Marketing Tips for Introverts – with Marcia Yudkin

November 18, 2022

Marcia Yudkin shares insights on myths about introverts and marketing and tips for how to market in your own way as an introvert.

Welcome to Episode 21 of the Create Your Story Podcast on Marketing Tips for Introverts. I’m joined by Marcia Yudkin, author and specialist in the area of introverts and marketing, based on many years’ experience as a marketing coach and consultant.

You can listen above or via your favourite podcast app. And/or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below.

Show Notes

In this episode, we chat about:

Myths about introverts
Ways of being bold as an introvert
Myths about introverts and marketing
Push vs pull marketing – and what works best for introverts
Authentic marketing for introverts
Content marketing and pull marketing – what’s the difference
Being clear in communicating who you are and how you work
Substack as an option for free and paid offerings and writing
Being inclusive of introverts in marketing
What we can learn from introverted characters in fiction and real life

Transcript of podcast

Introduction

Welcome to Episode 21 of the Create Your Story Podcast and it’s the 18 November as I record this.

I’m excited to have Marcia Yudkin join us for the podcast today.

For more than 10 years, Marcia Yudkin has stood up and defended introverts as worthy of respect and understanding. This developed out of her work as a marketing coach and consultant. She’s the author of 17 books and too many ebooks, online courses and so on to count. Her current focus is a Substack newsletter called Introvert UpThink, which critiques society’s misunderstandings and disparagements of introverts. She lives in the woods of Western Massachusetts, where she walks or runs five miles every day in the company of chipmunks, beaver, deer, porcupines and occasionally bears.

I was so excited when Marcia and I connected to be able to explore more about the area of marketing for introverts and to share these insights with you. Bringing an incredibly rich background as marketing consultant, coach and author together with personal and professional experience on marketing as an introvert, it was fabulous to dive deep into this topic. We explore myths around both introversion and marketing as an introvert with so many tips for helping you to share more about you and your work with the world if you are an introvert.

I had so many personal aha moments in this conversation. There are many powerful examples that illustrate the tips provided. It is a fantastic reminder to be ourselves in how we market including as introverts and how this can be a successful path. Take some time too to learn about Marcia’s work and books and connect with her via her fabulous Substack newsletter, Introvert UpThink. Plus Marcia has many valuable books and resources on this topic as well. Links in the show notes as ever.

So let’s head into the interview with Marcia.

Transcript of interview with Marcia Yudkin

Terri Connellan: Hello Marcia, and welcome to the Create Your Story podcast. It’s so great to connect with you and to chat about introversion from many perspectives today, including marketing and media.

Marcia Yudkin: Hi Terri. Thanks for having me.

Terri Connellan: So to kick us off, Marcia, can you provide a brief overview about your background, how you got to be, where you are today, and the work that you do?

Marcia Yudkin: Sure. As a kid, I was a bookworm. I loved words, and I was very much a classic introvert. My mother wished that I had more friends, and I found out recently that in this, she was just like, Ayn Rand’s mother who was always bugging her. Can’t you find some more friends? But I turned out fine.

In school. I studied philosophy in college, in graduate school. I taught philosophy for a while, quit academic life. I became a freelancer, because remember I said I had always loved words and so I thought, okay, writing is the next thing for me. And that morphed into becoming an expert in publicity and that developed into becoming an expert in marketing, which also used my love of words. And at some point I discovered that I’m an introvert. I think this was in the late two thousands, like 2008, something like that, and I started making more and more connections between things I saw in myself, things I saw in my clients, things I saw in my past, and reading that I was doing about what an introvert was.

And now I’m transitioning from marketing to concentrate on a newsletter that I started called Introvert UpThink, which looks at the prejudices against introverts in society and gives people resources for thinking positively about themselves as introverts.

Terri Connellan: Fabulous. And I love how your love of words is just woven through everything that you’ve talked about in different ways.

Marcia Yudkin: Exactly. Yeah, exactly.

Terri Connellan: It’s just fantastic. And, love the focus that you have through that weave of your life, bringing together that love of words, marketing and understanding about your own introversion and then helping others with theirs in areas of your strengths. So that’s really fabulous. So you’ve been working in that area now for more than 10 years in the area of marketing for introverts. Can you tell us a bit more about why you chose to focus there and how you help people?

Marcia Yudkin: Well, one thing I discovered when I was looking around and thinking about. What I was doing on a daily basis is I noticed that about 75% of my own clients were introverts, and I think that was because they saw in me a reflection of themselves and they wanted to work with somebody they could admire and who was like themselves and therefore was not going to push them to do things that did not come naturally to them.

So in addition to making those kind of observations, I also interviewed people who I saw as introverts, as successful introverts, especially in the marketing field and also in the writing field. And I wanted to find out, okay, what were their strategies for becoming successful as an introvert, not making a lot of compromises with their own personality.

Interestingly, some of these people weren’t themselves sure that they were introverts, even though I was sure that they were. And, I also analyzed things that I saw commonalities in my introverted clients. One of the things I noticed was that, Initially they were very set against marketing. There was something that didn’t sit right with them and I think it was because they were being told they had to do it in a way that didn’t fit their personality.

And then once I showed them that they could think about marketing in a different way, then it made a big transformation. In their ability to bring in clients. So that was gratifying, watching that happen with them. I’m not coaching clients anymore, but I’m still writing about things that I’ve learned, throughout my life and in working with clients.

Terri Connellan: Fabulous. And, it’s interesting what you say about introverts having a set against marketing and that idea of there’s a particular type of way that marketing should be done that might not be in line with introvert preferences.

Marcia Yudkin: I was noticing that, well, as a marketing expert myself, I wanted to see what my colleagues were saying, and a lot of them were saying really nonsensical things or things that would be downright harmful to introverts. Like, just get over yourself, don’t be such a wimp. Go out there and be aggressive and you didn’t have to do that, and we’ll get to that. What’s the alternative to that? But, I just noticed that there was so much in the marketing guru space that was only applicable to extraverts, really. And in order to follow that advice, you would have to be an extravert or skilled at pretending you were an extravert. And as you know, that’s really a strain and that’s a drain on energy.

Terri Connellan: Absolutely. It’s like we have our natural preferences and when someone’s trying to push us into what is not natural. The natural reaction to that is to just move away from it, as you’ve said, to avoid or just to step away from that space altogether.

And I think as you’ve highlighted from what you’ve learned and what you’ve experienced for introverts often, and it’s part of why I called my business Quiet Writing, you have to find another way to share who you are and what you do that may go against the grain a bit or may involve new practices that will go through as we chat.

So, let’s talk about introverts and myths about introverts generally. So what are the most common myths that you see and how do they impact people with introverted preferences?

Marcia Yudkin: Well, I’ll just talk about two of the myths. There are a lot of them, but the first one is that introversion is a weakness, a personality weakness that you can get over, that you can overcome, and you can learn to be like all the extroverts and you can learn to get business the way that they get business.

And to some extent that’s true. You can, you can try those things, You can force yourself to do those things, but it’s exhausting. So my perspective is always to try to figure out a way to work with your natural preferences rather than against them. So introversion is not a weakness and it’s not something you can get over. If you were an introvert as a kid, you might learn to adapt in certain ways, but you’ll most likely still be an introvert when you’re grown up.

And the second myth is that introverts are timid and retiring. And from the way I look at it, we just have a different way of being bold. So, an amusing example of this is I have an extroverted friend. And, she does things that I would never do and I do things that she would never do and we surprise each other. So one of those surprises was, maybe 25 years ago, a big way that I kept my business going was by sending out postcards and they would be these hot pink postcards with announcements of my upcoming classes and special coaching programs.

And, my friend Shifra said to me, I could never send out postcards like that. I said, What do you mean? What do you mean you couldn’t send out postcards? She said, I don’t know. It’s so out there and to her that that was something that she couldn’t see herself doing, and to me was totally natural, totally easy and, you know, I wrote the postcards and I even put the stamps on them and everything. But for me to go up to strangers and start a conversation, that’s much more difficult. And for her, that was the most natural thing in the world. So, of course, If I were giving advice to her about how to market herself, I would set her up all these different ways she could have those conversations, and for me, that’s not what’s the best way.

Terri Connellan: Absolutely. And there are two really key myths about introversion, aren’t they that just pop up and are persistent. Even though we’ve had a lot of books and focus on introversion as a strength, I think it’s still something that we need to continually be working on personally and as a society. Introversion is not a personality weakness, as you said, you can overcome. It’s not something you can get over. And I loved your point too about the fact that you can force yourself to do things in a different way, but it’s the impact on people who are introverted, that it is exhausting. Cause again, you’re working against your natural preference, everything is harder.

Marcia Yudkin: Not only do we still hear this idea that introversion is a weakness, we sometimes hear it that it’s a mental illness. And, I’m researching this for an upcoming article about different ways in which people who should know better, identify certain aspects of being an introvert as being some kind of abnormal tendency and downright mental illness. But I still see this a lot when I read general interest things.

Terri Connellan: Yeah, it’s out there on the public domain still. And, I loved your example too, of the different ways of being bold. That was great because, it’s true, there are things that might be again, quite natural for us that we do that don’t feel bold at all. But it’s interesting, there’s lots of ways introverts can be bold, be quite rebellious at times, be quite different. Exactly. Yeah. And, it’s just natural for us.

Marcia Yudkin: I’m very bold in writing, so I’ve had a lot of success writing letters to perfect strangers where I’m proposing something and I know how to use words to get attention. That’s one of my strengths. And I’ve said things that some other people wouldn’t say or that they wouldn’t know how to get attention.

So I’ve made a lot of connections with editors, especially earlier in my career when I was a freelance writer, I was able to contact these national magazines. And just in half a page, this was before email, just in half a page of a letter, get their attention and have them call me and say, Let’s talk. Come to New York and meet with me. I want you to write for us.

Terri Connellan: That’s a great strength and a great skill and my learning in this space is that it is taking the time to become more self-aware and educated. That’s why I use that term self leadership, like understanding yourself and what your strengths are so you can as you’ve shown through that beautiful example, deploy them effectively to meet your needs and to share what you have to share with the world.

So, we’ve talked about some of the myths around introverts generally. What specific myths do you see around introverts and marketing, and what’s their impact?

Marcia Yudkin: Well, we talked a bit about the idea that you need to be aggressive, that you need to get yourself out there. Another idea is that you need to interrupt people and pressure them. And introverts absolutely hate that. That’s like one of the things we most hate because we hate being pressured. We hate being interrupted. And what I tell introverts is that instead of being pushy, you use attraction. So you can pull people to you instead of pushing them toward you.

And there’s a whole genre of marketing that I call pull marketing, which is that you put things out there in the world and the right people, the people who you want to be attracted to you and who you want to work with, will find it and come to you. And that’s a very natural, very comfortable process for introverts. There’s nothing pushy whatsoever about it. It’s very authentic. It’s very natural, and it’s very effective.

Terri Connellan: And is that the same as content marketing?

Marcia Yudkin: I guess you could say content marketing. I like talking about it in terms of push and pull because I think that makes it very clear what the advantage is for introverts.

Terri Connellan: Mm. Yeah. I love that. I do. And it’s that idea of putting ideas, putting content, putting information, branding out there that will help people find you, be drawn to you, as you say. And it’s that natural attraction I guess that brings people to you and to the ideas that you share. And so what about discoverability in that space? Cause a lot of time, I think a lot of introverts can feel they’re putting information out there, but it doesn’t get read or it doesn’t get seen. So how could introverts be seen?

Marcia Yudkin: There’s some strategy there that you have to think through. So you have to think about first, who do you want to be speaking with, and you find out where they hang out, what do they read, what do they listen to, what do they watch? And you need to figure out how to get in front of the media that they’re already using. So, maybe that’s an online forum that your ideal clients exchange ideas on, and you can go there and depending on the rules of the forum. You find out, okay, what can I do to participate and become known, and then have those people want to find out more about me and so on.

Terri Connellan: Great. No, that’s really, an excellent idea because it’s probably easy for introverts to just think, I’ll put this information out and people will come and it’s not always the case. So, I think the sort of area that you’re working in to really articulate what we can do is just so powerful.

Marcia Yudkin: Let me say one more thing. The reason I hesitated about when you asked about content marketing is that there are other ways of attracting people that don’t have to do with creating content. So, for example, one of the people I worked with, was a Reiki practitioner, alternative medicine practitioner.

And she said she felt really alienated from marketing, from the whole idea of marketing because, to her, it had to do with communicating with these faceless masses of people that she couldn’t relate to at all. However, her strength was, she told me that when she got face to face with someone and was talking with them in a conversational way, that she was able to explain to them in a very persuasive, very compelling way what reiki was.

And what it could do for them in a natural conversation. So we decided that her marketing strategy would be to figure out ways in which she could have those conversations. So that’s not content marketing, but it still is pull marketing because you’re not being pushy. So she would, attend health expos for example. She would offer free sessions at places where people were already going. So she would make a deal with a yoga studio or a health club to offer free sessions there at a certain time and place. And that really, really helped her build her practice.

Terri Connellan: Mm, thank you. I really appreciate that distinction and additional comments about that idea between content marketing and pull marketing. I can see what you’re saying because, I think, content marketing perhaps can seem a little bit passive. And I guess what you are describing there too is that actively identifying how you might do things, including in a face to face way. So it’s not necessarily all putting content out there, it might be putting yourself out there in a different way.

Marcia Yudkin: Right. And I’ll give you an example of how this stuff works. So, years ago I gave a class on writing websites basically. And I had 12 people in the class and my idea was that everybody in the class would use what they were learning to create their own websites. But what happened was that, and this was totally not my intention, some of the people in the class realized that this wasn’t something that they wanted to do themselves. And they took what they were learning from me to ask me to do it for them, and that was a very natural outcome of something that I was already doing.

Terri Connellan: Yeah. That’s a really great example and it’s often working through areas that you’re working on and finding the best way for you. A lot of, it’s about finding a fit for a personality, cause there’s introverts, but there’s different types of introverts as well. So everybody needs to find, what works for them.

So what insights, practices and tools can help introverts with marketing themselves, their work and their business in the world?

Marcia Yudkin: Well, the first thing I would say is that You need to realize that you’re fine the way you are. And, 1 sentence I came across not too long ago was, No one wants to do business with a wallflower. You see how insulting that is to introverts, but also it’s just not true. Because what I saw again and again was that everybody’s not the same. So everybody doesn’t want to do business with dynamic, talkative, chatty people. There are many people who prefer to work with us quieter, less flashy, less pushy people.

And, so for example, in one of my surveys, I asked the introverts in the survey, if they found out that there was a local financial planner who was nationally famous, would they want to work with that person because they were nationally famous?

And one guy said, it was very surprising, he said, No, I definitely would not, because first of all, I would think that they would be too busy to give me any attention. And secondly, I don’t want somebody who’s spending half their energy trying to be famous and deal with that. I want somebody who’s just going to be doing client service.

And this goes against a lot of the advice that marketing experts are giving to people. You know, you have to build this big reputation. Well, not everybody wants to work with somebody who has a big reputation and somebody who’s just a local person and very good at what they do and has good referrals may be just perfect for a lot of people. That’s the kind of practitioner that some people want to work with, they actually prefer. So you don’t have to brag about yourself. You don’t have to boast, you don’t have to pretend. You can just be your best self and be how you like to work and use your strengths.

So the second thing I would say is, Figure out what you most enjoy doing and where you’re at your best vis a vis potential clients, and then engineer that. So if your best communicating by email, then you want clients who are comfortable that way and not everybody is. I’ve had a couple of clients who don’t want to settle anything by email. They want to settle everything by a phone call. And that’s stressful for me, honestly. I mean, I’ll put up with it to a certain extent if I really, really like the client and it’s the kind of work that I enjoy doing. But it’s a pain in the neck to me. And, it’s not the way that I prefer to work with people.

So figure out what works best for you. And there’s nothing wrong with telling people that you do most of your work by email, not over the phone. And that way you get the people who want to be working with you and you get the people who you want to be working with them in that way.

Terri Connellan: Great. I love that. It’s interesting as you described that because phone calls are not a preferred way of working too. So everyone has their preferred modes of communicating and their preferred ways of working, but I love that you stress that it really helps to be upfront about that and communicate that because as you say, people can often think that it’s not okay to say I use this preferred way of communicating where for somebody else that’ll make their heart sing.

I had to laugh a little while ago cause I was talking with someone about the phone and he said, Oh, I only use my phone for phone calls. I said, goodness. I use my phone for just about everything but phone calls. It was just hilarious. Both introverts interestingly, but it’s just interesting how we do have such preferences, personality driven or otherwise for how we want to be communicating.

So that’s a great point. And I also really appreciated your point about, you know, just being who we are. And as you were talking, I was thinking of Paul Jarvis’s book. I don’t know if you’ve heard of his book, Company of One. And it, he talks there about how he actually loves just being a company of one person and he doesn’t want to scale up. The way he wants to work is have a small team around him. He doesn’t want too many people. He doesn’t want to go big and his business and his marketing is driven by just keeping it small. So I think that’s really refreshing too.

Marcia Yudkin: And the thing to remember is however you like to work, there are people out there who also like to work that. So tell them. So for example, if somebody’s thinking of me as a writing coach, I need them to know that I’m candid, that I’m frank, that I’m not a touchy-feely kind of writing coach who’s going to always say, Oh yes, it’s wonderful. It’s wonderful. That’s not the way I handle things. If that’s what they want, they should go to somebody else. And so it’s really important to know yourself and to communicate those things so that you get the kind of clients that you enjoy working with.

Terri Connellan: Absolutely. And are there any particular practices and tools that you encourage introverts to explore, to help with marketing themselves?

Marcia Yudkin: Well, as I said, I always start by asking, what is it that you do best? So I’m always surprised at the variety of answers that I get. So there was one woman I was coaching to be a marketing consultant, and I never met her face to face. We just talked on the phone. I never saw a picture of her. So my sense of her was just how we related over the phone and by email and my impression of her was that she was kind of mousey and quiet and retiring and I worried a little bit about how she would find her place as a marketer.

But one of the things I recommended to her was that because she was looking for local clients, I said, Why don’t you go try BNI? And if you’ve heard of BNI it’s a certain kind of local networking arrangement. They have chapters all over the world, so I don’t, I’m sure they have it in Australia as well, but, It involves a weekly face to face breakfast meeting with about 20 people.

So it turns out she was really good in that situation because she was able to relate to people one on one and have conversations about what they did and what she did. And she was able to explain what she did in a way that was not intimidating to her. And she got her calendar all filled up to start with from this networking group and it helped that the structure, BNI has a certain structure that facilitates those kind of one-on-one conversations within the group. And they encourage referrals within the group, but she was off and running much faster than I would’ve imagined, and it was great. I was so happy for her.

Terri Connellan: That’s great. I love that example because to me again, that can be a real introvert strength. That ability to have really focused one-on-one conversations and to find an organization that provides that sort of structure to enable that to happen, that’s a really fantastic way of looking at marketing yourself and putting yourself out there. Again, the stereotypical idea is you must talk to a room full of people and for many, that’s not the best way to reach people.

Marcia Yudkin: No it’s not. And when I lived in Boston, it’s a big city as big cities go in the United States. And I did a lot of networking when I was building up my business, but, I approached it in a certain way. My idea was that if I go to a meeting and I have one really, really good conversation with a potential client, I’m happy. It’s not a matter of collecting business cards. It’s not a quantity thing, it’s a quality thing. So I remember one time there must have been 200 people in the room and I somehow got talking with a certain woman and we really clicked and she became a client for 20 years.

Terri Connellan: That’s fabulous. And again, it’s just tapping into, strengths anyone can have. But I think particularly, for some introverted types, that ability to really have, focused meaningful one-on-one conversations is a real strength and something that we can be really good at and we can tap into and use that as a way of weaving into our practices. So we’ve got ways of connecting with people. So that’s a great example. Thank you. As someone with INTJ preferences for introversion, intuition, thinking and judging as I also have, what works for you in marketing, Marcia?

Marcia Yudkin: Well, some years ago I did a report called Marketing in Tune with Your Personality, and I interviewed one person from each of the eight introvert personalities in the Myers Briggs system and asked them how did they succeed in their marketing and what did they like and what did they hate? And then I wrote it all up. And so I went back and looked at what the INTJ person in the report said.

And he said what worked best for him was a free initial consultation, which unlike many other people, he did as an actual consultation. So instead, it was not a sales thing. It was really giving the other person advice, and here’s a quote from him. He said, ‘the one-on-one client first session does not feel to me like selling. It feels more like giving them a valuable gift and enjoying the transformational process of seeing them really get what I’m all about.’

Mm. So that was him and for me, I actually don’t do free initial consultations. I’ve never done them. Someone wants to work with me, I always made it, okay, you can read all about me on my. You want to work together, let’s get started and get started with a real paid consultation. And that worked for me.

But in terms of marketing, what was my secret weapon. My not so secret weapon was for more than 20 years, I did a free weekly marketing newsletter. It was called The Marketing Minute. And at its highest point, it had, maybe 15,000 subscribers. I don’t know if that sounds like a lot or not, but it was like a money machine because every week I would have literally something that took a minute to say out loud, 180 words. And then I would have a special offer. So anybody who was reading the tip of the week or the example of the week or whatever it was, then their eye would naturally go to the special offer. And some of them worked, some of them didn’t work, and some of the ones that worked, worked really, really well.

So it was like, My marketing minute went out and a couple hours later I would look at my inbox, how many orders did I get, how many inquiries for consultations and so on. So that was my secret weapon, and it was something I really, really enjoyed doing. So, the only thing that got me to stop doing it was when I decided on my new newsletter, Introvert Up Think, and only then was I able to close down the other, the Marketing Minute newsletter.

Terri Connellan: Mm. And you’re using Substack for that, aren’t you? Which, um, Yes, I am. Is becoming quite popular, isn’t it, as a way of reaching people?

Marcia Yudkin: I like the platform actually, because almost everything that I wanted to do, it has an easy way of doing it. So they’ve created the infrastructure. And, I’ve read a couple things by the founder of the company and I like his whole philosophy as well. So he’s trying to create a culture of readers, and a culture of writers writing for readers, and the whole ethos of the company seems to be around quality writing. It’s not so much sell, sell, sell kind of marketing writing. I mean, maybe there’s some people who using sub stack to do that, but, the way the company talks to its customer base and the way it sets things up, it really is set up to make it easy for writers to communicate with an audience.

Terri Connellan: Yeah, I’ve been looking at it too. I think it’s really interesting. And for those who might not be familiar, and correct me if I’m wrong, Marcia, but my understanding is that, Sub Stack works as a free platform where you can create content and it looks really beautiful. It looks a bit reminiscent of blogging in some ways, like a combination of blogging and newsletters, but then people have the opportunity to pay for additional content. So, yeah, so I think that’s a really beautiful, easy way, isn’t it, to bring people to services.

Marcia Yudkin: You can also import a list from some other platform without any problems. That was a big thing for me because I had so many subscribers from My Marketing Minute, not all of whom chose to go to the introvert newsletter, cause not all of them are interested in those issues. But anyway, I was able to import those people who wanted to join the introvert newsletter. That was easy. It has a free platform with no problem whatsoever. So maybe you’ll never charge anything for anything, for any of your content.

And if so, Substack is happy to have you as a customer. They’ll never make money from you. That’s okay. But they also make it easy to start charging for extra content from your subscribers, and they tell you what they think the the going rate is. People in these subject areas can charge more and if you’re not, don’t go there and so on. So if you set up an option for paid subscribers, then Substack will take 10%.

Terri Connellan: Yeah, which is great. So there’s not huge upfront costs, which I think is a really great model in this day and age where there’s a lot of costs isn’t there, and running a business. So it’s excellent. And encourage people to have a look at Introvert Upthink. We’ll put the link in the show notes cause it’s a great platform and great ideas there. So if people are aiming to market to introverts or be inclusive of introverts in their marketing, what might they think about in their marketing approaches?

Marcia Yudkin: Two things. The first thing is don’t force them into your paradigm. So if you have a certain paradigm that you think is the bees knees, it may not be right for introverts. Don’t try to cram everybody into it. So for example, I had a job coach who approached me and her number one question was, how could she get her introverted clients to do informational interviewing.

She thought that there’s no way that you can get a job in this day and age without doing informational interviewing. So in case somebody doesn’t know what that is, it’s where. You find somebody who’s in the job or in the industry that you want to get a job in, and you call them up and ask them, basically to mentor you for the space of a lunch or a breakfast.

And so you can ask them questions and so on. And it’s an unpaid thing and you’re basically asking them to do this huge favor. And I told her, forget it, . This is not something that introverts are ever going to be comfortable doing or be good at doing.

And in fact, if somebody asked me to do an informational interview, I don’t know if I would even agree to it, and I certainly would not agree to do it if I were looking for a job because I don’t like asking favors of people. Hmm. It’s just something that’s unpleasant to me. And because if I wouldn’t do that favor for somebody else, why should I expect somebody else to do that favor for me? And so she wasn’t happy with this. She wanted me to tell her how to convince introverts to fit into her system and that wasn’t going to work.

And the second tip is to respect their privacy. A lot of introverts are really conscious about and protective of their privacy. So here’s an example of something that that is respecting privacy. So I signed up for a writing class and they have an online forum where the people in the class can interact and ask questions and so on. And it’s set up so that all the students in the class appear when they post something with their first name and their last initial. I’m really comfortable with that, and it made me happy that I wasn’t outed to all the other people in the class by my full name unless I chose to do that.

And so that’s the kind of thing that an introvert may be very attentive too. And, I’ve had introverted clients who wanted to give me a testimonial, for example, but they were very unsure about the idea of having their city and state put at the end of the testimonial, which is customary that a lot of people do it that way. And so I said, Fine. You know, we don’t have to do it that way if, if you’re not comfortable with that.

Terri Connellan: Yeah, absolutely. And I think there are two great tips, particularly the idea of not forcing, trying to get introverts to do something that might be good for them is almost what it sounds like from what you’re describing. And, it’s just finding that shoe that fits for the right way of doing things, both in terms of privacy and in terms of paradigm. So thank you for that. I was really interested to see that you run an introvert book club, which highlights the work of introvert creators and introverted characters, which is a great idea. So what can we learn from introverted characters, whether it’s in fiction or real life?

Marcia Yudkin: Well, this introvert book club is part of my Introvert Up Think newsletter. So once a month I have a post that is, focused on the book of the month, and that’s for my paid subscribers. So that’s my added value that I’m giving to the people who pay for the newsletter. So I’m going back through a lot of classics, the kinds of books that we may have read in high school or in college. And I’m going back to them to see what we can pull out of them or learn from them specifically about introverts. And it’s just been so interesting to me.

So for example, I did The Great Gatsby and my theme for the Great Gatsby was the mystique that introverts can have when they’re sort of distant and unattainable and on a pedestal and not very communicative. So I went through the novel and found all the places that highlighted the mystique that Gatsby had, and why is it that we think of him in terms of glamor. The novel takes place during prohibition, during the jazz age and he had these parties at his mansion on Long Island Sound. And, yet he didn’t really attend his own parties. Like a typical introvert. So you can look at characters in fiction and people in real life that we’ve heard about as famous names and try and see what are some introvert themes you can pull out?

So, for example, I did a thing on Thomas Edison. We think of him as the in inventor of the light bulb and this solitary genius. And, one interesting thing about him is that he actually built the world’s first research and development laboratory. He was not solitary at all. He set a world record for the most patents, but he had dozens if not hundreds of scientists and technologists and chemists and so on, working for him on all his little projects.

He was the brain behind it. He was not solitary at all. And the other interesting thing about Edison is that he lost most of his hearing when he was in his teens and as an adult, he said that that was an advantage because if he was having lunch with people, he wouldn’t have to listen to all their small talk because he literally couldn’t hear it. And so he could just be thinking in his own mind about his invention projects while everybody is blabbing around him. Somebody approached him once and said, You know, I’m working on some device that can help people who are hard of hearing to hear better. He didn’t want to have anything to do with it. He was happy being in his own world and it’s only an introvert that would respond that way.

Terri Connellan: So that just sounds amazing. And from that I see you’re also writing a book on what we can learn from famous and fictional introverts. So tell us a bit more about this book, how it’s going, and why you felt called to write it.

Marcia Yudkin: Well, I’m not actually writing the book per se. In doing the newsletter, I’m preparing to write the book and I’m also building an audience so that I can get a book contract.

So I’ve had book contracts from big publishers in the past. I’ve been sort of out of that for a while. And in order to get back in their good graces, I have to show them that I have people who are interested in this topic and who are following me and so on. So I have a number of subscribers that I want to reach, and once I reach that number, then I’m going to approach the publishers and I’ll have been working on the topic from all these different angles in my newsletter. And I’ll be able to put together a much better book proposal than I could if I just sat down now.

Terri Connellan: That’s really exciting and I love the way that that whole piece as you just described it, writing the book, connecting with an audience, and also preparing to pitch to publishers. So that’s fantastic and really exciting and interesting as well.

I saw you also had a session on, or a piece on Emily Dickinson, who I always find really fascinating as an introverted writer. So yes. Yeah. Fantastic. So I think people will find that really interesting. So again, we’ll link to The Introvert Up Think, and you’ll be able to find information if you’re listening and interested in that newsletter.

So, the last couple of questions, Marcia, are questions I ask every guest on the podcast. So the first one is how have you created your story over your lifetime?

Marcia Yudkin: Well, I thought about this and I wasn’t sure how to answer it. But what I can tell you is that I spent the year 2021 writing a memoir, and the theme of the memoir is Success Without Ambition.

And in my life, I talk about in, in the book, ways in which ambition led me astray and that I’m better off having come beyond that. So it’s a very philosophical book and very introspective book. It’s very much an introvert’s kind of book and I spent a year writing it. One of the things I had to do was reread all my old journals in order to get back into how I used to be and so on. And so since I finished writing it, I’m letting it sit. I need to get perspective on it and I need to get feedback on it before I go back and do the next draft. So I’m not quite ready to get back to it. But I will be, and I don’t know if that book will come before or after the introvert book. We’ll see.

Terri Connellan: Yeah. But I love that focus in your memoir around ambition and how that fits with success. I think that’s a really interesting perspective and example of, different ways we can create our story and look at the themes that thread through it. So that sounds a really fascinating project. Look forward to reading more. So the other question I ask guests is about wholehearted self leadership, related to my book, which has some tips on wholehearted self leadership and practices for women. So what would be your top self leadership tips that you would share with people?

Marcia Yudkin: Well, if you remember, when I saw that question, I asked you, Well, what is self leadership? And you gave me a nice answer and I didn’t quite understand it. And I went looking for more articles, more content about it. And there was something that was not clicking with me. And finally I realized that the reason I was having trouble with the words. That specific phrase is that to me it was a little redundant. And in my experience, probably I’ve always had self leadership and so therefore I never had to think about it.

So if I look back, even as a kid, whatever I was interested in, I went and did it. And when I was in college, again, there were things that attracted me, I pursued them.

So one of the things I did when I was in college, I went to Brown University, which is part of the Ivy League here in the United States. But what’s specific about Brown is that they have an option where you can go through all four years if you like, without having any grades from your professors.

Instead they write evaluations of you. And I really, really liked that idea. It’s a small enough school that you can get to know your professors, so it’s meaningful as well. But everybody told me, you’ll never get into graduate school if you don’t have grades.

I said, Okay, that’s fine, . And, when I went to apply to graduate school, I got into every graduate school that I applied to, so they were wrong. And I, attention to myself. Is that what you’re talking about?

Terri Connellan: Yeah, I think it’s that idea of self-awareness is one is one part of it. Like understanding yourself, an introvert, for example, as we’ve talked about through this conversation. And it’s that self mastery and that ability to make choices. But yeah, I think what I’m hearing from you is that self leadership’s been a really strong theme, or that self mastery, self belief has been really strong in you right from the start.

Marcia Yudkin: And so my tip for that is to listen to yourself. And this doesn’t come naturally to everybody. So when I was mentoring people who were learning to become a copywriter, what would happen again and again, and I noticed it and I learned from it. What would happen again and again was that we would have a conference about what they were learning.

And I would point out, you know, you really had to do such and such here. And the student would say, You know, I thought about that. And I would say, And… so over the course of this 10 week program, when I mentored them, they would have practice in listening to and respecting their ideas that they had just gone flitting through their mind.

And this was a huge step in making them confident and skilled in what I was teaching them. And I think anybody can learn to do that. It’s just a matter of attention and confidence and, you know, maybe a mentor.

Terri Connellan: Mm. And it’s that discernment in there too of knowing when to trust that voice and knowing when another thing like fear is talking, like that sort of. It’s hard to describe, but it’s a developing practice about wise listening, isn’t it?

Marcia Yudkin: Yes. And in this particular program, we were talking about ideas. So it wasn’t the fear so much that I was asking them to pay attention to, or that we were talking about. It was the ideas that, you know, had gone flitting through their mind, but they hadn’t taken seriously.

Terri Connellan: Yeah. I think that’s great advice that learning to listen to yourself, which I think is a lifetime practice, isn’t it?

Marcia Yudkin: Yes.

Terri Connellan: So thanks so much, Marcia, for your time today. It’s been really fascinating to hear more about you, about your work, particularly in the introversion space and the marketing space and how they come together, and also about your own writing and creativity, which is always fascinating. So where can people find out more about you and your work online?

Marcia Yudkin: They can go to introvertupthink.com spelled the obvious way. And, if you’re specifically interested in marketing for introverts or marketing to introverts, I have ebooks on those topics on Amazon and they’re just 2 99 each US dollars. I don’t know what they are, Australian or Euros or whatever, but, you know, just little things to get you thinking and get you started in this area.

Terri Connellan: Fabulous. That’s great. And we’ll put the link to Introvert Up Think and I can put the link to books too, if you like, in the show notes. That would be great to share with people.. Thanks so much Marcia.

Marcia Yudkin: Thank you very much for having me.

About Marcia Yudkin

For more than 10 years, Marcia Yudkin has stood up and defended introverts as worthy of respect and understanding. This developed out of her work as a marketing coach and consultant. She’s the author of 17 books and too many ebooks, online courses and so on to count. Her current focus is a Substack newsletter called Introvert Upthink, which critiques society’s misunderstandings and disparagements of introverts. She lives in the woods of Western Massachusetts, where she walks or runs five miles every day in the company of chipmunks, beaver, deer, porcupines and occasionally bears.

Introvert Upthink: https://www.introvertupthink.com

Twitter: http://twitter.com/marciasmantras

Marketing in Tune With Your Personality: A Guide for Introverts: https://www.yudkin.com/intune.htm

Marketing for Introverts: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B005ETBK9C

Marketing to Introverts: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07DZYGYYH/

Terri’s links to explore

Books:

Wholehearted: Self-leadership for women in transition: https://www.quietwriting.com/wholehearted-book/ & quick links to buy: books2read.com/wholehearted

Wholehearted Companion Workbook: https://www.quietwriting.com/wholehearted-companion-workbook/ & quick links to buy: books2read.com/b/companion

Free resources:

Chapter 1 of Wholehearted: Self-leadership for women in transition: quietwriting.net/wholehearted-chapter-1

Personal Action Checklist for Creating More Meaning + Purpose: https://www.quietwriting.net/checklist

Coaching and writing programs:

Work with me: quietwriting.com/work-with-me/

The Writing Road Trip with Beth Cregan: quietwriting.net/writingroadtrip

Connect on social media

Instagram: instagram.com/writingquietly/

Facebook: facebook.com/writingquietly

Twitter: twitter.com/writingquietly

LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/terri-connellan/

personality and story podcast transition

Quiet Empowerment Coaching and Creating with Jo Slessor

June 20, 2022

In Podcast Episode 18, Quiet Empowerment Coaching and Creating, I chat with Jo Slessor about midlife shifts and transitions, embracing the quiet strengths of introversion and the value of creativity, crafting and rewriting our stories.

Welcome to Episode 18 of the Create Your Story Podcast on Quiet Empowerment Coaching and Creating. I’m joined by Jo Slessor, a certified Quiet Empowerment Coach for midlife women, crafter and creative.

You can listen above or via your favourite podcast app. And/or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below.

Show Notes

In this episode, we chat about:

Seeking change in midlife
Becoming a life coach
Journey of midlife change
Midlife as a stage not an age
Quiet empowerment in midlife
Being a proud introvert
Valuing crafting and creativity
The power of rewriting our stories
Power of coaching in midlife
Building a new business later in life

Transcript of podcast

Introduction

Welcome to Episode 18 of the Create Your Story Podcast and it’s the 20th of June as I record this.

I’m excited to have Jo Slessor join us for the podcast today.

Jo is a certified Quiet Empowerment Coach supporting introverted and reflective women to embrace quiet and thrive in midlife and beyond. After a long career in education, working with young people with additional needs and their families, Jo stepped back to embrace gentle living, combining coaching with running women’s groups based around crafting and exploring her own creativity. Jo lives just outside London with her husband and their Cockapoo, Woody. She enjoys daily walks in nature and weekends away!

Jo and I met online via social media and as fellow certified coaches in the Beautiful You Coaching Academy. We share a focus on being midlife coaches working with quiet, reflective women across the mix of understanding introversion and embracing the opportunities and wisdom of the middle years and beyond. So I am excited to have the chance to speak with Jo on the Create Your Story Podcast to learn more about her and her important work in the world.

Today we will be speaking about midlife, shifts and transitions later in life, working with midlife women, embracing the quiet strengths of introversion, the value of creativity and crafting – and so much more.

Enjoy listening to this insightful and inspiring conversation and take some time to learn about Jo’s work and connect with her via her website and lovely, gentle Instagram profile. Links in the show notes as ever.

So let’s head into the interview with Jo.

Transcript of interview with Jo Slessor

Terri Connellan: Hello, Jo. And welcome to the Create Your Story podcast.

Jo Slessor: Morning, Terri, thank you so much for having me. It’s very exciting.

Terri Connellan: Yeah. Look forward to chatting and thank you for your connection across our work in the world. Especially as it relates to being a midlife coach and working with midlife women who may be quieter and more introvert in preference. There’s so much in common in our work. And I can’t wait to explore more about you and to chat about these topics today. So to kick us off, can you provide a brief overview about your background, how you got to be where you are and the work you do now?

Jo Slessor: Yeah, of course. How long have we got? So yeah, I come from a background in education. I probably should go back a little bit further and say that I’m English born and bred, live just outside London, and went into education when I left school as a teacher, primary school teacher. And, I worked in the classroom for a long time. And then travelled the world with my husband, with his work.

And then when I came back after I had my children, the classroom was a very different place. And I found myself moving into working with children with special needs, which I absolutely loved because I got to work with the families I got to work with their class teachers. And it was a kind of holistic support for children and the people around them.

I worked in an advisory role for quite a long time, which meant that I was going out into lots of schools and doing lots of training. And it was that working with adults and the families and the teachers that I found that I really loved most. Then, I was in my fifties when, it all started to fall apart. And I had a bit of an epiphany in the woods when I was out with the dog one evening.

I was working in a really, really challenging environment, in a rather broken system. And I was grieving. I’d lost my dad. My children were literally at that empty nest phase. And although I hadn’t realized it, I was in the thick of perimenopause. Despite having spent lots of time and lots of trips to my GP saying, I don’t feel right. I feel tired. I feel X, Y, and Z, it was never suggested to me that I was in perimenopause.

So I went home to my husband after this walk and I said, I can’t do this anymore. And he said, yeah, we’ll stop. Ah, okay, and he kind of thrown down the gauntlet. And we worked out a plan between us that we would simplify our lives, downsize, pay off the mortgage, which gave me the freedom to explore what I wanted to do next.

And I was doing a course in mindfulness, just for my own wellbeing and talking to my mindfulness teacher about our plans and how we were about to move. And I said to her, I think I probably need a life coach. And she looked at me and I’m still not sure whether she misheard me or, or not, but she said, Jo, you should be a life coach. You’d be amazing.

And that was it really, that seed was planted. And I went off and I explored courses. My initial course that I did was here in the UK. And that was it. I loved that exploration, that way of working with people. Life went on and we moved house. We took on a project and I didn’t really set up my business, but I wanted to be in that world somehow.

And then during the pandemic, during lockdown, I decided it was my time to get some more tools in my toolbox. I found the Beautiful You Coaching Academy in Australia and did the most amazing online course with people from all over the world and graduated in March 2021. And since then I have been honing my craft, working out exactly who I want to work with and who I do work with and slowly, slowly building my business. And that’s why I’m here today too Terri. So thank you for giving me the opportunity to explain.

Terri Connellan: Beautiful, and there’s truly so many similarities in our stories, isn’t there? Both have a background in education. Both had that epiphany in our fifties about needing a change and then finding that pathway to coaching others through what could be a really tumultuous time can’t it?, When you decide to make a change but you don’t quite know what it is. You just know it’s time to make a change.

Jo Slessor: Absolutely. And for me it was, there was that epiphany and then there was that moment when my husband said, well, s top. Do it. And then you think, well, how do we make this happen? Between us, we did. And that’s why I’m here today, but yeah, it’s quite a journey.

Terri Connellan: Yeah, sure. It is. And there’s lots of learning along the way. So you’re a midlife coach. What does that mean to you and how do you express your work in the world in this space?

Jo Slessor: So, midlife coach is one of the terms that I use. I think like all of us, when you’re in coach training school and you’re encouraged to find your niche and your own unique coaching sauce. So I spent lots of time thinking how I express what I do and who I am. And I think very early on because of my own journey, I realized that mid-life was a place that I wanted to be because I had been through so many of those peak experiences. You know, the career burnout, the empty nest, the career change, the downsizing, simplifying your life. And also the idea of having been through the grief of losing a parent and lots of life experience.

But also once I was in training from the beginning and I discovered the introvert extrovert spectrum. Oh my goodness. That just opened my eyes to a whole new world and gradually evolved that it was the quiet and reflective and introverted women in midlife that I wanted to work with. I love the fact that I can use my skills, my experience to empower and enable my clients to find their own answers.

But actually, Terri, I also have found that there are some times and I do express myself now sometimes as a mentor. And I will say that I’m going to put my mentor hat on here and can talk with clients about experiences that I have been through, and we can use that as a mirror to help them get through their own. So I do call myself a coach and mentor. And I’m also very clear about the fact that I am still on my own journey and discovering who I am and who I’m supposed to be in this world. We’re never finished, are we?.

Terri Connellan: And I love that idea of being both a coach and a mentor. And I certainly that’s something I also do in my own work. And I know from my own experiences of going through a midlife transition, the coach I chose to work with, I valued as much being asked the questions. But also valued that person who was a few steps ahead of me giving me some tools for the next step in the journey. Don’t you think that’s just so valuable?

Jo Slessor: Absolutely. And I think, where I am in mid-life, I’m 60 this year. So I’m still very much happy to call myself midlife and, might be something we come back to about how that has changed over the years, but I do very much feel, and I look back at myself in my forties and clients that I’ve had in my forties. And think my goodness, me, that was a different person because of everything that I have been through since then.

Terri Connellan: Yes, I loved your recent newsletter you just sent out where you mentioned in your forties, you sort of get a glimmer of what you think might happen. And then the fifties is where the rubber tends to hit the road. And it’s that sense of time running out. If I don’t start to make a change now. Plus you get tired I think of where you’ve been.

Jo Slessor: Absolutely. Yeah.

Terri Connellan: My investigations into midlife is it’s a very slippery term. It’s not well-defined but I think as the lifespan gets longer, I think midlife gets stretched out a little bit. On your website, you say that midlife is a stage and not an age. Why do you think that’s an important perspective?

Jo Slessor: Well, I think as we’ve just touched on, it’s funny, I’ve been giving this some thought recently and writing about it. Because the more I found myself in different midlife communities, the more I realized both the similarities and the differences between women who identified in midlife.

And one particular community that I was in had members from 38 through to 64. And these women were all very happy to call themselves in the midlife stage. But then it’s allowed me to reflect and look back, as I am now entering my sixties, at the fact that it’s not only just a stage that is self assessed. We decide when we’re in midlife. It’s also that idea that there are definite phases.

There is that phase when you’re in your forties, and this might be for some people in their late thirties, but yes, you get the sense of time passing. Time, certainly moves more quickly if you have children and you see them growing up. But in your forties, you’re so busy, you’re still focused on your work, your career, paying the mortgage, that you don’t really have time to stop and focus, but things are changing, both mentally and in your wellbeing and in your body.

But it tends to be a sense until you’re in your fifties. And the fifties phase is, my goodness, isn’t it? Where it all happens. All the hormones. This sudden realization that actually you don’t really care what other people think anymore, which is a huge thing. And then the idea of wanting to claim the time back for yourself and put yourself first. And the fifties were really, it’s such a huge phase within the stage. And the whole perimenopause and menopause carrying you through in one way or another.

We’re all on our own unique journeys, but then post-menopause, as we enter our sixties or late fifties and sixties, I get a sense as I approach my own 60th birthday of a time of still wanting to journey and go deep into who I am, but a stage of slightly more calm. And that might be personal for me because I have come so far with my fifties. But definitely the women that I see out there, there seems to be a more confident self-assuredness for many women in their sixties, about who they are and how they want their lives to be. But we’re still happy to say we’re a midlifer.

You know, my parents’ generation, my mother was claiming an old age pension at 60 and getting on free buses. And it’s not like that anymore. So everything has shifted I think.

Terri Connellan: As we were just saying a moment ago, lifespan is getting longer, the retirement age as a marker gets pushed out. But I had my 60th birthday last year, so I do think as you move, I mean, everyone’s on their own journey, but certainly for me and clients I work with having gone through that, if you are making a big shift in your fifites, that big change, that does tend to happen.

I think once you get on the other side of that, just the amount of things you’ve worked through in the process of moving through that journey just gives you that toolkit that we can keep strengthening to help ourselves move positively in life. So quiet empowerment is a focus in your work also. Do you find that midlife women need to embrace their quieter natures in different ways at this time of life?

Jo Slessor: I don’t know whether it’s in different ways. But what I know now, so having only discovered myself that I was an introvert at 55, that was just revelatory to me, because it just explained so much about me and about how I was and how I felt and how I felt growing up and it was like coming home. And hugely, hugely empowering to me. So in working with quieter, reflective, introverted women, many of whom actually don’t, like me, don’t use that term introvert.

I now say I am a proud introvert and that’s something that I would love more introverts to feel that they could say. But what I know now is having talked and worked with lots of women who identify as introvert or as quiet and reflective, is that my own experience of feeling not enough when I was growing up, too. All these things that teachers say to parents, you know, she’s not talkative enough. She’s too quiet. She doesn’t put her hand up enough. She doesn’t put herself forward enough. Those messages really, really sink home. And I know now that it’s not just me. I really felt that for me, that understanding of what it means to be an introvert felt like I had permission to live aligned with my energy and to accept and embrace the fact that quiet is a super power.

So I think that as a focus, I really, really want other women to feel this. And I do believe that in our fifties, we’ve jolly well, forties or fifties, we’ve earned the right to live natural and authentic lives. And actually if that is quiet, wonderful, because quiet women are amazing, aren’t they? We watch and we listen and we wait until the time is right. So often we can surprise people, I think. So I think it’s about embracing it and realizing that being who you are, is so much easier than trying to be something that you’re not or feeling bad because you feel you should be more. And I think it’s just that idea that it’s time to embrace who we are and align with our energy and putting our focus where we want to put it and not where other people expect us to.

Terri Connellan: I think that’s so true. And I resonate with so many things that you’ve said there being an introvert, my business, Quiet Writing. So there’s obviously parallels there. But I think, as Susan Cain wrote in Quiet, our world has that extravert ideal and it is oriented around the extroverted personality to a large extent. So I think many introverts can feel a bit out of touch with themselves or like a square peg or know. I was always told at work, I had to speak up more, you know, that sort of language. So you always feel like you’re found wanting rather than finding ways to express that gift in the world.

Some introverts I’ve worked with, for example, I’m sure you see the same. It’s just learning to value gifts that introverts have, like the power of listening, their ability to reflect quietly on everything that’s happening in a meeting and then summarise it. It’s just valuing different strengths. Isn’t it?

Jo Slessor: It is. It is. One of the books that really impacted on me was Marti Olsen Laney’s [The Introvert Advantage] and that was the book that, along with Susan Cain’s Quiet. Actually it was Marti Olsen Laney’s book that really spoke to me. And it is this idea that quiet leaders can be quite profound in an organisation. But too many of them don’t realise it yet.

Terri Connellan: Absolutely, many strengths from being quiet in many aspects of life, whether it be employee, family member, friend, community member, there’s just so much. I love your focus on quiet empowerment. And your newsletter is a beautiful read too about just embracing that quiet spirit in how we live our lives. And you have such a lovely social media presence too, which embodies your work so well. It’s a lovely, calming, gentle, quiet presence, which I really enjoy connecting with. So what do you focus on in your social media and why might people follow you there?

Jo Slessor: Well, if I’m going to be totally honest with you, Terri, thank you for that. But you know, I have very little idea of what I’m doing. Social media, it wasn’t something I really engaged with or used before I started running my business. And it was suddenly this realization, my goodness me, I’m going to have to work at this. I very much don’t really plan. I’m very intuitive and it’s aligned with my energy. And if I don’t have the energy to post and to follow and respond, then I won’t.

I have four main themes. So I suppose pillars, which are quite obvious really: midlife, introvert, creativity, and nature, which are the things really that I talk about the most. They embody for me that quiet empowerment. And I use my Instagram as a place to build my community. It’s not about the numbers. I don’t have huge numbers, but I do have a very engaged community of like-minded women. If we’re using it as a marketing tool, I use it to direct people to my website and to my newsletter. And it’s in my newsletter that I can really talk and be myself because I know exactly who I’m talking to.

Whereas I sometimes think you’re just talking into this space and I don’t know who is looking and who is listening. And with the Instagram algorithm as it is at the moment, I think everybody is saying those people that you’re reaching are absolutely plummeting. So therefore I’ve never put all my eggs in that Instagram basket.

There are times when I love it and I love connecting with different people. I’ve met some amazing people through Instagram. But you really have to do in a way that feels right to you. And I don’t do it naturally. It took an awful long time before I put my face on my grid. And now I do almost every time because that’s where I get the most interaction from people, the most engagement..

I speak as I see around midlife, being an introvert, exploring creativity and the wellbeing that I get from nature. And if other people like that and follow me, then they’re my kind of people. And , that’s what I want. And I do go through and I do knock people out quite a lot. If theyre people and I’ve looked on their accounts and they’re not the kind of people that I want in my community, then I would rather keep it small and engaged.

Terri Connellan: Yeah. And there’s a lot to be said for being able to reach people and engage by doing exactly that. We connected via Instagram through our connection with Beautiful You. But I think it’s that ability to find like-minded souls. Whether it’s just seeing the words, seeing the imagery, seeing the story, it’s a lovely way to connect with like-minded people.

Jo Slessor: But, you know, it’s becoming an increasingly complex place to be, a quite stressful place to be, especially as an introvert. Posting photos is one thing and then we need to be posting videos and then it’s the pointing and the dancing and all this. And I have actually taken a step back and just said, no, I’m going to stay aligned with what feels. And safe to me. And therefore I’ve almost committed that I’m not doing dancing. I’m not doing pointing. And I will do video as, and when it feels safe for me to.

Terri Connellan: Yeah, absolutely. And I think that’s a great example of honoring your introverted personality and the way you want to do things. There’s always, like you said, with not posting your face initially, there’s a process of perhaps stepping outside our comfort zone too. But I also think it’s important to do what resonates with us, whether it’s how often we post, where we post, how we post. We’re curating ourselves really, aren’t we?

Jo Slessor: Absolutely. Absolutely.

Terri Connellan: That’s great to hear your approach to that. So you’re also a crafter and creator with one of your pillars around creativity, which I found really fascinating too. So tell us more about this aspect of your life and how you see creativity fitting in with midlife experiences.

Jo Slessor: I mean, it’s something that I am so deep in at the moment. But it’s always been an important part of my life. And I have expressed my creativity in different ways over the years in crafting and making. I think I was a creative teacher. I loved teaching art, either displays. I loved finding creative ways to do things. I ran an afterschool club for children in my home, which was an art club. And as we’ve gone through those stages, I’ve always learned new creative skills, but very much, they’re hands on: textiles, glass, mosaic, crafter, and somewhere, I picked up a story that I wasn’t good at art.

And I carried that for four years. That’s just the story that I’m not good at art. And I literally, this year have decided that I’m challenging that now. And it’s been honestly, revelatory to me what I’ve achieved in taking on an Instagram 100 day project where I said, okay, well, I’m just going to do something creative every day. But I am just going to be playful.

And so for me, and this is something that has been huge. And it’s something that I would love to explore with other women, I think it’s an opportunity for us to go back and revisit our inner child. Because where did this message that I’m no good at art come from when I’ve spent my life creating things. So I went back right to the beginning and I have played with paint and layers and scraping things off and mixing colors and really kind of exploring my inner child. But alongside that, I’ve got two really weird things going on, really, really tight, creating precision collage and these other things kind of going on.

So I’ve been doodling and playing and I’ve been creating very focused pieces of work and they are pieces of art. Aren’t they? So if I’m creating pieces of art, then I need to be able to call myself an artist. So for women generally, I think, again, at this stage, it’s about giving us permission to do those things that make us feel good.

And I think for our wellbeing, exploring your creativity for well-being, it’s huge. It’s a time when, I sit down with whatever it is, whether I’m knitting or crochet or making mosaics or painting or collaging. And you just get in flow, don’t you? Everything calms down, you stop thinking about everything else outside of where you are and what you’re doing.

And then the self-expression, it’s just a way to express yourself. So one of the things that I have done recently, was I decided, and this is aligned with my business, it’s aligned with finding people outside social media is that I run face-to-face groups in my community for women who craft and we literally meet together over craft, coffee, cake.

And it’s just wonderful to see the group of 7, 8, 9, 10 women crafting, connecting, talking, and the outside world disappears. And everybody just says, oh, it was wonderful. It’s about giving yourself permission. I’m going to spend two hours in the company of other women crafting with my hands and connecting.

So I think then they do take that back into their homes and we work on our own. But just that idea of crafting for wellbeing, for expressing yourself, exploring yourself, especially with that inner child, I would love to do more of that. It’s a very mindful activity. So I think there’s lots of things about crafting for your mental health, your self expression and just actually committing and time bonding that time for yourself and for your craft.

Terri Connellan: Absolutely. And what I’m hearing you say is that it’s about taking back time for us as creative women, particularly, certainly been my own experience, when we’ve put all our time into work, into paid employment, into other people, family. Creativity might always be a thread that goes through our lives, but it may get pushed aside. One it’s hard to prioritize it when you’re busy, trying to earn an income and bring up children.

And then secondly, you mentioned permission. It’s just that saying that it’s okay to take the time out to spend a couple of hours working creatively. And I know I still struggle with it. Even with my writing, which I know is important. It’s easy to prioritize the administration, the social media, all the other jobs than it is to sit on this desk behind me and write for an hour or two it’s, you know, it can be a bit of a battle too. So I think we’re when we can create spaces such as you’re creating where we can meet with other women to prioritize creativity, it’s so important.

Jo Slessor: Yeah. I’ve actually just made a commitment to myself that next week I’m going to come off social media completely for the week and look at the time that I spent in there this week and dedicate that time to being creative. I’d be interested to see how I feel about. What impact it has on anything in terms of, am I going to lose all my followers in a week? No, of course I’m not. But I’m going to free up that time and give myself permission to do an online course and take a holiday from social media and invest that time in my creativity.

Terri Connellan: Sounds a beautiful project to focus on. So on your website you say that your midlife transition journey to living and working in new ways involved rewriting some stories you’ve been told and come to believe. What stories did you need to rewrite and how did you do this?

Jo Slessor: Oh, right. Stories, powerful, aren’t they? One of them we’ve already talked about really was that introvert story. That story that I’m not enough, I’m not interesting. I’m not funny. All those ideas around what it is to have a quiet preference and a quieter personality. And that was definitely learning about being an introvert and realizing what it means and realizing how safeguarding your energy just helps you to flourish and live so much more authentically in the world. That to me was huge.

I think one of the other big ones was that as women in a patriarchal society, we are more and more aware of this idea that women in mid-life, well, we’re past our prime. We’re coming to the end of our useful life. What value are we to society? What role, what purpose, those ideas. Which coming back to what you were saying about extended life expectancy, extended earning potential, all those things, actually, it’s a load of baloney. And honestly, I’m happy to feel that I’m only just beginning, although this is a very different stage and phase that I’m in.

That was a massive story. And it’s a story that we’ve been sold for generations. I think finding people who inspire you is incredibly important. And seeing other women.. The whole grey movement. Women who decide to stop coloring their hair. I mean, that movement has come from a few high profile women saying, oh, I’ve had enough of this now. And everyone’s goes, looks it’s amazing. Oh, so does she, so does she.

And it can be finding people who inspire you and make you realize. Yeah. I can do this too. I can be like this. And I think for some women, that’s enough. But this whole idea of stories. Stories are really powerful. You’re a writer, you understand that. And we know that our brains believe exactly what we tell them, because they don’t know what’s true and what’s not.

So if we rewrite our own stories, in the way that we want to present ourselves and the way that we want to be, then I honestly believe that we start living life more authentically. And we step into that power. And I found myself to be a lifelong learner. That’s one of the things far from being finished. I realize now that I’m probably going to be very poor in my old age. Cause I’m going to be doing courses and learning and stepping into new things for as long as I can. So lots of stories, but I think essentially it’s that idea of rewriting our own stories and saying how we want to be and how we want our lives to be and how we want to feel is a very important way to go.

Terri Connellan: I think it’s a mix of societal stories, but also what we internalize too, from that. You mentioned your ‘I’m not good at art’ story, which can be a combination of what society defines as good art. On top of that, our own definition of what an artist looks like and same for writers. I think rewriting our stories, claiming some of those words that empower us, like artist, writer, crafter, it’s really powerful work. A lot of the work we do in coaching is about reframing mindset actually around just helping people to articulate what it is we want to be, and then finding the language and the direction around that.

So yeah, very powerful work in the world. But it certainly starts with our own rewriting of our stories, doesn’t it? So how do you help other women in similar circumstances as a coach?

Jo Slessor: Well, I think that a hugely important part of my work is about helping women to identify their own stories and what stories have they carried with them from childhood, or that have come from somebody’s bad advice or a throwaway comment or something that they’ve picked up in education, or as you say, societal messages.

And I think once we begin to realize that we do carry these stories. And that in coaching, we like to set intentions or goals depending on how your client wants to work, really. But as we work together and we find barriers and things that are getting in the way of them fully exploring or succeeding in their goals and their intentions, what stories are getting in the way.

And I think again, it’s a very powerful, thread to explore what those stories are. And we rewrite them and we rewrite them in a way in which we can explore how they want to feel and how they want to live. The power of stories and rewriting stories is huge. And we can reclaim the power that they have over us. And I think that in coaching, that’s an amazing place in which to do that.

Terri Connellan: Absolutely. Yeah, it’s important work. And I just know myself from making the changes that I made and I’m sure you’ve found too, our own experiences of coaching, how it helps us realize the power for others. And, it’s hard to describe sometimes, the coaching process, but I think experiencing it for yourself is probably the best way to really understand the power of it. Isn’t it?

Jo Slessor: I’m really glad you said that because something that’s really difficult is when somebody says, well, how do you help people? And actually it is quite a magical process. And I’ve tried before to articulate what it’s like to be coach or how I help people. But actually it’s just an amazing process that has its own voice, takes its own journey for every woman, every woman’s coaching experience will be different.

My own personal coaching experience is that idea of well, why wouldn’t I, if not now, when and why wouldn’t I? Just that idea of somebody sitting in front of me asking me very, very simple questions that make me question, well, why not, why not now?

And having that accountability and somebody there to say’ if now is the time, then I’m here for you. I wish I could bottle i n an elevator pitch exactly what coaching is and how I help people. But I think it’s a very difficult thing to do until you’ve been in it yourself.

Terri Connellan: Yes. Yeah. And I think going through the process, you learn so much. But I did also strongly resonate with your comment earlier about coach and mentor. And I think, certainly as a coach, I’m sure you do the same, you’re mainly the one asking the questions to bring the information out, but there’s also a time when you can offer the right resource, the right guidance, the right book to read. This is what happened to me. Do you relate to that? And I think that part of the magic sauce too, is just being that guide, finding that little thing that’ll take the person the next step.

Jo Slessor: Yeah, it does. It sometimes really surprises me. I’m working with a client last week and there was a session which I had felt, oh, I’m not sure how much we achieved. I’m not sure that we were on the same wavelength. And she said to me, I can’t believe how much you’ve shifted me that week. So, there is magic in there that we can’t always understand or see at the time.

Terri Connellan: Yeah. And I think that our introvert intuitive skills help a lot in those situations too. So what does life look like for you now as a midlife courage?

Jo Slessor: Well, I’ll be honest. I’m living the life now that I couldn’t have imagined five years ago. You know that afternoon when I was walking in the woods as a burned out teacher and it’s due in no small part to the changes that we made in our lives as a family, which enabled me to have choices. So my life now is one that I honestly feel that I am able to live with intention. I have just the right balance of work, rest and play that aligns with my life stage and my energy. I have never set out to try and make a full-time salary from what I do as a coach, because there are other things at this life stage that I want to be doing.

And we made changes in our life to take that financial pressure away. So my life now I have to say is pretty good. You know, it’s not perfect and it’s not the life that an awful lot of people would want to live. But I have the work that I love. I have the groups that I run, which I just love the idea of community.

I have time to spend out in nature and to explore my creativity and I’ve also just got a little admin job, which buys my art materials, literally. So it’s a gentle life and it’s a life in which I’m really happy.

Terri Connellan: Congratulations for shaping a beautiful life that is what you need at this time in your life, because it doesn’t come without a lot of hard inner work.

Jo Slessor: No, absolutely. It’s been a lot of hard work and transitions and making hard decisions. And my husband and I, we’re both the same age, we both hit 60 this year. And, there will be more hard decisions to make as we do approach full retirement. But, in this stage of our lives, you make the right decisions with the right support and I think we’re benefiting from that now.

Terri Connellan: Fantastic. So what are some of the challenges you’ve experienced in building a new business later in life? And how have you worked on these?

Jo Slessor: Yeah, well, building a business at this life stage is not for the faint-hearted and I know that I’m probably not alone in wondering whether I would have done so if I had known just how hard it is. And that’s the honest truth. But I love it. I love it because, I said that I’m a lifelong learner and this is part of it.

Every day is an opportunity to learn more and to celebrate every success. The biggest challenge, and I think maybe some of it is our age, but I speak to many younger coaches who are finding the same, is the tech that is involved in running a business, especially an online business.

And I would say if that is something that challenges you, there are plenty of people out there who can help you. I run my business with my hand held high that I am not a slick machine. And that sometimes it’s easier to pick up the phone and have a conversation about an appointment, than set up my diary in a particularly tricky week.

You know, I’m not a slick machine. I love the relationship that I have with my clients and the way that we work together and that’s because my business is my business and it’s authentic and a little bit messy and that works for me. But the tech is a challenge but you only need to use as much as you want to use. And they’re other ways around things. You are working an awful lot of hours for possibly not as big of a return as you might hope in those early days. And I think I’ve gotten to a point where that’s easing now, because I realize where I need to put my boundaries in place, when I need to switch off from my business.

But it’s fun. It’s new, it’s learning, it’s meeting new people and learning new things. And in order to do the work that you love, and if it is work that you love, you do it anyway, because it’s fun. I can’t imagine putting this much work into a business that I didn’t love. I think that’s probably the crux of it. If it was a business, that didn’t mean something to me, I’m not sure that self-employment would be for me.

Terri Connellan: Yeah, absolutely. And I agree with all the things you’ve said. For me, there’s a creativity in it too. You can see, creativity is one of your core values, as it is of mine. Even doing the podcast, I was editing today, again, it’s tech focused and it can take time. But I thought, I just love this. I love the conversations we’re having. I love taking the time to craft them, another form of crafting, to shape them into something that I can share with the world and have people listen.

And I get such joy from that. So financially it may reward me in other ways if people find out about my book, find out about my business, find out about you. So there’s rewards from our time. But I think at the end of the day, it’s very much about self-expression. It’s about sharing the wisdom that we’ve learnt over the years that we’ve been living. And yeah, then the tech, I like the tech, but it’s no denying that it takes time and it can be a rabbit hole. But I think your point that , you can make it as simple as you like. That’s a great reminder. So I love watching your business grow in particular, seeing you, your cabin, how you’re meeting with clients. I think it’s really beautiful. How we show up in the world, as you said, it’s all about authenticity.

Jo Slessor: Absolutely. Yeah.

Terri Connellan: Cool. So a couple of questions that I ask each guest on the podcast. So the first is about how have you created your story over your lifetime?

Jo Slessor: I think I’ve always been a really independent spirit and I’ve made up my own mind and I’ve done my own thing. And perhaps this does come out of being an introvert. I think perhaps as a listener and a watcher, you do live slightly independently of other people. I have been incredibly lucky to have a husband who has wholeheartedly supported me in whatever I wanted to do and whatever decision I made at every step. And we’re a great team. But, in mid life, I think it was realizing the importance of self-development and growth, to know yourself, to understand yourself and that we are all on a journey. And that journey still continues.

And I think that creating my own story has just come out of being an independent being who is prepared to learn, work out exactly who I am and what I need.

Terri Connellan: I love that. And I love how many times stories has come up in the conversation today about rewriting stories, the stories we tell ourselves. And, I think that notion of being independent and that personal development journey through midlife is just a fantastic time to reflect on the stories and keep writing new stories. Yeah. The second question that I ask folks, my book Wholehearted has 15 wholehearted self-leadership tips and practices for women.

And I’d love to hear from the people I chat to on the show, what you would identify for people as your top wholehearted self-leadership skills, especially for women.

Jo Slessor: Right. I think the first one is listen and follow your gut. Whether you call it your intuition, your inner knowing, that has absolutely guided me over the years. And for that reason, I was so interested in seeing recently how much research has gone into how many nerve cells or neurons there are in your gut and the link with your brain. So number one, I would say, if you feel something in your gut, then it’s probably the right thing to do.

The second one I was saying is be curious. Maybe it’s part of my creativity, but be curious. Maybe this is why I love being a coach. Cause I’m always asking questions cause I want to know stuff. So be curious, ask questions. Think, well, why not? Rather than what if and I think that will get you a long way.

And then I think the last one that I wanted to say was just to have the confidence to be you in the knowledge that you are not the right flavor for everyone. And thank goodness for that. We will never be the right thing for everyone. It’s an impossible dream. So therefore, why waste time trying to be anything else than be you.

Terri Connellan: Beautiful, love those tips, especially that third one about, yeah, we’re not for everybody. And it doesn’t make a lot of sense to tailor yourself to somebody else who’s not you, does it?

Jo Slessor: Absolutely.

Terri Connellan: Thank you. I love those three really wise tips. Thanks for sharing them today. So that’s just about the end of our time together, Jo. It’s been lovely chatting with you. Can you tell people where they can find out more about you and your work online?

Jo Slessor: Yeah. I have a website which I am tweaking a little bit at the moment, but it’s still up and running and hopefully people will get a flavor of me at www.joslessor.com. I am on Instagram. And my Instagram handle is @joslessor. And I have a newsletter which is called Notes from the Cabin. We didn’t really talk about the fact that I work mostly out of my cabin in the garden, which is my gorgeous little introvert space. So my Notes from the Cabin, you can get on that mailing list from either my website or my Insta. And it’s a monthly roundup of midlife, introvert, quiet empowerment and nature and creativity and all those things that we’ve talked about today.

Terri Connellan: All the good things in life. Thank you so much, Jo, it’s been great to chat with you today.

Jo Slessor: Well, thank you for having me. It’s been lovely to talk about the things that we both realize are so important in life. It’s been great. Thank you.

About Jo Slessor

Jo is a certified Quiet Empowerment Coach supporting introverted and reflective women to embrace quiet and thrive in midlife and beyond. After a long career in education, working with young people with additional needs and their families, Jo stepped back to embrace gentle living, combining coaching with running women’s groups based around crafting and exploring her own creativity. Jo lives just outside London with her husband and their Cockapoo Woody. She enjoys daily walks in nature and weekends away!

You can connect with Jo:

Website: www.joslessor.com

Instagram: https://instagram.com/joslessor