Sisters In Law of Attraction

Christine heard a parable a few weeks ago and immediately texted Sam about it, so this episode opens with the story of the Mexican fisherman. An American investment banker meets a fisherman who works just a little while each day, then sleeps late, plays with his kids, takes siestas with his wife, and sips wine with his friends in the evening. The banker lays out a fifteen to twenty year plan for him: bigger boats, a cannery, a move to New York, an IPO. And after all that? Then you could retire to a small coastal village where you'd sleep late, fish a little, and sip wine with your friends. The fisherman is already living the life the whole plan is supposed to earn.

Last episode was about why living in the here and now matters. This one is about how. Sam and Christine get into being versus doing, and Christine shares her own version of the fisherman's choice: staying at the family restaurant through college and into motherhood while regulars kept asking when she was going to get a real job. It paid real money, it gave her time with her baby, and her sister's friend once said she always looked so happy. Maybe she had it figured out a long time ago.

Then the practical part. Christine shares the trick that's helped her daughter with anxious thoughts: name the voice in your head, so you can tell Bertha to take a hike. You are not your thoughts. You're the observer of them, and not all of them deserve your attention. Sam adds Gabby Bernstein's two words for the moment a spiral starts, choose again, and Christine brings a phrase she just heard that stopped them both: shopping for pain. You can visit those thoughts, but you can't live there.

In this episode:

• The parable of the Mexican fisherman and the Harvard MBA

• Being versus doing, and why you can live the life you want right now

• Christine's years at the family restaurant and the "real job" question

• Naming the anxious voice in your head so you can tell it to take a hike

• Choose again, and how to stop shopping for pain

Quotes from this episode:

"A life well lived is always complete. Whether that's twenty years old or eighty years old, that life was complete if you're living in the moment. Because the moment is the life." - Samantha Bauer

"Be careful which wolf you feed. The wolf of fear or the wolf of happiness and positivity. Whichever one you feed is the one that's gonna grow." - Christine Goforth

"Just be aware of your thoughts and realize that your thoughts are not you. They're manufactured thoughts in your brain that do create your reality. So you can create a different reality just by shifting your mindset." - Samantha Bauer

"When I find myself shopping for pain, that's when I know I need to come back to myself, because there is nothing wrong in this moment. Why am I going out and looking for it?" - Christine Goforth

Listen and subscribe:

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/sisters-in-law-of-attraction/id1848757802

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4OngsZM3ofSq3xTUgpChfc

All platforms: https://linktr.ee/sistersinlawpod

Episode page: https://sistersinlawofattraction.com/episodes/episode-35-mindfulness-how-to-do-it.html

Sisters In Law of Attraction is hosted by Samantha Bauer and Christine Goforth.

What is your problem right now, in this exact moment? Not the one you're bracing for. Not the what if. Right now. Most of the time the honest answer is nothing, and that question is the spine of this episode.

Sam has plenty she could spiral about. Her mom's health is uncertain, and her son Max is heading into his last year of college. She still made the back to school run to Target, picked-over shelves and all, and got him a few things for his backpack. When the sad crept in, she caught it. Life is a series of moments. Dance in this one.

Christine road tested the same idea on the side of a highway. Two blown tires on the electric car, a hundred degrees out, kids and dog in the back, two and a half hours waiting on a tow. A year ago that would have been a meltdown the whole way through. This time she noticed the panic, named it, and moved through it in about fifteen minutes. Safe, air conditioned, help on the way. No actual problem in the actual moment.

They also get into the flip side: what it feels like when presence isn't optional. Sam spent a week in LA helping her husband through a trial, and the rest of the world simply switched off. No headlines, no scrolling, no fifty small emergencies. Her new favorite sentence came out of that week, and it works on everything from a buzzing phone to adult kids: I can't care about that right now.

If your brain loves to sprint ahead to the next disaster, this one is a good anchor. The worry is optional. The moment is not.

In this episode:

• Back to school shopping for a college senior, and catching the sad before it takes over

• Why we steal the present by worrying about the past and the future

• Two blown tires, and noticing the spiral instead of riding it

• Reaction versus response, and why the gap between them is the real work

• A week in trial with room for nothing else, and what full presence feels like

• Being your kids' backstop, not their standby

Quotes from this episode:

"Life is a series of moments. You gotta dance in those moments of life, and you can enjoy it as long as you live in the here and now." - Samantha Bauer

"It's a Tuesday and you're in your bathing suit watering your lawn. You have the time off right now. It's okay to enjoy this." - Christine Goforth

"If you're in that moment, there are no problems. You have simply what is in front of you. The only problem is something your brain has created about a fear of what's gonna happen next." - Samantha Bauer

"A reaction is the history of how you've behaved and done things. Your response is who you really are now, and it takes a lot more practice for that to become automatic." - Christine Goforth

Listen and subscribe:

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/sisters-in-law-of-attraction/id1848757802

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4OngsZM3ofSq3xTUgpChfc

All platforms: https://linktr.ee/sistersinlawpod

Episode page: https://sistersinlawofattraction.com/episodes/episode-34-you-are-not-your-thoughts.html

Sisters In Law of Attraction is hosted by Samantha Bauer and Christine Goforth.

Sam and Christine finally close out The Courage to Be Disliked, and it's the piece that landed hardest for Sam. The philosopher's claim that life isn't a straight line from here to some finish line, it's a series of moments. A string of little dots you live one at a time. Draw a line with chalk, put a magnifying glass over it, and you find it was never really a line at all.

From there they get into the difference between kinetic and energeia, between climbing a mountain just to plant a flag at the top and actually being in the climb. You can reach the summit by helicopter, but then you missed the whole point. Sam shares the stage analogy that floored her. Shine a bright spotlight on the here and now and you can't see the back of the house, which is the future, or behind you, which is the past. Dim that light and suddenly you're living in the past or the future instead of right where your feet are. Christine ties it back to something they say all the time. In this moment, you have no problems. You're fed, you're housed, you're safe, you're here.

Then comes the part they both called a mic drop. Life in general has no meaning. Whatever meaning it has, you assign it, nobody hands it to you. The guiding star that keeps you from losing your way is contribution to others, and when you dance in the here and now in earnest, the meaning of your life becomes clear. Change yourself, and the world changes with you. It's a warm, honest wrap on a book Sam calls transformational, and a reminder that the value was never in the destination. It was in the dancing.

In this episode:

• Life as a series of moments, not a straight line to a finish line

• Kinetic versus energeia: climbing the mountain versus just reaching the top

• The spotlight and the stage, and why the here and now goes dark when you look ahead or behind

• Life has no built-in meaning, you're the one who gets to assign it

• Contribution to others as the guiding star, and how changing yourself changes the world

Quotes from this episode:

"If you live in the here and now, then a life that ends at twenty and a life that ends at ninety are both complete." - Samantha Bauer

"Right here in the moment, at my table with a microphone talking to you, what problems do I have? In this moment, you have no problems." - Christine Goforth

"Life in general has no meaning. Whatever meaning it has must be assigned by the individual. You are the only one who can assign meaning to your life." - Samantha Bauer

"The value is in the work, not the outcome. There's no winning or losing at life. The value is in the life you've lived, whether that's twenty years or ninety." - Christine Goforth

Listen and subscribe:

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/sisters-in-law-of-attraction/id1848757802

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4OngsZM3ofSq3xTUgpChfc

All platforms: https://linktr.ee/sistersinlawpod

Episode page: https://sistersinlawofattraction.com/episodes/episode-33-dancing-in-the-here-and-now.html

Sisters In Law of Attraction is hosted by Samantha Bauer and Christine Goforth.

Sam and Christine reach the fifth and final night of The Courage to Be Disliked, and Sam does not hide it, this one hit her as transformational. The final night opens with the young man asking whether he was brought into this world to achieve something, and the philosopher answers by pointing away from the self entirely. The work is to drop the attachment to I and turn toward concern for others, what Adler calls community feeling. Christine sums it up in four words: going from the I to the we.

From there the conversation gets into the ideas that pushed on both of them. First, the split between self-affirmation and self-acceptance. Telling yourself the real you is already a hundred percent is a trap that breeds a superiority complex, while asking how you get closer to a hundred is the honest, useful path. Christine wrestles with how that squares with the mirror affirmations and manifestation talk we all grew up on, and they land somewhere real in the middle: know your strengths, own your weaknesses, and be better than you were yesterday.

Then comes confidence over trust. Trust comes with conditions, confidence has none, and you cannot build a deep relationship until you have unconditional confidence in another person. Add contribution to others, not as self-sacrifice but as the thing that actually gives you self-worth, and you get the book's quiet punchline: happiness is the feeling of contribution. The part that stuck hardest is the courage to be ordinary. In a world that sells you the promotion, the bigger house, and the endless chase to be special, choosing your own normal takes real courage. Not society's normal, not your family's, your own.

In this episode:

• Community feeling and the shift from I to we

• Self-affirmation versus self-acceptance, and where affirmations actually fit

• Confidence over trust, and why deep relationships need it unconditionally

• Contribution to others as the real source of self-worth

• The courage to be ordinary in a world obsessed with being special

Quotes from this episode:

"Self-affirmation is false. It creates a superiority complex that isn't based in reality. You need to accept who you are in this moment, and then go from there." — Samantha Bauer

"The courage to be misunderstood, the courage to be disliked, the courage to live authentically as yourself and not according to somebody else's set of values or morals." — Christine Goforth

"If you want to be special, it's because you haven't accepted your normal self. You really and truly need to be chasing being normal." — Samantha Bauer

"Whatever normal is for you. Not society's normal, not what your family thinks is normal, but your own normal." — Christine Goforth

Listen and subscribe:

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/sisters-in-law-of-attraction/id1848757802

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4OngsZM3ofSq3xTUgpChfc

All platforms: https://linktr.ee/sistersinlawpod

Episode page: https://sistersinlawofattraction.com/episodes/episode-32-the-courage-to-be-ordinary.html

Sisters In Law of Attraction is hosted by Samantha Bauer and Christine Goforth.

Sam and Christine reach the fourth night of The Courage to Be Disliked, and the whole thing flips: you are not the center of the world. It sounds like a knock, but it turns out to be the good news. If whether people like you was never your task to begin with, then a huge weight you have been carrying was never yours to hold.

They start with an idea that stings a little. Wanting to be liked is actually a form of self-centeredness. When you are obsessed with being thought well of, you are still stuck on the I, still making it about you. Real belonging works the other way around. Instead of asking what other people can do for you, you ask what you can give, and Sam ties that straight back to what she told her son when he was little: you are here to lift others.

From there they get into one of Adler's most practical ideas, horizontal relationships. You drop praise and punishment, because both come from a place of looking down, and you replace them with plain encouragement. Christine and Sam love that the word courage is nested right inside encouragement. You are not rewarding a good outcome, you are helping someone find the courage to do their own work. Praise the effort, not the result. I love the colors you picked, what were you thinking when you chose those.

The most tender moment comes when Christine shares what she told her daughter on a hard day. Go paint some rocks with encouraging messages and leave them at the park. Weed a neighbor's garden. Write your grandma a note. Because getting out of your own head and being of use to someone else is where self-worth actually comes from. And self-worth, Adler says, is what gives you the courage to live. It all lands on one honest line that ties the whole book together: I am of use to someone.

In this episode:

- Why you are not the center of the world, and why that is freeing

- How wanting to be liked is really a form of self-centeredness

- Commitment to community: asking what you can give, not what you can get

- Horizontal vs. vertical relationships, and dropping praise and rebuke

- Encouragement over praise, and the courage nested inside it

- Serving others as a real tool for self-worth and mental health

Quotes from this episode:

"Your wanting to be liked by others is your attachment to yourself. It's not concern for others, it's nothing but attachment to self." - Samantha Bauer

"There is a feeling of being part of something bigger, and it feels so good. Especially when you're contributing to it, you realize it's not about you. It's just bigger than one individual." - Christine Goforth

"There's that word courage, nested right inside encouragement. In a horizontal relationship, you're encouraging someone to be courageous enough to do their own life tasks." - Samantha Bauer

"It gets you out of your own head, and it feels good to do good for other people. That's a huge piece of community, and it's a huge piece of mental health." - Christine Goforth

Listen and subscribe:

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/sisters-in-law-of-attraction/id1848757802

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4OngsZM3ofSq3xTUgpChfc

All platforms: https://linktr.ee/sistersinlawpod

Episode page: https://sistersinlawofattraction.com/episodes/episode-31-its-not-about-you.html

Sisters In Law of Attraction is hosted by Samantha Bauer and Christine Goforth.

Sam and Christine are back in The Courage to Be Disliked, and the third night of discussion is the one that hits closest to home: the separation of tasks. The big idea is deceptively simple. Whether someone likes you is their task, not yours. And trying to manage everyone else's tasks, fixing, steering, worrying, is exactly what turns life into something heavy and full of hardship.

Sam shares two real parenting moments where she caught herself mid-intrusion. Her son Max is hunting for an apartment for the new school year, and instead of weighing in on the listings, she landed on, "I believe you'll make the right decision for you." Her daughter cut it close on a flight, and rather than rescue or scold, Sam let her own the scramble. It's uncomfortable, especially as the kids get older and the stakes get higher, but it's also freeing. Their job is to be a backstop, not to live their kids' lives for them.

Christine brings the boundaries piece home with a line from an old colleague of Sam's: don't let people put their crap in your backpack. Some of us are more absorbent than others, quietly carrying fifteen people's little pieces of baggage until our own load feels impossible. They get into denying the desire for recognition, why people-pleasing leaves you empty, the reward-and-punishment trap, and the stone rolling downhill that gets smoothed of all its unique edges. Real freedom, they land on, is the courage to push back against the pull to be liked and stay authentically yourself.

In this episode:

• The separation of tasks and how to spot whose task is whose

• Two parenting moments where stepping back beat stepping in

• Denying the desire for recognition without becoming heartless

• Why people-pleasing quietly erases who you actually are

• The stone rolling downhill, and what real freedom costs

Quotes from this episode:

"Whether you like me or dislike me, that's your task. You can't make someone like you. That is not your task." - Samantha Bauer

"If you're trying to please everybody, you're pleasing nobody. You end up sacrificing who you are to live according to how other people think you should be living." - Christine Goforth

"If you give in to the desire to be liked, you're just a stone rolling downhill, left smoothed out with all your unique edges gone. You're no longer authentically you." - Samantha Bauer

"How exhausting is it to constantly seek validation from other people? You can't make somebody like you. The right ones will stick and everything else will fall away." - Christine Goforth

Listen and subscribe:

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/sisters-in-law-of-attraction/id1848757802

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4OngsZM3ofSq3xTUgpChfcAll platforms: https://linktr.ee/sistersinlawpod

Episode page: https://sistersinlawofattraction.com/episodes/episode-30-discard-other-peoples-tasks.html

Sisters In Law of Attraction is hosted by Samantha Bauer and Christine Goforth.

Sam and Christine keep working through The Courage to Be Disliked, and this week the claim on the table is a big one: every problem you have is an interpersonal relationship problem. Strip other people out of the picture and jealousy, comparison, shame, and the fear of judgment all disappear. You can't be lonely in an empty universe. The shadows of other people are always there. It sounds extreme until you actually try to name a worry that isn't tied to someone else.From there they get into Adler's take that feelings of inferiority are not a disease, they're fuel. We're all born helpless, we're all beginners at everything, and that little gap between where you are and where you want to be is exactly what pushes you to grow. The trap is when it curdles into an inferiority complex, the story that you're just not good at this and never will be. Christine reframes it with one small word: yet. The flip side is the superiority complex, the chest-puffing braggart who's really just masking a lack.That all builds to the heart of the episode: life is not a competition. Everyone is moving forward, just at a different pace. Some are way ahead, some are way behind, but everyone's moving, and the only race that matters is your own. Sam gets vulnerable here, admitting she may have raised her kids to compete when she could have taught them to run their own race. They close on Adler's three life tasks, work, friendship, and love, and the idea that this is a psychology of courage and use, not possession. It's not what you were born with, it's what you do with it. You're in the driver's seat. In this episode: • Why all problems trace back to interpersonal relationships • Feelings of inferiority as fuel for growth, and the power of the word "yet" • The difference between healthy striving and a superiority or inferiority complex • Sam's honest confession about raising her kids to compete • Comrades, not enemies, and Adler's three life tasks: work, friendship, love Quotes from this episode: "It's not about being better than others. Everyone is moving forward, just at a different pace. The forward motion is striving and growing for yourself, not competing against everyone else." — Samantha Bauer "You are on your own path, living your own life. Everybody has a different set of desires and goals, so why on earth would you compare the road you're taking to something completely different?" — Christine Goforth "When you focus on competing with others, it becomes about winning and losing, and you start to see everyone as your enemy. The moment you see them as comrades instead, the world starts to look more positive." — Samantha Bauer "I don't need to prove to you that I'm right about anything. I choose my peace." — Christine Goforth Listen and subscribe: Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/sisters-in-law-of-attraction/id1848757802 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4OngsZM3ofSq3xTUgpChfc All platforms: https://linktr.ee/sistersinlawpod Episode page: https://sistersinlawofattraction.com/episodes/episode-29-life-is-not-a-competition.html Sisters In Law of Attraction is hosted by Samantha Bauer and Christine Goforth.

This one is a direct follow-up to the Adler episode, and it goes straight after self-sabotage: all the quiet ways we get in our own way and never once call it that. Sam and Christine start with the sneakiest culprit of them all, comfort. Staying somewhere too long, not growing, telling yourself this is working for me when really it is just familiar. Sam talks about watching both of her kids leave comfortable situations in their twenties, her daughter Maddie moving to Dallas after her second year of law school and her son heading to Boston for training, and the line that stuck with her: you can always go and come back, but you can't always go.

From there they get into the idea behind the title, pulled from The Courage to Be Disliked: the life lie. It is the story we tell ourselves to excuse the inaction and shift the responsibility off our own shoulders. I'm just not organized. I'm not a numbers person. I never have the time. They walk through the everyday shapes self-sabotage takes, procrastination, perfectionism, overthinking, second-guessing, harsh self-criticism, and the negative loop that runs on repeat in your head. Christine makes the case that if you have time to talk yourself down, you have time to pump yourself up, and that rewiring the pattern happens one brick at a time. Sam brings in Byron Katie's The Work and the simple questions you can ask to take a thought apart and see if it is even true.

The best story might be Sam at seventeen, tutoring her softball teammates in math and refusing to touch a single equation until they fixed what they believed about themselves first. Mindset coach before math tutor. They close on a question from a Barbara Field piece in Verywell Mind that cuts right to it: is your behavior actually lining up with your goals? Sam's honest example is the diet that goes great Monday through Friday and falls apart every weekend. Nobody does the good-for-them thing all the time, and that is not the point. The point is catching where comfortable is quietly winning, and choosing to get back in your own driver's seat.

In this episode:

• Why comfortable is the most disguised form of self-sabotage

• The life lie, from The Courage to Be Disliked, and the stories we use to excuse inaction

• The everyday faces of self-sabotage: procrastination, perfectionism, overthinking, second-guessing

• Fear of success is just as real as fear of failure

• Rewiring the negative loop one brick at a time, with a nod to Byron Katie's The Work

• Sam at seventeen, coaching mindset before math

Quotes from this episode:

"You literally created a problem that didn't exist by overthinking and second-guessing. You sabotage your own progress because you keep doubting everything you did." - Samantha Bauer

"Self-sabotage is always wrapped up in something that disguises itself as beneficial in the moment, even though long term it's keeping you stuck and stagnant." - Christine Goforth

"We didn't even start with the math. We started with how she felt about it. You have to fix the belief before you can ever do the work." - Samantha Bauer

"If we have time to do the negative self-talk, we have time to pump ourselves up. For some reason our brains just naturally tend to find the negative." - Christine Goforth

Listen and subscribe:

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/sisters-in-law-of-attraction/id1848757802

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4OngsZM3ofSq3xTUgpChfc

All platforms: https://linktr.ee/sistersinlawpod

Episode page: https://sistersinlawpod.com/episodes/episode-28-the-life-lie.html

Sisters In Law of Attraction is hosted by Samantha Bauer and Christine Goforth.

Sam brings a birthday gift to the conversation this week: The Courage to Be Disliked by Ichiro Kishimi and Fumitake Koga, a book that walks through the psychology of Alfred Adler as a back-and-forth between a young man and a philosopher. The very first chapter is titled "deny trauma," and Sam knows going in that the idea is going to be provocative. So she says it out loud anyway.

The Adlerian claim at the center of it: we don't suffer from the shock of an experience, we suffer from the meaning we assign to it, because that meaning serves a purpose. Adler called the focus on purpose teleology, as opposed to etiology, which only looks at the cause. Christine pushes back, because trauma is real, and the two of them work through the nuance together. The point isn't that bad things didn't happen to you. It's that ruminating on why they happened keeps you stuck, while asking how you want to move forward is what lets you grow. As Christine puts it, we are not responsible for what happened to us, but we are 100% responsible for how we carry it.

To keep it from getting too heavy, they pull in the Summer House reunion, where Sierra finally tells Amanda to stop letting life happen to her and get in the driver's seat. Amanda got comfortable in the victim role because, on some level, it served her, and that comfort is the same trap Adler is describing. From there it comes back to the whole point of this podcast: you are more powerful than you think, your thoughts run on a loop, and you get to decide what you make them mean. The episode also opens with a sweet listener story about a dad who taught his kids that kind thoughts don't belong to you, so if you think something nice, you say it. Next week, they pick up the thread with self-sabotage.

In this episode:

• A listener's story: if you think something nice, you say it

• The Adlerian idea that we suffer from the meaning we assign to trauma, not the event itself

• Teleology vs etiology, or purpose vs cause, without getting too academic about it

• Why playing the victim can quietly serve you, with a Summer House assist

• The difference between visiting your pain and living there

• You get to decide what you carry forward

Quotes from this episode:

"We don't suffer from the shock of the experience, the so-called trauma. We suffer by the meaning we assign to it, because it serves a purpose." - Samantha Bauer

"We are not responsible for the things that happen to us that we have zero hand in. But we are 100% responsible for how we carry through life after that event happens." - Christine Goforth

"You could sit back and let life happen to you. But let's be honest, life is happening exactly how you want it to, because you're making decisions." - Samantha Bauer

"We all have these narrations in our head, stories we tell ourselves. So often they're not true, and they're self-limiting beliefs." - Christine Goforth

Listen and subscribe:

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/sisters-in-law-of-attraction/id1848757802

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4OngsZM3ofSq3xTUgpChfc

All platforms: https://linktr.ee/sistersinlawpod

Episode page: https://sistersinlawpod.com/episodes/episode-27-adler-trauma-and-the-drivers-seat.html

Sisters In Law of Attraction is hosted by Samantha Bauer and Christine Goforth.

Sam and Christine pick up the high-vibe thread from the spirit guides episode and turn it outward this week. The question on the table: what does it actually do for your mental health when you serve other people? The hook lands in the first minute when Sam shares the line she used to tell her son Max when he was four years old and asked her why he was here. Her answer was simple: your job is to lift others.

From there, the conversation gets practical. Helping other people lowers cortisol, the stress hormone, and raises oxytocin, the chemical tied to positive social interactions and generosity. Translation: doing nice things for other people genuinely reduces your anxiety and your depression. But Sam and Christine spend most of the episode pushing back on the idea that service has to be a grand gesture. It doesn't. It's holding the door. It's putting groceries on the belt for the older woman behind you who can't quite reach. It's smiling at someone in the grocery line. It's the small stuff nobody talks about but everybody notices.

Christine tells the story of her older daughter Jules, who started doing affirmations in the car on the way to elementary school, then asked the principal if she could lead the whole school in affirmations every Wednesday morning. She wrote them out the night before, stood in front of her classmates with a microphone, and the whole school repeated her words back to her. Then there are the anonymous notes Christine's girls would write and have the office slip into other kids' lunch boxes. Thanks for being my favorite teacher. You're awesome. That's it. That's the whole move.

Sam shares about a recent Clemson tailgate in South Carolina, where she and her husband wore the wrong colors and got hauled into strangers' chairs anyway. The guy walked over, handed her husband a beer, and said: we really would like to get to know you, can you please sit? Sam also talks about the bonding that happens during work days with her women's guild raising money for Valley Children's Hospital, folding a thousand napkins side by side. The takeaway is small: this week, turn around in the grocery line and smile at someone behind you.

In this episode:

• The mental health science of service: cortisol down, oxytocin up

• Why the grand gesture myth keeps people from giving at all

• Christine's daughter Jules leading affirmations in front of the whole school

• Anonymous lunchbox notes and other tiny moves that change someone's day

• Sam's southern hospitality moment at a Clemson tailgate

• How serving others builds community and pulls you out of your own head

Quotes from this episode:

"I always told my kids, your job is to lift others. So much of depression or anxiety is being internally focused. If you could just get outside of yourself and go help, you shift." - Samantha Bauer

"We have this idea in our head that it has to be some big grand gesture. It doesn't. All you have to do is have your eyes open, be aware of your surroundings, and see where you can help." - Christine Goforth

"Helping others decreases cortisol, our stress hormone, and increases oxytocin tied to positive social interactions and generosity. It reduces your anxiety and your depression by default." - Samantha Bauer

"If everybody laid all their problems out on a table, you would take yours back in an instant. That's the perspective shift you get from looking up and out." - Christine Goforth

Listen and subscribe:

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/sisters-in-law-of-attraction/id1848757802

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4OngsZM3ofSq3xTUgpChfc

All platforms: https://linktr.ee/sistersinlawpod

Episode page: https://sistersinlawofattraction.com/episodes/episode-26-lift-others-lift-yourself.html

Sisters In Law of Attraction is hosted by Samantha Bauer and Christine Goforth.