Mindset Makeover with Hilary DeCesare
Transforming Mindset and Finding Hope After Divorce
Seth and Pete welcome Hilary DeCesare, founder of Relaunch Co. and expert in neuropsychology, to discuss shifting limiting beliefs during divorce. This episode focuses on adjusting your mindset during a challenging life transition like divorce. Hilary shares her 3HQ model for getting into your best emotional and mental state before major conversations or decisions.
Questions we answer in this episode:
How do I stop negative self-talk during my divorce?
What daily habits can help me feel more empowered and optimistic?
Key Takeaways:
Tuning into an empowering song for 20 seconds can shift your emotional state
Visualizing your ideal scenario helps anchor positive intentions
Small daily actions create momentum towards your goals
Hilary introduces her TuneIn process to help people get into their "G-zone" - a state of gratitude, growth and greatness. This four-step practice takes just two minutes but can rewire your perspective before big moments. Seth and Pete also discuss using music and imagination games to ease difficult transitions for kids.
Whether you feel stuck in negativity or want to manifest an empowered mindset, this episode provides actionable tips to transform your emotional experience during divorce. Tune in to gain hope and clarity.
Links & Notes
Visit Hilary on the Web, LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube
Read Hilary’s Book ReLaunch! Spark Your Heart To Ignite Your Life
Got a question you want to ask on the show? Click here!
-
Pete Wright:
Welcome to How to Split a Toaster, a Divorce Podcast about saving your relationships from TruStory FM. Today, it's time for your toaster to get ready for a relaunch.
Seth Nelson:
Welcome to the show everybody, I'm Seth Nelson. As always, I'm here with my good friend Pete Wright. Today, we're going to talk about mindset. It's not the easiest topic for a lot of us. And when you most need to look at your own mindset, that might be the hardest time to get yourself to do it. But letting go of limiting beliefs and learning to find optimism and hope in a future is important when you're in the middle of a tough divorce.
Hilary DeCesare is a former Silicon Valley CEO and recognized expert in neuropsychology. She's the founder of The ReLaunch Co. She joins us this week to help us turn our most challenging transitions into transformations and relaunch our lives after divorce. Hillary, welcome to the toaster.
Hilary DeCesare:
Seth, Pete, so good to be here.
Pete Wright:
Hillary, we want to talk. It's a divorce podcast. We're talking about divorce. It's not the happiest of subjects. And the thing I'm most interested in everything that you're doing, you've got the book, you're going to talk about the book a little bit later, Relaunch, one of the things that I think the people who listen to this show struggle with is figuring out how their belief systems, their mindsets, their so-called limiting beliefs get in the way of getting to the other side of incredibly challenging life events like divorce.
And to hear you, and I've been listening to you on other shows throughout the morning as I've been prepping for this, and I think it's such an interesting way that you put, and I'll say you push aggressively on this, right, on this topic, that really you have to take control of your emotional well-being if you're going to get through hard things. And I wonder if you could start us off by talking a little bit about that.
Hilary DeCesare:
I have to say that for everyone listening, you have a choice. You can get through your divorce in a way with grace and dignity and come out the other end, or you can slog it out in the mud, in the depths, and it will take perhaps the rest of your life to get over.
Seth Nelson:
I vote for B.
Hilary DeCesare:
And here's the thing, Seth, yes, but for so many of us, we walk down the aisle, some of us even have children, and then all of a sudden, you wake up and you realize that you are on the other side of marriage, and you're either separated, you're divorced, getting a divorce. And it's one of those moments of, and it's hard to not feel this way, that there's been failure, because nobody takes that first day where you're getting married and you've got everything and think like, "Oh my God, the day I get divorced will be."
And then all of a sudden, something happens, right? And the way I looked at it, I had three little kids, I was working full-time, high-tech company, Silicon Valley, had been there almost 10 years, and the next thing I knew, I remember I was in my mom's apartment. I was in one of her upstairs rooms on a little teeny twin bed, and I was literally energetically at the worst place. I had had what I call and refer to with my company, The ReLaunch Co, I was going through a massive relaunch.
It's a transition. And again, the outcome is the transformation that you want. Now, here's the misnomer. People think transformation is always like you're transforming into something good. But you literally have the choice to say this is going to be a positive transformation, transition, relaunch, or a negative one. And so I at that point knew I had a choice to make. There was a place in my path, and I did a podcast on it, the Yellow Brick Road, where you have the ability to head on up to Oz or you can divert and go back to where you started from.
And in the process of doing this, I decided that I was going to literally make the most out of this learning lesson. They always say when you need something, the teacher will arrive, but you have the choice of being in the class or not. And for me, I thought, you know what? I don't want to be one of those people that just harbors anger, that always feels like he should, she could, something that was just all about them. And I thought, you know what? If I'm really going to do this, then I'm going to take ownership.
And I often have said, I'm going to write the book, The Great Divorce, because I really think what my ex-husband and I did allowed for us to now be very good friends, amazing parents. As we're going into the holiday season right now, we still spend Thanksgiving and Christmas together in this very blended family.
Seth Nelson:
But Pete, she's Jewish, so she's acting like Christmas is some big ass deal, right?
Hilary DeCesare:
Oh my God, you're [inaudible 00:05:52]
Seth Nelson:
And she never liked Thanksgiving anyway, so whatever. Whatevs, Hilary.
Hilary DeCesare:
You know what? You went into the wrong profession. We need to talk about this now. We're going to relaunch you. It was one of these moment that I like...
Seth Nelson:
Please. Please do.
Hilary DeCesare:
At the point where I decided to do that, I had people say, "Oh my gosh, tell me how you did that. Tell me what was involved." And I said, I've been coaching people for 23 years, and I have seen a lot of successes and a lot of failures. And it's always, and going back to Pete, your question about mindset, limiting belief. I got to tell you, the ones that come out the other end that feel accomplished, that find another incredible relationship and they make it work have a very different type of mindset.
And it's something that I actually say you got a 3HQ you. And what does that really mean? 3HQ is the headquarters of yourself. It's your internal headquarters. And the three Hs are head, heart, highest self. Head is where the limiting beliefs are, but they're also where your empowering beliefs are. The ones that say, "I'm not going to be like that. I'm not going to turn into my mother, my father, my aunt, so-and-so down the street. I'm not doing it."
And then there are in your heart that point where you're like, "Where is my why? Why do people continue to date the same person? Why do they make the same decisions?" It's all hardwired in our subconscious. Exactly what you're getting is what you were thinking and doing the past few months to years. You're getting it. But here's the best part.
When you can tap into your highest self, that best version of you, that's when you can actually make changes that will bring in, you hear manifest a lot of the times, but it will allow you to have a lifestyle success, whatever that lifestyle success is that you are actually putting out there. And the best way I want to take you through a process to understand 3HQ and how easy it is to use, but I do it in a form and a way that I think you guys are going to love. Are you game?
Pete Wright:
Okay, well, hold on, hold on. I'm totally game. I'm totally game. But I want to...
Seth Nelson:
If this can help Pete in any form or fashion, I'm in.
Pete Wright:
Do you know what? We can mute you.
Seth Nelson:
I'm in.
Pete Wright:
Yeah, right. I want to step back though just before we get into that because I think that when we look at some of these issues and what's really... And First of all, I got a buddy, when he says we have a choice to be happy, we have a choice to be optimistic, he said, anybody says that to me, I want to punch him in the neck.
Hilary DeCesare:
Tell him to call me.
Pete Wright:
Yeah, right. Well, because I mean, the whole idea is that...
Hilary DeCesare:
3HQ him.
Pete Wright:
3HQ the hell out of him. I think that there is something to this idea of having that get in your own way. And I just want Seth, I do want him to talk a little bit about how often this kind of stuff gets in the way of people in the divorce process. What do you see, Seth?
Seth Nelson:
Oh, it's daily. It's people come to me with preconceived ideas about how a divorce is going to happen. Now, some of them, they think they're going to come out of the other side with the kids 100% of the time, all the money, and then I tell them what the law is and they're like, "What are you talking about?" And I'm like, "Go get a second opinion. Go get a third opinion. Go get a fourth opinion. Substantively, there's X of what may or may not happen. Check your local jurisdiction."
However, emotionally, the trick is you got to meet your clients where they are, and they all come to you at different levels of the process. Some are like, "I just found out he was cheating on me for two years, and I just got served divorce papers." Other people are like, "I have been out of this relationship for 20 years." And so it is just a wide range of where they are in the process, and a lot of that has to do with how do they feel about themselves? How have they been treated? How did their spouse treat them?
Did they set boundaries during the relationship? Are they finally standing up for themselves? And now that I'm standing up, I am going to fricking go all the way. I'm taking him to the Matin Court. Anything I can do to make his life miserable. So it's a lot of people trying to get through a divorce and they'll all tell me, "I don't want to be expensive," and then they tell me they want me to take the guy through the ringer. You can't have both.
Pete Wright:
Right. You can't have both. And that seems like when you're talking about you have to meet them, it sounds like you're having to meet them in their head, their heart, or their highest self, depending on where they are in the process.
Seth Nelson:
Well, it's usually the head and their heart, but it's usually I'm not at higher self. I'm trying to get them there. Now, I haven't used the term higher self and it's the three Hs. But here's what I'm saying is it is absolutely... I think what I do, and this is the difference between an attorney and a counselor at law and on both. The counselor at law is talking about the things we talk about on this show.
The attorney is going to court, making an argument, following the rules, setting up a deposition, setting up a case, having a theme, doing all this other stuff that you learn in law school and in the practice of law. But a true counsel at law is trying to solve problems, is trying to get you through this process. And Pete, we've talked about it. It's not this scarlet letter of D that you wear, I'm divorced, right? It's a legal proceeding. That's all it is.
Hilary DeCesare:
But one thing that you said though, Pete, when you talked about this friend of yours that said, "If I hear another think positive or positive thought, I'm going to strangle you and kill you."
Pete Wright:
If I hear somebody tell me I can choose my positive thinking.
Hilary DeCesare:
So here's the best part of that, that's a limiting belief in itself, right?
Pete Wright:
That's right.
Hilary DeCesare:
I mean, that's the best...
Pete Wright:
You're proving the case.
Hilary DeCesare:
Yeah, right there. Right there. So he is choosing to be in that state, and that's okay. But when I am working with people, I like to let them have an awareness. Because if you have an awareness, then you have a little knowledge, then you can start to say, all right, the choice is you could remain where you are, do what you keep doing, and if you're fine with that, great, or these other people over here that really want to make a change, I can help them. But there comes a point where, as somebody said, I think it was Seth, you got to meet people where they are.
Seth Nelson:
Right.
Pete Wright:
And cynicism is also where they are. That's also a place where you can live. You can choose.
Hilary DeCesare:
And some people, they will say, "This is who I am. I am this way. I come from an Italian family. We just are this way. We feed everybody. We do this." I am statements. A lot of times when you hear that really can let you know a lot about the person and the belief system that they have. But here's what I want to really talk about as your audience is listening, the highest self, that best version of you, is when you're actually happy within yourself.
When you are angry at someone, when you're mad and it's like, "I am mad," you might have somebody come, Seth, and sit down in front of you and say, "I am so mad. I'm so pissed off at him. I'm so hurt. I am so," what we have to realize is no, you are a human being and you have these emotions that are sad, mad, angry.
And when you realize what an emotion is and where it is and how long these thoughts, because a thought and an emotion, a thought triggers an emotion that we feel, that's when you can actually take over this operating system and say, "Hold on, I need to upgrade this. I need to add the next version."
Because we're so stuck in how we think we're supposed to be, that all of a sudden you start to realize when you go to somebody, as you said, that's really coaching you through this process, you said, Seth, that you actually are both, that's the best type of person to go to because it's not just about the pound of flesh. It's not just about, "I need my half, or I need need more. He hurt me," it's about how are you going to come out at the end. I often say your ending is the best way to see your beginning.
Seth Nelson:
Well, that's what we do when I sit them down, what are your goals? What's most important to you? Because I'm not going to charge up a hill and get to the top and realize my client's not with me and I'm on the wrong hill, and they paid me all this money and spent all this time. We can revise the goals, because your goal might be to keep the house, and then we look at the financials, we realize that's not going to happen.
It just financially isn't going to work. So part of being I think this might fall into higher self is look at your life differently. Frequently, I'll say, "Go look at houses. Go look at condos." And they're like, "Why? I want to keep the house." I said, "Well, you want to keep the house because we covet what we see. So I want you to go look at something else because maybe you'll fall in love with that or realize I want that house, or I can see myself living here.
It's not as bad as I envisioned, and I'm done holding onto this house, which has a lot of bad memories. I'm just doing it for the kids." All the shit that we do for our kids, they don't care about.
Pete Wright:
They don't care. No.
Seth Nelson:
They don't care. They want to make sure that when they come home, you're there, you're listening, you're supportive. It doesn't matter if you're in a six bedroom house or a two bedroom apartment. So I think getting to your higher self to say, "I can make different choices. I can be somebody different. I cannot be angry and hold onto this stuff. Let it go. Let me get a better way to move forward."
Pete Wright:
Well, you just said something, Seth, that's interesting to me because how much is this... Not as a joke. How much of this relates to being able to put your mask on before you help your kids? How much of this is being able to take ownership of or where does this fit in the three Hs, like taking ownership of your own identity before you take it, that you evaluate others?
Hilary DeCesare:
Well, there's a big, big comment there that I want to make in regards to higher or highest self, because a lot of times we get caught up in that higher, is it God? Is it this? It's a connection that you have to yourself when you know that you are bringing the true you, the you that you really like. And the way I refer to it is it's your G zone. The G zone is your great zone, your gratitude zone, your growth. They always say, if you're not growing, you're dying. How are you growing? How are you growing yourself?
How are you growing your business? How do they interrelate? And so as you're sitting there and you're talking about this positioning of highest self, I don't want people to get caught up in... I'm not asking you to be like Buddha 24 hours a day, right? Because we're human beings, be-ing. We are going to be in situations that are going to bring us down and bring us up. But when you think about everything is energy, when you are operating at your highest level of energy, you know you're attracting the good stuff.
You feel like you're on top of the world. You're climbing up the right hill. That's what we're going for. When we know we're operating, maybe it's before you go into a meeting with Seth or Pete, maybe it's before you're going into something that you know your energy is not at that highest level. You know you're feeling the emotions. Low vibrational energy is sad, pissed, depressed. Those are all vibrationally low. We got to bump you up to a higher level so that your results are at a higher level.
Seth Nelson:
I know someone's listening to this like, "Really? Do you know how stressful it is to go talk to a divorce attorney? And you want me to bring my A game?"
Hilary DeCesare:
Ah! The only reason I want you to bring your A game is what's the outcome that you want? If you're able to energetically get yourself to a higher level, then your results will be law of resonance. What resonates the energetic level you're bringing to the conversation with your lawyer is what you are going to be able to get out of it. Now, until you've gone through it, and that's why I want to take you guys through it.
Seth Nelson:
Yeah. If you want to do it, let's do it.
Hilary DeCesare:
You'll see what I'm talking about. There's a lot of neuroscience. I've been studying neuroscience for over 10 years. I have a psychology degree. I love putting business functional concepts together, steps, procedures, very head-based, charging them with the emotions of the heart to get to energetically a higher level. And the way you do it is a process that I call tune in. A tune in process, four easy steps. The first step, and given that we're talking about divorce, the first step is what's the challenge you're going through right now?
And so it could be, I hate my ex-husband. He was the biggest a-hole out there. I want the kids. I want the house. I want this, and I'm going to have no money. I mean, there's challenges left and right, but you identify the challenges. And when you think about those challenges, those are low vibration energetically. Because again, that's an emotional state that is not a high level emotional state. There's a whole index around it. So now what we do is we look at step two. That's all you have to do in step one.
Again, this is so easy. You can do it in two minutes or less and it will change the way you approach everything. Step two is change the channel. Remember, low vibrational channel, we want to go to that higher level, the G zone, higher level. This is where you are really in your best, in your best way, in your best mindset. And the way we do that is with a song. There is so much great concrete evidence around what songs do for you.
So I want both of you to think about what is a song that when you hear it, and I want the name of the song, it lights you up. You just can't be low energy. You automatically are going to be at a higher level energy.
Pete Wright:
I got mine. Say My Name by Wes Cunningham.
Hilary DeCesare:
Okay, Say My Name. All right. And Seth?
Seth Nelson:
The Pina Colada Song.
Pete Wright:
Are you the divorce attorney?
Seth Nelson:
Yeah, and it's a divorce attorney. I knew you were going to love it, Pete.
Pete Wright:
[Singing 00:21:16]
Hilary DeCesare:
So now what I want you to do is neurologically, scientifically, we have to have that song come into our head. You can have it outside, like you're listening to it. We're on this podcast, this show. You can't do that because we would be shut down. So you can listen in your head, literally changing the state of where you are right now by having it go from your head to your toes. 20 seconds is how much time you need. So I want you to move your body, move it, hear your song. We're hearing Say My Name.
We're hearing Pina Colada. We're doing it. We're changing the state all the way down, all the way down to our toes. 20 seconds. And now, once you have done that for 20 seconds, your stay level, if you could get onto a scanner, would show that you're actually operating because you can't have a negative and a positive thought at the same time. Can't do it. We as humans cannot do that. So now all of a sudden you're in this state. Then what we do is, again, that first part was head, what challenge do I have?
The second part is jumping you up to the highest self. That's that energy. Step three takes you to the heart. What are you really going for? Clarity around. What would it look like? If at the end of this conversation with your attorney, at the end when you're finally signing all the docs, how do you really want to feel? Where do you want to be with yourself? Forget about everybody else, but how do you want to feel about this? Not in the negative sense, but the absolute this is the way I want it to be.
And then I have them focus in on a color that they're wearing like they're on a stage and you 10X that color. Because again, I'm lighting up the brain. You're going back to your song, tuning into your song. Again, as you think of yourself, best case scenario, what would you really want to have happen? Once you've gone through this very short I call it the micro movie in your mind, that's when you're going to have an internal picture, almost like you're creating a picture of a billboard of you so happy, so fired up.
You're seeing it and you actually anchor it in by closing and opening your eyes like an internal picture. Click. And you do it three times, capturing that moment. Now, you see a picture of yourself. There's an energy attached. There's an emotion attached. You don't want the horrible negative. We're really going for the best case scenario that you could ever have in this case. And then we go to our step four, which is what is a micro action? What is one small thing you tune back into your song, Say My Name, you tune back into the song, you light yourself up again and say, what could I do?
One small action. One small action, micro action, that would take me towards the vision that I created. And it might be, you know what? I don't need to. I don't need to have this one. I can go ahead and I can give on this because this is what I really want you to fight for with what I'm doing. You could go ahead. Success-like speed. And so we want to do something very quickly to acknowledge this is what I'm going for. Imagine you do this not once, but before every time you're doing anything around the divorce, before you're talking to your ex, before you're talking to your attorney.
To get back up, you use the same song, because this is all one intention, one goal that you're doing. Imagine you do it three times in a day. By the end of a five-day week, you've got 15 micro actions all leading to a better place, all leading to not having that anger manifesting inside of you, but a very different way, a different approach to looking at it. You can do this any area.
Pete Wright:
What do people report? When you go through this with people and you're workshopping with them, presumably over a longer period of time, what do they say to you on day three, day 23, day 33? How does this rewire you, this process? Is that the thing or are we just dealing with in the moment?
Hilary DeCesare:
So there's two different things. When you're taking my 3HQ and you're putting it into your business and your life, great point. It actually to rewire your brain takes between 62 and 67 days to actually have an empowering belief takeover a limiting belief. I have a full process to do that, but we are in such a quick fix type of situation where we go zero to 60.
Pete Wright:
Dealing with trauma, right?
Hilary DeCesare:
We go zero to 60. Just the voice gets me like that. So what I had to do was come up with a way to hit 3HQ, but do it in two minutes or less, so you have it as a pocket tool anytime. Anytime that, oh my God, oh my God, he's walking up right now. Oh my God, I'm going into this meeting. I literally have said that this is the number one peak performance habit that I coach people on, and it crosses all areas of their life, personal, professional, doesn't matter what you're doing, healthwise.
And what we're trying to do is have this so that it becomes that habit so that before you're about to go do anything, whether it's talking about a divorce or whether it's you're going in to ask for a business or whatever you're doing, you're going on a show, I tune in.
Seth Nelson:
But Hillary, I was just thinking about my typical day. When I get home from work, like a lot of us, we have stressful jobs, my wife and I make a point to say hello to each other. Now, sometimes I'm just tapped. I'm exhausted. I cannot make another decision. Limiting thought, I'll give you that. I'm like, if she's going to ask me what do we want to do for dinner, I'll be like, "I don't want to make another decision. Please. Just decide. I will eat cat food if that's what you tell us I'm going to do. I'm out. I'm done."
Pete Wright:
Real low.
Seth Nelson:
Yeah. But I'm thinking about this, if I was on the way home and about to see her and got this song in my head and was happy about it and going through this process, maybe I don't do it perfectly, but I'm probably walking up to say hello to her in a whole different mindset just from listening to a song that I like. When I tell her it's The Pina Colada Song about cheating on your wife [crosstalk 00:27:41]
Hilary DeCesare:
Maybe we don't even discuss the song, but she will notice something different about you, and that's the thing. So it was Pete who said, tell us about what does happen. So I'll give you a great example on a relationship. How about that? I was going to give you a different one, but this one just popped into my head. So this gal had a terrible divorce. She starts to date again and ends up meeting this incredible guy she thought. Ends up that he basically does the exact same thing that the first husband did the second time.
So now she's getting a second divorce, and she comes to me on business and had just been let go from an actual high C-suite job. And she thought she was coming to me just for that. What am I going to do? There are no jobs out there. Everyone's telling me the economy, the market. I'm not. I'm not. I'm not. I said, "No, no, no, let's start over." And we started to get her to tune in every single day. And then she came to me and said, "Well, what would happen if I started to use this because I'm ready again to start dating?"
And I said, "Let's try it." By changing, again, the challenge, well, geez, I keep bringing in the wrong guy, then all of a sudden we looked at, well, what are you really going for? She had her song and everything. And she started to do this before she went onto online dating. She started to do it before she went on any date. She started to it before she started talking to a friend about, "Hey, I'm getting back out there to date." So she energetically was charging up the future. And guess what happened?
Committed relationship. Things are great. And she ended up getting the dream job that nobody said she would ever get and literally created it. So what I want to say is that the people out there that are like, "No way. It doesn't work," thousands of people are actually tuning in.
Seth Nelson:
The other thing about when people say it doesn't work, Hillary, it's not going to hurt.
Hilary DeCesare:
Exactly.
Seth Nelson:
Give it a try.
Pete Wright:
You do kind of wonder how often the people who say it doesn't work are actually using it, right? It just feels like... To me, whatever you think about what kind of words you put to it, just finding an alignment with a direction. Wandering emotionally doesn't give you any sort... It doesn't put a rudder in the water. And I feel like so much of what you're talking about, I mean, I know I get jazzed from this song, although I should say it's also a breakup song. It's a horrible breakup song.
Seth Nelson:
We are two sick individuals.
Pete Wright:
It's really awful. Don't go look at the lyrics to this song, but this is a song I used to when I was working in sales a lifetime ago, I used to listen to it in the car for three minutes before I would go in on a sales call. Dramatically changes the nature of the call.
Hilary DeCesare:
And again, this is not just, hey, let's talk about this. This could work for you. Scientific. You put scans through your brain and you can see energetically, energetically. And when you operate at a higher level of energy, Einstein said you can't solve a problem at the conscious level it was created. And for so long I'm like, what the hell does that even mean? Well, what it means is if you have this challenge and it can't go, it just keeps coming back and you can't get past it, you can't get that...
I can't tell you how many people come to me and say, "Oh, Q3 is always our worst quarter." Limiting belief. You're fueling it. Well, what if it wasn't? Well, it always has been. Again, we fuel what actually happens in our world. So when you start to tune in, and I have people now tuning in 20 times a day before every single meeting, and you start to see the results, you start to see the changes. I've had people... No joke. A real estate agent came to me and she was always number one, and then she wasn't.
She's like, "Oh, what's going on? There's so much. Why isn't this working?" So we started to have her tune in. And I believe within five days, somebody at the office said, "First off, did you do something to your face? You look younger. You look like better." Because you think about when you're stressed, when you're challenged, you do have this... You had people walk you into the room and you're like, this energy is terrible in here. It's like, I just want to turn around and leave.
But when you walk in and people are like, yeah, that's the kind of energy. So instead of everyone out there is always saying, oh, like-minded people, like-minded people, forget about like-minded people, like energy people.
Seth Nelson:
But the other thing about this, Hillary, where I think it really can come into effect, I'm just going to focus on this music bit for a minute, one of the most stressful times in divorce for kids is the transitions. I call it the prisoner exchange. It is just stressful for those kids.
Are the parents going to be fighting? So one way you can help your kids through that process, have ready to go, what's your favorite song? You're in the car. The transition was just a shit show. Dad was yelling. Everyone's upset. What's your favorite song? Play some music.
Pete Wright:
Let's have a divorce anthem or transition anthem for the kids, right?
Hilary DeCesare:
Well, okay, are you ready for this?
Seth Nelson:
I'm ready.
Hilary DeCesare:
That's how this whole change the channel tune in started. My daughter got into the car. She was in middle school. She had a really crappy time. We were going one house to another. She all of a sudden just broke down. She loved music. And I'm like, as a mom, I have to do something fast because this kid is spiraling. So I said, "We're going to play a game. It's called change the channel. And when I click a button, you just start singing. If I say Taylor Swift, you got to start singing Taylor Swift until I change the channel."
And her dad was a huge Grateful Dead fan, so I'd be like Grateful Dead, and then she'd have to sing. And I kind of mix them all up and oh, rock and roll, and she'd have to sing something. And then I changed the channel again. And through this, granted it didn't happen that first day or the second, but by about the fourth or fifth time, she's like, "Are we going to play that game? Are we going to play that game change the channel, mom?" I'm like, "Yeah, we are. We're going to play the game."
And I watched this kid literally metamorphosize into a happier kid by the time we got to wherever we were driving. And I thought, well, if this works for her, could I do it in different areas with myself? And then I started to do it, and then I started to notice, okay, I'm using it with others. And so that's where the framework actually came from. And I write about it. I talk about it. I'm so glad you brought that up because yes, you can have these songs that you do put on that you know that just light the kids up.
I have three kids, two stepkids. You start to have different songs. You play them. And Rosie and I would start... I always make her be the boy and I was the girl in some of these songs. We play songs too and sing out loud, which is great together. And it changes everything. It really does.
Pete Wright:
That's fantastic. That's fantastic. Just speaking back to kids, thinking about parents listening, do you find your kids have internalized that process? Do they do it on their own?
Hilary DeCesare:
100%. 100%. And it's funny because even now they're in college and graduated and all that and we'll get in the car, and if it's just the two of us, Rosie's her name, she'll say, "Change the channel." I call a tune in. It's now the Tune In Power Tool is what we call it. But she says, "Change the channel." I'll be like, absolutely, because I'll get her singing and I'm like... It's more for me now, right? I'll be like, yes. So yes.
Pete Wright:
That's awesome. That's awesome. All right, well, all of this is in the book, right? Everything we're talking about, we can send people to learn more and pick up the book. Where would you like to send people to learn more about what you're working on?
Hilary DeCesare:
I think the best way since we've been talking about 3HQ and Tune In is the... It's called tuneinpowertool.com. Tuneinpowertool.com. I do a lot of the neuroscience behind it. It talks about the steps. It gives you a video, and it just helps you understand this idea of you do, you can, 100%. You have these resources right in front of you, within you, and we just have to tap into it. And I think, Seth, you said it. It's like, why not give it a try? What's the worst thing that can happen, right?
Pete Wright:
Yeah, right. Right. Oh no, the worst thing that'll happen is my beliefs are challenged.
Seth Nelson:
Woe is me. I'm telling you, when I get home tonight, I'm going to...
Pete Wright:
Don't play The Pina Colada Song.
Seth Nelson:
Just in my head. Just in my head, Pete.
Hilary DeCesare:
Okay, so Seth, can you do me a favor? You try this. You try it for three nights. And after the third night, I want you to DM me and you tell me. If this hasn't changed the way your night goes, let me tell you.
Seth Nelson:
I'll try it for the next three nights because my wife's going to be out of town for two of them.
Pete Wright:
You traitor.
Hilary DeCesare:
You're so bad. Oh my God, that's so good.
Pete Wright:
Well, Hillary, it's awesome. Thank you so much for hanging out with us and teaching me about your work. And we will put links to everything in the show notes. We sure appreciate your time.
Hilary DeCesare:
Pete, Seth, thank you. It was quite a show.
Seth Nelson:
Thanks for coming on. It's really good. I almost feel like thanks for having us. I felt like I learned so much, I was on her show. I'm like, what the fuck's going on here?
Pete Wright:
I'll tell you what, we just had our listener question episode, Seth. Do you know what that means?
Seth Nelson:
We need more.
Pete Wright:
We need more questions. We've gone through all the questions that were in the queue. We did all that. So please head over to howtosplitatoaster.com and click the little button that says, "Hey, I got a question. I want Seth to answer it," and that will come straight into us and it'll let us build another listener question episode. We need to fill up the queue. We love hearing from you.
We appreciate that. Again, that's howtosplitatoaster.com. Thank you everybody for listening to this show, for downloading, for being here. We appreciate your time and your attention. On behalf of Hillary DeCesare and Seth Nelson, America's favorite divorce attorney, I'm Pete Wright. We'll see you next week right here on How to Split a Toaster, a Divorce Podcast about saving your relationships.
Outro:
How to Split a Toaster is part of the TruStory FM Podcast Network. Produced by Andy Nelson. Music by T. Bless & the Professionals and DB Studios. Seth Nelson is an attorney with NLG Divorce & Family Law with offices in Tampa, Florida. While we may be discussing family law topics, How to Split a Toaster is not intended to, nor is it providing legal advice.
Every situation is different. If you have specific questions regarding your situation, please seek your own legal counsel with an attorney licensed to practice law in your jurisdiction. Pete Wright is not an attorney or employee of NLG Divorce & Family Law. Seth Nelson is licensed to practice law in Florida.
