Episode 16: Feel Your Feelings with Inside Out (2015) and Screen Cares

Jennie (00:02):

This is Screen Cares. I'm Jennie

Sarah (00:05):

And I'm Sarah. And we welcome you to our place to connect beyond the screen

Jennie (00:10):

And watch better, together.

Sarah (00:22):

I am so excited to talk about this movie with you, because this is one that shocked me when you picked it out. So tell us, what are we watching today?

Jennie (00:32):

All right. This week, my Screen Cares is all about Inside Out. And I know that we haven't done a lot of it, animated movies, but I realized I watched an incredible number of animated movies, or at least used to with younger kids. And inside out was one that hit so hard for me inside out is the Pixar animated. I would say classic, even though it was made in 2015, it was something that whenever I watched it for the first time with my kids in 2015, they were very young. 

So I really was mostly watching this for myself and for their own like, “Ooh, it's bright lights,” cause they were very little. My kids in 2015 were almost three and almost one whenever this came out. So they were like itty bitties. It is a fun age. 

And so this movie ended up being really formative for me as a mother. And then also just super helpful as a person. This is why I picked inside out I'm excited about it. So had you watched it before I recommended, “Hey, let's watch inside out this week?”

Sarah (01:33):

I did. And it was one of those movies that I feel like I discounted, so it was really cool that you chose this movie. It's just really fun being reintroduced to movies that you hadn't given enough credit to like this one. Do you want to give the description, just in case there are some people who haven't gotten a chance to watch this.

Jennie (01:52):

The IMDB description of inside Out is I think actually a pretty solid description: Growing up can be a bumpy road. And it's no exception for Riley who is uprooted from her Midwest life. When her father starts a new job in San Francisco, like all of us Riley is guided by her emotions, joy, fear, anger, disgusted, and sadness. The emotions live in headquarters, which really, side note until watching it this time, I did not appreciate the pun of like headquarters, like in your brain, like behind your face. 

Anyway, I don't think headquarters <laugh> I know right headquarters, the control center inside Riley's mind where they help advise her through everyday life as Riley and her emotions struggle to adjust to a new life in San Francisco turmoil and sues and headquarters.

 Although joy Riley's main and most important emotion tries to keep things positive, the emotions, conflict on how best to navigate a new city house and school. 

And this is also starring amazing voice artists. Um, and actors, Amy polar is joy. Phyllis Smith is sadness. Phyllis Smith from the office, Mindy Kaling is discussed, which like perfect bill hat, fear. I like I'm imagining the character in Barry being fear, um, which is like a dark angle, but you know, Louis Black is anger. Like of course he obviously, um, and then we have a host of others. I didn't realize until I was looking up the cast that Diane Lane is the mom. And

Sarah (03:25):

Is she ever not a mom in movies?

Jennie (03:27):

I know. I mean, I guess Under the Tuscan Sun? They have a shockingly good lineup, even in their minor characters. I also just have to mention the soundtrack. Did you love the soundtrack on this?

Sarah (03:37):

I didn't love it or hate it. I never felt really drawn to it, to be honest that doesn't, that's no knock to the, the composer who's amazing or anybody who loves it, but like for some reason it didn't hit for me.

Jennie (03:48):

Well, I think the reason it hit for me was because my now 10 year old, then three year old, it hit for him. And if it hits for your kids, you're gonna be listening to it a lot. And of the things I had the choice to listen to, like I was like, we can do this. So the soundtrack was by Michael GS, Chino Gino GI A C C H I N O can. I

Sarah (04:12):

I'm glad I'm not the only one who butchers names on Screen Cares.

Jennie (04:15):

You know, and I understand as someone who's last name used to start with a Z and end with K, no one knew how to pronounce it. I definitely I'm sympathetic to this, but like I I'm doing my best. 

I listened to the first song, this soundtrack with where we meet Joy for the first time. Oh yeah. And whenever Riley is born and you kind of are introduced to this concept that we will be meeting characters inside of this character Riley's brain. And the first of them is Joy. And that first song is this just kind of beautiful light, spacious, (singing) “ding, ding” kind of song.

 And my son would only go to sleep to that. And so I, if you have kids or have ever tried to put a child to sleep, whatever they want to go to sleep, you're going to do it.

Sarah (05:03):

It doesn't matter. Yeah. Whatever the hell it is.

Jennie (05:05):

Maybe it's the vacuum cleaner. Maybe it's like, who knows? So this was that for him. And so he would listen to it on loop to go to sleep because if you forgot to loop it and the next song came on, he would wake up. And um,

Sarah (05:18):

I, I had one of those sleepers too. Yeah, yeah,

Jennie (05:20):

Yeah. And, uh, so it was definitely part of our kind of life soundtrack, if you will. The other cool thing about this soundtrack Maxwell could tell you exactly what was happening in the movie at different points in the soundtrack. 

So like we would also just listen to it in the background and he would be like, oh, this is the part where Bing, bong finds his rocket ship and da, da, da, da, da. 

And I'm like, is it wow. And then I would look at the name of the song and it would be like the rocket ship or something like that. And so I was just like, okay. And so it was also one of, so the brilliance of the composer, being able to match the action…

Sarah (05:50):

…Also like your kiddo who it doesn't surprise me that he was able to do that. That seems very on on- brand for him actually.

Jennie (06:01):

Right, right, right. And it's neat that at the same time you're meeting Riley and realizing that her emotions are evolving and they're valid. And they're the same as her parents that my own children watching this are valid and evolving and have the same feelings as their parents. Right. 

So that was a super cool piece about it. But before we get too much further, I do want to share our Screen Shares Rating for this episode. Our Rating System offers listeners with five different options and to guide you on, you know, who should you watch this movie with? It's rated PG. I think it is.

Sarah (06:33):

Why is it PG? Do you think?

Jennie (06:35):

I think scary moments also I'm meant to have a disclaimer. There's not a lot of triggers in this because it's a PG Pixar movie, but if you're scared of clowns, the end of this might not be for you. This might not, it might be a moment when you would cry because I'm not scared of clowns and it's legitimately scary. 

There are scary moments, but our Rating System, we've got our Buddy Screen where you'd watch it with a friend, your Work Screen, your Family Screen, where you would watch it with a family, Little Screen Love Screen, and Solo Screen where you would watch it alone. What rating would you give this with our screen shares rating? 

Sarah (07:13):

So I'm going to skip the one that you probably think that I would say, even though I very much agree with Little Screen completely, I actually would want to give this Family Screen because at least in my family, my dad was a social worker. So he has a very good vocabulary for like emotion words and that sort of thing. But there are other members that I think could really benefit from seeing this movie and being able to have really interesting conversations about kind of the content of, of what what's happening to, to Riley and, and all of those cool characters in her head. So I would say Family Screen.

Jennie (07:50):

I think that is a super smart rating, Family Screen, because it does give you a shared vocabulary. So a hundred percent, I agree with Family Screen. I chose Little Screen for this, just because I think that whether or not you have a family to watch this with, if you maybe you're an educator or you work with kids in some capacity, but you don't necessarily have a family, I feel like Inside Out can be an absolutely pivotal and critical tool that you can use to kind of shape the, the way that you discuss this, um, feelings and the internal life of, of children. 

And so definitely for me, Little Screen, Little Screen. So anyone who engages with children, this is a way that you can introduce them to the concept of you have feelings. They, if shape your life, as the description on IMDB said, they do control and shape your life. And then also give them really clear visualizations for what that looks like for them. How is it different? How is it unique for them

Sarah (08:50):

That you talked about people who might not have kids in their own family? Because I think that, you know, we approach, you know, a lot of our conversations that we have from the perspective of being parents and having kids in our lives, but there are tons of people who don't have their own children who live with them, but yet interact with kids in a meaningful way. And I think you're spot on to make sure that people are thinking about sharing this with a child in their life or kids in their life. That's great. I love that. 

I know that you did a lot of thinking about this movie and like all things, Jennie, this is not going to be like a surface conversation of like inside out is great. So I really want to know more about what you were thinking about this movie. Just gimme some meat.

Jennie (09:34):

Yeah, absolutely. As I mentioned already, kind of this movie was introduced to me at a time whenever I was newly a parent, newly engaging with my own small children, but I had been an educator prior to that and I preschool educator and a middle school educator. And I had seen firsthand with children who were not my own, how difficult it was for kids to name their feelings and the power that naming their feelings, gave them over, changing their actions. 

And I felt like when I saw this movie, I thought, oh my gosh, I wish I could have shown this to my preschool students, my middle school students. And they could have met this character because I found that storytelling was always as a teacher, one of the most effective ways of engaging children, but also in making it last. And I think that movies do that.

And as I was looking into this movie, I realized that all of the things that it did for me, which was, you know, validating the fact that all feelings are meaningful. The fact that we have feelings, they do affect our actions and that our memories are pivotal to shaping who we are. All of those things that ha that I had noticed about this movie were exactly what they had wanted to have happen. 

The creators of this movie, Peter, Dr. And Ronnie de Carmen set out to make a meaningful movie that would explain and introduce children to feelings. They consulted with experts in the field about what are emotions, what should we include? They couldn't include all of them obviously, but what should we include? What's important. And they were effective in that. Why did it matter to me? You know, one, I know that as an adult, I still struggle to talk about my feelings sometimes.

And the prospect, when I watch this of needing to kind of coach a child through life and help them, the way that Riley's parents need to help her through life, I was looking, you know, into the future. I'm like, oh, I'm going have an 11 year old, like Riley soon. Like <laugh> sooner than I think, how will I do that? And it, it really felt like an instruction manual a little bit. 

And I felt like the creators of the movie were super planful and I think super effective at creating something that you can truly use to help develop your own emotional intelligence, but also the emotional intelligence and vocabulary of your entire family

Sarah (11:55):

Completely. When you were talking about the storytelling and the imagery and the other cool thing was that Riley's emotive characters in her head were matched by, you know, her mom had the same emotive characters in her head and the dad the same thing. And there's a friend who had the same as well. Like, look, we all have this stuff going on in our head. This is a universal thing. They're all in your head. And I thought that was like a really interesting point is just having that visual that everybody's everybody had them. 

Jennie (12:24):

And like a lot of other fixtures too. So before we go too much further, I think it might be useful, especially for listeners who haven't watched inside out to kind of describe the structure of this movie, because it is a little bit different. You have two kind of parallel plots going on. We have, what's actually happening in Riley's life, which is when you write it out. 

It's actually an extremely simple plot line. It's: this is Riley. Riley has to move from Minnesota to San Francisco. That's hard. She struggles feelings ensue. And she comes back around accepting her feelings, being embraced by her family and accepting the full kind of control panel and range of her emotions. So that's a very simple, this is actually what happens. And that really, whenever I plotted this out, the whole movie stop happens in like a week.

Maybe, maybe, I mean, I don't know how long it takes to drive from Minnesota to San Francisco, but the real meat of it, the big plot actually happens completely internally with the feelings and the dynamics, which I think is obviously also true of life. Right? That's a great lesson to share with ourselves and with kids, like these are simple things that are happening, right? 

This is her being called on in class to say, as the new child, you know, hi, introduce yourself also like, hold up that teacher as a former teacher, would I ever cold call a brand new student? No, I would not like, no, I would not, but anyway sure. That's

Sarah (13:50):

Just evidence that there are different levels of quality of educators out there. Like, I mean, hello,

Jennie (13:56):

That teacher was so well intentioned, but I think it was a lack of considering the emotional state of a child who's just moved across country. Like I think she was being considerate and like, oh, I'm going to be friendly and let her introduce herself, but not thinking probably what would that teacher have thought? Had she been new to a school as a staff member and been cold called to like, whatever. So, I mean,

Sarah (14:19):

I love that you're calling it cold calling <laugh>

Jennie (14:21):

Yeah. You know, like, I

Sarah (14:22):

Mean, it really is. I love that

Jennie (14:24):

It's cold. It's just like, Hey, you talk in front of everyone. Well, and I love that the character of fear in it was very like, oh right. I've made a list of like 20,000 things that could go wrong. And the first day of school, and he was like, was things like quick sand and earthquakes. And he was like, or being called on in class, like right.

Sarah (14:42):

Cause it’s equal. 

Jennie (14:42):

Right. It's equal. Right. And so the dynamic story is really happening behind the scenes where joy is kind of trying to steamroll everyone. She is in charge. She has been in charge since the day Riley was born and she considers a perfect day a day. Where all of the memory, what would you call them? Memory balls, like spheres of memory. I don't remember. I don’t know what they name, they call them memories. But they manifest on the screen as like did glowy ball balls,

Sarah (15:11):

Glowy ball <laugh> as children of boys. I mean, I'm sorry to laugh, but yeah. Glowy balls <laugh>

Jennie (15:20):

Oh my gosh. Exactly. So Joy definitely wants everything to be, you know, joyful obviously and joy doesn't understand the other emotions. And so by extension Riley probably doesn't really understand all the other feelings. And so there ends up being some kind of strife whenever Riley's feelings get more complex as her life gets more complex. And it's hard to accept that things are not always awesome. Things are not always positive. Things are not always joyful. 

One thing one of the experts had actually said, he was like, well, I think that it was Professor der Keter. He was like, well, they didn't include embarrassment or sympathy or love. And I had thought of that love was the one feeling that I was like, wow, there's no love in here, but I'm interested in your opinion, Sarah, about why love wasn't included and also kind of what amalgamation of the other feelings is love.

Sarah (16:10):

I actually was thinking a lot about the feelings that they chose. And I had a conversation with my daughter about love and we were kind of arguing in a very playful way, but like is love and emotion or is it not an emotion? And she doesn't believe that it is an emotion. She feels that, and this is just speaks to her like core level of sweetness that I guess her cynical mother does not have, but she believes that everybody was born with immense love. And it's just part of you says that sometimes you can feel your love more and sometimes you feel it less, but that it's always there. And where she says that you can train your other feelings like you, they happen because of a circumstance. She didn't use these words to explain it, but she said, you know, I'm happy when I get caught in candy, which is my favorite thing ever.

And she would say, I'm sad. And it was like a whole thing. I'm sad when my cotton candy is all gone or I'm angry when Liam, my older brother eats my cotton candy. So she was using her cotton candy reference point to explain her experience with feelings. But she said, but I, I love cotton candy just all the time. And sometimes I might want it more than other times, but I always love it. And so it was really interesting. 

And so I don't actually have a good answer for you because I wasn't, it was one of those process things where I have to still process what she was saying and, and what I think and feel I'm, I'm not sure if it's an emotion either. I thought for sure it was last night when I was talking to her, but now I don't know. What do you think?

Jennie (17:48):

I think, think that Violet is brilliant because the thing that she points out that I hadn't considered when I was thinking about like, where would love fit in this dynamic with the other feelings that are in inside out, but love is something that happens in tandem. Like you can have all of those feelings, but like the love is still consistent. It just like, is it, which is, I think kind of more in line with my kind of more spiritual beliefs about like, I think that love is like this very deep thing. And we describe it to the boys. 

My kids about love is always wanting to do what is best for someone, even if it is difficult and not the easiest choice or not something that makes them happy. And so I think that that piece is at least kind of congruent with, I think the message of the film is that love is not always happy. Sadness is okay. And so I love that conversation though, that you were able to kind of spark by talking to your daughter after this movie. So could you tell me more about, you know, what your context, when did you first watch this movie?

Sarah (18:48):

My oldest was, he was either seven or just on the tail end of six and almost seven when we watched it and my daughter was a baby. And at that point we were moving yet. Again, we were, we we've moved a lot. I was excited about the move, but I was really conflicted about all of the other things that were going on at the time. I had always envisioned being a mom, always. And I had always envisioned being a mom who worked outside of the home. 

And it was in the summer that I had to sort of grapple with the reality that I was going to be a stay at home mom earlier that year, I had a job that I loved very much. I had to leave it because of some health stuff that came up. And when we were moving to the new place, we made the decision for me to be a stay at home mom for at least a year, instead of me trying to get, you know, a new, a new job and, and do that whole thing again.

And I was very conflicted about it. It was very, very hard. And I think also just being a, a daughter and a sister and a friend and a wife and definitely a mother at the time trying to balance all of those roles was really hard for me, especially because I felt very conflicted about everything I've always felt like, okay, do one thing and do it super well. 

Even though I don't do that, I do lots of things, probably in a mediocre way. <laugh> um, but I think it was just a weird, weird time for me. And then watching it again with my daughter recently was so different because I don't feel as conflicted anymore about all of that stuff. We're also in still kind of this period of transition settling into a new place, but my feelings are very secure and confident now about where we are in our life and where I am in my life. 

Like I still don't have crap figured out at all. I'm still doing lots of things, probably in a mediocre way, but I actually feel okay with it. I feel like it's fine for me to own that. I like a lot of different things and I'm not able to fully commit, you know, to the one thing and be amazing at that one thing. That's just who I am as a person. What about you? Cause yeah, I mean, this movie was long enough ago that a lot of life can happen in those years.

Jennie (20:58):

Right, right. And I'll ask a question too, before I kind of share about where I'm at in my, you know, watching process with this movie, is it comforting to you a little bit that as much has changed and as much transition as there is that your headquarters, if you will, as they describe in this movie, your, they also talk about the idea of personality islands, which I'll dig into a little bit more in a second. Those things aren't changing. Like you take that with you. 

And so for me, anyway, there's something very comforting about that. That as long as I stayed connected to this kind of internal world, that if the transitions outside of me happen, there's this kind of stability that it offers. And the movie helps me like visualize what that actually looks like and pretend it's a real place. So that even if my physical place changes, there's this level of never leaving home. Like if that makes sense,

Sarah (21:46):

It makes so much sense. It makes so much sense. And I feel like we have this theme a lot just in our conversations together. I think that's always the thing like as human beings, we always want to find our place in the world, but also figure out who we are and where that place is. You referenced talking about kind of complicated feelings earlier and I'd love to know what, what do you mean by that?

Jennie (22:10):

I think it really hit hard for me because I am an only child daughter of two parents who love me very deeply. And I also know what it feels like to kind of prioritize joy and happiness above all else. So in the movie we have this truly joyful, goofy girl, Riley. She loves hockey. I love soccer whenever I was little, I was goofy. You know, she was goofy when she has core memories happen. These things that really just anchor her in her life, they're special. And they come into the pipeline of headquarters and they create a personality island. So for her, they created like I'd mentioned hockey, family, goofball island, friendship, island, honesty island. And these are kind of her core pillars. And I could see a lot of myself in that, but then as much as your like internal self is set these outside circumstances, hard things happen.

And especially as you're growing up and they literally have her control panel in the headquarters, expand, as she grows into herself, you do change, you do evolve, but like your core is the same. Right? And so she is faced with moving, leaving all of her friends and leaving these things that are part of her core. And you know, I, growing up had different, you know, difficult things happen too. We didn't move a lot, but you know, we had family members die. I alluded before to the moment where she is so trying to stay positive and she's kind of had it and her mom comes upstairs and she says, I just want to thank you cause you’re being, you stayed our happy girl and oh yeah. That statement for me, you could view that as like, wow, what a nice mom taking the time out to thank their daughter for being happy.

But I have had the experience where being told you are, fill in the blank feeling you are an angry person. You are a mean person. You are a kind person. You are a happy person. I feel like is the most challenging because then she's like, oh my God, the role I play in this family is happiness. I am the joy of this family. Riley was the person who had to get out the hockey sticks and be like, Hey, like let's keep it light and let's play and have fun. 

When we got to this kind of dump of a house in San Francisco and that's a really heavy burden for a child to bear. And this is my kind of the deep connection for me. And this movie is constantly challenging my own self expectation that I am responsible for the happiness of others. And that happiness is the end goal in life.

This movie highlights that that is not the case, that whenever children are forced to feel that way, Riley ran away from home because she had a shut. Because whenever you realize that sadness is not an option, you can either be joyful or angry, disgusted and fearful, which is what she was left with. Your actions are going to be very potentially dangerous or harmful or not healthy. And so that's kind of, for me, the place that I know, what that feels like, I know that it's all coming from a place of love and everyone wants everyone around them to be happy. But just kind of embracing that sadness is part of love. Sadness is part of life. It's part of processing and they are co-equal, they are not good or bad.

Sarah (25:36):

So let me ask you this then had you watched this movie as a little girl, do you think that would've impacted your like emotional vocabulary or just your way that you went through life?

Jennie (25:45):

That's a good question, Sarah. I really think it could have that's part of why I think that I love this movie so much to share with kids. I feel like had I already had kind of a primer for your feelings are all okay. That's all right. Crying's fine. There's nothing wrong with crying. There's nothing wrong with being disgusted or angry or scared or we're joyful. Those are all, you know, partners in the same headquarters. I think that would've definitely empowered me. I was, I mean, I was a feisty little lady. I think I would've definitely stood up for myself to it. And I, I could imagine myself saying things like I'm having a blue feeling right now and like that kind of feeling because all the different feelings have different colors in the movie. And so that's actually part of it in the movie whenever she's embarrassed and called on class.

And she realizes that she's remembering her friends and those used to be yellow joy memories, but they're not with her. And so there's that ability for memories to change, which I thought was also super dynamic. That was brilliant. Brilliant. 

Her happy memories start changing, but she's been told that she's the happy girl. So she kind of short circuits and inside headquarters. Joy is literally grabbing a blue core memory, which is the first one that's ever come in. It's a sad memory. And that is the memory of being embarrassed in class. Cause you are crying in front of people. You just met mm-hmm <affirmative> Joy's trying to stop it. And I think that just letting it happen, what do you think would've happened to Riley had joy said, oh, we have a blue memory sadness. This is like your moment. Take over.

Sarah (27:24):

That's the brilliance of the movie. Being able to deal with all of that gray and all of those combined feelings and combined experiences you more than most people that I know deal with complicated feelings and situations in a really graceful way. How do you think that you are able to balance those feelings that are complicated or conflicting even as you know, a person experiencing those and then also watching your kids go through things that are complicated.

Jennie (27:55):

I think that it's been a long road. I don't think I've always been good at it. I've definitely struggled with mental health throughout my life. And most of it has been kind of coming from a place of having difficult, you know, transitions and things like that happen. But pushing down my own feelings, I mean honestly is not until having kids. And then also going through some like real self work with that, I've really realized like feelings are not good or bad. They just are. They're part of you, but they don't define you either. Like there's a lot in this movie. Yes, they drive her. But she also has all these other cool features. She has her imagination island. She has her, you know, her subconscious and her dream productions and all of these cool, cool, thoughtful things. It helps me to have kind of little mantras.

So I'll say this to myself as much as, and I'll say it to my kids, I'll say you cannot make someone be happy and you're not responsible for anyone else's happiness. I also say you have to choose happiness. And so like you can have a great thing happen, but if you are living in disgust or anger or fear, that's a choice. Like no one can, you know, you can take a horse to water, right? You can, you know, you can try to make someone be happy, but you can't, and it's not your responsibility. And I think that whenever I let go of thinking, I was responsible for other people being happy and I'm not going to lie. This children's movie by Pixar played a larger role than I am probably like, like am happy to admit, but whenever I am able to visualize a blue, yellow, happy, sad moment, that's fine. That's okay. 

And I realize too, if someone else is crying, that is not my fault. That is an opportunity for me, me to like be there for that person and the way the little blue character of sadness was there. Whenever the, um, imaginary friend, Bing bong lost his rocket joy really felt like she always had the answers. And I always felt like I had the answers. Like I'll make everything happy and great and perfect and pretty. But then she saw Sadness sit down next to Bing Bong and didn't try to make it right. Didn't try to fix it. Didn't do what Joy did, which I have been guilty as a parent of doing, which is like, oh, it's okay, we'll get another one. 

We'll make it da, da, that that's not what Bing bong needed. That's not what people need. Sometimes you just need to be sad. Phyllis Smith character, Sadness, said, which was, “you had a lot of fun with the rocket and it was, you know, it was, it's sad that it's gone. You're going to miss that.” Mm-hmm <affirmative> and you're just kind of narrating what's happening and saying like that's okay. And I think giving permission for other people to be sad is, is truly powerful. And I'm wondering like, did you get emotional with the whole dynamic with the Bing Bong character and the rocket ship? Because I did.

Sarah (30:46):

I did get emotional. I was mentally preparing myself. Okay, Sarah, remember that super traumatic part with Bing bong, just remember that happens. And it didn't matter. The prep didn't help. I was still completely ugly crying on the couch. I think it hits me differently now that I think a lot about my son growing up and losing a lot of these things that were integral to his childhood. Something like an imaginary character that, you know, imaginary friend like Bing Bong was, but silly things like for him, like this is probably kill me to mention this. But as a little kid, he used to always run, like he was a saber tooth tiger and he had a name for this saber tooth tiger and the name was Dark Tooth and it was this whole, like he would draw pictures. 

And I realized as I was watching this movie this last time that I have not heard about Dark Tooth for a couple years and watching that and watching Bing Bong more and thinking about this at the same time was almost completely devastating to realize that this really important part of his formation as a human, just like that was so important for Riley for her formation, it's gone. It was there, you know, Bing Bong did what Bing bong needed to do for her, but she doesn't need it anymore. And there's something very sad about your kid not needing this childish thing anymore. And it like basically broke my heart. What about you? How did you feel when you were watching the rocket stuff?

Jennie (32:25):

And I want to paint a picture for our listeners here, uh, in case you haven't watched it or haven't watched it in a while, we meet this character that Riley created of her favorite things, cotton candy, like violet. Yeah. An elephant dolphin and a cat. And he is just kind of, of like lovable, fluffy, like hobo character that, that Riley. And he would go to the we're gonna go to the moon on their rocket. And it was powered by song power and, and Bing Bong has these hopes and dreams, just like a kid has hopes and dreams. 

And towards the end of the movie, whenever Joy, because she tried to shut out Sadness because she tried to leave sadness in long term memory and catapult herself back to headquarters alone because Riley needs to be happy. And I have clung to that too. I have thought that myself for myself, for other people, and what that resulted in was the moment where family island and honesty island are starting to crumble because of the choices Riley's making and Joy falls into the, um, I think it's called the Memory Dump down there, the memories dissolve and they disappear and they're truly gone.

And Bing Bong and the rocket had fallen down there and now joy is down there. And the thing I even in this conversation, my understanding of this has actually evolved a little bit joy needs to get out. She needs to go save sadness. She has this epiphany, that sadness was actually part of happiness. That part of joy, that sadness is the necessary counterpart. And so she thinks, oh, we can ride the rocket out, Bing bong, and I can sing like, who's your friend who likes to play or, um, they sing this song that actually powers the rocket and Bing Bong’s in the back. And he's singing along with Joy and they're getting closer and closer, but they can't quite make it mm-hmm <affirmative> and Bing Bong realizes his arms are dissolving. And that Riley is not thinking about him anymore. Just like Dark Tooth. Wasn't being thought about anymore with Liam, which that story just honestly breaks my heart.

But hearing you talk about Liam and how you're letting go of it and how it's formative for you in the movie, the choice they made to have Bing Bong sing extra loud and say, oh my God, I’m going to cry. Thing is it's like, I feel like it's going to work this time. Joy is singing extra loud. And so Joy is so focused on making it out to help Riley, making it out of the memory dump and Bing Bong jumps out and lets his extra weight, the weight of childhood that like extra baggage, you do have to let go of you can't keep it forever. 

And it's not necessarily that the childhood memory was lost. It was that in that moment, it literally fueled the rocket ship to propel her future into, into her future to propel Joy forward. And so in that way, I think that a slightly more optimistic take could be that those things are formative and those memories are important that even though you forget about them, they're a, a fuel for the joy of your life. And in this case, the literal fuel needed to push Joy over the edge so that she could get back, get Sadness and go back to headquarters to kind of fortify Riley in this really difficult moment of her life.

Sarah (35:28):

Bing Bong was the fuel. Yeah, I think a lot of times when I worry about being an adequate parent, I'm always thinking, okay, I’ve got to make sure to do all the things for my kids when they're little, because these are the important things that are the building blocks for confidence, resilience, all this other stuff that you read, whatever the trendy annoying thing is that we're supposed to foster in our children for those six months that it's popular.

But I think that maybe also what this movie and what Bing Bong was trying to tell us in that moment is not just that Bing Bong was the fuel, which I think he absolutely was, but maybe sometimes the fuel isn't so complicated and not so fancy and not so perfect. I mean, looking at Bing Bong, you kind of set him best. Like he looked a little ramshackle and that was part of his endearing nature was that he was something that a child would've created in their mind when they were little. We forget how impactful and meaningful, simple things are for our kids. Like being there for them.

Jennie (36:32):

I think that the Bing Bong moment with him letting go hits the same chord for me, that is in Toy Story. Whenever he ends up letting go of his toys and like drives away from his mom, I, it crushes me, destroys me, but these things I think really stand out for me because they fast forward me to a point in time. And then also point out to me now, as my kids are getting older, like these memories that feel like so precious and this childhood that is so fleeting, it's coming. Like I know I had to prepare myself because I don't, it does not serve me or my children to hang on too tightly to those things. And so I think also for me now with this kind of reframe childhood is not gone. It's just fuel and fuel necessarily gets spent and it's not bad, it's it just is the same way that the feelings aren't necessarily good or bad. Are there any tools that you're taking from this movie that you think that you have, or will continue to think about going forward?

Sarah (37:32):

That's such a good question. I’ll make a deal with you. I'll answer the question, if you also answer the question

Sarah (37:39):

I will. Okay. Yeah. I think the biggest takeaway for me, and I think this is something that I've just struggled with is not apologizing for my feelings. There have been tons of times whether I've been at work or, you know, in a personal situations where like, if I burst into tears, my first reaction is to apologize. I I'll just automatically be like, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. And then I feel the need to explain why it is that I'm crying. When, why do I need to do that? 

I can just be sad or overwhelmed or frustrated, and that's why I'm crying. And I don't need to have a whole long description to some stranger at Publix, not necessary. But I think that is something that I, I am continually working on is being okay to be mad or sad or frustrated and just naming it and letting it be, I don't need to assign a value to that. It's not like my mad is bad. It can just be I'm mad because of reasons. And that's fine. What about you?

Jennie (38:39):

I think exactly what you said. I'm not just going to say ditto and then move on <laugh> but all of that, a hundred percent for myself accepting my emotions. And I think that whenever you apologize for a feeling, you are necessarily giving value, assigning value to different feelings, good or bad. And I'm definitely going to be doing better about that for myself. But I definitely struggle and am continuing to work on the need to quote unquote, fix other people's feelings. 

And so for me, the tool I'm going take away is the reminder of what happens when you prioritize and value feelings, one over another. And when you try to fix other people's feelings and you can be empathetic and sympathetic and kind and present, but the most valuable thing I've seen for in my own experiences, when I just let my kids feel their feelings, when I let my family members just feel their feelings and to Violet's point of love being a separate thing, I'm just here. I am just like love for you. And I will help you problem solve the actions of life, the same way that, that Riley's parents eventually helped her work through finding her, her personality islands. 

Again, by the end of the movie, they helped Riley get on the hockey team. Again, they let her feel sad and they remind her, we just love you. Like I know we said we wanted you to be happy because of course we all want our kids to be happy, right. They just hug her and they cry together and they're sad. And a new core memory was made at the end. And that visualization helps fuel this practice I'm having of not forcing feelings and not, you know, placing value on them. The first mixed um, core memory came in, it was yellow and it was blue because that's how feelings really are.

And at the end we see Riley's new headquarters and like all of her feelings are mixed. They're all this beautiful rainbow of not just yellow or blue, they're yellow and green and yellow and red. And, and that's okay because that's what feelings are. And so I think I'm going to definitely take the tools of imagining what that looks like, asking myself, what are my personality islands, like, what is core to me? And then remembering that everyone else is entitled to their own agency and validity of their feelings and that everyone has that. And so everyone kind of, even if it's hard, sometimes deserves that kind of grace and patience to remember that they all are living their own emotional, very dynamic life behind what might look like. A very simple action. 

Sarah (41:13):

Ian't think of a better way to sum up the heart of this movie. What conversations have you had with your kids about this movie?

Jennie (41:21):

Well, I've had a few, so some of our Screen Sparks this week are going to be a little bit special. So listeners, whether you have kids or not, there are some activities you can do with, with children in your life that I have found to be very, very meaningful with mine. 

And so the conversations I've had have not just been conversations because one of my children loves talking and one of them loves doing. And so sometimes it's a conversation. Sometimes it's an activity and one of them is actually inspired by, by Maxwell three year old Maxwell, actually, when he was very little and the screen sparks question for this week related to this actual activity, is this, what are your personality islands? What core memories fuel them? And can you create your own map of your mind, your own personality islands or your own sculpture or diorama of that?

And Maxwell when he was three, when he was in the full throngs of being obsessed with this movie as a little kid and I, this has given him language, we use all the time. He was out in the backyard with his like one almost two year old brother putting little like bars across from a like five gallon bucket to a wagon. And the little, like, I was like a hockey stick and a, like a golf club. And like all these things going across, just like how in Riley's mind, she had these little pathways connecting her headquarters to her personality islands. And I was like, Maxwell, what are you doing as he started to step on to one of the tiny, thin little, like, I think it was probably like a, a plastic golf club. So not going to hold his weight. He was like, I'm going to walk across my personality island to my headquarters.

But even as a kid, he was kind of saying like, I have these things in me. And he was like, actualizing them as a model. And what was really nice is that we were able to have a conversation then and say, Hey, max, well, what, what are your personality islands? And he was able to list like, oh, well, this one is, is, and I can't remember what he was saying at the time, but you know, this one is my, like, you know, having a pet fish island or whatever, you know, it is different islands. 

And I had this conversation with him again, cause we are also moving. And that's also why strategically picked this movie because I wanted my kids to rewatch this, to refresh the language. And it's definitely a movie you can watch a lot of times and see it differently. And it's also just a delight to watch the creators did such a good job, making it vibrant and funny.

And it's not, I think is didactic the right word? It's not preaching at you. It's not saying like this is feelings and everyone has feelings cause that would've like in a boring lane movie, it's funny and it's characters. You can like all of the feelings in it. They're all funny. They all have their things going on. And so the boys, my kids are thinking about, well, what are your personality islands? And they were like, oh, I need to think about that. I really do want to think about that. And so I know that in their minds, they're thinking about that. 

So listeners, if you want to help your kids think through that, you can draw a picture. If you've got kind of a 2d kid, you can build an actual, dangerous wagon and five gallon bucket manifestation of it. It does not have to be perfect. Right. I think Bing bong, would've been proud of that one and it was really, really meaningful for them. And also I've used phrases like, ah, this is kind of like a mixed feeling, isn't it? And I know they have the like visual of what that looks like instead of just some kind of ephemeral like conversation, me talking at them description of what a mixed feeling is. And have you talked about personality islands or anything like that with your kids since watching it?

Sarah (44:58):

Actually no, but I love your Screen Sparks question so much and I'm, I definitely want to do these activities even with my older kiddo and I don't know how much cooperation I'm going to get for that. Cause he will probably say I'm 14. I don't need to do this. I'm going to see if we can do this anyway, because I think what is nice about personality and again, this movie, is that: Going back a little bit on something I said earlier and thinking through some of the things that you said, our personality islands are somewhat more static than our emotions, but yet they do change. And so I think what would be cool even for a teen, um, or frankly, even an adult part of me kind of wants to do this is seeing what our personality islands are right now in this moment. Hey, in two weeks from now, maybe my personality island might be slightly different. I don't know, but I'm sure that three year old Maxwell's personality islands are probably somewhat different than what they are now as like a double-digit kid. A

nd it makes me think again just about the beauty of using movies as a vehicle for conversation and so wanting to share some other Screen Sparks questions for our listeners: what was the obstacle that Riley needed to overcome? Was there a bad guy? Did Riley and the emotions overcome? What about you, Jennie? What are some other Screen Sparks you can come up with?

Jennie (46:23):

Did it make you cry? If it didn't make you cry? Why? And then if you feel uncomfortable with other people crying, why is that? 

Sarah (46:30):

Oh, that's a good one. I like that one. Speaking of crying, are some babies born without joy to lead the way. And how does this shape their personality?

Jennie (46:41):

Whenever Riley's born, it's just blackness. And then she's, Riley's being held and loved by her parents. And so joy is there and I couldn't help but think about, you know, the myriad experiences that people and humans and children and babies have, where not every child is as lucky to be born into a joyful situation. And I think that it's undeniable that some people are definitely driven by different feelings. And I think realizing how human and out of their control that is gives me a lot more empathy for people who are maybe driven by anger or fear or discussed. Cause sometimes I encounter people I'm like good grief. Like you’ve got a chip on your shoulder, but you know what? Like that might come from a really like traumatic place for them. Like the reason that that's it. And that leads me to another question, which feelings lead your emotions and then what do those feelings look like?

So one observation I had upon a rewatch of this was that the choice that the creators make to have different genders for the feelings was really fascinating to me. So for example, Riley had what you could cap classify as like a masculine and feminine, you know, looking or presenting feelings, which I thought was interesting. Whereas her mom, they all presented as female and her mom wasn't led by joy. Her mom had sadness at the head of the control panel. Her dad had all anger was at the head of his control panel in his headquarters. And he, they all presented as masculine, but it showed a range of different presentations of your feelings. And so as an activity, another activity that you could do, I would love with any age of kids, have them draw a picture or if they don't want to draw, describe what would your who's at the control panel or who's at the control panel today? Maybe it's not always the same. How is that affecting your action? And I think you could learn a lot about someone, especially a young child. Who's not kind of self-editing when they drew their feelings, like what does their headquarters look like? Who is in charge? Do they, what are they looking like? That just like fascinated me that the creators made the choice to show some diversity of presentation in the, in the feelings.

Sarah (48:48):

I love that. That's another really good activity. The last thing that I want to say about our Screen Sparks is like, it should never feel like work and these questions are so great because you don't have to like print it out as like a PowerPoint and present these things and ideas to your kids or your family or your friends or whoever it is that you're watching these movies with. They can just spark something fun, spark something new. And I think the key is always just to be thinking, to be thinking and letting yourself feel your feelings and think your thoughts and share them,

Jennie (49:19):

Feel your feelings. That is my takeaway for the week. I definitely feel like I'm going to live in that place. And remember that more. And thank you so much for sharing our screens with you this week and for listening to all of our screen sparks. And I hope that you can have some great offline conversations. Again, just like Sarah said, they don't need to be fancy. We hope you keep watching for the meaning behind the screen. Don't forget to like, and subscribe to screen cares wherever you listen to your podcast and check out our show nods this week@www.screencares.com or on our social pages, because we'll be sharing some resources we found with interviews from the experts in emotional intelligence that the creators of inside out consulted with as well as several articles about how to talk about feelings with your kids and really interesting article from psychology today. That can, if you just are that person who needs homework after watching a movie or listening to a podcast, we have that for you to help you feel your feelings.

Sarah (50:16):

Thank you for letting us share our screens with you this week. We hope that you keep watching for the meaning behind the screen. Don't forget to liken subscribe to Screen Cares wherever you listen to your podcasts. Check out

Speaker 3 (50:26):

Our show notes for great info and to visit our website www.screencares.com or check out our social media pages for great resources.