Latest / Friendship IRL: Real Talk About Friendship, Community, and What It Actually Takes / The Extraordinary Ripple Effects of Small Moments of Connection with Amy Stafford

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The Extraordinary Ripple Effects of Small Moments of Connection with Amy Stafford · Friendship IRL: Real Talk About Friendship, Community, and What It Actually Takes

• 0:02
  Podcast Intro/Outro: All right, gang. Here's to nights that turn into mornings and friends that turn into family. Cheers. Hello, hello, and welcome to the Friendship IRL podcast. I'm your host, Alex Alexander. Each week we talk about what is working(and what is not) in our friendships, community and connections. Have you ever wished you could sit down and have a conversation about what is really going on in your friendships? Well, you found your people. Join us as we dive into real life stories and explore new ways to approach these connections. Together, we're reimagining the rules of friendship
• 0:57
  Alex Alexander [Narration]: What if I told you that wearing a t-shirt could change your entire life. I know that sounds ridiculous, but stay with me, because today's guest, Amy Stanfo-d, is living proof that the smallest moment of connection can create the most extraordinary ripple effects.
• 1:15
  Alex Alexander [Narration]: Amy is the founder of Blixa, six studios in Berlin, Germany, where she's equal parts cultural producer, Creative Director and artist. For over 20 years, she's been shaping the Lucky Trimmer, short format dance festival, a volunteer run in our national community that uses design and performance to bring people together from around the world.
• 1:36
  Alex Alexander [Narration]: But her story of how she got there. Well, it's gonna make you think. Picture this. You're an expat in Berlin in the early 2000s no smartphones, no social media, barely any internet.
• 1:51
  Alex Alexander [Narration]: You're walking down the street when you spot someone wearing a t-shirt made by a friend from your past life in Baltimore. Do you approach them? Well, Amy did, and that single moment of courage led to a 20 year journey of building one of the most beloved dance festivals in Europe. But here's what's going to blow your mind about this conversation. Amy isn't even a dancer. She found her way into this community by offering what she was good at design to something she was curious about, by volunteering. And through that contribution, she didn't just find belonging, she helped create a global network that's still growing today. This episode is so full of takeaways, you'll discover that maybe your next life changing relationship might be sparked by something as simple as a t-shirt, a shared symbol, or a moment of vulnerability with a stranger.
• 2:55
  Alex Alexander [Narration]: You'll see how formal communities, those groups with shared values and goals, don't just give you a sense of belonging. They can completely transform your life trajectory in ways you never imagined. And maybe most importantly, you'll understand how leaning into your genuine interests and volunteering your authentic skills to something greater than yourself doesn't just build community, it builds connection.
• 3:21
  Alex Alexander [Narration]: So whether you're feeling stuck in your current social circles, wondering how to connect in a new city, or questioning whether your passions could actually lead to meaningful relationships, Amy's story is going to show you that the connections you're seeking might be closer than you think. You just have to be brave enough to say hello. And with that, let's get into this week's episode.
• 3:48
  Alex Alexander: Amy, it's so fun to be hanging out with you today.
• 3:52
  Amy Stafford: Yeah, what a nice surprise.
• 3:57
  Alex Alexander: I was gonna say, I feel like we need to tell people where it all began, which I was thinking about this morning, which is that I showed up in Porto, Portugal to a tour bus with two small children. My nieces were in tow. We were the only people with kids on this tour bus. And immediately we were like, wow, everyone maybe wouldn't like be annoyed by us.
• 4:25
  Alex Alexander: The girls actually travel all the time. So they're very well behaved.
• 4:28
  Alex Alexander: They were very well behaved. I was very impressed.
• 4:30
  Alex Alexander: I mean, well behaved, just maybe not. I don't actually like that.
• 4:33
  Alex Alexander: I put it that way. But they just, they travel all the time.
• 4:38
  Alex Alexander: They understand that, like you use the bus time for nap or coloring, and then you get to adventure when you get off the bus and they crush it, yeah, so you had been with us all day, watching me, like, tote children around, and then we got seated next to each other at lunch in the Douro Valley.
• 4:59
  Alex Alexander: Yeah. We just. Started chatting, and now here we are, and here we are, yeah, exactly, and you're in Seattle.
• 5:05
  Alex Alexander: Now, I assume is that right in Seattle, and you have a Seattle connection too, we found out
• 5:09
  Amy Stafford: exactly, yeah, because that was something like, while we were sitting on the bus, I heard you mentioned something about flying out of SeaTac. And I was like, oh, SeaTac, I know that. And then when we were sitting at the table at lunch and started chatting, I was like, I've got it, you know, I've got to make the Seattle connection. And yeah, and the fact that you even know the family, that it's my oldest, my oldest sort of surrogate family in Seattle too.
• 5:35
  Amy Stafford: I mean, it fits very well with the overall concept of your podcast as well,
• 5:40
  Alex Alexander: yeah, yeah.
• 5:40
  Alex Alexander: There were so many little connections. Yeah, the SeaTac thing is funny because it's going to kind of tie into what we're going to talk about today, which is, you know, there are all these things that are out there, if you're listening and you're paying attention, that can be connection points with people. So I didn't even know you heard me over say, SeaTac,
• 5:59
  Amy Stafford: yeah.
• 6:00
  Alex Alexander: You're like, wait, I hope thing to, you know, I don't exactly.
• 6:04
  Amy Stafford: And then I was like, she looks very Swedish.
• 6:07
  Amy Stafford: She looks very Scandinavian. She must be from Seattle or the Pacific northwest, yeah, exactly,
• 6:16
  Alex Alexander: yeah, I can, yeah, that's the Bjorklund side of my family,
• 6:21
  Amy Stafford: yeah, yeah. I think that's Swedish.
• 6:26
  Alex Alexander: We're definitely Scandinavian. There's a mix of the three in there. But anyways, then we got to chatting, and then you reached out to me. Now we're on the podcast, and I'm so excited today, because I just think there are, there's so many directions. I mean, we're gonna kind of touch on a few things. I could have made an entire podcast series out of the things we're gonna talk about today here. Yeah, yeah. But that's a good thing. That's a good thing.
• 6:52
  Alex Alexander: We talked about how you lived in Seattle, and then you moved to Berlin. So that's a huge part of starting this is kind of that expat experience. Can you talk about what it was like to move to Berlin? Sure, well, and when you moved,
• 7:09
  Amy Stafford: yeah. I mean, I grew up in Seattle, but I left Seattle when I was 14, when my parents got divorced, and then I spent a year away in Boston, and then came back, because I was like, screw that. I'm going back to Seattle. And so I was in Seattle, in Seattle until I graduated, and then moved off to Chicago and Baltimore, and wound up in San Francisco for a while, for six years after grad school, and then was offered an opportunity. I was at a conference, and met a woman there on the first day of the conference, and was chatting, and then she didn't know how to get back to her hotel, so I gave her her ride back to her hotel, and she mentioned that she had this communications agency, like a, actually brand strategy think tank in Berlin and London. And I was like, Ooh, you know, I've been wanting to get to London.
• 7:54
  Amy Stafford: So I followed up with her the next day, and I said, you know, I'm, I'm actually quite interested. If you know anyone in London who's looking for, you know, designer, whatever she said, Well, actually we might be. And so that led us to, like, a six month email back and forth correspondence. I wound up flying over to Berlin and London to check it out, and was offered a job. So about six months after this initial meeting, I was getting on the plane with my cat and a suitcase and moving to Berlin, and this was in 2000 so, like, this was before social media. This was before smartphones. And in Berlin at the time, I mean, in the US, it was a little bit different. We were a little bit more ahead with Wi Fi, not Wi Fi, but with, I don't even know Ethernet, you know, like, high internet, yeah, yeah, high speed dial up, yeah.
• 8:46
  Amy Stafford: And in Berlin at the time, we basically had dial up, and you paid by the minute, which meant that, like, the adoption rate for this kind of tech was really slow. And so, I mean, I only say that now because these days, we take so much for granted when we travel or when we go to a new place, that we have Google Maps on our phone. We have all kinds of different apps that we can use to find out about things that are happening in the local area, places that you can go and meet people, activities that you can do, and nothing like that existed. So after being there for a couple years, and this was part of the thing I mentioned to you in our talk at the table at lunch, was that I was walking down the street. I'd been there for maybe two and a half years, and I was just walking down the street very close to my house, and I see this guy sitting on a corner at a cafe, and he's wearing a t-shirt that was made by a friend of mine that I had known from Baltimore, and I have the same t-shirt, and the t-shirt says I'm with Mr. Means, and Mr. Means is the guy who'd made these t-shirts. And this was like, 10 years later, you know. When I'm in Berlin, discovering this guy on the street corner, and I just thought to myself, You know what, I have to go talk to him.
• 10:05
  Amy Stafford: Yeah, because, you know, like, of course, it's Mr. Means. And so I went up on him. I was like, You're with Mr. Means, so am I?
• 10:12
  Amy Stafford: I'm with Mr. Means too. And he's like, No way. So we exchanged phone numbers, and, you know, developed a friendship out of this, and many things sort of evolved from that. But this first connection was made because of this t-shirt that, you know, industry means, probably made 100 of them. You know, it's not like he made 1000s and 1000s. It was like things he gave out to his friends as a sort of, how would you say that sort of guerrilla marketing for him, although there was no clear indication of what he what Mr. Means, who he was, or what he did on a t-shirt. But this was before social media, so you know, this was a way to find your tribe, before there was even a term for this. And in getting to know this gentleman, gentleman Clint, who's equally as as fun and talented and cheeky as Mr.
• 11:04
  Amy Stafford: Means. About a year later, he and a woman from Berlin started an experiment with a dance event where they put together an evening of short format contemporary dance pieces. And I was in the audience for the first show, and I thought to myself, Wow, this is amazing.
• 11:22
  Amy Stafford: And how can I get involved with this? And, you know, through him, I was meeting all of these people in the dance community, which is fantastic. And I'm not a dancer, but, and even like, you know, I studied fine art, I have an art background, but in the US, I never went to go see dance, aside from, like the Nutcracker at Christmas time.
• 11:45
  Amy Stafford: And yet, in Berlin, how do I say this? Like, the the cost of tickets is really affordable, because so much of culture is subsidized by the government, and dance gave me a way to go into the theater without having German as a language, you know, like, I could appreciate that being in an audience and seeing a performance, but I didn't have to know German to be able to enjoy it.
• 12:09
  Alex Alexander: That's kind of a little bit of like the belonging piece, right? Like, when it's German, you probably feel kind of a little like, I don't belong here, but also, like, overwhelmed and comfortable to connect because you feel on edge, because you're like, Well, I don't really even if you went to talk to someone after the show, it's like, Well, did I really catch 100% of the meaning of precisely and at that point?
• 12:29
  Amy Stafford: I mean, these days, it would be different. I mean, it's been 25 years now, so I'd hope to at least catch 80% but at the time, I had no German so yeah, there was no way I could have found that,
• 12:40
  Alex Alexander: like, some natural, like, innate, you really just went after, like, this is a place I can actually connect here, yeah? And it wasn't something talking universal,
• 12:52
  Amy Stafford: yeah, it was universal. And it wasn't something that I intellectually thought about at the time, but in hindsight, I was like, oh, yeah, that makes sense, because, yeah, I don't need language for it. I mean, and I unders, I have my own vocabulary around art and performance and things like that, but, you know, I didn't need to have German for it, which was great. So he started this dance performance. It wasn't a festival at the time.
• 13:14
  Amy Stafford: It was more like an experiment.
• 13:17
  Amy Stafford: And in the next show, I actually did a performance where I told a story about the hell truck that I used to drive in high school, this really crappy little Ford courier that I had to put oil in every day, and I had to put water in it every day, and there was no power steering and no power brakes, and I'd have to turn the heat on in the summertime so that the engine wouldn't overheat. And you'd get these, like, running, you know, I was in Seattle, and you get these running, you'd have to get, like, a running start downhill to make it up over the next hill, because there was almost no expression. I learned a lot about cars and how to drive, yeah, you did, how to, how to, you know, deal with engines and stuff at a very early age. But, and how did, oh, yeah. So that was the story that I told in this performance, which is called Lucky Trimmer And I mean, the name is a story in itself. But after that experience, I was like, Wow, holy shit, getting up on stage in front of 250 people, that's hard, you know, I can't believe I did that. And I actually did it, almost as a dare to myself.
• 14:21
  Amy Stafford: I was friends with them, so it wasn't like they had a stringent application process yet, but I said, you know, hey, I've got this story. I can tell it. And they're like, yeah, come on. And it was so easy and flexible at the time, but after doing that, I had so much more respect for performers and I could and I was like, actually, I can see why a lot of them become alcoholics, because it takes a lot to go out on stage
• 14:43
  Alex Alexander: numb out that fear, yeah,
• 14:46
  Amy Stafford: and, and this was the first time I'd done it. But anyway, so after that, I was like, you know, I really want to stay with this and contribute, but I don't need to perform anymore. And so as a. Designer and new to Berlin. I'd only been at that point it was 2004 so I'd been there about four years, and I had moved there for a job, but the job ended in 2002 so from 2002 on, I was sort of struggling to build my own self employment role there or job in Berlin. And so getting involved with this dance festival was a way to as a volunteer, because everything is volunteer in this organization. But my my idea was like, here's a way for me to demonstrate my skills, build my network, and, you know, contribute to this community and actually have a chance to build my own community through it, because it's very difficult to do that in a foreign country before social media. And so yeah, over the years, I started just doing all of their flyers and their posters and helping them with communication stuff.
• 15:52
  Amy Stafford: And then eventually I got involved with the curatorial process. I helped them sort of move online with the online application process. Because at the beginning, we would just have people sending in DVDs, you know, and we'd sit together twice a year with a stack of 500 DVDs to watch and go through and make our selection for this show. And eventually, I was like, you know, guys, maybe we do this. There's this thing called YouTube, and people can upload their videos to it. So maybe, you know, they can save a lot of money by not sending in DVDs. So maybe what we do is we switch the model a little bit, and we have them apply online.
• 16:34
  Amy Stafford: So we did that, and all of a sudden we were getting, you know, hundreds and hundreds of applications, because it's so easy to just upload anything.
• 16:40
  Amy Stafford: And then I said to them, you know, guys, maybe we should charge an application fee. I mean, none of us are getting paid anyway. It's not for us.
• 16:51
  Amy Stafford: But just to make people serious, if they want to apply, there's, you know, there's a threshold.
• 16:57
  Amy Stafford: There's a barrier to entry. It's 15 euros. It's not enormous, but it's enough to make you think like, yeah, do I want to do this or not? And for about a year, I was lobbying for this, the idea, and many of the people in the Lucky Trimmer organization, most of them were German, and some of them were East German, and many of them were very resistant to this idea of an application fee.
• 17:20
  Amy Stafford: And I explained, you know, in the design industry, this is common. If you apply for a competition, you pay for your entry, and very often it's like$100 or more. So if you think about it, 15 euros is not a lot.
• 17:38
  Amy Stafford: And so eventually they came around to the idea, and we started this model. And the first year, we lost some of the applicants, but the quality got better. But over the years, we got more and more applicants, and it made it possible for us to do a lot of things, like visiting other dance festivals and representing our festival and, you know, printing t-shirts, and what do you call them? Stuff, Taschen canvas bags and, you know, creating what was it? It was some program we called Lucky change maker, where we had actually extra because we would pay the artists who came to perform, but we didn't pay ourselves. At some point, we had this extra slush fund. So we developed a grant program where we would give a grant to an artist who was using dance for the greater good, so not just making a dance performance, but doing something like teaching people with Parkinson's how to do popping and locking as a way to, you know, find new forms of movement. And so, yeah, so this all grew this Lucky Trimmer brand, and over the years, it's become kind of an international phenomenon, but so much of it is based on this kind of solidarity idea. We're all working together. None of us are getting paid. We're doing this for the greater good of dance in the Berlin community, and first with the Berlin community, but eventually with the international community. And over the years, the t-shirts for Lucky Trimmer for this dance festival have become this tribal little badge. And the dancers who've come and performed, they wear the t-shirts to their dance classes that they teach and that they're in, and people from around the world discover Lucky Trimmer this way. So the awareness grows, the community grows, and as the dancers then come to the performance, or to, you know, perform in the shows, it's really lovely to see the connections that are made there.
• 19:36
  Amy Stafford: And, you know, family is a tricky word, because people have different ideas of what family is, but there's the family you're born into, and the family that you build for yourself. And Lucky Trimmer has done a beautiful job of creating this sort of self, self styled family of people all over the world who share. This passion and the interest in not just dance, but, yeah, finding ways to expand it beyond just your local, you know, homegrown set.
• 20:11
  Alex Alexander: I think what we I think we talked about, you talked about how, like, the Lucky Trimmer festival has kind of these, like values. It's like, you know, very childlike, taking risks, experimenting, yeah, things like that. And so the t-shirts line through this whole story, it's like, that's how you met, yeah? That's how another person, yeah, Clint, who founded, right?
• 20:39
  Amy Stafford: Was one of the other founders, one of the two founders, and it wasn't conscious, necessarily, but the t-shirt then became its own form of spreading the message. But you're absolutely right that like one of the things that I do in my, you know, sort of daily life, beyond watching lots of dance videos, is I do branding and brand strategy and work with different clients to help them build their brand essence. And from that, whether it's a logo or a website or marketing materials or just communication strategy, comes out of that. And again, I was sort of early in my my own business as I was working with Lucky Trimmer, so I used Lucky Trimmer, in a way, as a model test case for myself. And we went, I led the whole team through a brand brainstorming process, and we came up with this idea that Lucky Trimmerrepresents the child mind, and this like, sort of sense of fearlessness and openness to take risks and experiment and make mistakes.
• 21:52
  Amy Stafford: And, you know, not work from a place of judgment, but work from a place of curiosity. And it's fascinating, though, having set that in place, probably in around 2006 and now we're in 2025 to see how, over these past 20 or so years, this core essence has created a resonance within the organization that works like a strange attractor.
• 22:18
  Amy Stafford: You know, like in chaos theory, you have these things are like these strange attractors, and they attract similar and they repel the opposite. And what we found is that we really attract people and participants who reflect the same values as ourself and the ones that are coming out of competition or back fighting or whatever, they don't stick, you know, they don't make it through our sort of force field of goodwill. I mean, that sounds a little cheesy, but it's amazing how effective it's been over the years in, yeah, sort of operating like a, like a tuning fork, you know? And the, yeah, the things that find that frequency and resonate at that frequency find their way to us, and it's resonating out too, in my mind.
• 24:21
  Alex Alexander: So I have this framework called the wheel of connection framework, and in that Lucky Trimmer would be a formal community, right? Yeah, and formal communities have shared values and goals, which is exactly what you're talking about. And the strongest formal communities, you know, like, really stick by those principles for exactly the reason you're talking about, like, it gives shared meaning to all the people who participate. And what I think is so cool about this is, over the past 20 years, you're saying it's become very evident that like that through line has stuck, yes, but then what happens is those people wear those shirts in their dance studios in Toronto, in Seattle, in Mexico City, in wherever you know,
• 25:11
  Amy Stafford: Cuba,
• 25:11
  Alex Alexander: yeah, everywhere. And somebody meets that person and starts talking to them, and because that through line is so strong, if they resonate, even though it's like one layer outside, they're not even at the festival? Yeah, they're not even at the festival. Exactly that person is like, Wait, what is this festival? Where do I find this?
• 25:35
  Alex Alexander: Where? What is the website I want to be surrounded by, not just you? Like, it's great to have a conversation with one person, but wow, what if I was in a room with 100 of you and, like, I finally felt this feeling I have wanted, you know, like the child mind. And there were so many of us where that was acceptable.
• 25:58
  Alex Alexander [Narration]: I'm gonna pause us here for a second, because I think we need to talk about Amy's winding path to Lucky Trimmer. Think about it. She said yes to a random t-shirt from a friend in Baltimore, years later, she approached a random stranger on a Berlin street corner wearing that same shirt. Then she said yes to attending a dance festival she knew nothing about.
• 26:23
  Alex Alexander [Narration]: Then yes to volunteering, then Yes to getting more involved.
• 26:29
  Alex Alexander [Narration]: That's a lot of yeses and a lot of places where she could have said no and never found this community that has become so central to her life. And here's what I want you to take away from this. If you've tried one group, one meetup, one activity, and it didn't feel right. That's not a sign that you don't belong anywhere. That's actually good information. It means you're getting closer to finding the places that will feel cozy and welcoming and aligned with who you are. Amy talks about this in the episode, right? She talks about how some people just aren't the right fit for Lucky Trimmer. That's why you have to have a strong culture. So if you don't fit, that's not a bad thing. It's just information.
• 27:15
  Alex Alexander [Narration]: Amy's story could be like your own. It isn't about finding the perfect community. It's about staying curious and open until you find a community where you feel a sense of belonging. The path is rarely linear, and you have no idea where that sense of belonging might be waiting for you. So if something didn't work out, don't give up. Keep saying yes to the next thing that appears your Lucky Trimmer might be just around the corner,
• 27:49
  Amy Stafford: and it's so gratifying to hear this then reflected back by the artists and the dancers when they come.
• 27:56
  Amy Stafford: So this year, we moved from Berlin to Frankfurt, and we've sort of switched the leadership team, but we're, I've been in the process of helping the transition and really holding this this frame for Lucky Trimmer. And so in the show we had in Frankfurt, some of the artists that were performing had actually performed in previous shows of ours. And we always have, you know, round table discussions with the artists, and invite different programmers in and so on. And during this round table discussion, one of the artists from Italy said, you know, I love coming to Lucky Trimmer. This is second time we've been here, and it's always such a positive experience. And the thing that's so great is there's no competition, you know, like one we're here, we're all working together. We're all happy to be here, but there's no like looking over your shoulder and wondering what the other artists are doing, and, you know, feeling like you're having to elbow each other out for the prize. And we said, Yeah, because the prize is coming to Lucky Trimmer, you know, that's the prize. So once you've gotten here, you've all, you know, made it through that, and you are all sort of gold wit and gold medal winners by showing up, and there's no competition at this point. The competition's, you know, sort of behind the scenes, and yeah, it was so nice to hear that and see everyone else in the group, sort of nodding their heads and saying, Yeah, this is really a special, unique kind of festival experience that you don't have.
• 29:27
  Alex Alexander: The prize is kind of community and connection. Yeah, money, absolutely. Prize is this place where you feel like you belong, where you feel like you can grow and change and you know your truest self and do your thing and try things. And, yeah, it's like the freedom of the space,
• 29:47
  Amy Stafford: absolutely. And going back to the t-shirt comment that you were saying, like, people see the t-shirts and, you know, feel this like, I want to know more about this.
• 29:55
  Amy Stafford: Also, the artists who performed in Lucky Trimmer will say to their friend, dude, you got to apply, you know. And so there's a lot of spreading the word that way too. So in the application process, we always ask, where did you find out about us? And so often it's from other artists who've already performed and are telling their friends about us.
• 30:13
  Amy Stafford: Yeah? So, yeah, that's been a really, really valuable anchor point for me, then also in building my community in Berlin.
• 30:22
  Amy Stafford: Because before that, you know, it was so difficult part of it was my job. Before the job ended, was to basically live in airport lounges, traveling around as a as a consultant, which was miserable. So when I finally ended that job, I was happy to finally have the chance to get to know Berlin and get my feet sort of anchored there, but again, without what we take for granted today, which is our smartphones, without that meeting people, especially in, let's face it, in sort of Berlin culture, which is not outgoing in the sense of like being curious about other people or striking up chatty conversations. Yeah, you'll find that with others, other international people, but you won't find it with the Germans.
• 31:10
  Amy Stafford: So for the first, you know, seven or eight years, until smartphones came around, it was really like banging your head against a wall and Lucky Trimmer then, and being a part of this community really helped me.
• 31:23
  Amy Stafford: That's where I really found, yeah, my people and helped build my network. And even to this day, like, Well, I think the last time we chatted, just in preparation for this talk, I was in Paris, and I was house sitting for Clint, the guy with the t-shirt who I met on the street all those years ago. So like, you know, the relationships just grow and continue and and it's so lovely to see how something that's built out of goodwill like that can have this sort of echo out across time in different ways.
• 31:57
  Alex Alexander [Narration]: Yeah, well, and you know, I want to point out here like you leaned in and volunteered. I talk a lot about like joining a group, and, you know, finding an interest group, like becoming a participant. And I think for a lot of people, if I jumped in and I was saying, like, go volunteer, go get involved, and I get that you maybe don't want to do that right off the bat, because you want to make sure that this does feel aligned. You don't want to walk up to everything and just like, put your name on the list, and you've never been in the never been in the group before, kind of thing. But there is something to be said about like when you volunteer, when you take a leadership position in an organization, like a community organization, you become so much more entrenched and you get so much more time with other people working on a kind of like joint venture together, and that naturally creates more opportunities for conversation and connection. And it really just like accelerates where, you know, if you just go to the meetings, you maybe have to put a little more work in yourself to, like, initiate conversations with people. So I'm just pointing that out. I think there's a piece here to point out of like, part of the reason this probably accelerated so fast for you is because you committed.
• 33:23
  Amy Stafford: Yeah, I think you're right with that. And the deeper I committed over the years. You know, first it was just like doing the flyers and the posters, but the more I got involved, the more I was able really to understand the magnitude of what was happening in terms of the power of the organization, the power of this sort of shared vision. And yeah, like you said, not just showing up to the meetings, but actually working together with the entire group, and, you know, contributing to the strategy and contributing to the the selection process, and, you know, developing little codes for how we how we would rate the videos that we watch from, like, how would you say that good plus good to, What the fuck you know, all kinds of stuff.
• 34:09
  Alex Alexander: Yeah, they thought to submit that.
• 34:12
  Amy Stafford: What the hell is that?
• 34:15
  Alex Alexander: And now you're like, is that a leftover YouTube video that was just sitting there that you missed out?
• 34:21
  Amy Stafford: Yeah? Yeah, yeah.
• 34:21
  Amy Stafford: There were definitely a few of those. And, you know? And it's funny, because going into it, I, you know, I come from a background of fine art, but I don't come from a background in dance. And so over the years, I've come to really see and understand what good moving is like who, you know, I can recognize a good mover and a good dancer beyond the composition or the story they're telling with the piece, but just the physicality of them, I see that now, whereas before, and then especially, you know, watching 500 videos in a month, you see the entire range of quality. And you know, it's wonderful, in a way, to have that insight into a different world. But getting back to the volunteer part. It's funny because I my background over the years, off and on, I volunteered for all kinds of different things. Back when I was in the US, and even the high school I went to in Seattle was very focused on volunteering and working together as a group, and the students were never called out as as an individual for their success, but it was always like the group success that was, and that was just the sort of philosophy of the school, that the group success was celebrated, but the individual was part of the group. But not, you know, there was never like the magna cum laude or something like that in the school, and volunteering was very much a part of our curriculum in a way, so it's not it wasn't outside of my frame of view when I got there, but finding Lucky Trimmer made sense to me from so many different reasons, and one of them was that it was sort of adjacent to my skill set. It wasn't that I was volunteering for a design. Design Group with a bunch of other designers. I was applying my skills to something. I wasn't overlapping with other people. I was able to contribute my own thing to something greater. But it's not like I'm, yeah, doing something that's in the design world in particular so but the the volunteering part, and again, like these days, and it's certainly still a possibility.
• 36:31
  Amy Stafford: But, you know, there's so many different ways to meet people, but at the time, it just seemed like a logical thing for me to do, to find community and to meet people with shared interests and shared values. And it's funny because it wasn't my intention. But over the years, through all of these connections, I've wound up working with clients like Katerina Witt, who was an Olympic gold medalist in figure skating, and the East German sort of, who does she look like?
• 36:59
  Amy Stafford: Like Brooke Shields of the East German skating team, and all kinds of different artists and creators, and, yeah, all kinds of different clients all through these connections that I've made through Lucky Trimmer. And again, it wasn't that wasn't my aim, but it's just the natural sort of end effect of participating.
• 37:21
  Alex Alexander: Yeah, you're, you're, you have all these people who you're around, they are seeing your work in the Lucky Trimmer space. They trust you. They know you because they spend time working with you. So it's only natural that then people are going to say your name in rooms and be like, no, no, no. You have to talk to Amy for that, right?
• 37:44
  Amy Stafford: Exactly
• 37:47
  Alex Alexander [Narration]: What Amy is describing here is social capital in action. Social capital is basically the network of relationships and connections you build over time. The people who know your work trust your character and think of you when opportunities arise. And social capital, by the way, isn't just in a professional sense, but that's mainly what I'm going to talk about for the sake of this episode. Now here's why it's important to think about social capital in your life. Most opportunities come through people, not job boards. When someone needs a designer, a consultant or any kind of service, they're going to think of someone they know and trust, or they're going to ask a friend if they have a recommendation that's social capital in action.
• 38:33
  Alex Alexander [Narration]: Second, social capital compounds over time. Every person Amy worked with at Lucky Trimmer became a potential bridge to their network, their projects, their recommendations. Amy didn't show up and volunteer to build her business. She volunteered at Lucky Trimmer because she cared about the mission. But by consistently showing up, contributing her skills and building genuine relationships, she created a web of connections that has supported her professionally for decades. A lot of people think social capital is built by attending endless networking events, but you can build it just by volunteering to do what you love.
• 39:17
  Alex Alexander: When you were talking earlier about how like you brought your skill set, it wasn't like you were in a room full of designers. I was thinking when you volunteer like that, and you are the designer, right? Everybody else in that room probably has other jobs, other things. They do, other skill sets. They don't know how to design. And so you become a very, a very vital person. It's not like they're sitting in the room and there's a project and they're like, oh, who should we go to? It's like, oh, you have to talk to Amy about that. Like, immediately your front of mind, and I'm in the room with who we're having a bunch of photos.
• 39:57
  Amy Stafford: Which ones do you like? Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's definitely a different Yeah.
• 40:01
  Amy Stafford: Anyway, I'm interrupting you
• 40:05
  Alex Alexander: just, I guess, no, no. I'm just saying, like, for somebody who is trying to become connected in a space and feel like they belong, you're gonna feel like you belong pretty quickly. When people need to move something forward and they just keep looking at you because you are the expert in that field, very quickly you're going to be like, Yeah, I belong here because they literally need me to design these things and, like, set the visual tone for this brand.
• 40:32
  Amy Stafford: Yeah, yeah, absolutely, it did take time, you know, from the belonging standpoint, because I, at the beginning I was like, this sort of external service provider, as opposed to sitting in the meetings and doing the planning.
• 40:45
  Amy Stafford: But as I got more involved with that, beyond just the design, but also the selection process, the strategy, you know, these different approaches that we were exploring with, you know, going to YouTube and things like that, that's I really felt like, yeah. Now sudden it's like, yeah. Now this is, I'm part of this, as opposed to being sort of on the fringes where. I had started,
• 41:08
  Alex Alexander: yes, I understand this a long time ago.
• 41:10
  Alex Alexander: But do you remember, like, when you say you were an external service provider, did you tell them you wanted to be more involved? Or was it just that they kept asking you, and then you ended up more involved?
• 41:21
  Alex Alexander: Like, was that you initiating?
• 41:24
  Alex Alexander: Do you think, or was that then,
• 41:26
  Amy Stafford: that's a good question. I think what happened was, at first, I was just doing the design stuff, and then maybe two years into it, I said, you know, let's do the branding. We really need to come up with a system and story. And, you know, I have this thing that I'm doing for my clients, and we can do it here and and in that process, I think that's when I also got more embedded in because I became much more involved with the construction of the overall storytelling around it, and not just like creating a flyer. And in that process, then I also was like, you know, I kind of want to get involved with the curatorial stuff, and it'd be fun to participate. And of course, their, you know, their attitude was like, please come.
• 42:14
  Amy Stafford: The more the merrier. Let's, you know, come sit on the couch with us for 14 hours while we sit and watch all these videos together.
• 42:23
  Amy Stafford: And I, you know, I thought like, that sounds like, actually, that sounds like fun. Not so much the endurance part of it, but the sort of communal commiseration around the energy and the time effort that it takes to do this and in that process, then there came a point as well where I said, because we have a one of the guys that is in the group, sort of the the father behind the two that founded it, he's German, and he would do the introduction for the show in German and then in English. And I said at some point, I was like, Ufa, maybe we do this together, you know, I'd be happy to go up with you, and you speak in German, and I speak in English, and we do our little introduction. And then the show begins. And he's like, Hey, that's great. So then I started that, I think probably 2011 or 12, I started doing that,
• 43:15
  Alex Alexander: and now you're on the stage,
• 43:17
  Amy Stafford: yeah, yeah. And doing it like, you know, getting and traveling around and going to different, you know, festivals, and introducing Lockheed children as well. And it's gotten me much more comfortable with public speaking and standing on stage and talking and also talking about Lucky Trimmer, which is very easy for me to do. It's a lot easier to talk about that than myself. But, yeah, that was, you know, it was like each step was deeper and more involved, to the point now where I'm, like, the grandma, you know, like, I'm the Lucky Trimmer grandma who's been there more or less since the beginning, and everyone else has sort of moved off and moved into different things, and new people have come in. And it's like my dad had this joke that he's had the same acts for 50 years, but it's he's had three different heads on it, and, you know, six different handles, and Lucky Trimmer is similar in the sense that we've had so many different people sort of participate and move through it. And we've, you know, held this shape, but the contents of it that has created it have changed over the years, and the people in it have changed.
• 44:26
  Alex Alexander: But you sit at that table now. And this also stood out to me, you sit at that table now, and because you are so connected to this organization, to the mission, to the people, you can look back at all of these little random kind of probably like everyday moments where you were just in a conversation and saying, you know, like, hey, what if we put this on YouTube in the moment that probably didn't seem like it was maybe going to completely shift, like the entire culture of the festival, yeah, looking back now, it did. You know, same with the entry fee and the shirt for sure areas where you just, you were just in your moment, in your day.
• 45:12
  Amy Stafford: Yeah, come on. You know, it works great for other you know, people use it to do other things. We could try it too. And certainly, you know, to be fair artists, being visual artists, dancers, we carry so much of the financial burden of our work. You know, we have to buy the materials. And for dancers, they've got to have a studio, they have to keep going to dance classes. They have to pay for their applications for competitions. They have to go off and travel and pay for all kinds of different things. And I know that the expenses are high, and yet, somehow we've managed, without any funding from the government, which is an unheard of sort of thing in Germany or in Europe, even we've managed to keep this running for a super long time as a non commercial enterprise. And yeah, there's something very special about that. But I think the application fee, as controversial it was at the beginning, gave us so much more power, not in the outside world, but it gave us the engine underneath ourselves to do more for the artist and for the community and so on, and that just helped to spread our name broader and wider. So it, yeah, it's been a very positive knock on effect. And yeah, something that I doubt they would have gotten to without me. But I don't want to say, Oh, I'm the genius here. But it's more like, yeah, it takes a North American, in a way, to see like dudes, we actually need to charge for this. And, you know, if we do this, yeah, and, you know, 15 euros. And, you know, and at the beginning, it was so funny too, because, you know, the way we wrote it on the website, it's like, oh, you know, it's only three cups of coffee. It's less than you'd spend drinking beer at night with your friends. And some point I was like, We do not need to justify this, you know.
• 47:09
  Amy Stafford: We don't need to justify this.
• 47:13
  Amy Stafford: It's not a lot of money, you know, even for artists. And, yeah, it's definitely made a huge difference for us and what we can do for the artist. And so poured back, yeah, you've seen the ripple effect. Yeah, exactly, exactly, all because you threw an idea out there.
• 47:30
  Amy Stafford: Yeah, yeah. You know something else I want to talk about. Want to bring us back to because I have taken this part of our conversation into my everyday life, like I actually experience last week about this. And that's the shirts.
• 47:47
  Alex Alexander: Oh, the shirts, yeah, stand out to me because I am a person who I used to like, not really want to wear anything branded. I don't even mean like luxury brands, just, you know, the local bakery I love, or the local this thing I love. I don't know why, but I was very kind of not into that. I just didn't want it. And I think before our conversation, maybe, like a year ago, I kind of had this moment where I was like, why? Like, why is that? And I realized that it's kind of me putting my interests or my passions, like, really out there, right? If I'm wearing a local bakeries branding, it's kind of like, okay, I don't even know the owners. Like, why am I walking around in a bread shirt?
• 48:46
  Amy Stafford: You know, I don't need an unpaid endorsement.
• 48:50
  Alex Alexander [Narration]: Yeah, like, Why? Why am I doing that?
• 48:53
  Alex Alexander [Narration]: And I had already been deep in this thought. And then we're in the Douro Valley, and you are telling me about the Mr. Means shirt and the Lucky Trimmer shirts and kind of the culture that happens. We've talked about these multiple times, and I think before our conversation, had already, like, bought a couple shirts that had branding on them. Because what I decided is the reason I wasn't doing that is because it kind of felt vulnerable. Yeah, it was like an in for people to talk to me about said thing on my shirt. It was like admitting that I liked that thing, that band, that company, that whatever. So I had already bought a couple, but I have kind of recently, like I walked in the I have not bought the bakery one yet. There's this local bakery in Seattle. I don't know how long it's been since you've been home. It's called Sea Wolf bakery. I love them.
• 49:54
  Alex Alexander [Narration]: They they're amazing. Oh, it's in Fremont.
• 49:58
  Amy Stafford: Okay, good to know next time I'm in town, yeah.
• 50:03
  Alex Alexander [Narration]: And every time I go in, I look at their hat. I'm like, I don't know, I should just buy, like, a Sea Wolf bakery hat. But I have been actually, purposefully starting to buy certain items that have, like, local business, branding, artist, branding, band, branding, whatever, to almost push myself to, I don't know, like, acknowledge openly, like, these are things I like, yeah, and I was at the grocery store last week. I was wearing, I had just left, like, a gym appointment. I was wearing a Backstreet Boys - shirt because I just saw them recently. And this guy who was working behind the counter goes, is that a Backstreet Boys shirt? Wow, that is a throwback. We must be about the same age, like it's out of nowhere. It started this conversation. And I was like, Yeah, I just saw them. And he was like, they're touring. I was like, Yeah, we had this whole.
• 51:05
  Alex Alexander [Narration]: You know, I think, like, five plus minute conversation about the Backstreet Boys out of nowhere, yeah. So I have been really testing this because, like, you were talking about the Mr. Means shirt, you know, you saw that. You knew that was a connection point. You also probably saw this person, and were like, Okay, well, if they're one of the 100 people that ended up with a shirt, and I, like, Mr. Means, yeah, like, maybe connecting with them too, exactly the same with, like, the Lucky Trimmer shirt of this, this culture where, if somebody's wearing it, they know, I'm trying to lean into this in my everyday life. Amy, that's fine, fantastic.
• 51:48
  Amy Stafford: I'm super excited to hear that. And actually, since our conversation about it, I've leaned into it even further. And red bubble, which is a, you know, online shop where you can print on demand things. Yeah, I've just been uploading designs and printing t-shirts that I can wear to the gym. And, you know, full disclosure, I'm 55 years old, and I'm going through menopause, and the hot flashes come hard and heavy, so having multiple 100% cotton t-shirts that you can sweat through and throw in the wash and put the next one on is really, really like the way I survive. And at some point you just can't keep wearing black t-shirts all the time, so I've started my own series of t-shirts just for myself. I mean, most of them are available that other people can buy, and it's amazing to see what people buy, but they are following in this same sort of spirit. So I've been making these t-shirts, and one of them is this violent femmes t-shirt and says, I forget what eight is for. And I just printed another one the other day that says gaslighting isn't real. You're just crazy.
• 52:56
  Amy Stafford: And and then there's another one that I haven't printed yet, but I think I've sold three of them in Australia, but I'm excited to print it for myself soon. And it says Dyslexics untie. And my friends who aren't dyslexic don't get the joke, but anyone who's you know at all sort of understanding the sake laugh instantly, because it's just a play on unite and untie and yeah. So these are, yeah, it's making these t-shirts so that it's funny, because I wear them to the gym, and I also wear them in bed when I'm sleeping, but when I wear them to the gym to see the way people respond to them, and especially the violent femmes one, I've gotten quite a few sort of nods of recognition.
• 53:41
  Amy Stafford: Again, we're in Germany, so people aren't going to come up and talk to you, but they're going to be like, I know that, you know, or they'll be like, oh yeah. And it's, it's very gratifying, but it also is like, Ah, yes, I see Yes. They're all my in my you know, like, between 50 and 65 it's not the ones in their 20s. They don't know what the hell they're talking about.
• 54:02
  Amy Stafford: It is. But it's definitely a way to find, yeah, to find the people who are resonating, who recognize these messages.
• 54:11
  Alex Alexander: What you were saying with the Dyslexic shirt the Untied is, you know, well, if you if you are dyslexic, you immediately laugh, like you would. It's like we were talking about earlier, where people get filtered out, yeah, exactly and immediately, like people can't see us. Yeah? Immediately you were like, yeah, not you Okay, explain it to me,
• 54:32
  Amy Stafford: and I've had to explain it to other people as well. That's why I'm like, Yeah, you know, you have to be kind of dyslexic to get this one.
• 54:39
  Alex Alexander: But that's the whole point. Is it's like, meant to connect the right people, or the people who have the same interest. Or, I mean, dyslexia is not interest, but I'm saying, like, the violent femmes one, yeah, for sure,
• 54:52
  Amy Stafford: for that for sure, or just an awareness, yeah, yeah, yeah. And, or for you with the Backstreet Boys, and that this then opens up the opportunity for a conversation, or for, like, a meeting of the minds, or a shared interest. And it's lovely, yeah? It becomes like a self selector as you walk through, you know, a room and people see it and say, oh yeah.
• 55:13
  Amy Stafford: Or what is that?
• 55:15
  Alex Alexander [Narration]: I just I talked to so many people about connecting, making friends, whatever, and so many people have a very common question is, like, okay, but like, how do I start, right? How do I start the conversation? So then after that Backstreet Boys interaction, I was thinking in my head like, Okay, I make a very big point of when I interact with someone that, let's say is like the checker in the grocery store, I will look them in the eyes and be like, how are you today? Which, by the way, the number of times I get somebody who kind of is like, caught off guard, or gives, like a big smile, because they're so used to being kind of ignored in their interactions, is 90% of the time, yeah? So that's that one, people would love to be acknowledged. But two, yeah, yeah. Two, I was thinking, okay, so this guy. I wasn't ordering from his counter. Like, I literally just walked by him and he, all of a sudden, was like, is that a back straight boy shirt? Like, over he's making pizza. He's like, at the pizza station. Oh, wow, yeah. And like, maybe I would have said hi to him, but, like, I didn't have a read. I wasn't getting pizza.
• 56:26
  Alex Alexander [Narration]: So it was a completely unknown interaction. Let's say I was going to talk to him, right? I'd be like, Oh, hi, how are you?
• 56:33
  Alex Alexander [Narration]: How was your day? You know, he'd be probably like, Oh, it's fine.
• 56:37
  Alex Alexander [Narration]: Or I have a couple hours left in my shift, and that, like, that's a really common question I ask people. It's like, oh, at the grocery store, right? Trying to find common ground. Like, are you at the beginning, the middle or the end of your shift, because I know they're working.
• 56:48
  Alex Alexander [Narration]: So anyways, this is all to say that these shirts for the right people, they create like a conversation starter Exactly.
• 56:55
  Alex Alexander [Narration]: It's actually something somebody is excited to talk about. And it's not everyone, but the people that do catch it are like the violent femmes, yeah? Like, what? Exactly?
• 57:08
  Amy Stafford: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 57:08
  Amy Stafford: I'm actually thinking of starting an Essie shop for it just called Generation expressions, because it's exactly this, like, targeted at Generation X expressions, yeah, for that, yeah. I mean the Backstreet Boys, different generation?
• 57:28
  Alex Alexander: Well, yeah, with like, the underlying point of like, it really is, it does drive connection in a unique way, if you are willing to wear it out into the world. I'm not saying every time I've worn that shirt out, but often I do get some sort of comment which leads to actually a really fun, engaging little, couple minute conversation that I walk away from, like, smiling and feeling happier.
• 57:54
  Amy Stafford: Yeah, exactly, exactly so. And yeah, there's a lot of there's a lot of opportunity in that.
• 58:02
  Alex Alexander: Yeah, it could be anything. And I know there are lots of people out there who wear, you know, shirts and printed things, backpacks, pins, whatever. I just hadn't tapped into that. And I really feel like I've been missing out in my years.
• 58:18
  Amy Stafford: You found that whole new avenue. Oh, I'm inspired,
• 58:23
  Alex Alexander: cool,
• 58:24
  Amy Stafford: yeah, by that, and it's working, yeah, as evidenced by your Backstreet Boys t-shirt, it's definitely an effective strategy for sparking conversation, yeah, especially in North
• 58:36
  Alex Alexander: America, yeah.
• 58:36
  Alex Alexander: Well, Amy, we have covered so many topics that I'm like, What do I end this, this conversation with today? Because I could ask you so many kind of wrap up questions, but I think the one that stands out to me because you have done such a beautiful thing with Lucky Trimmer and created this really far reaching community. But also, just like I want to give you some kudos, because not only is it the community piece, but there's this like, value of the childlike and the play and the taking risks that so many people are craving. And so it's not only the community, but it's like pushing this, this values out into the world, and creating space for them is so amazing. So I hope for you, like fulfilling.
• 59:29
  Alex Alexander: I'm inspired by it.
• 59:30
  Amy Stafford: It's so fulfilling. Yeah, it really is.
• 59:33
  Amy Stafford: It's, it's, you know, like working with clients and doing my own things is also fulfilling. But there's something, there's a different kind of value that comes from this. And obviously, it's not about money, it's about building something together with a group of people who are all working together for this same idea. It actually just quickly, it reminds me I had a conversation last night with some friends.
• 59:57
  Amy Stafford: I'm here in London visiting a friend of mine who was my mom's roommate in college, not in college, but my mom's roommate before my mom got married and had kids, and she would come and visit us when I was growing up.
• 1:00:08
  Amy Stafford: And now, when she's traveling in Europe, I go and visit her, and we hang out. And last night we were talking about Quakers and some of the Quaker tenants, or I don't even know how to say it, like these basic I think there are 10 basic tenants of being a Quaker. I can't list them all off, but there are a few of them that resonate with me very strongly, and one of them is contributing to something greater than yourself that may not be completed in your lifetime, but it's something that you are then putting your energy towards, and that for me, I mean, Lucky Trimmer is its own entity, but it stands for a vision that will not be completed in my lifetime, you know? And again, it's also not about me claiming sort of glory, but it's for the glory of Lucky Trimmer. And that's another one of these aspects of the Quaker.
• 1:01:07
  Amy Stafford: Sort of mindset that I really appreciate. And the example that I have is in the Second World War. You know, there was tons of orphans that were had lost their parents and were displaced. And after the war, there was a community of Quakers that got together and helped with finding the families, and, you know, finding new families for the children. And they were given the Nobel Peace Prize for this, but the group that were involved with this said, we won't accept the prize unless you give it to all of us instead of and we don't want to be, you know, called out by name. It has to be to this larger group, and that also, really, I'm getting goosebumps actually talking about it, because it's like, yeah, it's not about me. It's about this greater thing. And each of us, in our own way, that are participating in the Lucky Trimmer project have this or share this idea, you know, and that it is for something greater and for the long term, and to foster this sense of play and creativity that comes from that without the fear of judgment and without the fear of criticism or what happens if I fail. You know that's don't let that stop you.
• 1:02:26
  Amy Stafford: Do what you love.
• 1:02:30
  Alex Alexander: That was the perfect story. I'm so happy you told it and that you talked about that, because that's kind of my question is like, there are a lot of people out here, right? I had a DR Adam Dorsey a guest. I will link that episode in the show notes for people listening. But he talks about how, you know, connection is like connection to yourself, connection to nature, connection to other people, but then like kind of connection to something greater. And as I'm listening to you talk about Lucky Trimmer, there are so many people, their mind is going to go to religion when I talk about that, or spirituality. But I think there are actually a lot of people who that connection to something greater is like this change in the world. And that's kind of what I think of when I think of you and the work you're doing here, like you've tapped into, you know that you have made some small dent in moving the world towards this vision you have, which is a more playful, accepting, risk, taking world
• 1:03:28
  Amy Stafford: space for creativity. Yeah, absolutely,
• 1:03:30
  Alex Alexander: yeah, yeah. And you've done that like you have tapped into that in some way.
• 1:03:34
  Alex Alexander: And if there is somebody out there who is craving that, this is a really hard question to answer, but, I mean, we'll just take whatever you'll give us.
• 1:03:42
  Alex Alexander: Sure, if there's somebody who's craving that, what would you tell them craving this?
• 1:03:50
  Amy Stafford: Like, find meaning?
• 1:03:51
  Alex Alexander: Like, they want that. They want to, yeah, they want to, like, tap into this kind of, like, something greater. But religion maybe isn't, is it there? That's a different thing. Like, I'm talking more about this, like, leaving your mark on the world, but that's not quite the right way to say it, because, again, it's not about you. That's the story you just told. It's not about you. It's kind of like trusting in this greater group project of moving it forward.
• 1:04:17
  Amy Stafford: The answer that comes to mind may not go directly to that's okay, what you're looking for, but it goes to one of the questions that I asked my clients when we do a brand discovery project, and the question is, if you were going to tattoo a verb on your body that you be willing to live with for the rest of your life, it's A tattoo that represents what your greatest thing is, but it's a verb, whether it's to serve or to illuminate or to bake cookies or to whatever. What is that verb? And once you can sort of get clarity on what that verb is, that you would tattoo on your body that will help you find where you can tap in and find that meaning for yourself.
• 1:05:14
  Amy Stafford: So whether it's through religion or spirituality or community or family or, you know, sitting in your kitchen in your underpants at three o'clock in the morning with your paintbrush and your watercolors and, you know, crazy music playing whatever it is, once you can find that, why?
• 1:05:31
  Amy Stafford: Why? Then you will be steps ahead in the process of finding the what
• 1:05:41
  Alex Alexander: I was also thinking like, because I'm thinking about my own, my own journey, like this podcast and things like, it's like, Just do it. I don't think you will know what you have done when you are doing it absolutely. Yeah, it's really hard to know, right?
• 1:05:56
  Alex Alexander: Like, it's easy for me to look at you and see this ripple impact. And I haven't even met the people, so if I met attendees of. Lucky Trimmer, if I went to the festival like that would just be amplified to me as an outsider. And it's so hard when you're in it, you just have to keep going like, that's my personal experience, right? I do this podcast, I talk, but then I get the wildest messages, and I'm like, Wait, that's because you listen to me,
• 1:06:28
  Amy Stafford: you know exactly, yeah, yeah. You're just in your head doing your thing. You don't realize that there's like, people out there who are like, Oh my God, this has totally transformed my life. And you're like, Okay, I'm just doing my thing. Yeah, yeah.
• 1:06:41
  Alex Alexander [Narration]: Just show up and I watch the dance videos, and I get up on stage and I feel these, like, just everyday actions you're taking for your verb, for your why, and you're just like, not gonna, really gonna know.
• 1:06:56
  Amy Stafford: And it's funny too, because, like, as you know, as we were talking about it when we started, we had no idea that it would turn into this. It was just an experiment, and it was exactly like what you said, Just do it. Like, let's just try. We have nothing to lose. And, you know, this sort of joke, and the story we had was like, hey, you've got macaroni. It's a very East German sort of approach, which is, you've got macaroni noodles and I've got cheese, and they've got parsley, and this guy over here has a bottle of wine. And if we all come together, we can make an amazing meal, but each one of us, on our own, just has one little piece of it, and bringing it together, we can create something greater than all of us that feeds far more people than all of us.
• 1:07:38
  Amy Stafford: Yeah?
• 1:07:41
  Alex Alexander: Well, that's a great way to close out this episode, because what I don't necessarily, well, yeah, but, like, don't try and necessarily do it alone too.
• 1:07:49
  Amy Stafford: Absolutely,
• 1:07:50
  Alex Alexander: find other people and work together.
• 1:07:52
  Amy Stafford: Yeah, yeah. And it's funny, because I'm, you know, I work alone, and I'm in my, you know, I work in my home studio and so on. But at the same time, it's connected to a much larger sort of network of people. And so it is a bit of this, like, inside and outside and alone and together and so on. But there's a lot to be said for just taking that step and getting out of your comfort zone to try something that you wouldn't necessarily would have done, like me going up on stage and telling the story about the truck that I used to drive like so random, but it was, it broke the seal, and from there, yeah, I was able to say, hey, you know what? I'm not doing that again.
• 1:08:33
  Amy Stafford: But how can I help you? How can I help you in a different way?
• 1:08:36
  Amy Stafford: Let me do what I'm actually really good at doing, which is the well, at the time it was designed, and now I'm getting better at talking, talking on stage and telling stories, yeah, yeah. But this has been so great to share this with you
• 1:08:48
  Alex Alexander [Narration]: so much. Yeah, I have loved this
• 1:08:48
  Alex Alexander: for to listen to podcasts. Now if conversation. I thank you so much for being here.
• 1:08:55
  Alex Alexander: From the time I met Amy in the Douro valley to standing here recording the closing narration of the episode, this one thing continues to stand out to me, and it's that one moment of courage approaching a stranger about the fact that he was wearing a t-shirt has created decades of connection, community and opportunity. It's also the fact that Amy didn't find Lucky Trimmer because she was a dancer. She wasn't googling like dance festivals because she wanted to enter. She found it because she was curious, because she said yes to trying something new, and because she volunteered what she had to give her design skills to something she believed in. And I think that's an important distinction. We often think we need to find this you want to take this conversation a step further, obvious fit, where we feel like we'll belong, right? If we're a send this episode to a friend.
• 1:09:46
  Alex Alexander: Tell them you found it dancer, we go to a dance festival. But communities need all kinds of people with all kinds of skills. Lucky Trimmer interesting. And use what we just talked about as a needed a designer, just as much as it needed dancers. Your local environmental group might need someone who's great at social media. The book club might need someone who can organize events.
• 1:10:06
  Alex Alexander: That neighborhood association might need exactly the skills that you bring to your day job.
• 1:10:10
  Alex Alexander: So if there's a group or community you've been curious about but weren't sure how you would find that sense of belonging, maybe it's because you don't have the main skill they focus on. Consider this your permission slip to show up anyways. Talk about the skills you have that you can contribute, offer what you're good at, and then stay curious and see what comes up out of that. Because here's what Amy's story teaches us, belonging isn't just about what you get from a community. It's about what you get to give and when you contribute authentically to something you care about. You don't just find your people, you create the kind of world you want to live in. The other thing conversation starter the next time you and your friend hang I loved about this episode is that nothing really is quite linear. And I think that's so true, like we like to look back and say that a story. Know, it just went A, B, C, but Amy is really kind of leading us on this journey here and in true fashion like because nothing is quite linear. I always ask every guest if there's something they want to offer to the audience, and Amy has an offering that showcases one of her other passions. It's not even something we've talked about here, but it might be the connection point that you need to feel more connected to Amy.
• 1:11:30
  Alex Alexander: So she's offering a free coloring booklet with samples from her unnatural history collection. It might be the perfect way to experience another version of her creativity, and you can find it linked in the show notes, and if lucky, trimmer sounded like it might align with your values or your interests, that sense of play, creativity, community.
• 1:11:52
  Alex Alexander: Then don't let the fact that you're not a professional dancer stop you. Check them out. They might be a community you want to be a part of. They're linked in the show notes. All in all, I hope you see that your next life changing community connection might just be one or two yeses away, and with that, I'll see you next week.
• 1:13:02
  Alex Alexander: out. No need for a teary goodbye. I'll be back with a new episode next week.