Invisible Stories: Write to be Seen

Today's podcast is with Heather Vickery, professional leadership and success coach, founder of Vickery & Co, and host of the podcast The Brave Files. Heather is also a motivational speaker and author of Gratitude Journal: Shift Your Focus and Grow Grateful: A Gratitude Journal for Kids and Families. Through her story of personal bravery, perseverance, and resilience, Heather inspires audiences and empowers clients with the tools they need to live bold and meaningful lives.

In this podcast, Heather and I talk about:

• How she set goals and deadlines for herself and found the motivation to keep writing.
• Why writing her second book was easier for her in many ways, and what she learned about the necessity of focus groups for her work.
• How she learned to practice her own advice to others, and to leverage her fears and turn them into intentionally brave choices.
• Why having a published book increases your clout as an expert in your field.

In today's podcast I speak with the incredible Lamont Robinson, supplier diversity professional, entrepreneur, founder of Robinson LaRueCo Consulting (RLC), and author of his biography, TransformNational: Journey of a Bastard, which details his personal experiences in overcoming challenges on Chicago's violent West Side to achieve success.

In this podcast, Lamont offers insight and wisdom to those authors working to craft their own memoirs. Lamont discusses:

• How he was able to work through the trauma of his past and stay true to himself and the stories of his family.
• How he was able to channel his experiences and utilize how others perceive him to create a brand for both himself and his work.
• His own methods for immersing himself in his past and overcoming others' judgement to stay true to his memoir.

Today's podcast is with award-winning speaker, and diversity, equity, and inclusion expert Jennifer Brown. She is the author of two essential books about diversity and inclusion in the workplace, titled How to Be an Inclusive Leader: Your Role in Creating Cultures of Belonging Where Everyone Can Thrive and Inclusion: Diversity, the New Workplace & the Will to Change.

In this discussion, Jennifer and I talk about two of our favorite topics, marketing and entrepreneurship, and how it relates to wrestling with authors' self-doubt. Jennifer Brown reveals:

• How she overcomes feelings of imposter syndrome in order to market herself and her brand, and to reach a wider audience.
• Her experience as a keynote speaker, and how she is able to get her words to relate to and be accessible for people of all backgrounds.
• Why it was important to her to include her own story within her books, and why hybrid publishing can be a faster track to success.

Today's guest on Invisible Stories is Monica Kang, founder and CEO of Innovator's Box, a company dedicated to creative educational workshops and consulting with the goal of helping all professionals hone their creativity to solve problems in the face of change and complexity. Monica is a renowned speaker and educator, and the author of Rethink Creativity: How to Innovate, Inspire, and Thrive at Work.

In today's podcast, Monica and I talk about allowing yourself to take your time on writing your book, and how she leveraged her unique perspective to create a book with mass appeal. She shares:

• How she used her unique perspective as a dual-language speaker to consider the perspectives of all her readers, and how to market her book to a global audience.
• How she overcame self-doubt and recognized good writing is hard and that sometimes you have to challenge yourself to go deeper and get to the heart of the writing.
• Even if she could change the past, she wouldn't, because it has brought her the experiences and learning she needed to grow and write the best book she could.

Today's podcast guest is online business brand and marketing strategist Nikki Groom. Nikki is the founder of the Movement Makers Mastermind, which is a small business incubator for women business owners, as well as a podcaster and author of A Power of Your Own: How to Ignite Your Potential, Uncover Your Purpose, and Blaze Your Own Trail in Life and Business.

In this podcast, Nikki and I discuss the love-hate relationship that exists for authors writing their first book. She offers her insight on:

• How she overcame her own doubts about her writing in order to serve a greater purpose by inspiring other entrepreneurs with shared experiences.
• The benefits of working with a writing community as a support system.
• And how she walked the line between getting blunt feedback and critiques from others, while still staying true to her vision and her mission.

Today's podcast is with Robyn Vie-Carpenter-Brisco, a spiritual life coach who utilizes the "5 Priciples Of Joy" to unlock her clients potential and inspire them toward growth and fulfillment, through mindfulness and manifestation techniques using stones and crystals. She is the author of Let's get stoned: Using Stones and Crystals to Create a Life That Rocks!

In this podcast, Robyn and I jump right into questions of editing and writing in a way that realizes your true purpose. Robyn shares:

• How she switched gears mid project and wrote the book she feels she was meant to write instead.
• How she learned to trust her editors and let them do their job, and how to recognize the fact that editors are hired for a reason: so writers can focus on writing!
• Why Hybrid Publishing was the right track for her book.

Today's Invisible Stories guest is Kristin Andree, a business strategist, speaker, podcaster, and author of You're Not for Everyone: But, You Can Be For Everyone. Kristen specializes in working with folks that own businesses, financial advisors, and powerhouse women looking to scale up their businesses and generate growth. An engaging speaker, Kristin's goals are to Coach, Challenge, and Empower her clients.

In this podcast, Kristin and I delve into the details of how to market yourself and your book. She advises listeners about:

• Never compromising who they are, and to instead capitalize on their strengths to build an intentional life for themselves.
• The benefits of engaging with a beta reader group and other publishing professionals, which helped make the publishing of her second book a better, more organized, and streamlined process.
• Marketing themselves and their book using calls-to-action and online and social media marketing.

On today's episode I speak to Tony Ferraiolo, author of Artistic Expressions of Transgender Youth, volumes 1 and 2. Tony has dedicated himself to both promoting competent and respectful health care for the transgender community, by educating providers, and advocating on behalf of patients. He also trains educators on providing a safe and respectful space for transgender children in a school environment.

In this episode we discuss:

• Stay in the moment. Mindfulness is a powerful tool.
• Write a sentence a day, that's how you start.
• Don't worry about what anyone else thinks, just write for yourself. They are your words, and they matter.
• You're not in this alone, get a support system around you. It can be a mental health provider, a writing partner, or even a Zoom writing friend.

Enjoy the episode!

On today's episode I speak to Dr. Maysa Akbar, Author of Urban Trauma. Dr. Akbar is a clinical psychologist and board certified in child and adolescent psychology. Her work is centered around the impacts of trauma within urban communities. Her company, Integrated Wellness Group, is a behavioral health clinic in Connecticut specializing in culturally competent care and addressing racial trauma.

In this episode we discuss:

• Start by sharing with small groups, then build up your confidence and start sharing with more people. And write it down. Converse around your story.
• You're the only one that can hold you back! Not the time, not the people, not the naysayers, not the shame
• No one's going to be able to narrate and dictate your life better than you. Those people don't live in your shoes, those folks don't know what you've gone through or how you've overcome.

Enjoy the episode!

In this episode we discuss:

• We can move our pain. Through our story, and through sharing our story with other people, and finding meaning in it, we can transmute pain.
• Having a dig word, a truth that you are operating and acting within creates a different vibe even if the topic is the same. By acting within the bubble of your dig word, you can add all new meaning to a topic you are speaking or writing about.
• You as you are, are never going to exist again. That's the coolest thing about my job is extracting these operating systems from people and getting to their truth and just knowing, this is never going to happen again.
• Having a safe space where you can let your guard down, be vulnerable, and create and share, is a prerequisite for writers.

Enjoy the episode!