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Episode 84: Owning Your Story with Kat Short

Welcome to The Career Clarity Show, where we help you find a lucrative, soulful, and joyful career path for you!

Today on the Career Clarity Show podcast, we are talking about telling and owning your story. This is a topic that applies to anybody and everybody listening, no matter what kind of a phase you’re in life. I love getting to share this topic and this idea with you because our words have power and our words create worlds. 

If our words and how we communicate about who we are have such power to create an image to create an impression, we should be careful and strategic and intentional about what we’re trying to create to make sure that it matches up with our inner authenticity and who we know ourselves to be. We’re joined by Kat Short, founder of Tell Your Damn Story, as she shares how she has helped hundreds of individuals and businesses harness the power of storytelling to make their ideas fly.

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Transcript:

Lisa Lewis Miller  0:04  

Welcome to the Career Clarity Show. If you want to create a career path you’ll love, you’re in the right place. I’m Lisa Lewis Miller, career change coach, published author and your host. And each week, we’ll bring you personal transformation stories, advice and insights from experts about how you can find a more fulfilling, soulful and joyful career. Hello, and welcome, clarity seekers. I’m your host, Lisa Lewis Miller, and I am so delighted that you are with us today. Today on the Career Clarity Show podcast, we are having a conversation about telling and owning your story. And this is going to be a topic that applies to anybody and everybody listening, no matter what kind of a phase you’re in life. But you’ll be able to take these ideas and concepts and customize them and tailor them to exactly what you are going through. Whether you are in a role right now. And you’re trying to make an internal move, be it going for a promotion via moving to a different team or a different role. This is going to be for you if you are thinking about making a career change, and you’re trying to have a better sense of your new identity, and how you talk to people about who you are and what you want. And this is definitely definitely for you if you’re actively on the job search. And you’re trying to make sure that you are putting together a compelling and professional narrative about who you are as a human and as a candidate, to help set yourself apart from the oodles of people who are on the job market right now. So I love getting to share this topic and this idea with you because our words have power and our words create worlds. And we have to be intentional as heck about what kind of a world our language is creating around us. Because that has a huge impact on the way that our reality shapes around us. And if you’re listening to this and thinking like Oh, man, I don’t know, I don’t know. Think back to a time when you’ve interacted with somebody, and you only interacted with them on the phone? And how many thoughts questions and judgments you might have had come to mind just based on somebody’s voice and somebody’s tone and somebody’s words, you probably made assumptions about their emotional state, were they happy? Are they sad, you might have made assumptions about their physical state, they sound sick, do they sound tired, you might have made assumptions about their level of seniority, and their level of authority and their level of power, just based on the way that they were communicating. And you certainly made judgments about whether or not you like that person and wanted to work with them again, or collaborate with them or even meet them in person based on this one thing. So if our words and how we communicate about who we are, have such power to create an image to create an impression and a reputation in somebody else’s head, we should be careful and strategic and intentional about what we’re trying to create and what we’re trying to put out there to make sure that it matches up with our inner authenticity and who we know ourselves to be and what we truly want in the world. So with that I am so excited to tell you a little bit more about the bio and the background of today’s guest Kat Short. Kat Short, is a writer, poet and storytelling coach. She is the founder of Tell Your Damn Story and has helped hundreds of individuals and businesses harness the power of storytelling to make their ideas fly. Her writing has been published in elephant journal mindbodygreen, WordPress, freshly pressed and Soma magazine. She lives in Denver, Colorado with her tiny dog bear. And for any of you who have gone through the Career Clarity Show programs that we run here, you may be thinking to yourself, that name cat short is ringing a bell, and you would be right. Kat is one of the guests experts that we feature in the Career Clarity Show program, talking exactly about how stories can both limit us and make us play small and make us think that we are not capable. And stories can empower us and open up possibilities connection and growth beyond our wildest dreams. So with that I am delighted to bring Kat to the Career Clarity Show today. Kat, Welcome to the show. Thank you so much for having me. I’m thrilled to be here. Well, I am delighted to get to share your brilliance and your knowledge with more people and to really evangelize about the power of story in our lives. And I’d love for you to share for the folks listening who haven’t yet been through the Career Clarity Show program or who are unfamiliar with you in your work. What got you into stories and storytelling.

Kat Short  4:56  

That is a great place to start. It’s a nonlinear journey as I think many stories are for many people, I definitely did not go to college being like, you know what, I’m going to start a storytelling business someday. That was definitely not what I was intending to do. I actually went to college, originally to study opera, I was a vocal performance artists. And, and so that obviously didn’t work out, I still think I mean, you never stopped singing, but I decided not to take that career path. And I ended up going to school for marketing instead. And that led me on an interesting journey of getting to work with a lot of different people in businesses in very different capacities. Because marketing is a lot like storytelling in the sense that it, it ties into lots of different factors of business. And there’s a lot of nuance there. And so over the course of my career, after graduating from college, I dabbled in marketing and communications and event planning and operations and all types of things. I’ve worn a lot of hats in my life. And I think that what I started to realize was that, that there is like, it really, it really does come down to the story that a company or an individual is communicating that determines whether they, they bring forth what they wish to bring forth in the world, and they have the success that they wish to have in the world, or they don’t. And it really, it sounds very simplistic, but it really does come down to the narrative that we’re telling, both to ourselves and to the world in general. So and so I just found it so fascinating. And as a, as a writer and communicator my entire life. I really started to ask myself, what is it? What is what is this storytelling thing, this kind of like, ephemeral, interesting, kind of it can be a little bit airy fairy of like, what what, what does storytelling mean? And I kind of set out to make it much more practical and understandable for anyone because it is such a powerful tool. And it’s, it’s not just for writers, it’s not just for creators, or people who consider themselves to be artists. It’s for every single person. And storytelling is what sets us apart from everyone else. And our there will never be another person with your same story, there will never be another person with my same story. And there’s just so much fodder for fueling our lives and our life work in our stories. 

Lisa Lewis Miller  7:25  

That feels like a beautiful place to dive into the exploration of a story because I think that at some level, most people know and appreciate and understand that. Storytelling is powerful, because it creates connection. And it creates kinship in a certain way through narrative that’s difficult to achieve, in other ways difficult to achieve with just back to the facts and figures difficult to achieve oftentimes with a linear story of I did this, and then this and this and then this. But I also one of the things that I love about your philosophy and your approach to story is that your story can be as empowering or as disempowering as you choose for it to be. And I’m wondering if you can riff for a minute on disempowering versus empowering stories and what some of the distinctions and differentiations are?

Kat Short  8:18  

That’s a great question. So. So one of the best ways that I use to describe this is when, when we’re talking about ourselves, and we’ve probably talked about ourselves in a similar way, for a lot of our life, we say, like, Hello, I’m cat short, I’m, like, you know, and I, when I first started doing this work, I looked at the words that I was using to describe myself, I would, I would walk frequently walk into a room or meet a new person and be like, Hi, I’m cat, I’m sorry, I’m really shy. And I would like apologize, initially, for meeting them, and immediately disempower myself in the conversation by saying that I was shy, and it was kind of this, it was this guard I put up. And it was like, this way of what I thought was protecting me from having to show up in a way that felt inauthentic. But when I started to really study the origins of words, and the story behind this, the words that we use to tell stories, I looked into the word shy and the etymology of it, I believe it’s Latin. And it’s, it means it’s, you’re just shy of, you’re just missing the mark, or you’re falling short in some way. And so I was introducing myself with that energy of I am missing the mark, and I’m falling short, and I am less than, and I realized that that is a story I had been telling for 25 years. And, and I started to think about how that had shaped where I was in my life and the people that came into my life and was I honoring who I truly felt that I was, no definitely not, I am I don’t think of myself that way. And so I set out to find a new word that better describe myself that I could use in those words. introductions when I was meeting someone new, and I came across the word observe, and, and the, the origin of the word observe means to watch with the intent to understand. And that just felt so much more true and in my heart and my soul and I could walk proudly up to someone and introduce myself and explain like how much I love to observe people and love to, to kind of watch them be before I interact and engage and how that helps me in my, in my empathy and my storytelling journey in my ability to form like deep and connected relationships with people. And so I that’s like, very granular, but when you think about the the ways, the terms that you use to describe yourself, I really encourage people when they’re just starting out with storytelling to to look at those words and be like, does this really reflect who I who I believe that I am on the inside? Or is this a disempowering narrative that I’ve just been telling for so long? That it’s just become a part of me that I haven’t questioned? You know, and so that’s a good example of one of the stories that we we tell about ourselves. Another one, obviously, is, is kind of the stories that have been ingested by us from society and from our families and from our religions. And and looking at those and and asking ourselves like, is this independent of what I was brought up to believe and independent of where I grew up? And the religion that I grew up in? Is this true? For me, the story about my life? Is this is this the highest and the most beautiful story I can tell about my life right now. And if it’s not, that’s the beauty of storytelling is you have the power to change that narrative for yourself. And it just takes a little due diligence, a little reworking and reframing to find something that really brings you to life. 

Lisa Lewis Miller  11:46  

I love the idea of that the highest and most beautiful story that you can tell about yourself. Because I think that there’s there’s a certain group of humans and I’m an INTJ. So I belong to you, group of humans, that oftentimes thinks about accuracy. At the most accurate, factual version is the best version. And in this pursuit of quote, unquote, accuracy, we usually are real assholes to ourselves or to other people, right? We we, by trying to sort of manage expectations and be realists right now, nobody calls themselves pessimists anymore. We’re all realists. In order to be a realist, you feel like you have to sort of kick yourself, take yourself down a couple pegs in a couple notches, to have to start a conversation, be it by saying, I’m sorry, I’m shy, be it by saying, you know, well, I’m, you know, I’ve been at the company for two years, I haven’t been promoted. Or I work in Marketing, but it’s not that cool. It’s not that impressive. Or conversely, some of the some of the sort of, like, perverse humblebrag around, like, Oh, I just I wish I could go to your party, but I’m just I’m really busy. They just need me at work right now that we just have a lot going on. Where we tell these stories that have a point of view, that we’re pretending like is the only factual The only accurate way to describe who we are or what’s going on in our world. When in reality, there might be a lot of words, or a lot of perspectives. That can be true about a situation that might be true, we’re or more beautiful, or more elevated, then this sort of like, over over attachment to authenticity in a way that is a little bit demeaning, and taking somebody down a couple bags, even if that somebody is you. And that isn’t creating space, for humaneness and for, for responsiveness. Almost.

Kat Short  14:00  

Yes, I hear that So, so deeply. And I think we can all remember a time or at least recall a time when we have made ourselves small through our story in some way or another, whether it’s to whether it’s because we were just having a bad day, or we’ve been having a bad month, or we just we don’t feel that great about ourselves right now. Or we don’t want to make the other person feel insecure around us. Because we’re just like, on top of the world right now, and we don’t want to make someone else feel bad or feel small. And I, I see that so much, especially with women, unfortunately, is, is we we just don’t want to we don’t want to threaten someone with our power. And that and I think that, that there is there’s truth to that. Like there’s that feels like there’s truth to that for me like I don’t, I’m never going to be the kind of person who’s going to walk into a room or walk up to someone and kind of just command power Like like that kind of power that we think about that masculine energy that is so prominent in a lot of our work in this country and in just in globally right now, and where we are right now in the world. And However, that doesn’t mean that we have to be powerless, we don’t have to be like this huge, like, like, extroverted loud, like domineering force, I actually believe in a more a softer, more feminine form of power. And storytelling is really kind of the Golden staircase that allows us to do that. It is a way to, to kind of understand, at a very, like, fundamental and personal level, what we are working towards as ourselves like, what are we here to do? What is our highest point of leverage? What is the gift that we’re continuing to give every day? And how do we continue to give that those gifts when you know, life, life goes wrong? Life goes really well, when we’re having a terrible day when we’re having a good day, when we don’t really feel like being where we are, how do we honor like, the long term trajectory of our dream and our gifts and our vision. In those like moments when we’re when we’re feeling a little weaker, or we’re feeling a little powerless. And I, I think that, for me what has been so important in these moments, like right now, we say You and I are talking to each other. During the election week, in 2020. And there, it’s intense. And I think you said it earlier, like we’re all a little distracted. And it’s like today I feel, I feel very distracted, I feel anxiety in my body, I feel nervous, I feel a lot of anger towards, you know, where we where we are versus where I thought we were as a country. And also showing up here on this podcast with you today. It’s, I could, I could show up from that space of where I’m feeling maybe right now, which is kind of, you know, sad and grief stricken and nervous. Or I can show up and let you know that that’s where I’m at. And also tell the story that I believe to be more true than that story and the story of what I’m feeling in this particular moment. And the story of that is that we were all so powered, we’re all such powerful beings, we all have so much to give, and so much goodness inside of us. And that is what I want to continue to fight for. And so showing up for this podcast, like, I feel like this conversation that you’re having that we’re having, and this podcast that you created is your legacy work of like, you know what, when all those bad days are done, when all those those failures are finished, and are long in the past, like, this is what I want to endure. And when I think that when people are thinking about their stories, it’s um, it’s just getting really quiet and clear with yourself on what do I want to endure about my story? You know, like, what do I want people to think of when they think of me? And let that guide you is, especially through those times when you You really don’t feel it? Does that make any sense? 

Lisa Lewis Miller  18:14  

Absolutely, that two pieces that are really sticking out to me are the the bedrock of leaning into what you want to be enduring what you want to be true over time about who you are. And then sort of juxtaposing that with space for possibility, space for co creation space for being able to respond to a situation or an an opportunity. And one of the things that I love about the way that you talk about this concept, and the way that you teach it is, I’m thinking about the model that you use when you teach about soul stories, and how they’re both tethered to the current moment. And they are very inspirational, aspirational, visionary, with creating this possible future and possible opportunities for yourself. And I’m wondering if you will share with listeners a little bit about what a soul story is and what the component pieces are? 

Kat Short  19:18  

Absolutely, thank you for asking. So, so let’s see, I, I break it down into there’s two, two different types of stories that we tell there’s the the soul story, and there’s the goal story. And the goal story is like it’s pretty short term looking, it has a finite outcome that you can kind of see you know, pretty close down the road, it doesn’t offer a whole lot of room for growth and expansion. It’s it’s just like checking something off of a to do list and or making it up to the next level of the ladder whatever. Whatever metaphor you works for you but um, but the full story is is kind of to what I was describing a little earlier is something that continues to generate energy for you Long after you’ve shared it initially, and it kind of it’s this expansive practice, and it’s very practical. It’s not, it’s not it doesn’t require a whole lot of skill or, or learning. It’s just, it’s a way to keep your, your story working for you, as long as possible so that all these kind of new and interesting doors have the opportunity to like open up for you. And so you’re not just slamming a bunch of doors saying, No, no, this is the only path and going down, I can see the finish line. And I’m just staying the course right here. The soul story model is it.

Kat Short  20:38  

It’s a little, it taps into a little more of those values and those those undercurrents of your life, and allows people to to meet you in very different ways. And so the model that I use is called the White House model. And the best way I describe this is, so when when you think about how many times you are asked the question, what do you do? I mean, probably less now that we’re in COVID, because we aren’t going to as many cocktail parties and sitting in as many waiting rooms. But we still are asked this question a lot. And I think many listeners can relate to this when someone says so what do you do, you kind of maybe you’re feeling lazy that day, or maybe you just like, don’t really want to start a conversation, or maybe you’ve just been saying the same story for a really long time. And it’s just, that’s just what you say, when someone asks you that you’re like, Oh, I’m in marketing. And it’s like, or, oh, I’m a lawyer, or I’m a career coach, you know, something like that. And what that is, is that staying right in the in the White House model, that’s, that’s the how that’s the what we’re doing just right now, it’s just what’s happening in our life. And that doesn’t really offer a whole lot of opportunity for conversation opportunity for curiosity or growth, it kind of, in a way it kind of slams the door in someone’s face, when when they’re asking you this and with the why how now model is it’s getting really clear on on that that kind of legacy work that why like your big why of of what you want to bring into the world. And this is obviously something you would do before that conversation is determine that for yourself. But it’s, it’s combining kind of the the why the underlying current of your life. And also what’s how that’s showing up in your work right now.

Kat Short  22:21  

And then the key part is the now, which is opening up a door for someone to actually take a step towards you, and either no help or hire you. And so the so an example of this is someone like you asked me, so what do you do, and I say, Hi, I’m a Kat. I’m a storytelling coach. And, and I believe in the power of stories to help people harness their power to make the right things happen in their working life. I currently run a business called tell your damn story. And right now I’m actually looking for help in PR, I’m trying to expand my business reach farther. And what that does is that gives people a lot of different avenues to connect with you. And some of them, they won’t be able to connect in any way. And that’s okay. But it’s it’s opening up a bunch more doors so that someone can take a step towards you. And especially when you’re looking for a new job, or you are considering starting a business, there’s always a next write stuff that you are looking to take in your work and your life. And that conversation that you’re having with that person is an opportunity to open a door for possibility for you. 

Lisa Lewis Miller  23:29  

Oh, that’s so beautiful. And I love that that now you could think about that now piece, just hearing it and assume like Well, I guess this has to be sort of anchored in my current reality and what my current job is. But the now pieces actually now, here’s what I’m looking for. Now, here’s what I’m craving. Now, here’s what I’m hoping to build next. And it creates this, this platform, this shared space, where listeners can then come and interact with you. And they can say, that sounds amazing, or I know a person who can help you with that. Or how did you get started with that. One of the things I love most about this mode of talking about yourself. And what you do is that it’s sort of like it gives people a big old pile of yarn, and a million different threads that they can pull on to find their way in to connect with you. A goal story can be so oriented to here’s my title here is what I’ve been schlepping for the last couple of years it just it can. It can feel very anchored and a little bit like a downer sometimes. And just like you were saying hard to connect to hard to relate to. Right? And when you tell somebody I work in Marketing or I’m a lawyer, I’m a teacher or whatever. It usually then tees up the exact same questions that you answer over and over and over again. Exactly. The gold story creates this space that you can be having new and fresh, interesting Deep engaging conversations with folks all the time. And I feel like, again, for my highly analytical people who are listening to this who are very dedicated to actuality, actuality, accuracy, reality. We’re not fabricating anything, we did not change who you are, we did not change what you have done, we did not change your heart or your soul or your brain, we purely just found a new way to package parts of yourself that don’t always get shown, so that they can create the kind of connection and deep soulful conversations that I think we all want more of in our lives. 

Kat Short  25:38  

Exactly, exactly. And, and like, no, there cannot, there can be no progress without a conversation, you know, it’s we have to have conversations in order for anything new and interesting to happen. And what this does is this opens the door to a deeper, more authentic, more beneficial conversation for everyone involved. And that truly is the power of storytelling. That’s what connects us. Nobody walks outside of their door in the morning. And it’s like, you know what, I really hope that I don’t connect with one person today at all, no one does that. I mean, unless they’re like a sociopath, but I, you know, for the most of us, we want to deeply Connect, and we, and it’s so fruitful not only for our careers, and our and our livelihood, and our work, it’s so fruitful for our souls, and who we are as human beings. And it adds that texture and that adventure and that nuance to life that we so deeply need in this in we’ve always needed, but we especially need it now.

Lisa Lewis Miller  26:36  

It’s such a beautiful way to put that I love it. And to contextualize this in the career space, in particular, the relationships are everything. Mm hmm.

Kat Short  26:48  

Yep,

Lisa Lewis Miller  26:48  

It is a relationship with an individual that gets you an informational conversation as part of your listening to her. It’s a relationship with somebody who knows a hiring manager, that opens the door for a an official interview for a job offer to come. If you’re applying to a role completely cold online, which is obviously never something we suggest is your first line of defense. But if you are doing this, you have taken all the richness and nuance and and holistic beauty about who you are. And you had to condense it down into a two dimensional piece of paper. So telling a compelling story on that two dimensional piece of paper is critical. So that you don’t look like just another name and number printed on an eight and a half by 11. You are a human, you transcend and rise above and rise through the paper to create the kind of connection with a hiring manager that makes them review the resumes that the HR screener past them and say, you know, I don’t know why this person might not have the perfect experience, but there’s something that’s really compelling about them. Let’s schedule an interview with this person. 

Kat Short  27:54  

Exactly. Yes, yeah. And it really is about it’s resumes, a, they’re so necessary, they’re so vital. And they’re also they can be it, they can be kind of soul sucking a little bit, you know, of like, here’s my, here’s where I went to school, here’s my like, list of all these things like, and you’re right, they can all be the same. But the I think what, and you know a lot more about this than I do. But I think what makes certain candidates stand out from others is that they have found a way to, to kind of integrate the story of their life into the story of their work in a very interesting way. Because we are not just we are we’re not just marketing managers, we’re not just, you know, accountants, there is there’s so much that has happened in our entire life that has given us the gifts and the abilities to see things in a very unique and distinct way that other people can’t see. And, and that’s, that’s, that’s ours alone. Like, like, if you ran, if I tried to run Lisa’s business, there is no way that I would be able to run it in the exact same way that she does. And, and vice versa. It’s like we all come to the table with with so much more than we than we allow ourselves credit for you know, and and I think just opening up our eyes to, to what has really made us who we are and those little things that make us that are just like Gay Hendricks describes it as like our zone of excellence and our zone of genius like those, those little things that make us so wonderful to work with. Because at the end of the day, companies are hiring you as a person. They’re working with you, as a human being Yes, you’re going to do the work great. But also, you’re going to be spending like 40 to 80 hours a week with these individuals like you. You need to bring your whole self to the table. 

Lisa Lewis Miller  29:51  

The idea of integrating the story about your life and the story about your work is so intriguing to me. Partially because when we talk about The four pillars of career fulfillment here at Career Clarity Show, we talked about that, for some people, the the purpose, and the interest area that their work aligns with, tends to become a big piece of their identity, or vice versa, their identity is such that they have to seek out specific areas of interest in their work in order to find that kind of alignment. And for some people like that the integration of the personal story and the professional story may happen a little bit more intuitively or naturally. Right, if you have been obsessed with dinosaurs, since you were four, and you went to school for archaeology, and now you get to go to Egypt and do all these cool digs. Like you, you have blended those pieces of who you are beautifully. But not everybody aspires to blend together their personal self and their professional self with that level of integration or with that level of sort of inaccessibility to. And so the idea of finding the pieces of who you are, as a human that do integrate into what you’re doing and why as a professional, is really compelling to remind yourself, that there’s not some sort of distinct bifurcation of like your work self versus your personal self, there is a connection through your values through your heart through your story. And that if you don’t identify what that is, and share it with people, you’re doing a disservice to the people in your life who you want to know you. Mm hmm, that’s so true. I love that you said that. Well, cat, let me ask you this question. Because I think that this beautiful and highest story concept is so intriguing, and probably is a little bit confronting for some people. Because I can imagine somebody listening to this and thinking, like, well, I don’t even know if there’s a beautiful story to be told about my life, or my work. You know, I don’t even know what the highest version of the story would be. What would you say to somebody who’s finding it to be a little challenging to identify or to claim a highest and most beautiful story about themselves?

Kat Short  32:14  

I, that’s a great question. So there, whenever I’m trying to trying to communicate to an individual who maybe who feels disconnected from their own story, or feels like they really can’t see the forest for the trees, which, just so you know, is so many people because we are stuck in our stories all day, every day, we can’t really see what’s so interesting about them anymore, because it’s just we’re in it all the time. We look at other people’s stories, and we can see them so clearly see their specialness so clearly. But it’s very hard to see our own. And one exercise that I really love to do. And this might sound kind of, kind of away from what, from the story that you would want to be telling about your work, but is I asked people to tell me about something that they love. And either write about something that they love, or actually verbalize it to me. And what that does is everyone is able to access that part of themselves that is able to talk just openly and freely and honestly about something that they love, because we all love something, right. And it can be you know, chocolate chip cookies, it can be I don’t know hiking in the mountains, and but just a different gear kicks into place. When you’re talking about something you love, like your eyes kind of get this like sparkle, your voice starts to get like excited, your heart might start racing a little bit. And I’m and I do this exercise with people because what it does is it it’s somatically in your body, it indicates to you when you are feeling enlivened by something, and so and what that what that does is when you can, when you can feel in your body, you can express it in your voice, it’s it’s like we’re connected, we’re we’re hearts or souls or minds, we’re all the things and when when you can find it, when you can feel what it feels like to access that part of yourself and your ability to communicate from that place. It makes it a little bit easier to look at your work and be like, okay, like, what about my work makes me feel like that, like what what are the little pieces of what I do in my in my job and the reason that I followed this path that tap into that area of of love and excitement. And what you can do from that place is is be like okay, an example is in my work when I when I first started my business, I I was talking about something I loved and I was like, I love to be on stage like I really I’m I’m like I said I was very shy or I classified myself as shy for much of my life but that being on stage was just such a beautiful thing because If it was an opportunity for me to have a voice, without having to compete over everyone else for that voice, and it was a place where I could take all the observations that I’ve made, and all the ideas that I’d really cultivated and, and hardest in my, in my mind, and I could share them with other people whether through song or through speaking, in a way that felt good to me, because I wasn’t trying to shout over someone else, or trying to demand attention, it was just the space was mine for that little amount of time. And, and so I started thinking about that of like, okay, like, like, what, what is it about being on stage that I love? so much? And how does that how does that? How can I make that like a story that I tell in my storytelling work. And it’s like, it’s because I, it’s the purest form of communication that I know how to do, which is to verbalize my my story, in a in a calm and collected manner on something like a stage. And that makes me so good at my work, because I’m able to communicate my story to other people verbally, like I have very good communication skills. And I can also, I also know how to take kind of the breadth of a lifetime of stories and hone it down into a very like, small period of time, like when you’re on stage, you only have you know, 20 minutes, half an hour. And that’s a huge part of storytelling is taking is condensing the breadth of your experience down into kind of like a very bite sized piece of compelling information, right. And I was like, that’s why that’s why I love being onstage so much, because it forces me to hone a story to condense it down and only speak to the most compelling part of that. And that’s what makes me such a good storyteller. And so, does that make sense? A little bit of how how you can kind of talk about something you love and overlay it onto your work and find a similar vein within it. Does that make sense?

Lisa Lewis Miller  37:02  

Well, it sounds like it’s, it’s one part, changing your physiology is one part tapping into joyfulness, creativity, excitement, energy, and then using those emotions and hormones and states, and sort of transposing them on to your work, and potentially looking for intersection points and connectivity points, or even just using that changed physiological state to access new and different thoughts that you weren’t able to have in your previous physical, emotional and mental state. Because I, I feel like it’s, it’s really real. And I know I talked about this a little bit in, in the Career Clarity Show book, that there’s such an interplay between how we feel and what we feel and how we think, if we are feeling sad, low, isolated, defeated, hopeless, the thoughts that will come across our mind, typically will tend to fall into confirmation bias of affirming that that is why that we should feel the way that we feel and giving us extra reasons why, oh, you’re right to be feeling that way. Because this is really stressful right now, your right to be feeling defeated, because you’ve tried everything that there is to try. And by tapping into the physiology of excitement, love energy possibility, you can shift the kinds of thoughts that feel accessible and possible to you to thoughts that would not have been allowed to that different physiological and emotional version of you. So it sounds like there’s a lot of cool interplay between sourcing and producing different thoughts by doing a little brain Jedi ninja trick of putting yourself into a different mental state so that you can access new and different ways of seeing and perceiving yourself. 

Kat Short  39:04  

Exactly. That is so well put, yes. And like freeing yourself from I think you had mentioned it earlier, something I use in my work a lot, which is the story trap, which is like, yes, it’s kind of that bogged down feeling we get when we can’t really, we can’t get out of a cycle of storytelling that we’re telling either internally or externally. So say we’re like, we’re looking for a new job, and we’re constantly telling ourselves in our mind, like, like, Oh, it’s the recession, and no one’s gonna hire me or Oh, it’s a pandemic and like, no one’s hiring right now. That is a story trap, because it’s, it’s a self defeating narrative that we’re perpetuating over and over again, that’s keeping us trapped in a smaller place. And talking about something you care about talking about something you love shaking up, like you said, your physiology and your mental state allows you to kind of break free from that story trapped, even just for a moment. So you can see that there is other possibilities at play that you can actually Just as long as like you are willing and able to exit the story trap for long enough just to see them for a month, you know, and believe that they’re there. Yeah. 

Lisa Lewis Miller  40:10  

So the recession in particular is a really important story trap to be identifying. Because if you keep telling yourself, it’s a recession, nobody’s hiring, you are going to look for and cherry pick the confirming evidence to show you that that’s true. Yep. This this week alone, I’ve had a client get a new job and a client get promoted. And, you know, that’s just one week. Right? So if you believe, hey, there are opportunities out there in specific sectors, if I’m looking in the right places, the kinds of thoughts and the kind of behaviors that will then result in will be way more empowering, way more possibility oriented, they’ll break you out of the smallness of the story trap, and may ultimately result in you changing your life. 

Kat Short  40:57  

Exactly, exactly. And just living a more in a more liberated state in general, you know, which draws a lot more opportunity to you, you know, as law of attraction, like we attract what we are, what we embody. And, like, if we’re embodying a scarcity mindset, like that’s okay, it’s understandable. It’s a scary time that we live in right now. And also, like, we have the power alone, and I find that to be so just so hopeful, is that we, we really do have the power to change our state, we have the power to change our stories. And we have the power to, to make the right things happen for ourselves in our life. Like, yes, things can beat us down. Yes, there are things outside of our control. But we do have control of our stories, always. And that is not something that anyone can take away from us.

Lisa Lewis Miller  41:51  

Or even if you feel like somebody has taken it away from you, you have the power to rewrite your story and your narrative and to reclaim it. reclaim it. Exactly. Well, cat for people who have been listening to this and who have been loving what you’re saying and eating this up, and they want to hear more about you and tell your damn story and how they can be learning more from you or even working with you what are the best places for them to keep in touch? 

Kat Short  42:14  

Thank you. Well, you can find me on my website at www.tellyourdamnstory.com and I’m also on Instagram @tellyourdamnstory on the Instagram handle. And those are pretty much the two places that I love to see people and have conversations and engage. So please reach out to me and and if you have any questions, please feel free to follow up on my website. I’m always I always love to be a resource. And I get really excited about storytelling as you can see, so please reach out if you have any questions. awesome little cat. 

Lisa Lewis Miller  42:46  

Thank you so much for sharing your brilliance on the Career Clarity Show today. 

Kat Short  42:51  

Thank you so much for having me. Lisa. It was wonderful to see you. 

Lisa Lewis Miller  43:00  

And that’s the wrap. Let us know what you thought about today’s episode. leave us a review on Apple podcasts. Because not only can your stars and words help us find great guests and topics to feature on future episodes. Your input also helps other people find the resources they need to discover the work that lights them up. And make sure to check out my book Career Clarity: Finally Finds The work That Fits Your Values and Lifestyle. For the link to order it go to BetCareerClarity.com/book. And don’t forget to get your other tools resources and helpful goodies at GetCareerClarity.com/podcast. Thanks again for joining us for the Career Clarity Show today. And remember, if you don’t love your work, we should talk because life is too short to be doing work that doesn’t light you up. Talk to you next time.

About the Author Lisa Lewis

Lisa is a career change coach helping individuals feeling stuck to find work that fits. She helps people clarify who they are, what they want most, and what a great job for them looks like so they can make their transition as easily as possible. Lisa completed coaching training in Jenny Blake’s Pivot Method, Danielle LaPorte’s Fire Starter Sessions, Kate Swoboda's Courageous Living Coaching Certification, and the World Coaches Institute. In addition to that, she apprenticed with the top career coaches in the country so she can do the best possible work with — and for — you. She's helped more than 500 individuals move into more fulfilling, yummy careers and would be honored to get to serve you next!

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