Welcome to Nobody Told Me.

I'm Laura Owens.

And I'm Jan Black.

What does it take to raise happy, healthy, resilient kids?

Our guest on this episode, Dr. Daniel J. Siegel,

says it's actually not that complicated. Dr. Siegel is a renowned child psychiatrist, clinical

professor of psychiatry at the UCLA School of Medicine, and a best-selling author. He's the co-author

of the new book, The Power of Showing Up, How Parental Presence Shapes

Who Our Kids Become and How Their Brains Get Wired.

Doctor, thank you so much for joining us.

Pleasure to be here with you.

What does it mean for a parent to show up?

Showing Up is a simple term that means a very deep lesson that we get from all of the science of parent-child relationships, which is when you are there with your full attention, bringing an open awareness to connecting with your child, that's what we mean by showing up.

And it has amazing ways that studies show it leads to positive growth of resilience and well-being in your child.

How is it harder than we think?

Well, these days, it's so easy to get distracted, whether it's distracted by your digital devices like your smartphone or your computer,

distracted by things you're worried about, all the things going on in the world these days,

or even just distracted by all the busyness that people tend to have themselves scheduled to do this

and do that and do this.

Showing up is kind of an antidote to all of those distractions that can lead to some

really important ways of changing your parenting.

And so the reason it's hard to do it is because the distractions take away your focused

...