268. Spreading Joy: The Happy Cowboy Foundation with Anna Moon

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This is happiness solved with America's happiness coach, Sandee Sgarlata.

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Hello, everyone, and thank you for joining me today. I'm so happy you're here. I'm Sandee Sgarlata. I was born in Virginia beach and raised in the Baltimore Annapolis area and had very humble and tragic beginnings. And as a result, my life was a hot mess.

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Thankfully, 33 years ago, I got my act together and since that time, I have dedicated my life to serving others and raising awareness that no matter what you've been through, you can choose happiness and live the life of your dreams. Happiness solved is dedicated to giving you content that is empowering, motivational, inspirational, and of course, a dose of happiness. It's my way to give back to the world and share other people's stories. This thing called life can be challenging and my guests share their amazing stories, wisdom and life lessons that demonstrate anyone can choose happiness. You see, happiness is a choice, and the choice is yours.

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Today's episode is amazing and I am so grateful for you. Thank you for listening. And don't forget to leave a review and follow me on social media at coach Sandee Sgarlata. Enjoy the show.

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Anna Moon, my gosh, I'm so excited to talk to you today and trying to not feel too starstruck because of who you are. And you are the wife and partner of country music singer Nico Moon, and you also write some music as well.

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Don't be too starstruck. I'm just average Joe. I prefer, actually to be much more in the hindsight than the spotlight. So don't be too starstruck. But we are so blessed to get to do what we love together.

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And I'm so happy to be able to write songs with my husband. It's such a fun little life I've wound up in. Wow. Now, where are you guys located? We're in Nashville.

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You are in Nashville? Okay. Yes, but we're originally from Georgia. We always say, he's from Douglasville. I'm from Cartersville.

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But we say we're from the same small town, but different because it's like the same distance away from, but it's on the opposite side, but it's that same. We both grew up with sweet tea, and we all know the same things going on in Atlanta. And so we have a very similar upbringing in small town Georgia. That's awesome. I tell you, nashville, I've been twice, I think.

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Yeah, I've been there twice. And I tell you, when people go for the first time, I'm like, just wait till you get to the airport. I'm like, it's probably the only place in the world where behind security, there's the most talented musicians just sitting there playing the guitar. That's credible. That's got to be the toughest job in town, I feel like, is those people who you see playing at the airport or down on Broadway.

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I truly think that that's, like, the hardest gig in town, because those guys are just playing, and hopefully you have a crowd who is kind and involved and listening to you. But a lot of times, especially if you're on Broadway, people are drinking, and you're just kind of, like, there. So I always encourage people, if you do ever see a musician playing in the corner of a restaurant or on Broadway or in the airport, go up and encourage them. Give them a tip. Could you imagine if you were in that position that they're in and putting themselves out there, and then everybody's just kind of, like, acting like they're not even there?

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Well, the talent is ridiculous. It is full of it. There's so much talent there, and there's so much. Oh, my gosh. Talk about the town of starving artists, I would imagine, right, just to use that phrase, but, yeah.

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So how did you get to where you are today? I love to hear people's stories. Well, the short form of this story is, I have always loved music, and I've always wanted to be a part of music in some type of way. And when I met Nico, the goal, know, how can we do music together so that we know, be a family unit and not be separated? Because when we first met, we were both actually artists.

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I had an artist career of my own, and he was kind of more focused on songwriting, but it was leading down a path to where we were about to be separated a lot, because if I was traveling and he was traveling, we had to come together a little bit. And so I've started going into full songwriting, which is where I'm much happier. I'm much happier being behind the scenes a little bit, and it's been great because it keeps us together, and it keeps us also working on something together. We have so much fun collaborating that we love being able to write songs together, and the path that got us here wouldn't change a thing. That's awesome.

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That's fantastic. Okay, so you're the co writer of the number one hit good time.

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How did all of that come about, and what does it feel like to be in that position where all of your hard work has paid off? Well, I gotta tell you, I feel very grateful. Know, in the town of Nashville female songwriters and female artists. It is hard to kind of get your foot in the door because it is a more masculine, driven isn't everything is, but, you know, the opportunity. With good time came Nico, actually, he had written the song with a group of talented songwriters, and they actually wrote it to be pitched.

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This was actually before Nico had really decided to begin an artist career of himself, that he wrote the song. And then about a year later, nobody had picked up the song, and he was thinking about it, and he was like, you know what? That was a great song. So he brought it to me and our co producer, josh, and said, hey, I have this song. I had wrote it, like, a year.

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Just, I believe in it. I think if we rework it a little bit and make it fit what we're doing, it could really be something. And so we were like, okay, let's try it. And I tell you what, it was one of those songs that we had no idea. I think we even did, like, we did a one through ten list, or like, however many songs was on the first album of what we think is the strongest song.

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And it was towards the bottom because it's a different sound, it's a different style. It's just not your typical country song. So we just had no idea the life that it would take on once it got released. But, yeah, that's a little bit about the story of how that song came about. I love it.

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I love it. All right, so you're a stay at home mom, which is the hardest job I ever did. Not kidding. Stay at home mom, stay at home chef, stay at home house cleaner, stay at home, right? You name it.

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That's right. But I love that you co founded a foundation that's going to be. It looks like it's just being launched, this foundation. Yes. The Happy cowboy.

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A foundation that raises money to provide therapy to those who can't afford it. I love that. What an amazing thing. Yeah. Thank you so much.

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And thank you for bringing it up. We are so excited for what's coming with the Happy Cowboy foundation, as we know. I mean, to just even exist is so expensive right now, and a lot of times mental health gets put at the very bottom of the list of things that you're going to splurge on yourself for. And so we just really wanted to create an avenue to raise money to help people access mental health care. And another big part of what we're going to be doing is educational.

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So a lot of people actually have behavioral health covered on their insurance, and maybe they just don't know or aren't aware. And so another big part of the foundation is going to be education around, maybe you have it already covered and you can actually go and get that service. But we're so passionate about giving people the opportunity to improve themselves. A lot of people, they want to, but if you can't afford it, if it's between feeding your family and getting therapy, people are going to choose feeding their family, of course. Oh, my gosh.

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Yes. We hope to make at least a little bit of an impact for people. Yeah. Well, I tell you what, that is such a huge conversation that needs to be talked about in today's world, and it's becoming more talked about. And thankfully, there's people such as yourself and other celebrities that are coming out and really sharing their own personal journeys and stories because it removes the stigma of it.

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Well, I think it's just so important, even if I consider myself to have a very small platform in the world of the Internet. Nico has a bigger one, obviously. But even on my little daily stories on my platform, I love to put out positivity and a positive message because you never know. Even if you have 500 followers and you get on your story or if you post a quote that you saw, you might have one person, maybe it's your great aunt, you know what I mean? Maybe that's the only person following you.

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But she needed to hear that. And so I really hope to see more people of influence and not inflict. Like I'm saying, you can just be average Joe and post about positivity and mindset. And I feel like if everybody just did one thing like that a day, whether it's online or in real life, like one act of kindness a day, I feel like, man, wouldn't the world be such a better place? Yeah, without question.

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Without question. That's why I launched my podcast almost three years ago. It's incredible because we need something out there for people to get that daily dose. Well, and I tell you what I love about your podcast I've been listening is. Thank you.

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So many different conversations with people of different backgrounds. And so I have to imagine for your audience, there's someone out there that you've spoken to that resonates with them and they can say, oh, today I was listening to one of your episodes. You were speaking with an athlete, and whoever might have seen that, that needed to hear that from that perspective. I love that you have such a diverse audience. Thank you.

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And that's what my goal was, because no matter who you're talking, like, for example, I told you, I just interviewed a professor and medical doctor from Stanford University, and I knew he had a book out called the Happiness Handbook. And I was like, okay, but I have no idea what the conversation is going to go into. It turned into this just most magnificent conversation that even though he's a doctor, whoever listens to it's going to resonate with it. And the same with you, right? Well, I'm not a Stanford professor, but pretty mean.

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Sausage tortellini.

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Awesome. That's awesome. Okay, so you and your husband, Nico, just released a brand new Christmas song. Yes. What is it called?

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Because I haven't started listening to any Christmas music because. Oh, come on, you got to get.

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Wait until after Thanksgiving to get the tree up. We did a version of all I want for Christmas is you by Mariah Carey. We reimagined it kind of as a duet, and it was so much fun. I actually flew out to LA to record it with Nico for 24 hours. It was my first trip away from Lily and I know a lot of parents listening to this will relate, but it was the most emotional trip I've ever taken.

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I was just so nervous being so far from her and getting on an airplane and just all the things that come up when you're leaving your kid for the first time. But I had to do it. It was such an amazing opportunity. And she is my why, she is my purpose. She is like, ever since she's been born, anything that frightens me or anything that intimidates me, I just think about her and remember that I'm her mom and I can do it.

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So I'm so excited that we got to go and record that, especially for her. I can't wait for her to be able to listen to it and really understand it when she gets a little older. How old is she? She just turned one. Oh, wow.

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So you're at the beginning of your journey. Oh, yeah. Whenever I start talking about kids, I have my one. He was my miracle baby because I was told I would never have children. Oh, wow.

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And lo and behold, I talk about this in my book that the day my ex husband and I, we agreed to separate and I found out I was pregnant and I stayed married for ten more years. Wow. Now he's 23 now and he's in college and he's not coming home for thanksgiving. And is he in trouble? No, he has to come back for his.

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He has a full time job because he's just finishing college, so he has a full time job, but he's working remotely for them part time. And they have a holiday party, so it was too far to drive back and forth in such a short period of time. And he goes, mom, I don't know what to do about thanksgiving. And I go, it's okay. Don't call me.

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He's like, oh, thank you. I'm sure that really took a weight off his shoulders, right? And you don't realize that influence. And I'm the most laid back mom. But he was so worried about that disappointment, right when you said that.

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Lily. That's your name. Her name? Yes, Lily. Lily is your why.

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Well, Brandon is my why. And I tell you, it's been like this every single day since the day he was born. Everything, you know, I do it for myself first, obviously, because I put myself first. But he's my why, and he will always be my why. Well, I think it's like, for me, what my why means is it's that thing that gives you strength when you yourself need a little help.

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It's like, before Lily, I was my own why. Right? My interests, my ego, my things, those were my own whys. But that only gets you so far. I feel like when you have a child, it just becomes such a deeper purpose.

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It's like I have to be the best version of me. I want to be strong. I want to be courageous. I want to be all the things that I want her to be. I want her to see in me, her becoming my why.

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In the last year has just grown me so much as a person. It's gotten me needing some more babies. I think I'm like, if this is what one does, if I have a few more, I might be running for president. Who knows? There you go.

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Well, the thing is, and let's talk about that for a minute, knowing your why, because I work with professional athletes, amateur athletes, and a lot of business leaders. And that is, like, the one thing that I always stress with them. You have to be really clear on your why. But whether you're doesn't matter. Even if you're just.

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I'm doing with air quartz because you're never just a mom, but I think a lot of women may feel like that. Well, I'm just a mom. No, you have that purpose. You're a rock star. Because no matter what it is you're doing in life, you have to be clear on that why.

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It's that purpose. Something to get you out of bed in the morning. But like being a mom, you're responsible for this child and their development, everything. And I'm sure you've seen, especially in what you do, but I feel like so much education is coming out now, where a lot of times people's things that come up later in life is because of their childhood. And I've done a lot of reading in that.

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And so I think I'm just hyper aware of making sure that I'm giving her the best chance possible at being as mentally strong as she can as she gets older. But I just think a big part of that, in a way, that I'm going to be parenting her, is letting her know that I'm not perfect. I'm going to 100% mess up. I don't know everything, because when we're young, we think our parents are these superheroes who know everything and they're never wrong. But I want to be very clear with her that I know almost absolutely nothing, and we are learning this together.

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But I'm always going to do my best for her. And I think as long as she knows that, as long as she knows that I'm giving it 100%, I think she'll be set up for at least as best success as I can give her. Yeah, absolutely. Without question. And here's the thing.

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I was having a conversation yesterday with someone, and we were talking about how hard we are in ourselves, right? And he brought up an interesting thing that I hadn't really considered before, and that was, when we're young and when we're little, when we're children, we do something wrong. What happens? Your parents punish you or they put you in a timeout or. For me, it was always, they take my skating.

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I was a professional figure skater. They would take my skating away from me, which was the most thing I love the most. They'd take it away from me. And granted, my parents didn't have an instruction manual. None of us are given instruction manuals.

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Right, when you have a baby. So they didn't know. Right. They were just doing the best they could. So I'm not faulting them.

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But it's an interesting thing for parents out there to think about, because what happens is, as an adult, your brains think, oh, well, when I made a mistake before I got punished, I guess I'm supposed to punish myself, right? That's such a true thought. And one thing, I recently read a book called good Inside. And the whole purpose of the book is really encouraging kids to always know that no matter what, they're a good person, they're good inside. And I think that that's kind of what you're saying.

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You were made to feel like you were bad. So it should never be that you're bad. It's just that there's a lesson to be learned in this situation. But you're a good person. And I think that's such an important message that kids hear.

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Yeah. And you just reminded me because it's been so long since my son was little, because he's 23 now. I remember reading something about that, and I used to say, you're not bad. Your behavior. Exactly.

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Was your behavior. Separate it. To separate the two. Yeah. And I just totally forgot about that until just now.

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So thank you, though. That's such a great practice, I think, to take into all relationships. Absolutely. I try to take that into my marriage as well, and my relationship with family members. And I try to disassociate the person sometimes from the behavior.

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And if I'm having a conflict, try not to let. It shouldn't shape the whole person, one act. So I try to keep that in mind. Yeah, for sure. Because you're right.

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In any relationship, they're not a bad person. But we all make mistakes, right? We have to just know generous and kind to other people, but also to ourselves. Be gentle and kind to ourselves. And sometimes, isn't it funny how that's the hardest person to be kind to, right?

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I was telling Nico, I said, I wonder, do all people? And of course they do, but we all know the meanest person in the world, and it's the voice in our head, right? It's like, I have never heard such mean things about myself than what I tell myself. Isn't that so interesting how we do that to ourselves? And so one thing that I've been really trying to focus on is when I do hear, because I feel like you always hear that voice, and it is loudest, but at the same time, there is the other voice saying, it's not that bad, you're not that bad.

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It's all good. We can try again. And so I've been trying to turn down, or at least acknowledge, when I hear that voice, at least say, oh, there she is. Let's tell her to come back another day or something. Because today we're focused on positivity.

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But isn't that something how we're worst. Critic and what you just said is the best way to handle it? Because we're all, every single person, there is not one person that is immune from that negative self talk. And I've had to challenge people for, because people don't. I don't have negative thoughts.

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And I'm like, well, you're not human. Because, wow, you are really. Oh, so you've transcended above Mother Teresa and Buddha because they all had negative thoughts too, right? Right. But it's what you do with it afterwards.

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So that's such a great practice. I call it being positive on purpose. And one thing that I love to do is when I do feel like those negative voices and thoughts are becoming really loud, I like to hop on my phone or on the Internet somewhere, especially if I'm already on. Usually when my voices get the loudest, it's because I'm already on the Internet scrolling, and it's making me depressed and anxious. So one thing I like to do when I feel that is I like to refocus what I'm looking at.

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And this is something that everybody can do. If you feel that way, or even if you're just needing a boost of positivity, whatever platform you want or you're already on Instagram, YouTube, Pinterest, type in positivity, type in mindset motivation, and scroll on that for a little while and see if it doesn't help a little bit. Because another thing too is the way that the Internet works and the way the algorithms work is the more that you type in positivity, the more that you heart things that are positive mindsets, the more it's going to show you and the more that you're going to intake good things. And I think that we all need that, especially right now, especially going into this next year, being an election year and all the wildness that's going to come. I hope people really take time to be positive on purpose and be proactive in seeking out positivity.

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Oh, yeah, for sure. And I'm glad you brought that up with the algorithm because I don't think people realize that. But if you just happen to click on a specific ad, all of a sudden you're going to get flooded with the same type of ads. And that's how it works. So it's no different when you're scrolling.

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The more time you spend on one specific post or comment on it, you're going to be shown more of that. That's exactly right. And that's why I feel like one of the most powerful tools that you can do to help get yourself in a better mindset every day is to proactively search and save to your phone and send somebody a positive message. The more that you interact with media in that way, the more it's going to be customized to you and it's going to be customized in a way that hopefully helps your mindset, which I think would be so helpful for so many people. I know.

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It's been incredibly helpful for me ever since I've learned that that's something that I'm actually in control of. And I don't have to be looking at the world's ending tomorrow and we're being invaded by aliens today and the world's falling apart. If I can instead Google mindset, motivation, amazing recipes, that's my reality now, and that's where I'm staying for the moment. And that's the best thing to do. Maybe only a few times a week, I turn on the news just to see what I missed in the world because I don't pay attention.

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I don't watch the news because it's just so negative. Right. And it puts you into that state of mind that just doesn't serve you. It's so true. And I think it's just, you got to find out what are the things that trigger you.

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Some people that might not. My mom, she loves to watch murder mysteries. She can watch murder. I do, too. Yeah, she'll watch murder mysteries till all wee hours in the morning.

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And if I watch that, I will be torn up for days. I cannot watch it. So I think it's just about knowing your triggers, knowing what sets you down a negative path and being positive on purpose and avoiding those things and kind of putting in new practices that might take you away from that. Yeah, I love that. Being positive on purpose, it's so.

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It's an intention. You have to think about it intentionally. Really, you do. You have to be proactive. You have to be proactive to be positive.

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I feel like. And another way that you can implement that and something I've been loving doing, it's kind of like a challenge I've been giving myself. But when you go out into the world being positive on purpose, you can be the first one to smile at somebody. You can be the first one to ask, how are you doing? And it's amazing how when we're asked those things out in public, we feel so good about ourselves.

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If somebody compliments your outfit, you're like, oh, I must be looking good. But if you do that for somebody else, I promise you it'll feel 100 times better than if you get the compliment yourself. Yes. That is random act of kindness, which can simply be looking at somebody, making eye contact and smiling. Just that.

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That's all you got to do. Just that. And it's funny how I love the thought about how when you set in motion a certain vibe for the day, like, if you wake up and you stub your toe and everything else is just bad for the rest of the day, it's like you can turn things around, right. You're in control of your reality a little bit, I feel like. And that's all about how you approach things and how you approach other people, I think, too, and I think being kind to others, especially if you're the first one to do it, it always makes you feel great.

00:27:32
It's a great boost of dopamine for you if you're ever in need. Yeah, no kidding. One last thing that I wanted to bring up, because I thought about this when you were talking about your daughter and how it's changed you, I noticed I had a huge shift in perception and the way I viewed other people after my son was born, because I realized, well, number one, how much you love the person, and number two, how much fear there is, right? At the same time, you love them so much and you're afraid there's that fear of loss. Right.

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But the big thing for me was when I looked at other people that maybe weren't behaving in a way that was the best way to behave as a human. And you look at them and you say, you know, they were a baby once, right? They were a baby once. What must have happened to that person? And I look at with people, instead of judging them for the way they were treating other people or whatever, I look at them with compassion and say, wow, what must that person have gone through to be able to be like that today?

00:28:44
And you feel compassion for them because they were a baby at one point. I think that that's such a beautiful way to look at people in general, I think because when you look at one thing I've been noticing when I look at Lily is just trying to really understand what are those qualities we have when we're a baby that we lose when we're an adult? One of those big things is just innocence. And so if you almost look at people who maybe aren't the best, and you realize that at one point they were just this innocent, full of love and wonder. Little creature.

00:29:22
That's right. Like you're saying what happened and just trying to empathize, I think, a little bit about their difficulties when and how they lost the light that we're all born with. Right. I think that it's so hard to lead with compassion, especially in a day and age where on the Internet people love to lead with. I would say, not compassion, hatred, bitterness, judgment, all those things.

00:29:57
But I think if you can look at somebody and that they were once innocent and life happened to them, what was that? Look at people more with a question instead of this answer that you've come up with about them. Well, because what you're doing is you're making up a story. Right. When in reality you don't know what this person has just gone through in their life.

00:30:26
It could have been ten years ago, it could have been 20, it could have been an hour ago. Right. And we just don't know. Yeah, no, I think that's a beautiful way to look at people. And I think that thought might even be helpful when thinking about how to communicate people with who you disagree with or how to engage with people who you disagree with is just that, look, I mean, we all come from same unknown source of light and energy, I guess you could say, and life happens and everybody takes different paths, but at the core, we're all just these innocent children on this floating rock in the universe.

00:31:09
So if we could lead a little bit with compassion, I think the world would be a much kinder place, for sure. That was so beautifully said. So, Anna, this has been so great. Is there anything else that you want to share that I haven't asked you about or that we haven't talked about today? I'm just so excited for the launch of the Happy Cowboy foundation and to just continue spreading the message of positivity.

00:31:35
And I really would love to encourage anybody listening today. If you go on your social media, it doesn't matter if you have 20 followers, 500 followers, 10,000 followers, post something of kindness and see if that doesn't engage with your followers. I promise you, people are going to write you and say, I needed to hear this. Thank you for posting this. You will be amazed at what happens when you're positive on purpose.

00:32:01
And I just think that's one of the most beautiful things that you can put out there, is kindness and. Yeah, I hope everybody tries that out and see where that. Oh, love it. Yes, I second that. All right, Anna, this has been such a pleasure today.

00:32:19
I could have conversations like this for hours on end, but I like to be respectful not only of your time, but of the listeners time, because I know that most people only like certain amount of time for these episodes. So thank you so much. I really appreciate you, everything you're doing. And everybody check out the happy cowboy foundation. We'll make sure we have everything in the show notes as well.

00:32:41
Thank you so much. All right, thank you for listening. Everyone certainly hope that you enjoyed today's interview. Thank you so much for joining me. And as always, I hope that you and your family are healthy and safe and that your lives are filled with peace, joy and happiness.

00:33:10
Take care, everyone.