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Finding Clarity and Getting Unstuck (with Steve Woodruff) · The Daily Writer

• 0:01
  SPEAKER_00: Imagine that you and I are having coffee together, and I looked across the table at you and said, Give me a clear summary of what you do in one to two sentences.
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_00: What would you say?
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_00: If you would struggle to answer that question, then you have a clarity problem.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_00: And I can relate to that because this is an area where I have struggled as well.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_00: Well, we're in luck because our guest today shares a massive amount of wisdom and practical tips for getting clarity about your creative work, your business, and your ideal customer, client, or reader.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_00: So stay tuned.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_00: Hey friends, welcome to the Born to Create podcast.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_00: My name is Ken Sanders, and I'm an author, professor, and creative coach.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_00: This is the show where we explore the mindset, habits, and principles to help you make a bigger impact in your life and creative work.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_00: I'm excited to bring you this conversation with Steve Woodruff, who is known as the King of Clarity.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_00: Steve helps people find their professional purpose through his Clarity Consulting Process.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_00: He works with businesses as well as individuals in career transition to help them become more effective and to discover their fit in the marketplace.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_00: He is also the author of the excellent book called Clarity Wins Get Heard, Get Referred.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_00: This episode is packed with a ton of amazing information, as you can see from the length of the episode highlights that I've listed in the show notes if you check those out.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_00: But just to give you a couple of highlights, you'll learn how to start thinking like a business person, how to determine your ideal customer or client, which also applies to authors and not just to business people, and how to effectively network with people as an introvert.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_00: Steve also gives me a mini coaching session and shares his very personal journey with depression.
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I hope you enjoyed this conversation as much as I did.
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_00: And if you want to take a deeper dive after the episode is over, be sure to check out the show notes at KentSanders.net slash clarity.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_00: That's KentSanders.net slash clarity.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_00: So let's get right to the interview.
• 2:13
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I'm here with my friend Steve Woodruff, and uh Steve, I want to welcome you to the show and really appreciate you taking time to chat with me today.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_02: It's a pleasure to be here.
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_02: Thanks for inviting me.
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_00: I was really happy that we were able to connect briefly on the I guess it was a mastermind call with Aaron Walker a couple of months ago, and you were talking about clarity in that setting, and I got your book and have been reading it, and I thought, man, I've got to talk to Steve on my show because the book has been so helpful.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_00: So the first thing that I want to say is I really appreciate you going to the trouble and effort to write this book, Clarity Wins.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_00: It's really, really fantastic, and I feel like I'm sort of an evangelist for it because I've told so many people about it.
• 2:53
  SPEAKER_02: Well, that makes me feel good.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_02: Uh the this book was uh a long time in the womb.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_02: Uh I'd been writing about these things and and doing work, uh consulting work around these things for about 12 years.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_02: And uh and so I've known for quite some time there was a book somewhere in there, uh, but for the longest time I just didn't know how to get it out.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_02: And uh I needed a Sherpa, somebody to help me who understood the publishing world and who ended up being my editor to help me put it all into this format.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_02: And um and it it it it's been a very gratifying process actually taking all this and systematically putting it in one place so that other people could read it and and benefit from it.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_02: It's just been a joy to get feedback from people that it's actually been helpful.
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I knew this was going to be a really fun book even before the book started, because you have you know, most books have quotes from people at the beginning sort of singing the praises of the book.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_00: Then you have some fake quotes, which I thought were absolutely hilarious, and I thought, oh, this is gonna be really, really fun.
• 3:56
  SPEAKER_00: So I won't spoil those, but uh everybody's gotta get the book and read those.
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's uh there's a certain sense of humor that uh my family has, the Woodruff sense of humor.
• 4:06
  SPEAKER_01: I had to restrain it.
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_01: I had to restrain actually a lot of it, but it but some of it did did manage to come out at points in the book.
• 4:13
  SPEAKER_00: I love the you know, you get a hint of sarcasm at times in the book, and I totally relate to that.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_00: So the title of the book is Clarity Wins, and I guess my first question, among many questions that I have really on our conversation today is why are so many entrepreneurs and creative types confused about who they are and what they're doing?
• 4:33
  SPEAKER_00: What is the source of that confusion, do you think?
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_02: I think it boils down to the fact that they're human, uh Ken.
• 4:39
  SPEAKER_02: Uh so we all are very we're all subjective, every one of us about ourselves, and uh actually there's a certain myopia that every business has too.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_02: Uh we are in the midst of our own forest and our own trees, and we don't actually see ourselves very clearly.
• 4:56
  SPEAKER_02: Uh so as you and I were discussing before we started the call, um uh there's a piece of artwork that I uh refer to all the time that says you can't read the label of the jar you're in.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_02: And uh what ends up happening is we just have a myopic view of ourselves, and often it's not until somebody from the outside says, Okay, let's sort this out.
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_02: And do you realize you have these strengths and you have these weaknesses, and this is the real opportunity you should be pursuing, and this is how to express it.
• 5:28
  SPEAKER_02: Uh and so that's what I do for a living is I actually help individuals and businesses gain clarity by being that outside analyst, that outside voice, uh, because all of us walk around with a kind of a foggy notion of who we are, what we're doing, and why we're here.
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_02: And I want to clear that fog.
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_00: Boy, that's great.
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_00: I love the idea of first of all getting help from somebody, and second of all, getting help from somebody who knows what they're talking about.
• 5:57
  SPEAKER_00: And so many times I think creative types stay stuck where they are because we don't ask for help.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_00: We we have this idea that we can figure all this out on our own, which is not possible at all because you you have no objectivity about yourself at all.
• 6:11
  SPEAKER_00: So this sounds like something that's really fulfilling to you and really helping a lot of people as well.
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, it's immensely fulfilling.
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_02: It's something I've told many people if if someone would just pay all my bills, I would do this for full time.
• 6:23
  SPEAKER_02: And uh one of the things that I really like being able to bring to the table with people is that I can wear uh a business person's hat, a creative hat, an entrepreneur hat, a marketing hat, a branding hat.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_02: I've done all these different things.
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_02: And so if you can take the creative aspect and join it to the business aspect and figure out how those two can work together, uh, then that can help people that have that creative bent find some sort of profitable and fulfilling avenue for themselves.
• 6:55
  SPEAKER_00: Aaron Powell See, I'm glad you mentioned both of those elements, the business and the creative aspect.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_00: So a lot of people who listen to this show are what I would describe as artist creative types, uh a lot of people who are interested in writing, music, painting, and so forth.
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_00: One of the things that I think is a common theme among artists, especially, is that we don't think of ourselves as business people.
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_00: And that's one of the voices as I'm reading your book that I have to sort of squelch a little bit is I have this voice that keeps saying, but you're not a business person, you're not a business person, you're not a business person.
• 7:26
  SPEAKER_00: How can those of us who identify as artists start thinking more like a business person?
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_00: In other words, we may have a blog or even a podcast or something, and we'd love to write, but how do we begin thinking about our art as an actual business that brings an income?
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_00: Is that a mindset shift or what's involved in that?
• 7:43
  SPEAKER_02: It is.
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_02: It's a mindset shift, but you don't have to be Stephen Jobs or Bill Gates or whatever.
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_02: Uh you have to tune into this.
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, so here's this well of all this good stuff that I can do.
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_02: And what I have to then look at on the other side of the desk is what are the business, what are the pains and aspirations that people will open their wallet for?
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_02: So if I can do a certain thing, make a certain piece of art, apply my craft to a problem that someone will say, that's worth opening my wallet for, then I can take my creativity and turn it into a business.
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_02: If it's just something that is to fulfill me, if it if it's just something that's you know wonderful, beautiful in itself, but but nobody cares, then I don't have a business, I have a hobby.
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_02: Uh so there has to always be this sense for any creative person that there is this audience out here and they want to know what's in it for them.
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_02: How is this relieving a pain?
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_02: How is this helping me achieve a goal?
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_02: How is this making me uh find my hope fulfillment?
• 8:57
  SPEAKER_02: And that's the secret to creating a business, basically, is somebody needs something, I can help fill that need.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_00: So, how can somebody who is at the beginning of this journey, let's let's take writers, for example, that's the clearest example that comes to mind, how can they start to get feedback on what potential problems they could be solving, what pain points they could be addressing through their writing?
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_00: If they just, you know, let's say they just love to write because they want to write a book or whatever.
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_00: Are there some some ways they can start to get feedback and start to get some clarity on potential pain points they could be addressing for people?
• 9:30
  SPEAKER_02: I think anybody with a gift for writing needs to start finding uh people that are in the business of writing, not just uh people that are writing ebooks to sell on Amazon romance novels.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_02: Great point.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_02: But there are many, many avenues of technical writing, business writing, uh training, uh communications, PR.
• 9:51
  SPEAKER_02: And so if you've got this itch for writing, and if you've got this gift, and maybe you really do want to become a novelist, or maybe you want to become an author, um, one of the best ways to test out the reality of it is to say, uh, okay, that's my long-term goal.
• 10:07
  SPEAKER_02: It may take a while to get there, but let's see if I can write for money.
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_02: Let's see if I can find a way to use my ability, my facility with words, to actually meet a business need.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_02: Now, it may not be as fulfilling as uh writing a great screenplay, but somebody's got to put the money on the table, and it's a great way to test out whether you only think you're good at writing or whether you really do like it.
• 10:36
  SPEAKER_02: And uh, it may be that you find your avenue in the world of business because uh you you end up loving doing that.
• 10:45
  SPEAKER_00: You know, it's interesting that you mentioned that because my I guess for lack of a better term, the paying gigs that I have had with that are have revolved around writing have mostly come about by accident.
• 10:55
  SPEAKER_00: You know, and and I know you can obviously seek those out and you know you can pitch clients and and all that stuff is good and necessary, but it's been funny because a lot of the things that I have done, like you know, editing books and formatting books and helping build websites and writing podcast show notes and articles, you know, all those kinds of things, they've come about because I've been around the right kind of people.
• 11:16
  SPEAKER_00: It's not necessarily that I've sought out, okay, I want to be a podcast show notes guy, you know.
• 11:22
  SPEAKER_00: And writing those is is fun.
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, and I've learned a lot from it, but it just has been really interesting to me that most of those things have come about just because I happen to associate with the right kind of people.
• 11:33
  SPEAKER_00: Not be not because I sought out to do that.
• 11:35
  SPEAKER_00: Would you say that is that a key component of all this is kind of getting yourself in the right crowd?
• 11:40
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, it definitely is.
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_02: I I write a lot in my book about networking and how uh clarity is a tool to effectively network because when you're meeting people and creating a network, you want people to know who you are and what you do.
• 11:54
  SPEAKER_02: So if you just say the word writing, that could mean 25 different things, and I don't really know what kind of writing.
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_02: If you tell me uh I do podcast show notes or I do ghost writing or I've edited textbooks or you know, something that's tangible, then I can more easily make a good referral to you, but you've got to tell me that.
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_02: I can't, I'm not gonna figure it out for you.
• 12:19
  SPEAKER_02: Uh you've got to figure it out and tell me.
• 12:22
  SPEAKER_02: Uh so this is one of the keys, and that's why the subtitle of the book is Get Heard, Get Referred.
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_02: Yes.
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_02: Is there are two moments of truth.
• 12:30
  SPEAKER_02: One is when somebody says, uh, what do you do?
• 12:33
  SPEAKER_02: And you have this brief time to introduce yourself and say, Here's what I do, and here's who I do it for.
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_02: In that moment of truth, if I can get my point across clearly, if I can say to you, uh, Kent, I'm the king of clarity.
• 12:47
  SPEAKER_02: I help people get 2020 focus on their direction, their strategy, and their message so that they can send a clear signal to the market.
• 12:55
  SPEAKER_02: The second moment of truth is when you meet somebody tomorrow and they say, Man, I'm really struggling.
• 13:01
  SPEAKER_02: Our company's not differentiated, we need a clear message, and you go, ah, I know who you need.
• 13:06
  SPEAKER_02: You need the king of clarity.
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 13:09
  SPEAKER_02: So by compressing the message into a vivid, memorable form, you now activate a referral network.
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_02: And networking can be serendipitous where opportunities just sort of come because you're sort of with the right crowd, and that's great.
• 13:26
  SPEAKER_02: But you can also be very directive in the way that you speak of yourself to people so that they know exactly who to refer you to and why.
• 13:37
  SPEAKER_00: So this goes against a lot of the impulses of creative people that we want to be a variety of things, we want to dabble in this, we want to explore our curiosity.
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_00: So you're saying that there is a lot of value in, in a sense, pigeonholing yourself, at least in terms of business, so that people can really understand what it is that you do and they can make a referral.
• 13:56
  SPEAKER_02: In terms of business, yes.
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_02: So if you want to do a lot of exploration on your own time of creative stuff that isn't going to pay any money, that's awesome.
• 14:05
  SPEAKER_02: Do it.
• 14:06
  SPEAKER_02: But when it comes to actually getting business, the best way I can condense my book down to one message is I want to change people's minds about pigeonholing.
• 14:15
  SPEAKER_02: Uh people tend to hate that word.
• 14:17
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, I don't want to be pigeonholed.
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_02: I don't want people to think of me in just one way.
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_02: I want a wide world of opportunities.
• 14:23
  SPEAKER_02: Well, the problem is that we all will be pigeonholed because people only have a little bit of memory space for us.
• 14:30
  SPEAKER_02: So they're going to put us in a pigeonhole based on some kind of interaction with us, and it may or may not be accurate.
• 14:39
  SPEAKER_02: So, what we want to do with clarity is create the right pigeonhole in the minds of people so that when they think Kent is the king of podcast show notes or something like that, they you're occupying that space in their mind, and that's the referral that you want.
• 14:59
  SPEAKER_02: So I am a big fan of pigeonholing.
• 15:02
  SPEAKER_02: I only want referrals that make me help me do my best work for the best clients.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_02: I don't want the other work.
• 15:08
  SPEAKER_02: I want to refer that to other people who specialize in those things.
• 15:13
  SPEAKER_00: So you would call that I think the term you used in the book is your superpower, correct?
• 15:17
  SPEAKER_02: Correct.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_00: It's kind of that thing that you're known for, that thing that you really excel at.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_00: So if you're a creative type and you're good at a lot of different things, you know, maybe you can you can do five or ten things really well with competency.
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_00: How do you pick one thing to do when you can do several things well?
• 15:35
  SPEAKER_00: Like, is there some sort of indicator that that will tell you this is the direction you should go with your business?
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, what I use for that, and and I love dealing with multi-competent people.
• 15:45
  SPEAKER_02: Uh some of the people that I've done clarity with, and some of them are in career transition.
• 15:49
  SPEAKER_02: So it's uh the process of branding a company and the process of branding basically someone in career transition is exactly the same.
• 15:56
  SPEAKER_02: You know, let's surface your strengths, let's look at your DNA, your wiring, you know, what are the best things you've ever done?
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_02: What do you not like?
• 16:03
  SPEAKER_02: What are the opportunities and how do we message it?
• 16:05
  SPEAKER_02: It's all the same.
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_02: So uh when it comes to superpowers, um some people can do multiple things well, but the way I find the real passion point is by sitting down and doing a deep dive and having that person tell me stories.
• 16:22
  SPEAKER_02: And when they tell stories about the successes they've had, the clients they've had, the failures they've had, the past work relationships, inevitably you see where their eyes light up.
• 16:34
  SPEAKER_02: And their eyes light up on the things that they just nailed, the things they do well, the things they love.
• 16:41
  SPEAKER_02: And that's how you pull that particular thing out.
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_02: And now you have to look at that and say, is there a business opportunity that can be built around that, or is there at least a direction that can go there, maybe in two years, three years, four years, but at least you know what it is.
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_02: And how can we weave together this package of capabilities you have into an opportunity that's gonna emphasize what you do best?
• 17:10
  SPEAKER_02: And sometimes people can go directly to their superpower, and other times they say, all right, I know it.
• 17:16
  SPEAKER_02: It's gonna take me five years to get there, but at least now I know where I'm going.
• 17:20
  SPEAKER_00: See, that is that is a really critical element, I think, and that is so true of my journey.
• 17:25
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not doing the exact same things that I was doing five years ago or even two or three years ago.
• 17:29
  SPEAKER_00: I've changed, I've grown, you know, my thinking is different about some things.
• 17:33
  SPEAKER_00: Is there an element to all this where you sort of have to let go of this perfectionism and the idea that I'm going to jump into this certain area of business and that's going to be my thing?
• 17:43
  SPEAKER_00: You almost have to be willing to morph and to shift and to transition with the times.
• 17:48
  SPEAKER_00: Would you say that's correct?
• 17:50
  SPEAKER_02: That's absolutely true.
• 17:51
  SPEAKER_02: Um there's a certain amount of uh what when I started my company uh twelve and a half years ago, I I had this philosophy, and I don't know why I came up with the 85-15 thing, but I've I've made that statistic do yeoman's duty for me, you know, whether there's any real data behind it or not.
• 18:09
  SPEAKER_02: So I figured, all right, I kind of 85% know what I want to do, and the market's gonna have to tell me the other 15% when I get out there and just do stuff.
• 18:18
  SPEAKER_02: And that approach of being open to evolving over time has really uh been great because we can only know so much, and and the the customers, the marketplace, that's changing, and the needs that we think we're addressing, uh we may actually have uh there are other needs that need to be that need to be addressed.
• 18:39
  SPEAKER_02: There's some things I'm doing now that I didn't even think about 12 and a half years ago.
• 18:43
  SPEAKER_02: So we have to be open to that evolutionary process, but at the core of it, we still have to know what our DNA and our wiring is and what our direction is and where we want to go.
• 18:54
  SPEAKER_02: And uh I find that it's a lot easier to put up with work that we know is not quite a right fit if I know what the right fit is and I'm heading in that direction.
• 19:09
  SPEAKER_00: Well, that makes a lot of sense because you you have some hope that you you can go in the right direction and that you can shift at some point.
• 19:16
  SPEAKER_00: So and you can kind of put up with things that maybe aren't your best fit, but they're tolerable on some level if you know you're headed in the right direction.
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_00: Is that correct?
• 19:24
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, that makes sense.
• 19:25
  SPEAKER_00: Let me backtrack a little bit.
• 19:26
  SPEAKER_00: You've mentioned networking a couple times, and this is something a lot of people struggle with, particularly introverts like myself, because I find that being around large groups of people, particularly those that I don't know, and if I feel intimidated because this is, you know, like a highly successful group of people, then that just sort of drains my emotions.
• 19:45
  SPEAKER_00: What are some practical ways that particularly introverts can start networking online and offline?
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_02: Uh well, you're speaking my language.
• 19:55
  SPEAKER_02: A lot of people who know me now are surprised when I tell them that I'm an introvert, but I am.
• 20:01
  SPEAKER_02: I have learned learned how to be outgoing, I've learned confidence, but I am absolutely wired as an introvert.
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_02: I don't like big crowds, I don't like unstructured groups, I don't like noise.
• 20:14
  SPEAKER_02: And so uh I've built quite a uh quite a remarkable network, but I've done it according to the way I do it, which is one-on-one.
• 20:23
  SPEAKER_02: And uh so I sit down with people, I have coffee, I uh sometimes in small groups, uh I am not the schmoozer that goes from person to person and and you know is is crop dusting business cards everywhere.
• 20:38
  SPEAKER_02: Um that's great.
• 20:39
  SPEAKER_02: So I try to go deeper with people.
• 20:41
  SPEAKER_02: That's my style as an introvert.
• 20:44
  SPEAKER_02: And uh I have found, uh, and I and this is something I talk about in the book, that if you cultivate a habit of asking for stories, I want to ask for stories, and people will talk about, they want to talk about themselves.
• 20:58
  SPEAKER_02: And so instead of going out and feeling like I've got a blab and I've got to figure out, you know, 25 things I've got to say, I mostly go out and and just ask people questions about themselves and their history, and and I sometimes even say, Well, what's your story?
• 21:13
  SPEAKER_02: And just shut up and let people tell me their story.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_02: And uh inevitably, that leads into really productive networking where I get to know that person, I can share things with that person, and you build this sense of shared advocacy, and uh that's the kind of connection that turns into referrals and mutual support and a network that's really working as opposed to just a superficial uh sea of connections on LinkedIn and Twitter.
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_00: So you can almost approach it like a game in a sense where if you're in a particularly networking meeting or or s you know some type of gathering, that you go in and and you're not just thinking, okay, what does everybody think of me?
• 21:57
  SPEAKER_00: It's almost a sense where you go in and and you're trying Trying to actively think, okay, I'm going to listen, I'm going to ask questions, I'm going to learn about people.
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_00: And so I come from a pastoral and ministry background earlier in my my career.
• 22:10
  SPEAKER_00: And and when I'm in those settings, I almost sort of gamify that approach where I think, okay, I'm going to go in and not that this is my church setting or anything, but I'm going to go in and I'm going to almost act as a as a pastor to these people in the sense of I'm going to ask them questions and listen and let them talk, you know, almost sort of a counseling thing because people do love to talk about themselves.
• 22:32
  SPEAKER_00: And that has kind of been the way that I have been able to manage being in large groups that are so emotionally draining.
• 22:38
  SPEAKER_00: So it's it's really good to hear you sort of validate that approach.
• 22:41
  SPEAKER_02: Actually, the the easiest way to do this is uh, and I I have been in I don't know how many uh meetings, conferences, you know, I've done it all and fought my introvert nature the whole way.
• 22:53
  SPEAKER_02: But uh now I'm much more at ease because if you meet somebody and they say, uh I'm working with X and Y company, we do marketing stuff for uh you know chicken manufacturers or something like that.
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_02: I don't know how you manufacture chicken, but then the next question, all you gotta know is this question.
• 23:13
  SPEAKER_02: Tell me how do you how did you get there?
• 23:15
  SPEAKER_02: How did you arrive there?
• 23:17
  SPEAKER_02: And what you're asking for is the evolution story.
• 23:20
  SPEAKER_02: And people will tell you, well, I started out in college, I did this, and then I went here.
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_02: And it's always this sort of pinball story of I started there.
• 23:27
  SPEAKER_02: I met somebody and they ended up over here for some reason, and then that didn't work out, and and all the other questions grow out of that question.
• 23:35
  SPEAKER_02: Well, why did you leave that one?
• 23:36
  SPEAKER_02: How come you weren't comfortable with that particular company?
• 23:39
  SPEAKER_02: What why were those customers really good?
• 23:42
  SPEAKER_02: But all you gotta do is just tell me how you got there.
• 23:45
  SPEAKER_02: And that just opens the floodgates.
• 23:48
  SPEAKER_00: And that also relieves a lot of pressure from you having to feel like you've got to memorize this spiel about yourself and spew about your your company or what you do or whatever.
• 23:57
  SPEAKER_00: So it kind of takes the pressure off.
• 23:59
  SPEAKER_02: Well, inevitably, once you start doing what I call uh story asking uh and and you get this, then those people feel this need after a while to get your story.
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_02: Uh but you now have permission to tell it because you have been listening to them for anywhere from five to forty-five minutes.
• 24:17
  SPEAKER_02: And my goal is to not tell my story until they're begging me to tell the story because I've been listening to theirs all along.
• 24:23
  SPEAKER_02: I I actually deflect questions about me while I'm still digging into their lives.
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_02: Um and so it does remove the awkwardness, and then uh uh I encourage people to have their own evolution story in a relatively short compass.
• 24:39
  SPEAKER_02: You know, I I went to college for this and I ended up doing this and this.
• 24:43
  SPEAKER_02: And that it just opens up this massive encyclopedia of topics and questions and issues, and sometimes uh, oh, you went there.
• 24:51
  SPEAKER_02: Do you know so-and-so?
• 24:52
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah, I met them five years ago.
• 24:55
  SPEAKER_02: Uh so it's just getting past that first awkwardness and and asking for the evolution story is the best way to do it that I know of.
• 25:03
  SPEAKER_00: Now I see that you're you're pretty active on LinkedIn and social media in general.
• 25:07
  SPEAKER_00: How can we transfer these same kinds of things to social media platforms?
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_00: Because obviously it is different, but I do see that you're pretty active there.
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_00: Are these some things that you're doing intentionally to try and engage people and build relationships online?
• 25:22
  SPEAKER_02: Um I started in social media back in the early days with LinkedIn, and um I saw I saw that there was this potential.
• 25:31
  SPEAKER_02: I I recognized that social media and and that point LinkedIn in particular, Twitter hadn't even shown up yet or Facebook, that there was something magical there about this network connection thing.
• 25:44
  SPEAKER_02: I didn't even know why it was just this instinct.
• 25:47
  SPEAKER_02: And then uh I remained very active and and became more active through social media for all these years.
• 25:53
  SPEAKER_02: But in the initial years, I didn't have a strategy so much as just this instinct that it was important and this desire and need to get to know people and to get to know quality people, figuring that this was important even if I didn't exactly know why.
• 26:10
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_02: And uh so then as my career developed, as my uh direction developed, as my practice for for clarity developed, then I actually had more of a focus for my messaging of what I was putting out there and starting to create more videos or more focused blog content.
• 26:28
  SPEAKER_02: Um but at first I I didn't really have much of a strategy at all.
• 26:32
  SPEAKER_02: I was just fascinated with it, and I I enjoyed meeting people on my own terms.
• 26:37
  SPEAKER_02: It was a lot safer on social media than in a bar or something.
• 26:40
  SPEAKER_02: Definitely.
• 26:41
  SPEAKER_02: And uh so it created this filtering mechanism of finding great people.
• 26:46
  SPEAKER_02: Uh and uh and now if somebody looks at my social stuff, it's much more focused around my clarity message.
• 26:54
  SPEAKER_00: So specifically in terms of strategies, are there is there a certain way that you approach uh particularly LinkedIn as far as, hey, I'm gonna post a certain number of times a week, or I'm gonna post these certain types of things, or I'm gonna interact with a certain number of people, or or anything like that?
• 27:10
  SPEAKER_02: I do several things uh primarily now, and this has been a long evolution process over over uh a decade.
• 27:16
  SPEAKER_02: So uh I've tried lots of different things.
• 27:19
  SPEAKER_02: Uh right now, what I focus on with LinkedIn and some with Twitter is I like to put up little snippets of things, you know, one sentence sayings, it might be something from my book, it might be something from someone else, uh, but something that kind of encapsulates an important message.
• 27:35
  SPEAKER_02: Sometimes it's clarity, sometimes it's other aspects of business, because people react more to little things, uh, little messages.
• 27:43
  SPEAKER_02: So I do that.
• 27:44
  SPEAKER_02: Uh then I do two to three minute videos.
• 27:48
  SPEAKER_02: That has been really uh in the past year, something that's been developing where I call it clarity over coffee.
• 27:54
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 27:54
  SPEAKER_02: Uh where I just deal with one topic.
• 27:57
  SPEAKER_02: I I realize people have a limited amount of time.
• 27:59
  SPEAKER_02: They can watch something for a couple minutes, but they're not gonna watch me blab for ten minutes, so I try to deal with one topic.
• 28:05
  SPEAKER_02: And those have gone pretty well.
• 28:08
  SPEAKER_02: Um but then I mix in a number of personal things too.
• 28:12
  SPEAKER_02: And uh yesterday I think I had the most active Facebook uh thread going when I just simply asked this question.
• 28:20
  SPEAKER_02: I said, All right, we've got to settle this right now, right here.
• 28:23
  SPEAKER_02: Is it math or is it maths?
• 28:26
  SPEAKER_02: Because you know how the British call maths.
• 28:28
  SPEAKER_02: And I got this stream of stuff back and forth about math versus maths, and and it was just fun, and and I like having some some some of my cynical sense of humor stuff going.
• 28:40
  SPEAKER_02: It's fun stuff.
• 28:41
  SPEAKER_02: And it's great because uh, you know, part of my message is look, we're we're humans and and you're gonna do business with humans, and you may as well know, you know, the rest of who I am, not just some faceless keyboard warrior.
• 28:54
  SPEAKER_02: And uh and it turns out people really you know like interacting about stuff like that.
• 28:59
  SPEAKER_02: I even put up these this series of pictures I started on on Facebook a while ago called What Is It?
• 29:04
  SPEAKER_02: Where uh Yes, I've seen those.
• 29:06
  SPEAKER_02: You've seen my what is it?
• 29:07
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I'll take a picture of something, I'll condense it down to where it's like, what the heck is that?
• 29:11
  SPEAKER_02: And then people have to guess what that is, and and you know, sometimes it'll go on for for hours and hours of guessing, and and my last one was great, nobody could get it.
• 29:21
  SPEAKER_02: Uh so those little fun things really help keep the engagement level up.
• 29:26
  SPEAKER_00: Well, and that reinforces your you know, your theme of clarity also, the guessing what it is and and stuff.
• 29:32
  SPEAKER_00: And so I thought that was really clever.
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_00: That's really fun.
• 29:35
  SPEAKER_02: I hadn't actually thought about the what is it with with in terms of clarity.
• 29:39
  SPEAKER_02: It was just for me, it was just, you know.
• 29:41
  SPEAKER_00: That's interesting.
• 29:42
  SPEAKER_02: Have some fun.
• 29:42
  SPEAKER_00: I I assumed it was thematic, but uh I just kind of serendipitous.
• 29:47
  SPEAKER_00: So let me put you on the spot a little bit, and you know, because you you deal with this topic of clarity, I'll kind of put myself in the hot seat for a second and act, I guess, sort of as an avatar uh and if you will, for my audience.
• 30:02
  SPEAKER_00: So when you look at what I do, a lot of people who listen to my show and who I interact with are people who love writing.
• 30:08
  SPEAKER_00: So I'll put myself as a guinea pig here.
• 30:10
  SPEAKER_00: When you see kind of what I'm doing, and I know you've, you know, you haven't dug into my stuff in a huge amount, I know, but from what you've seen, you know, I talk about creativity, uh I talk about writing, I talk about productivity and processes and those kinds of things.
• 30:24
  SPEAKER_00: If you were going to give me just a snapshot of, okay, here's some ideas about things you could go business-wise, or some directions you could go, or here's what you're seeing in terms of maybe some ways that you could really pinpoint this down, or or those kinds of things.
• 30:39
  SPEAKER_00: Is there anything specific that comes to mind that, based on the limited amount of information you have about me, that these would be some options or some things for me to consider?
• 30:49
  SPEAKER_02: So if you and I were were to sit down and and sort of explore this, and it would take some exploration, but I'll I'll you know, do do a real superficial job with you here.
• 30:59
  SPEAKER_02: Um I would say if your audience is creatives, uh for the most part, uh I I would start to explore with you the idea of, okay, what are what's the major pain point that these creatives have?
• 31:14
  SPEAKER_02: And I'm gonna assume, even based on our discussion today, that a lot of creatives struggle with how do I translate my my i interest, talent, passion into business, into something that's going to actually make money.
• 31:29
  SPEAKER_02: Yes because I I think that is a major issue for creatives.
• 31:33
  SPEAKER_02: And so if there's a vast audience out there of people like that, then my next question to you would be well, can are there any individuals or small companies or consultants or somebody that actually duh they they do a kind of a they have a hands-on process of talking with a creative and coming up with a simple business plan?
• 31:57
  SPEAKER_02: My guess is there probably aren't that many people doing that.
• 32:01
  SPEAKER_02: I I don't know, I haven't looked at it, but I'm guessing that this is probably a market need that's just sitting there waiting to be fulfilled, and even if there are some people doing it, it's probably nowhere near enough.
• 32:13
  SPEAKER_02: And uh is it the kind of opportunity where you could take your audience, take your own experience, take your pastoral sensibilities, and say, I'm gonna come up with a uh half day program where we're gonna take you, the creative person, and walk you through the five-step Kent process of determining two to three avenues of business application.
• 32:41
  SPEAKER_02: And uh very hands-on, very one-on-one, very much coaching/slash consulting, um, but affordable for people that are uh creatives.
• 32:51
  SPEAKER_02: It's not like you're dealing with you know large corporations that are just throwing all money at problems.
• 32:56
  SPEAKER_02: Um so there would have to be a large enough potential audience for it.
• 33:01
  SPEAKER_02: This would have to be the kind of passion that you have.
• 33:04
  SPEAKER_02: This would have to be something that you feel you could actually do with credibility, you'd have to be able to tell stories about how you you've done this and and can do it, and we'd want to have some success stories about it.
• 33:16
  SPEAKER_02: And then one of the things I mentioned in the book is you want to make what you offer tangible.
• 33:23
  SPEAKER_02: You want it to be a package.
• 33:24
  SPEAKER_02: People buy packages.
• 33:26
  SPEAKER_02: So if you say, uh, I'm Kent and I am the creative's consultant, and you come to me and we figure stuff out.
• 33:35
  SPEAKER_02: Well, I I don't know what that means.
• 33:36
  SPEAKER_02: It sounds expensive.
• 33:38
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's always our first response.
• 33:40
  SPEAKER_02: But if you say I have a uh a three-hour process and it's five steps, and here are the deliverables, and I go through this particular thing, people will pay for something tangible where there are clear expectations.
• 33:53
  SPEAKER_02: And this is one of the areas where I think uh a lot of folks can make progress in business.
• 33:59
  SPEAKER_02: They just haven't known they don't know how to package.
• 34:02
  SPEAKER_02: Well, you know, it's not that hard.
• 34:04
  SPEAKER_02: You you just got to figure out a way to label something and uh and a way to do that.
• 34:08
  SPEAKER_02: And I've had to do that with my clarity services.
• 34:10
  SPEAKER_02: When I was doing clarity at first, I didn't really know how to package it.
• 34:13
  SPEAKER_02: I was just kind of like, you know, I'll come in and figure your brand out.
• 34:16
  SPEAKER_02: And then I had to come up with steps and deliverables and labels for it, and now it's much easier to explain it to people.
• 34:24
  SPEAKER_02: So in your case, uh, and I'm I'm operating kind of on the spur of the moment uh instinct here.
• 34:29
  SPEAKER_02: I don't know dug deep, but I'm betting there's a huge need for creatives to be able to say, wow, you mean like in one day I could actually figure out uh that there's there's a genuine business?
• 34:44
  SPEAKER_02: That sounds that sounds a worthwhile investment to me.
• 34:47
  SPEAKER_00: You know, it's interesting because a lot of the people that I work with and people who are approaching me, I I get people who get in touch with me pretty consistently who want to know how to write a book.
• 34:58
  SPEAKER_00: And I would even say it's it's even more basic than and I don't mean basic in the sense of bad or or people don't know things, but I don't mean that in a negative sense.
• 35:07
  SPEAKER_00: I mean a lot of people don't eat don't really you know know like how to set up a website or how to write a book, how to self-publish a book, just you know how to set up a blog.
• 35:16
  SPEAKER_00: So I even wonder if if the business aspect is sort of step two, three, or four, or five when a lot of people that at least I interact with want to just know, can I even write a book?
• 35:26
  SPEAKER_00: Is that something I should do?
• 35:28
  SPEAKER_02: Well it's a huge need because that was the reason why I uh stalled for years writing my book.
• 35:35
  SPEAKER_02: I did not have a Sherpa.
• 35:37
  SPEAKER_02: I needed, I knew there were options out there.
• 35:39
  SPEAKER_02: In fact, there were too many options out there.
• 35:42
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, there are so there's Amazon this self-publishing, there are these hybrid publishers, traditional, you know.
• 35:48
  SPEAKER_02: I was confused and I was intimidated, and I had a couple false starts with my book because I just didn't I needed a guide.
• 35:57
  SPEAKER_02: So I know that's a business need, and there are many budding authors.
• 36:02
  SPEAKER_02: We know with the proliferation of self-publishing that more and more people can do it.
• 36:07
  SPEAKER_02: We know it's confusing, and I would say that that's a huge business need of uh let me be your authoring Sherpa and help you make your decisions and also help you set up your first website, and and maybe even uh I can guide you into uh being the uh the one that's going on various podcasts.
• 36:29
  SPEAKER_02: I have uh you know a network of 25 podcasters that are all about business and creativity.
• 36:34
  SPEAKER_02: So you make it this whole package, this launch you as an author package.
• 36:40
  SPEAKER_02: Huge need.
• 36:41
  SPEAKER_00: Boy, that is that's really compelling.
• 36:44
  SPEAKER_00: So in other words, it's seeing the book it's so in other words, it's not about the book, it's about the book as a cornerstone or as a hinge of a lot of other potential business things that could be more lucrative and profitable.
• 36:56
  SPEAKER_02: Well, here's the thing.
• 36:57
  SPEAKER_02: Here's how you gotta think.
• 36:58
  SPEAKER_02: This is part of the we we tend to think in small pieces, and I I like to take the 30,000-foot view.
• 37:04
  SPEAKER_02: Here's the goal, Kent.
• 37:07
  SPEAKER_02: Let's take you and make your platform.
• 37:11
  SPEAKER_02: Okay?
• 37:11
  SPEAKER_02: Now the book is the cornerstone of the platform, but so is you know, connecting you with podcasters, so is your website, so is you know, all these different things.
• 37:20
  SPEAKER_02: So what you're doing is not just, you know, I'm gonna help you publish a book, it's the higher goal, the business goal.
• 37:28
  SPEAKER_02: Let's take you and turn you into a capital U with two exclamation points, which involves these five things, and I do these three steps, and I put this together, and I'm your guide all along the way.
• 37:38
  SPEAKER_02: And now it's not just a one-time engagement, this is a six to nine month uh guiding Sherpaing process where you're taking someone with raw talent and turning them into uh at least a minor celebrity.
• 37:51
  SPEAKER_00: See, this is a really important point, I think, for writers to realize is that writers tend to think of the book as the point.
• 37:59
  SPEAKER_00: You know, we think, okay, the book is the point of what I'm doing.
• 38:02
  SPEAKER_00: When the book is the book really isn't about the book.
• 38:04
  SPEAKER_00: The book is about the message contained within the book, which could also be contained in courses or coaching or blogging or podcasts or speaking or lots of other things.
• 38:14
  SPEAKER_00: So I wonder if sometimes we writers put the book as we put that form of communication on a pedestal when there's really nothing special about a book as opposed to other ways of impacting people.
• 38:27
  SPEAKER_02: Well, you wanna you want to distinguish yourself from commodity uh people.
• 38:31
  SPEAKER_02: So commodity, there's there's a ton of editors, there's a ton of web designers, there's a ton of people that might uh do a podcast.
• 38:39
  SPEAKER_02: There's all this commodity stuff, and we tend to atomize and think about these little things.
• 38:43
  SPEAKER_02: The real value is if you have uh multiple uh contacts and and a lot of experiences, you can come in at a much higher level and say, we're gonna turn you into, you know, someone well known with a message, and we're gonna optimize what message platforms are used, and we're gonna turn you uh we're gonna take a three-year process and turn you from a nobody into a rock star.
• 39:08
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, here's how we're gonna do it.
• 39:10
  SPEAKER_02: So that it almost becomes like a manager uh, you know, of a talent.
• 39:14
  SPEAKER_02: And that you can charge more for that, and you're also more unique because other people aren't doing it, they're still thinking about, you know, I'll do one piece of the puzzle.
• 39:23
  SPEAKER_00: You know, a good analogy to me seems like in the music world, you have the artists who are up front, then you have, you know, the producers, you have the managers, you have the songwriters in particular, and those people benefit for years or decades many times from the work of an artist.
• 39:39
  SPEAKER_00: Whereas if you didn't write a song but you recorded, or you know, if you just go out and perform it, you may get paid one time for something or or or something like that.
• 39:48
  SPEAKER_00: But the real sort of the real action is behind the scenes, so to speak, many times.
• 39:54
  SPEAKER_00: And I wonder if if there's not something to be said for that sort of producer role or that manager role or that coaching role, which sometimes those of us in creative fields, we we want to think, I want to be the person out front on the stage, when sometimes that's the more powerful role is actually behind the scenes.
• 40:13
  SPEAKER_02: So here's uh here, this is how my mind always works, and and so uh you can say, listen, uh lots of people want to be writers, lots of people will be writers.
• 40:23
  SPEAKER_02: I'm here if you want to not just be a writer, if you want to be a success.
• 40:28
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's great.
• 40:29
  SPEAKER_00: I like that.
• 40:29
  SPEAKER_02: Because, you know, that's the bottom line.
• 40:31
  SPEAKER_02: You're gonna make them a success.
• 40:32
  SPEAKER_02: Ooh, what does that mean?
• 40:33
  SPEAKER_02: Well, you have to write with purpose, you have to have a platform, you have to have a point of view and a message, and you you know, you're writing for a reason.
• 40:42
  SPEAKER_02: And you want to sort out right away people that just want to write as a hobby and people that want to succeed.
• 40:48
  SPEAKER_02: People that want to succeed, they're hungry.
• 40:50
  SPEAKER_02: They're the ones that will pay.
• 40:52
  SPEAKER_02: And so uh, and that's how I sort out my customers.
• 40:56
  SPEAKER_02: I I tell people, look, everybody needs clarity.
• 41:00
  SPEAKER_02: But I work with people that are hungry and people that are humble.
• 41:04
  SPEAKER_02: The two H the two HUs.
• 41:06
  SPEAKER_02: Uh hungry means they've got to figure out what their focus, direction, and message is, and humble means they recognize that they can't read the label of the jar they're in and they need somebody to come alongside.
• 41:17
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that that impulse to admit that you need help is is it's a very simple concept, but man, it's really hard for for artists, especially.
• 41:26
  SPEAKER_00: You know, we we're used to being so great and you know, being out fronted on stage and and all that stuff.
• 41:32
  SPEAKER_00: But yeah, we all need some help and and some coaching and clarity for sure.
• 41:36
  SPEAKER_00: One topic that I that I wanted to for sure hit on that I hadn't planned on, but you mentioned it at the beginning, and I thought this was such an important topic, is depression.
• 41:44
  SPEAKER_00: And that's something I've been public about my own battle with depression over the years and written about it uh several times on my own blog and podcast and so forth.
• 41:52
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm curious if you if you would mind sharing what you're comfortable sharing in your journey with the whole idea of depression and what you've learned from that process.
• 42:02
  SPEAKER_02: Well, it's uh it's something that's that's marked my uh my life since my teens, and I didn't actually know it.
• 42:10
  SPEAKER_02: Uh I was clinically depressed uh most of my adult life and wasn't really even diagnosed until my early 40s, uh, which was uh or mid-40s, which was my fault.
• 42:21
  SPEAKER_02: I I'm stubborn, I'm a New England stubborn man, and you know it's all up to me, and I have to fix everything myself.
• 42:29
  SPEAKER_02: So what I did during those years, my teens, twenties, thirties, forties, is I just coped uh and managed, but I didn't even know what that I was pushing this rock uphill uh endlessly.
• 42:42
  SPEAKER_02: And uh uh looking back, uh I realized I was not anywhere near full capacity, uh, even though all that time I was succeeding in a career, and I've had a marriage and five kids and and you know, all this stuff uh that that was keeping me busy.
• 42:58
  SPEAKER_02: But underneath it all, I was miserable.
• 43:00
  SPEAKER_02: And uh everything, everything I tried failed.
• 43:04
  SPEAKER_02: It didn't matter what it was, and you know, you can pray, you can meditate, you can do self-affirmations, you can do a thousand things.
• 43:11
  SPEAKER_02: Uh it turns out my biochemistry was out of whack.
• 43:14
  SPEAKER_02: And uh I finally went to a doctor and said, you know, uh I'm feeling this way, and I'm I'm beginning to think maybe it could be organic.
• 43:23
  SPEAKER_02: And and he looks at me with this ironic face and he says, Well, your brain is an organ, you know.
• 43:31
  SPEAKER_02: You can't think your way out of a broken leg, could you?
• 43:34
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, this is this is part of the clarity from the outside.
• 43:37
  SPEAKER_02: It's like, oh, yeah.
• 43:40
  SPEAKER_02: So he put me on an antidepressant and uh very low dose.
• 43:45
  SPEAKER_02: And uh two days later, Kent, I woke up and I was a completely different human being.
• 43:50
  SPEAKER_00: Wow.
• 43:51
  SPEAKER_02: My brain was so messed up, uh, and I needed a biochemical adjustment.
• 43:57
  SPEAKER_02: And uh I woke up and I felt at peace.
• 44:00
  SPEAKER_02: I felt happy for no reason.
• 44:03
  SPEAKER_02: It was like everything's okay.
• 44:05
  SPEAKER_02: The cloud lifted.
• 44:09
  SPEAKER_02: And it's been a long process of years of trying to restore what the locusts of depression have eaten, of you know, learning how to become who I really am and get through all those negative thought patterns.
• 44:23
  SPEAKER_02: But uh but it turned out in my case I I tried in vain for years to conquer something that really just needed a pill.
• 44:31
  SPEAKER_02: And uh so I very uh am very grateful to to be able to say, yeah, I'm I depend on a pill for my health, and I'd never go back.
• 44:41
  SPEAKER_02: I don't want to go back to those days.
• 44:43
  SPEAKER_02: And uh sometimes if I miss a dose, I even begin to feel those creeping black fingers again of of depression.
• 44:49
  SPEAKER_02: And and uh I I am absolutely grateful to God that uh that you know in this case it was a medical uh intervention that uh that led me to a sane mind.
• 45:01
  SPEAKER_02: And so in some respects, here I am, you know, late in life.
• 45:05
  SPEAKER_02: I have more creative energy, more drive.
• 45:08
  SPEAKER_02: I wish my body was as energetic as as my mind is, but I feel like I've just been set free to start to start doing my best work now as a 60-year-old, uh, when I was just basically surviving all those other years.
• 45:27
  SPEAKER_00: Wow, I appreciate you sharing that, Steve.
• 45:29
  SPEAKER_00: That's super encouraging, and I hope that is an encouragement to people who are listening who are struggling with depression to get help, to get you know, get the help that they need, and and to, you know, as in my case, and I have a very similar story as you, to not be so full of pride that we can't admit that we need help and go see a doctor or a professional to get the help that we need.
• 45:50
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I've got an ebook floating around out there on the interweb.
• 45:53
  SPEAKER_02: So if somebody googles Steve Woodruff and Clearing Clouds, they'll probably find it.
• 45:58
  SPEAKER_02: It's a PDF file.
• 46:00
  SPEAKER_02: And it tells my story, and the main message of that story is you know, stop trying to do this on your own and get help.
• 46:07
  SPEAKER_02: Uh you just we cannot isolation is the worst thing for somebody that's depressed.
• 46:14
  SPEAKER_00: I will put a link to that in the show notes.
• 46:16
  SPEAKER_00: I'll Google that and find it.
• 46:17
  SPEAKER_00: It's so interesting to hear that you mentioned the idea of clouds because I've always described depression, my experience with depression, as it's not sadness, it's not having the blues.
• 46:28
  SPEAKER_00: I've always thought of it as a fog.
• 46:30
  SPEAKER_00: Like my my brain is just in a fog and I can't focus, and everything is bland and gray.
• 46:36
  SPEAKER_00: And um yeah, medication for me has been important.
• 46:39
  SPEAKER_02: It takes different forms for different people.
• 46:41
  SPEAKER_02: So for me, it was self-absorption and self-accusation and negative, negative, negative, negative.
• 46:46
  SPEAKER_02: Uh I still could think in in a sharp, clear analytical way about some things, but I was just uh eviscerating myself daily.
• 46:57
  SPEAKER_02: It was that that was my pattern.
• 46:59
  SPEAKER_02: So depression can take a lot of different forms, and uh, you know, sometimes it it's going to be talk therapy or other forms of therapy.
• 47:07
  SPEAKER_02: In my case, uh the pill Prozac made just this massive, massive difference in my life.
• 47:13
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I have just a couple more questions before we wrap up here.
• 47:16
  SPEAKER_00: These are quick ones.
• 47:17
  SPEAKER_00: What are some practical steps that people can start implementing immediately to get more clarity in their business?
• 47:23
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm obviously going to recommend reading your book as a first step, but are there some other things that they could be doing immediately to start getting more clarity?
• 47:31
  SPEAKER_02: The thing that I find most helpful uh is for people to start to define their uh what I call their bullseye customer, their ideal customer.
• 47:41
  SPEAKER_02: Some people call it your customer avatar.
• 47:43
  SPEAKER_02: Um and uh you know, I I hear that the term target market or target customer, but I I like bullseye better because that's even more precise.
• 47:51
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 47:52
  SPEAKER_02: And what you do is you look back through all that you've done and all your past work, and this can be done as an individual or as a business, and you say, let's look at those types of customers where we just nailed it.
• 48:05
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, we were in our zone, in our sweet spot, they loved us.
• 48:10
  SPEAKER_02: Because those stories, those success stories, are the key to actually deconstructing what you've done and finding out who that client is, what they are feeling, what they are wanting, what they're expecting, what their title is, what their role is, all that stuff.
• 48:28
  SPEAKER_02: A lot of businesses don't do it.
• 48:30
  SPEAKER_02: They don't do that fairly simple work of saying, here's my ideal customer, because if I'm going to try to talk to other people about giving me referrals, I want to paint that picture of the ideal customer.
• 48:42
  SPEAKER_02: And then in relation to that, if you can start getting that, then the question you ask is, what does my ideal customer feel?
• 48:51
  SPEAKER_02: You want the emotions.
• 48:53
  SPEAKER_02: What's the pain?
• 48:55
  SPEAKER_02: What's the frustration?
• 48:57
  SPEAKER_02: What's the hope?
• 48:58
  SPEAKER_02: What's the what's the thing that is driving them?
• 49:02
  SPEAKER_02: Because your message can't just be an abstraction of 10 bullet points.
• 49:07
  SPEAKER_02: It has to talk to the feelings.
• 49:09
  SPEAKER_02: Uh and one of the things we have to not be afraid of in our selling and marketing is talking about the existential feelings because that's what makes people make decisions.
• 49:20
  SPEAKER_02: It's not just rational, as you know.
• 49:22
  SPEAKER_02: It's it's this is what I feel.
• 49:25
  SPEAKER_02: So we have to take all the things that we do and package them to address what those significant target people feel.
• 49:35
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, and that's what will get us uh in past the what's in it for me filter when we're talking to you know what they're really looking for.
• 49:44
  SPEAKER_00: Boy, that is so good.
• 49:46
  SPEAKER_00: That reminds me of so I'm reading a book right now by Robert Green called The Laws of Human Nature, and the first chapter talks about how we need to master our emotional selves, and he talks about how we are also driven by emotions and not logical judgments.
• 50:01
  SPEAKER_00: You know, we all think that we're logical and rational, but we're really not.
• 50:04
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 50:04
  SPEAKER_00: So we can reverse that and think about our potential, you know, our our our bullseye customer or client, what are they feeling and what sort of emotions drive their decisions?
• 50:14
  SPEAKER_00: So I love that insight.
• 50:15
  SPEAKER_00: That's really great.
• 50:16
  SPEAKER_00: So my final question is actually my next to final question is what is one habit or practice that has contributed most to your success?
• 50:27
  SPEAKER_00: I know that's a hard one.
• 50:28
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 50:30
  SPEAKER_02: Um I'll I'll tell you the thing that had probably has most contributed to it, but like all things, it has an upside and a downside.
• 50:39
  SPEAKER_02: And uh so for me, it's I am tenaciously stubborn and will just keep at it.
• 50:47
  SPEAKER_02: Uh and so I don't quit.
• 50:50
  SPEAKER_02: And uh the downside of that was I tried to fight my depression for many years all on my own because I wouldn't quit.
• 50:57
  SPEAKER_02: I it took a long time to hit the wall.
• 50:59
  SPEAKER_02: Uh and I have tended to to just latch on to things and and go after them.
• 51:06
  SPEAKER_02: So when people give up, and a lot of people do give up, uh, one of the ways that you succeed is you just simply endure and keep going.
• 51:14
  SPEAKER_02: Uh the downside of that, though, is that I tend to not be able to let go and rest and and let things happen.
• 51:24
  SPEAKER_02: I tend to try to force things too much.
• 51:26
  SPEAKER_02: So I I'm especially in this past year trying to learn the discipline of not being so tenacious and learning to take my hands off and trust that things are going in a good direction, everything's gonna be fine, and I don't have to force it.
• 51:43
  SPEAKER_02: Uh and other people, they need the exact opposite message.
• 51:46
  SPEAKER_02: Stop sitting on your butt and get to work.
• 51:49
  SPEAKER_00: Take some action.
• 51:50
  SPEAKER_02: Take action.
• 51:52
  SPEAKER_02: I have to actually consciously, deliberately stop taking action for the sake of my own health.
• 52:01
  SPEAKER_02: It's uh psychological health.
• 52:02
  SPEAKER_02: I'm uh too driven.
• 52:04
  SPEAKER_00: That's really interesting.
• 52:06
  SPEAKER_00: So, you know, some of us fall on the spectrum of we analyze everything and we don't take any action because we're paralyzed by the options, and I would put myself in that category for sure.
• 52:14
  SPEAKER_00: So it's good to hear kind of the opposite viewpoint as well.
• 52:18
  SPEAKER_00: Well, Steve, thanks so much for spending your time uh this morning talking to me and serving our listeners.
• 52:24
  SPEAKER_00: I appreciate your book and I appreciate you as a new friend, and um am looking forward to future connections as well.
• 52:30
  SPEAKER_00: How can our listeners connect with you?
• 52:33
  SPEAKER_02: Uh so the easiest way to get to the book is I've created a short link, claritywins.org, which goes directly to the Amazon page.
• 52:42
  SPEAKER_02: So that's simple.
• 52:44
  SPEAKER_02: And then my website is ClarityFuel, F-U-E-L.com.
• 52:50
  SPEAKER_02: Uh and on Facebook, I also have a page called King of Clarity, which is my nickname.
• 52:56
  SPEAKER_02: Uh so if you search Facebook for King of Clarity, they'll find that, and that's where the little videos are and other uh blogs and other articles of interest I put under King of Clarity.
• 53:07
  SPEAKER_00: Very cool.
• 53:07
  SPEAKER_00: Well, Steve, thanks again so much, and I look forward to connecting with you in the future.
• 53:11
  SPEAKER_02: Ken to me as well.
• 53:12
  SPEAKER_02: Thanks for having me.
• 53:13
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 53:16
  SPEAKER_00: I hope you enjoyed my conversation with Steve Woodruff.
• 53:20
  SPEAKER_00: Here are three takeaways that I learned from the interview.
• 53:22
  SPEAKER_00: These are things that you can start putting into practice right away to help you make a bigger impact in your life and your creative work.
• 53:30
  SPEAKER_00: Takeaway number one, you must decide whether you have a business or a hobby.
• 53:35
  SPEAKER_00: This question can be hard on us artists and creatives.
• 53:38
  SPEAKER_00: We have a tendency to dabble in things and to just follow our curiosity wherever that leads us.
• 53:43
  SPEAKER_00: And while curiosity is great, it doesn't always pay the bills.
• 53:47
  SPEAKER_00: If we want to make income from our creative work, we have to identify a pain or aspiration that people are willing to open their wallets for.
• 53:54
  SPEAKER_00: And this means joining our creativity with the practical needs that people are actually feeling and experiencing.
• 54:00
  SPEAKER_00: And I've heard it said before that everybody is tuned into the station WIIFM, which means what's in it for me?
• 54:08
  SPEAKER_00: And that's a great reminder that ultimately people are most concerned with how we can help them.
• 54:13
  SPEAKER_00: So we must ask the question, how can we use our creative talents to meet a need that people are actually willing to pay for?
• 54:21
  SPEAKER_00: Takeaway number two, don't resist the need to pigeonhole yourself.
• 54:27
  SPEAKER_00: Following on from the first point that I just mentioned, while it's good to explore our curiosity, at the end of the day, we gotta be clear about what we do and the value that we provide to people.
• 54:37
  SPEAKER_00: And I confess that I've really struggled with this many times.
• 54:40
  SPEAKER_00: I'm kind of a perfectionist by nature, and I tend to get paralysis by analysis.
• 54:45
  SPEAKER_00: I can do a variety of things, I'm multi-talented, and that's good in some ways, but it's also bad because sometimes you can just sort of be paralyzed and wonder, what the heck am I supposed to do?
• 54:55
  SPEAKER_00: What direction do I pick?
• 54:57
  SPEAKER_00: And maybe you felt that way as well sometimes.
• 54:59
  SPEAKER_00: The reality of it is that people only have so much mental space for us, and they're gonna pigeonhole us anyway.
• 55:06
  SPEAKER_00: It's better to create that specific image for people and make it easier for them to identify what it is that we do and the value that we bring.
• 55:13
  SPEAKER_00: It's better to do that than just leave it up to chance because as I said, they're gonna pigeonhole us anyway, so we may as well pick the category that they're going to assign to us in their minds.
• 55:23
  SPEAKER_00: So you've got to decide what you want to be known for.
• 55:27
  SPEAKER_00: Number three, follow Steve's strategy for networking.
• 55:32
  SPEAKER_00: Steve mentioned how he uses LinkedIn and Twitter.
• 55:34
  SPEAKER_00: He shares short videos and he regularly posts content.
• 55:38
  SPEAKER_00: And I love that strategy and I'm gonna start following it more.
• 55:41
  SPEAKER_00: Steve also mentioned that he prefers to network one-on-one with people, which builds strong relationships of mutual support over time.
• 55:48
  SPEAKER_00: So if you're an introvert, those are great suggestions that won't emotionally drain you.
• 55:53
  SPEAKER_00: At the end of the day, it's much better to have a key number of deep relationships than it is to have a bunch of superficial relationships.
• 56:00
  SPEAKER_00: At least that's what I believe.
• 56:02
  SPEAKER_00: Well, those are again I mentioned a lot of there's a lot of content there in those takeaways, a lot of things to chew on, so maybe even just pick one of those things and really start putting it into practice this coming week.
• 56:13
  SPEAKER_00: Well, hey friends, that wraps up this episode of the podcast.
• 56:16
  SPEAKER_00: I want to thank Steve for taking the time out of his busy schedule to share this amazing conversation.
• 56:21
  SPEAKER_00: You can find the show notes at KentSanders.net slash clarity.
• 56:26
  SPEAKER_00: And if you'd like a great resource to help you save time and become more productive, you could download my free guide, 21 Time Hacks for Writers, by visiting KentSanders.net slash subscribe.
• 56:38
  SPEAKER_00: If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe and leave a rating and a review on Apple Podcasts.
• 56:42
  SPEAKER_00: It only takes a second and it helps other people to discover the show.
• 56:46
  SPEAKER_00: You can do that by visiting KentSanders.net slash Apple.
• 56:50
  SPEAKER_00: And finally, if you enjoyed this episode, please consider sharing it with a friend or a family member who you think would enjoy it as well.
• 56:57
  SPEAKER_00: You can find tons more resources to help you unlock your creative potential at KentSanders.net.
• 57:03
  SPEAKER_00: Until next time, remember that you were born to create and designed to make a difference.
• 57:08
  SPEAKER_00: Now go create something awesome.