004: Healthy Relationships With Your Teens – Deborah Owen

00:00 Beau Henderson: You’re in the one place committed to giving you the tools, the resources, and the experts to live your definition of a healthy, wealthy, fulfilled life on purpose, what I call your definition of a rich life. And one of the things I’ve found fascinating over the years that comes up over and over again, is we go to school and we learn things like literature, math, science, social studies, things that are important, but wouldn’t it be nice if in the course of school to actually navigate life. We had some classes like how to handle money, how to stay married, and something we want to cover today, how to raise healthy, happy kids. So I’m really excited, our guest today, Deborah Owen, from youcanraisegreatkids.com, she’s a coach, speaker, best-selling author, national board-certified teacher, and probably most credible, she’s raised three teenagers of her own, and now is on a mission to help kids and families connect or reconnect with what she calls ‘calm compassion’. Welcome Deborah to The RichLife Show.

01:07 Deborah Owen: Hey Beau, it’s great to be here. Thanks so much for having me.

01:10 Beau Henderson: So, in the intro, I was kind of lightheartedly saying it’d be nice if we could learn some of those things in school, but not really. A happy home, and having some kind of… These kids don’t come out necessarily with an instruction manual.

01:25 Deborah Owens: [chuckle] They don’t come out with an instruction manual, that is exactly right. And one of the things we don’t learn very well in school is anything about relationships, you’re right.

01:36 Beau Henderson: So what is something that we can do, or some practical tips on raising kids in a successful way, and maybe even a less stressful way?

01:46 Deborah Owens: Yeah. The most important thing for parents to do, the number one thing that I tell parents, is to spend time with your kids, and this is how you connect, this is how you reconnect, and there are a couple of things about spending time with your kids that…

It’s more than just being in the same room with them while they’re doing something else, what it is, is actually doing something that your kid wants to do, and giving them an opportunity to teach you something maybe that you don’t know. Maybe it’s, they’re getting good at soccer and you never really had a chance to play when you’re growing up, or maybe there’s a… Honestly, there’s a favorite video game that they want to share with you. Now I wouldn’t do that more than two or three times a week, but definitely go into their world, let them be the master. Let them teach something to you. Ask them questions about it that aren’t annoying... [chuckle] and let them feel like they’re going through the third-degree. And then this is also really, really important when you spend time with your kids is, don’t judge what they say to you, don’t interrupt, and just be present. So, those are the keys for having a great relationship with your kids, and still being able to have influence over them despite all the noise of media, technology, and peers.

03:04 Beau Henderson: Well and I think a word we used in your intro, ‘teaching kids and families how to connect or reconnect’, I think that’s really what we’re talking about here, is if you’re so far outside of your kid’s world, there’s just no… There’s no connection there and it’s just… It’s hard for them to… Like you said, I think it’s smart to get to know these video game characters maybe and talk about them so at least you’re having a conversation that you have something in common you could talk about.

03:29 Deborah Owens: Right, we want our kids to do things in our world; if you’re a football lover, you want your kids to love football; if you love to play golf, you want your kids to love golf; if you’re somebody who loves to knit and crochet maybe you want your kids to do crafty kinds of things with you. It only makes sense for you to also acknowledge what it is that they love to do and let them share that with you. So it needs to go both ways.

03:53 Beau Henderson: Now, and this idea, is there a fine line in this world that with technology is… Okay, I could probably rationalize or justify, we had the TV on and we’re all in a room together, but I’m working on my work projects, and the kids are watching a movie, that’s not quite the same thing, is it?

04:12 Deborah Owens: No, it’s not the same thing. When a kid is doing their homework it’s important to just be in the same space with them, especially the younger kids. Once they get to be older teenagers, they may want to do it in their own space, or not. If they want to have you in the same area with them, great, do it, but particularly with younger kids, just to be in the same room with them, if you’re slicing vegetables or doing your own work, and you’re sitting at the table next to them while they’re doing homework, you’re modeling for them that everybody has things they need to do and you can do it even if you’re not conversing. But when you’re sitting there watching a movie or playing a video game, or playing a board game, or going for a hike, really what you want to do is model how important it is to be able to be in conversation together, to say, “Well what did you think about it when that character said that?” Or “How do you do that?” Or “Why is this character doing that? What do you think?” And really dig into it a little bit more. Find out what’s going on in their heads.

05:11 Beau Henderson: Another piece you brought up, Deborah, that I thought was just key to pull out even further, is that don’t… Make it safe for kids to talk to you about whatever they’re gonna talk to you about, because what happens, I believe, if they don’t feel like it’s safe or they’re gonna be ridiculed or they’re gonna be chastised, they’re just not gonna talk to you.

05:31 Deborah Owens: Exactly. And it comes from a place of really wanting to help our kids. So let’s say you’ve got a 14-year-old who comes home, and they’re actually feeling a little bit open today, and so they say, “You know… ” You ask, “How did your day go?” Which is actually too broad a question, it should be more specific. But let’s say you say, “How did your day go?” Or “How did your math class go?” And your kid says, “Ugh, Mr. Johnson was such a pain in the neck. He didn’t believe me when I told him I’d done my homework and… ” Or, “I was up in the front of the classroom and he was criticizing what I wrote on the board, and really was frustrating for me.” And very often what we do is we wanna give advice and say, “Oh! Well, you should’ve done this and you should’ve done that, and you shouldn’t have done the other thing… ” And what that’s gonna do is it’s just gonna totally put up a wall between you and your kid. Instead, the best thing to do is to be empathetic, and to say, “Oh, that must’ve been frustrating for you,” or “How did you feel when he said that?” Or, “What did you say in response?” And you don’t have to agree with what they did, you just be empathetic with what their experience was.

06:35 Beau Henderson: That brought up… As you’re describing this what… Again I’m thinking of families I’ve worked with and some things you see today, you have some input. I’m curious, this is a pure curiosity question of this fine line between… So say the kid comes home and says, “I had a frustrating experience in Mr. Johnson’s class today.” What’s the difference or where’s that healthy boundary of that parent that’s involved and that parent that just goes and takes over to the extent that the kid has no responsibility in the matter. Does that… Do you know what… Where I’m trying to get to with that?

07:10 Deborah Owens: Oh absolutely, absolutely. Yeah, yeah. One of the things that we need to teach our kids as they get older is how to solve their own problems.

07:18 Beau Henderson: Perfect.

07:18 Deborah Owens: And I have an example, my sister has a teenage daughter, who I think when she was 15, I think she’s like 16 or 17 now, when she was 15… No, it was last year when she was 16, she had to miss some school, because she had… She was ill… Or she had a concussion. I forget now which it was, but at one point she had to miss some school and she fell behind in her gym classes, and there… Like many schools there’s certain requirements about how many classes you have to do and if you miss them you have to make them up and such, and so my niece went to the Phys Ed teacher and said, “Well I’ve had… ” Oh, and the other thing is, many schools will allow athletes to count that instead of having to make up missed PE Classes if they were out sick. So my niece went to the PE teacher and said, “So I had… I missed three classes but I dance five days a week. I take dance lessons and I’m dancing about 10 hours a week.” And the PE teacher made some disparaging remark about how that’s not a real sport.

08:21 Deborah Owens: And my niece came home and told my sister and my sister was pretty outraged, in fact my sister’s a teacher at the same school. And my sister was pretty outraged, they talked about what my niece can do to handle the situation herself. So she went back and she tried again to get out of having to make up this time, which was pointless anyway, she was just gonna walk around the track for an hour. And finally, my sister actually had to go and speak to the PE teacher and say, “Let me show you videos of what my daughter does in dance class.”

08:48 Beau Henderson: Right.

08:50 Deborah Owens: [chuckle] So that was a point where my sister was trying very hard to have her daughter stand up for herself, and it’s important for us to teach our kids to do that, to solve their own problems, to give them the skills, role play with them, talk through with them what the… Brainstorm what the possibilities are to solve their own problems, and then sometimes it’s just the parent’s time to jump in say, “Hey look, you’re being unreasonable.” But you’re absolutely right Beau, as our kids get older, from 10 to 15 and 16, we need to gradually let go of their problems and not solve them for them, but give them the skills in order to solve their own problems. It doesn’t mean stand back and wash our hands of it, it means teach them how to solve problems.

09:32 Beau Henderson: No I like that, kind of an active… There’s a learning opportunity there.

09:35 Deborah Owens: Yes, absolutely.

09:37 Beau Henderson: Okay, so I’m going to admit something, I don’t know if I’ve ever admitted on this show before. There was a time when I was a teenager when I actually knew everything, everything in the world. And it’s amazing what’s happened, the older I get the less I realize I actually do know.

09:52 Deborah Owens: Shocking. [laughter]

09:53 Beau Henderson: But I think that’s a common thing for teenagers to go through, “We know more then… We know it all. We know more than our parents, certainly.”

10:02 Deborah Owens: Yes.

10:03 Beau Henderson: And it can create some disrespectful scenarios and environments at home. What are some strategies we can do when these teenagers are coming through, maybe that phase or that part of their life, to maybe eliminate some of that disrespect from the home?

10:17 Deborah Owens: Beau, that’s such a great question, and it’s something that so many parents struggle with. I mean, basically every parent struggles with it at some point, even really ‘good kids’, will let something slip that they… They’re just testing it out and then just trying to see what kind of reaction they’re gonna get. Well, the first part of it is, you need to start as… Go back to what we said at the beginning, by having a really good relationship with your child. And you’re not gonna be able to have a child who respects you if you don’t respect your child, and that includes treating them as adult as they can possibly be, age-appropriate, but treat them like adults as much as possible, and giving them the opportunity to solve their own problems and encouraging them and saying, “I know you can solve this problem, let’s talk about how we’re gonna do it together. I respect that you can figure this out, I can help you.”

11:03 Deborah Owens: So respect is really a two-way street. If we come along and say, “Do it my way or the highway,” where we don’t give our children a choice in how to handle the consequences of their decisions, then they’re going to be disrespectful. I mean if we were to go to work and have our boss say to us, “This is the way you do it, you get no choice in the matter whatsoever. Do it my way or you’re outta here.” I mean, we might walk out, if we don’t like it. And kids can’t do that, they can’t walk out of the family. So what do they do? They become disrespectful. So the two first pieces are, show respect and be respectful to your child, build a great relationship like we were talking about earlier, and third piece of it is, don’t take it personally, because honestly most of the time it’s coming from something else. And the best way to handle disrespect is to remain calm and not get upset. Don’t just jump into, “Don’t you dare speak to me that way.”

The best way to handle it is to say, “I am treating you with respect and I expect you to treat me with respect. I’m very upset with the way you are talking to me right now. We’re going to come back and discuss this in a little while, and we’re gonna see what we can do to prevent this from happening in the future, because I’m too angry to talk to you about it right now,” and walk away, and let your child know that they crossed the line, that wasn’t acceptable, and then sit down later on and have a discussion about it.

12:31 Deborah Owens: The other thing is, I would recommend having a discussion when everybody’s calm and nobody’s upset, and plan in advance for what consequences will be. And consequences shouldn’t be retribution, they should all be about teaching. The word ‘discipline’ comes from the word ‘disciple’, which means ‘to teach’. So when we want to discipline our children that means we need to teach them positive results from poor decisions, or positive results from great decisions, that’s another part of consequences too, they don’t always have to be bad. And by explaining to kids that they’ve made a poor choice and the result is going to be this.

So for instance, let’s say they’re very disrespectful to you and then later on they want to have a ride somewhere. Well, a real consequence of being disrespectful to you could be for you to say, “Look, you know, I really wasn’t happy with the way you spoke to me earlier, I didn’t feel that you gave me good respect, and for right now I just don’t feel like driving you to your friend’s house. So, when you have a chance to think about this a little bit more, and we’re going to be able to figure out a way to be able to prevent this from happening in the future, I think I’m just not going to drive you to your friend’s house for the next day or two.”

13:47 Beau Henderson: Well you know, over the years I’ve talked to parents about looking for… And this was in the context of money. I would say, “Look for teachable opportunities.” It might take a little more effort, you might have to be a little creative, but look for teachable opportunities for your kids to learn some lessons that’ll serve them well in the future, and as we’re talking I’m realizing, that’s really everything. Everything… You’re sad with you kid, you’re… Well maybe there’s a lesson for them there that’s gonna make them a healthier better adult one day.

14:15 Deborah Owens: Yeah, you’ve got it right Beau. Every opportunity is a teaching opportunity, if you want it to be, and that’s the best way for us to raise our kids is to look at every moment we’re with them, every single thing we say and do is a chance for us to model how to be a great adult, because let’s face it, we’re not raising kids, really we’re raising adults. We want to… We don’t want our kids to stay in our homes once they get to be 19 or 20. We want them to be self-sufficient, caring, compassionate human beings who can go out and fend for themselves when they get to be that age, and if we’re constantly telling them what to do and how to do it, “It’s my way or the highway,” they don’t learn how to do it for themselves.

14:58 Beau Henderson: And Deborah, I think a good point to bring back out was that, don’t take it personal, as a parent. Over the… I’ve just seen that to where, okay, a kid says something and it might of hurt me at first glance, and I’ve seen two reactions really, and there may be more, but two I’ve seen are, “Okay, I don’t like it so I’m gonna go into dictator mode,” and like you said, “Just because I said so mode.” And then the other is, “Well I don’t like it, and I’m gonna go to best-friend mode.” And that’s probably even a more dangerous situation for a parent in some scenarios.

15:27 Deborah Owens: Yeah, yeah. There are a lot of different parenting styles and we can get into that, but those are two that you just brought out right there; one is the one that is too permissive and the other that is too dictatorial, and there really needs to be a happy-medium between those. You can’t be your child’s best friend, much as you want to be, and much as they can be enjoyable. I mean our youngest is 19 right now and I miss him terribly. He’s away at college. He was such a delight for the three years that he was living here alone after his older brother and sister went off. And so in many respects we do become friends, but the bottom line does still need to be, “I’m teaching you how to be an adult, and sometimes I need to make hard choices and I need to stick to those choices.” And that’s really hard for a lot of parents, to stick to something that they know is right for their kids, right for their family. They don’t wanna deal with the pushback that the kids are gonna give them, or they don’t wanna deal with, not being their child’s best friend. A lot of single parents can really fall into that too, they end up talking to their kids as if they were their companion, and that’s not really the way it should go, I mean you still need to be a parent.

16:40 Beau Henderson: Any tips for consistency? ‘Cause that seemed to be a big issue is, “Okay, when I’m tired, when I don’t feel good.” How do I be consistent in my parenting so that kids actually… They have something or some structure that they can depend on?”

16:56 Deborah Owens: Yeah, perfect question. Well first of all, practice self-compassion because you’re never gonna be 100% consistent.

[laughter]

17:05 Deborah Owens: So that’s an important thing to remember; however, you’re gonna try for it, and the way to do it is… I actually have a technique I call the ‘A to E technique’ for remaining calm, in the heat of an emotional moment. And I’ll just very briefly share that with your audience because I think that this is a way to help you be consistent.

So the first part of it is ‘A’, where you’re aware of how you’re feeling, you’re aware of how your kid is feeling, you ask yourself, “What am I afraid of in this situation? What is my child is afraid of?” Even anger, everything… Anger, frustration, depression, it all comes out of fear. There are only two emotions; there’s fear and love, and anything that’s not coming out of a state of love is coming out of a state of fear. So find out, be aware, “What am I afraid of? What’s my kid afraid of?”

Then ‘B’ is to breathe, just you know, gently breathe. “Ah… ” A couple of deep breaths, just like your grandmother told you when you were little. And what that does is, it slows down the stress hormones in your brain, and decreases the adrenaline and the cortisol that start to course through your body when you get stressed out, and instead it allows the oxytocin, which is our bonding hormone, and it allows that to come to the forefront, so breathing consciously and slowly helps you calm yourself down.

Then C is to connect calmly, and with compassion. And your child may not wanna look you in the face, they may not want you touching them, but you’re just, you’re there, you’re present, and you just be a presence right there with them, and let them know that you’re not gonna leave them alone, particularly with little kids with their big scary, feelings. And the other part of this is to remain calm. It’s like, be a brick wall. Your child is getting more and more and more upset. Well if you get upset in response, that just causes them to get more upset, it escalates in this vicious spiral. So if you can remain calm, your child cannot stay upset in your presence. They either calm themselves down after a few minutes, or they go flying down the hall and slam the door and go into the room. They can’t get terribly upset when they are in the presence of somebody who is calm.

And then D and E is to discuss with empathy, and we’ve kind of talked about that already. So, this is the way to really maintain consistency by going through this A to E technique. It becomes second nature after awhile. When your child is upset, you can remain calm, even when they’re upset, and then, come back later on when everybody is calm and say, “Okay look, we had a problem. We need to discuss this. I understand… ” Again, empathy. “I understand where you’re coming from, I need you to understand where I’m coming from. Let’s talk about what we can do to solve this so this doesn’t happen again in the future.” And again, plan for consequences. Let your kid know, “If this happens again, this is going to be the consequence, just so that you know and you are making a choice. And this is the rule, alright?” So you blame it on the rule, it’s not… They can’t blame you, just blaming it on the rules. Put it up on the refrigerator and say, “These are the rules, these are our house rules. If you come in past curfew, this is what happens. If you’re disrespectful, this is what happens.” And ideally you come up with these rules together so that they feel that they have some input and they have some choice in how they live their lives and what choices they get to make.

20:32 Beau Henderson: Wow Debra, great actionable techniques to interact and build these healthy relationships. So if RichLifers out there listening, with kids, these kids in this teenage range, and they’re saying, “You know what? I could do better with this.” What are some tips maybe, or any takeaways you have as far as, how could we be better at this connection or reconnection with our teenagers?

21:00 Deborah Owens: Yeah, this is great. So, our relationships are everything in life, and your show is a RichLife, and honestly, if you’ve got great relationships, you have a rich life. And the tips that I’ve just shared with you work for your spouse, as well as for your kids, and frequently for your coworkers or the people that you meet in the store.

The A to E technique works for almost any emotional situation you find yourself in. And so that’s what I would recommend, again just to, don’t take things personally. Remember that if they’re having a problem it’s their problem, it’s not really your problem. I mean, it’s a reflection on what’s going on inside of them, more than a reflection of what’s going on inside of you, and that will help you be present without taking it personally, and just to be able to practice the A to E technique, so that you don’t get upset and you can use this as a basis for great relationships, and then also as we indicated before, make sure that you spend quality time with each of your children every single day, even if it’s only 10 minutes. And I know that’s hard for a lot of like single parents in particular, but find a way to make it happen; child swap, get a babysitter, whatever you can do to spend 10 minutes a day with each of your children doing what they wanna do without judging and without giving too much advice, that’s really the best way to have rich relationships with your family members.

22:27 Beau Henderson: Well, you nailed it on the head, it comes down to, we talk a lot about money and success and building businesses, vacation, I mean we talk about it across-the-board, but when we get down to the… We just keep asking the why, the why, the why, behind everything, it comes down to the most important relationships in your life, that make it rich, always does. Your absolutely right…

22:47 Deborah Owens: Yep, definitely.

22:47 Beau Henderson: And your kids are right. So this is… We’re in a world that’s different than even when we were growing up, much less the last 10 years.

22:56 Deborah Owens: Totally.

22:57 Beau Henderson: And you brought up single parents a few times, it seems that there’s more single parents out there these days. What’s the actual role and the balance of a mother and a father in a household or in a kid’s life now?

23:11 Deborah Owens: The role… Actually it’s a good question that you ask, and what I tell parents is, it’s a servant leadership model, which means that as parents we are the leaders of our house, but we do it from a place of service; so that means that you help meet other people’s needs while you help grow them to be healthier, wiser, more autonomous, and authentically themselves. So that’s the role of the parent in our kids’ lives, is to be a servant leader.

23:44 Beau Henderson: Love it. So it’s not just… Yeah, it’s not just providing the necessities which we… I mean that’s kind of a responsibility we have, we brought these humans into the world, but also like we were talking about earlier, is making sure we teach them as they go.

23:56 Deborah Owens: Right, exactly. Yep.

23:58 Beau Henderson: Perfect. Now, Deborah, is there any way the RichLifers listening that are like, “You know what, I wanna dig into this,” how can they take another step or maybe connect with you further on this?

24:09 Deborah Owens: Yeah, thanks for asking, Beau. My website is youcanraisegreatkids.com, and I’ve got some great resources on that website, and if you go there you can also get my, ‘Five Steps to Success for Stressed-Out Parents.’ And there’s an ebook there that I think will be really helpful, it digs into some of these things that we were just talking about as well as some other things. I have a podcast with two other women, which I’m thoroughly enjoying, it’s called ‘Mighty Married Moms’, at mightymarriedmoms.com, and one of my colleagues is a marriage relationship coach and the other’s a health coach, so we talk about all sorts of things. [chuckle]

24:50 Deborah Owens: And lastly, if there’s anybody who really wants to have a chance to just chat with me and get some clarity on what their family issues are, you could connect with me on my contact page, on my website, and I would be happy to have a short conversation just to see if we’re a fit, and see if… Even if it’s just to bring some clarity to your situation, I’d be happy to do that.

25:10 Beau Henderson: Well Debra, thanks for the generous offer of being available. So guys, if this is something you’re wanting to do better with, reach out. When we have speakers or we have people teaching, and we have people sharing on this show that are willing to spend some one-on-one time with you with something that’s truly their mission and their expertise, take ’em up on that. Debra, so before we go, a couple things I like to do, biggest lesson you’ve learned in this journey of what you teach now, of I guess raising teenagers. So this might be something that wasn’t a great situation at the time, but turned out to be something you actually needed to know to be better.

25:49 Deborah Owens: Yeah, great question. I’ve often said, “I wish I knew then what I know now.”

[laughter]

25:54 Deborah Owens: And I think the biggest thing for me is just, I wish I had known how to remain calm when I got upset, that’s been the biggest takeaway. I didn’t get upset very often, but there were enough times when I look back now and I think, “Oh man, if I had, had the tools then that I now have in order to remain calm in an upsetting situation, I probably would’ve saved myself and my kids some stress and headaches.” So that’s been my biggest takeaway as I’ve gone through this journey.

26:25 Beau Henderson: And the solution has been the A to E model?

26:27 Deborah Owens: Yes, yep.

26:28 Beau Henderson: Okay, excellent. Quick questions, “Best advice you’ve ever… ” Well, one of the themes we’ve talked about since day one of the radio show, the RichLife Show, is success with life and money, they’re kinda common themes. So I love to ask our guest one thing, “What’s the best money advice you ever received and who gave it to you?”

26:51 Deborah Owens: Oh, good question. The best money advice I’ve ever received has been to, just really keep track of the things that are important to me and make sure that I am spending money on experiences more than on stuff. I think that’s been… There are all kinds of studies that have been done about that, and the things that bring us true happiness in life are experiences more than acquisitions of things, and so that’s something that I have really focused on, and my husband and I enjoy doing things like that, and we love to spend time with our kids and our family, and so experiences more than things, and I think that’s a big financial aha for us.

27:38 Beau Henderson: No, that’s a huge lesson. When you brought up oxytocin earlier, I knew we would have kind of a kindred spirit, ’cause that was… I’ve spoke on that before, about the one thing that I actually that actually makes giving and taking care of each other, something innate in us that has helped us survive, and it’s the one thing that can’t be taken away from us, is when we invest in other things, or give to other people, much less those people and things we believe in that are important to us.

28:08 Deborah Owens: Yes, absolutely, absolutely. And that’s something that’s been really important to my husband and me, and we make sure that we donate regularly to our church, to our alma maters, to several other organizations, like World Vision and a few other places like that, and some local places as well, and that’s a part of who we are and what we do, and it’s what we’ve taught our kids to do as well, and I think it’s just really important… I mean, you get such satisfaction when you see the results of the donations that you make. And so, yeah, I agree with you completely on that one.

28:43 Beau Henderson: Now, what about a little broader, this is advice you’ve received at some point along the way for just general success in life, or you can take it any way you want to, but success in life and who maybe gave that to you?

28:58 Deborah Owens: I think my mother gave me a great tip at one point in time when she told me that a great marriage relationship is not 50/50, it’s gotta be at least 80/20. And I think I’ll go her… And that means you give 80 and you accept 20, and I think I’ll even go her a little bit further and say, you have to be willing to just give 100%, knowing that eventually your spouse or your partner will be able to return that, even if they’re going through a time when they can’t give anything, but just by giving 100% to your partner, just out of love and recognizing that it will come around to you as well. But yeah, I think my mother gave me one of my best tips, that was a good one.

29:41 Beau Henderson: Well, and that’s another thing as a parent, since this is kind of a theme of what we’re talking about today is, this comes up a lot when I ask this question on the show is, you never know when something… When you take the time to find that little learning seed or that little opportunity, how that might be something 30 years down the road your child is sharing somewhere that, that was one of the most valuable tips they’d ever received.

30:02 Deborah Owens: That’s right, I’ll have to tell my mother about that now.

[laughter]

30:05 Beau Henderson: Well very good. Well you’ve delivered, as I promised at the beginning of the show, Deborah, of creating actionable tips that add value to our definition of a rich life, because a home with happy, healthy teenagers, definitely goes a long way in creating that for sure.

30:21 Deborah Owens: Yes. Thank you so much for having me Beau. This has been a pleasure.

30:24 Beau Henderson: Well, as we… To take it out, I got one last question for you: No constraints, no limits, what would your definition of a rich life be?

30:35 Deborah Owens: A rich life is a life full of love, relationships and experiences that brings you joy and helps you bring joy to other people as well.

30:43 Beau Henderson: Can’t do any better than that. RichLifers, you’ve been listening to the richest conversation on the radio, great tips for having that healthy family, those healthy relationships with our kids. If you want to check out the tips and the offer that Deborah agreed to share with us, go to the show notes, and we’ll be back with a lot more things to help you live your definition of a rich life, right here, on the RichLife Show.