Summary: My guest this week is Dayna Martin of The Sparkling Martins. Dayna is a nationally recognized expert, writer and speaker on Unschooling. Her blog is a fun and fascinating look into the daily life of an unschooling family. Dayna and her husband own a natural wooden toys business, Willow Toys. We’re talking about natural parenting advocacy. Dayna talks about how moms can find an area they’re passionate about in order to pursue advocacy and then how to get their voice heard. We also talked about how a mom’s attitude about breastfeeding is such an important aspect of creating success. Visualization and an optimistic worldview has a tremendous impact on birth and breastfeeding. Dayna also recommends avoiding things that make you feel bad and guilty and fearful and instead doing the things that make you feel good. As an example, exercise during pregnancy. If you enjoy walking more than doing pelvic tilts, then forget the pelvic tilts and walk! Ditto for nutrition. Instead of being dogmatic and righteous about your choices, it’s better to find what foods make you feel well and healthy. If you take in fear with your food, you absorb less of the nutrients. This has been documented scientifically. What you believe about food and health tends to come true for you. Dayna encourages moms to find what feels good and right for them for their births and use that method instead of sticking to a preconceived idea. For instance, Dayna listened to heavy metal music during her birth because it worked for her instead of new age soft music. Dayna is developing a natural childbirth method that helps moms find what clicks with them as individuals. To be an authentic parent, we need to be who we are instead of living someone else’s script. Many people shift from mainstream parenting to natural parenting but this doesn’t mean doing what others are doing. I mentioned how uncomfortable I am with the question “What is a natural mom?” because I don’t want to set up some ideal. It’s about listening to your instincts instead of relying on external experts. Mentioned on the show: Ideal Bite – daily green living tips Vital Juice – weekly health tips for moms Margin Seligman’s books on optimism and happiness
