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Children can benefit from mindfulness.

The mindfulness in school projects suggests that well-conducted mindfulness interventions can help young people be more focused, reduce anxiety, and gives children the ability to manage behavior and emotions.

Tonight, we talk to a former educator and international bestselling author.

To find out how we could develop these skills and our children.

I'm so happy you're joining us.

From Los Angeles.

This is KLCS PBS.

Welcome to everybody with Angela Williamson.

And innovation, Arts, education and public affairs program.

Everybody with Angela Williamson is made possible by viewers like you.

Thank you.

And now your host, doctor Angela Williamson.

Denise McCormick is our guest.

Mindfulness is a part of who you are.

Can you tell us before we get to your children's book?

Never mind the monkey mind.

Can you tell us what does mindfulness mean to Denise?

And how did you start walking this path?

Mindfulness means to me the message of my children's book.

That what you say to your mind.

Your mind will then say to you.

It all starts with your words, which you have the power to choose.

And Angela, I have a very powerful story of how I started on my mindfulness journey before I even knew what mindfulness was.

I was 13 years old and we were out golfing.

We heaved our golf bags on our shoulders, a group of four girls one day, and we got to the fourth hole and Terry, who was not with a set day, lived right by the golf course.

So she came.

We went up and over to talk with her.

We were unaware that one of our friends was going to go ahead and take her shot.

I was standing right by Kathy and then myself and Mary, and the ball hit Kathy in the head, and I went blistering pace to the golf course and got some help for.

We found out that night she was resting quietly.

The next morning I left for vacation for a week.

That afternoon she told her mother she was tired and she went to lie down and she passed away from a brain aneurysm, the autopsy said.

So I was gone the week of the funeral.

There was no processing there was no any of that.

I came back a week later, and when I found out, I stumbled up to my bedroom and plopped down on the bed with my quote books and my Bible passages, and I had to figure out, because I came from a very dysfunctional family, how I was going to process this in my own mind.

And that is the day I really feel like I had a spiritual transformation, because I became a woman with a Y that day.

And I actually have a talk that I did, as a worldwide woman speak Circle Leader on both my website and YouTube that chronicles this journey of what I did that day.

And I decided that choices must be positive in my life.

And I started visualizing what I wanted to do in my life, as if it had already happened.

And I went after goal after goal after goal.

And by the end of my senior year, I was the Dan fourth Foundation Outstanding Leadership Award, and I knew it was just the beginning of my service to the world.

I have a few questions to ask you based on on that powerful story.

first, explain to us what that award means and how do they find recipients like yourself at such a young age to receive that award?

So tell us about.

Well, I it it's contingent on all the things the contributions you make throughout your high school years.

And I was just involved with everything.

And not only did I believe in being a good student and a student at the high school, but I was I active in my community.

I started playing at church at 12.

And, I was just, active in all kinds of community things too.

And so I think they saw in me they had a belief in me early, and I always borrowed my mentors beliefs till I believed in it myself.

And that's another mindful thing that you can do seek out positive people and positive reading.

Because whatever you say to your mind, your mind believes.

And that's what a lot of people don't realize.

And so my my question to you is we're going to go back to, that tragic week and, you deciding that you were going to change the way that you were thinking to make positive choices.

But in that story, you mentioned that even though your family was a dysfunctional family, you were still able to turn it around for the positive.

a lot of people will be watching, and they may have grown up in that type of dysfunction, too.

So how do we turn that around?

And what gave you the power to do that at such a young age?

Because the dysfunction is an energy that's stronger than you being a functioning person.

So how do you do that?

Well, it's it's by saying positive things to yourself.

So I would read my quote books every day.

And this is still a practice I have in my morning on purpose now.

But I didn't know what it was then.

And see.

Do you see where my impetus to teach children this comes from?

Because they're not going to have an experience like I had.

I was very, sometimes a really tragic thing can be a fortunate thing for you.

If you have a growth mindset and you can say, what can I learn from this?

Kathy wanted to be an astronaut.

She came from a wonderful family that would have given her that support.

Well, I just decided to honor her life and her legacy by making my own.

And that's a story I'm also putting in the book you and I are doing together.

that's launching on October 26th.

That's part of my story with that.

So tell us what the name of that book is.

It's called leading with legacy.

And a legacy is what a person leaves behind, how they will be remembered.

And so I decided to end to honor Kathy, that I would leave my life with legacy.

And so that's how I did it.

And you talked about a growth mindset.

And I mean, how does a young person, you know, just barely starting in her teens, that goes through this, you know, tragedy and loses?

What are your dear friends, how do you develop that growth mindset?

I think I'm really fortunate because I love to read.

And so because I read a lot of things, biographies, I was always looking to mentors beyond my, my realm of, of, you know, where I was.

And so I read I sought out good mentors that I borrowed their belief till I believed in myself.

And I still do this, and people do it for me and I do it for them.

And so I just once I found out that I could set a goal and make it, I just I just went, oh, that's how it works.

You make a picture in your mind, you visualize what you want it to be, and then you believe it's going to happen.

And I have time after time after time in my life.

And in fact, in Women Who Shine, I wrote about six decades a mindset, and I talked about, a tragedy or an adversity that I've gone through and how I used mindset to get me through that.

And I did it in Women Who Impact, because I showed how my husband and I went through ten years of the farm crisis by visualizing what we were going to do and how we were going to get through it.

And we did.

And so many people lost their farms.

But, you know, that's when I went back into education.

Angela and, you know, I would get up at four in the morning.

It takes the work.

Jack Canfield says everything you want is out there waiting for you to ask.

Everything you want also wants you.

And I found that out because I said, if I want it and it comes to me what my smart want me to.

But you have to take the action.

So I was a really hard worker and I found that work.

If you are working towards a goal, no matter how long it takes, and that's a growth mindset, you just keep saying, I'm I'm learning, I'm growing, I'm getting better and this, this will happen.

So you mentioned two, things that I want to follow up on before we end this segment, because people might not remember.

So I want you to tell us a little bit about that farm crisis that you wrote about in your first book and, and how that impacted all.

You mean friends of yours in the state of Iowa, how that impacted you?

Because we may people may think, I think I've heard something, but to refresh our memory would be really wonderful, because then it would show your growth mindset of getting through something that was that challenge you.

Well, that's why I wrote that story, Angela, because I felt like the not just the United States, but I felt the world didn't understand why that crisis happened.

So I also gave the background of why what caused it, and that it was totally out of the farmer's control of everything that happened.

But we had so many awful things happened.

There were suicides, and there were there were shootings, and there were I mean, people were losing four generations of their life's work and I said to my husband, what do you want to do?

And he said, we can make it.

It's going to take us a long time.

That's when I went back to school.

So I would get up at four in the morning.

I would study and to get my education degree.

I had two and a half years of college before this hit, and I would, study then, get our kids off to school.

They were in grade school.

Then I'd go to classes, they'd study at the library, I'd come home, take care of them and do that.

And I was a 4.0 student, and I learned that I had this goal that I had to be I couldn't be an average to get a job.

And we needed we needed the income from me.

And so I just said, I'm going to use my mind, my mindset and visualize that I can do this.

And sure enough, I got a great job afterwards.

And I've been a teacher for 26 years and then a college professor for ten.

We are going to take a break, and then we're going to talk about now your journey to make sure children have these skills to help them move through their life as well.

So stay with us and we will be right back to to you.

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Hey, world, I have a quick message.

It's about stagecraft.

All right, let's go.

Any time you drive and have the Super Bowl tight, both hands on the wheel and your phone out of sight when not in your hand, want to take somebody's bet?

Because if you do, the car might get snatched.

The moral of the story?

Just put your phone down.

The people on the road will stay safe and sound, but your phone down.

Put your phone down.

People on the road would say safe and sound.

Yeah.

Where's Tom?

I thought he was with you.

No, Jack.

It's Tommy.

Oh.

Don't stop.

Keep playing.

Here we go.

Here's the fun part.

Encouragement.

Pass it on.

From the Foundation.

For a Better Life.

Thank you for watching.

You'll see us.

Denise, tell us how recently you've used this mindfulness process and how that worked for you to have an amazing experience.

Well, about a year ago.

And I really wanted to see Donny Osmond in concert.

because I had first seen him when I was eight years old and he was five years old on The Andy Williams Show.

So I had been watching his career for 60 years, and I said, I'd really like to see him in Las Vegas before he stops doing shows.

And sure enough, this year when we're coming out to do the the premiere of Authentic Conversations, Deep Talk with the Masters that Angela has done as a documentary, she said, well, I think there might be a way that we could go to Las Vegas.

Let's set up a time for a show.

And so I started saying to my mind that I believed that I was going to get to sing with Donny Osmond.

And I told her, I told my husband, I told my virtual assistant, I told several other people, and I didn't know how it's going to happen.

Now, with mindfulness, you don't have to know how it's going to happen.

You don't know, okay?

You just put it out there and just let it unfold, okay?

So we went to Donny Show on Saturday night, and I'm sitting there at the part where they allow the audience to choose songs that they'd like.

And I'm not even really thinking.

I'm trying to think, well, what song would I like for him to do?

And pretty soon he comes down off the stage and he's coming towards me, and I'm going, and my friend is behind me going, Denise has been waiting to see you in concert for 60 years.

And he goes, well, where you been?

And he asked me where I was from, and I said, Mount Pleasant, Iowa.

And he asked what song?

And I told him he took my hand and he led me up to the stage where he started singing to me.

Then he danced with me, and then we joined together at the end of the song.

It was like, I believe that that was going to happen, and it did, and I can I can give you so many, examples of that throughout my life.

And you make it sound so easy because most of the time, I think when we, we put out to the universe what we want most of the time it's probably negative because we have so many thoughts running through our heads with 80, 60.

60 to 70.

Thousand every day.

And most of that's negative.

80%, negative.

80%.

That's where I got the 80 from 80% negative.

So I mean, to put something out in the universe that's positive is I mean, we don't even think that we can do that.

But this has been something I mean, we're using this phenomenal example, but this has been something you had to put in practice during times of tragedy or major hurt in your life.

So tell us how you did that.

Well, it's just it's just because I did it at 13 and I saw it work through my high school years.

Then I did it through my 20s each each decade.

I had long term goals and short term goals, and I would write them down.

That's important.

And I would visualize them coming to fruition.

And every single time I got through that.

And so, you know, raising children and then going through the farm crisis and then going to get my masters.

And then I started traveling around the world with student I, I put this out to the universe.

I would like to travel the world.

Well, I got a phone call from the college from a woman that said, you've been nominated to be at People of People student ambassador leader.

So I took middle school students for five summers to ten countries around the world, and I got to do this before I ever was able to, pay for my own trip because we had kids in college.

But it was done.

I mean, so there's another example.

I have example after example after example, but.

You have a wonderful example of how you used it that brings you to Jacksonville to.

Yes.

Explain to us, that that experience.

And then also to refresh our audience about who Jack Canfield is.

One of the most tragic things that happened after I retired from my.

And actually I use the word redirect, not retire.

I got that from a professor.

it was my mother died suddenly in January, right after I retired.

And then my nephew took his life ten days later, and I entered what I call the dark night of my soul because it was very, very tragic and it was very difficult.

Everything that I had to do as the executor of my mother's estate.

So by August, I said to my husband, I need to get my spirit back.

And I met my mindfulness, my positive attitude.

So I saw online Jack Canfield, break through to success, and I thought, I've been very successful.

I want to breakthrough back to that because I was so, so sad and not sure what I was going to do with all the knowledge that I had from my former career.

So I went to down to, Arizona, and I met my publisher, now publisher that you and I both have, Kate Butler, and she planted a seed in my mind to shine about possibly writing a story.

And I didn't do it right away, but it stayed there, and I went on to become a certified Canfield trader in the success principles.

And I started writing books.

And then the biggest thing was my dream as a K-12 reading specialist to be a. I've read thousands of books to kids and all the elementary kids, and I wanted to write my own book and then write a song because I'm a singer and songwriter.

That would cement the lesson of the book in the minds of the children forever.

And let's talk about this book as we end our conversation tonight.

Tell me about this book and how our educators can use this inside the classroom.

Because it's not just for elementary school children.

You've used this in middle school and high.

School, and I did it in high school.

In your class the other day?

Yes.

This book, the people ask me the ages.

I say 5 to 99.

It is actually a message for all of us about the power of what we choose to say to our own minds.

Remember my message, what you say to your mind.

Your mind will then say to you, it all starts with your words which you have the power to choose.

So I have had the pleasure to take this book out to former classrooms I've been in and share with the kids and and do writing activities.

It's all about what they this.

The boy in the story recognizes he's based off a student I had that had a fixed mindset.

He believed he couldn't read when he got to third grade, I went over to him and I said, what would you love to do?

And he says, miss McCormick, I want to read a chapter book.

I said, done tomorrow when you come, there will be a stack of them there.

I got four libraries, every Frog and toad book I could find.

And he learned to read that year in fifth grade, he walks back to me with a great big, thick chapter book and he said, Mrs. McCormick, look what I'm reading now.

You were the first person that taught me how to read.

I said, now wait a minute here.

I only ask you a question.

I ask you what you would love to do.

And you told me, and you did the hard work and you persevered.

And I said, you can do that with anything you want to do.

And he goes, I can't, can't I?

So he had a growth mindset and that's what we have to give our children.

That's what this book does for children, because the boy is the hero in the story, because he discovers that he has these negative voices that are telling him, I can't shut up.

What if you know all those things that I just quit, all those things that children deal with.

But every adult deals with them too.

And so I just made it so that he could sing a song called Never Mind the Monkey Mind, because that's not really me.

We are not our thoughts.

We are not our thoughts.

They are the result of all the things we take in through our five senses.

But we're only consciously aware, Angela, a 1% of what comes into our brain.

So that's why we have to get more mindful.

Well, and and before we end our time together was such a wonderful conversation.

when we talk about in Never Mind the monkey mind, that actually the monkey mind comes from a Buddhist philosophy that teaches us.

So tell us about that before we end our conversation.

And then there's a part of this book that we could actually do.

Everybody can do it.

So talk about that too.

Okay.

So the monkey mind is a term I researched it, there's books on it.

I'm actually developing a course online to master the monkey mind, to go from worry to wonder.

It is when people, Angela cannot stay in the present moment.

They're either worried about something wrong that happened in the past, or they're anxious about what's happening in the future.

So it is a way to be mindful, to stay in the present moment, to stay in joy and love and peace.

And we need to teach our children this, and we need to teach them the techniques that allow that to happen.

One of them is breathing.

And when I went to your high school class, they love that.

Didn't Angela walked in and they're all just I was doing a meditation with one of the people that he's actually the meditation and mindfulness, contributor on the today Show, Jay Shetty as its name.

And he has a book called Take Like a monk, and he compares the monk mind with the, monkey mind.

And so there are things you can do to become more aware and to actually live your life on a whole new trajectory that that people don't even know.

It's possible.

I just feel so blessed.

I discovered this at such a young age, but I'm going to spend the rest of my life helping children to discover that, and the adults and caregivers along the way.

Thank you so much, Denise, for taking this technique and putting it so that young people can start this process of mindfulness and also the growth set mindset as well, but also to what you do to help educators so that they can stay strong and help children not only learn the basics, but learn how to use mindfulness in their emotions as well.

And so I look forward to seeing what you do next, and we'll make sure we'll have your website there so people can reach out to you directly.

So thank you so much for that.

And thank you for joining us on everybody with Angela Williamson.

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