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

Terri’s links to explore:

Books:

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

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

Free resources:

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

Free 10 Tips for Creating more Meaning and Purpose Personal Action Checklist https://quietwriting.lpages.co/10-tips-mp-checklist/

Coaching and writing programs:

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

The Writing Road Trip with Beth Cregan email list: http://eepurl.com/hNIwu9

Connect on social media

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/writingquietly/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/writingquietly

Twitter: https://twitter.com/writingquietly

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

introversion intuition personality and story

Introverted Intuition: Learning from its Mystery

June 30, 2021

Introverted Intuition is my dominant function as an INTJ personality type. I’ve been learning more about it through my personal journey and as a practitioner in psychological type. I share my insights to guide your own journey, whatever your personality preferences.

Introverted Intuition and your type

If you identify as an INTJ or INFJ personality type, Introverted Intuition is typically your dominant function; if you identify as an ENTJ or ENFJ, it’s your auxiliary function; for ISFP and ISTP types, it’s the tertiary function and for ESFP and ESTP types, it’s the inferior function. And it plays out in some way for all types. If you don’t know your type, it’s not a huge issue; if the words ‘Introverted Intuition’ speak to you, chances are they are natural preferences for you or areas on your radar for development.

Introversion and Intuition

Focus on introversion and working its strengths has surfaced in recent times especially as a result of Susan Cain’s book, Quiet: The power of introverts in a world that can’t stop talking. This has been powerful, helping introverts feel more understood and aware of their gifts; however, understanding how introversion and intuition play out together has had less attention. True to type, much of my learning about Introverted Intuition is from my intuitive, personal experiences. I’ve also found valuable insights through reading and research on the function to help make sense of how its mystery works.

What Carl Jung says

Firstly, though, I went back to Dr. Carl Jung for insights as the source, given he conceptualized the eight functions based on his work with patients. Jung’s wise thoughts have helped me to understand my experience of Introverted Intuition.

In a video interview, Jung describes the life of the Introverted Intuitive (Ni) type as ‘a very difficult life…although one of the most interesting.’ This is strangely comforting. He says the key challenge is that there is ‘something funny’ about intuition as we don’t normally consciously know how it works.

In this same interview, Jung defines Introverted Intuition as ‘a perception by ways or means of the unconscious.’ Being linked with introversion and the inner world, these perceptions are unique to the individual and not common to all. This makes it hard to explain these insights in a comprehensible way and creates a sense of mystery. He explains that Introverted Intuitive types tend to keep their insights to themselves because no one would understand.

So what is Introverted Intuition?

So how does this play out in a practical sense? Introverted Intuition works primarily via symbols and images. It involves being aware of abstract ideas and tuning into the language of dreams and the unconscious. It functions especially through an ability to see connections and associations. Through the filter of your inner world, you attach your own meaning to these symbols or images. You can’t always see how you got from A to B; you only know the result of the sequence.

Dario Nardi has applied neuroscience to see how the neocortex of the brain works for different personality type preferences. In his book, Neuroscience of Personality, he describes how people with Introverted Intuition as a dominant function enter a whole brain, zen-like state when asked to envision the future and when focusing on a single question without distraction. The Introverted Intuitive particularly accesses this state when working on a new problem.

The Introverted Intuitive function has been described as ‘Visionary Insight’, by Mary McGuiness in her book You’ve Got Personality and as ‘The Seer’, in Gary Hartzler and Margaret Hartzler’s book, Functions of Type: Activities to develop the eight Jungian functions.

Ways Introverted Intuition manifests – my learnings

Here are some of my practical learnings about Introverted Intuition and how it can manifest:

Poetry and other intuitive writing

As an INTJ, Introverted Intuition appeared early in my life via poetry. This is the perfect vehicle for Introverted Intuition to play out its magic, given it is based on symbol and imagery created in quiet space and time. Any stream-of-consciousness writing is a valuable way of tapping into what’s going on at a deep level and to resolve contrasting positions. You can work with poetry and other creative writing to perform magic not possible in real life – like bringing people back into your life, if for a moment, or resolving hurt or disappointment. And this can help move you through hard times and into a new stage of life.

Envisioning in the workplace

Working on the big picture and creating the long-term vision of what might be is something I enjoy. My auxiliary function, Extraverted Thinking, ably supports me in this. Day to day in my work role, I read the strategic landscape pretty well to know what might come up as an issue. I don’t always know why, but I often intuitively know the next thing to concentrate on as an action or project. It helps me bring together the larger vision process with identifying the next steps. It’s valuable to find the quiet time to coalesce these aspects and I’ve learned to rely on this and listen to it as a leader.

Tarot and oracle practice

Working with tarot and oracle cards has become a deep personal practice. The framework of tarot and oracle symbolism is a way of working with the unconscious in a practical and structured way. Engaging with tarot and oracle cards regularly helps to tune into intuitive guidance as a form of ongoing narrative. Finding a symbolic language that works for you can help to enter the core strength of introverted intuition that offers such deep wisdom and insight.

The challenges and balancing of Introverted Intuition

There are challenges in being introverted and intuitive. You can get drawn into your own world too much. You keep things to yourself. The ideas you come up with are often hard to communicate to others.

To balance the extremes, it’s useful to bring in some of its opposite functions, especially Extraverted Sensing (Se) and Extraverted Intuition (Ne), including:

accepting that some things just are what they appear to be;
spending time outside in nature to ground all that inner work in reality;
focusing on timeframes and what is practical; and
shaping visionary thoughts into a structure or framework

Ways to work with Introverted Intuition

Whatever your type and dominant function, you can learn to integrate introverted intuitive approaches into your life to help with creativity, visionary insight, connecting associations and seeing the whole.

Here are some practices for developing and applying Introverted Intuition in your life based on my own experiences fleshed out with concepts from the book, Functions of Type: Activities to develop the eight Jungian functions by Gary Hartzler and Margaret Hartzler. This book has excellent practical examples of activities to develop all the eight Jungian functions.

Ideas for developing Introverted Intuition include:

Work with symbols and the connection between ideas:

Notice the symbols that recur for you and work through their connections and meaning.
Write about the connections, tapping into stream of consciousness writing as a way of accessing the unconscious meanings for you.
Work with tools and media that have symbolism and imagery as their focus e.g. tarot, oracle, poetry, art, mandalas.

Envision how things could be:

Journal to envision how things you desire could be – your dreams, your plan, your work life.
Flesh the vision out in your imagination so you can see what it looks and feels like.
In business contexts, step out of the every day for a higher level view of the future.
Let images of how it all could look like in 1 year, 2 years, 10 years come to you.

Work on viewing things from a range of perspectives:

In a meeting or online group or in your family, see things from the perspectives of others and hold those perspectives simultaneously to see a more holistic view.
See how these multiple versions or viewpoints can come together into something new.
See how you can bring together diverse products and services into something unique.

Look behind the obvious to the more hidden meaning:

In a coaching or mentoring situation, listen to see the hidden meaning behind words and behaviours.
Reflect back what you are seeing sensitively as a platform for further insight.
Practise identifying what is not being said in situations such as television interviews and meetings.
Try to get a more holistic perspective and practice your skills of reading the unspoken.

Introversion and intuition working together can result in vision, positive solutions, and innovative insights. It’s valuable to learn how to work with its mysteries whether it is a strong preference or a less natural one. I hope these insights are valuable for flexing your introverted intuitive muscle for more holistic perspective and inspired creativity.

You can learn about Extraverted Intuition here: Extraverted Intuition – Imagining the Possibilities

Introverted and extraverted intuition – how to make intuition a strong practice

Shining a quiet light – working the gifts of introversion

Intuition, writing and work: eight ways intuition can guide your creativity

Read Wholehearted: Self-leadership for women in transition

Want to learn more about personality, creativity and self-leadership for positive transition to the life you desire?

Head over to read about my book Wholehearted and the accompanying Companion Workbook now.

Available in paperback and ebook from retailers listed here:

Wholehearted

Companion Workbook

introversion personality and story

Quiet in my life – how learning the value of quiet made all the difference

September 25, 2018

As part of the #quietwriting hashtag and Instagram Challenge, we shift now to looking at the value of quiet in my life and yours.

Use the #quietwriting hashtag across platforms – for the challenge and beyond – as a way to create, connect and link us together on our ongoing journey to draft, process, create, make space for writing and other creativity and otherwise live a wholehearted creative life. Read on to discover more and connect with creative others about the value of quiet.

Quiet in my life

When I was thinking of prompts for the #quietwriting challenge, it wasn’t long before the word ‘quiet’ popped up.

Why? There’s no surprise that quiet is a value I hold very dear as a writer, an introvert and an INTJ in Jung/Myers-Briggs personality type. You only have to look at my business and website name to see that!

For the challenge, I’ve chosen to share an image of two books that made a huge difference in my life:

Quiet by Susan Cain
Quiet Influence by Jennifer Kahnweiler

I’ve written about both books in more detail in my free e-book, 36 Books that Shaped my Story.

The first time I understood my need for quiet in a deeper way was when I worked on assessing my psychological type with a coach. My coach said to me, asking about work contexts as a leader, “Do you close your door?” It was a light bulb moment that helped me to value my need to close the door occasionally, get quiet and regroup. It was okay to do it and it was something I needed to do.

That insight and conversation was the beginning of a deeper journey into understanding my introverted intuitive nature and its needs. These two books helped me immensely in that journey.

Quiet in my life as a leader

I read these two books on quiet and introvert strengths when I was a leader in the adult vocational education sector. My role involved leading many people, up to 3,000 staff and with responsibility for tens of thousands of students and their learning environment and programs. I often had to speak to large groups. Tough negotiations and meetings were commonplace. I also worked in the political arena, advising our state Minister for Education in an environment that was mostly anything but quiet or relaxed.

These books, furthering my knowledge of my INTJ personality type, helped me to understand the value and strengths of being a quiet worker and leader. Skills like the ability to listen deeply, read widely, prepare and research well, ask valuable questions and use writing as a strategic skill. You need to learn how to deploy these skills and use them to effect in different ways. Not comparing yourself to extraverted others helps. Being able to understand and marshal your strengths is a powerhouse of knowledge and skill you can quietly own and use. Jennifer Kahnweiler’s book particularly helped me understand key six skills of quiet influence and recognise my strengths in this space. Writing is one of these and my superpower that I use in many ways to enact quiet in my life and its influence.

Quiet in your life

How about you? Think about roles you have been in and where you have learnt the value of quiet in your life. As an introvert, you might need to learn to work differently and honour what is natural rather than see it as a weakness. Extraverts might need to learn to carve out space in their lives for quiet because it’s not always a natural preference.

Were you a quieter person growing up? How did it make you feel?
How do you make space for quiet in your life now?
What does quiet look like in your life?
How does quiet play out in your relationships, between the extraverts and introverts in your life?
Did you feel different if you were a quiet person at home or at work?
What did you do about this? Do you understand it?
If you were not the quiet person, did you find it challenging to make space for quiet in your life?
What helps you quieten?
Which practices at work or in your creativity help you to harness the power of quiet?

Love to hear your thoughts and see any images on Instagram – just use the hashtag #quietwriting for the challenge or anytime so we can connect with you. Or share your thoughts in the comments or on Facebook.

Understanding your personality

If you’d like to work more on understanding our personality, I’ll be rolling out my offerings in the personality space in mid October. It’s not just about introvert and extrovert aspects though these are important. You learn about your preferences around sensing and intuition; thinking and feeling; and perceiving and judging as well.

The Personality Stories package includes:

personality type assessment online
an online course on personality preferences so you can understand your type
a coaching package to work on deep-diving into the wholehearted story of your personality.
a Quiet Writing personality type summary, and
email support for two weeks after.

Personality Stories coaching package

Here’s the detail of the coaching package. You receive:

Personality assessment online: Complete the Majors Personality Type Inventory (MajorsPTI™) online assessment. This helps you to begin to identify your Jung/Myers-Briggs 4-letter personality type.
Self-paced online course on personality type: Working through the self-paced Personality Stories ecourse. It takes about 3 hours (max) to complete this short online course. I hope you will find it fascinating learning about Carl Jung, his followers and their rich work on personality type.
Coaching debrief to work through your results: Once you complete the ecourse, we have a 90 minute 1:1 face to face coaching session via Zoom to debrief your results. You receive your Majors Personality Type assessment report, and the four letter code arrived at, in this session. The coaching debrief focuses on checking that your assessment result is your true or best-fit Type and discussing your results. We work through any questions and set inspiring goals and actions to take this knowledge forward and embed it in your life.
Quiet Writing summary: Once your true personality type is confirmed from the coaching session, you will receive a Quiet Writing summary of the key aspects of your personality type to take forward. This includes links to further reading, tarot connections and suggestions for managing stress and fostering creativity in your life.
Email contact for 2 weeks after to follow up on any questions and learnings.

The investment for this package is priced at $350AU as a special ‘first release’ price. Just let me know via email at terri@quietwriting.com if you are interested in being included in the first limited October enrolment.

Quiet connections via #quietwriting

So I welcome your comments here or on social media. I look forward to seeing #quietwriting images that share thoughts and open up dialogue on quiet in your life. Just share an image on Instagram using the tag #quietwriting and follow the prompts each day for ideas. Here are the prompts:

And the #quietwriting hashtag will continue beyond the week of the challenge, so use it anytime to create and connect. You can learn more here about #quietwriting

Just a reminder of the key points:

Quiet Writing is about the strength that comes from working steadily and without fanfare in writing and other spheres to create, coalesce, influence and connect.
Hashtags are such a fabulous way to gather, finding our creative kindred souls and inspiration online.
On Instagram, you can now follow hashtags as well as individual profiles. So follow #quietwriting now and into the future to connect around creativity and your quiet work, writing and making art.
You can head on over to the #quietwriting hashtag on Instagram or Facebook or other social media anytime and see what’s popping up.
You could also post on your own profile on Facebook as well using the hashtag.
Often we write quietly, behind closed doors or in busy cafes, privately. Let’s shine a light behind the scenes and capture the process of writing and creativity in action, wherever we are.

Get on board with #quietwriting + the hashtag challenge!

These are just some ideas and they will evolve as we all contribute. It doesn’t have to be all about writing – it can be any form of creativity. Nor do you need to be an introvert; all of us need quiet writing time to get creative work done.

I’ll feature my favourite images from the tag here and on Instagram and Facebook so share your images for the chance to be featured!

So join the #quietwriting party and let us know what you are up to! Who knows what creative connections you might make to support you on your journey or inspire your next creation?

Welcome your comments and images to inspire and connect our creativity online from the quiet in my life and yours!

Keep in touch & free ebook on the ’36 Books that Shaped my Story’

You can work with me to help reset your creativity and wholehearted self-leadership. Free 30-45 minute coaching consults chats are available so please get in touch at terri@quietwriting.com to talk further. I’d love to be a guide to help you create with spirit and heart in your own unique way. Consults available now for an October coaching start!

You can download my free 94-page ebook on the 36 Books that Shaped my Story – just sign up with your email address in the box to the right or below. You will also receive updates from Quiet Writing and its passions. This includes personality type, coaching, creativity, writing, tarot and other connections to help express your unique voice in the world.

Quiet Writing is on Facebook and Instagram – keep in touch and interact with the growing Quiet Writing community.

If you enjoyed this post, please share via your preferred social media channel – links are below.

Personality skills including how to be the best you can be as an introvert in recruitment

October 27, 2017

This article is a roundup of recent Quiet Writing guest posts with a personality skills focus. This includes: how to be the best you can be as an introvert in recruitment; leadership and self-leadership; and introverted and extraverted intuition.

They all reflect the focus in Quiet Writing on wholehearted self-leadership and knowing our personality and how to work it.

Learning about recruitment as an introvert

My guest post, This is How to Make the Most of the Right Recruitment Opportunities as an Introvert, is featured on WorkSearch.com. It explores the challenges and opportunities in presenting yourself strongly as an introvert in recruitment processes.

This article on personality skills in introversion and recruitment stems from my leadership experiences, observing and supporting others going through recruitment. It is shaped by my developing practice over time as an applicant and an introvert. And it’s informed by my professional understanding as a personality type practitioner.

There have been three key influences in shaping my practice and experience as an introvert in the recruitment space:

Working with a coach and mentor over time – I worked on my skills over time in coaching and workshop contexts with executive coach, Nick Greenhalgh, from Career Innovations. In partnership, we developed skills in leadership and recruitment in staff members. This was so they could present themselves in their best light when applying for positions.
Understanding quiet influence skills via Quiet Influence: The Introvert’s Guide to Making a Difference – This book, by author, speaker and executive coach, Jennifer Kahnweiler features in my 36 Books that Shaped my Story. Through it, I learnt to value and deploy the natural introvert skill-set for influence and impact. Importantly, I learnt how to apply it for maximum effect in recruitment situations and leadership roles.
Developing my practice as a professional in Jung/Myers-Briggs personality type – It’s one thing to know you are an introvert and what that means. But I wanted to dive deeper and use my knowledge to help others. I knew the difference this self-knowledge made in my life, so I was keen to share this light with others. So I’ve trained in personality skills and type assessment, adding this to my professional leadership and self-leadership skill-set.

Sharing skills learned as an introvert in recruitment

Based on this input and background, in this article, I share my feelings and experiences about being an introvert in recruitment contexts. I have invested significant energy in my skills over time both as an applicant and leader. I share my learnings and key resources from this experience in personality skills to guide you.

Whilst this piece focuses on introverts in recruitment, the skills are valuable for all going through recruitment. You might be more extraverted in preference and so able to think quickly on your feet. But skills like thorough preparation, achievement mapping, knowing your case studies and writing well will only complement your natural strengths, making your claim for positions stronger.

I hope you enjoy this article honed from my personality skills knowledge, leadership and self-leadership skills. I’d love any feedback and thoughts on your experiences and on the article itself.

This Is How To Make The Most Of The Right Recruitment Opportunities As An Introvert

Leadership, self-leadership and solitude

You might also enjoy my other recent guest post on WorkSearch.com, How to Become the Heart of Successful Leadership: This is What You Need to Know. It was based on the book, Lead Yourself First: Inspiring Leadership Through Solitude by Raymond M Kethledge and Michael S Erwin. My personal experience as a leader, introvert, life-long learner and committed autodidact influenced my thoughts and reflections. Leadership especially as a quieter person and the value of solitude for all leaders are highlighted in this piece.

How To Become The Heart Of Successful Leadership: This Is What You Need To Know

Personality, wholeness and intuition

I naturally focus on introvert areas as an introvert and because I know the difference this knowledge made to me. Learning to work my introversion was a light-bulb moment for me and many of my coaching clients and Quiet Writing readers relate to this. But in my personality work, I’m interested in promoting balance, wholeness and acceptance of others, whatever our type. It’s great to understand our own personality type. It’s also valuable to learn from other preferences.

So, it was fascinating to deep dive into intuition from both an introverted and extraverted perspective in guest posts over on Life Reaction recently. If you haven’t already read them, you can find them here:

Introverted Intuition: Learning from its Mysteries

Extraverted Intuition: Imagining the Possibilities.

To make intuition a strong practice, it’s worthwhile to review the different modes of cognitive processing and comparing these different ways in which intuition plays out in the world.

Personality skills and wholehearted self-leadership

I hope you enjoyed this round-up of Quiet Writing guest posts on introverts, recruitment, leadership, personality and intuition.

These guest post pieces reflect the heart of Quiet Writing. Two key themes underlie Quiet Writing: one is being wholehearted and how we create our stories; the other is self-leadership and how we work towards being wholehearted through taking personal action.

The key to taking action and knowing which actions to take are:

knowing ourselves and what we value and desire
learning to listen to our inner knowing
understanding our innate personality, including its strengths and what is challenging for us
seeking out, incorporating and acting on influence and inspiration from others.

My thoughts on wholehearted self-leadership stem from being a leader in the workplace and learning from this experience. The leadership of creativity and my impact on others’ ability to be innovative has been a key theme in my life’s work. I’m interested in how this lens can now be applied more broadly so self-leadership is a way of promoting self-driven approaches to more holistic career and creativity.

The key aspects I have chosen to focus on in Quiet Writing are:

Life Coaching – for wholehearted self-leadership
Writing – to discover our wholehearted stories and how we strive for creative lives and careers
Personality assessment and exploration – to be able to explore our personality skills and stories through Jung/Myers-Briggs frameworks and other perspectives to help us in our quest for understanding, accepting and knowing ourselves.

I look forward to exploring these themes further at Quiet Writing and in writing, personality and coaching work.

And my sincere thanks to WorkSearch and Life Reaction for featuring my work on their platforms as part of a growing body of knowledge on personality skills, leadership and self-leadership.

Keep in touch

Keep in touch – subscribe via email (see the link at the top and below) to make sure you receive updates from Quiet Writing and its passions. This includes personality skills, Jung/Myers-Briggs personality type developments, coaching, creativity, writing and other connections to help express your unique voice in the world. You will also receive my free ebooks 36 Books that Shaped my Story and Reading Wisdom Guide for Creatives, Writers and Coaches – so sign up now to receive it!

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My wild soul is calling – a wholehearted story

August 28, 2017

This guest post from Elizabeth Milligan reminds us that listening to our wild soul calling can provide important clues to a more wholehearted life.

This is the second guest post in our Wholehearted Stories series on Quiet Writing. I invited readers to consider submitting a guest post on their wholehearted story. You can read more here – and I’m still keen for more contributors if you are interested.

Quiet Writing celebrates self-leadership in wholehearted living and writing, career and creativity. This community of voices, with each of us telling our own story of what wholehearted living means, is a valuable and central part of this space. In this way, we can all feel connected on our various journeys and not feel so alone. Whilst there will always be unique differences, there are commonalities that we can all learn from and share to support each other.

I am honoured to have my online friend, Elizabeth Milligan, as a ‘Wholehearted Stories’ contributor. Elizabeth and I met through Susannah Conway’s e-course, Blogging From the Heart, years ago now, and have followed and celebrated each other’s journeys ever since.

My sincere thanks to Elizabeth for the contribution of her beautiful personal story to Quiet Writing, including the stunning images from her journey. It’s a journey that has taken her to many new and rediscovered places – read on to find out more!

My wild soul is calling

It’s difficult to say where my story of living a more wholehearted life started. There was no one dramatic, life-changing event. It was more of an ongoing unease and restlessness that prodded me awake at night through my twenties and thirties. A gentle tap-tapping, a whispering breeze, a far-off voice calling my name. I tried to listen and follow my heart. I travelled widely and far afield but I never found an answer. I kept on moving. I switched careers, jobs and countries more times than I can recall, but still something was missing. Depression hit me. Anger. Despair. Why couldn’t I just be? Why the restlessness? The continual searching?

I arrived at my forties and decided it was stability I needed. I stopped moving, got a job, met a man. For a time I was able to breathe. The elation and euphoria of a new love blotted out all other concerns. Or did it? Soon the question of our combined futures was gently raised, and it turned out we were both looking for something other than the lives we were leading. Ten months into our new life together we jumped ship, left the city and ran away to the countryside. The plan was to use our savings, take a sabbatical of sorts from life and work in the city and do something more creative with our days, surrounded by nature. We found a housesit in the middle of nowhere in rural France, gave notice on our jobs, put our stuff into storage, and set off.

Doing the groundwork

It sounds like this was all a smooth transition, but in reality there was a lot going on before any of it could happen. I’m talking about mind-set and subtle changes that take place through conversation, discussion, self-questioning and research. Where ideas and thoughts start to become viable possibilities. I had been listening to Danielle LaPorte’s Fire Starter Sessions and was wanting to take a more proactive approach to my life based on my true values. I had made my first vision board and stuck it on the wall opposite my bed so it was the first thing I saw in the morning and the last thing at night. I wasn’t really sure what I was looking for but I was certain I was looking for something different.

I felt like I had spent the best part of my life as an observer and onlooker. When was I going have the starring role in my own life rather than a sad, out-of-camera cameo? I could see very clearly where I was in life and to most people, this probably looked like a pretty good place. A good job in a nice French city, a leisurely cycle to work, regular meetings in Paris, outdoor markets for shopping, and beautiful city parks or the hills of Beaujolais for weekend jaunts. But in reality, my job was boring me to tears. It was not who I was and it was not what I wanted. I felt guilty for not wanting it but I just couldn’t do it anymore.

I realised things had to change and I had become aware of other options. Instead of constantly trying to quash the panic and feeling of wanting to run, like I’d been doing for so long, it was time to listen to my gut and break free.

Taking a risk and breaking free

So we took a risk, threw everything up in the air and allowed the universe to catch us. Ever since I read the books of Oriah Mountain Dreamer many moons ago I have wanted to trust in the power of the universe, to open up and surrender to something bigger and infinitely more powerful than we will ever be. This was my chance. I knew that we were going on a journey but I didn’t realise, and still don’t fully understand, the long-term implications of that decision we made one warm summer’s evening in our tiny French apartment.

Before arriving at our housesit, an isolated farmhouse sitting alone in over one hundred acres of rambling fields, I had no plan of what I would do every day. I wanted to see how things would unfold. I was not going to force myself to do anything. I was craving unstructured days and freedom and this was the perfect opportunity.

Finding my inner child

Being completely free with no commitments, no expectations from anyone, and no structure in the day is rather strange at this age. I can see how some people may be uncomfortable with this, but for me it was a wonderful and decadent regression. I felt like a child left behind in a secret world after all the adults had gone home.

I found a pair of wellington boots that fit me and spent my days in wellingtons and shorts trudging around the fields spotting the local wildlife. Deer, hares, coypu, egrets, foxes, wild boar, although these I never saw. I only heard them some nights when the moon was full, calling across the fields with their terrifying blood-curdling screams. I chopped wood for the fire and foraged for herbs and fruit, making nettle soup, elderberry jam and mountains of quince chutney. I made friends with the barn owl that lived in the unused kitchen chimney, and the bats that flew around at night, often through the open windows. I watched the sunrise in the morning and the sunset at night and every full moon I would run into the field behind the barn to catch the first glimpse on the horizon.

Feeling like I was finally in my true environment, I became re-acquainted with the little girl inside and realised with relief that she hadn’t left me after all. She had just been hiding and waiting for the right conditions to show herself again. As a child I loved cycling and I had forgotten what fun it was to cycle around quiet country lanes. Using bikes we found in the barn we started cycling to the shops for our groceries instead of driving. When the weather was warm we would stop off and swim in the river on the journey home. I felt alive. I felt in touch with this beautiful planet we live on. I had rediscovered a missing piece of the puzzle.

Rewriting my story

The next piece of the puzzle I found was regarding personality type. I was in an online group of women and one week a discussion about personality type came up. This was new for me so I did an online test and identified as personality type INFP on the Myers-Briggs scale.

This means nothing if you don’t know about this scale. But what the test results revealed was that I was an introvert. I had never considered whether I was extrovert or introvert before but the realisation felt like the penny dropping. I suddenly saw my past with startling clarity. I had felt like an outsider my whole life. An observer. Someone who kept their distance. I thought I was maybe anti-social. I had been called shy and quiet at best, and aloof and stand-offish at worst. Here was something saying I was perfectly normal and not only that, other people felt the same way too.

I realised that if the stories I had been telling myself were no longer true then everything could change. If I nurtured my introvert qualities and stopped trying to be extrovert like the world seems to want, then I could rewrite not only my past, but my future. Astounding.

Freeing my creative soul

So I started to nurture my newly discovered introvert self. I very tentatively started to allow myself to enjoy being who I was, rather than reprimanding myself for not being someone I wasn’t. I tried to stop worrying about all the things I was not and focus on all the things I was. Of course, this is easier said than done. But what seemed to help me was the daily pursuit of a more creative way of life.

To document life in the farmhouse I had started a blog and this became my way of communicating my newly discovered introvert self to the outside world. Using writing and photography I started expressing myself and sharing my journey online. Later on in our housesitting adventures, I would learn to express myself through art, something I had sadly locked away for years but which thankfully resurfaced along with other creative pursuits as yet another important, and previously missing, piece of the puzzle.

Intuition as a guiding light

Trusting my intuition, although incredibly difficult at times, has become a guiding light on my journey. If I had planned things out too much I would never have discovered my creative side as I have, because I would have been busy committing to those plans. I still have a lot of problems trusting my intuition and tend always to look outward first even though I know that only I have the answers to the deep questions I ask myself. But I’m slowly learning to take the lead in my own life. Inhabiting my life with my creative, nature loving, introverted self rather than filling the role of onlooker in a life that appears alien to me.

Bit by bit the negative and fractious energy built around the person I thought I should be has dissolved and been replaced by a more positive, gentle, flowing energy that is built around who I truly am. Some parts of me I am still shy to show to the world, but these things take time and if I continue to trust my intuition then I am sure everything will slot into place as and when it needs to.

The struggle of self-discovery

All of these new experiences and discoveries were not without struggle though. My demons showed up time and time again in dark moods, self-doubt, fear, impatience and insomnia. Try to imagine this wonderful farmhouse in rural France in the middle of winter when we have been living in a grey cloud for the past few weeks. There is no dry wood for the fire and the wind is howling through the badly fitting doors and windows. The boiler keeps blowing out so there is no hot water and we are sitting there in the kitchen with our demons wondering how long you can spend in such isolation before going completely insane.

In dialogue with my demons

This part of my journey I was not prepared for. But one by one as the demons showed up at the door, snarling at me in disgust, taunting me with their snide comments of ‘not good enough’, ‘failure’ and other such niceties, I invited them in and I sat with them. Quietly hearing them out until they had no more to say and disappeared off, one by one, back into the mist. I knew they would return but I felt like it would be ok. For the first time in my life I had opened up a dialogue with my own mind and somewhere deep inside I knew this to be a turning point and something to learn from. I am still learning, but I now know that once we let the light in and start to show up every day as our true selves, everything changes.

We never did go back to real life, whatever that is, like we sensibly thought we would after our one year sabbatical, now four years ago. Our savings lasted longer than we thought and it was difficult to say no to other housesits. A winter by the sea looking after a tiny hotel. Another two winters looking after an 18^th century château and the resident cat. A summer in a city apartment in Copenhagen.

The way forward

I’m not sure what’s next and I’m not sure it really matters. My life has changed from the inside out and although I know I’m not there yet, I’m certainly on my way to living a much more wholehearted life. Letting go of what no longer serves me and focusing on what lights me up. Most importantly though, I’m enjoying the journey. ♥

Key book companions along the way

The Fire Starter Sessions – Danielle LaPorte

The Creative Fire – Clarissa Pinkola Estes

Writing Down the Bones – Natalia Goldberg

The Power of Now – Eckhart Tolle

Women who Run with the Wolves – Clarissa Pinkola Estes

I Will Not Die an Unlived Life – Dawna Markova

Turning Pro – Steven Pressfield

The Big Leap – Gay Henricks

The Invitation / The Call / The Dance – Oriah Mountain Dreamer

About Elizabeth Milligan

Elizabeth is an aromatherapist and quiet creative. She is currently redesigning her life and work around her own wholehearted values of creativity, positive interaction with nature, and slow and simple living. You can find Elizabeth online at https://smashedmacarons.com or on Instagram Twitter and Pinterest.

Keep in touch

Subscribe via email (see the link at the top and below) to make sure you receive updates from Quiet Writing and its passions. This includes developments on coaching, personality assessment offerings, creativity and other connections to help express your unique voice in the world.

My free action checklist with 10 Tips for Creating More Meaning and Purpose in Your Life! Just pop your email in the sign-on box and it will be with you.

Quiet Writing is on Facebook – Visit here and ‘Like’ to keep in touch and interact with the growing Quiet Writing community. There are regular posts on intuition, influence, creativity, productivity, writing, voice, introversion and personality based on Jung/Myers-Briggs theory.

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How to make the best of introvert strengths in an extraverted world

July 22, 2017

I am an introvert, an INTJ in the Myers Briggs Type Indicator world and basically off the dial on introversion. Yet I have balanced this with a job that involves a huge amount of people interaction, talking in front of groups, leading and participating in many meetings with complex interactions. As a result, it’s not easy to make time to charge my batteries through time alone, even though it’s something I desperately need.

Learning to successfully negotiate this balance is an ongoing journey and finding the time for recharge is a challenge. I’m interested in working my introvert side, understanding its strengths and weaknesses, capitalising on it, identifying what I can bring to a situation. I want to make the best of my introvert abilities and work them rather than have them working, and sometimes exhausting, me.

Here are some key inspirations and influences on understanding your introvert strengths in the work sphere for greater impact and positive outcomes.

Leveraging the advantages of being an introvert at work – Penelope Trunk

This article from Penelope Trunk discusses how the world of work rewards and is basically set up around the needs of extraverts. Her article provides a balance to this by offering some tips for leveraging the advantages of introverts. These tips include:

working from the world of ideas
giving full attentiveness for a short, concentrated time
improving your self-knowledge of your type
teaching other people how best to interact with you as an introvert, and
learning about the job roles that would best suit you.

There are also some excellent references for further reading embedded in this insightful article.

Caring for your introvert – Jonathan Rauch

This classic 2003 article from The Atlantic is about understanding the orientations and needs of introverts. It looks at some common myths or assumptions about introverts and provides a balanced point of view. The article takes the perspective that introverts are misunderstood and dogged by stereotypes such as being shy. Rauch corrects this one by saying that “introverts are people who find other people tiring.”

Rauch has some good pointers for balancing time with people and finding time to charge again. His answers to a scan of issues about introverts (are they misunderstood? are they oppressed? what are the implications of extraverts dominating public life?) provide useful perspectives for introverts seeking to find points of strength and balance. I especially love the distinction between introverts who typically ‘think before talking’ vs extraverts who typically ‘think by talking’.

Top ten myths about introverts – Carl King

This article lists Carl’s top ten myths about introverts, in a similar vein and drawing on the book ‘The Introvert Advantage: How Quiet People Can Thrive in an Extrovert World’ by Marti Olsen-Laney. It captures these myths in a pithy way I could instantly recognise. The article concludes:

‘It can be terribly destructive for an Introvert to deny themselves in order to get along in an Extrovert-Dominant World.’

Suggestions for managing this include: understanding the myths, linking in with other introverts for support and the need for extroverts to respect the ways of introverts.

Extroverts, introverts, aspies and codies – Venkatesh (Venkat) Rao

This article is a fascinating summary of introvert and extravert issues but takes a step further into the realm of microeconomicss, transactions and social psychology. The article explores energy in the exchange from the introvert and extravert point of view. It also reviews:

how introverts and extraverts manage isolation vs physical contact
1:1 encounters and their depth
weak-link social fields such as coffee shops
strong-link social fields such as family gatherings
relationships over time and relationships with strangers.

Venkat also looks at how the tension between extraverts and introverts plays out in the slang terms they use or might use for each other. For example, ‘aspies’ (a term used by extraverts for introverts and linked to Asberger’s Syndrome) and ‘codie’s ( a possible term as none exists and linked to co-dependency). Venkat concludes by saying that introversion is becoming far more visible, resulting in shifts in the landscape of social psychology.

Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World that Can’t Stop Talking – Susan Cain

The publication of Quiet in 2012 was a significant milestone in the landscape of literature about introvert strengths and how to work them. This book changed my life as I read page after page of narrative that explained so clearly the way I operated in the world. Backed by extensive evidence, cutting edge research, neuroscience and stories of real people, ‘Quiet’ helped me make sense of so much. As a result, I better understood myself and especially my unique powers of negotiation and leadership. The practical strategies exemplified assisted me to work my specific strengths and also manage my energy far more effectively.

These strengths include:

thorough and detailed preparation
asking the right questions at the right time
active listening
ability to focus intensely and be in flow
working more slowly, carefully and deliberately
the ability to take strong positions and come across calmly and with reason

Quiet Influence: The Introvert’s Guide to Making a Difference by Jennifer B. Kahnweiler

Jennifer Kahnweiler’s Quiet Influence was another game changer for me in understanding how you can have influence in quiet ways. It provides a response to the problem often experienced by introverts: “In every performance review, I’m told I need to speak up more.” I’ve experienced this and I knew it wasn’t the problem or the solution! This book helped me realise that I had strengths – quieter strengths – that I needed to recognise as such and deploy more effectively.

These influence strategies for making a quiet difference include:

taking quiet time
preparation
engaged listening
focused conversations
writing
thoughtful use of social media

Learning how to use these strategies more effectively made an enormous difference to my impact and influence. I felt better about myself as I was more in flow with my natural energies rather than trying to be more extraverted. Quiet influence is a far more empowering and instinctive place from which to work.

Unpack your introvert strengths

I was fascinated to read in Penelope Trunk’s article above that my type, INTJ, has the longest Wikipedia page:

‘Because the combination of being an introvert and being ideas-driven makes one very interested in learning about oneself. INTJ’s are an extreme case, but all introverts have this combination to some extent, and the self-knowledge will help you put yourself in situations where you’ll have the most positive impact.’

It’s true, I am an extreme case and this summary is a piece of evidence testifying to that, an addition to the INTJ genre. True to type, I can’t tell you how energising I found the experience of researching and writing it.

But for everyone, self-knowledge helps you make the most of your natural strengths. I hope this article is useful in identifying and unpacking your strengths and working your introvert. Or that it helps in the all important perspective of better understanding the ways of those around you.

How do you work your introvert? I’d love to hear!

Note: This post was originally published on my blog Transcending in 2011 as ‘Working your Introvert’. It’s updated in July 2017 to reflect key additional influences since that time.

Feature image via pexels.com and used with permission and thanks.

Keep in touch

Subscribe via email (see the link at the top and below) to make sure you receive updates from Quiet Writing and its passions in 2017. This includes MBTI developments, coaching, creativity and other connections to help express your unique voice in the world. My free e-book on the books that have shaped my story is coming soon for subscribers only – so sign up to be the first to receive it!

Quiet Writing is on Facebook – Please visit here and ‘Like’ to keep in touch and interact with the growing Quiet Writing community. There are regular posts on intuition, influence, creativity, productivity, writing, voice, introversion and personality including Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI).

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introvert

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.

Show Notes

Transcript of podcast

Introduction

Transcript of interview with Jo Slessor

About Jo Slessor

Terri’s links to explore:

Books:

Free resources:

Coaching and writing programs:

Connect on social media

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Introverted Intuition and your type

Introversion and Intuition

What Carl Jung says

So what is Introverted Intuition?

Ways Introverted Intuition manifests – my learnings

Poetry and other intuitive writing

Envisioning in the workplace

Tarot and oracle practice

The challenges and balancing of Introverted Intuition

Ways to work with Introverted Intuition

Ideas for developing Introverted Intuition include:

Work with symbols and the connection between ideas:

Envision how things could be:

Work on viewing things from a range of perspectives:

Look behind the obvious to the more hidden meaning:

Read more:

Read Wholehearted: Self-leadership for women in transition

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Quiet in my life

Quiet in my life as a leader

Quiet in your life

Understanding your personality

Personality Stories coaching package

Quiet connections via #quietwriting

Get on board with #quietwriting + the hashtag challenge!

Keep in touch & free ebook on the ’36 Books that Shaped my Story’

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Learning about recruitment as an introvert

Sharing skills learned as an introvert in recruitment

Leadership, self-leadership and solitude

Personality, wholeness and intuition

Personality skills and wholehearted self-leadership

Keep in touch

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My wild soul is calling

Doing the groundwork

Taking a risk and breaking free

Finding my inner child

Rewriting my story

Freeing my creative soul

Intuition as a guiding light

The struggle of self-discovery

In dialogue with my demons

The way forward

Key book companions along the way

Keep in touch

Read more Wholehearted Stories

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Unpack your introvert strengths

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