
I’m joined today by Susan Cain, who is a best-selling author and Ted Talk speaker, and she’s been named one of the top influencers in the world. I’m a big fan of her work and I’m really excited to get to chat with her today! Susan’s first book “Quiet” was all about the beauty and acceptance of the introverted nature. Her newest one, “Bittersweet” covers how joy and sorrow combine in life to create fullness.
If you’ve ever felt inspired by a rainy day or sad music, or people have called you “an old soul,” then you probably already know what bittersweet feels like. Susan talks about how the sadness in our lives isn’t a detour from our main path, but a part of it. We also discuss how this relates to helping our kids deal with the full spectrum of their own life experiences.
Some of you may know that I have the words “memento mori” (remember your death) tattooed on my wrist as a reminder to live every day to the fullest. The concept of bittersweet is to embrace our emotions and experiences and let them help us shape a brighter future. I really really enjoy Susan’s work, and I hope you’ll join me and listen in on today’s episode!
Episode Highlights With Susan Cain
- What led her to write her book “Quiet” and why “Bittersweet” was an important follow up
- The importance of joy and sorrow together for the fullness of life
- Why the impermanence of life paradoxically leads to joy
- Connection of melancholy and love and why certain sad music can touch us so deeply
- What studies show about the relationship between a melancholic state of mind and creativity
- The wounded healer archetype and why a very high percentage of people we consider “the greats” in art or music had a huge loss, often of a parent, at an early age
- Strategies for learning to embrace the bittersweet
- Ways we can help our kids learn to accept the bittersweet as part of life and support them through this
- How we can inherit grief and trauma from past generations and how we can transform this into beauty and creativity
Resources We Mention
- Susan Cain – Her website
- Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking by Susan Cain
- Bittersweet: How Sorrow and Longing Make Us Whole by Susan Cain
- Letting Go: The Pathway of Surrender by David R. Hawkins M.D. Ph.D
- Spring and Fall Poem by Gerard Manley Hopkins
- Her Bittersweet playlist on Spotify
- 483: Mark Wolynn on Why It Didn’t Start With You, Inherited Trauma & How We Heal
- The Next Big Idea book club
- Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi
More From Wellness Mama
- 592: Dr. Rachel Yehuda on How Trauma and Healing Cross Generations
- 577: Sherry Walling on How to Use Movement to Ease Pain and Grief
- 519: Yung Pueblo Diego Perez on Meditation, Going Inward, and Clarity & Connection
- 502: Dr Joe Dispenza on Changing Your Thoughts, Emotions & Life
- 491: Peter Crone on Freedom From the Prisons of the Subconscious Mind
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