April 29, 2025 • 47 mins
What happens when a big-hearted farm girl turns Muppet-inspired porch performances into TED Talks and global keynotes?
Tina B. joins Lauri for a soulful, sparkly conversation on intuition, presence, and the power of letting your full self be seen. From the fifth-grade teacher who believed in her voice, to a Paris keynote gone sideways (and back again), to 30 days of Facebook Lives in her sweats—Tina shares what it really means to speak from your truth—slides or no slides, fear and all.
If you’ve ever dimmed your light, doubted your story, or wondered how to truly connect when you speak, this one’s for you.
TAKEAWAYS
1. Being seen is powerful.
2. Presence trumps perfection every time. You don’t need perfect slides to make an impact.
3. Storytelling is a muscle. No matter where you’re starting, you can train your ability to speak magnetically,
4. Intuition is a superpower. Learning to “yes, and” your own inner voice creates magic - on stage and off!
5. Let go of the need to be impressive. Focus on being interested, not interesting.
6. PowerPoint isn’t Preparation. Soulful speech prep is rooted in energy, intuition, and doing it out loud and on your feet.
7. Magnetism isn’t one size fits all. Your disco ball might be someone else’s white fluffy pillow, and both are beautiful.
8. Comparison is a story that silences. The more we embrace our uniqueness, the more magnetic we become.
9. Magnetism = Heart + Truth + Sparkle. It’s not about being loud, it's about being real.
Connect with Tina
https://www.tinabakehouse.com/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/tinabakehouse/
https://www.facebook.com/TinaBakehouse
Take the Speaker Alter Ego quiz to find out which protective mask hides your natural radiance so you can learn how to get present, connect deeply, and share your vision when it matters most!
https://voice-matters.com/speaker-alter-ego-quiz/
Thank you so much for listening!
Take the free quiz and learn which Soul Sucker™ you need to release to free your voice: https://voice-matters.com/soul-sucker-quiz/
Follow me on:
Instagram https://www.instagram.com/voice_matters_llc/
Linkedin https://www.linkedin.com/in/lauri-smith-voice-matters/
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Lauri (00:00):
Hello and welcome back to the Soulful Speaking podcast.
I am so excited .
.She my guest today.
She started her own company,tina B LLC, to provide intuitive
communication, consulting andcoaching to guide heart-centered
leaders and organizationsinternationally to communicate
(00:23):
more effectively.
So she fits right in here onthe Soulful Speaking podcast.
She has oodles and buckets ofexperience and I want to save
this auditory version for you tohear that in her story.
Welcome, tina.
Tina (00:38):
Thank you.
Thank you, Lori.
It's so wonderful to be here.
I'm excited for thisconversation.
Lauri (00:42):
Me too.
Me too, let's dive in.
Tell me, where did yourspeaking journey begin?
Tina (00:52):
I would say when I was very, very little, I grew up on
a small farm in southwest Iowaand I literally had this front
porch that became my prosceniumstage and I loved crafting
little shows with my stuffedanimals.
I was motivated from the MuppetShow, jim Henson, all Things
Performance, and when I bought ayounger brother and sister I
(01:15):
just thought you know what?
Now I have people I can direct,and so when I was seven, I
started doing annual anniversarystories and shows dinner
theaters, if you will for myparents, and it really got
inside of me this excitementthat is possible for writing
something that people areattentive to and listen.
(01:38):
And as I adventured throughhigh school and college, I did
speech and theater and all thethings and then just leaned into
teaching the field ofcommunication at the high school
level and then got my advanceddegrees at the collegiate level
and I just found that there wassomething so gratifying in the
(02:00):
idea of okay, I have an audience.
What is something that I'mexcited and passionate about in
the idea of, okay, I have anaudience?
What is something that I'mexcited and passionate about?
How can I pierce theirlistening with what I have to
say?
Through story and ideas?
Lauri (02:16):
I wanna go back in time to the earlier end of the
spectrum in the fifth grade.
I think the teacher's name wasMrs Hogave, close Hogave.
Tina (02:28):
Yes, yes.
Lauri (02:30):
Tell me what kind of role did Mrs Hogave play in your
story?
Tina (02:35):
Yeah, mrs Hogave, she, oh my goodness she's.
I still keep in touch with her.
She's nearing 100.
And we I write her letters,call and I've even had teas with
her for her birthday and so I'msuper grateful.
She sees the light in otheryoungsters in terms of what
(02:57):
their possibility is.
And when I was in fifth gradeI'd had a rough fourth grade
year.
A really rough teacher and whowas discouraging, really shushed
me a lot from reading aloud andshe saw potential in me and I
remember she came up to me andhanded me a script and she said
I picked this particular playwith you in mind as the main
(03:19):
role and I just was like whatyou see something in me?
And she says, yes, and I knowyou'll do what you see something
in me.
And she says, yes, and I knowyou'll do.
Her word was marvelous, you'lldo marvelous.
And so I took so muchseriousness, like the rigor that
an actor would for, like theirdebut on stage as a Broadway
(03:39):
star or that very first movie,an Oscar winning performance,
and I remember just rigorouslyreading and practicing and
memorizing and just beautifullyhad this experience of people
listening and clapping and herarm around me and the big hug
and said see, I knew you had itin you and you're going to do
beautiful, big things with yourvoice.
(04:01):
So keep performing, keep acting.
And it was her that reallyinstilled in me that.
Oh, she saw even more.
So the thing that I love to doI'm meant to do.
Lauri (04:14):
What was it like to have someone with that belief come
into your world right after theshushing person in your world?
Tina (04:26):
Yeah, that it was exactly what I needed.
I mean, she loved her students,loved them, and I remember even
having a conversation with herwhere she had a student that was
just rough around the edges andshe got through to that student
because he knew he could counton her to care for him.
(04:47):
When someone cares for you andwhen they notice you and see you
, everyone wants to be seen andrecognized for their gifts, and
I just hadn't had that at all.
In fact, I have big enthusiasm,big love, big heart, and it was
squished down by so manyteachers.
I mean, I even had one thatsaid you know, Tina, I love your
(05:09):
creativity on this assignment,but remember to color inside the
lines, and I'm an outside ofthe lines person.
And Mrs Hovabine embraced that.
She just really encouraged itand said okay, there are no
rules to this other thancompleted on time.
That's the only thing.
This is the deadline.
(05:30):
And so to have her believe inme, I think, heightened my
passion, my openness to learningand my abilities of wow someone
sees in me, my possibility, andit just encouraged me to want
and do more.
Lauri (05:47):
Love it, love it and then you've done Muppets.
You have such an extensive,beautiful journey and I also I
know when we first connect youmentioned a little bit that even
through all of that, you havehad moments of imposter syndrome
(06:08):
.
Even though I'm telling youpeople like I did not read her
bio aloud because there is toomuch amazing stuff in it.
It is extensive and amazing andyou're probably, if you're
listening, already getting asense of her and yet even you
have had some moments of thecrippling nervousness and the
(06:31):
imposter syndrome.
Can you talk a little bit moreabout that in your journey?
Tina (06:38):
Yeah, I've done two TED Talks and I remember that very
first one where I was like, ohmy gosh, I'm getting up on a
stage on that red dot.
That is the quintessentialcredibility, and this is the
very thing that I teach.
And I started to play terribletapes in my head of what if I
(06:59):
forget what I'm supposed to say,what if I come off too robotic
and memorize what if, what if,what if.
And the what ifs became verydaunting and heavy and scary.
And I fortunately have thisamazing mentor, another teacher,
a professor that is actuallyvisiting me later this month,
which I'm so grateful for.
She's a theater prof.
We've known each other for over30 years and she invited me and
(07:24):
said we're going to get you outof your head, hon.
And it took her.
She not only gave me her purpleblazer for good luck, so like
wearing that token of love,wrapped me with a big hug and in
words of encouragement.
But it's true, our minds arepretty powerful, like we can get
(07:44):
into this, like Brene Browntalks about, the stories we tell
ourselves can be so cripplingand the fear was very real,
where I almost didn't want to doit, where I almost said I don't
have to do this, but then myintuition said absolutely, this
is exactly what you need to do.
Yeah.
Lauri (08:03):
Yeah, what a gift in that theater, professor reminding
you the magic is not in yourhead, it's in your body, it's in
the present moment, it is inyour presence, your heart and
your heart.
Yeah, it's not in theinformation I mean.
Tina (08:41):
Yeah, it's not in the information.
I mean, yes, you had valuableinformation to share, and
ourselves.
First, to get in that grounding, which we did prior to this,
which I so appreciate, it is tobe fully in the moment that what
happened before, what's goingto happen next, is not there.
It's this, it's this moment.
And when you do that, when youwalk out onto a stage, kind of
(09:02):
like I did internationally for aParis keynote, when the
technology wasn't working, I hada choice I could panic and flip
out, or I decided to take thatmic and, in the moment, create a
musical, improv, improvised rapthat I got all the women on
their feet and shifted thatenergy.
Not only did it shift theirenergy and get them excited, it
(09:24):
did that for me.
It was very important for me,so that I was like you know what
?
I don't even need those slides,I'll email them to you.
Let's just have thisconversation.
Lauri (09:33):
Yeah, and just tracking, like if you had listened to the
teacher who said Tina, don'tcolor out of the lines when
coloring out of the lines, whencoloring out of the lines is one
of your magic powers.
When you're standing there andthe slides aren't going, how you
(09:55):
responded is all well, she wentoutside of the lines, the lines
where you're supposed to haveperfect technology.
You're supposed to have theslides.
So thank goodness you have hadteachers and you chose to commit
to coloring outside of thelines and owning that, like when
(10:15):
the slides go down, you are theperfect person to be standing
at the front of the room helpingeverybody else in the room have
the experience that they weremeant to have on that day.
Tina (10:27):
Well, a lot of them actually said they were so
grateful because it let them letgo of perfectionism and not be
so committed to their slides andsay, oh, if this happens I can
just have a conversation.
I have this information andthis stuff inside of me that I
don't need these things behindme to be the focal point that
(10:50):
really people come to hear myvoice and feel my energy, and
slides simply cannot do that.
Lauri (10:57):
Yeah, no.
And our inner critics?
I call them the soul suckers.
Tina (11:03):
Our inner critics.
I call them the soul suckers.
Lauri (11:05):
They're so trying to help us that they can often make us
hide behind the slides.
And when people's inner criticsare trying to control the
experience, sometimes they makethe slides the whole show.
It's death by PowerPoint.
Theater sports, to some extent,the audience seeing a movie.
(11:28):
Those are experiences that thepeople in the audience and the
people in the building reallyhave together, and I remember
during the pandemic, when thewhole world shut down and all
the live theaters shut down,someone bringing up the fact
that studies have shown thatwhen actors and audience are in
(11:50):
the same space together, theirhearts do actually start to beat
in unison.
Tina (11:58):
And that can happen from a speaker and an audience also,
in fact I've done some researchwhere our brains change when we
hear stories, and there's PaulZak who's a researcher that our
hormones, our oxytocin, thathelping hormone, actually
increases.
You know, because, similar towhat you were saying about the
hearts, we go on that journey,that it's like we see, feel and
(12:25):
experience the story as it'sunveiling and unrolling, because
maybe we didn't experienceexactly the same way as that
person of the teller.
However, we've experiencedparts and pieces of it, of what
it means to be human.
Lauri (12:39):
Yeah, yeah, and I'm curious what your journey with
storytelling is about.
You has been I don't know aboutyou and your clients A lot of
my clients they know they should, if they're running their own
business, share stories sopeople can know, like and trust.
(13:01):
They've heard all those thingsand they still have a voice in
their head that's saying why,why on earth would I do that?
My story isn't interesting.
What has your experience beenlike being seen telling your own
stories?
Tina (13:20):
it's been hard, honestly.
I found I actually had a clientsay that, tina, you love to
hide behind your clients andthis was a few years ago
actually, actually and I thought, wow, that's very profound.
What do you mean by that?
Well, you're really great atthe guidance and teaching and
you really tell a great story,but I don't see enough of you
and I recognize I'm like, oh, itis some efforting to look the
(13:45):
part.
Do the videos posts that I hadthis visibility issue, that I
worked through a businesscoaching experience about four
or five years ago, that I did a30 day Facebook live challenge,
no matter what popped on, did avideo and it took me 26 days to
get through it to feel, oh, oh,it's me, they want, they don't
(14:09):
mind if I'm in my sweatsuit andI'm just having a conversation.
I was minding more than theywere minding Like.
I also went to an experience ona horse farm because I noticed,
when I was going to networkingevents as things were opening up
, that I was like trying to besuper interesting, like, oh,
self business, blah, blah, blah,blah, blah, you know, instead
(14:30):
of being interested and it itwas like off-putting.
And so this horse farmexperience was like focused on
letting go of controlledperfectionism and I call it
finding the Dale in the room.
That's what I do now when I goto networking events.
Is Dale the horse really taughtme to be fully calm, present
(14:50):
and not throw myself at it.
We just stood with each otherfor a good 15 minutes before I
even touched him because Iwaited for his readiness and I
grounded myself in my readiness,and then we gazed eyes first
like it was this nice slow dance, and then pretty soon he
nuzzled me and that was the okayto brush, and then we just got
(15:12):
into this beautiful, lovelydance, if you will, and then,
one by one, the other fourhorses joined and it was this
magical moment of that's what itis.
I need to just be in my beingand you know transition time
take a beat and a breath andwalk in with just tuning in and
(15:32):
finding that Dale in the room,of having one or two
heart-centered conversations,not 20.
Lauri (15:38):
Yeah, yeah, that's beautiful.
We've had a couple of people orI've recorded with a couple of
people and I've had a horseexperience myself.
Tina (15:47):
It's magical?
Lauri (15:48):
Yeah, it really.
There is no like forcingyourself on people.
There is no performing with ahorse, as you said.
The horse nuzzled and gave youthe invitation that you
responded to, rather than youjust going up and I feel like
brushing you know, yeah, and itreally was.
Tina (16:10):
I mean marrying that energy.
And then the other four horseswere like wait a minute, I want
to have some of this and be partof this, which was beautiful to
experience, and I just I feellike it was eye opening in terms
of foundational shift in mewhen I how do I be, how do I
show up in terms of futurevirtual or in-person events?
(16:35):
Because you know, I was nolonger representing a university
or a for-profit or nonprofitorganization, but me and my
business, and I think I took itso personally and put that
unnecessary pressure.
And there is this really bigdifference between force and
power.
Force, as you said, brings onan edginess, ickiness, feeling.
(17:00):
Power is beautiful.
It comes from more inside andit can be so calm and quiet.
It doesn't have to be big andloud, it doesn't have to be big
and loud.
Lauri (17:10):
Yeah, and there's.
It has always felt to me likeforce.
There's a lot of musculareffort and there's an energy
coming out the front of the bodyand power has this feeling of
effortless and ease or a balancein the body.
Tina (17:37):
And the energy is radiating out 360 degrees and I
think that that's where you knowwhen you run your own business.
Going back to your originalthought about storytelling is, I
think that we put that absolutepush pressure to make money and
we feel like, well, if I don'tget this story right, or right
enough, or good enough, I mean,I've had clients that they think
they have no story and somethat too many, they don't know
(17:58):
how to slice and dice it, all ofthose problems, everything in
between.
And when you put money as thepressure, as the focal point,
instead of the connection toself and other, then that's
going to make a big differencein terms of the content of your
message.
Lauri (18:12):
Yeah, the alignment between the two of us.
Yummy, very yummy.
Same thing when the I got tomake money is at the top of the
pyramid.
It generally doesn't feel rightfor a lot of the people like
(18:33):
yourself, like me, where we wantto serve, like if someone has
ever said to you you're hidingbehind your clients, it's
because you love them and youwant to serve them, so you hide
behind clients instead ofPowerPoint.
Been there, done that.
And when we're speaking andthere might be an invitation at
the end, it's much more alignedfor us to make the service the
(18:58):
top of the pyramid.
Yes, to tell the story inservice of their journey and
their transformation.
And then, yes, if we love themand we love their transformation
and we want to continue toserve them on it or at least
invite them into thatpossibility.
It has a very different feelingthan like I got to tell my
(19:20):
story.
It's got to be perfect, it'sgot to check all the boxes so
that you buy from me at the endRight, and you get clunky about
it.
Tina (19:29):
Because I've been found myself like and still I have to
be very centered on the givencontext and audience and
experience of the call to actionat the end and I believe if we
show up with that heart-centeredway of being, we soften our
inner judgment of it has tosound and be a certain way and
(19:50):
comparison is such an evilthreat or a danger, if you will,
because if we look at an unclewho's super funny and awesome
with jokes and storytelling andI'm not that or we see someone
in our field who's just killingit, we step out.
It tends to silence us becausewe want to be at least that good
(20:11):
, if not better, and then we endup being quiet because it's
just easier to not do anythingthan to maybe mess up or do it
not to the level that we feellike we should do.
Lauri (20:24):
Yeah.
Or we see them and we getjealous and start to think, well
, jealous and start to think,well, does what I have even
matter?
If it's similar and thatperson's getting a lot more
response right now, who am I toblah, blah, blah.
Or if it were valuable, I hadthis one.
Until I discovered coaching, Iwas being silent in a lot of
(20:49):
rooms because I thought if whatI was seeing and sensing and
feeling was valuable, someoneelse would have already said it.
Tina (20:59):
Yes, that's very spot on.
Or I even silenced myselfbecause I'm like, well, why
would I do this?
Because there's thousands ofother communication coaches out
there.
How would I set myself apart orbe, you know, any good at this
thing we call, you know,intuitive communication coaching
, which recently it's beenwithin the last six months.
(21:19):
I've added the word intuitive,you know, because I held back
from that word for a while,because I get into corporations
and it's like I think we're moreopen to that word now.
Lauri (21:29):
Yeah, yeah, we definitely are.
You know, I didn't even usewords like holistic.
Yes, I said integrated in 2008.
And now I will use the wordholistic.
I will use integrated and I'mmuch more interested in meeting
people where they are andstretching them.
Yes, so if holistic is a littlebit of a stretch that may come
(21:54):
out of my mouth instead ofintegrated, because it's like
I'm inviting the executives inthe corporation to be a little
bit in their sweatpants, justlike people on the free stretch
lines, yes, Well, it's kind oflike the work that I've done
with leaders with yes andleadership with improv.
Tina (22:09):
Right, improvisation was kind of quirky and scary.
It's a theater thing play what?
And we're recognizing that whenwe do more of this thing we
call play and improvise with theyes and it's an attitude, with
making bold decisions, withlistening.
Really well, you know all thosethings matter to be effective
(22:30):
in business, to be effective asa communicator.
I love that your journey soundsvery similar and that you know
what this is, who I am.
I am a spiritual person andthat's what is unique to me,
where I do meditate on myclients ahead of time, draw a
card and sit with them and seethem and be with them, and then
they feel that and they getthese gorgeous downloads when we
(22:52):
work together, when they'recrafting on a keynote or a ted
talk or just getting better attheir meetings to be more
engaging with their teams yeah,yeah, and what I hear from the
childhood experience of don'tcolor outside of the lines, to
Paris, to yes and to usingintuitive.
Lauri (23:13):
It's like a journey in this moment of you, yes, anding
your own intuition.
Tina (23:19):
Yes, oh yes, that's so true.
I mean, I've always had thatability and it had been crushed
and scrunched at times, becauseit's kind of weird, you know,
magical.
But everybody has the sixthsense of this thing we call
intuition, and it's whether youdecide to open it up and be with
(23:40):
it.
I've been known to do keynotesor presentations at workshops
where, oh, I usually do thisstory.
But you know what?
My random creative says let's dothis and it's getting okay with
that shift, with going withwhat my heart is saying, and
then boom, the yummy comes out.
Lauri (23:59):
Yeah, and the yummy comes out when we're really as
present with the room as youwere with the horses.
I feel like it's eerie thenumber of times where I usually
say this here but my mouth isheading toward this other way of
saying it, and it doesn'thappen every time.
(24:19):
Yet I have had moments wheresomeone in the audience came up
to me and said that moment whenyou were speaking about, and you
talked about your father and myfather just passed away three
weeks ago, and I'm like woo.
Tina (24:34):
And what a beautiful way to have that land.
When you trusted yourself, you,yes, anded yourself and then it
connected you at a deeper levelwith that audience member.
And I think when we ignoreintuition, we ignore the
possibility of really getting aricher conversation.
That lands and you know, I'veworked with any corporation from
(24:58):
Union Pacific Railroad, first,national Bank, all these bigger
groups, but then also nonprofits, and you have to be aware of
that.
your context impacts and affectsyour content as well as your
beingness and who you be mattersand how you show up is also,
like I like to say.
(25:19):
I love to be the, you know, thekind of the thermometer and I
take the temp and I impact andmove that forward with, like
ease them in you had mentionedearlier, meet them where they
are, you know, I know as aformer disney cast member, I'm a
10 with energy and big,vivacious enthusiasm.
When I was a chief creativeofficer at a bank, walking in
(25:42):
with that would be veryoff-putting.
So I softened with love to moreof a 7.5 because I want them to
feel comfortable.
It's not like being inauthentic, it's being me with an
awareness a loving awareness ofwhat the context and the
(26:02):
audience are wanting in thatmoment.
Lauri (26:04):
Yeah, that's so beautiful , you with a loving awareness,
and it's not like you walk intrying to lower your energy down
to one or you put on a mask ofbeing like a very silent,
internally processing introvert.
You were a 7.5 you.
Tina (26:25):
That's right.
So that you could meet them andyou all could go somewhere
together it is an energy trainright that we, we say like, come
on, and you're the conductor asthe speaker and allowing
passengers to come on, theyaren't going to trust you and
trust getting on that train car.
If you are or you're findingthat healthy, happy space of
(26:51):
energy that says it's aninvitation that you're inviting
them in, and then your heartscan connect in a beautiful way
and listening listening withyour eyes, listening and
noticing more and usingeverything in the space to
really craft the message to come.
Because if you don't trustyourself and your intuition and
(27:11):
if you haven't done the workahead of time with the
preparation, then of courseyou're going to be even more
nervous than what is normalbecause you haven't done the
work.
You have to do that preparation.
When you do the preparation,that's when you can have a lot
of fun with your audience,because you have trusted, you've
got the stuff in your heart andin your body to where it will
come out in the most effectiveway.
Lauri (27:34):
I'm curious because I feel like at some point I
realized that speakers justdon't know how to prepare.
They think that sitting in thedesk chair rewriting the
powerpoint over and, over andover again is the only
preparation.
Tina (27:54):
So bring to life how you prepare well, first of all, the
energy that you put into thepreparation is input, output.
What goes in comes out.
I really find myself, uh.
First of all, it's setting thetime of day that is yummiest for
me, and that is I'm a morningperson, so it's knowing that I
(28:15):
create in the mornings.
That's when my brain and heartand body are really ready.
Then I also time and space.
It's grounding myself with someyoga, some stretch, some
movement.
I do the audience analysis butit's sort of like you're Nancy
Drew, you're the sleuth.
You find out as much as you canabout the morale of the
audience.
What do they want, what do theydesire, what do they need to
(28:35):
know, want to know, don't know.
All that to impact my stories,my research, my insights.
And then it's asking yourselfwhat is your general and
specific purpose after you'vedone the audience analysis,
(28:55):
getting yourself into thatcreative energy and space to
craft the actual message.
And for me I always like I thinkthree is a beautiful complete,
you know it's.
It's like three billy goats,gruff, three little pigs.
You know the three bears, welike three.
And so having three main pointsbecause you want it to resonate
and you get more than that,it's too much and then I
actually practice.
And I have a dear formermother-in-law that she's a
(29:17):
retired English teacher and Iwould present it to her and get
feedback, because she's a greatlistener, she's smart, I trust
her opinions and she's given megreat layperson insights to
tweak things.
So I feel like saying that outloud to yourself, but also to
someone else you trust to getthat feedback and make the
tweaks.
Then you're ready to go.
Lauri (29:38):
Yeah, very similar to theater.
I also hear the mix of, likethe craft, of any art form
there's the craft and then thepassion or the inspiration, and
I hear intuition and sciencecoming together and your body
(29:58):
woven through everything fromthe beginning phases to when you
get up to go do it on a stage,which I'm like yes, people of
that, yeah, and it's soimportant to dance with all
those things, right.
Tina (30:17):
I think we need to be in our bodies, we need to be
inspired, we need to be heartcentered and all of that matters
.
It's sort of it's the equation,for what makes it the
difference between a goodpresentation, great.
Lauri (30:30):
Yeah, yeah, and the practicing with someone saying
it aloud is like doing yourmonologue in your house before
you go to do the auditions,which, for those of you that are
not actors, it's not ourfavorite part.
It is infinitely better to sayit aloud.
Tina (30:48):
Yes Than just looking at your notes.
Lauri (30:51):
Yeah, because you won't remember when you just it's
disaster.
Tina (30:55):
Well, you don't even feel the rhythmic pattern, right, I
feel like a lot of the timesI've caught myself like oh, that
sentence looked great on thepage to be in a book not.
Or in an academic article orsomething like that.
Or newspaper article not meantto be spoken aloud.
So oratory and writtencommunication are different.
Lauri (31:15):
Speaking of which, yes, your story eventually led you to
writing a book.
Tell us a bit about yourjourney getting to the book and
also the book, so the people whoare in love with you right now
can go get a copy for themselvesyeah, well, I, I was that kid
(31:37):
in mrs brown's creative writingclass as a senior that I
remember asking her how do youpublish a book?
Tina (31:43):
and she's I opened to a book and I was like, I want to
get published.
How, how do you do that?
She goes oh, tina, tina, tina.
It's a long process and that'swhere it ended.
And I was like that wasn't veryhelpful and I get it because we
had other things to do, like youknow, get on with the
assignment.
But my inquiry led me to likejust fortunately, going.
(32:04):
I got invited to a woman's booksigning event and she says I
and talk about intuition, right,I knew I needed to go.
I didn't know her very well,but I knew I needed to go to
this event.
So I said yes and she's like Ifeel like I need to tell you
that you need to contact thisGeorgetown University.
They have a book publishing,book creators class and then you
(32:25):
can get chosen to be published.
And I was like oh, so I lookedinto it and within the week I
contacted them, got acceptedinto the class and then my
manuscript got accepted into thenext phase of being published
through manuscript publishing.
And that was a journey in andof itself and what I learned is
wow, it was hard.
(32:45):
The journey was hard because I,all of a sudden, was working 80
hours a week trying to manage abusiness, a family and this
book and getting like deadlinesand this and that.
And when you write a book, firstof all talk about like I would
never say I'm writing a book forthe longest time my revisions
(33:07):
editor I mean, this was a fewmonths before it was coming out
she goes Tina, you need to sayyou're an author, You're writing
a book, not just it's a writingproject.
I felt so vulnerable and nakedand weird and also judging
myself.
Am I worthy to be doing thisthing we call authorship or
authoring a book?
And so it really revealed a lotof vulnerability.
(33:27):
Like even my revisions editorsays, you're a smart woman.
Why are you doing all this data?
Everybody else's story and noneof your own?
And that was revealing too.
Right?
People ranging from improvisers, storytellers, comedians and
psychologists and communicationstudies professors and
(33:52):
researchers.
And what does it mean to bemagnetic with our minds, message
and mechanics?
And along the way, I learned alot about myself.
Lauri (34:00):
What did you learn about yourself?
Tina (34:06):
I learned that it's not as hard as I thought to be
magnetic.
People always ask are you bornthis way?
Well, there are certainpredispositions of wanting to
speak Like the desire is innate.
The ability to be good at it istrainable.
So I learned that the hidingneeded to stop, and that was a
(34:30):
big one, and I still do itoccasionally because it's a
conditioned pattern, right ofbehavior, and I also got super,
super burnout.
And what was wild is during theaudio portion of it, I was
starting to lose my voicebecause of anxiety.
I was like, what if my voicesounds weird, Like in my head,
(34:50):
because this is the thing Iteach?
What if people are like I don'twant to hear?
Her voice, but because of thatand the burnout was real I
really learned more about me.
What?
does it truly mean to be Tina B.
And what does that look like,sound like, feel like?
And it's okay that I'm this bighearted, big loving,
(35:11):
enthusiastically kind,passionate, powerful, creative,
intuitive leader, and that I ama unicorn in Southwest Iowa and
now in Omaha, Nebraska, andthat's okay.
Lauri (35:22):
That's okay, yeah, and to tie it back to you know,
coloring outside of the lines.
Unicorn, you is magnetic, yes,and owning that.
Tina (35:36):
Yeah, I think that that's what I struggled with is I
wanted everybody like I wasalways going along to get along,
and the core question was likehow can I make them comfortable?
And that meant dimming my light,dimming my sparkle.
You know, I think I told you Iwas in the process of
consciously uncoupling with myspouse, who's a dear, dear
friend, and I came out in, youknow, six plus months ago.
(35:59):
All these things happened in arural community that was just
shaken to a core, on top of himhealing from a recent diagnosis
of stage four follicularlymphoma, lots and lots of
things all within six months,very packed.
And he said to me, out of love,I don't want to dim your
(36:19):
sparkle anymore, tina b, youneed to be you and I will stand
for you and all the magic thatyou are.
That's love.
And honestly, it gives mebeautiful chills now because
I've never had a specialnesslike that and that's why I'm so
lucky that I found him when Idid it, because he saw me, for
(36:41):
me and he was the first personthat held me and appreciated me
enough to let me go.
So magnetism, true beautifulmagnetism, is being at the core
who you are and not allowingwhat other people say, think,
(37:03):
behave or be around you toimpact your love bubble, your
energy and your sparkle.
And we all have a sparkle.
Mine just happens to be verybig, purple, bright, disco ball.
Lauri (37:17):
Yeah, yeah, and I hope if you're listening to this you're
getting the message that, likeyours is big, purple, bright
disco ball and somebody elsemight have like white, fluffy
pillow yes, and they're bothbeautiful and they're both
magnetic.
Tina (37:38):
Yeah, it's like compare barack obama and his style of
speaking with the big boldnessof oprahfrey right.
Very different, yeah, bothmagnetic.
Yes, maya Angelou, or you know,we have Brene Brown.
I mean Tina Fey love her, theyknow themselves foundationally.
(38:02):
Or Chevy Chase, back in the 70s, when he was big into SNL and
even watch SNL.
We love them very differently.
Yeah, when he was big into SNLand even watch SNL.
We love them very differentlybecause of what they brought to
the words, to the physicalitywith their body language.
And I've realized through mytraining in improv that I was
slowing down my body, like I'mvery Carol Burnett, very mugging
(38:23):
and big, and I'm just offendingthat because of the feedback I
was getting from discomfort fromfamily and some people, because
it's not the way of the culture.
Lauri (38:32):
Yeah, and guess what?
Tina (38:34):
It's okay to be not the way of the culture, you know.
Lauri (38:37):
Yeah, and on Saturday Night Live.
All of those different stylesare what make it work, and
that's actually what I believeis going on with humanity.
Yes work, and that's actuallywhat I believe is going on with
humanity.
Imagine saturday night live ifit was 14 different chevy chases
(38:57):
, and that's it it would right,it'd be very redundant and in
humanity there's so much likecolor inside the lines.
You need to be quieter, you needto talk faster.
You need to do this when, inreality, humanity will work
better when we've got all eightbillion people being themselves,
(39:20):
letting themselves be seen andletting their magnetism shine
through.
Tina (39:26):
Well, and it's especially challenging as a woman.
I mean, if you're and that'swhat I found is it being in
rural Iowa as a woman businessowner?
I broke all the already.
You know that to leave the farm, move to the city doing my own
business, coming out as alesbian, you know all these
(39:47):
things.
It's like check, check, check,check for lots of big difference
.
And the more I own my being andenergy and essence, the more
that I find as as Martha Beck,who's a sociologist, talks about
is.
You'll find your Eden, yourcommunity, and you know it's
okay to go against the culture,in fact, and you know it's okay
(40:08):
to go against the culture Infact, I'm a disruptor, I'm a
loving, visionary rebel.
You know a heart center.
You know love warrior, if youwill, Similar to I think it was
Glennon Doyle.
She has a beautiful book aboutbeing a love warrior and it's
true.
You show up with heart and loveand that intention and the
right people will follow you andyou're not meant to be like
(40:31):
making everybody comfortable.
There's no way to do that.
Lauri (40:32):
Yeah, there is no way to do that.
Yeah, yeah, if people arewanting to be part of your
community, wanting to get toknow you better, where can
people find you and get to knowyou better?
Tina (40:47):
Well, the best way is on my website where you could sign
up for yummy, greatcommunication storytelling tips.
It's tinabakehousecom.
That's Tina T-I-N-A, BakehouseB, as in boy, A-K-E-H-O-U-S-E,
so Bake is baking cookies.
Housesandcasacom,tinabakehousecom.
And then I'm on LinkedIn aswell as Facebook.
(41:08):
You can check those socialhandles as well as Magnetic
Speaking with Tina B.
On YouTube, you can get someyummy rooftop chats as well as
other insights.
So tinabakehousecom is the besthub.
Lauri (41:20):
Thank you, and I could talk to you for what feels like
decades, and I knew that wasgoing to happen.
Tina (41:26):
I know.
Lauri (41:26):
I could talk to you.
Lori forever and it's time toslide into our Pivo Pivot.
Okay, I'm ready.
Tina (41:41):
Tina, what is your favorite word?
B?
B-e what is your least favoriteword.
Hate what turns you oncreatively, spiritually or
(42:04):
emotionally A lot of things.
Lauri (42:08):
I would say dancing and nature.
Hmm, what turns you off?
Tina (42:16):
Insecurity.
Lauri (42:20):
What's your favorite curse word Shooty poops, shooty
poops I created that in myfreshman year of college.
I love that one.
What sound or noise do you love?
Tina (42:41):
Boomshakalaka, like when I'm thinking to do something.
I'm like boomshakalaka.
Lauri (42:46):
What sound or noise do you hate?
I'm like boom shakalaka.
What sound or noise do you hate?
Tina (43:00):
What profession other than your own?
Lauri (43:02):
would be fun to try Roller skating derby what
profession would you not like todo?
Tina (43:09):
Sitting at a computer all day and hearing data that's mind
numbing?
I would rather collect garbagethan that.
Lauri (43:20):
And Tina, what do you hope people say about you on
your 100th birthday?
Tina (43:27):
She loved and she lived with heart and all things
sparkle.
Lauri (43:33):
Well, you certainly brought all things sparkle and
love today.
Thank you so much for takingthe time and having the
conversation and being you inthe process.
Tina (43:46):
I love it.
That's why I really go by TinaB.
Thank you and everyone else inthe process.
I love it.
Lauri (43:50):
That's why I really go by Tina B.
Thank you and everyone else.
If you loved this episode,please share it with a friend, a
family member, somebody elsewho's had somebody shush them in
their lives so that they canstep into their own innate
charisma and their own magic.
Hello and welcome back to the Soulful Speaking podcast.
I am so excited .
.She my guest today.
She started her own company,tina B LLC, to provide intuitive
communication, consulting andcoaching to guide heart-centered
leaders and organizationsinternationally to communicate
(00:23):
more effectively.
So she fits right in here onthe Soulful Speaking podcast.
She has oodles and buckets ofexperience and I want to save
this auditory version for you tohear that in her story.
Welcome, tina.
Tina (00:38):
Thank you.
Thank you, Lori.
It's so wonderful to be here.
I'm excited for thisconversation.
Lauri (00:42):
Me too.
Me too, let's dive in.
Tell me, where did yourspeaking journey begin?
Tina (00:52):
I would say when I was very, very little, I grew up on
a small farm in southwest Iowaand I literally had this front
porch that became my prosceniumstage and I loved crafting
little shows with my stuffedanimals.
I was motivated from the MuppetShow, jim Henson, all Things
Performance, and when I bought ayounger brother and sister I
(01:15):
just thought you know what?
Now I have people I can direct,and so when I was seven, I
started doing annual anniversarystories and shows dinner
theaters, if you will for myparents, and it really got
inside of me this excitementthat is possible for writing
something that people areattentive to and listen.
(01:38):
And as I adventured throughhigh school and college, I did
speech and theater and all thethings and then just leaned into
teaching the field ofcommunication at the high school
level and then got my advanceddegrees at the collegiate level
and I just found that there wassomething so gratifying in the
(02:00):
idea of okay, I have an audience.
What is something that I'mexcited and passionate about in
the idea of, okay, I have anaudience?
What is something that I'mexcited and passionate about?
How can I pierce theirlistening with what I have to
say?
Through story and ideas?
Lauri (02:16):
I wanna go back in time to the earlier end of the
spectrum in the fifth grade.
I think the teacher's name wasMrs Hogave, close Hogave.
Tina (02:28):
Yes, yes.
Lauri (02:30):
Tell me what kind of role did Mrs Hogave play in your
story?
Tina (02:35):
Yeah, mrs Hogave, she, oh my goodness she's.
I still keep in touch with her.
She's nearing 100.
And we I write her letters,call and I've even had teas with
her for her birthday and so I'msuper grateful.
She sees the light in otheryoungsters in terms of what
(02:57):
their possibility is.
And when I was in fifth gradeI'd had a rough fourth grade
year.
A really rough teacher and whowas discouraging, really shushed
me a lot from reading aloud andshe saw potential in me and I
remember she came up to me andhanded me a script and she said
I picked this particular playwith you in mind as the main
(03:19):
role and I just was like whatyou see something in me?
And she says, yes, and I knowyou'll do what you see something
in me.
And she says, yes, and I knowyou'll do.
Her word was marvelous, you'lldo marvelous.
And so I took so muchseriousness, like the rigor that
an actor would for, like theirdebut on stage as a Broadway
(03:39):
star or that very first movie,an Oscar winning performance,
and I remember just rigorouslyreading and practicing and
memorizing and just beautifullyhad this experience of people
listening and clapping and herarm around me and the big hug
and said see, I knew you had itin you and you're going to do
beautiful, big things with yourvoice.
(04:01):
So keep performing, keep acting.
And it was her that reallyinstilled in me that.
Oh, she saw even more.
So the thing that I love to doI'm meant to do.
Lauri (04:14):
What was it like to have someone with that belief come
into your world right after theshushing person in your world?
Tina (04:26):
Yeah, that it was exactly what I needed.
I mean, she loved her students,loved them, and I remember even
having a conversation with herwhere she had a student that was
just rough around the edges andshe got through to that student
because he knew he could counton her to care for him.
(04:47):
When someone cares for you andwhen they notice you and see you
, everyone wants to be seen andrecognized for their gifts, and
I just hadn't had that at all.
In fact, I have big enthusiasm,big love, big heart, and it was
squished down by so manyteachers.
I mean, I even had one thatsaid you know, Tina, I love your
(05:09):
creativity on this assignment,but remember to color inside the
lines, and I'm an outside ofthe lines person.
And Mrs Hovabine embraced that.
She just really encouraged itand said okay, there are no
rules to this other thancompleted on time.
That's the only thing.
This is the deadline.
(05:30):
And so to have her believe inme, I think, heightened my
passion, my openness to learningand my abilities of wow someone
sees in me, my possibility, andit just encouraged me to want
and do more.
Lauri (05:47):
Love it, love it and then you've done Muppets.
You have such an extensive,beautiful journey and I also I
know when we first connect youmentioned a little bit that even
through all of that, you havehad moments of imposter syndrome
(06:08):
.
Even though I'm telling youpeople like I did not read her
bio aloud because there is toomuch amazing stuff in it.
It is extensive and amazing andyou're probably, if you're
listening, already getting asense of her and yet even you
have had some moments of thecrippling nervousness and the
(06:31):
imposter syndrome.
Can you talk a little bit moreabout that in your journey?
Tina (06:38):
Yeah, I've done two TED Talks and I remember that very
first one where I was like, ohmy gosh, I'm getting up on a
stage on that red dot.
That is the quintessentialcredibility, and this is the
very thing that I teach.
And I started to play terribletapes in my head of what if I
(06:59):
forget what I'm supposed to say,what if I come off too robotic
and memorize what if, what if,what if.
And the what ifs became verydaunting and heavy and scary.
And I fortunately have thisamazing mentor, another teacher,
a professor that is actuallyvisiting me later this month,
which I'm so grateful for.
She's a theater prof.
We've known each other for over30 years and she invited me and
(07:24):
said we're going to get you outof your head, hon.
And it took her.
She not only gave me her purpleblazer for good luck, so like
wearing that token of love,wrapped me with a big hug and in
words of encouragement.
But it's true, our minds arepretty powerful, like we can get
(07:44):
into this, like Brene Browntalks about, the stories we tell
ourselves can be so cripplingand the fear was very real,
where I almost didn't want to doit, where I almost said I don't
have to do this, but then myintuition said absolutely, this
is exactly what you need to do.
Yeah.
Lauri (08:03):
Yeah, what a gift in that theater, professor reminding
you the magic is not in yourhead, it's in your body, it's in
the present moment, it is inyour presence, your heart and
your heart.
Yeah, it's not in theinformation I mean.
Tina (08:41):
Yeah, it's not in the information.
I mean, yes, you had valuableinformation to share, and
ourselves.
First, to get in that grounding, which we did prior to this,
which I so appreciate, it is tobe fully in the moment that what
happened before, what's goingto happen next, is not there.
It's this, it's this moment.
And when you do that, when youwalk out onto a stage, kind of
(09:02):
like I did internationally for aParis keynote, when the
technology wasn't working, I hada choice I could panic and flip
out, or I decided to take thatmic and, in the moment, create a
musical, improv, improvised rapthat I got all the women on
their feet and shifted thatenergy.
Not only did it shift theirenergy and get them excited, it
(09:24):
did that for me.
It was very important for me,so that I was like you know what
?
I don't even need those slides,I'll email them to you.
Let's just have thisconversation.
Lauri (09:33):
Yeah, and just tracking, like if you had listened to the
teacher who said Tina, don'tcolor out of the lines when
coloring out of the lines, whencoloring out of the lines is one
of your magic powers.
When you're standing there andthe slides aren't going, how you
(09:55):
responded is all well, she wentoutside of the lines, the lines
where you're supposed to haveperfect technology.
You're supposed to have theslides.
So thank goodness you have hadteachers and you chose to commit
to coloring outside of thelines and owning that, like when
(10:15):
the slides go down, you are theperfect person to be standing
at the front of the room helpingeverybody else in the room have
the experience that they weremeant to have on that day.
Tina (10:27):
Well, a lot of them actually said they were so
grateful because it let them letgo of perfectionism and not be
so committed to their slides andsay, oh, if this happens I can
just have a conversation.
I have this information andthis stuff inside of me that I
don't need these things behindme to be the focal point that
(10:50):
really people come to hear myvoice and feel my energy, and
slides simply cannot do that.
Lauri (10:57):
Yeah, no.
And our inner critics?
I call them the soul suckers.
Tina (11:03):
Our inner critics.
I call them the soul suckers.
Lauri (11:05):
They're so trying to help us that they can often make us
hide behind the slides.
And when people's inner criticsare trying to control the
experience, sometimes they makethe slides the whole show.
It's death by PowerPoint.
Theater sports, to some extent,the audience seeing a movie.
(11:28):
Those are experiences that thepeople in the audience and the
people in the building reallyhave together, and I remember
during the pandemic, when thewhole world shut down and all
the live theaters shut down,someone bringing up the fact
that studies have shown thatwhen actors and audience are in
(11:50):
the same space together, theirhearts do actually start to beat
in unison.
Tina (11:58):
And that can happen from a speaker and an audience also,
in fact I've done some researchwhere our brains change when we
hear stories, and there's PaulZak who's a researcher that our
hormones, our oxytocin, thathelping hormone, actually
increases.
You know, because, similar towhat you were saying about the
hearts, we go on that journey,that it's like we see, feel and
(12:25):
experience the story as it'sunveiling and unrolling, because
maybe we didn't experienceexactly the same way as that
person of the teller.
However, we've experiencedparts and pieces of it, of what
it means to be human.
Lauri (12:39):
Yeah, yeah, and I'm curious what your journey with
storytelling is about.
You has been I don't know aboutyou and your clients A lot of
my clients they know they should, if they're running their own
business, share stories sopeople can know, like and trust.
(13:01):
They've heard all those thingsand they still have a voice in
their head that's saying why,why on earth would I do that?
My story isn't interesting.
What has your experience beenlike being seen telling your own
stories?
Tina (13:20):
it's been hard, honestly.
I found I actually had a clientsay that, tina, you love to
hide behind your clients andthis was a few years ago
actually, actually and I thought, wow, that's very profound.
What do you mean by that?
Well, you're really great atthe guidance and teaching and
you really tell a great story,but I don't see enough of you
and I recognize I'm like, oh, itis some efforting to look the
(13:45):
part.
Do the videos posts that I hadthis visibility issue, that I
worked through a businesscoaching experience about four
or five years ago, that I did a30 day Facebook live challenge,
no matter what popped on, did avideo and it took me 26 days to
get through it to feel, oh, oh,it's me, they want, they don't
(14:09):
mind if I'm in my sweatsuit andI'm just having a conversation.
I was minding more than theywere minding Like.
I also went to an experience ona horse farm because I noticed,
when I was going to networkingevents as things were opening up
, that I was like trying to besuper interesting, like, oh,
self business, blah, blah, blah,blah, blah, you know, instead
(14:30):
of being interested and it itwas like off-putting.
And so this horse farmexperience was like focused on
letting go of controlledperfectionism and I call it
finding the Dale in the room.
That's what I do now when I goto networking events.
Is Dale the horse really taughtme to be fully calm, present
(14:50):
and not throw myself at it.
We just stood with each otherfor a good 15 minutes before I
even touched him because Iwaited for his readiness and I
grounded myself in my readiness,and then we gazed eyes first
like it was this nice slow dance, and then pretty soon he
nuzzled me and that was the okayto brush, and then we just got
(15:12):
into this beautiful, lovelydance, if you will, and then,
one by one, the other fourhorses joined and it was this
magical moment of that's what itis.
I need to just be in my beingand you know transition time
take a beat and a breath andwalk in with just tuning in and
(15:32):
finding that Dale in the room,of having one or two
heart-centered conversations,not 20.
Lauri (15:38):
Yeah, yeah, that's beautiful.
We've had a couple of people orI've recorded with a couple of
people and I've had a horseexperience myself.
Tina (15:47):
It's magical?
Lauri (15:48):
Yeah, it really.
There is no like forcingyourself on people.
There is no performing with ahorse, as you said.
The horse nuzzled and gave youthe invitation that you
responded to, rather than youjust going up and I feel like
brushing you know, yeah, and itreally was.
Tina (16:10):
I mean marrying that energy.
And then the other four horseswere like wait a minute, I want
to have some of this and be partof this, which was beautiful to
experience, and I just I feellike it was eye opening in terms
of foundational shift in mewhen I how do I be, how do I
show up in terms of futurevirtual or in-person events?
(16:35):
Because you know, I was nolonger representing a university
or a for-profit or nonprofitorganization, but me and my
business, and I think I took itso personally and put that
unnecessary pressure.
And there is this really bigdifference between force and
power.
Force, as you said, brings onan edginess, ickiness, feeling.
(17:00):
Power is beautiful.
It comes from more inside andit can be so calm and quiet.
It doesn't have to be big andloud, it doesn't have to be big
and loud.
Lauri (17:10):
Yeah, and there's.
It has always felt to me likeforce.
There's a lot of musculareffort and there's an energy
coming out the front of the bodyand power has this feeling of
effortless and ease or a balancein the body.
Tina (17:37):
And the energy is radiating out 360 degrees and I
think that that's where you knowwhen you run your own business.
Going back to your originalthought about storytelling is, I
think that we put that absolutepush pressure to make money and
we feel like, well, if I don'tget this story right, or right
enough, or good enough, I mean,I've had clients that they think
they have no story and somethat too many, they don't know
(17:58):
how to slice and dice it, all ofthose problems, everything in
between.
And when you put money as thepressure, as the focal point,
instead of the connection toself and other, then that's
going to make a big differencein terms of the content of your
message.
Lauri (18:12):
Yeah, the alignment between the two of us.
Yummy, very yummy.
Same thing when the I got tomake money is at the top of the
pyramid.
It generally doesn't feel rightfor a lot of the people like
(18:33):
yourself, like me, where we wantto serve, like if someone has
ever said to you you're hidingbehind your clients, it's
because you love them and youwant to serve them, so you hide
behind clients instead ofPowerPoint.
Been there, done that.
And when we're speaking andthere might be an invitation at
the end, it's much more alignedfor us to make the service the
(18:58):
top of the pyramid.
Yes, to tell the story inservice of their journey and
their transformation.
And then, yes, if we love themand we love their transformation
and we want to continue toserve them on it or at least
invite them into thatpossibility.
It has a very different feelingthan like I got to tell my
(19:20):
story.
It's got to be perfect, it'sgot to check all the boxes so
that you buy from me at the endRight, and you get clunky about
it.
Tina (19:29):
Because I've been found myself like and still I have to
be very centered on the givencontext and audience and
experience of the call to actionat the end and I believe if we
show up with that heart-centeredway of being, we soften our
inner judgment of it has tosound and be a certain way and
(19:50):
comparison is such an evilthreat or a danger, if you will,
because if we look at an unclewho's super funny and awesome
with jokes and storytelling andI'm not that or we see someone
in our field who's just killingit, we step out.
It tends to silence us becausewe want to be at least that good
(20:11):
, if not better, and then we endup being quiet because it's
just easier to not do anythingthan to maybe mess up or do it
not to the level that we feellike we should do.
Lauri (20:24):
Yeah.
Or we see them and we getjealous and start to think, well
, jealous and start to think,well, does what I have even
matter?
If it's similar and thatperson's getting a lot more
response right now, who am I toblah, blah, blah.
Or if it were valuable, I hadthis one.
Until I discovered coaching, Iwas being silent in a lot of
(20:49):
rooms because I thought if whatI was seeing and sensing and
feeling was valuable, someoneelse would have already said it.
Tina (20:59):
Yes, that's very spot on.
Or I even silenced myselfbecause I'm like, well, why
would I do this?
Because there's thousands ofother communication coaches out
there.
How would I set myself apart orbe, you know, any good at this
thing we call, you know,intuitive communication coaching
, which recently it's beenwithin the last six months.
(21:19):
I've added the word intuitive,you know, because I held back
from that word for a while,because I get into corporations
and it's like I think we're moreopen to that word now.
Lauri (21:29):
Yeah, yeah, we definitely are.
You know, I didn't even usewords like holistic.
Yes, I said integrated in 2008.
And now I will use the wordholistic.
I will use integrated and I'mmuch more interested in meeting
people where they are andstretching them.
Yes, so if holistic is a littlebit of a stretch that may come
(21:54):
out of my mouth instead ofintegrated, because it's like
I'm inviting the executives inthe corporation to be a little
bit in their sweatpants, justlike people on the free stretch
lines, yes, Well, it's kind oflike the work that I've done
with leaders with yes andleadership with improv.
Tina (22:09):
Right, improvisation was kind of quirky and scary.
It's a theater thing play what?
And we're recognizing that whenwe do more of this thing we
call play and improvise with theyes and it's an attitude, with
making bold decisions, withlistening.
Really well, you know all thosethings matter to be effective
(22:30):
in business, to be effective asa communicator.
I love that your journey soundsvery similar and that you know
what this is, who I am.
I am a spiritual person andthat's what is unique to me,
where I do meditate on myclients ahead of time, draw a
card and sit with them and seethem and be with them, and then
they feel that and they getthese gorgeous downloads when we
(22:52):
work together, when they'recrafting on a keynote or a ted
talk or just getting better attheir meetings to be more
engaging with their teams yeah,yeah, and what I hear from the
childhood experience of don'tcolor outside of the lines, to
Paris, to yes and to usingintuitive.
Lauri (23:13):
It's like a journey in this moment of you, yes, anding
your own intuition.
Tina (23:19):
Yes, oh yes, that's so true.
I mean, I've always had thatability and it had been crushed
and scrunched at times, becauseit's kind of weird, you know,
magical.
But everybody has the sixthsense of this thing we call
intuition, and it's whether youdecide to open it up and be with
(23:40):
it.
I've been known to do keynotesor presentations at workshops
where, oh, I usually do thisstory.
But you know what?
My random creative says let's dothis and it's getting okay with
that shift, with going withwhat my heart is saying, and
then boom, the yummy comes out.
Lauri (23:59):
Yeah, and the yummy comes out when we're really as
present with the room as youwere with the horses.
I feel like it's eerie thenumber of times where I usually
say this here but my mouth isheading toward this other way of
saying it, and it doesn'thappen every time.
(24:19):
Yet I have had moments wheresomeone in the audience came up
to me and said that moment whenyou were speaking about, and you
talked about your father and myfather just passed away three
weeks ago, and I'm like woo.
Tina (24:34):
And what a beautiful way to have that land.
When you trusted yourself, you,yes, anded yourself and then it
connected you at a deeper levelwith that audience member.
And I think when we ignoreintuition, we ignore the
possibility of really getting aricher conversation.
That lands and you know, I'veworked with any corporation from
(24:58):
Union Pacific Railroad, first,national Bank, all these bigger
groups, but then also nonprofits, and you have to be aware of
that.
your context impacts and affectsyour content as well as your
beingness and who you be mattersand how you show up is also,
like I like to say.
(25:19):
I love to be the, you know, thekind of the thermometer and I
take the temp and I impact andmove that forward with, like
ease them in you had mentionedearlier, meet them where they
are, you know, I know as aformer disney cast member, I'm a
10 with energy and big,vivacious enthusiasm.
When I was a chief creativeofficer at a bank, walking in
(25:42):
with that would be veryoff-putting.
So I softened with love to moreof a 7.5 because I want them to
feel comfortable.
It's not like being inauthentic, it's being me with an
awareness a loving awareness ofwhat the context and the
(26:02):
audience are wanting in thatmoment.
Lauri (26:04):
Yeah, that's so beautiful , you with a loving awareness,
and it's not like you walk intrying to lower your energy down
to one or you put on a mask ofbeing like a very silent,
internally processing introvert.
You were a 7.5 you.
Tina (26:25):
That's right.
So that you could meet them andyou all could go somewhere
together it is an energy trainright that we, we say like, come
on, and you're the conductor asthe speaker and allowing
passengers to come on, theyaren't going to trust you and
trust getting on that train car.
If you are or you're findingthat healthy, happy space of
(26:51):
energy that says it's aninvitation that you're inviting
them in, and then your heartscan connect in a beautiful way
and listening listening withyour eyes, listening and
noticing more and usingeverything in the space to
really craft the message to come.
Because if you don't trustyourself and your intuition and
(27:11):
if you haven't done the workahead of time with the
preparation, then of courseyou're going to be even more
nervous than what is normalbecause you haven't done the
work.
You have to do that preparation.
When you do the preparation,that's when you can have a lot
of fun with your audience,because you have trusted, you've
got the stuff in your heart andin your body to where it will
come out in the most effectiveway.
Lauri (27:34):
I'm curious because I feel like at some point I
realized that speakers justdon't know how to prepare.
They think that sitting in thedesk chair rewriting the
powerpoint over and, over andover again is the only
preparation.
Tina (27:54):
So bring to life how you prepare well, first of all, the
energy that you put into thepreparation is input, output.
What goes in comes out.
I really find myself, uh.
First of all, it's setting thetime of day that is yummiest for
me, and that is I'm a morningperson, so it's knowing that I
(28:15):
create in the mornings.
That's when my brain and heartand body are really ready.
Then I also time and space.
It's grounding myself with someyoga, some stretch, some
movement.
I do the audience analysis butit's sort of like you're Nancy
Drew, you're the sleuth.
You find out as much as you canabout the morale of the
audience.
What do they want, what do theydesire, what do they need to
(28:35):
know, want to know, don't know.
All that to impact my stories,my research, my insights.
And then it's asking yourselfwhat is your general and
specific purpose after you'vedone the audience analysis,
(28:55):
getting yourself into thatcreative energy and space to
craft the actual message.
And for me I always like I thinkthree is a beautiful complete,
you know it's.
It's like three billy goats,gruff, three little pigs.
You know the three bears, welike three.
And so having three main pointsbecause you want it to resonate
and you get more than that,it's too much and then I
actually practice.
And I have a dear formermother-in-law that she's a
(29:17):
retired English teacher and Iwould present it to her and get
feedback, because she's a greatlistener, she's smart, I trust
her opinions and she's given megreat layperson insights to
tweak things.
So I feel like saying that outloud to yourself, but also to
someone else you trust to getthat feedback and make the
tweaks.
Then you're ready to go.
Lauri (29:38):
Yeah, very similar to theater.
I also hear the mix of, likethe craft, of any art form
there's the craft and then thepassion or the inspiration, and
I hear intuition and sciencecoming together and your body
(29:58):
woven through everything fromthe beginning phases to when you
get up to go do it on a stage,which I'm like yes, people of
that, yeah, and it's soimportant to dance with all
those things, right.
Tina (30:17):
I think we need to be in our bodies, we need to be
inspired, we need to be heartcentered and all of that matters
.
It's sort of it's the equation,for what makes it the
difference between a goodpresentation, great.
Lauri (30:30):
Yeah, yeah, and the practicing with someone saying
it aloud is like doing yourmonologue in your house before
you go to do the auditions,which, for those of you that are
not actors, it's not ourfavorite part.
It is infinitely better to sayit aloud.
Tina (30:48):
Yes Than just looking at your notes.
Lauri (30:51):
Yeah, because you won't remember when you just it's
disaster.
Tina (30:55):
Well, you don't even feel the rhythmic pattern, right, I
feel like a lot of the timesI've caught myself like oh, that
sentence looked great on thepage to be in a book not.
Or in an academic article orsomething like that.
Or newspaper article not meantto be spoken aloud.
So oratory and writtencommunication are different.
Lauri (31:15):
Speaking of which, yes, your story eventually led you to
writing a book.
Tell us a bit about yourjourney getting to the book and
also the book, so the people whoare in love with you right now
can go get a copy for themselvesyeah, well, I, I was that kid
(31:37):
in mrs brown's creative writingclass as a senior that I
remember asking her how do youpublish a book?
Tina (31:43):
and she's I opened to a book and I was like, I want to
get published.
How, how do you do that?
She goes oh, tina, tina, tina.
It's a long process and that'swhere it ended.
And I was like that wasn't veryhelpful and I get it because we
had other things to do, like youknow, get on with the
assignment.
But my inquiry led me to likejust fortunately, going.
(32:04):
I got invited to a woman's booksigning event and she says I
and talk about intuition, right,I knew I needed to go.
I didn't know her very well,but I knew I needed to go to
this event.
So I said yes and she's like Ifeel like I need to tell you
that you need to contact thisGeorgetown University.
They have a book publishing,book creators class and then you
(32:25):
can get chosen to be published.
And I was like oh, so I lookedinto it and within the week I
contacted them, got acceptedinto the class and then my
manuscript got accepted into thenext phase of being published
through manuscript publishing.
And that was a journey in andof itself and what I learned is
wow, it was hard.
(32:45):
The journey was hard because I,all of a sudden, was working 80
hours a week trying to manage abusiness, a family and this
book and getting like deadlinesand this and that.
And when you write a book, firstof all talk about like I would
never say I'm writing a book forthe longest time my revisions
(33:07):
editor I mean, this was a fewmonths before it was coming out
she goes Tina, you need to sayyou're an author, You're writing
a book, not just it's a writingproject.
I felt so vulnerable and nakedand weird and also judging
myself.
Am I worthy to be doing thisthing we call authorship or
authoring a book?
And so it really revealed a lotof vulnerability.
(33:27):
Like even my revisions editorsays, you're a smart woman.
Why are you doing all this data?
Everybody else's story and noneof your own?
And that was revealing too.
Right?
People ranging from improvisers, storytellers, comedians and
psychologists and communicationstudies professors and
(33:52):
researchers.
And what does it mean to bemagnetic with our minds, message
and mechanics?
And along the way, I learned alot about myself.
Lauri (34:00):
What did you learn about yourself?
Tina (34:06):
I learned that it's not as hard as I thought to be
magnetic.
People always ask are you bornthis way?
Well, there are certainpredispositions of wanting to
speak Like the desire is innate.
The ability to be good at it istrainable.
So I learned that the hidingneeded to stop, and that was a
(34:30):
big one, and I still do itoccasionally because it's a
conditioned pattern, right ofbehavior, and I also got super,
super burnout.
And what was wild is during theaudio portion of it, I was
starting to lose my voicebecause of anxiety.
I was like, what if my voicesounds weird, Like in my head,
(34:50):
because this is the thing Iteach?
What if people are like I don'twant to hear?
Her voice, but because of thatand the burnout was real I
really learned more about me.
What?
does it truly mean to be Tina B.
And what does that look like,sound like, feel like?
And it's okay that I'm this bighearted, big loving,
(35:11):
enthusiastically kind,passionate, powerful, creative,
intuitive leader, and that I ama unicorn in Southwest Iowa and
now in Omaha, Nebraska, andthat's okay.
Lauri (35:22):
That's okay, yeah, and to tie it back to you know,
coloring outside of the lines.
Unicorn, you is magnetic, yes,and owning that.
Tina (35:36):
Yeah, I think that that's what I struggled with is I
wanted everybody like I wasalways going along to get along,
and the core question was likehow can I make them comfortable?
And that meant dimming my light,dimming my sparkle.
You know, I think I told you Iwas in the process of
consciously uncoupling with myspouse, who's a dear, dear
friend, and I came out in, youknow, six plus months ago.
(35:59):
All these things happened in arural community that was just
shaken to a core, on top of himhealing from a recent diagnosis
of stage four follicularlymphoma, lots and lots of
things all within six months,very packed.
And he said to me, out of love,I don't want to dim your
(36:19):
sparkle anymore, tina b, youneed to be you and I will stand
for you and all the magic thatyou are.
That's love.
And honestly, it gives mebeautiful chills now because
I've never had a specialnesslike that and that's why I'm so
lucky that I found him when Idid it, because he saw me, for
(36:41):
me and he was the first personthat held me and appreciated me
enough to let me go.
So magnetism, true beautifulmagnetism, is being at the core
who you are and not allowingwhat other people say, think,
(37:03):
behave or be around you toimpact your love bubble, your
energy and your sparkle.
And we all have a sparkle.
Mine just happens to be verybig, purple, bright, disco ball.
Lauri (37:17):
Yeah, yeah, and I hope if you're listening to this you're
getting the message that, likeyours is big, purple, bright
disco ball and somebody elsemight have like white, fluffy
pillow yes, and they're bothbeautiful and they're both
magnetic.
Tina (37:38):
Yeah, it's like compare barack obama and his style of
speaking with the big boldnessof oprahfrey right.
Very different, yeah, bothmagnetic.
Yes, maya Angelou, or you know,we have Brene Brown.
I mean Tina Fey love her, theyknow themselves foundationally.
(38:02):
Or Chevy Chase, back in the 70s, when he was big into SNL and
even watch SNL.
We love them very differently.
Yeah, when he was big into SNLand even watch SNL.
We love them very differentlybecause of what they brought to
the words, to the physicalitywith their body language.
And I've realized through mytraining in improv that I was
slowing down my body, like I'mvery Carol Burnett, very mugging
(38:23):
and big, and I'm just offendingthat because of the feedback I
was getting from discomfort fromfamily and some people, because
it's not the way of the culture.
Lauri (38:32):
Yeah, and guess what?
Tina (38:34):
It's okay to be not the way of the culture, you know.
Lauri (38:37):
Yeah, and on Saturday Night Live.
All of those different stylesare what make it work, and
that's actually what I believeis going on with humanity.
Yes work, and that's actuallywhat I believe is going on with
humanity.
Imagine saturday night live ifit was 14 different chevy chases
(38:57):
, and that's it it would right,it'd be very redundant and in
humanity there's so much likecolor inside the lines.
You need to be quieter, you needto talk faster.
You need to do this when, inreality, humanity will work
better when we've got all eightbillion people being themselves,
(39:20):
letting themselves be seen andletting their magnetism shine
through.
Tina (39:26):
Well, and it's especially challenging as a woman.
I mean, if you're and that'swhat I found is it being in
rural Iowa as a woman businessowner?
I broke all the already.
You know that to leave the farm, move to the city doing my own
business, coming out as alesbian, you know all these
(39:47):
things.
It's like check, check, check,check for lots of big difference
.
And the more I own my being andenergy and essence, the more
that I find as as Martha Beck,who's a sociologist, talks about
is.
You'll find your Eden, yourcommunity, and you know it's
okay to go against the culture,in fact, and you know it's okay
(40:08):
to go against the culture Infact, I'm a disruptor, I'm a
loving, visionary rebel.
You know a heart center.
You know love warrior, if youwill, Similar to I think it was
Glennon Doyle.
She has a beautiful book aboutbeing a love warrior and it's
true.
You show up with heart and loveand that intention and the
right people will follow you andyou're not meant to be like
(40:31):
making everybody comfortable.
There's no way to do that.
Lauri (40:32):
Yeah, there is no way to do that.
Yeah, yeah, if people arewanting to be part of your
community, wanting to get toknow you better, where can
people find you and get to knowyou better?
Tina (40:47):
Well, the best way is on my website where you could sign
up for yummy, greatcommunication storytelling tips.
It's tinabakehousecom.
That's Tina T-I-N-A, BakehouseB, as in boy, A-K-E-H-O-U-S-E,
so Bake is baking cookies.
Housesandcasacom,tinabakehousecom.
And then I'm on LinkedIn aswell as Facebook.
(41:08):
You can check those socialhandles as well as Magnetic
Speaking with Tina B.
On YouTube, you can get someyummy rooftop chats as well as
other insights.
So tinabakehousecom is the besthub.
Lauri (41:20):
Thank you, and I could talk to you for what feels like
decades, and I knew that wasgoing to happen.
Tina (41:26):
I know.
Lauri (41:26):
I could talk to you.
Lori forever and it's time toslide into our Pivo Pivot.
Okay, I'm ready.
Tina (41:41):
Tina, what is your favorite word?
B?
B-e what is your least favoriteword.
Hate what turns you oncreatively, spiritually or
(42:04):
emotionally A lot of things.
Lauri (42:08):
I would say dancing and nature.
Hmm, what turns you off?
Tina (42:16):
Insecurity.
Lauri (42:20):
What's your favorite curse word Shooty poops, shooty
poops I created that in myfreshman year of college.
I love that one.
What sound or noise do you love?
Tina (42:41):
Boomshakalaka, like when I'm thinking to do something.
I'm like boomshakalaka.
Lauri (42:46):
What sound or noise do you hate?
I'm like boom shakalaka.
What sound or noise do you hate?
Tina (43:00):
What profession other than your own?
Lauri (43:02):
would be fun to try Roller skating derby what
profession would you not like todo?
Tina (43:09):
Sitting at a computer all day and hearing data that's mind
numbing?
I would rather collect garbagethan that.
Lauri (43:20):
And Tina, what do you hope people say about you on
your 100th birthday?
Tina (43:27):
She loved and she lived with heart and all things
sparkle.
Lauri (43:33):
Well, you certainly brought all things sparkle and
love today.
Thank you so much for takingthe time and having the
conversation and being you inthe process.
Tina (43:46):
I love it.
That's why I really go by TinaB.
Thank you and everyone else inthe process.
I love it.
Lauri (43:50):
That's why I really go by Tina B.
Thank you and everyone else.
If you loved this episode,please share it with a friend, a
family member, somebody elsewho's had somebody shush them in
their lives so that they canstep into their own innate
charisma and their own magic.
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