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Dadville with Dave Barnes and Jon McLaughlin

Sara Watkins’ Urgent Advice for Balancing Art and Family

Dadville with Dave Barnes and Jon McLaughlin

That Sounds Fun Network

Kids & Family, Parenting

4.91.4K Ratings

🗓️ 9 June 2026

⏱️ 72 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

We sat down with 4-time Grammy winner Sara Watkins to solve a problem every professional faces: How do you maintain a 30-year career without burning out or losing your creative edge? From founding Nickel Creek at age eight to touring with icons like Jackson Browne, Sara has mastered the "communal dance" of longevity. In this session, we tackle the high-stakes pressure of performance anxiety. Sara reveals the counterintuitive secret that transformed her art: how motherhood taught her to stop "sweating the small stuff," making her a more fearless performer. We break down her blueprint for navigating complex team dynamics, the power of "side-person" leadership, and why she treats music as an essential life skill—like math or cooking—to avoid the traps of forced practice. If you’re struggling to balance ego with collaborative success, Sara’s "osmotic" approach to learning will revolutionize your workflow. This is your masterclass in staying grounded while scaling your talent. Check out Sara here: https://www.sarawatkins.com/ Join us: http://dadville.substack.com All Things Dave: https://www.davebarnes.com All Things Jon: https://www.jonmcl.com Thanks to our sponsors! Boll & Branch - Get 15% off plus free shipping on your first set of sheets at ⁠http://bollandbranch.com/dadville⁠ Exclusions apply. Quince - Go to ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠http://quince.com/dadville⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 365-day returns, plus free shipping on your order! The Wonder Project: Subscriber support makes more great content like I Gotta Ask with Annie F. Downs possible. The Wonder Project subscription on Prime Video is available in the U.S. for $8.99/month or $89.99/year after a 7-day free trial. Visit ⁠IGottaAsk.com⁠ to learn more! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0

Dadville

0:02.0

Yeah

0:05.0

Hi, I'm Dave Barnes

0:07.3

And I'm John McLaughlin

0:08.4

And welcome to Dadville

0:09.6

Dadville is a podcast

0:11.8

Where we talk about life, love,

0:13.7

And the pursuit of awesome dadding

0:15.6

It's funny thoughts and deep talks

0:17.9

So please enjoy your time here in Dadville

0:20.2

And enjoy this episode with Sarah Watkins.

0:28.6

Welcome to the Raising Boys and Girls podcast. I'm David Thomas. And I'm Sissy Gough. And we are therapists who've been practicing with kids and families for

0:38.3

over 30 years. And in each episode of our podcast, we're going to share some of what we're learning

0:44.2

in this work that we do with kids and families on a daily basis. Our goal is to help you care for the

0:49.8

kids in your life with a little more understanding, a little more practical help, and a whole lot of hope.

0:56.1

We are honored to invite you to join us on this journey of raising boys and girls.

1:04.5

Sarah, we start with what we call the brag sheet, which is just getting to know you.

1:08.9

So here we go. So just enjoy.

1:11.0

This is people hate this part because it's just all the amazing things that you've done. Actually, it's not because that would take a bajillion years, by the way. Jason sent over the brag sheet and I was like, this is, we have, we're trying to do this in an hour, man. Plus I don't have in different languages, but just for today for you. I'm just going to do English. Okay, so today on Dadville, we've got the incredibly talented Sarah Watkins with us. Sarah's one of those musicians who's basically grown up in music. She was a founding member of Nickel Creek, which started when she was a kid and went on to become one of the most influential acoustic groups of the last couple of decades. Since then, she's continued to evolve in all kinds of directions. She's part of the trio with I'm with her. She's made her own solo records, and she's collaborated with just about everybody from Dolly Parton to John Mayer to Phoebe Bridgers, which is a... And we didn't put Jackson Brown. I read that, which was so cool, which is a pretty wide range. Along the way, she's picked up a few Grammys.

2:17.4

How many, is it three or four? Four. Okay, so John, let's do a quick Grammy count. So between all of us, how many Grammys is that? Yeah, we just got those numbers in. Okay. So between the three of us, it's four. Four, okay. Yeah, just keeping that Grammy count up and live. We're going to contribute some days.

2:18.0

We'll update throughout the episode.

2:19.1

But yeah, right now it's that four.

...

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