Dopamine Kids with Michaeleen Doucleff: Episode 228

You can listen wherever you get your podcasts or check out the fully edited transcript of our interview at the bottom of this post.

In this episode of The Peaceful Parenting Podcast, Michaeleen Doucleff and I talk about her new book Dopamine Kids: A Science-Based Plan to Rewire Your Child’s Brain and Take You’re your Family in the Age of Screens and Ultraprocessed Foods. Michaeleen’s position is not that screens and ultra-processed food are “bad.” Rather, Michaeleen explains how they can take the place of things that truly bring us joy and pleasure, leaving us with an empty feeling of "what's next?" and an endless cycle of wanting. We focus on how dopamine has been misunderstood and how it actually works, how magnets like screens and ultraprocessed foods keep us stuck, and small changes you can make to start shifting things in your home.

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We talk about:

* 00:00 Introduction to Dopamine Kids and why our understanding of dopamine is outdated

* 02:15 Michaeleen’s journey from NPR science journalist to parenting author

* 05:00 Dopamine isn’t pleasure—it’s wanting: the neuroscience that changes everything

* 07:20 Why kids say they’d rather play with friends than be on screens

* 08:00 The difference between dopamine, serotonin, and real satisfaction

* 13:30 How apps and ultra-processed foods hijack the brain’s reward system

* 16:45 Why endless scrolling never feels satisfying

* 18:30 “Bottomlessness”—one of the biggest design tricks keeping us hooked

* 20:30 Why we want activities for our kids with a clear purpose and a clear endpoint

* 22:00 The veggie straw experiment that changed Michaeleen’s thinking about food

* 26:50 Magnets and cues: how screens become automatic habits

* 32:00 Why removing screens isn’t enough—you have to replace them

* 33:30 Helping kids meet their real need for adventure and autonomy

* 36:00 Small, permanent changes vs. temporary screen detoxes

* 37:30 Why the car is a great place to start reducing screens

* 38:00 Is reducing screens really more work?

* 40:15 Why laws and regulations haven’t caught up with technology

* 43:00 Why this isn’t a willpower problem

* 46:30 Can kids ever use screens in moderation?

* 49:00 Paid video games vs. free games

* 51:30 This isn’t about screens being “bad”

* 53:00 Helping kids gradually learn to use technology well

* 54:00 School Chromebooks and why parents have more influence than they realize

* 58:00 Advice Michaeleen would give her younger parenting self

* 1:00:00 Why kids have to experience offline joy before they’ll want it

* 1:01:00 Sarah’s client who removed the TV—and what happened next

* 1:02:30 Final thoughts and where to find Michaeleen

Resources mentioned in this episode:

* Michaeleen’s website

* Dopamine Kids: A Science-Based Plan to Rewire Your Child’s Brain and Take You’re your Family in the Age of Screens and Ultraprocessed Foods

* How to Stop Fighting About Video Games with Scott Novis

* The Peaceful Parenting Membership

Connect with Sarah Rosensweet:

* Instagram

* Facebook Group

* YouTube

* Website

* Join us on Substack

* Newsletter

* Book a short consult or coaching session call

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Sarah: Hey everyone. Welcome back to another episode of the Peaceful Parenting Podcast.

Today’s guest is journalist Michaeleen Doucleff. She is the author of the book Hunt, Gather, Parent and now has a new book out called Dopamine Kids: A Science-Based Plan to Rewire Your Child’s Brain and Take Back Your Family in the Age of Screens and Ultra-Processed Food.

Michaeleen’s first book is one of our favorite parenting books, and now we can add this one to the list. She walks us through how screens and ultra-processed food hook us and keep our brains stuck in a hijacked wanting cycle without giving us actual rewards and pleasure.

We eventually get around to discussing this, but I want to stress right here at the beginning that Michaeleen isn’t saying that screens and ultra-processed food are evil or that they have no place in our lives. Rather, they can take the place of things that truly bring us joy and pleasure, leaving us with an empty feeling of “what’s next?” and an endless cycle of wanting.

I learned so much from this book. I’d been wanting to make some changes in my own life with my relationship with my phone, and this book helped me understand why it was so hard and what I could do. A hint: as it turns out, we don’t understand dopamine correctly at all. Our cultural shorthand about what dopamine is and what role it plays in the motivation and pleasure cycle is totally outdated.

If you’re interested in making some positive shifts in your child’s life, in your family, and in your own life, you’re going to love this interview and Michaeleen’s book.

If you like this episode, please share it with a friend so more parents can learn about peaceful parenting. If you’re a fan of the podcast, you can help us out not only by sharing it, but by leaving a review and a five-star rating in your podcast player app. While you’re there, don’t forget to follow the show so you don’t miss an episode.

If you’d like to support us even more, you can become a supporter on Substack to help us offset the cost of making the show. We’ll put a link in the show notes.

Let’s meet Michaeleen. I hope you enjoy this conversation and get as much out of her insights as I did.

Sarah: Hi, Michaeleen. Welcome back to the podcast.

Michaeleen: Thank you so much for having me.

Sarah: When we had you on a few years ago to talk about your first parenting book, Hunt, Gather, Parent—we’ll link to it in the show notes—it ended up being one of our favorite podcasts out of the 200-some episodes we’ve done. I’m so excited to have you back to talk about your new book.

Michaeleen: Thank you so much. That’s so nice. It’s an honor to come back.

Sarah: I’m so happy to have you. Tell us a little bit about who you are and what you do.

Michaeleen: I was—or I still am—a science journalist. I’ve been one now for about 16 years, and I spent 13 or 14 years as a radio correspondent at NPR. I’m still there covering children’s health, global health, neuroscience, and psychology.

Before that, I was trained as a chemist. I have a PhD in chemistry.

Five years ago, I wrote the parenting book Hunt, Gather, Parent, and I had no idea I’d ever become a parenting expert. That definitely wasn’t on my life bingo card.

When I had my daughter Rosie almost 11 years ago, I had no clue what I was doing. It just seemed like an impossible task. Then I started studying parenting around the world, and I realized there was an easier way to do things. That’s what Hunt, Gather, Parent is about.

More recently, about six years ago, I was really trying to fix my own screen problem—my own addiction to my phone. I was so obsessed with it. As I investigated neuroscience, psychology, and behavioral psychology, I started to realize, “Oh gosh, we’re really getting a lot of things wrong when it comes to screens and our kids.”

That led me to write this next book, Dopamine Kids, to clarify a bunch of myths but also update the advice because it’s really old. A lot of the advice out there is based on psychology from 20, 30, even 40 years ago.

Sarah: Or even more.

Michaeleen: Exactly.

Sarah: Exactly. And I’m going to ask you about that. So tell us, what’s the central idea behind your new book, Dopamine Kids?

Michaeleen: One of the biggest ideas is that we’re thinking about screens wrong. We think they’re these endless sources of pleasure. We think dopamine is this molecule that brings us pleasure and that the more we have, the happier we are.

But that’s really old neuroscience.

What dopamine actually gives us is the feeling of desire, wanting, and craving. It makes us obsessed.

So what screens are doing is cranking that system up. They’re increasing motivation, craving, and wanting. But if you look at what happens over time, they actually rob us of pleasure and reduce the amount of pleasure we experience in our lives.

So this idea that screens—video games and social media—are treats and rewards for kids is wrong. It’s all wrong.

What is actually most rewarding and pleasurable for kids are things in the real world because real-world experiences don’t just give us desire and wanting. They also give us satisfaction, joy, and long-lasting pleasure.

So Dopamine Kids is really a reset of what actually brings our kids pleasure in life. It also provides a toolset to retrain your kids’ brains so they naturally want and reach for offline activities and foods that make them feel good—foods that really nourish them and bring satisfaction.

It’s about rethinking our idea of pleasure. What does pleasure actually look like?

I think the media, marketing, and corporations have taught us that pleasure and wanting are basically the same thing—that we want things because they bring us pleasure.

But if you actually look at the science and the data, there are so many things out there that drive our wanting while robbing us of pleasure.

Social media is a really good example. Kids use it because they want a sense of belonging. They want to feel connected. But over the long run, social media does the opposite. It makes them feel lonelier, and yet they still want it.

I see this book as an operating manual for shaping and changing your kids’ habits into the ones you want for them as a parent, but also habits that nourish kids and bring joy, happiness, and pleasure to the whole family.

We often think limiting screens is about depriving kids of pleasure.

It’s actually the opposite.

It’s about reclaiming pleasure.

Sarah: I had Lenore Skenazy on the podcast. Do you know her work?

Michaeleen: Yeah, we’re friends.

Sarah: She was on the podcast a few months ago, and she was talking about how, if you ask kids what they want—would they rather be on screens or play with their friends?—by far the number one answer is playing with their friends, not being on screens.

Michaeleen: Yeah. I think it’s almost double.

Sarah: Exactly. And yet I don’t think most parents realize that.

Michaeleen: Right. I didn’t realize that either. I think it’s because we confuse begging, screaming, and tantruming for the screen with joy and pleasure.

Sarah: Okay, so tell us about that, because what I learned from your book is that everyone thinks dopamine is, “Ah, I just got a hit of dopamine and I feel so good.”

Michaeleen: Yeah.

Sarah: But it’s not dopamine that makes you feel good. It’s serotonin and, I think, endorphins that make you feel good.

You go into this in much more detail in the book, and I highly recommend it. It was excellent. I have to tell you, I was on an office hours call with my membership before I even knew you had written a new book, and one of my members said, “I’m reading this parenting book called Dopamine Kids, and it’s a page-turner.”

She said, “I’ve never had a parenting book that’s a page-turner, but you’ve got to get your hands on this.”

Then I looked it up and realized it was your book, and I was so excited to get it and read it.

Can you explain the basic idea? I know it’s too much detail to go into fully, but what’s the difference? What does dopamine actually do, and why isn’t it what we think it is?

Michaeleen: For a long time—really since the 1950s—neuroscientists thought we do things over and over again because they’re pleasurable.

Neuroscientists have been obsessed with getting people and animals to press buttons for over a hundred years. Rats, mice, apes, pigeons—they’ve all been part of these experiments. It’s almost like an iPad. Press, press, press, tap.

For a long time, researchers could stimulate one region of the brain—the dopamine center—and the animals would go crazy pressing the button all day long. They wouldn’t even stop to go to the bathroom. It makes you think of someone playing video games for hours. They’re just obsessed with pressing the button.

Researchers believed that because this was the dopamine center of the brain, dopamine made you press the button because it felt good and brought you pleasure. They even conducted similar experiments with people, and that very simple explanation stood for a long time.

Then, about 30 years ago, a couple of scientists came along and asked, “Wait a second. Is this really true? Do we always act because something is pleasurable?”

They designed better experiments, and what they found was astonishing. Dopamine doesn’t do that at all.

Dopamine makes us want.

It makes you want something, and it makes you want to do something over and over again. It’s like a “do it again” button in the brain.

Do it again.

Do it again.

Whenever you can, do it again.

The way the system is supposed to work is that first you want something, and dopamine motivates you to work for it. Then, when you get what you wanted, the pleasure center starts to light up.

Those are different neurotransmitters. That’s where endorphins—the body’s natural opioids—and serotonin come in.

Serotonin allows you to appreciate what you have. It’s what lets you say, “Oh, I got what I wanted. I feel really good. Ah... I can stop now. I can take a break.”

In many ways, pleasure is the opposite of dopamine because it gives you satisfaction, and satisfaction stops wanting.

There are a couple of classic examples. One is sex, which is probably the R-rated version. But another is thirst.

Imagine you’re running on a hot day. You’ve run out of water, and after half an hour or an hour, you really want something to drink.

That’s dopamine. That’s your dopamine hit—that strong feeling of desire.

Wanting can actually feel good. If I fall in love and I want to be with my partner, the wanting feels good.

But wanting can also become frustrating. If you want something for too long and don’t get it, that feeling turns into frustration.

So you’re out running on this hot day thinking, “Oh my gosh, I want water so badly.”

That’s dopamine.

That’s not pleasure yet.

Then you see a glass of water, or you get one and take a drink, and you think, “Ah, that feels so good.”

That’s the pleasure system.

Sarah: That’s where you get the serotonin and the endorphins.

Michaeleen: Exactly. And the endocannabinoids too—the body’s natural cannabinoids. A whole bunch of things kick in.

The wonderful thing about this pleasure response is that it can last a long time. It lingers. It makes you feel optimistic and gives your life a kind of glow because you’ve gotten what you need to survive.

I remember being really upset as a kid, and my mom would come over and hug me. I’d bury my face into her, and it felt so good. It was just this feeling that everything was okay again.

That’s what these pleasure molecules do.

Dopamine is saying, “Everything is not okay. I need this before things can be okay.”

They’re very different.

Sarah: Okay. This is the part I still feel like I’m only beginning to understand.

How do the makers of apps and video games—and we’ve mostly been talking about screens, but you also write a lot about ultra-processed foods—how do they get us stuck in the dopamine cycle?

What I took away from your book is that these things are so powerful because they keep us trapped in that cycle of wanting...

Sarah: What I understood from your book is that these things are so powerful because they keep us stuck in the dopamine cycle. It’s just wanting, wanting, wanting.

You said something in the book about how they’ve figured out a way to hack a weakness in our brain circuitry. Forgive me if that’s not the exact wording, but they’ve essentially hacked a weakness in the brain to keep us stuck in dopamine without ever giving us a real reward.

How does that work?

Michaeleen: First of all, both the tech industry and the food industry have admitted this for a long time. This isn’t something I’ve come up with. They’ve openly admitted it. Even the food industry says, “We want to make something you can’t stop eating.”

Sarah: Right. You read all these interviews with industry insiders, and they’re very open about it. Everybody knows they’ve admitted it. But how does it actually work?

Michaeleen: There are a lot of tricks.

Let’s start with screens because a lot of these techniques actually came from the gambling industry. In the ‘80s and ‘90s, casinos started replacing mechanical slot machines and poker machines with video versions—basically gambling apps on giant touchscreens.

They explicitly asked, “What can we do to this game to keep people playing for as long as possible?” Some people would play for 24 or even 48 hours straight. They ran massive A/B tests to figure out exactly how they could tweak the games to send people into this dopamine loop—this wanting loop—where people actually stopped wanting to win because winning took them out of the loop.

So it’s very empirical. They’ve simply tested what keeps people there.

In the book, I describe it as a kind of recipe parents can use to recognize whether an app is doing this to their child. Psychologists even have a name for this state. It’s called dark flow, where you lose track of time and where you are. We’ve all experienced it while scrolling social media. Twenty or thirty minutes go by and you think, “What just happened?” You’re in this loop of wanting because, if you actually experienced pleasure and satisfaction, you would stop. You’d stop wanting.

One of the biggest tricks is speed. The faster the cycle runs, the more it traps you. If you think about videos and video games, they’ve become faster and faster. Even children’s iPad games are just question, answer, question, answer, question, answer over and over again. That’s driving up dopamine.

But where’s the satisfaction? What’s the reward? Basically, it’s just a light on the screen.

Another trick is promising something fundamental. The dopamine system evolved to help us fulfill our basic human needs—water, food, social support, adventure, creation. These are things we needed to survive, so kids are naturally highly motivated to pursue them.

These apps promise they’ll meet those needs. Social media, for example, promises belonging. It says, “Get on here and you’ll finally feel connected. You’ll finally feel like you belong.” The problem is that it never actually fulfills that promise.

If you look at some of the leaked internal documents, you can see the algorithms intentionally withhold what people actually want. One neuroscientist explained it this way: they figure out what you’re looking for and why you’re on social media, then they give you something that’s close to what you want. Maybe on the next click they give you something a little closer. Then a little closer.

This does several things. First, you never actually receive the reward because you never get what you really need. Second, you develop this feeling of making progress—as though you’re getting closer and closer. “Maybe one more comment. Maybe five more likes. Then I’ll finally get it.”

What most people don’t realize is that we produce the most dopamine not when we get what we want, or even when we think we’re about to get it, but when we feel like we’re making progress.

That’s one of the biggest tricks.

Video games are a perfect example. Kids always feel like they’re making a little more progress. A little more. A little more. By the time they reach the next level, they’re already making progress toward another one.

There are all these different tricks designed to crank up wanting while dialing down satisfaction and pleasure because satisfaction is what gets you off the game. You think, “Okay, I’m done.”

The same thing applies to social media. If social media actually gave me what I was looking for, I’d be finished. I’d think, “I got what I needed. I’m done.”

But it never gives it to you.

It can’t.

Sarah: I started feeling kind of gross about how much time I was spending on Instagram and Facebook—really just on my phone in general. I’d think, “Oh, I need a five-minute break,” and immediately pick up my phone.

Actually, I did this before I started reading your book, but now I realize it fits perfectly with what you’re talking about. I downloaded the New York Times Games app.

Now, when I feel like I need a little break, I’ll do Wordle or the Mini Crossword or Connections. What’s nice is that it’s limited. You get one crossword, one mini crossword, one Wordle, and one Connections each day.

I’m almost never on Facebook or Instagram anymore because of it. It actually feels like a real reward. I finish the crossword and think, “Oh, I did the Mini in one minute and 38 seconds.”

There’s an ending to it. It really does feel like I accomplished something, which is very different.

Michaeleen: Exactly. And you’ve actually stumbled onto one of the biggest tricks: bottomlessness.

This is huge.

TV didn’t used to be bottomless.

Michaeleen: TV didn’t used to be bottomless. You had a handful of channels, and eventually the content ended or it got bad enough that you simply stopped watching.

Now everything is endless. There’s always another news story, another level in a game, another post, another video. That endlessness is what keeps us trapped in the cycle.

You actually did so many things right with the New York Times Games app. You found something that takes a little more effort, but it also has a clear stopping point. You finish it, and then you’re done. You created a bottom.

That’s exactly what I want to do with my own kids. I want to help them find activities that have a clear purpose and a clear ending. When you’re done, you’re done, and you turn it off.

Compare that with scrolling Instagram for 30 minutes. What’s the purpose? What are you actually doing? What are you looking for? There’s always more content. It never ends, and it’s incredibly fast.

I think it’s Chapter 4 of the book where I talk about figuring out how to use these technologies—if you’re going to use them at all—in ways that don’t manipulate you into these loops but instead feel genuinely satisfying.

People often ask, “How do you know it’s a real reward?” Your brain tells you. You feel better afterward than you did before. You feel done. You feel full. You think, “I’m ready to stop.”

If, instead, you’re thinking, “What’s next? One more. One more,” then you’re still stuck in the loop.

For a lot of people—for a lot of kids, and certainly for me—that loop is frustrating and deeply unsatisfying. It just makes life feel gray and gloomy.

Sarah: I noticed something a while ago. One of my favorite activities in the world is reading, and I realized I can’t read if my phone is in the same room with me.

When I was reading your book, I thought, “This is something I absolutely love doing, but it doesn’t create that same dopamine loop.”

Reading doesn’t do that.

I actually have to keep my phone in another room because reading takes more effort than scrolling Instagram.

Michaeleen: Exactly. It takes more work, and that’s part of why it’s more satisfying.

We’re made to work. Human beings are actually very good at working, and that effort is part of what creates satisfaction. If something is too easy, it’s much easier to get trapped in the wanting loop.

Sarah: You also say in the book that, evolutionarily, our brains are designed to look for the easy way out.

Back when life was hard, that made perfect sense.

But now that everything comes to us so easily, it doesn’t make sense anymore.

Michaeleen: That’s exactly right. These products are exploiting that tendency.

Food is probably where you can see it most clearly.

Our brains evolved to look for the foods with the most calories per bite. Why would you eat something with fewer calories per bite, especially when food was scarce? That’s how we evolved.

We also evolved to look for calories that our bodies could use quickly. A refined white-flour cracker gives you calories much faster than a carrot does. You’d have to eat carrots for much longer to get the same energy.

Our brains are completely designed to choose the cracker.

You’d never touch the carrot. It doesn’t make evolutionary sense.

That’s especially true for kids, who are eating much more instinctively. But honestly, I’d argue that adults have the same problem. If the crackers are sitting there beside the carrots, most adults are going to have a hard time choosing the carrot.

Sarah: Tell the story about the strawberries and the veggie straws.

Michaeleen: This was when I really understood what was happening.

Rosie was about eight years old, and we went to the pool with one of her friends. I packed raw edamame and strawberries. The girls were tired and hungry, and they were happily eating them. They were enjoying them.

Then I pulled out a bag of veggie straws—which, by the way, aren’t really veggies and aren’t really straws. They’re basically highly processed potato starch.

Sarah: I think it’s extruded potato starch.

Michaeleen: You’re right. Extruded potato starch.

The starch is chemically extracted from the potato, so there’s really nothing potato-like left except the starch. It’s heated at a very high temperature, pushed through machinery, then sprayed with fat or basically fried and covered with salt.

If you really look at the research, your body treats it almost like sugar. It practically dissolves in your mouth. There’s almost no digestion required. It moves into your gut and into your bloodstream incredibly quickly.

So even though the package says “veggie” and even though it says “potato,” what you’re really getting are extremely fast calories, much like sugar.

The moment I put those veggie straws on the table, those two girls ate the entire bag.

One after another.

You want to talk about dopamine?

“Do it again. Do it again. Do it again. Do it again.”

They didn’t stop until every single veggie straw was gone.

And then they completely forgot about the strawberries and the edamame.

That was the moment I realized that if any ultra-processed food is available, kids simply won’t choose the whole foods.

Sarah: You asked Rosie afterward which she actually liked better, and she said, “Oh, the strawberries.”

Michaeleen: Exactly. Even though she genuinely likes strawberries better—they taste better—her brain, and all of our brains, are designed to choose the veggie straws because they’re such a dense source of fast calories.

That realization led me to start doing little experiments. I’d make homemade meals with whole foods, then put one ultra-processed starch on the table—a dinner roll or some corn chips. I’d sit there and watch my husband and Rosie eat all of the ultra-processed food first. Then my husband might eat some of the whole foods, but Rosie wouldn’t touch them.

It wasn’t her fault. It wasn’t my fault. This is simply how our brains are designed. It makes perfect sense from an evolutionary perspective, and the food industry is explicitly taking advantage of that. If you look at the calorie density of ultra-processed foods, it’s gone up and up over time. What really surprised me, though, is that it isn’t just about sugar. Sugar clearly triggers dopamine—”Do it again. Do it again.” But highly refined potato starch, corn starch, and white flour are just as powerful, and in some studies they’re actually more addictive than foods with added sugar.

I recently read a study describing almost the exact recipe you mentioned: extruded starch that’s fried or sprayed with a little fat and loaded with salt. That combination is incredibly addictive. The moment you see it, you want it, and then you eat it. The dopamine hit actually happens before you eat it. It’s, “Oh, I see the bag. I want the bag.” That’s the dopamine.

Then there’s almost no satisfaction or pleasure because satisfaction comes from protein and fiber—and, to a lesser extent, fat. Those are the things that make you feel, “Ah, I’ve had enough. I’m done.” Ultra-processed foods have stripped away almost everything that creates that feeling of satisfaction. That’s what pleasure actually is.

I really believe we can learn to tell the difference between wanting and genuine pleasure. Just like you did with the New York Times games, you replaced endless scrolling—which kept you wanting more—with something that actually makes you feel good every day.

Sarah: Can you talk a little bit about what you call “magnets” and “cues”?

I finished your book last week—it really was a page-turner—and I’m already putting some of your ideas into practice. One of the simplest suggestions was to stop carrying your phone around everywhere. I wore a watch to a baseball game the other night because I didn’t want to keep taking out my phone just to check the time.

Then this morning I went for a walk with my daughter and left my phone at home. When I got back, I made something to eat and did a couple of other things before I suddenly realized, “Oh—I left my phone upstairs for two hours.”

Just the act of not taking it with me on the walk and leaving it in another room made it disappear from my mind. It was amazing.

Michaeleen: I love that. That’s beautiful.

I call phones, video games, iPads, and ultra-processed foods magnets because neuroscientists actually use the term motivational magnets, and that’s where I borrowed it from. They work through space, and they create what we call cues.

Let’s use screens instead of veggie straws. Imagine Rosie comes home every day after school and plays Toca Boca World on the iPad.

Sarah: My daughter used to play those hairdressing games—and even vacuuming games. I never understood the appeal until I read your book and realized she was basically getting dopamine-mined.

Michaeleen: Exactly. If you look at what keeps young children on those apps, it’s the repetition. They’re doing essentially the same thing over and over again, which is actually very unsatisfying.

At first, what keeps Rosie playing are those little dopamine hits—”Do it again. Do it again.” But over time, something fascinating happens: the dopamine hit moves backward in time. Eventually, just seeing the iPad triggers dopamine. Simply seeing it creates desire and makes her really want it. Dopamine doesn’t just make us want things—it motivates us to work to get them.

So she sees the iPad, and suddenly she wants it. If it’s sitting there, good luck getting her interested in anything else because her brain has already triggered that powerful feeling of, “I need this to survive.” She’ll be pulled toward it like a magnet. That’s where the term comes from. You don’t just want it—you physically move toward it. You want to pick it up. You want to hold it. You want to touch it.

Even if it’s hidden away in a drawer or a closet, if she knows it’s there, those magnets work through walls. She’ll go looking for it.

Sarah: Have you seen that study where students either had their phone on their desk, in their backpack, or in another room? Just having it in the backpack was almost as distracting as having it sitting on the desk.

Michaeleen: That’s exactly right, because they know it’s accessible. Over time, these cues become so deeply wired into our brains that we don’t even have to see the object anymore. We just have to know it’s there.

What’s often triggering the habit isn’t even the phone itself—it’s an emotion. For example, when I’m writing and I get a little frustrated, that feeling becomes the cue: “Go check the news.” That used to be mine. Then it became, “Go check your email.” Now I’ve stopped checking the news, so mine has become, “Go check the weather.”

Sarah: At least that can only last so long unless you’re checking the weather around the world.

Michaeleen: Exactly. It’s much less sticky.

But that’s the point. If the phone is in the backpack, the brain knows it’s available. These magnets work through walls. They work through bags. To really make those cues disappear, you have to do exactly what you did. You leave it at home. Your brain knows, “I can’t get it. I’m not walking all the way back home for it,” so it lets go.

As parents, we have to make these things completely disappear within a particular context. That’s another really important piece of this: magnets and cues work in contexts.

Every day after school is a context for Rosie’s brain. Every day after school, in our house, she plays Toca Boca World. So when she walks into the living room at four o’clock, her brain already knows what time it is, even without a watch. Human brains are incredibly good at tracking those patterns.

That context triggers dopamine. It triggers the desire for Toca Boca World.

What we want to do instead is use that same context to trigger a desire for something that actually fills her up. Maybe after school in the living room becomes the cue for making art, riding her bike, or going outside.

That’s really what Dopamine Kids is about: using dopamine to get your kids excited about the real world and training their brains accordingly.

Sarah: Can I back you up a little bit there? Because one thing you say in your book is that it doesn’t work to simply take the screens away and say, “Let them be bored. They’ll figure it out.”

That’s really the only other advice I’ve seen out there: just take the screens away and let kids be bored.

But you did a lot of work to create opportunities for dopamine from other things. You didn’t just tell Rosie, “No more Toca Boca World.”

Can you talk about that? I think a lot of parents try the approach of saying, “Okay, we’re just not doing screens anymore.” Then they end up with weeks—or maybe months—of crying and begging: “Can I just play a little?”

Michaeleen: I think that approach can sometimes work with very little kids, but even then I don’t think it lasts. These things are like weeds. The screens will come back unless you replace them with something else.

Behavioral psychology is actually very clear on this. It’s much easier to create a new habit than it is to break an old one. It’s much easier to replace a behavior than simply remove it.

For example, while I was writing Dopamine Kids, I decided I wanted to stop drinking as much. I had gotten into the habit of having a glass of wine every night, and I realized it just wasn’t working for me anymore.

I didn’t simply take it away. I bought non-alcoholic beer. I replaced it with something.

Kids are the same way.

If you just take away the iPad—especially if they’ve been using it for a long time—their brain has come to believe it’s something they need to survive. That’s what these products have tricked the brain into believing. So when you take it away, it genuinely feels awful.

But if you give them another activity that’s exciting, interesting, and something they genuinely want to do, taking the screen away doesn’t feel nearly as difficult. Over time, you can actually help them discover activities that make them feel even better than the iPad does.

That’s what creates a permanent habit instead of a temporary one.

Behavioral psychology is pretty clear that kids are using these things because they’re trying to meet a need.

Rosie wasn’t obsessed with Toca Boca World or cartoons because she wanted screens. She wanted adventure.

Adventure is a fundamental human need for kids. You could also call it autonomy, but I like the word adventure because I think it’s easier to understand. Kids need to explore, learn, and take little risks. They need that in order to feel good.

I think a lot of kids are using screens to try to fill that need.

So instead of simply taking screens away and leaving that need unmet, you have to backfill it.

I said to Rosie, “Tonight we’re not going to watch Netflix. We’re going to take a break. Instead, we’re going to do something you’ve been dying to do that I just haven’t made time for yet. You’re going to ride your bike to the market by yourself.”

I would even say to her, “Instead of watching cartoon characters have adventures, you’re going to have a real adventure yourself.”

That’s the difference.

You’re taking something that was trying—but ultimately failing—to meet a real human need and replacing it with something that actually does.

When you do that, it’s not nearly as hard.

It goes back to what you mentioned earlier about kids saying they’d rather be with their friends than on screens. That same research also found that kids would rather be outside playing than watching screens. So you’re giving them the opportunity to do the thing they actually want to do.

That’s really the process: figure out a replacement activity—or a replacement food—and then gradually begin taking the old thing away.

The result is that your child isn’t angry at you all the time. Your relationship is better because they have something wonderful replacing what they lost.

More importantly, it creates a lasting habit because they’re not simply complying with a rule. They’re building a hobby, a skill, or a way of living that genuinely brings them pleasure and meets their needs.

One of my biggest concerns with a lot of the screen advice that’s out there is that it isn’t permanent.

Real change comes from making small but permanent changes.

It’s not, “We’re doing a 30-day screen detox.”

It’s, “We don’t use screens after dinner anymore,” or, “We don’t use screens on Saturdays.”

And that’s just how our family does things now.

That’s how you train the brain.

If you keep bringing the old habit back, you undo the learning and go right back to where you started.

So I always encourage people to think small—but think permanent.

Sarah: One suggestion you make is starting with something simple, like, “We don’t do screens in the car.”

Michaeleen: Yes.

Sarah: I think that’s such a great place to start. Your book is full of practical little ideas like that, so the whole thing doesn’t feel overwhelming.

We’ve been talking about some of the bigger concepts, but the book is incredibly practical.

I’m working on a book myself right now, so I know how much work goes into something like this. I just want to say you did a really beautiful job balancing the theory with concrete things families can actually do.

I really, really recommend it.

Michaeleen: Thank you.

The car is a great place to start because it’s such a clear context for a child’s brain.

They get into the car and their brain thinks, “Screen time.”

Instead, you can make the car mean, “Reading time,” or “Journaling time,” or even “Bored time.”

It’s a really useful place to begin because they’re already somewhat contained, so it’s easier to establish a new routine.

Sarah: I love that.

The one thing I want to ask about—and I hope you don’t take this as criticism—is that some of what you’ve done takes a lot of time and energy privilege.

Michaeleen: Yes. I think it’s very similar to what I found with Hunt, Gather, Parent. There is some work up front, but I also think we dramatically underestimate how much work we’re already doing when we rely on screens as babysitters or pacifiers.

We tend to think that’s the easy route, but even in the short term, I don’t think it actually is.

Sarah: That’s a really good point because the fighting itself takes a lot of energy.

Michaeleen: Exactly. That’s ultimately what made me change and what made me want to write this book. I was just tired of arguing with Rosie about screens. I hated policing her.

It’s very similar to what I found with Hunt, Gather, Parent. Recently, one parent gave me some feedback that I actually thought was really insightful. She said, “I think you could have been clearer that having daily screen time—or unlimited screen time—is actually a lot of work.”

And she’s right.

The parent is managing it every single day, moment by moment. There’s constant fighting, negotiating, and policing.

I’ll tell you something else. Once we got ultra-processed foods out of our house, the amount of work I do around food dropped to about one-tenth of what it had been before. We actually spend less money because we’re eating less.

People don’t realize that ultra-processed food makes you eat more. That’s very well documented. Kids snack constantly when those foods are around. Rosie now eats two or three real meals a day when she’s eating whole foods.

So I’m actually doing much less work because those foods aren’t in the house.

I do agree there’s some work at the beginning. Teaching Rosie to ride her bike to the market took time. But now she’s 10, and she rides her bike everywhere. She bikes to piano lessons. She bikes all over town.

That investment keeps paying dividends.

Sarah: That’s a really fair point.

I had just been telling you before we started recording that, over the years, I’ve noticed more and more parents coming to coaching specifically because of challenges around screen time.

The fights about screens, getting kids off screens—it has become such a common struggle.

They just need to read your book and get some strategies.

Michaeleen: I’m really just trying to encourage people that if they have that gut feeling—that sense of, “This just isn’t working for our family”—it’s okay to say no.

There is a way to do it that doesn’t require an enormous amount of ongoing work.

Really, what you’re doing is setting up the environment so the default becomes these other activities. You’re designing things so you’re not constantly policing or managing every moment.

That’s my biggest pushback against the idea that this approach is more work.

It took a lot of work for me to figure all of this out and understand how it works—

Sarah: And you did that for us.

Michaeleen: Exactly.

I also think the court system—and society more broadly—is slowly starting to catch up. The regulations around screen content are so far behind the technology.

If you think about it, 20 years ago Rosie wouldn’t have been able to walk into a movie like Jaws without a parent. There were very clear rules about what children could and couldn’t see.

Now I can hand her a device that gives her access to some of the most extreme content imaginable.

One scientist told me that a child today can see, in about ten minutes, more pornography than our grandparents’ generation would have encountered in an entire lifetime.

Something is clearly out of balance.

Either society has changed dramatically, or our regulations simply haven’t kept pace.

When you look at child exploitation, trafficking, and abuse online, it’s obvious that regulation is behind.

Sarah: Big Tech has so much money and so much influence that I think that’s part of why the laws have fallen so far behind.

Michaeleen: It absolutely is. But I also think there’s this persistent myth that kids need these technologies and that they’re doing so much good.

One of my hopes for this book—and for the work many other researchers are doing—is that people will begin to understand that kids genuinely need help regulating this stuff.

They cannot regulate it on their own.

Right now, that entire burden falls on parents, and that’s a tremendous amount of work.

Sarah: We can’t regulate it on our own, and we’re grown-ups.

Michaeleen: Exactly.

When I first started researching this book, I interviewed a famous economist at Stanford—someone in his forties who will probably win a Nobel Prize someday. He spent our entire conversation telling me all the systems he had to build so he wouldn’t look at the news while he was working.

He had blocked it at the router. He’d blocked it on his computer. He’d blocked it in multiple other ways.

I remember sitting there thinking, “If he has to do all of that, how is a thirteen-year-old supposed to do her homework?”

That’s one of the central messages of the book.

This isn’t about willpower.

It’s not about teaching kids to resist temptation through self-control.

It’s about teaching them to build environments where they aren’t constantly tempted in the first place.

That’s exactly what you described earlier when you left your phone at home.

You create spaces in your life where the temptation simply isn’t there.

That’s the key to living a happier, healthier life—not relying on willpower, but learning to avoid unnecessary temptation and building habits that don’t require you to fight yourself every day.

Ironically, that’s what ends up making life much easier.

Sarah: That was another really interesting thing you talked about in your book—willpower.

Michaeleen: One of the really interesting findings about willpower is that people with fewer bad habits don’t actually have more willpower. They’ve simply arranged their lives so they’re exposed to fewer temptations.

Sarah: That’s right. A great place to start might be something like what you did with food. You talked about not eating food on the go.

Michaeleen: Exactly. No food on the go.

Sarah: Baby steps.

Michaeleen: Right. Or parents will tell me things like, “We don’t have ultra-processed foods at breakfast.” Breakfast is actually an easy place to start. You have oatmeal. You have eggs. There are lots of simple whole-food options. So you make that one meal your starting point.

That’s really the idea. Start with something small.

I think the same principle applies to parenting. Parenting actually becomes easier when the temptations simply aren’t there. You’re not constantly managing them.

Sarah: When my kids were growing up—and thankfully they mostly missed all of this because my youngest is 19, so there wasn’t Netflix and everything else that’s available now—we had a simple family rule: no screens Monday through Thursday.

Back then it was television, but they just knew that was how our family worked. If they asked, I’d simply say, “Remember, it’s Wednesday. We’ll watch TV on the weekend.”

It was actually very easy.

Michaeleen: Exactly. And that’s the dopamine system at work.

Their brains know what day of the week it is. We’re remarkably good at keeping track of time and routines. They knew they were in your house, after school, and that there wasn’t going to be TV.

It’s like a smoker on an airplane. Eventually the smoker’s brain learns, “I’m on a plane. I can’t smoke.” The craving relaxes because the brain understands the context.

The same thing happens with family routines.

In Israel, for example, many families observe a digital Sabbath where they unplug for a full 24 hours every week. Parents tell me their kids love it because they know that’s the time they play board games, spend time outside, and do other things together.

Their brains learn that weekly rhythm.

Our brains naturally work this way, so we can use that tendency to make family life calmer and more peaceful.

Honestly, one of my favorite outcomes is that when nine o’clock comes around, my daughter is calm and actually wants to go to bed. Whatever effort it took to establish those habits at the beginning has been completely worth it. It’s peaceful now, and hopefully those routines will stay with her for years.

Ironically, it was much harder for me to stop scrolling before bed than it was for her.

Sarah: Do you think there’s any place for moderation?

For example, could Rosie ever pick up Toca Boca again and play it for a little while? Or is it more a case of, once it’s gone, it’s gone?

Michaeleen: That’s a really good question.

I think there are a couple of ways to think about it.

The first is simply asking whether a particular technology is worth it. Does Toca Boca actually give us something valuable enough that it’s worth the possibility of bringing back arguments and struggles? Or is there something else that gives us the same benefit without those downsides?

One of the goals of the book is to help parents start asking that question about technology in general: Is this actually worth it?

The second question is whether your child can handle it.

I use YouTube for work. I’ll watch scientists explaining research, informational videos, or sometimes I’ll listen to music. I also know all the tricks YouTube is playing on me, so I can use it pretty intentionally.

But Rosie at ten years old?

No way.

YouTube is far too sophisticated for her to use purposefully.

Maybe when she’s sixteen, seventeen, or eighteen. Maybe fifteen. I don’t know.

But I’m not going to intentionally introduce it.

If it becomes necessary because of school or something else, then we’ll try it and see how she handles it. If she can use it well, maybe we’ll continue. If she can’t, then we won’t.

I think a lot of this is really about figuring out what your own child can handle.

We don’t give children alcohol or tobacco because they can’t handle them. We don’t give them pornography for the same reason.

These technologies have entered our lives so quickly that we’re all trying to answer entirely new questions.

One of the most important things parents can watch is what happens afterward.

How does your child behave? What’s their mood like? Is it immediately, “One more. One more. One more”?

If that’s what’s happening, then they’re probably not ready for it.

Sarah: Right. It’s not restorative.

This reminds me of a guest I had on the podcast a year or two ago. He was a former video game developer, and the episode was called How to Stop Fighting With Your Kid About Video Games.

Sarah: This reminds me of something another guest said on the podcast, and I think it fits perfectly with what you’re talking about.

He was a former video game developer, and he said something I’ve never forgotten. He said, “If you’re going to let your kids play video games, don’t let them play anything that’s free.”

He said there are lots of amazing games that you actually buy because they’re designed with a real story arc, real challenges, and an ending. As I was reading your book, I kept thinking about that because those paid games are designed to give you an actual reward at the end. You complete levels, you build skills, and then you finish.

He wasn’t talking about buying things inside free games. He meant games that you purchase outright. I remember my husband used to play The Legend of Zelda. It was a game you started and eventually finished.

Michaeleen: I love that. There’s so much I love about it because the business model is completely different.

With free games, the longer you stay on them, the more money the company makes through advertising and in-game purchases. Their entire goal is to keep you there for as long as possible. They’re holding the child inside that loop.

But with purchased games, they actually want you to finish because then they hope you’ll buy another game. It’s almost like movies used to be. They wanted you to enjoy the experience, reach the end, and then come back for the next one.

You’re exactly right—they’re designed to end.

I think that’s really beautiful advice because it highlights how much the business model shapes the experience.

Sarah: That’s what he said. In the free games, the commodity is your child’s attention.

Michaeleen: Exactly.

Whereas with a purchased game, you’re paying for an experience that has a beginning and an end.

We’ve actually done something similar with movies and television. We got rid of all of our subscriptions, and honestly, we’ve saved a lot of money. Now, if we want to watch a movie, we buy it.

We’re much more intentional. We stop and ask ourselves, “Do we really want to watch this? Is it worth it?”

Then, when the movie ends, we’re done.

I think that simple change does so much to keep you out of the wanting cycle we talked about earlier. Paying for something slows the whole process down. It makes you think about your choice, and the design itself is completely different. It’s designed to leave you feeling satisfied—to let you say, “I finished it.”

Sarah: It’s an experience. It’s an adventure. There’s a reward.

Michaeleen: Exactly. I love that idea. I wish I’d put it in the book. It’s really good. Honestly, I didn’t even realize there were that many games designed that way.

Sarah: I’ll send you his contact if you ever want to talk with him.

I could honestly talk to you about this all day.

I’m just trying to think if there’s anything else I really wanted to ask, but I do want to highlight something for anyone who’s still listening.

This isn’t a moral argument about screens or ultra-processed foods being “bad.” You make that very clear throughout the book.

It’s really about bringing more joy and fun back into your life because getting trapped in this cycle of wanting without ever feeling rewarded is making all of us kind of miserable.

Michaeleen: That’s exactly right.

The first thing I hope parents take away is that this isn’t their fault.

This has happened incredibly quickly, and most of us don’t even understand what we’re up against. These products are intentionally designed by multibillion-dollar companies to capture and hold our children’s attention. That’s what we’re competing with, and for a long time we simply haven’t had the right tools.

The second thing is that this isn’t about taking everything away. That’s a fantasy. It’s not going to work.

It’s about figuring out what actually brings joy to you and your family, keeping those things, and letting go of the things that don’t.

We’ve also moved beyond the old idea that kids will somehow fall behind or be left out if they don’t have all these technologies. There’s so much evidence now showing that giving kids a phone or social media doesn’t suddenly make them feel accepted or like they belong.

In fact, it often does the opposite.

So we can let go of that fear.

Instead, we can ask, “What actually works for our family?” Then we can build the skills to get there and help our kids gradually adopt these technologies in healthy ways because they’re going to be part of their lives.

Almost everyone will eventually have a phone. Most kids will eventually use some form of social media, whether that’s YouTube, Instagram, or whatever comes next.

The question isn’t whether they’ll ever use it.

The question is: When are they ready?

And how do we help them use it in a way that still allows them to be productive?

For me, that’s one of the essential parenting skills of the twenty-first century: helping kids set up their environments—their computers, their workspaces, their routines—so they aren’t constantly fighting temptation.

Sarah: You also talk specifically about having kids work where a parent can see them because I think that’s becoming a huge challenge now that so many students are issued Chromebooks at school.

Sarah: You also mention having kids work where a parent can see them, because I think that’s becoming a huge challenge now that so many students are issued Chromebooks at school.

Everyone I’ve talked to—and maybe there are exceptions out there—says you can’t put parental controls on school-issued devices. Kids need YouTube to watch something for school, and suddenly you’ve opened the door to all kinds of temptation.

Every parent I know whose child has a school-issued Chromebook struggles with it.

Michaeleen: Yes, and I think this is an area that’s really in flux.

From what I’m learning, parents are starting to push back—not only on schools issuing Chromebooks in the first place, but also on not being allowed to set them up in ways that remove things like YouTube. I think parents actually have more power than I realized.

Some schools will work with families if parents speak up. You can go to the teacher or the principal and say, “This is what I want for my child’s Chromebook. I don’t want them to have access to YouTube,” or, “I want these restrictions in place.”

Parents have more rights than I think most of us realize.

I’ve talked with parents who are trying to get Chromebooks out of kindergarten through Grade 2 altogether. Others are asking for more limited internet access or different settings during school hours. There’s really a whole spectrum of possibilities.

I honestly think this is going to be one of the defining parenting issues of the next decade—the school-issued Chromebook, the school-issued iPad.

For me, it just makes those screen-free gaps in the day even more important. If your child has spent the day doing schoolwork on a device, then after dinner becomes even more valuable as a screen-free time.

You need a break. I need a break. We all need a break.

Creating what I call sanctuaries becomes increasingly important as more of school moves onto screens. Kids need opportunities to move their bodies, relax their brains, and experience activities that are genuinely restorative.

I also think there are resources available for parents who want more control over that digital space. It does take work, but as parents we sometimes hand over more authority to schools than we actually have to. We have more rights than we often realize.

In fact, a lot of this is being challenged legally. There are lawsuits against school districts because some software has been given to children in ways that violate privacy protections and collect data improperly.

So I think this whole area is changing, and I’m hopeful we’ll eventually reach a place where, even if students are working on computers, they’ll have better protections against unnecessary distractions.

That’s exactly how I work. I turn on an app blocker so I can’t wander around the internet while I’m working. Otherwise, I’d be distracted constantly.

I have a colleague who says she can’t work for more than a couple of minutes before she finds herself checking something online.

Sarah: I struggle with that too.

It’s getting easier the more I practice, but the pull—that feeling of wanting—is incredibly strong.

Michaeleen: It really is. It’s become a habit, and eventually you’re barely even thinking about it.

I remember when I first installed an app blocker. It felt so uncomfortable. I kept thinking, “But I want to check this. I want to check that.”

Then it faded.

It actually faded pretty quickly.

Sarah: Thank you so much—not just for being here, but for writing this book. It’s really remarkable.

Even though I’m past the most active stage of parenting, I keep noticing the ideas from the book working their way into my own life.

I have to tell you, the last couple of nights I’ve made brown rice instead of white rice because of something I read in the book. I love white rice, but I know I need more fiber. Honestly, once you start eating brown rice regularly, you hardly notice the difference.

You’ve gotten me wearing a watch, eating brown rice, and leaving my phone at home when I take the dog for a walk.

Michaeleen: I love that.

It lets your brain relax because you’re not constantly multitasking anymore.

I have my watch on too. Rosie and I actually wear the same watch. To me, it’s become a little symbol of this more digitally minimalist way of thinking.

I was doing exactly the same thing—checking my phone every time I wanted to know the time. Eventually I thought, “Why am I using this little computer just to tell the time?”

Sarah: Exactly.

Well, thank you so much.

Michaeleen: Thank you.

Sarah: Before I let you go, I have one question that I ask every guest. It’ll be interesting because I can compare your answer to what you said the last time you were on.

If you could go back in time to your younger parent self, what advice would you give yourself?

Michaeleen: Which age?

Sarah: Any age. Go back to brand-new-mom Michaeleen. What would you tell yourself?

Michaeleen: I’ll give you two answers.

For the baby stage, I would tell myself, “Michaeleen, just carry her all the time. Put her in the carrier and carry her. Don’t worry so much about putting her down.”

She was so happy whenever I carried her, and that’s how so many cultures do it. The baby is simply on someone’s back or on their front while life goes on. I really wish I’d done more of that because I think it would have made both of our lives much easier.

For the older years, I’d tell myself to stop worrying so much that taking away the screens was going to be hard.

I built it up in my mind as this enormous thing. I thought, “It’s going to be so difficult to take away Netflix at night. It’s going to be so difficult to take away Toca Boca.”

But it wasn’t.

It really wasn’t.

Our lives became so much easier afterward, and I wish I’d been able to see that ahead of time.

Sarah: Well, how could you have known?

What you were seeing was the outward expression of all that wanting—the crying, the begging, the desperation. It would be so easy to mistake that for, “I’m denying my child something that brings them enormous pleasure.”

I think that’s an important distinction for parents.

Just because your child is crying and screaming that they want something doesn’t actually mean that it’s bringing them pleasure or that it’s good for them.

Michaeleen: Exactly.

Someone said something to me that I think made it into the book. A child can desperately want to spend another hour playing a video game while actually getting very little pleasure—or no pleasure—from it.

That’s really where the trick is.

That’s the hijacking.

I also think Lenore’s work is right. Kids really do want the offline world.

They just have to experience it first.

I didn’t fully appreciate this before, but you can’t really want something until you’ve experienced the joy of it yourself. Maybe you can see someone else enjoying it, but to actually build that dopamine pathway, you have to get out there and feel it yourself.

You have to think, “Oh, this is wonderful. I love this.”

Then your brain starts wanting more of that.

Sarah: I was thinking about one family I work with. They have five kids, they run their own business, and they’re incredibly busy.

Their five-year-old son was having constant meltdowns and aggression, so I suggested they start tracking what happened right before those moments.

When they came back, they realized that about 90 percent of the incidents were connected to screens. He was trying to get one of his parents’ phones. He was trying to grab the remote from his sisters. He wanted the TV turned on or wanted it to stay on.

This was actually before I read your book, so I probably could have given them even better advice afterward.

But I suggested they experiment with going screen-free for a while and see whether it changed the aggression.

The next time I talked to them, the dad told me that, out of pure frustration, he’d picked up the television and put it out in the garage. He basically announced, “No more TV for the rest of the summer.”

The following week, the mom started texting me pictures.

“Here’s the girls sleeping in a fort they built on the trampoline.”

“Here’s our five-year-old playing with his trucks.”

Picture after picture.

She said, “I think this is going to be the best summer ever without TV.”

Michaeleen: I love that story.

I really do.

And it’s easier.

It’s easier.

All he did was move the TV into the garage.

That’s amazing.

That’s exactly the advice I’d give myself.

Just do it. Trust your instincts. Do it.

Sarah: Do it.

Well, thank you so much. I really appreciate you coming back on the podcast.

As always, it’s been such a pleasure talking with you, and you’ve written another wonderful book to add to the parenting canon.

Michaeleen: Thank you so much for having me. It was truly a pleasure to come back.

Sarah: Thanks so much.

We’ll put links to everything we talked about in the show notes, along with your website.

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