is it gonna be like when we get off the bus? Like, who are you gonna notice? Is there anyone, huh, that you might want to say thank you to, I wonder? And even giving our kids, in some ways a preview of what to come, it generates experience inside them. And so then when they're actually on the bus, it's almost like they've already practiced, right? We all do better when we practice something, right? So that anticipation, what is it gonna be like for you? What is it gonna be like when we wake up in January and all the birthday presents and all the Hanukkah presents and all the Christmas presents. All of them. All of them. So many presents are done. No more. Ah, that might be kind of a bummer, right? We skip that part too often. We don't acknowledge the very human feeling of disappointment. Because I think so many of us were taught early on that disappointment means you don't have gratitude. When really learning to regulate disappointment is what allows for the emergence of gratitude. But that starts by helping our kids normalize. Yeah, that stinks. To get presents for 30 days and then I don't remember the last time I got presents, like 30 days in a row. If I did on day 31, I would look at someone, I'd be like, where is my present? Like, where is it? I just got habituated to this, right? But if someone had said to me, tomorrow is gonna be the last day of a present and the next day is gonna be the first Day of no presents. That day's gonna. That's gonna be a bummer, Becky, isn't it? And I was like, yeah, that's gonna be a bummer. Like, what the heck? I might even in advance, I really mean this. I'm just thinking if I really had that, I might think in advance. Well, what else can I do for myself that's special? That morning, maybe I'll go, I don't know, you know, take a walk or maybe I'll go get my favorite bagel. That feels like a treat. Now I'm actually thinking of something to cope with the disappointment. But that only came from my advanced recognition of the fact that it's okay to have that feeling. I wonder what that would look like with your oldest. Like, how would that conversation go and what might happen?

This is extremely helpful because totally, he's the best, sweetest little guy and he just gets in this like gift cycle cyclone, if you will. So giving him a little language around that and yeah, anticipation, control, more I think is so useful. Wow.

I think we can almost zoom out as parents and every time we want to tell our kid, don't do that, or like, don't react that way, I think we can almost replace that with like, what feeling got so big that it got in my kids way of accessing their whatever it is, their gratitude, their empathy. And then when we do that, I think we activate inside us like more of a coach mentality. Oh, well, if that got so big and they're trying their best, then how can I help them with that feeling? And what we're doing is replacing the don't do X with oh, Y is happening for you. And I can help you with that. Right? But change, change takes time. And so our kids behavior is not always the best barometer for the effectiveness of our parenting interventions. And I think just remembering that allows us to kind of stay on that path.

But then how do you turn that questioning not into answer giving but into like empowering kids to feel that they can make a little change or help or you know, like have a, have an impact in some way.

What comes to mind for me, as you say, is just like those conversations that wondering that noticing and then I, I don't know, I imagine myself saying, what can we do about this? Like what we notice, this difference we notice that brings up all types of feelings. Doesn't whatever it is, doesn't feel fair. It doesn't feel right. How could this be? What could we do? What is one thing we could do today? And again, what I Expect my three year old, my four year old to say, I know, mom, we can write a letter to the congressman. No, of course not. But again, I think it's important we ask our kids the questions we want them to ask themselves. That's why we ask kids questions, because we want them to ask themselves those questions as they get older. Not. Not because we think they're gonna give us some answer. So ask that question. What can we do about it? And then I think there's a variety of things we can do. Let's say your kid says, I don't know. I would put some compassion and almost credit around that answer. Like, yeah, this is hard to think about. Do you wanna know something interesting? Nobody knows exactly what to do or else this wouldn't be a problem. So no one in the world has figured out how to solve this. So you don't know. I don't know. Okay, let's take the pressure of knowing off the table. Okay, what, what could we do? Like, okay, name something that you think is a ridiculous idea. Like even that. I say that to my kids sometimes, so let's name something. That wouldn't work at all. Okay, well, I could and I would just say something totally ridiculous just to lighten the mood, which usually adds to more brainstorming. I guess I could get on this dining room table and like jump up and down on it and sing a song and dance. Oh, wait, sorry, that's actually, I don't know what that would do at all. That wouldn't. Okay, not a great idea. Put something out there. It's not going to work. What about you? Right? And just we can add some humor and take the pressure off. Because if we're talking about generating ideas, nobody generates good ideas from a place of pressure. You generate good ideas from a place of freedom. Right. And kind of playfulness in a way. And let's say you still end the conversation and you're thinking, that didn't work. It's like, I don't know, mom, leave me alone. Use that. Okay. This stuff is tricky to think about. Let's. Let's just come back to it. Maybe I'll come back to it. We'll talk about in a couple days. No problem. Right. You don't need to force this on our kids because again, if we trust that our kids are good kids and we know these kind of skills take time to develop, then we can give ourselves a little bit more leeway to kind of trust the process with our kids, as opposed to saying, this is my one moment. It's my Sunday night conversation with my son and I have to generate, you know, an idea. And so I, I think these are kind of a lot of components, right. This kind of exposure, this asking more questions than having answers and really seeing the value of kind of having conversations with your kids where you're wondering about things together instead of lecturing about differences.

Yeah. Giving them the forum or the opportunity to kind of do that deep questioning and thinking and brainstorming.

I think that's exactly right. And you know, you've given me so much to think about and so much to look into. For everyone listening here, tell people how can they learn more about Feed? How can they learn more about opportunities to kind of involve their kids. Some of the things you mentioned, I'm sure everyone kind of again has this, oh, I want to do something about this. So help us out.

So Feed Projects.com is our website actually a little an engaging thing. We started many years ago, but I think it's really fun, especially leading into the holidays is called Feed Supper. So essentially making your supper, this your dinner, whether it's, yeah, friends, family, etc. A little mini fundraiser, but also awareness raiser about the issues of hunger. And it's making those more intimate moments, moments to reflect and actually do something about it. So you can, you know, raise, ask everyone to give a dollar who's going, you know, if it's your kid, maybe they've saved a dollar from their allowance or doing chores. It doesn't have to be a grandiose big thing, but they'll know, you know, literally just giving that dollar will give 10 meals in America, which is hard to believe. So a little goes a long, long way. So I think it's a really neat way to engage people of all ages, but especially kids who can really feel like, wow, yeah, the dollar I saved is doing that. So Feed Supper, that's a link on our website. I think in the bottom footer I would encourage, you know, families to do with, with, with themselves for the holidays. And then, yeah, if you live in the New York area and want to volunteer, get involved with the Food bank for New York City or anywhere.

Thank you for sharing that, Lauren. I feel like you and I have a million more things to talk about. Thank you so much for coming on. Thank you, you know, for such an important kind of topic. Thank you for all the work you do at Feed. It's so amazing and look forward to many more conversations with you.

Same. I learned so much. Thank you.

I'm so glad I had the chance to have this conversation with Lauren. It was such an important one during this time of the year and always Here are three things I'll be thinking about following this one. We cannot learn gratitude from shame. It's so easy to come down hard on our kids when they seem to not appreciate the things they have. Remember that shame is a sticky emotion. It actually stagnates all the all of us. So take a deep breath. Remember that your kid is a good kid who's having a hard time, and think about how to teach them the lesson you actually want to teach them in a way they can actually take in. 2. Let's ask more questions than provide answers. We want our kids to develop thoughtfulness, which comes from curiosity and not knowing. So let's pose questions, wonder together, and give ourselves permission to not tie things up with a bow. 3. There's no such feeling as ungrateful. The more we normalize disappointment, the more we can help kids prepare to feel it. And as they develop coping skills to manage the disappointment of, say, not getting the gift they want, they they will be more likely to have gratitude emerge because they're not so dysregulated and overtaken by their disappointment. Thanks for listening to Good Inside. There are so many more strategies and tips I want to share with you. Head to goodinside.com and sign up for Good Insider, my free weekly email with scripts and strategies delivered right to your inbox and follow me on Instagram and Facebook. Dr. Beckyoodinside for a daily dose of parenting and self care ideas. Good inside with Dr. Becky is produced by Beth Rowe and Marie Cecile Anderson, an executive produced by Erica Belsky and me, Dr. Becky if you enjoyed this episode, please take a moment to rate and review it or share this episode with a friend, friend or family member as a way to start an important conversation. Let's end by placing our hands on our hearts and reminding ourselves. Even as I struggle and even as I have a hard time on the outside, I remain good inside.