Secrets to a Happy Catholic Family
Girlfriends (A Podcast for Catholic Women)
Danielle Bean
4.9 • 810 Ratings
🗓️ 27 May 2025
⏱️ 33 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
This week, I’m bringing back a fan favorite episode—one that’s close to my heart because it features a very special guest: my husband, Dan Bean! Together, we dive into what it really means to have fun as a Catholic family.
We talk honestly (and hilariously) about what has and hasn’t worked in our 26+ years of marriage and parenting our eight children. We share personal stories, lessons learned, and the surprising importance of not taking ourselves too seriously. From letting go of perfectionism to making space for joy, this episode will leave you smiling, nodding along, and maybe rethinking your next family outing.
In this episode, you’ll hear:
* The one thing every family should always do to make space for joy
* Why trying too hard (yes, even with hot dog mummies) can ruin the moment
* Dan’s surprisingly deep take on why families shouldn’t “fake it” when it comes to connection
* Our take on Catholic family culture that’s fun, faithful, and free of guilt
This is a great one to revisit—or listen to for the first time if you missed it the first time around!
Got a favorite way your family has fun together? I’d love to hear about it! Reach out to me on social media or via email and share your stories.
🎧 Listen now and laugh along with us as we remember what really matters in Catholic family life.
ANNOUNCEMENTS
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This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit daniellebean.substack.com/subscribe
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hey girlfriend, how are you? Thank you so much for showing up for this special episode of the |
| 0:04.1 | Girlfriend's podcast. This is a throwback episode and it's even a special episode outside of that. |
| 0:09.3 | So what I'm doing here is I'm sharing with you this recording of a podcast that I recorded together |
| 0:14.1 | with my husband, Dan. So way back when I want to say it was probably four, I can tell you exactly |
| 0:20.3 | how many years ago it was. It was |
| 0:21.6 | five years ago because in this podcast we say we've been married for 26 years and actually this July, |
| 0:27.1 | it'll be 31 years. So it's that long ago that we recorded this, but it was, it's evergreen material. |
| 0:32.6 | And I loved doing this conversation with Dan. So we recorded it way back when we were creating these |
| 0:38.1 | pilot episodes for a podcast that we were going to do together with a publisher. That ended up not |
| 0:44.5 | working out. And in the end, as disappointed as I was at the moment, in the end, I'm glad it |
| 0:50.1 | didn't work out. It wouldn't have been the right fit for us or for them. And I guess God knew that. |
| 0:55.9 | Anyway, just a little side note there. Sometimes when you're disappointed with things that happen in life, |
| 1:00.1 | you've got goals, you've got ideas, you've got dreams, you've got things that you want to happen, |
| 1:04.4 | and then they don't go quite the way that you thought. It can be really disappointing and |
| 1:07.8 | discouraging in the moment. But this morning, as I'm |
| 1:11.1 | recording this and thinking back on this and listening to this recording to share it with you |
| 1:14.9 | here, I'm like, that really worked out for the best. I loved recording this with Dan. I still would |
| 1:20.2 | love to do a podcast together with Dan. In fact, the first time that I shared this was when |
| 1:26.0 | we were thinking about launching a podcast together on |
| 1:29.3 | Substack. And I got him to agree to it. Dan's a little bit more reluctant when it comes to media, |
| 1:33.8 | when it comes to speaking. He's a Catholic school teacher for over 20 years. It's not like he's |
| 1:38.4 | not good at speaking. He's definitely good at that. It's just he's got a very different temperament. |
... |
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