Happier Summer Series Part 4: Joy is Waiting for You with Deb Porter

In this episode of the Raising Wild Hearts Happier Series, I sit down with Deb Porter, creator of Hearing Out Life Drama, to explore one of the most overlooked ingredients of wellbeing: feeling truly heard.

Deb is a professional listener who believes many of us are carrying thoughts, emotions, and stories we've never fully expressed. When we finally have the space to be seen, heard, and understood—without judgment, interruption, or advice—something shifts. Clarity returns. Pressure releases. We reconnect with ourselves.

Together, we explore:

• Why happiness is often found in small moments, not big milestones
• How many of us learned it wasn't safe to express joy
• Why being deeply listened to is a form of love
• The connection between authenticity and wellbeing
• A simple nightly practice to help you notice what makes your heart sing

This conversation is a gentle reminder that joy doesn't disappear—it waits for us. And sometimes the path back begins with listening. 

Resources Mentioned in This Episode 

Emotional Scale | Abraham Hicks

Hearing Out Life Drama Blog 

Hearing Out Life Drama Who am I Now Free Guide (no email required)

Deb's Prior Raising Wild Hearts Podcast Appearances:

🎧Mastering the Art of Active Listening for Deeper Connections and Growth

🎧Raising Your EQ 

More Resources:

🪷Rise & Flourish LIVE | Delray Beach, FL | Sat. 9-26 | Learn More & Reserve Your Spot

Yoto Player | Screen Free Fun for Kids
Summertime screen audio player. Choose from 1000+ cards, music or podcasts.

Transcript

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As a parent, isn't it marvelous that we have the opportunity with the little ones around us to see them and to go, oh, they're remembering something I forgot? Oh, wait a minute. Oh, they're showing they're showing me joy in this moment when I'm just all frustrated and upset and here they are demonstrating this thing. What if I embrace that rather than exuding this unhappy or uncomfortable emotion that I'm feeling? What if what if they're right and I'm actually the one who's out of alignment here? When was the last time someone really listened to you? Not to fix you, not to give advice about what you should do, not to tell you what they think about everything, just to actually hear you out. Today's guest believes that being truly heard may be one of the most overlooked paths to happiness. Deb Porter is the creator of Hearing Out Life Drama, where she helps people release emotional pressure and reconnect with their own wisdom through the power of deep listening. This is also Deb's third time on the podcast. I will link her prior conversations below. In this conversation, Deb shares why happiness isn't necessarily found in the big mountaintop moments that we actually spend our lives chasing, but it's found in the small moments, the moments that make our heart sing at the end of the day. And just maybe learning how to listen both to ourselves and others can change everything. Let's jump into my conversation with Deb Porter. Deb Porter, welcome back to the show. Ryan, hi, I love you so much. How are you? I love you too. So good and so excited to be here with you. Your perspective on happiness is unique and everybody's is, right? But you listen to people for a living. Like you are a professional listener. And I'm so curious, in your experience, what is a story that people are telling themselves about happiness that's not true? I can only be happy when there's a big thing, or I can another one is I can only be happy when everything else is done, like when everything is right and like I expect it to be. No, no, none of that's true. I resonate with both of those so much. Like I was talking to another parent yesterday and she's like, Yeah, I just think like with this parenting thing, like we should be on cruise control at some point. We should be able to just like, you know, like coast. And it's like, no, there's always like another something or challenge around the corner that you need to master. Yeah. I'm I'm still uh, you know, parenting now at 54. I didn't ever experience coasting. Still don't. No coasting. Still don't. No coasting. Next week it's gonna be wisdom teeth. Like there's no coasting, there's no such thing. No coasting. What is that? Yeah, it's so funny. So most people are getting wrong that happiness is this big thing. So if happiness isn't a big thing, then is it safe to say that it's more of a little thing? For for me, it's about intention. Like I we have to choose it to and first of all, we have to know we want it. Do you really want that? Like, and as soon as you're really clear, hey, I want that in my life, are you willing to to be it? Like you have to as soon as you're willing to say, yes, I want that, yes, I'm willing to be that, then we have to allow it in and we have to let it be. Wow. Am I willing to be it? Yes. So most people will say yes, but there's a no stopping them. What do you think that little no is that that stops us? Because, like, yeah, we want to be it. Of course we want to be happy. Yes, we're willing, but then our actions and our habits and our words, you know, they stop us. Somewhere along the line, we may have learned it wasn't safe to be joyful, to be happy. I know I did. I can give you several experiences really from a really young age. I was um uh yeah, that I learned it wasn't safe to do that. So uh consequently, I backed away and made sure I I didn't ever like show that effusiveness or that exuberance or that ecstasy, uh, didn't let it come from me because uh it wasn't a good idea to do that. Think about our early experiences in education and schools. Like, if we got happy, if we got joyful, what happened to us? Like, it's no wonder we're scared of it. We got we got it trained out of us. We gotta learn how to remember, we gotta remember how to connect with the the part of us that knows it and to let it be. Is there a moment in your life or a series of moments where you were like, I'm not playing small anymore? I'm not closing myself in. This is me, this is my joy, and I'm here for it. It's it's intention, Ryan. It's it's an everyday choice. It's being aware of the process of the habits that developed, and then making an intentional choice day by day, by day, by day, by day, by day, by day, by day, by day at infinitum to do it different and to to live it. And so, you know, we can block joy, but it doesn't disappear. It does, it never disappeared, it waits for us. And so, because is because I know it's waiting for me, I gotta go meet it. And and that means if I'm gonna go meet it, it means I gotta pay attention. Joy waits for us. Joy waits for us. That's beautiful. Yeah. So you say that being deeply listened to actually allows well-being. And there's some sort of emotional component there. Will you walk us through why after being deeply listened to, we're able to access that joy that was always waiting for us? We're seen, we're heard. We begin to understand that, hey, we matter in the universe. I'm I'm important here. And that connects us with who we truly are. We're uh when somebody really listens to us, it's it's a form of love. Like I'm really aware, and I'm I'm starting to use that word more and more because some people are like, oh, love, like that, that can feel uncomfortable, but it's okay. I can really just like uh as we entered into our conversation, I do love you, Ryan. And then as such, I love the people that I interact with. Like that that comes from a very real place. It's the deepest, most authentic core self that we all are. We've determined already on this series, which is so cool. Like, I love these through lines that are coming through here, that authenticity is our soul truly at the core of who we are. So it's not like Instagram authenticity, it's like stripping it all away and who we are at our essence, right? When nobody's looking, when there's no performing, when there's no accolades, it's just who we are and what we came here to do. It's a remembering. So I think this process of being seen and heard is so essential because I like to think of growth and evolution as us and our kids and everybody like bouncing ourselves off of experiences and beliefs and um challenges, even. And then like coming back to okay, how did this mold me? How did this shape me? And how can I strip away even more of what was never mine to begin with, right? You already alluded to this. When we're little, we're told sit down, be quiet. We know what's good for you, don't be too joyful, but don't be too sad. And, you know, that's a little inappropriate, and that's not nice, and that's really mean, and stop doing this dozens of times a day, right? And so being seen and heard at its essence is healing. Yeah. Allowed to be who you are. That becoming that being allowed to be who you are. That's so important. Yeah. So this is like a permission slip to say, you don't need to perform here. Yes. You can be what you want, you can say what you want, you can tell your truth. Exactly that. Exactly. Yeah. I was so excited when I saw this topic come up and I saw your email come through because I literally wrote a blog uh in October of last year, permission to be joyful. Like that's the title of the blog. And I was like, oh, it went out into the universe, it's coming back. I can actually talk more deeply about this in a real conversation. I'm so excited. Permission. Because we don't need permission, but we feel like we do. It's giving ourselves the permission. We don't need it. Outside validation. That's not what I'm talking about. Internal permission to be that. Where do we source that internal permission from? I think I know the answer, but what do you what do you think? You and you, that's all there is. You, the the what, astral body, the human body, the meat suit, whatever you want to call it. That, but then there's the the greater source part. That's all, that's all you need. It's just you and you. That's all there ever is. I think that it takes this courage and this like boldness, this audacity to really take a look within and kind of get right with yourself, right? Because there's so many things that we've felt shame or fear, or these really like seemingly sticky things that have become associated with who we truly are, or that thing that happened when we were seven, or that thing that happened when we were 11, or the thing the teacher said that nobody even thought of, but is still somehow sticking with us. Like, what is going on with that? So, what's going on with that, in my opinion, is this because we have that negative emotion, we have that feeling of that doesn't feel right. It's our the bigger you that I just talked about, that bigger source you, letting you know, hey, that's not what I thought about that thing. We still need to fix that because you are uncomfortable about that, and that's not what I'm really thinking. And so then the next question is what does what does my higher being think about that? What what is another way of looking at that that actually gives me some relief, that helps me feel a little bit better? So, does this come down to the way we think or what we believe about ourselves in the world? Yes. Yes, and yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So the good news and the bad news, as always on this show, folks, is that it all starts with us. It's an inside job. There's no bad news. That's not bad news. That's good news. You don't have to rely on anybody else. Nobody else can do this for you. It's you get to do it. It's it's yours. I don't see that as bad news at all. That's like, that's like the ultimate permission slip. Like there's nobody else. Nobody else can do it for you. Nobody else can do it for you. It's just you. And and it's your choice, and you get to make that choice. And I see that as a marvelous thing. Why do you think so many people are looking outside for circumstances to be different, for you know, their life path to feel easy, for the job to be here or the house to be here? Like, why do you think people are looking outside though? That's the internal process that we were given from the time we were little. And again, it's going back and relearning that no, actually, it's it's me. I I'm I get to choose it from from always. Um, but we we lost it along the way. And so I think it's really that reclaiming it. I really do. I love the words reclaiming and remembering when we talk about happiness, joy, you know, soul, like because we, when we're babies and children, we're so connected still to this divine and know it. We know it, but we forget a lot. It's our mission to reclaim and remember. And as a parent, isn't it marvelous that we have the opportunity with the little ones around us to see them and to go, oh, they're remembering something I forgot. Oh, wait a minute. Oh, they're showing they're showing me joy in this moment when I'm just all frustrated and upset and here they are demonstrating this thing. What if I embrace that rather than exuding this unpleasant emotion, this unhappy or uncomfortable emotion that I'm feeling? What if, what if they're right, and I'm actually the one who's out of alignment here? Like, yeah. What if? What if? What if? You said, what if I embraced that? To me, what you're saying is allowing every single moment of our day to be as it is. Yeah? That's the work. You say when you go to bed at night, find the thing that makes your heart sing, even if it's really small. Tell us how you came to that conclusion and how worked that in tech your daily rituals and routines. People talk about a gratitude practice. That's basically what it is, right? But I really like what makes my heart sing, that's really that's easier for me to get in touch with. I don't know why the gratitude feels like I don't know, like I've heard of the journals and all the things. I have some resistance for whatever reason to that. But when I think about, oh, what makes my heart sing, like that, I don't know, it just makes my little happy, I guess. The little person inside me, she wants to sing. So, what did make my heart sing? And so just laying in my bed and thinking about that, like um, I actually wrote in that blog post about the tulips that I planted last fall. They're coming up now, and they're so beautiful. It that makes my heart sing. Sitting on my patio with my dog on my lap in the sunshine that makes my heart sing. Having a moment with my kids when my son called me yesterday and talked to me on the phone for five minutes made my heart sing. Like, and so last night as I was going to bed, I was just going through those things. Like, you know, time out in the sunshine, just um uh the the progress I'm making with the business, learning new things, it makes me happy. It's about the feeling. It's connecting with the feeling, the feeling of it all. Yeah. Yeah. So what's a big thing right now that's making your heart sing? Because you mentioned a lot of little things. Is there a big thing in your life that you could share with us that's like, yes, like you're kind of if are you having a mountaintop moment or like something that we can celebrate? You know, uh my son is deploying. I think we talked about him being in the military, and I'm not actually supposed to talk about that, but I just did. So I opened that door, so I'm gonna just go through it. What's making my heart sing about that is um, you know, I'm I I'm at peace with it and I'm happy for him, and he's gonna have an amazing experience, and um, it's gonna be okay. Like I don't know what that's gonna be, um, but it's it's gonna be okay. That's a really big thing. Like finding happiness with that, that's a big deal. My daughter's presenting at a conference and she's uh this weekend, uh she's doing a poster for her um for her program for a PhD. I'm so proud. Like, oh my gosh, that just makes me so happy, Ryan. It's it's you know, I'm not sure are are those big things? I don't know, but they feel big in my life. So there you go. Yeah. Those are big things, I think. I mean, it's so cool to see the ones around us thrive, right? That's like the entire reason we're talking. It's the entire reason this show is still happening to see the ones around us thrive and to be a part of that too. You said I'm at peace with that. How did you realize that peace was a necessity and a precursor to happiness? I was honestly listening to a lot of Abraham Hicks, and Abraham talks about the emotional scale and how when you hit contentment or satisfaction, that's the tipping point. And as soon as you get there, then it gets easier to get to the top of the scale. And so what I truly have come to understand is wherever we're starting from, if we're starting from a different um feeling that's not necessarily a good one, we can't just jump, right? We can't make a big jump. We can't just hop from, oh, I'm I'm frustrated to oh, I'm happy now. That's not usually how it works. I mean, it's possible. I'm not saying it's not possible. All things are possible because of my belief system, but I do think that, you know, it's taking those tiny steps. And so um I've spent a lot of time working with that and going, okay, well, I don't feel good about this. What's a thought that feels better? And what's a thought that feels better? And okay, now I think that, okay, I yes, I yes, I'm there. That's as far as I can go today. That's okay. And then waiting and then coming back. And okay, now I'm here. How can I get to the next best thought and just keep working it through? This is really important because I immediately feel like, oh, this work is accessible because I'm not being asked to be blissed out 24 hours a day because that's not actually real life. Like it's not. It's not. It's not. I mean, you said the word contentment. Like, yes, what if we could all just be a little more content? What would that be like in our lives? I love that. It feels so good to feel content. Just relax. It feels relaxed. It feels easy. I think the most important thing when we're starting, and if we acknowledge that we want to be happy, is we have to be real about where we're starting from. Like you have to get there. You can't just pretend and and sugarcoat it and oh yeah, everything's fine. I'm I really am happy. Nope. You gotta own where you're at. And that's okay. Nothing wrong with where you're at. It's just where you're at and let that be. And because once you uh understand and allow yourself to start from where you are, it's it's what I do in every listening appointment is like I have to quickly and clearly click into where is this person starting from? Where are they? That is the key to being able to help them feel better when they leave. Do you picture that scale of emotions that you referenced when you're listening to somebody, or is it just a different process? A lot of times I do. Yeah. Yeah. If I if if I if I'm struggling, if they're if they're really struggling, oftentimes I'll, you know, I'll I'll think, I'll see the list on my mind and I'll throw a couple of words out to try to gauge, okay, where, where are we at? And maybe what words might feel better and where in a listening appointment, I'm not about giving advice. I I don't need to change anybody. I don't have a need to change anybody. Everybody gets to be who they are and what they feel, it's it's okay. But if somebody wants to feel better and they're ready to feel better and they're looking at me like, okay, I just I'm just dumped and now and now I really am ready, then what is the next thing? What is what is the thing they can reach for? Because again, I don't want to try and push them all the way up because they won't get there. That'd be a mistake on my part. I want them to feel relief. We're just looking for the thought that feels better. I think your work is so world-changing because here's one thing I notice as a highly sensitive person that if and when I'm with a friend or an acquaintance, or even, you know, the grocery store cashier, sometimes when you ask people, like, how are you? and they start to dump on you. And I'm like, Oh my gosh, I'm not, I don't have the capacity for this right now. And you know, sometimes I do and sometimes I don't, right? I think that our friendships and our family relationships would feel a little lighter if we could reserve our dumping and our venting for those specifically trained to hold that space, like you, perhaps a therapist, these many, many roles that we have in our society that are specifically meant to hold the space. What's your take on that? You have to start to evaluate if that's how the person's always showing up. Is that a relationship you want to continue to be in? But I do think it's inevitable that there are, we're gonna have days when we're not feeling good because those are our learnings. And so if somebody shows up in your world and they're having one of these experiences, then then it's about okay, what is this teaching you? What is this, what is you showing up with this in my life teaching me? What am I supposed to learn from this example? Like you're here, we're having this conversation. Whoa, we're together. The universe put us here. So what is this telling me now about what I need to learn? And how am I open to that? And how can I draw that in and let that open me up in new ways? Interesting. That's exactly the response that I needed to hear because my first instinct is to fix or dish out advice when most people don't need advice or fixing. They just need to get it off their chest, right? A little love. They need a little love. A little love. How do we show a little more love to the people in our life that it's easy to, and then the people in our life that it's kind of hard? How do we show just a little more love to all those people? I hope people go and explore my blogs after this because I know I have so much. I have so much in my blogs on exactly this and and loneliness and anxieties we were talking about before we started to record. Like there's so much on all of these things. Oh my gosh, Ryan. Um, there's a there's a very popular blog. Um, it's about mean people. Um, there's another blog I have about um difficult people in a family. Like, there's there's so much there. And you also have a link that you shared with me. Who am I now? Is this opt-in you have, which is not even an opt-in. You don't have to put your email in. I just checked it out. It's amazing. And so for anybody who has asked the question, who am I now? This is so good. And I can relate to this in big transitions in my life so much because when we move to a different version of ourselves, there is a grief for who we've left behind and the many, you know, varied, imperfect versions of ourselves who maybe weren't filling us with joy, but we kind of miss, you know, like I kind of miss my Marlboro smoking bar dancing uh 20-year-old self in a way because damn, she was fun. That kind of thing, you know? Ryan, what was fun about her that you can still bring forward into today? What about that experience in your life is waiting for you to wake up and embrace maybe without the Marlboro's without the Marlboro. However, lust tequila. For sure. For sure. I don't drink alcohol anymore, so that's good. Um, and I do sound like I smoked a pack of Marble's because I'm recovering from a cold, but I didn't. Um, yes. So I love that question, Deb, because the first thing that popped into my mind was freedom, like this this free, like open, receptive attitude about life. And like before some of the fear got in the way, I think as I've gotten older and really peeled away some of the stuff, a lot of fear bubbled to the surface. You talk about, you know, us needing to explore these emotions before we can lit live this life of well-being. For me, one of those big things was fear. And so when I look at past Ryan, that version that I said, there's many versions of her, but that version is this free and fun and not really worried about too much kind of gal, who just kind of went where the wind blowed her. And I so I can be that way moving forward just by accessing that feeling of freedom, which as soon as I thought it, I'm like, I can feel that free right now. Think about the title of your podcast, Raising Wild Hearts. Do you not see the connection? Like you are raising your own wild heart. Do you not know it? Because, girl, you are, and that freedom is there for you. All you gotta do is just let it be. I love it so much because I still to this day try and figure out how to explain what raising wild hearts means. And that's what it is. I'm so glad you said that, Deb, because it's so true. This is not just about raising our kids or educating our kids. And by our, I just mean like, you know, society's kids, plus our own. Yes, it's about raising ourselves, our inner, you know, girls and boys, and also each other. You know, this conversation with you right now, we're all walking around, raising each other up a little bit more. And to me, that is definitely life-changing work. So thank you so much for reflecting that. I'm just gonna let that sit because I felt like that was really powerful and I could say more, but let's just let that be. It's so powerful. I I feel it. And I know you guys are gonna want more of Deb Porter. She'll be back on the podcast, I'm sure. But for now, check out her blog, hearingoutlifedrama.com slash blog, and then I'm gonna put the link to who am I now? Would you call it an article? It's a free resource. Like, you know, some people do freebies and what uh, you gotta do your email. I stopped doing email newsletters because I just realized it's not aligned for me. I don't like getting a lot of emails. Your email made me happy. Like, Deb, come do this. But that's that's really different than like all of the emails that are, I don't know, promotional. And I just I I felt that draining me and I was writing them and I was like, why am I? I was trying to do it and be authentic. And I was like, you know what? Why am I pushing this upstream? Why can't I just be me? Like, how about we just be authentic? So I stopped doing that last year. Nobody has to give me anything. Like, I love you. Here, here it is. If this helps you, I'm grateful. Maybe you'll tell somebody else, maybe somebody else will learn about me. My logo actually is a dandelion. One of my first experiences of remembering joy is I was in um our yard and my neighbor had shown me how to pick and blow a dandelion. I was I was really young. And it was so powerful. And like those seeds going everywhere, and I just remember feeling so much joy. My dad came home and saw me doing that, and he was extremely unhappy with me. But the whole point of my logo is that it's that moment. It's those going out. It's the trust and the belief that our joy, that that is allowed to spread, that my joy is allowed to be out in the universe, that who I am can go and be. And it's healing for me. What a gift. Your work is a gift, and you are a gift. Deb, thank you so much for being here. Thank you.