I sat down and thought about what makes dynamic, powerful, engaging public speakers and here’s the stuff that shines out to me. As a public speaking coach, It’s definitely different than what I see most speaking clubs and performance coaches talking about.

“I kept thinking "what is wrong with me? I know how to do this!" I felt blocked, robotic, tongue-tied at times, my energy was off. I kept thinking "everyone can clearly see that I'm terrible at this".

And by the end of the festival? The exact opposite. I was calm, confident, funny, engaging.”

In the realm of visibility, a really important focus is: who are you when you’re marketing your business?

Are you “polished you”? “Professional you”? “Some hacked together persona you think you should be”?

Do you feel exhausted having to keep up the façade of this persona?

Because this is what I’m hearing from small business owners lately. A lot.

Your power is infinite. It is not given to you, and it cannot be taken away.

I forget all the time. My anxiety gets the better of me, and I find myself thinking things like:

"I hope this person takes this news well so that her emotional reaction doesn't affect my morning."

To be clear - I'm giving those people allllllll of my power by allowing their decisions to control how I go about my day.

When I was in grade school, I watched an episode of Degrassi Jr. High where there was a rumour that Ms. Avery was a lesbian. (And, truth be told, in my mind she did come out, but in looking over old Degrassi Wikis, it was just a rumour.)

At the time I thought “PLEASE don’t let this happen to me!”

And if you’re thinking to yourself that there’s no way you could ever be that brave, then just know that I think you can. And also ask yourself: why not? You’ve done hard things (hello 2 years of pandemic for starters). And if the only answer is that you’re telling yourself you can’t… what if you tell yourself you can?

Shadow work has become popular over the last couple of years, and a lot of folks are curious about what it is. Here’s my quick take: shadow work is consciously taking a look at the dark side within your psyche (i.e. your shadow, as coined by Carl Jung), finding compassion for yourself within that murky area, and incorporating radical self acceptance so that you are embracing, instead of denying that stuff.

Buckle up, ‘cuz I’m still pissed from an experience from last week and it perfectly explains why I hate persuasion/tactics/rhetoric/debate and I think they’re classist tools of oppression used by the patriarchy.

How’s that for a fiery opening line?

As a former people pleaser I had a weird couple of weeks that have challenged my relatively new found freedom from fear of rejection/abandonment. This is something I’ve worked on my entire life (fear of abandonment or rejection shows up in so many annoying ways for me, as I’m sure it does for you.)

I struggle with it. But I think I’ve come up with something that helped me wrap my head around it, and I want to share that with you. It’s not a scholarly exploration by any stretch, but it’s one of the things that can happen with tarot work - where you explore the archetypes and symbolism and begin to develop certain takes that open up old paradigms.

Is this you?

“I’m tired of feeling like the outside me doesn’t represent the inside me.”

“I feel like I’m supposed to somebody else other than myself when I’m talking about my business or making videos.”

Visibility is so important to your small business, and finding the courage to be the spokesperson your organization needs will help you build even further!

I’ll often tell my clients not to expect too much of their performance the first time they get in front of an audience. Or the first time they give a presentation. Disagree with a relative at Thanksgiving.

It’s the trying that’s the most important part here. It’s the trying that feels bad. Hard. Unusual. Uncomfortable.

It’s the trying that’s the growth.

If it’s been a real struggle for you to give presentations before, your brain is going to try to trick you all the time to stop you from getting up there (and potentially dying, according to your brain). “You’re going to mess up and embarrass yourself in front of all of your colleagues!” “Who the hell do you think you are? You’re not an authority on this!” “You are so terrible, don’t do this to yourself.”

Yesterday I talked on Instagram a bit about several conversations I’ve had recently about how to navigate our differing ideas/comfort levels about Covid and vaccinations.

• What do we do if we’re double vaccinated but our children can’t be?

• What if certain family members can’t or refuse to get vaccinated, but also expect to participate in indoor family events? (The October-December holidays will be here before we know it.)

• What if roundtable discussions about conspiracy theories and “loss of freedoms” happen during a gathering?

A few weeks ago I started to notice a trend - really aggressive behaviour on social media, usually from women, and quite outside of character (or whatever I’d come to observe about them).

As it continued, I wondered what the heck was going on…

And then it hit me! And I cheered!

If you’ve seen my free public speaking guide, or if you’ve taken a workshop or worked 1:1 with me, you’ll be familiar with my go-to stress management exercise: controlled breathing.

It is the simplest most effective way to control your nerves when you have to speak in a difficult situation (giving a speech or presentation, in conflict, advocating for yourself or somebody else, or even just raising your hand with an idea at a work meeting).