Love Your Story: Stories and discussions about personal growth, mindset and living with intention

Interview with the Kjars (pronounced Cares) 50 by 52

The Kjar family sold their home, bought a motorhome, and took their four kids on the road for a year of seeing the country, meeting other kids their age in different parts of the country and shadowing their lives for a day, and learning how to live in cramped spaces for extended periods of time.

Join us for today’s interview with Matt and Lindsay as we catch up with them on the road to hear how things are going and what wonderful stories and adventures they have created already.

If you want to follow them:

Dominos – Ripples – Butterfly Effect: You make a Difference

Have you ever felt small or insignificant, maybe even powerless? In our big world where media gives us access to the vast happenings across the globe we come to realize the scope of the world, the overwhelming nature of the trauma and catastrophes across the globe, and all too often that bigness creates in us a sense of smallness; a sense of overwhelm and insignificance. Once we feel powerless, that our efforts will make no difference, we become passive passengers on this rock we call a planet. We hope for the best, but feel too small to instigate change. When we get to that place we have essentially stopped believing that we matter. Today I want to remind why this is untrue. Stay tuned for the small and simple things that change the world.

Stories are our lives in language. Welcome to the Love Your Story podcast. I’m Lori Lee, and I’m excited for our future together of telling stories, evaluating our own stories, and lifting ourselves and others to greater places because of our control over our stories. This podcast is about empowerment and giving you, the listener, ideas to work with in making your stories work for you. Story power serves you best when you know how to use it.

You’ve pushed the first domino in a string of set up dominoes and watched one fall into the next, and the next, and the next as the domino structure unfolds. You’ve thrown a rock in a pond and watched the ripples start small and get bigger and bigger until they cover the pond, or watched a fish break the surface of the water sending ripples out to the shore.  You’ve heard of the ‘butterfly effect’ which posits that the flap of a butterfly wing on one side of the world generates the air movement that eventually culminates in a storm on the other side of the world. All of these are an illustration of how one action sets in motion other actions, that continue to set off additional actions. And we do this a hundred times every day…

There are thousands of reasons that each of us matter. They begin in the intrinsic value of being alive and that alone means we must be significant…to the butterfly effect and how even our smallest actions create responses, affect lives, change the world in ways we can’t fully understand.  If you’ve had a child you’ve changed the world. If you’ve loved someone you’ve had impact. If you’ve hurt someone you’ve pushed a domino. If you’ve shared or forgiven or learned something you have created some type of ripple. In a way, it seems like a silly thing to talk about because everything we do and don’t do affects the people and the world around us, in ways we can sometimes see and often in ways we cannot. It’s so obvious, but at the same time, maybe it’s not so obvious, so it merits a fifteen-minute conversation about how much we each matter in the world.

Despite this tremendous influence and significance of each person, one of the most struggled with concepts, across the board, is that of self-worth. The one ghost that I have seen, as I’ve been privy to people’s deepest self-work, is that even the most successful of us, at our deepest core of things that hold us back, struggle with feelings of self-doubt and our own handful of insecurities about being enough—whether it’s physically, mentally, even spiritually. Self-doubt, in one way or another, is a killer of dreams and joy.

It’s kind of crazy when you break it down. Cultural values that say odd things like – you matter if you’re a movie star, you matter if you’re a sports star, you matter if you make a lot of money…when you actually step back and evaluate the absurdness of those ideas and how heavily they are bought into, it’s disturbing. In Scientific American and Huffington Post in 2012 both ran articles on research that pre-teens put the value of being famous as their number one goal, overshadowing financial success, love, and community. American Idol, You Tube, followers on social media, the obsession with needing exterior validation to feel worth is rampant. So let’s have a little bit of a reality check.

The things that we do, the way we interact with others, the talents we share, the things we create, the love we generate, the smile, the hug, the choice to rescue a dog, to show patience, to forgive to notice someone else….my heavens I could go on forever with this list…these millions of interactions create responses, movements, feelings, and in general tremendous power in the world around us.  The ripple in the pond, the first domino pushed. Every day we impact one another in tremendous ways.

Let me start with something I noticed as I have worked in groups who are doing healing work on their stories. One of the things I was initially most surprised at, was how often something small – a comment made by a peer or a teacher had literally shaped the stories in a child’s brain until as an adult they find it nearly impossible to shake off the imposed reality of the time in 6th grade when a peer told them they were ugly. When I started teaching composition at Utah State University, we had an assignment where I had the students write about their history with writing and those teachers who had affected them most as they grew and learned to write. Inevitably there were a handful of students in each class who were certain they could not write because sometime in their elementary education they had received too many red marks on a paper, or a teacher had made a comment meant to instruct that instead was interpreted as a pronouncement that they were hopeless writers. I was shocked at how small comments, one-liners, a mark on a paper, had defined a complete interpretation of an individual’s concept of themselves. But then I considered, how in fourth grade I had written an essay about my doll Rachel and the paper had come back with praise about the descriptive detail and suddenly I knew I was a talented writer. These things are so incredibly small – and yet internalized in such a way as to be completely formative in another’s life. The other day a friend and I were talking and she shared how in grade school she had walked into a class and a class mate, who incidentally was caught up in a friend triangle, told her that she was ugly, and now, as a 40 something woman she still hears that child’s voice in her head every time she looks in the mirror.

While these are a few negative examples of how the smallest things we do can significantly impact the trajectories of people’s lives, especially during their formative years, we also have the power to create tremendous good. I’d like to share a story told by Rick Lewis, he was a guest I interviewed on episode 41, and he tells about a time he unexpectedly had an interaction with an audience member that changed them both.

Rick Lewis Story: Listen to the audio for this recording.

Rick Lewis www.ricklewis.co or [email protected]

We’ve talked about how powerfully small things can affect us in negative ways if we buy into those stories, we’ve just heard how being patient, supportive, and kind can deeply impact another, Rick’s willingness to reach out and draw attention to and praise the man in the yellow tie for his dedication to kindness – praising another—can deeply affect another, let me share a few more stories sent to me from a listener about moments in the life of her family where they were deeply touched by the choices and actions of others:

She says:

We were a young married couple with two small children and had just bought our first home. When the water pipe broke, it was of course on our side of the city line and so we were responsible for fixing it. We didn’t have any money but somehow word reached a Doctor who lived up the hill from us. He had the know-how and a backhoe tractor and he came down and dug the hole for us and helped my husband to replace the pipe and covered it up. Every time I turn the water off I think of this kind man who would humble himself to help out our little family.

When I was 8 ½ months pregnant with our third child our second child got the chicken pocks. After two weeks of nursing, her, myself and our oldest child got the chicken pocks. I have never been so sick in my life and so many horrible things can happen to a child when in the womb. I was sick of body and sick of mind. My friends and neighbors fed us for two weeks. Then I delivered a healthy baby girl, they fed us for two more weeks. They never made me feel as if I were a burden or an inconvenience in their lives.

Four years later our oldest blew up is hand and needed surgery to reattach a tendon in his finger. Two weeks later the Dr. found a lump on the side of our youngest neck. He recommended that we have a biopsy of the lump because he felt it could be cancer. They would put him all the way under. This was because if he moved during the procedure the whole side of his face could be paralyzed. We were very worried about our boys and about how we would pay the medical bills. One day I went outside to get in the car and there in an envelope was $400 and a note telling us they hope this would help and we were loved.

A few years ago her husband was diagnosed with brain cancer. During this time lots of choices by lots of people made a tremendous impact on this families life, for example, she lists:

She finishes her letter to me with the words: “From the smallest act to the very largest act, kindness changes people’s lives. Whether receiving or giving.”

Rick Lewis said, in his book The Seven Rules You Were Born to Break, “Paying attention to the small daily details of our lives is one facet of excellence. When we ignore those details we discount our ability to make a difference in the lives of others and ourselves.”

When we look about us on a daily basis to see what small act we can do for another, or how simply living our best life blesses the world, how getting rid of old negative stories that have played on rerun in our lives can free us from untruths that hold us back or make us feel insignificant, and how that changes our interaction with the world, which IS significant, we start to get an idea of how much control we have over the impact we have on the world, and how taking responsibility for small and simple things we can do causes tremendous impact around us. First, we simply have to acknowledge that no matter who you are, you are immensely significant and what you do and don’t do changes the world through ripple effects you can’t even predict. It’s crazy cool when you think about it. All you can control is what you put out there, and then the ripples start.

My challenge to you this week is two-fold. First, sit down like the listener who sent me her list of kindnesses and take 15 minutes to think about the impact others have had on your life in a positive way. The second challenge is to look for a way to impact someone today. By small and simple things are great things brought to pass, and while you may not know how far reaching your action ends up being, you most certainly can push the first domino.

Have a great week out there creating hero scenarios in your story. We’d love to hear some of your stories. Go to www.loveyourstorypodcast.com and go to the contact us page – share, we read all your emails.

Interview with Margaret Meloni  MBA, PMP

Margaret is a speaker, writer, and teacher who supports project managers with the art and science of project management.

Margaret understands that managing projects can be difficult and this is why her goal is to provide her community with knowledge and skills that can be used on the job RIGHT NOW! Her wish is to see her students take on tough projects and emerge as strong and sought after project managers.

Margaret is a recipient of the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) Distinguished Instructor Award and a contributing author to the book 101Great Ways to Enhance Your Career where she addressed the topic of conflict resolution. She has also been called upon to contribute to articles in PM Network®, the monthly magazine covering trends, tools and best practices in project management

When she is not teaching, Margaret works to help project managers and other professionals resolve work related conflict and strengthen their soft skills. Her passion is to help people successfully navigate the workplace peacefully.

For more information on Margaret Meloni: www.MargaretMeloni.com or www.pmstudent.com and join her community today. You can also find her on Twitter at @margaretmeloni or @pmStudent

Persistence – the simple key to success

I started sending my writing out for publication or sending out queries, while I was still in college: little blurbs on backpacking food and political rock climbing issues. I was willing to write for free.

I look at the then and the now, and the one thing I know for certain is that the primary reason I am well published is because of persistence. Because, month after month, year after year, decade after decade I keep writing and I keep sharing, and after 20 odd years the successes add up. But if I’d gotten tired of it and given up after five years, or six years, or ten years, that would have garnered a different outcome. Now, I’m not suggesting that I have fabulous powers of persistent perseverance, because the truth is, writers always write because it’s inherent to who they are. We just keep writing because that’s what we feel like doing, but the lesson, the clarity this brings to me in hindsight, and that I bring to you, is that any time you can just keep going, you will get there. Whatever the reason you keep going–maybe it’s because you are doggedly determined and disciplined, maybe it’s because you are simply compelled to keep on keeping on, like I was, or more likely there is  some other “why” that moves you forward, but consistent persistent forward movement, WILL get you there. There is just simply something to be said for not giving up. One step after another will eventually get you to the top of the mountain. That’s a fact. Today’s episode is about the rewards of downright dogged persistence. The key to the door of success.

Stories are our lives in language. Welcome to the Love Your Story podcast. I’m Lori Lee, and I’m excited for our future together of telling stories, evaluating our own stories, and lifting ourselves and others to greater places because of our control over our stories. This podcast is about empowerment and giving you, the listener, ideas to work with in making your stories work for you. Story Power serves you best when you know how to use it

Calvin Coolidge said, “Nothing in this world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not: nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent. Genius will not: unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not: the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent.”

What is persistence? It’s starting, it’s continuing even when it gets hard, it is the courage to keep trying after you’ve faced defeat or exhaustion. It’s continued forward movement even when the payoff is not in sight. It takes focus and vision to carry on, day after day with any task or plan from which immediate rewards are not garnered. Persistence is not a trait found in the weak because it’s not easy, therefore not everyone persists. But, it is the foundation of accomplishment. It’s the key that often separates the ones who make it to the top, and those who do not.

Let me share a story that I like to call One Grand Night – it contains some grand vistas, a grand sunrise, and some grand pain.

Most mountaineers follow a protocol involving permits, backpacks with carefully selected gear, and physical preparation before climbing a mountain.  Not us.  It is our year to summit The Grand, the tallest peak of the Grand Teton Range in Wyoming, and after too many near cancellations of the trip because of logistics, Chad calls and says, “Let’s leave now, we’ll climb all night and summit at sunrise. We won’t even need a permit if we can do it without camping.”  And so we do.

It is eleven p.m. by the time we arrive at the trailhead, 5 hours away,–Lupine Meadows parking lot.  The lot is filled with cars, SUV’s, trucks, and vans, the moon reflecting off the dark metal bodies lined like waiting soldiers for their hikers to return. It is high season in the Tetons and climbers must wait in line for a backcountry camping permit on the way up any one of the peaks: The Grand Teton, the Middle and South Tetons, the Nez Perce, Mount Owen, Mount Moran, or Teewinot.  During an ancient ice age, glaciers covered Jackson Hole and carved the jagged range with 3000 feet of ice melt.  We do not see the white glacier fields we climb by in the dark, but we hear the waterfalls and the river dumping down the mountain, looking for peace in one of the many lakes dotting the range.  By summiting in one day we will forgo the permit process, our headlamps illuminating small circles of rock as we make our way up the trail, up the rocks, up the chimneys, up the mountain.  As we climb I look into the dark at my left, yellow eyes catch the reflection of my headlamp.  They are big and bold and stare as if they know we cannot see them. They are unflinching as we make our way past.

There is not much story to tell.  It is the same grueling thing step after step. Straight up. The trail up the Grand is not filled with switchbacks or meanders.  At 2:30 a.m. we pass a team heading down trail.  “The climbing is great,” they say, their headlamps lighting our faces as ours light theirs. They don’t want to stay on the mountain because they are hungry.  One says, “We would rather be tired than tired and hungry.” We exchange beta, offer food, and pass with well wishes.  It is not long before other teams start waking, preparing for the summit.  In the dark we are all easy to spot, headlamps pierce the darkness with yellow and blue light.  We gauge how close we are to the next team, how much faster we need to move to stay ahead.  By the time we get to the Upper Saddle I am picking my legs up one at a time, very, very, slowly.  Chad is well ahead.  He is more worried about another team passing us.  I say, “let them.”  I can hardly walk. We’ve been pushing non-stop for hours up a consistent incline to the top of one of the most beautiful and rugged ranges in the West.  It is still dark and this is the last stretch until we are directly in assault of the peak itself. So far we have done 7 up-hill miles in six hours. Lines of headlamps twist their way up the trail behind us.  It is interesting to watch the snake of lights curving its way slowly up the mountain. It provides a pulse of life, an urgency. Other people are going for the summit.

At times I lay against rocks trying to slow my breathing to an aerobic state.  When we were still in the trees I stopped and wrapped my arms around a pine, every now and again, let it hold me up until my breathing slowed; I turned and stepped back onto the trail, one leg after the other, again. It is a race the way we push each other, and it is not a race, the way we each have to find our own way up the mountain.

The light on the eastern horizon is a strip of purple and orange glowing through a mist from the lakes.  Oh, there are lakes.  From this vantage point of nearly 13,000 feet, we have the view of gods.  Below us, down thousands of vertical cliff feet and farther still, the remnant lakes dot the curvatures of the range.  Jenny Lake, String Lake, Surprise Lake, Amphitheatre Lake, and lakes for which I don’t know the names.  Off the west side of the Upper Saddle, the exposure becomes extreme. Cliff walls tan and sheer, fall away as if this is the chute to the middle of the world, it just drops and drops and drops into cliffs very far below.  I sit on a boulder staring to the west, doing homage in this cathedral, the light of morning pressing its fingers just far enough into the sky behind me that I can see where I may fall.  When I climb or even look along cliff walls of this magnitude I cannot help but picture my body tumbling down, cartwheel style, to a bottom I would only know for an instant.  I like to think I would have the presence of mind to tuck and flip, make some graceful and impressive aerobatic moves on my way out.  Maybe flap my arms and think about flying, like Icarus, feeling the wind in my hair, knowing how close I am to heaven.

I’m interrupted as a guide and his client make their way up behind us, so I move, head to Bellycrawl, a horizontal flake along the abyss itself.  This, Chad moves across, unprotected, one hand and toehold at a time.  There is no margin for error and I am a mother with two small sons.  I remove my pack, send it over to Chad and straddle the flake.  I am more secure with all four appendages as an anchor.  Today is not the day for a swan dive. We can do dangerous, but we can do dangerous carefully.

At 6:45 a.m. we position the camera for our timed summit shot.  Chad photos the steel disk embedded in the rock: 13,770 feet; Grand Teton.  We are here on the top of the world to watch the sun roll.  It is color and brightness, the haze across the range is light infused, and we are so tired this seems like the right place to nap, the right place to curl up with the wind and the sun, settle into exhausted dreams of jacuzzis and foot massages.  Alas, we have two repels and 9 downhill miles on which to torture our knees, ankles, and toes before such frivolity. But for now, we sit at the top, the hard-fought summit, and watch the sun rise on the world in all its orange, yellow and purple glory. For 30-minutes we are exultant. We are gods looking down on creation. We are exhausted and a little giddy, and we are on the top!!!

This would be a nice place to end the story, but contrary to the Disney adaptation of fairy tales, there is life after the happily ever after.

As we keep on keepin on, we must now return to the car. Having not brought hang gliders we must return the way we came, via foot. There is another day’s work ahead of us, and as the exhausted often do, we become giddy.  Before we reach the car, we are spouting stupid remarks and giving other mountaineers the superhero sign we have invented on the way down.  It is the secret sign we give when we see a helmet and gear that tells us they are going to a peak, not just a lake or an afternoon walk to the Meadows.  Chad creates his superhero persona and admits he will wear green tights with a yellow lightening rod on a helmet.  His superhero name is In-Cognito.  Now, looking back, the whole thing makes no sense whatsoever – so don’t expect it to, but at the time it was hilarious.  I decided I would be a superheroine fairy with purple gold wings.  This makes even less sense than Mr. In-Cognito, but if I could have flown down that mountain my feet would have been much happier.

We created weird story scenarios, and the closer we got the more tired and sore we became, the rawer my feet got. The last two miles to the car were the hardest of the trip.  “Focus on a goal,” Chad said, “something you want at the car.”  I waddled down the trail saying my high school locker combination over and over in my mind.  It’s just a thing I do when endurance is required.

2:15 pm, we hit the car and I grab the keys, start the air conditioner, dump a bottle of water over my head and take off my shoes.  I sit riverside and wash the blisters and grime on my toes, ice water numbing the pain with a different kind of pain.

With my wet butt back in the driver’s seat the trip becomes epic, as they always do.  Chad sleeps and I drive to Village Inn for banana-brownie pie and a really bad Philly-beef sandwich.

“Ain’t life Grand,” I say to myself as I pull out onto the road and drive past the big brown sign that says Grand Teton National Park. I look up at the peak we were just sitting on, and it seems impossible and possible all at the same time. So far up, so majestic, so rugged.  Just one step – sometimes brisk, sometimes dragging, sometimes compensating for a blister, one step at a time, through the pain, the danger, the exhaustion, and the unknown. That’s how you make it to the top of a mountain. And if you stop, you will not see the sunrise over the world, or feel the satisfaction of a fight well fought, you won’t sit with God in a moment of knowing. That’s just the way it is.

There are a lot of things in life that take persistence. Hobbies, careers, relationships, fitness, heck…persistence is the key to actually making things happen. Not giving up. You want to get published? You want to get to the top of the mountain? You want to get fit? You want a good relationship? You want to ski that line? Learn to catch fish? Become something you’re proud of? Teach your kids to read? Get your kid raised? Run that marathon?  It’s going to take persistence. In a world that is filled with immediate gratification, and a culture that almost demands it, persistence may be something we need to think about a little more because it’s so much a part of being the hero. Your story isn’t going to have many action-packed moments if at resistance and roadblocks you just sit down or turn around.

I want to share a passage with you from the book The Postmistress, by Sarah Blake. On page 119 there is a passage where an American reporter is over in England, boots on the ground, reporting via radio what’s going on during WWII and the blitzkrieg bombing of England. She is retelling a scene she’s lived through.

“Yesterday evening I found myself once again on my stomach, flattened to the sidewalk for protection after a close call. Nothing had been hit nearby but the sound had been deafening and there are always the three or four seconds right after a bomb when you are too shaky to stand. After a little while, I pushed myself up, first to my knees, and then slowly to my feet. Across the way on the other side of the street, two boys, about ten years old, had pulled themselves off the ground also and were busy trying to back their frightened horse in the stays of their delivery cart. Come, they cajoled, weeping, wiping their tears on their sleeves, Come on, the boys patted and murmured, though they couldn’t stop their own sobs. And slowly, ever so slowly, the animal calmed and stood. Sniffling, the boys climbed up on the cart, clucked and jerked the reins, and went off again down the street.

Waiting and watching. Weeping into your sleeves – those are not the traits of heroes, neither Ulysses, nor Aeneas, and not Joshua. Think, rather, of Penelope. Think of all the women down through the years who have watched and waited, but who, like the boys with their horse, wept and picked themselves up and went on—and you will have a small sense , then, of the heroes here. The occupied, the bombed, and the very, very, brave. This is Frankie Bard, in London, Goodnight.”  The character in the book, listening to the radio broadcast stood back from the radio and crossed her arms—she was fairly sure that the radio gal had just redefined the nature of a hero.”  –Getting back up, and continuing on.

Sometimes persistence is about making it through tragedy. Like the war. Sometimes persistence is about being able to keep trying so you reach your goal, create what you have decided to create. Sometimes persistence is about retraining your neural pathways to change behavior or thought patterns for better living, for creating habits you want, not habits that have grabbed you and hung on. Sometimes persistence is just waking up every day, putting your feet on the ground, and trying again for whatever feels valuable to you.

While persistence can be seen as the drudgery of pushing through pain and resistance, we can also choose to find a perspective with a little more pizzaz – that persistence is about bravery, about power, about hero stuff. Find a way to insert the fun, and gratitude in your persistent path. What might that look like?

Maybe it involves imagining a superhero costume and dashing, or limping forward on the trail of life, but with the knowledge that what you’re doing is moving from average to greatness, from stagnant to motile, from hoping to doing.

In the book Lead with Story,  Paul Smith shares this rendition of President Abraham Lincoln’s life events. I share it again here because President Lincoln could be the poster boy for persistence. He was a man of tremendous resistance to the ravages of life. A man of earned wisdom. And he is one of our countries greatest heroes, and yet his story is one that must have required phenomenal fortitude of heart and mind. A real hero. Let’s take another glimpse at his life:

“When he was seven years old, his family was forced out of their home and off their farm. Like other boys his age, he was expected to work to help support the family. When he was nine, his mother died. At age of 22, the company he worked for went bankrupt and he lost his job. At 23, he ran for state legislature in a field of 13 candidates. He came in eighth. At 24, he borrowed money to start a business with a friend. By the end of the year, the business failed. The local sheriff seized his possessions to pay off his debt. His partner soon died, penniless, and he assumed his partner’s share of debt as well. He spent the next several years of his life paying it off. At 25, he ran for state legislature again. This time he won. At 26, he was engaged to be married. But his fiancée died before the wedding. The next year he plunged into a depression and suffered a nervous breakdown. At 29, he sought to become the speaker of the state legislature. He was defeated. AT 34, he campaigned for a U.S. congressional seat, representing his district. He lost. At 35, he ran for Congress again. This time he won. He went to Washington and did a good job. At 39, when his term ended, he was out of a job again. There was a one term limit rule in his party. At 40, he tried to get a job as commissioner of the General Land office. He was rejected.

At 45 he campaigned for the U.S. Senate, representing his state. He lost by 6 electoral votes. At 47, he was one of the contenders for the vice-presidential nomination at his party’s national convention. He lost.  At 49, he ran for the same U.S. Senate seat a second time. And for a second time he lost.  Two years later, at the age of 51, after a lifetime of failure, disappointment, and loss (and relatively unknown outside of his home state of Illinois) Abraham Lincoln was elected the 16th president of the United States. He served only four years in office before his final defeat at the hands of an assassin. But, during those 4 years, President Lincoln successfully led the country through its greatest internal crisis, the American Civil War, preserved the Union; ended slavery; and rededicated the nation to the ideals of equality, liberty, and democracy. So the next time you think about quitting because you’ve already tried and failed, ask yourself this How different would the country be if Abraham Lincoln had stopped trying after his first defeat….or his fifth….or his tenth.”

Who you are and what you are here to do, is most often unknown. Some people have a clarity about this, a sense they are following, but I’m certain President Lincoln had no idea he was destined to become the lynchpin that held the United States of America together, nor did he understand the stress, strain, and utter depletion it would require to do what had to be done, day by day, hour by hour, decision by decision. But he moved on, one step after another, and he changed the world.

Who knows what you are here to do, or what I am here to do. Or the impact of our actions and choices, our sacrifices and our efforts. You’ve heard of the butterfly effect – how a butterfly flapping his wings on one side of the world can affect the weather on the other side of the world. It’s often used as a metaphor to illustrate how small things can have large effects. When we keep going, it matters. When we give up, it matters, we just don’t always know in what ways it matters.

If you’re working on a project, a talent, a relationship, a business, beating an addiction…a mountain to climb, remember that if you

Welcome back to the Love Your Story interview land. A couple quick announcements before we get started – I wanted to let you know that there is a new free mini-e-book available on the Love Your Story podcast website. It’s called The 5 Steps to Reframing the parts of your story that Feel Broken. Just give us your email and we’ll send it to your inbox.

Now, let me tell you who we’re talking with today. This man is something else.

From Arizona,  Rick Lewis is a speaker, author, entertainer, professional misbehaver – yes, misbehaver, and confidence coach. He started as a child actor, and street performer, using humor, comedy, and theater to overcome his fears.  From this, he has become a sought-after speaker, author, and trainer who has appeared before more than 400 organizations in the last 20 years. Rick’s book, 7 Rules You Were Born to Break, is a celebrated business book that uses stories to inspire growth and his coming book, Confident Under Stress, is again a collection of stories from Rick’s own professional journey about responding to life’s opportunities and challenges with confidence and courage. Stay with us and hear some of his stories and his thoughts on how our reactions to current situations are our old stories pasted on the present.

Stories are our lives in language. Welcome to the Love Your Story podcast. I’m Lori Lee, and I’m excited for our future together of telling stories, evaluating our own stories, and lifting ourselves and others to greater places because of our control over our stories. This podcast is about empowerment and giving you, the listener, ideas to work with in making your stories work for you. Power serves you best when you know how to use it.

Interview with Rick Lewis

There are two primary reasons I think this idea of reaction and action are so powerful. The first is that when we act we are in charge. When we react, our past is in charge. Usually, reactions are unfair and cause things in the present to go badly. This makes it a very important thing to understand so we can act as we choose in the current situation, creating love instead of more of whatever we are dragging behind us. You know, those things we call “hot buttons.”  The second reason is that in order to reframe our stories we have to learn how to step away from the stories of the past as something set in stone.

Wayne Dyer, a man revered for his spiritual and mindfulness work, said “One of the greatest lessons of my own life was learning to turn the inner rampage of hatred and anger toward my own father for his reprehensible behavior and abandonment of his family into an inner reaction more closely aligned with God and God-realized love.”

Wayne is specifically talking about taking one of his life stories and learning to reframe his reaction from hatred to love. This is an important key to many of our most difficult stories.

For more information on Rick Lewis:

www.ricklewis.co

www.facebook.com/ricklewisco;

Rick’s books include: 7 Rules You Were Born to Break 

Coming soon: Confident Under Pressure

A Facebook Post About How To Create Your Dreams 

There are moments in our lives when someone succinctly verbalizes our beliefs and understanding in a clear and perfect fashion, and we say “Yes! That is exactly what I have come to know,” or “Yes, that is exactly what I think.” This happened to me this week. My son is on an LDS mission where he is out serving others and teaching them about Christ. While he is doing this he has very limited contact with family. Once a week the missionaries get a chance to write home, but other than that they stay focused on their work. Recently, the LDS church allowed the missionaries to have Facebook pages where they post inspiring messages and thoughts. It’s a real treat when I’m on Facebook and something pops up from my son, but today was especially interesting because his words were the exact encapsulation of everything I had been working on over the last year. Let me share them and then I’ll tell you my story. Stay tuned for the rest of the tale…

Stories are our lives in language. Welcome to the Love Your Story podcast. I’m Lori Lee, and I’m excited for our future together of telling stories, evaluating our own stories, and lifting ourselves and others to greater places because of our control over our stories. This podcast is about empowerment and giving you, the listener, ideas to work with in making your stories work for you. Power serves you best when you know how to use it.

Here is his post:

“A thought I had recently was that if we allow them, dreams can be so much more than just happy thoughts and wishful thinking. They can be more than pleasant imaginings left for a world more perfect than this. If we let it, the act of dreaming and then working with determination and courage can be one of the most powerful demonstrations of faith possible to man. As we team up with the Lord and “do many things of [our] own free will, and bring to pass much righteousness” (D&C [58:27]) then, by the grace of God, will we be able to develop the competency and ability we need to steadily overcome the obstacles we find that are placed in our way. As we grow to trust the promise that “all things are possible to him that believeth” (Mark [9:23]) the Lord will enable us according to the faith that we exercise in him, and we may achieve that which we have determined to be our goal. So dream big, work hard, trust much, and then enjoy watching the miracles come to pass.”

That’s the end of his post. When I read that my first thought was, “Yay! – I needed to read that today, all of my daily struggle put into such a clear and organized paragraph.” My second thought was, “I wondered if he really knew what that meant. I have been working on this for the last year, and I’m still working with it every day, how does he just suddenly have this thought and ‘bam’ there it all is.” Maybe I’m a little slower than my son, but let me share my journey – that I’m still on, by the way – of coming to understand and live this principle. And I share it, because it may serve as a model of how to make your dreams happen.

“Dreams can be more than just a wish or a happy thought” –  When I was in my early 20’s I had a conversation with God. I wanted three things more than anything in my life, and I felt like, in this particular conversation, that I’d been given the right to ask for them. The first was that I would have an extraordinary relationship and connection with the right man. That I’d have a husband who was my other half – the right fit. The right guy.  The second was that my children would be watched over, protected and upheld. The third was that I would be able to use my talents, gifts, and abilities to give back to the world, to create something that would inspire and lift other people. In my mind, because I was/am a writer, I pictured that being an inspirational book that was successful in reaching a broad audience. That was it. Everything else I wanted, my career, my schooling, my fun was all a huge part of my life and way of living, but the foundational aspects of a meaningful life for me were found in those three things. I suspect, these basic components are universal for many people. The desire to love and be loved, to have the best for your children, and to give back to the world, these are not new ideas, just meaningful ones.

So, of the three only the second one, the protection, and amplification of my beautiful children, has been given to me. And, to be honest, if I had to have only one, I would sacrifice everything else for that, so thank God for his tender mercies. But that being said, let’s look at the other two for a moment.

The first, to find the right man, has been the largest and longest struggle of my life. When we open ourselves to love we also open ourselves to heartbreak – the two go hand-in-hand, so there has been a lot of pain and disappointment. For those of you who are regular listeners to this podcast you already have a lot of background information about this area of my life, because my three marriages and all the heartbreak and struggle involved along the way has been the major part of my story that had to be reframed. I had to find the purpose behind all the broken dreams and broken hearts, because the emotional reality of it, before the reframe, was just a messy life of what felt like tremendous hurt and accumulating failure. I have loved well, and I have loved deeply, but the depth to which we love is usually equal to the pain in which we feel upon the loss of or betrayal of that love. Let’s just say no one can ever say I didn’t try. I’m not sure how I keep standing back up, but by the grace of God.

The third item is the real story today. Last spring I had an impression that really stuck out to me. “Be it unto you according to your faith.” Now, this is a common expression, it comes from scripture, so it’s not new, but it stood out to me enough at that moment that I held on to it. I carved out a space to find out what this was about. About this same time my friend Sally returned from a Next Level Discovery workshop. She pulled me into her office one day, told me about it and said, not in these exact words, but something along the lines of, “Lori, this workshop was extremely powerful and you need it. I really think in order to move forward you’re going to need to get past all your accumulated resentment toward men, and this can be a tool to help you do it.”  I trust Sally, so I told her I’d think about it. And I did, and I went, even though it meant flying across the United States. I knew I was stuck in my life and I didn’t know how to get unstuck. I felt myself banging my head against this wall that never moved, and I didn’t have the understanding or skills to get past it. So, what did I have to lose? Worst case scenario I’d have a weekend away in Columbus, Ohio, and I got my best friend to go with me, so we’d make a week of it.

Well, I found myself in the workshop remembering item #3. I found myself opening up the old dreams that had been shoved to the bottom of the pile, given up on, covered in the musty t-shirts and dirty socks of time, and before I knew it I was standing in front of the workshop group, 100-people strong, declaring that I would write my New York Times Best Selling book that would influence and inspire. I imagined it so vividly while I sat in that room that I literally felt it happening – I felt the feelings that I would feel when the things I wanted most manifested and for the first time it had teeth, I believed. What I didn’t know at the time was how much incredible work lay ahead. I also didn’t know how the project would morph into a podcast and the other things that have taken shape because of it. Most of all what I didn’t know was how much faith it would take every day to get out of bed and work on a project when I’m not clear on where it’s going. I can see one step ahead at a time, and only one. It’s like a mist. I feel God’s support, I feel my own desire to contribute and add value to the world, I have my vision, but so much of the day-to-day effort unfolds completely on faith. Without faith in a desired outcome, we do not engage in anything. We do not apply for a job we know we have no chance of getting, or ask someone out who is way out of our league, or try out for the Major Leagues unless we think we have a shot at it. Without faith in a course of action, we do not embark upon that course. So, getting up every day and trusting that I’ll be led, that the path I am headed down is going somewhere, that in the end I’ll actually make some type of impact in a fun and loving way as I intend, this is a path of tremendous faith for me.

So, back to my son’s words.

He goes on to say, “Working with determination and courage can be one of the most powerful demonstrations of faith possible to man. This is what he said, that 20-year-old kid just throws that out there, while his 47-year-old mother is living it, feeling it every day. But then I realized, he is doing the same thing in his life. Every day he wakes up at [6:00] and works with determination and courage as he goes into the community to serve and share the love of Christ. His efforts are not always met with acceptance, as you can imagine, but doing it every day is definitely one of the most powerful demonstrations of faith possible to man. We show faith when we move our feet. When we use our hearts and minds and actions to pursue a course of action. Faith without works is dead. But to get to the point where we will act we have to overcome fears – that’s a plural. Fear of failure, fear of wasted time, fear of looking stupid, fear of fill in the blank. Faith is the opposite of fear.

Then he said, “Team up with the Lord and do many things of our own free will.”  A few years ago I came up with a three-tiered approach to living well that I felt encapsulated all the directive God had given us and made sense to me in an applicable way. For me, it was an attempt to simplify a lot of commandments and expectations. The three tiers were as follows: First – virtuous living is required in order to live a life that is clean and clear so one has the greatest chance of inspiration and guidance. All those commandments about keeping your mind and your heart and your body clean are all toward the end result of virtue, and virtue is power through a greater connection with God. It is god-like. No unclean thing can enter into the presence of God, and while we are all mortal and messy, the more virtue with which we live, the clearer the channel of communication with God.

The second tier encompasses all the Love. This tier is about our relationships and the importance of loving each other, forgiving, serving and truly coming to a space of win/win with our fellow man. Coming to understand our connectedness and power with one another.

The third tier then transitions into creation. This is where we start taking mini steps toward being like our father, who is a creator, and we start creating things ourselves. We take action and we create. I know from God’s perspective my little bitty creations and my struggle every day to do this is minuscule. Almost laughable, but I think about watching my children grow up and how hard they had to work to walk, and dress themselves, and clean their rooms, and do their homework, and as they learn and grow we watch them and cheer them on. And I’m sure God is doing the same thing with me. The other day I was attending a temple service and suddenly there was a clarity about the small but miraculous serendipitous and positive steps forward, answers to prayers, and blessings that had shown up in my life. Because they happen one day at a time the small successes often get clumped together as part of the process of moving forward, but I felt the Lord pointing out that these were his way of supporting me, and reminding me of them was his way of letting me know he was walking along side me. That he was there, he was aware, and he was supporting my efforts. So, back to Christian’s thought, “Team up with the Lord and do many things of our own free will.” That third tier of using our agency to create good, of our own free will, using our agency to make things happen, I feel we have a responsibility to do so, and that God will expect us to account for our time and what we did with it. That’s why tier three is important – agency, action, and faith to create things, but we are not alone in our efforts. Teaming up with the Lord to create positive creation in the world is a powerful level to live on.

My son’s next sentence was, “By the grace of God we will be able to develop the competency and ability needed to steadily overcome the obstacles we find in front of us.” There is not one part of that sentence that does not resonate with me. Each day I pray that my brain will connect the dots. That the Lord will give me clarity in pulling ideas together. I fall terribly short more often than not, but I certainly ask for his help and through the grace of God, occasionally I am given an increased competency and ability to do what I’m doing, and more often than not it IS indeed overcoming an obstacle. That’s another thing I didn’t realize starting out on the Love Your Story adventure. I had no idea how many obstacles there would be, and how often that obstacle would be me. How often I would have to actively override the fear or apathy circuits and flush them with faith and sometimes just motion. Just because we are creating and in motion with a desire to do good, create value in the world, does not mean that obstacles, fear, money, exhaustion, diversion, lack-of-focus, etc. will not be our companions. I believe that third tier about creation and action provides a whole different level of learning and spiritual growth. It requires discipline, faith, hope, persistence, vision and a host of other spiritual muscles that get flexed and worked out on a daily basis.

My son’s next line, “All things are possible to him that believeth (Mark [9:23]). The Lord will enable us according to the faith we exercise in him.” This brings us full circle to the beginning of my story, the time last spring where I felt the impression of “Be it unto you according to your faith.” I understand much better now why that thought was impressed upon my mind right before I embarked on this journey that I had no idea I was embarking on. One thing for certain in my story, I can only see one or two steps ahead of me at any given time. Mostly it’s a wing and a prayer, but the promise that all things are possible to him that believeth is a powerful promise. Each day I say, “help thou my unbelief,” and then I start walking forward. Can I just say, if nothing else, I am flexing some spiritual muscle and some days it’s more successful than others, but in the end of all this, no one can say I didn’t try for my number three wish either. And, because I believe, in the words of Yoda, “there is no try, only do,” therefore, I will go forth, and as my son said in his concluding remarks, “Dream big, work hard, trust much, and then enjoy watching the miracles!”

Thank you for listening to the Love Your Story podcast and indulging me in telling so much of my own personal story. Your challenge for this week is to think about your own story. Where could you use a little more belief in yourself? A little more faith to propel you forward? What fear story can you shut down today so you can take one more step forward in faith? Please share this podcast, subscribe, rate and leave us a review. Unless you don’t like it, then skip the review part. Also, a freebie for you – go to our website, www.loveyourstorypodcast.com and get the free mini-ebook for 5 Steps to Reframing the Parts of Your Story that Feel Broken. It will come straight to your inbox, no strings. Have a great week creating your stories.

Matt Garner, CEO of Longboard PR and a public speaker, specializes in helping people understand how to connect with their audience, and he’s a real fan of story.

5 Tips for How To Tell A Story– with Matthew Garner

Welcome back to Love Your Story interview land. Today I am bringing you Matthew Garner and he’s going to share his 5 tips for how to tell a story that impacts. Why does this apply to you?  Well, no matter who you are every day you are telling stories. We use stories to help our kids, our friends, our employees understand what we need or want them to do. We use stories to make real connections with each other and share our experiences. We use stories when we present ourselves at work, church, or in social circles. Stories have soooo many functions in our lives – it’s how we share awe, how we share lessons we learned – both good and bad, it’s how we make sense of things that have happened to us, it’s how we let someone into our experiences and share our lives.  Now, while story comes super naturally to everyone, and you’ve been telling stories your whole life, understanding how to tell them effectively makes you more effective and powerful in your communication. Stay Tuned.

Stories are our lives in language. Welcome to the Love Your Story podcast. I’m Lori Lee, and I’m excited for our future together of telling stories, evaluating our own stories, and lifting ourselves and others to greater places because of our control over our stories. This podcast is about empowerment and giving you, the listener, ideas to work with in making your stories work for you. Power serves you best when you know how to use it.

If you are a leader of a family, or a manager or leader at work, you need mad story skills. Story is the genre that everyone understands – you get a much better response when you share an idea or an expectation through a story that illustrates the example, rather than an explanation or a demand. Try it. But first, we’ll get a few tips from Matt so that you can rock it!

Matt Garner is from Longboard PR. He is a retired US Army Lieutenant Colonel who started his PR company when he retired.  His company helps companies and individuals increase their business by helping them understand their audience and how to send the message most effectively to that audience. Matt is a master storyteller, speaker and trainer, and he’s here to share his Wisdom.

To contact Matt:

(801) 786-9383

[email protected]

You Must Be Present to Win – Sensual Living

May Swenson said, “Not to be fully aroused to the potentialities of one’s senses means to walk the flat ground of appearances.” What this means is You Must Be Present to Win. Stay with us today for some thoughts on using your senses to bring the richness out of your story. The best and most interesting stories are full of rich detail. Not only is this an important technique in writing in order to take your reader where you want them to go and to help them recreate the scene in their own minds, it becomes an important part of living your own story – being fully present and aware within your own life, being in the present is required to take home the prize.

Stories are our lives in language. Welcome to the Love Your Story podcast. I’m Lori Lee, and I’m excited for our future together of telling stories, evaluating our own stories, and lifting ourselves and others to greater places because of our control over our stories. This podcast is about empowerment and giving you, the listener, ideas to work with in making your stories work for you. Story power serves you best when you know how to use it.

There is always the fine print on the bottom of the ticket that tells you that if you wander off before the drawing for the K2 skies, the facial, or the trip to Costa Rica, the loot will not fall into your hot little hands.

Years ago I had a large wooden sign – I mean big – it was six-feet long, and it read “You Must Be Present To Win.” I hung it proudly on my dining room wall. There were a variety of interpretations, but my reason for having it there was to remind me that every moment that my mind was not fully attentive to the present experience – the smell of my son as he sat on my lap so I could read him a book, the tightness of my arms paddling across Tony Grove lake in my canoe, the feel of the breeze across my skin as I speed down a mountain path on my bike, the brilliant intricacy of a flower when I look at it in detail – every time I let those details go unnoticed I lose. I lose the opportunity to take with me what that experience offers. I lose the opportunity to be most fully alive. I skim the waters of living instead of getting deep and real.

Our senses – sight, smell, touch, taste, hearing and I add intuition – these are the filters through which we get to interpret the world. Our senses help us connect with what surrounds us. There is a great deal of brain that is dedicated to our senses. This relationship between our senses and our brains is subjective – for example, it’s been proven that to some people cilantro tastes like a delicious herb, and to others it has a soapy flavor. The receptors in our taste buds work differently for different people, and though it’s only been in the last 30 years that scientists have figured out how smell works, it is scientifically proven that everyone smells things differently. Sight takes up a large portion of the brain, but what we see and how we see it is often influenced by our fears, our stories, our perspectives. Our senses are our link with the world around us. But when we go on auto-pilot, there is an awful lot that goes on that we miss because we aren’t paying attention. This is where the richness is found or lost. This is where you win or lose the prize.

A few months ago I was in a group coaching meeting where a woman confessed that her life was good, she wasn’t having any problems, except that because things were running smoothly she was bored and felt life didn’t hold very much for her at the moment. Dulled and complacent she was numb. There is definitely a space in life where we are so used to stimulation, that without chaos or something extraordinary to get our chemicals flowing life feels dull, uncolorful, muted. This is not the only time we have proof of not using our senses. It also happens when we are moving so fast that we can’t take time to notice what’s going on around us. These are the moments when we are losing the now. These are the moments when we need to check in and actively get back in touch with the vividness of the colors around us, with the way the air feels on our skin or the background noises we’ve blocked out. These are the moments that we get to take a deep breath, breathe in and notice what there is to notice, or look deeply into a friend’s eyes, or hold someone’s hand and feel a moment of gratitude because you can see, feel, hear, smell, taste whatever is around you.

When I guide outdoor adventures I almost always stop my clients and we listen for a moment – actively. Sometimes we hear the leaves rustling in the wind, sometimes the buzz of insects in the air, sometimes a stream, sometimes the birds or something rustling in the undergrowth and sometimes cars on the road below. Sometimes we hear a plane overhead. I always encourage them to reach out and touch the trees – to feel the texture of the bark. Is it papery? Peeling? Thick and jagged? What about running your hands across the grasses or reaching out to feel the petals of a flower, their perfect softness. Or even a thorn. “Breathe deep,” I tell them. What do you smell? Can you smell the pine trees? And of course, please stop for a moment and look around you – see, really see the colors. There is a whole palette of greens, browns, blues and of course, depending upon where you are, any other number of colors. I do this exercise with them because more often than not when we hike, and even when we just live our lives, we are pushing against time. We have an end result, a destination, something to check off a list, a place to be, a thing to get done, and we focus so closely on that end result or our mind is caught up in some worry that the details go unnoticed. If we’ve forgotten how to engage with the sensory aspect of life we miss the sensual details along the way – the stuff that adds the actual depth to living.

On a late night hike in the Tetons, moving through the moon soaked dark, I met with a herd of bolting elk. They came out of nowhere their chosen trail no more than ten yards in front of me and I couldn’t see any of the. Stampeding through the Wyoming night their shadow shapes pounded past my eyes. I froze in amazement when I should have ran. I was on the edge of fear at the closeness, but their power was a magnet. In the dark I was only able to hear the force of their movements as they vaulted a fence that stood in their way. I felt the vibration of the ground as their hooves pummeled it. I could see the outline of their bodies in motion, just barely, but most potent was their smell: the smell of raw elk, of sweat, of wild animal. It held me captive in the moment, mesmerized; then they were gone. After they passed I stood taking deep breaths, trying to keep that smell: the smell of that powerful fleeting experience, of the wildness of elk. I stared hard through the darkness after them.

Matthew Fox said that the opposite of awe is taking it all for granted. He thinks we have taken too much for granted for too long. It’s why we’re bored, and we’re violent, and we don’t have reverence, and therefore a sense of the sacred toward the soil and water and the air. It may also be why we do not hold a sense of the sacred for the other beautiful every-day gifts in our lives. The smell of a delicious dinner. The green of the trees pressed against a summer blue sky. The way the water bounces off your skin in the shower. The joy of your favorite song, or the call of your child’s voice. A hug – the pressure of another’s body close and sharing. The wet kiss of your dog and the affection behind it. Looking deeply into someone’s eyes. Having someone’s hand to hold. The smell of a really wonderful soap. Your very favorite drink. The air on your skin. The beauty of your child just as they are. A flower – it’s brilliant and beautiful design. A kiss that means something. Your feet in the warm sand. The perfect song. A tender mercy.

Live a sensual life talking in all the detailed minutiae, and all of the sudden everything will have much deeper meaning. The world starts to come alive again, and gratitude for the small and simple springs up like a small plant in the fertile ground. Sometimes we overlook the little graces and beautiful details looking for some type of bigger sense of satisfaction. Looking for the big rush, the thrill. I know I have been guilty of this. Often still am. But perhaps that is where we most often miss the greatest depth. Every moment you are brave. Being present, without letting your mind wander to other things brings us happiness and this is something we can actually tie to scientific data.

Matt Killingsworth, on the TedX stage at Cambridge, shared his scientific research into happiness. Research into happiness has taken many forms over the years, but one thing that could never be done was the moment to moment monitoring of the details of what made people happy. Killingsworth designed an iPhone app – Track Your Happiness– that allows him to question people, via text, at random moments during their day with a list of questions that rate their happiness and what they are doing. He’s had over 650K real time reports over 15,000 people, all diverse demographically, and he’s found that we are least happy when we allow our minds to wander away from the present moment. He’s got all the data on how often that happens, and he’s looked thoroughly into the issue, but I’ll summarize it for you – NO MATTER WHAT WE ARE DOING, even if it’s something we hate, like commuting or hanging out with in-laws we are less happy if we are not present to the moment.

Ted Talk: Want to be happier – Stay in the moment: https://www.ted.com/talks/matt_killingsworth_want_to_be_happier_stay_in_the_moment

Matt found that people are less happy when they are not present because when our minds wander they wander into our fears, into our worries, our regrets, and our negative voices.

Now, this is fascinating because we know that fears are self-generated. We know that worrying about something does not change the outcome, but it does make us miserable, and we know that those negative one-liners (as we discussed in episode 6) are absolutely something we are trying to replace. And, it appears that a tool to happiness and to weeding out these things that are such a force within us for crippling our very existence can be pushed to the side by being present! Ha!! If you and I stay present, sensually aware of the things we are experiencing right now – the only time we have any control in anyway—we experience life more fully with a greater depth and richness, AND we will be happier! Scientifically proven.

Henry David Thoreau recorded in his journal, on January 6, 1858, the following: “…very little evidence of God or man did I see just then and life not as rich and inviting an enterprise as it should be, when my attention was caught by a snowflake on my coat sleeve. It was one of those perfect, crystalline, star-shaped ones, six-rayed, like a flat wheel with six spokes, only the spokes were perfect little pine trees in shape, arranged around a central spangle. This little object, which, with many of its fellows, rested unmelted on my coat, so perfect and beautiful, reminded me that nature had not lost her pristine vigor yet, and why should man lose heart? Sometimes the pines were worn and had lost their branches…these little wheels came down like the wrecks of chariots from a battle waged in the sky…we are rained and snowed on with gems.”

I recorded in my journal in 2008, during a backpacking yoga trip in Needles District in Canyonlands National Park, “There is silence in the desert that makes me want to shake my head just to hear something rattle. The wind stirs the junipers, but other than that the land sits vast and quiet as if we are in a void. I wonder as I sit atop a rock, how do you tell someone in the city about real silence? A void where your ears actually ring because they can’t pick up another sound and your primary sense becomes visual with the textures and colors– geologic journaling in orange, caramel, cream, and chocolate. Cliff bands, pillars, hoodoos, mushroom rocks, caves, and arches become the whole world in rumpled, smooth, shadow and color. And, the silence, when broken, is the swoosh of a raven wing, so loud it’s a big dog panting somewhere near, the wind hustling the leaves and nothing else.”

These are the moment of people who stopped, for a moment and tuned into their senses, into the present exactly where it was, exactly what it was. These are the moment of epiphany and connection. These are the moments we can have all the time.

I share these ideas with you today because as you write/live your life story I want to remind you that you have SOOO much control over the brilliance, the feelings, the scene, the experience. This is one of the story writing skills that takes lots of practice – always pulling yourself present. It’s why when you meditate you are supposed to pay attention to your breathing because it pulls you to the present. Right now, take a second and check in with every one of your senses. What do you see? What do you smell? What do you hear? What do you sense? What can you feel against your skin – pressure, fabric, cold, hot? What do you taste? Your challenge this week is to come back to this – to get present, as often as you can. Because we all want to win, and you must be present to win!

Have a great week out there tuning in to your surroundings. Making your story richer and deeper because you are paying attention. Enjoy the depth and breadth and please go to www.loveyourstorypodcast and share one of your experiences. Also, don’t forget that we have the free mini e-book for you on the website—5 Steps to Reframing the Parts of Your Story that Feel Broken. See you next week and don’t forget to share this podcast with someone today.

Binge Eating Disorder – Interview with Courtney Zollinger

Courtney Zollinger is the author of the Snatching Sunshine blog. She began the blog to help others understand Binge Eating Disorder and to share her story in overcoming. Living in Rocklin, California Courtney is a wife and mother of a beautiful 2-year-old girl. Courtney has Bing eating disorder and has learned how to overcome. She wants to raise awareness of BED because it’s a common disorder that isn’t often discussed. On today’s podcast we hear her story, how she discovered what she had, and tools she found to help her get it under control.

You can find more of her story on www.snatchingsunshine.com and Snatching Sunshine on Pinterest.

Tips and Techniques for Better Storytelling

I was speaking at a business event the other day and afterward someone said, “I’d love to have some tips that I could work on, so I can tell better stories. Do you have a newsletter you can send me?” I told him about the weekly inspirational thought that you can sign up for on the website – and I totally suggest you all do that – it’s great to get an inspiration thought with a call to action each week, right in your Inbox box. But, I started thinking about his request for story tips – because that’s not what comes in the weekly inspiration.

Why not do a whole podcast on story tips?  I thought. So, here it is – our first set of story-telling tips. Stay tuned for some tips and techniques for making your stories super effective – powerhouse stories – remember what we say—Story power serves you best when you know how to use it.

Stories are our lives in language. Welcome to the Love Your Story podcast. I’m Lori Lee, and I’m excited for our future together of telling stories, evaluating our own stories, and lifting ourselves and others to greater places because of our control over our stories. This podcast is about empowerment and giving you, the listener, ideas to work with in making your stories work for you. Story power serves you best when you know how to use it.

When I was just starting out in real estate, and for years actually, I would present listing presentations with facts, figures, charts, and statistics. These are the things I thought people wanted to hear. When you are competing for a listing and you want to illustrate what you stand for, and you know you’ll be put up against the other competing agents, you’re going to say, “Of course I’m concerned with client connection and I’ll take your calls.” But, every agent is going to say that. What kind of different response do you think I get when instead I share an example of taking a client’s call at 10:00 pm to discuss a last-minute concern. Or when I tell a story about the time that I helped my client clean up his home when he was short on time in getting moved out? Points are scored and made when a potential client can see your claims in action by the stories you tell. It’s no longer just a statement or a stat – it’s sharing your work in action.

This is just one example of hundreds that could be given. But the point is that there is no space in business where having a skill set that allows you to tell the right story in the right way isn’t going to be the most powerful play you can make. This is why these tools matter in the real world. So here we go – do you have your notebook ready?

Jump right into the action. Nothing loses the audience like dragging out a point. Jump into the story, imagine the scene, and go straight there. “So there I was…”  or  “there was a time, just last year we worked with the city to enhance the recycling program.” No preamble, no explanation, just take them to the scene where the action is going to happen.

The stories we, as humans, connect most readily with, are those that draw out our emotion. Stories are vehicles for us to connect our emotional experiences with the characters in the story. How often when you watch a movie or read a book are you brought to tears or laughter because you are relating to the emotional spaces the characters are in? These are the places where you say, “I know what that feels like,” or you nod with certainty because the story has struck its mark.

To pull the emotion out of the story because you feel it will be unprofessional is to take the human factor out of the tale, and therein the tale loses its power. Emotion, vulnerability, realness – these are the spaces where we come to our own humanity, the spaces where we connect in real and lasting ways. Emotions like uncertainty, fear, anxiety, even moments that show you making mistakes, love, joy, exhilaration, these are all relatable spaces.

Once you find your stories, you can, with a little effort, craft your hooks.  Ok, our final tip for the day.

So that’s it for today fellow storytellers. Five tips to work into your stories. Find the stories that you want to have ready to share in your conversations. Prep your hook and jump right into the action. Don’t be afraid to share and create the emotion involved in the story, and then bring in all the glorious details so your listeners are transported to the place you want to take them.

The next step – test out your stories. Take notes on the responses you get, and if necessary, adjust it again to make it even stronger.

If you have ideas or thoughts on story that you’d like to hear about, go to the Contact Us page and chime in. Have a great week out there working up your best stories with these new story tips and we’ll see you next Wednesday. Please share the podcast with your friends and fam. You can listen on www.loveyourstorypodcast.com or wherever you get your podcasts.