August 28, 2017 • 54 mins
Welcome to this week's episode of Be Amplified! On this podcast episode we discuss the power of joy, and the role joy must play in our lives. We are joined by Rakia Reynolds as she shares her thoughts on ambitions, motherhood, joy, and living an amplified life. Check out the shownotes at www.TheAmplifyCollective.com
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You are listening to Be Amplified thePodcast with Bree En Tais, episode number
sixty. Hey Amplifiers, welcome tobe Amplified the Podcast. My name is
Tayis and I'm Bree Seeley. Weare the co founders of The Amplified Collective,
a movement aimed at radically disrupting howpurpose driven women connect and operate in
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the world, because we believe it'snot just what you do, but who
you are that matters. Each week, join us for messages and interviews that
will leave you feeling amplified and readyto change the world. Let's do this.
Oh hey, peoples that listen toour podcast, It's Monday or possibly
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not Monday for you on when youlisten to this. Yes, I'm Taus
guy, this is b Seeley.We are the co founders of the Amplified
Collective and we come to you todaywith a new episode of Be Amplified.
I have to say Tayus that aftereighteen months, your radio voice has really
like you've really embraced that yep,like being no radio person. That's like
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and today I need to do Ineed to be on the radio. We
are right now. No, butI mean like you know, like the
thing that you turn on in thecar. Do people actually listen to that
anymore? Is that that's still athing? I listened to NPR every day
when I'm in the car. Wow, So I guess some people still do.
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If NPR still goes the way it'sgoing. I have to admit I
did actually listen to the radio inthe last week, but it was only
because my phone was so dead thatif I played music through my phone,
my maps weren't going to get meto where I was going. Cool,
good thing, you made it,good thing. It would have been a
terrible thing. And luckily the radiois still around too. Luckily A silent
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car ride, what would that havelook like? That's scary terror, sheer,
a complete terror. All right,people, No, no, I'm
gonna speak no, no, noannouncements. I make my announcement. You're
a lot an announcement. Um.We have our final public event of the
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year tomorrow in Los Angeles, andwe would love, love, love for
you to be in the room withus. We were specifically we will be
jamming at Michael Cores at the Groveand we have La Grand Cortage, we
have Cavita, we have lots ofsnack companies on board because our intern this
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summer kicked ass. Uh some giveaways, some prizes and lots of love and
shopping. So who's free? Soyeah, so come and join us,
um and give and toast with us. It's our last public event, peoples,
so you might as well just puton some shoes and come join us.
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More likely, let's be real,put on some pants. Well,
yes, you're right, that ismore of a priority than shoes. I
was joking with some clients yesterday.I was like, oh man, I
have to leave a house tonight,Like I actually have pants on right now,
and we're on like video chat together. They're just like what And I'm
like, no one can ever seemy bottom half? So I'm go even
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know if I'm wearing pants right now, I'm wearing yoga pants right now,
and I could be naked right now, So you're welcome for that. Oh
my god, can you imagine thenaked podcasters? There has to be a
thing out there is It's kind alreadya thing. I got a FaceTime call
from a friend yesterday and she justcalled me as I was getting out of
the shower, so I had likemy hair up in a towel, and
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I was like, you know,so I didn't have anything on. Anyway,
I didn't expect her to FaceTime me. I thought, you know,
I didn't want it to be somesort of emergency. So I answered it
and she starts laughing because I'm,you know, clearly naked. Look people,
all we're saying is you can puton a pair of pants and kind
of have a glass of champagne,and tomorrow I will accept skirts and dresses.
That is also acceptable. Yeah,factum. Okay, So last week
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we talked about grief, and sowe wanted to kind of make some space
to talk about the other side ofthe spectrum. Not that it's a duality.
It's not either or people, it'snot either or. Actually you can
find tremendous amount of joy when yougo through your grief. But anyway,
today, so we're moving from ofgrief. We're moving from the little blue
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inside out character to the really funyellow inside out character. If you guys,
yes, I didn't even think aboutthat. That's amazing. We're gonna
be talking about joy. Yay.So joy is the last module that we
teach in the Amplified Woman, whichis our six month group thingy barber,
and so let's talk about joy,let's talk about happiness, let's talk about
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U bringing that into our lives.So the first thing I want to kind
of touch on is that's a littlefunny to me, is that joy and
happiness is like the top the tipof the mountain, right, Like we're
always just striving and trying to getto the top of the mountain to like
be happy, Like that's the beall end, all, the finish line,
like all these things. And it'sso funny because one oftentimes when we
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get to the tip of the mountain, we're still we still don't allow ourselves
to be in joy, and we'restill complaining about how things aren't they are
with the way they are or whatever, and we don't allow ourselves to feel
joy in any of the middle stuffeither. We get so caught up in
like the daily to dos and though, well, I have to do this,
and I have to clean my dishwasher, and I have to, you
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know, scoop the cat litter,and I have to do this, and
I like all these things, weget so bogged down by all the shit
that we just don't allow ourselves tohave any goddamn fun. And I think
fun is important, so important,you know, I think that we take
ourselves way too seriously. There areso many beautiful books that I've read in
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the Buddish tradition that are so humorousand they joke. That's like, if
you're teaching and you're making it serious, you're not doing it right, because
ultimately, you know, playfulness andlightheartedness and humor and love and happiness,
that's what's going to help people remembermore so than you know, being all
serious and uptight. And I don'tknow, I love the idea of playing
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more. And I love the feelingof joy, like it's just such a
like heart bursting experience. Or likewhen you're with someone and they're really funny
and you guys can't stop laughing andyou're about to peak because you're laughing so
hard, and like that's those areincredible moments. But I think what stops
us from really feeling those incredible momentsis that we're so scared that they're never
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going to happen again. We getso attached to that moment and we're still
terrified of it going that we clingto it. And when we cling to
happy moments, then we create sufferingbecause happiness and sadness. Everything else is
just you know, it just comesin and out. It's all just moves
through you. And when we getattached to certain feelings, we rob ourselves
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of, you know, the entirespectrum of human emotions. Yeah, yeah,
I had one of those. Iremember this year specifically, There's like
one instance of that. We werewalking through the streets of la and I
was laughing so hard I almost collapsedon the corner on the sidewalk. And
those moments are so amazing and theydon't happen all the time. But one
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thing I've really been playing with ishow can I integrate more of that energy
into everything I do? Like,how can I be joyful when I'm scooping
cap poop into a paper bag?How can I be joyful when I'm you
know, cleaning out the kitchen sink, which is not one of my favorite
things in the whole world. Yeah, How can I be joyful when I
accidentally put too many carrot peelings downthe kitchen sink and then my sink doesn't
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drain and then I have to geta guy in to come do all things?
Which was my life this week.But finding joy in all the things
in everyday activities and not just thesebig, you know, ostentatious displays of
the heavens opening up and you know, raining down magic juju on you and
no kind of stuff. Yes,Eckhartool talks about how there are three states
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that we want to be in andI can't remember the second one, goddamn
it. But you know, he'slike, you know, infuse joy and
I would think you can. Butif you can infuse joys, then at
least infuse acceptance. You know.If you can't, if you can't be
joyful about something, at least practicebeing an acceptance of what that something is.
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And and um, you know,I love that. I love that
joy has maybe like a spectrum.I love that we're not to force ourselves
to be happy, because that's nota thing, but we can certainly ask
ourselves, how can we infuse moreof that element into what we're doing.
The Internet says that the first modalityis acceptance. Oh my god, you're
you're hilarious. The second modality isenjoyment. See, I have this rule.
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Google knows everything everything, and soif you don't know which I don't.
There's a lot of shit I don'tknow. First to admit it.
There is a lot of shit Idon't know, but Google knows. So
I'm so glad that you So wecan give our audience a full clear spectrum
of the three things that that Kartolteaches. Okay, so acceptance, enjoyment,
enjoyment and enthusiasm. Oh yes,I love that. I've totally totally
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forgot about that. Yeah, yes, Like I think the idealness is to
bring enthusiasm into everything you do.But obviously sina posible. We are humans
and there's certain things that we justwe can't force it, right. Yeah,
So he talks, he does.He says that too, enthusiasm cannot
be a continuous state. But enthusiasmis just like an intense aliveness that flows
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into everything you do, whether it'sdusting the table or making a cup of
tea, or taking your dog ona walk or you know, all the
routine things as well, which Ithink are the ones that we forget to
have joy in. They really amreyep. Yeah, And I found that
the key, like the gay wayto joy, Like if we want joy
to be our destination and we're currentlynot in a state of joy one except
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accept your emotions. Damn it.Okay, dash people stop forcing herself to
feel shit. Okay, so feelyour emotions. But then the second step,
you know, once you felt allthe fields, it's gratitude. Gratitude
is so good, like not makinga list, like really feeling it in
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your body. Like when you canreally feel gratitude for what you're doing or
what's here, it's like joy kindof just naturally, it just comes in.
It just tickles your belly, youknow, it just it's just a
thing that is here, so naturallywhen we can shift our mind to that
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place of what am I grateful for? And as you were talking, one
other thing that it reminded me ofis one of our favorite books by Wallace
Waddle, The Science of Getting Rich, and he talks about you you don't
get a change of environment by beingunhappy where you are, Like, you
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get a change of environment through action. You don't if you're sitting around waiting
for the change of environment to happen, it's not going to happen. Yeah,
But if you're embodying the change thatyou want to see, your environment
will just naturally shift. And sothe more that you can be ingratitude and
enjoy even in the moments when you'renot so feeling like you're ingratitude and enjoy
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that's what's going to change your environment. That's what's going to change your perspective.
Yeah. Yeah, And you know, even if you can't change your
environment because of external things, Ithink stepping into a place of enthusiasm or
enjoyment or acceptance or gratitude gives youthe the energy, the perspective shift that
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will allow you to either accept what'shappening or take action and do something about
it. You know, I thinkmore while angry anger can be an incredible
fuel for action, it's not assustainable. Just like enthusiasm is not sustainable,
anger isn't sustainable, right, Sowe've got to find the places within
us that are more sustainable and thenacts accessing that place. And again I'm
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telling you, I'm telling you,gratitude is the shit you know every time
we want And I'm not I'm nottalking about the cliche gratitude because I know
it's so stewed around. Oh Ithink behateful. No, No, I'm
talking about the real when you reallyare complaining and you really feel hopeless,
like there's nothing you can do.To just take a deep breath and remember
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your alive mi us you know,and remember and feel it in your entire
body. That's what I'm talking about. When was the last experience that you
were able to be in that state? I try to be in that state
all the time. Cash take sustainability. I would be because I'm enlightened and
ship. Someone called me a bodhisatvathe other day. I go, whoa,
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whoa, let's walk off as ahorse. There is you know,
it's a Buddhist commitment to being onthe on the path of you know,
why don't you google it? Whydon't you google it? Really? Yeah,
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it's body like the tree like bod h i, and then it's
sa t t va. Google willhave a better answer than I will.
A person who is able to reachnirvana but delays doing so out of compassion
in order to save suffering beings.Yeah, okay, I was saying about
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you create a chi vowel like anyonecan do it if they're really committed in
the Buddhist path to be in thestate of oneness. Right, So that's
bodichi and then once you enter thepath, then you step into the ultimately
hopefully step into being. Yeah.Someone called me got the other day,
I was like, hmm, thatis so. Now where I'm at my
friend, that is so. Butthat's cute. That's cute. Okay,
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let's see. Last time I wasin a place of that type of gratitude,
well, you know, I willsay, being in a partnership with
someone for four years, you gotyou kind of start taking some things for
granted, and you know, youkind of go into the rhythm of your
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life and you kind of forget thatyou have made a commitment to be with
this person and they're not just alwaysgoing to be there. Right. But
I was leaving for the East Coast, and so I've been thinking about that
a lot. You know, I'mnot gonna be seeing him for two weeks,
which is fine. You know,what does that mean? And I
don't know. I just got thisthis sense of just complete gratitude for our
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relationship and for our trust of eachother and for our communication and just for
how he supports me and who heis in the world. And that moment
of gratitude when I infused it intothe relationship was really magical. Like the
three days before I left the EastCoast, it's so yep, It's like
relationships are so much yummier when youcome in instead of trying to change the
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other person, being like just thegratitude for who they are what they do
for you in your life. Sothat was my last experience. Yeah,
how about yo? How about yohhuh? And then can we talk about
play? Because I think that's important. When need you to talk about play?
We can, Yes, I don't, Yes, we'll talk about that.
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So for me, I actually hada moment this morning because I'm in
this massive to do state. Ihave a lot of things going on,
a lot of balls in the airthat I'm all trying to juggle all at
once. And I've decided in thelast few weeks that it's a really good
idea to start getting up earlier becauseI need more time in my day.
And so now I've been getting upat six or sorry, five thirty in
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the morning every morning and negating mymorning routine and immediately jumping into work and
being all in the like I haveto get this done, you know energy.
And this morning I had my laptopon my lap. It was six
am, and I was writing andmy cup of tea by my side,
and all of a sudden, peachesjumps on top of my laptop, and
I just had this moment where Iwas like, Ah, you're keeping me
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from doing all the things, andyou're fucking things up and you're stepping younkeys
and like all this just like ah, and I had a moment and I
looked down at her fucking cute,little furry face, and she just looked
up at me with her big greeneyes and she just needed a second of
love, just like and so Ilooked at my clock and I was like,
I can give you. I'm likefour minutes, gonna put my computer
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aside. I'm gonna be really presentin this moment and just be in an
intense state of love and gratitude.Because and then did you take a picture
and show on social media? Idid? Did you just see it?
It's on the Instagram stories. No, I didn't see it, but oh
of course you would. She's justso cute. And she was she was
not sitting on my lap. Shewas literally sitting like up above my boobs,
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like in my face, like needingto be right up on it was.
Yeah, it was. She's justso cute. So I gave myself
five minutes this morning to just bein that place and let my heart expand
and receive all of her little healingkitty purse. And it was it was
good. It took me out ofthe insanity and the frantic chaos for a
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hot second. Yeah, so let'stalk about play. So what I was
gonna say is like, I don'treally have a lot to say about this
because as a kid, I didn'treally get to play that much. But
but you know, I'm learning howto play as an adult, which is
an interesting thing. I don't reallyknow how to do it. So you
tell us all the things. Twise, how do I learn to play other
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than board games? I know howto play board games, those I got.
I mean, I would say thatI think I'm a pretty playful person,
And to me, playfulness is anenergy that you can bring into anything,
you know, just being more lightheartedand sun and not taking things so
seriously. But that's just I guessit's kind of just who I am.
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So I don't want to, like, you know, the five steps to
become more like tis because that's weird. Um. I will say I think
that we all need to spend moretime doing things that are really just fun,
like um, like going put puckgolfing or like um laser tagging or
you know, doing like these funkind of things, like experiences like when
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new museum and not museums that isnot playful amusement parks and why can't be
playful? Have you gotten to theMuseum of ice Cream tics there we go?
Okay, yeah, like that likeum, like fun museums, not
like play museums. Oh my gosh, hashtag no judgment. Oh I love
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all museums. Please don't judge me. Tights is super cultured. I'm super
cultured. That's what I meant,not educated cultured. Okay, love museums
hashtag t youselves mus but yes,fun museums that bring out the playfulness,
like the ice Cream Museum in LAand whatever else. I just think we
need to do more of that,And I think when we can do more
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of that, it's easier for usto go into that state of playfulness.
And when we can do that,then we can bring that energy into other
things. One of the things thatI remember as just kind of a fun
playful people take too seriously is whenwe did the events at UM. Oh
my god, why am I losingmy mind? Here? On Larchmont,
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the spin events flywheel, and everyone'sso serious and everyone's like sweating and like
so exercising, and like, ah, you know, we have to get
through the end and tie us nextto me, just like screaming and just
like laughing and just like oh mygod, Yeah, there's no need.
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I was so tortuous that I didn'tknow what else to do. And of
course there's you know, we werein a private class. It was only
amplify people. Blah blah blah.You don't really want to disturb too many
other people's experiences, But come on, people think that stuff so seriously,
and why are we killing ourselves withall these things that are like so intense
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and so serious All the time.When I teach yoga, I try to
make people laugh, you know.I do things like different different balance poses
or arm balanced, and then askthem to do something that's really uncomfortable,
and I'm like, you're like standingon one foot on the big ball of
rock that's like moving through space.Like this shit's not that serious, you
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know, Um, I don't.Yeah, I just think that playfulness is
the way, it's the it's theanswer to all of our problems. You
know, if you were to goout and play for the rest of the
day to day to use what wouldyou do? Um, Well, this
may be tm I, but I'mon the first day of my period.
We are sinked, even though weare three time zones apart. I love
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this well, so I'm not feelingmy is not feeling so well. So
my level of play right now isto like have a hot pad on my
belly and watch Netflix. Not veryplayful, but it's exactly what I mean
right now. But in general,I mean, you know, Mark and
I we've been wanting to go backto um the Champlaine, the Champlaine Park.
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Oh yeah, that was so muchfun. It's so much fun.
We also love room escape in Lawhere you get like you're in a room
and you have to find the clue, so like find your way out and
it's fun. And we can alsotake that to I mean, you could
take all these things seriously. That'sthe point, right, Like, you
could go to a Champlaine park andtake it too seriously and you have to
get the backflip. And if youdon't get the backflip that means something and
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whatever. But really it's like practicingdropping into energy of what it feel like
to be a kid to be achild again, you know, to not
take these things so seriously. Yeah, well, let's wrap this up and
bring our beautiful guest, m RikiaReynolds is gonna imbue you with more joyful
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energy and more you know, excitementand enjoyment and all the things. So
pause for one hot second and wewill bring Rakia on. All right,
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amplifiers, we are back. Wehave an amazing guest with us and cannot
wait to introduce you to Miss RikiaReynolds. Hi, Hi, welcome.
We let me tell everyone all aboutyour amazingness. So first off, we
were just reminiscing that Rakia was featuredalongside both of us on an inc Magazine
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feature back in March, and we'vekind of just been chatting since then,
and she is brilliant. So sheis the CEO and founder of sky Blue
Media, a multimedia public relations agencywith an all star roster of lifestyle,
technology, nonprofit and fashion clients.As a leader in the industry, she's
highly sought after by companies to provideexpertise in creative development, branding, marketing,
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and business communications. Her path toentrepreneurship started with numerous creative ventures,
including producing shows for MTV, TLCand Discovery Health Channel. She's a business
major, turn TV producer, turnedPR pro, and the twists and turns
have made her into the media mogul, an unstoppable trailblazer that she is today.
She launched sky Blue Media in twothousand and eight with only one employee,
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one client, and the driving desireto form a PR agency that would
break the mold and represent the futureof public relations in the digital age.
The firm has since grown tremendously tofourteen employees and more than thirty prominent clients.
In addition to building her business andthose of others, she actively participates
in speaking engagements nationwide and has beenable to share her knowledge of business and
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brand development numerous stages, including thoseof TED Tech, eight O eight DC
and Dell Women's Entrepreneur Network. Sheworked as a guest editor for Marie Claire
magazine and has been featured in publicationsincluding Essence, Lucky, and Uptown.
She regularly contributes her expertise on entrepreneurshipand leadership to outlets such as al Forbes,
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Inc. Huffington Post, and Fortune. As an on air brand expert
for Serena Williams line for HSN,Rikia works closely with Williams and her design
team on messaging and social media integrationfor launches, special product rollouts, and
consumer engagement. In addition to allof that amazingness, she is a wife
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to her best friend and husband,Bram, and mother of three amazing children.
Holy book, right there, Wellwe are so well, thanks so
much for having me. I'm like, why it was that? That was
definitely the long biome. It wasa good one though. I mean,
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we have to read every juicy nuggetof your brilliance, you know. Oh,
thanks why I appreciate it and likeat a time like this, you
know, like it's it's great tojust have, you know, women lifting
up women. So I appreciate thebraggadocious air of your reading up my bios.
I enjoyed it. Thank you somuch. Braggadocious That is a word
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that we need to integrate into moreof life. So tell us, Rikia,
what does it look like for youto live and amplify life? Oh?
Wow, what does it look likefor me to live and amplify life?
I mean, I think you knowit for me that a couple of
different meanings. As a mother,I see like amplifying life through my children.
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I see amplifying life through you know, inspiring others and being a trio
Blazer and and and you know,being a and a woman of color in
an industry that it's moving so rapidlyand sometimes you know, sometimes with a
ton of barriers. So I thinkamplifying life to me is like, you
know, just having more life.I've been seeing the hattag more life all
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over Instagram because of Drakes Want ofDrinks and I think Rihanna song. So
I think for me, it's likebeing able to be excited about what I
do all of the time, beinga being in a place where you know,
I'm thriving and I'm also happy.I think sometimes we take the happiness
out of the things that we do, we take the joy out of it,
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and we're just grinding. We're talkingabout hustling, We're talking about growing
and building and making and creating andall of these things that I think for
me, amplifying life is doing allof the things that I do, but
doing it in an enjoyable way,being excited about it and being really happy.
I love that happiness. Let's diveinto that. Yeah, yeah,
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you have such a feel that energyand excitement within you. And I'm curious,
have you always been this way orwas there a moment in your life
where you awakened to the necessary essentialelements of happiness. Well, I think,
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you know, I'll say I generallyI was always a happy kid.
I always remember people always saying,oh my gosh, what You're always so
happy, or you're always so jumpy, or you're always doing this. So
I think generally I wasn't a happykid. But I think we all get
to moments of our lives where wefeel completely helpless. And I know I've
been. I've hit the wall acouple of times throughout my life. I've
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had so many different ebbs and flows. As an entrepreneur, you know,
we're generally risk takers and the peoplethat are like, you know, trailblazing.
But I don't, you know,with entrepreneurship, it could be one
or two things. You can,you know, risk taking, jump off
the bridge one day, and thatbridge could be you laying in water and
treading in water, or it couldbe you blanding on a pile of rocks.
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So I think for me, I'veseen both sides of the fence.
I've been I've had some really lowloads and I've had some really high hides.
But I know that, you know, as I got into later on
in my life, like I've nestledin my thirties, you know, later
on in my thirties, but Ithink in my mid thirties and I was
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to say this, you know,being transparent, I just really started to
learn how to reset my mindset andthe you know, be the master of
my thoughts. You know, I'veread somewhere that you know, I think
we had like sixty thousand thoughts aday, and I'm like, you know,
I have to be really conscious andI have to be mindful about having
like fifty five thousand race offs aday because we can easily, you know,
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only have one. But I tendto look more at the positive side
of things and being like grateful forwhat I had in front of me,
and you know, not worrying aboutall the other ships. You know,
I'm like, not just worrying aboutit. So I think happiness is sort
of relative for a lot of people, and sometimes for me it's a it's
different. It's different. It's thatI walked out of a meeting not sweating,
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or I didn't love. You know, I'm happy that I didn't lose
my temper. You know, Ididn't lose it, you know, like
ten minutes ago. So I thinkit's relative. And so when you say,
like, have you always been thisway? I think it's been different
forms of happiness happiness. I thinkcontent, you know, with one form
relief who was a form of happinessfor me at one point. And now
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I'm at a time where I amjust conscious about all the things around me.
I'm as conscious as I've ever beenabout all the things around me,
and super mindful of how to controlthe things around me, even even the
variables and the balls that are thrownat curveballs sometimes amazing. I have been
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going through a lot of this myselfas well. I've been talking to a
few friends, like those of usthat are super ambitious, right, We're
always striving for something else, andthere's always this desire to like do more
and be more. And I washaving a conversation with a friend that's like,
how do you balance that that likestriving to like grow a business and
(31:22):
impact people and you know, foryou be a mom and grow great children
and you know, be really happyand present with exactly where you are right
now in the moment, And sothat's kind of one thing I've been looking
at a little bit. So foryou, what do you how do you
manage that? Like, how doyou how do you calm that desire for
(31:47):
yourself to like do more and bemore and expand and all these things and
still be in this happiness. Youknow, I think there are a couple
of different things that I do.I'll say that, you know, there
are times when you know, I'velike gone down the black hole online,
you know, like, oh,let me check my instaceeeds this morning and
see what people are up to.Let me make sure I'm posting my content
(32:10):
on my Facebook and I'm pleading,and I'm doing all these things and you
know, publishing an article on LinkedIn. And when you do that, you
then start looking at what other peopleare doing. And I think sometimes we
compare ourselves to other people and lookat where they are in their lives at
that moment, and we you know, sometimes I would say, subconsciously,
(32:31):
we'll just sort of size ourselves upand say, you know, we're not
where we want to be, wherewe're supposed to be doing all these amazing
things, and we're constantly you know, striving, as you said, for
greater and I think for me,it's being able to pull a step back
and be in the moment. Ilearned from a media coach a while back
(32:52):
because I also do on air forone of our clients, and she was
watching me on television one night andshe was like, you're not there,
Like you're just not there. AndI said, I have to be honest,
I'm thinking about this, I'm thinkingabout that, and I'm thinking about,
you know, my business growing,and I'm thinking about this contract.
There were so many things I wasthinking about at that time, and she
was like, I need you tostart living more in the present. I
(33:14):
need you to do breathing exercises aroundliving in the presence. So what I
do now before I do anything major, whether that's walking into a meeting with
a client, whether that's you know, completing a contract or standing you know,
going on air or doing a photoshootfor one of our clients, I
take, you know, at leastfive minutes to myself where I can really
(33:35):
breathe and visualize myself just being inthat moment. And it takes a lot
to do that. So what Ido before I do anything, before I
walk into the house before I gobike riding with my kids, before I
you know, sit down with myfourteen year old to have a serious conversation
or to you know, just havea conversation with her around motivating, you
know, around motivation. I putmyself in that moment, so they're breathing
(33:59):
exercises that I do, and thenI kind of have to like I don't
want to say psyched myself out,psyched myself up, but I essentially,
I essentially do you know, Italk about everything that's happening right then and
now and sort of throw away anddiscard anything that's happening, you know,
in the next ten minute, fifteenminutes or you know, further out.
(34:20):
But for me personally, it's aboutliving in the moment, being in the
present, and totally immersing myself inthe moment, in the present. Awesome,
Oh my gosh, that was justso good. You know, I'm
all about mindfulness and focusing on what'shere. And I'm curious for you,
(34:43):
what do you find to be thebiggest hurdle, challenge, obstacle, whatever
word you want to put when itcomes to really being president, Like,
what do you find pulls your attentionaway the most or the most powerfully from
the president. How do you navigatethat? I mean, you know,
as an entrepreneur, I'm thinking ofeverything. I'm thinking of the hr side
(35:07):
of my business. I'm thinking ofyou know, you know, the hiring.
I'm thinking of who's not supposed tobe there anymore. I'm thinking about
growth, you know, I Ithere. Everything is a constant distraction for
me. It is it is veryhard to be in the present, live
in the moment, and be supermindful around those things. So I think,
you know, the things that pulledme away the most, And again
(35:30):
it depends on the day. Youknow. The other day, you know,
I'd like gotten got into this placebecause I was in a conversation talking
about you know, diversity and diversityand media, and I felt myself getting
really sad about all of the thingsthat you know, I've had to go
through as an entrepreneur, as awoman in the media landscape, that some
(35:52):
of my my peers that don't looklike me or don't sound like me have
had to go through. So inthat moment those I was so distressed and
overwhelmed by the conversation that was goingon in our country at that moment that
it was really hard for me tobe present. It was really hard for
me to it was really hard forme to focus on being present, and
(36:13):
that it was me being able totake up, take up, take a
bike ride with my kids and sortof snap out of it. But I
think for me, I'm dealing withso many different variables, you know,
in my industry and you know,being in media, you know, clients
and day to day operations of runninga business and being an entrepreneur and a
mother and a wife and all ofthese things. You know, I used
(36:36):
to call myself the octopus woman andWe're an octopus to remind myself, like,
you have all of these things todo. You have to be somebody's
mother, you have to be somebody'swife, you're somebody's daughter, you're somebody's
you know, fifth or you're aleader, you're an entrepreneur, you're all
of these things. So I neededthat that said octopus as a symbol to
remind me that I was all ofthese things. So saying, you know,
I'm saying all of those things thatI'm involved in, I have a
(36:59):
constant distract, so they're never justone thing. It really, it really
depends on the day and the hourthat it is of the day. Who
amazing, Thank you. That's agreat metaphor. I like thinking about it
that way. With the octopus.I feel like, right, I feel
(37:20):
like octopus that are symbol for something, like they symbolize something. I just
going to look it up. Youknow, I love this shit. Yeah,
look it up. Wild Bree islooking up. Um, I am
killing my spirit animal. Let's movein a slightly different direction because you have
a lot of PR and media expertise, and we've I can't recall off the
(37:43):
top of my head, but Idon't really have a great memory on anyone
else that we've had that's really inthis industry. And I'm curious your thoughts
on women putting themselves out there andwomen, you know, um, putting
themselves on media and the challenges thatwomen face when it comes to putting themselves
out there. Yeah, I thinkfor women and and people in general.
(38:07):
You know, we're in a we'rein a climate of you there, there's
no resumes anymore. You know,your brand is your CV. Your brand
is what people are constantly evaluating,whether you're going into you know, you're
going into an interview or you're applyingfor colleges, or you are pitching a
(38:28):
client, or you know, insome cases you're implying you're applying for certain
insurances. People are looking you uponline constantly, um And I sometimes check
Google to see what people are searching, you know, on me. And
you know, I've I've seen thingscome up about you know, my husband
and my children. So you knowthat you're in a constant and it's this
(38:49):
constant climate of like sizing you upand being evaluated online. So if you
know that you're being evaluated online,be consistent and be true to who you
are. And I think that fora lot of you know, a lot
of I think for a lot ofwomen that it's taking a step back and
maybe having your own think tank.You're evaluating, Okay, who am I?
You know? What what are thethings that people say about me when
(39:12):
I leave a room? What arethe things that I want people to say
about me when I'm entering the room? Does that come across on my online
presence? Is that you know?That? Is that if that prominent in
my profile? You know, Ilook at you know, online presence all
of the time, and I lookat what people call themselves or what people
are posting. But I think dependingon your industry or you know, the
(39:35):
people that you appeal to, youhave to be true to that brand and
you're auosed to be consistent. Soit's not just you know, being true
and being your your your best selfor being your transparent self, but it's
being it's being consistent if you wantto if you want it to be something
that's going to be impactful, orif you want it to be something that
you can leverage later on. SoI think when online meet and you know
(40:00):
and I don't, and I mightnot be answering the question, but I
think as we're looking at ourselves onlineand you know, from from a communication
standpoint, it's just you just haveto be careful, thoughtful, um and
strategic when it comes to the presencethat you're building for yourself online, whether
that's your outed is, whether that'syour tweets. Sometimes when people search to
(40:22):
you, your tweets might come up. Um other times that they search to
you know, depending on what's outthere. You know, your ID profile
will come up if it's public umyou or your LinkedIn profile will come up
or in some instances, your youknow, your Facebook. It all depends
on how they're searching you and whatthey're they're typing in. So I always
say to people, be consistent acrossthe board, be your authentic self,
(40:45):
make sure that it's organic and nowit not only speaks to the content that
you love, but what is youraudience responding to? Why are people why
are people following you? Why arepeople reading about you? So it's feeding,
it's feeding net, it's staying trueto your So I know that a
lot of women's fears about being theirauthentic self online, of course, or
(41:07):
things like judgment or you know,disownment, or their friends are going to
stop talking to them, or someone'sgoing to tweet back at them about how
wrong they are about what they justposted, or any of those things.
So what is your advice to womenwho are craving to be their authentic selves
(41:27):
online and build this presence and havethis part of themselves that are like,
ah, you know, what ifI get burned at the stake and what
if people disown me? And whatif all my friends abandoned me? And
da da da da da da dada da. Do you have to what?
Like, what do you tell yourwomen or your clients that are kind
of in that space. Well,I would say it always depends on the
(41:50):
client. You know, I havemy youngest client, give a twelve year
old social activius, so what Itell her might be different there, you
know what we're telling some of ouryou know, older corporate clients. Um.
But what I usually will say isthere that might happen. You aren't
going to get comments where people arenot going to like you. They're going
(42:14):
to disagree with you. And I'vealways said, don't see the trolls.
But you have to be in aposition if you're if you're someone that is
going to or about to or isin the middle of embarking in saying,
kay, I am going to buildmy online presence or I want to you
know, tweak or refine my messagingonline. You have to be with you
(42:34):
have to be okay with the factthat not everyone is going to agree with
you, and not everybody's going tolike what you put out there, and
and sometimes people really don't care whatyou have to say at all. So
you have to be willing to sayI'm going to be the risk taker.
And and you know, in mycase, you know, I deal with
a lot of entrepreneurs. I alwayssay the definition of an entrepreneur is the
risk taker. So you're going totruly be a risk taker, you have
(42:58):
to be willing to take that risk. What I will say is that for
some of my clients UM ones thatand I believe in research and I and
I do believe in you know,think pink and hosting things among friends for
first I've had clients in you know, some situations where I've said, you
know, builds are really cool,the build a WhatsApp group and some of
(43:19):
the things that you really want topost online that you think might be great
for your audience might not be great. So why don't you put it on
your What's because some of us likeposting online. It's like a release.
It's like our it's like our therapy, Like we want people to know that
we've had a bad day and wewant people to know. UM sometimes for
motivation, you know, not tofeed your haters and things like that.
(43:39):
But that might not be appropriate foryou, That might not be appropriate for
your brand. You're the people thatare following you might not want to hear
you say things like, you know, don't feed the haters or don't you
know, don't feed the trolls.So you have to have outlets so that
you can you know, inspire.Um, you have to have outlets online.
That's it's feeding you and feeding youraudience at the same time. But
(44:02):
for me, you know, ifit's no if there's there's no copying and
pasting to this, I believe intaking a book spoke approach to every brand.
So if you're a chef, Imight tell you to I might say,
stay away from these outlets and payattention no more to to pendrance.
If you're a television producer, youknow, I might I might tell you
(44:24):
to use one outlet over the other. If you're you know, a supermodel,
I might say the super visual andyou know, just focus on the
three outlets. So it all dependson who you are and what you're doing.
But in the general sense, it'syou know, picking things that you
can respond the most two and youraudience wants to respond the most two and
(44:45):
then carving out what that authentic contentis around that and not only you know,
feeds your soul, but also feedsthe people that you're outlets, I
mean, feeds the audience that you'reengaging. But essentially you're you're a risk
taker. You have to be ableto you have to be able to take
that risk and say sometimes people arenot kind of like what I say.
Wow, thank you, that wassome really good points. I appreciate you
(45:07):
sharing that with us and with ourcommunity. Yeah, I do have a
question. I've been thinking about thisa lot, and I would love to
know your perspective. Let's blow upthis idea of a brand real quick.
I've noticed since the rise of socialmedia that it is true that even individuals
(45:29):
are brands, whether or not theyrun the business, and they have to
be thinking about themselves and how they'reputting themselves out there as such. And
you know, there's these kids thatare posting, you know, stupid things
online and then their college applications arebeing denied because a college finds out about
it. Right, So we've gotto be aware of what we're posting and
(45:52):
putting ourselves as This idea of abrand is a great way of being aware
and being consistent. But I'm curiousto the downside, especially for women's psychology,
I feel like we already have sucha stigma of wo to be perfect
and needing to present ourselves in ain a certain way even before social media.
(46:12):
I'm curious. Do you feel likethis notion of a brand is perpetuating
the need for women to be perfectionistsand to be consumed with her looks and
you know, obsessed with what peoplethink about her even more so? Oh
absolutely, I mean, you know, as a mother, that's something that
I'm faced with, you know,constantly. You know, my children,
(46:37):
you know, are seven, nineand fourteen. And for my fourteen year
old, she's not really online asmuch she you know, she has you
know, she has an Instagram,but it's mostly of her drawing. And
we've had we've had real conversations aroundyou know, and this is you know,
to a child saying they are notwritten in pencil, they're written in
(46:58):
ink. So what you put onlineday, there's whether it's a video where
you know, a snap, ofcourse you think it. It disappeared that
somebody else spring grabbed it and sentit to twenty other people before you were
able to delete it. So I'vehad to have those real conversations with my
kids, you know, I've hadto have those real conversations with my kids
because I had two daughters, andI want to make sure that they know
(47:22):
what it's to come, even ifthey're not, they're not online as much
right now, but what is tocome? But I think for a lot
of women it is this, youknow, we we we this woman a
good friend of mine set the otherday that we all have this this sheet
mentality where you know, we're justheavily influenced by other people. If one
(47:45):
person doesn't like it, then it'sa domino effect and no one likes it.
So I think as we are livingin this sort of sheat mentality space
and we're all sizing one another upand comparing ourselves online, it is not
good for our not good for ourpsychology. Um, you know, I
see the things that are trending themost online right now, like you know,
(48:07):
health and fitness, which I thinkare great. I think that you
know, we're all you know,eating a lot healthier and we're all working
out, but they're also there's alsoyou know, some some downs, you
know, some downside of that,because everybody's looking at who can work out
the bed, who can had themost satched weight, and you know,
(48:27):
who's drinking the most tee to tostay fit, and who's eating the most
salads, And it's like, atwhat point does that bubble does that bubble
verse. So that's why I'm reallyyou know, when I when I'm talking
to clients, I am very I'mvery transparent with them, and sometimes it's
not a nice conversation. I willtell them, you have no business being
(48:50):
on Instagram. Build your Facebook communityand you're a thought leader. Stay on
Twitter, you're a great writer.We do not need to tell your story
through all of these images. Butagain, it's it depends. So it's
knowing where you have the authority tovoice and where what you're an expert in
and what kinds of content you putout. I don't think that everybody has
to tell their story through pictures.I think some of us are very you
(49:14):
know, with great quick wit,informative and authoritative, you know, using
Twitter and publishing articles on LinkedIn.So it's really knowing you're laying and what
your voice is, where your voicematters to both and not where you feel
like you're having the most fun.If that makes sense, Yes, that
(49:35):
definitely makes sense. I've loved Instagramfor most of my business, but this
past year I've been so checked outof it because I'm no longer interested in
showcasing my life as this ideal lifestylefor people to look up to. That's
not where my content lies, That'snot where my power lies. And so
I've been doing that of navigating,well, where is the best place for
(49:58):
my content in mind nation? Andyou know, I have a mask to
following on Instagram? So what doI do with that? How do I
manage that? You know, likewhat types of pictures do I share?
So I'm glad that you said that, And I feel like this is so
relevant to so many of us whoare seeing the flip side of building a
brand online. Is this constant expectationof how you have to appear and how
(50:23):
you have to look and how youhave to be showing up every day.
And I feel for a lot ofus it's slowly killing us. Yeah,
And I think it. Listen,it's it's good for some people in it.
In it is it? I think, what's the old thing? Like
what good's good for the goose isn'tgood for the gander. I hear my
grandmother things like that. It's like, and it's true, you don't have
(50:46):
to My mother used to always say, we're Kia. You cannot be on
every ship that sails, and youcan't like, you can't be that person
it's like, Okay, I havea you know, like a huge Instram
following, and I want to beon Twitter. I want to be on
Facebook, you know, I wantto be on Pinterest. I want to
be snapping. I want to beupdating my eyes, but I want to
we have fathing like, yeah,I want to be at all. Yeah,
(51:09):
we we have to. We havepeople that you know, like we
ap clients that want to be onall of those things because I'm like and
sometimes I'm like, are you serious. You're on snaps and you have ID
stories, you have an Instagram,you have a Facebook personal page, you
have a Facebook fan page, youhave a You're tweeting constantly. So it's
like at some point you do haveto pull back because you're going to super
(51:30):
saturate the market. People do gettired of everything. But you also have
to know and that's why it's good. You know, I would say,
you know, we're experst you know, in communication, so you know,
with my team, it's like wefocus and we research on where it's you
know, where your brand is gettingthe most engagement, and we stay focused
on those channels. Yes, youhave to be able to communicate with people
(51:52):
in different mediums. To tell differentstories to appeal to those audiences. Because
we know that there's a you know, a different demo or you know in
sell or Snap and Facebook and penentrant, yet they're all different outlets. But
you have to also know what isgoing to be best for your brand and
for your audience because you might beyou might have a massive idea following,
(52:14):
but you're getting more impacts through yourlinks in because people are making business connections
for you or the people that thepeople that are moving the needle on and
making most of the decisions are readingyour your opinion pieces and saying, hey,
I like this person's thought. Weshould partner up and we should work
together. So you have to reallyunderstand what's your goal. Is your goal,
(52:36):
you know from building contents, isto motivate and inspire people. Is
it to you know, make morebusiness connections? You know, is it
to be popular because a lot ofus right now are really struggling with that,
Like I want to be popular,like you know, my life in
my currency, I want to Iwant to make sure that I've gotten like
nine hundred LIFs on my photo,But is that nine hundred life on your
(52:57):
photo really doesn't really matter? Ifyou get nine hundred lights in your photo,
or is it more impactful for fiveinfluencers to read an opinion piece that
you WoT? Yes, I lovethat. Yeah, No, this is
really really good. I feel likethis is important true smack to some of
our millennial listeners are building their brandsand building their online presence, and we
(53:23):
love this conversation so much, butwe have to wrap it up. So
here's what we're gonna do. We'regonna put a pin in it. We're
gonna put a pin in it,and we're going to take this to the
extended cut conversation. So for anyonewho wants to learn more about Urikia and
your incredible work in the world,where can they go? They can follow
(53:45):
my business page, guide Blue Media, which is Skai Blue Media, so
we're on Instagram mostly telling the behindthe theme stories and Facebook. Or they
can send an email info at skybumediadot com and be added to our newsletter
and hey, do you want toknow more about me? Just personally?
(54:07):
I'm just Ricky oriminals R A KI A R E Y n O l
V. And I have most ofmy conversations on Twitter and Instagram. Amazing
glad you know your outlets yay.Well, we are going to talk all
things octopus and ask rikias some morein depth questions on the extended cuts.
(54:31):
You can join us over there atbe amplified dot community. You can also
find us on all the socials atthe amplified co. We particularly love Instagram
And until next week, go beamplified
You are listening to Be Amplified thePodcast with Bree En Tais, episode number
sixty. Hey Amplifiers, welcome tobe Amplified the Podcast. My name is
Tayis and I'm Bree Seeley. Weare the co founders of The Amplified Collective,
a movement aimed at radically disrupting howpurpose driven women connect and operate in
(00:21):
the world, because we believe it'snot just what you do, but who
you are that matters. Each week, join us for messages and interviews that
will leave you feeling amplified and readyto change the world. Let's do this.
Oh hey, peoples that listen toour podcast, It's Monday or possibly
(00:42):
not Monday for you on when youlisten to this. Yes, I'm Taus
guy, this is b Seeley.We are the co founders of the Amplified
Collective and we come to you todaywith a new episode of Be Amplified.
I have to say Tayus that aftereighteen months, your radio voice has really
like you've really embraced that yep,like being no radio person. That's like
(01:06):
and today I need to do Ineed to be on the radio. We
are right now. No, butI mean like you know, like the
thing that you turn on in thecar. Do people actually listen to that
anymore? Is that that's still athing? I listened to NPR every day
when I'm in the car. Wow, So I guess some people still do.
(01:30):
If NPR still goes the way it'sgoing. I have to admit I
did actually listen to the radio inthe last week, but it was only
because my phone was so dead thatif I played music through my phone,
my maps weren't going to get meto where I was going. Cool,
good thing, you made it,good thing. It would have been a
terrible thing. And luckily the radiois still around too. Luckily A silent
(01:53):
car ride, what would that havelook like? That's scary terror, sheer,
a complete terror. All right,people, No, no, I'm
gonna speak no, no, noannouncements. I make my announcement. You're
a lot an announcement. Um.We have our final public event of the
(02:15):
year tomorrow in Los Angeles, andwe would love, love, love for
you to be in the room withus. We were specifically we will be
jamming at Michael Cores at the Groveand we have La Grand Cortage, we
have Cavita, we have lots ofsnack companies on board because our intern this
(02:37):
summer kicked ass. Uh some giveaways, some prizes and lots of love and
shopping. So who's free? Soyeah, so come and join us,
um and give and toast with us. It's our last public event, peoples,
so you might as well just puton some shoes and come join us.
(03:00):
More likely, let's be real,put on some pants. Well,
yes, you're right, that ismore of a priority than shoes. I
was joking with some clients yesterday.I was like, oh man, I
have to leave a house tonight,Like I actually have pants on right now,
and we're on like video chat together. They're just like what And I'm
like, no one can ever seemy bottom half? So I'm go even
(03:21):
know if I'm wearing pants right now, I'm wearing yoga pants right now,
and I could be naked right now, So you're welcome for that. Oh
my god, can you imagine thenaked podcasters? There has to be a
thing out there is It's kind alreadya thing. I got a FaceTime call
from a friend yesterday and she justcalled me as I was getting out of
the shower, so I had likemy hair up in a towel, and
(03:42):
I was like, you know,so I didn't have anything on. Anyway,
I didn't expect her to FaceTime me. I thought, you know,
I didn't want it to be somesort of emergency. So I answered it
and she starts laughing because I'm,you know, clearly naked. Look people,
all we're saying is you can puton a pair of pants and kind
of have a glass of champagne,and tomorrow I will accept skirts and dresses.
That is also acceptable. Yeah,factum. Okay, So last week
(04:08):
we talked about grief, and sowe wanted to kind of make some space
to talk about the other side ofthe spectrum. Not that it's a duality.
It's not either or people, it'snot either or. Actually you can
find tremendous amount of joy when yougo through your grief. But anyway,
today, so we're moving from ofgrief. We're moving from the little blue
(04:32):
inside out character to the really funyellow inside out character. If you guys,
yes, I didn't even think aboutthat. That's amazing. We're gonna
be talking about joy. Yay.So joy is the last module that we
teach in the Amplified Woman, whichis our six month group thingy barber,
and so let's talk about joy,let's talk about happiness, let's talk about
(04:58):
U bringing that into our lives.So the first thing I want to kind
of touch on is that's a littlefunny to me, is that joy and
happiness is like the top the tipof the mountain, right, Like we're
always just striving and trying to getto the top of the mountain to like
be happy, Like that's the beall end, all, the finish line,
like all these things. And it'sso funny because one oftentimes when we
(05:23):
get to the tip of the mountain, we're still we still don't allow ourselves
to be in joy, and we'restill complaining about how things aren't they are
with the way they are or whatever, and we don't allow ourselves to feel
joy in any of the middle stuffeither. We get so caught up in
like the daily to dos and though, well, I have to do this,
and I have to clean my dishwasher, and I have to, you
(05:44):
know, scoop the cat litter,and I have to do this, and
I like all these things, weget so bogged down by all the shit
that we just don't allow ourselves tohave any goddamn fun. And I think
fun is important, so important,you know, I think that we take
ourselves way too seriously. There areso many beautiful books that I've read in
(06:08):
the Buddish tradition that are so humorousand they joke. That's like, if
you're teaching and you're making it serious, you're not doing it right, because
ultimately, you know, playfulness andlightheartedness and humor and love and happiness,
that's what's going to help people remembermore so than you know, being all
serious and uptight. And I don'tknow, I love the idea of playing
(06:31):
more. And I love the feelingof joy, like it's just such a
like heart bursting experience. Or likewhen you're with someone and they're really funny
and you guys can't stop laughing andyou're about to peak because you're laughing so
hard, and like that's those areincredible moments. But I think what stops
us from really feeling those incredible momentsis that we're so scared that they're never
(06:55):
going to happen again. We getso attached to that moment and we're still
terrified of it going that we clingto it. And when we cling to
happy moments, then we create sufferingbecause happiness and sadness. Everything else is
just you know, it just comesin and out. It's all just moves
through you. And when we getattached to certain feelings, we rob ourselves
(07:19):
of, you know, the entirespectrum of human emotions. Yeah, yeah,
I had one of those. Iremember this year specifically, There's like
one instance of that. We werewalking through the streets of la and I
was laughing so hard I almost collapsedon the corner on the sidewalk. And
those moments are so amazing and theydon't happen all the time. But one
(07:45):
thing I've really been playing with ishow can I integrate more of that energy
into everything I do? Like,how can I be joyful when I'm scooping
cap poop into a paper bag?How can I be joyful when I'm you
know, cleaning out the kitchen sink, which is not one of my favorite
things in the whole world. Yeah, How can I be joyful when I
accidentally put too many carrot peelings downthe kitchen sink and then my sink doesn't
(08:09):
drain and then I have to geta guy in to come do all things?
Which was my life this week.But finding joy in all the things
in everyday activities and not just thesebig, you know, ostentatious displays of
the heavens opening up and you know, raining down magic juju on you and
no kind of stuff. Yes,Eckhartool talks about how there are three states
(08:37):
that we want to be in andI can't remember the second one, goddamn
it. But you know, he'slike, you know, infuse joy and
I would think you can. Butif you can infuse joys, then at
least infuse acceptance. You know.If you can't, if you can't be
joyful about something, at least practicebeing an acceptance of what that something is.
(08:58):
And and um, you know,I love that. I love that
joy has maybe like a spectrum.I love that we're not to force ourselves
to be happy, because that's nota thing, but we can certainly ask
ourselves, how can we infuse moreof that element into what we're doing.
The Internet says that the first modalityis acceptance. Oh my god, you're
you're hilarious. The second modality isenjoyment. See, I have this rule.
(09:24):
Google knows everything everything, and soif you don't know which I don't.
There's a lot of shit I don'tknow. First to admit it.
There is a lot of shit Idon't know, but Google knows. So
I'm so glad that you So wecan give our audience a full clear spectrum
of the three things that that Kartolteaches. Okay, so acceptance, enjoyment,
enjoyment and enthusiasm. Oh yes,I love that. I've totally totally
(09:50):
forgot about that. Yeah, yes, Like I think the idealness is to
bring enthusiasm into everything you do.But obviously sina posible. We are humans
and there's certain things that we justwe can't force it, right. Yeah,
So he talks, he does.He says that too, enthusiasm cannot
be a continuous state. But enthusiasmis just like an intense aliveness that flows
(10:16):
into everything you do, whether it'sdusting the table or making a cup of
tea, or taking your dog ona walk or you know, all the
routine things as well, which Ithink are the ones that we forget to
have joy in. They really amreyep. Yeah, And I found that
the key, like the gay wayto joy, Like if we want joy
to be our destination and we're currentlynot in a state of joy one except
(10:41):
accept your emotions. Damn it.Okay, dash people stop forcing herself to
feel shit. Okay, so feelyour emotions. But then the second step,
you know, once you felt allthe fields, it's gratitude. Gratitude
is so good, like not makinga list, like really feeling it in
(11:03):
your body. Like when you canreally feel gratitude for what you're doing or
what's here, it's like joy kindof just naturally, it just comes in.
It just tickles your belly, youknow, it just it's just a
thing that is here, so naturallywhen we can shift our mind to that
(11:24):
place of what am I grateful for? And as you were talking, one
other thing that it reminded me ofis one of our favorite books by Wallace
Waddle, The Science of Getting Rich, and he talks about you you don't
get a change of environment by beingunhappy where you are, Like, you
(11:45):
get a change of environment through action. You don't if you're sitting around waiting
for the change of environment to happen, it's not going to happen. Yeah,
But if you're embodying the change thatyou want to see, your environment
will just naturally shift. And sothe more that you can be ingratitude and
enjoy even in the moments when you'renot so feeling like you're ingratitude and enjoy
(12:11):
that's what's going to change your environment. That's what's going to change your perspective.
Yeah. Yeah, And you know, even if you can't change your
environment because of external things, Ithink stepping into a place of enthusiasm or
enjoyment or acceptance or gratitude gives youthe the energy, the perspective shift that
(12:37):
will allow you to either accept what'shappening or take action and do something about
it. You know, I thinkmore while angry anger can be an incredible
fuel for action, it's not assustainable. Just like enthusiasm is not sustainable,
anger isn't sustainable, right, Sowe've got to find the places within
us that are more sustainable and thenacts accessing that place. And again I'm
(13:03):
telling you, I'm telling you,gratitude is the shit you know every time
we want And I'm not I'm nottalking about the cliche gratitude because I know
it's so stewed around. Oh Ithink behateful. No, No, I'm
talking about the real when you reallyare complaining and you really feel hopeless,
like there's nothing you can do.To just take a deep breath and remember
(13:26):
your alive mi us you know,and remember and feel it in your entire
body. That's what I'm talking about. When was the last experience that you
were able to be in that state? I try to be in that state
all the time. Cash take sustainability. I would be because I'm enlightened and
ship. Someone called me a bodhisatvathe other day. I go, whoa,
(13:50):
whoa, let's walk off as ahorse. There is you know,
it's a Buddhist commitment to being onthe on the path of you know,
why don't you google it? Whydon't you google it? Really? Yeah,
(14:11):
it's body like the tree like bod h i, and then it's
sa t t va. Google willhave a better answer than I will.
A person who is able to reachnirvana but delays doing so out of compassion
in order to save suffering beings.Yeah, okay, I was saying about
(14:33):
you create a chi vowel like anyonecan do it if they're really committed in
the Buddhist path to be in thestate of oneness. Right, So that's
bodichi and then once you enter thepath, then you step into the ultimately
hopefully step into being. Yeah.Someone called me got the other day,
I was like, hmm, thatis so. Now where I'm at my
friend, that is so. Butthat's cute. That's cute. Okay,
(14:58):
let's see. Last time I wasin a place of that type of gratitude,
well, you know, I willsay, being in a partnership with
someone for four years, you gotyou kind of start taking some things for
granted, and you know, youkind of go into the rhythm of your
(15:20):
life and you kind of forget thatyou have made a commitment to be with
this person and they're not just alwaysgoing to be there. Right. But
I was leaving for the East Coast, and so I've been thinking about that
a lot. You know, I'mnot gonna be seeing him for two weeks,
which is fine. You know,what does that mean? And I
don't know. I just got thisthis sense of just complete gratitude for our
(15:41):
relationship and for our trust of eachother and for our communication and just for
how he supports me and who heis in the world. And that moment
of gratitude when I infused it intothe relationship was really magical. Like the
three days before I left the EastCoast, it's so yep, It's like
relationships are so much yummier when youcome in instead of trying to change the
(16:03):
other person, being like just thegratitude for who they are what they do
for you in your life. Sothat was my last experience. Yeah,
how about yo? How about yohhuh? And then can we talk about
play? Because I think that's important. When need you to talk about play?
We can, Yes, I don't, Yes, we'll talk about that.
(16:25):
So for me, I actually hada moment this morning because I'm in
this massive to do state. Ihave a lot of things going on,
a lot of balls in the airthat I'm all trying to juggle all at
once. And I've decided in thelast few weeks that it's a really good
idea to start getting up earlier becauseI need more time in my day.
And so now I've been getting upat six or sorry, five thirty in
(16:48):
the morning every morning and negating mymorning routine and immediately jumping into work and
being all in the like I haveto get this done, you know energy.
And this morning I had my laptopon my lap. It was six
am, and I was writing andmy cup of tea by my side,
and all of a sudden, peachesjumps on top of my laptop, and
I just had this moment where Iwas like, Ah, you're keeping me
(17:11):
from doing all the things, andyou're fucking things up and you're stepping younkeys
and like all this just like ah, and I had a moment and I
looked down at her fucking cute,little furry face, and she just looked
up at me with her big greeneyes and she just needed a second of
love, just like and so Ilooked at my clock and I was like,
I can give you. I'm likefour minutes, gonna put my computer
(17:33):
aside. I'm gonna be really presentin this moment and just be in an
intense state of love and gratitude.Because and then did you take a picture
and show on social media? Idid? Did you just see it?
It's on the Instagram stories. No, I didn't see it, but oh
of course you would. She's justso cute. And she was she was
not sitting on my lap. Shewas literally sitting like up above my boobs,
(17:55):
like in my face, like needingto be right up on it was.
Yeah, it was. She's justso cute. So I gave myself
five minutes this morning to just bein that place and let my heart expand
and receive all of her little healingkitty purse. And it was it was
good. It took me out ofthe insanity and the frantic chaos for a
(18:15):
hot second. Yeah, so let'stalk about play. So what I was
gonna say is like, I don'treally have a lot to say about this
because as a kid, I didn'treally get to play that much. But
but you know, I'm learning howto play as an adult, which is
an interesting thing. I don't reallyknow how to do it. So you
tell us all the things. Twise, how do I learn to play other
(18:37):
than board games? I know howto play board games, those I got.
I mean, I would say thatI think I'm a pretty playful person,
And to me, playfulness is anenergy that you can bring into anything,
you know, just being more lightheartedand sun and not taking things so
seriously. But that's just I guessit's kind of just who I am.
(18:59):
So I don't want to, like, you know, the five steps to
become more like tis because that's weird. Um. I will say I think
that we all need to spend moretime doing things that are really just fun,
like um, like going put puckgolfing or like um laser tagging or
you know, doing like these funkind of things, like experiences like when
(19:25):
new museum and not museums that isnot playful amusement parks and why can't be
playful? Have you gotten to theMuseum of ice Cream tics there we go?
Okay, yeah, like that likeum, like fun museums, not
like play museums. Oh my gosh, hashtag no judgment. Oh I love
(19:48):
all museums. Please don't judge me. Tights is super cultured. I'm super
cultured. That's what I meant,not educated cultured. Okay, love museums
hashtag t youselves mus but yes,fun museums that bring out the playfulness,
like the ice Cream Museum in LAand whatever else. I just think we
need to do more of that,And I think when we can do more
(20:10):
of that, it's easier for usto go into that state of playfulness.
And when we can do that,then we can bring that energy into other
things. One of the things thatI remember as just kind of a fun
playful people take too seriously is whenwe did the events at UM. Oh
my god, why am I losingmy mind? Here? On Larchmont,
(20:30):
the spin events flywheel, and everyone'sso serious and everyone's like sweating and like
so exercising, and like, ah, you know, we have to get
through the end and tie us nextto me, just like screaming and just
like laughing and just like oh mygod, Yeah, there's no need.
(20:51):
I was so tortuous that I didn'tknow what else to do. And of
course there's you know, we werein a private class. It was only
amplify people. Blah blah blah.You don't really want to disturb too many
other people's experiences, But come on, people think that stuff so seriously,
and why are we killing ourselves withall these things that are like so intense
(21:12):
and so serious All the time.When I teach yoga, I try to
make people laugh, you know.I do things like different different balance poses
or arm balanced, and then askthem to do something that's really uncomfortable,
and I'm like, you're like standingon one foot on the big ball of
rock that's like moving through space.Like this shit's not that serious, you
(21:33):
know, Um, I don't.Yeah, I just think that playfulness is
the way, it's the it's theanswer to all of our problems. You
know, if you were to goout and play for the rest of the
day to day to use what wouldyou do? Um, Well, this
may be tm I, but I'mon the first day of my period.
We are sinked, even though weare three time zones apart. I love
(21:56):
this well, so I'm not feelingmy is not feeling so well. So
my level of play right now isto like have a hot pad on my
belly and watch Netflix. Not veryplayful, but it's exactly what I mean
right now. But in general,I mean, you know, Mark and
I we've been wanting to go backto um the Champlaine, the Champlaine Park.
(22:19):
Oh yeah, that was so muchfun. It's so much fun.
We also love room escape in Lawhere you get like you're in a room
and you have to find the clue, so like find your way out and
it's fun. And we can alsotake that to I mean, you could
take all these things seriously. That'sthe point, right, Like, you
could go to a Champlaine park andtake it too seriously and you have to
get the backflip. And if youdon't get the backflip that means something and
(22:40):
whatever. But really it's like practicingdropping into energy of what it feel like
to be a kid to be achild again, you know, to not
take these things so seriously. Yeah, well, let's wrap this up and
bring our beautiful guest, m RikiaReynolds is gonna imbue you with more joyful
(23:00):
energy and more you know, excitementand enjoyment and all the things. So
pause for one hot second and wewill bring Rakia on. All right,
(23:21):
amplifiers, we are back. Wehave an amazing guest with us and cannot
wait to introduce you to Miss RikiaReynolds. Hi, Hi, welcome.
We let me tell everyone all aboutyour amazingness. So first off, we
were just reminiscing that Rakia was featuredalongside both of us on an inc Magazine
(23:45):
feature back in March, and we'vekind of just been chatting since then,
and she is brilliant. So sheis the CEO and founder of sky Blue
Media, a multimedia public relations agencywith an all star roster of lifestyle,
technology, nonprofit and fashion clients.As a leader in the industry, she's
highly sought after by companies to provideexpertise in creative development, branding, marketing,
(24:10):
and business communications. Her path toentrepreneurship started with numerous creative ventures,
including producing shows for MTV, TLCand Discovery Health Channel. She's a business
major, turn TV producer, turnedPR pro, and the twists and turns
have made her into the media mogul, an unstoppable trailblazer that she is today.
She launched sky Blue Media in twothousand and eight with only one employee,
(24:36):
one client, and the driving desireto form a PR agency that would
break the mold and represent the futureof public relations in the digital age.
The firm has since grown tremendously tofourteen employees and more than thirty prominent clients.
In addition to building her business andthose of others, she actively participates
in speaking engagements nationwide and has beenable to share her knowledge of business and
(24:59):
brand development numerous stages, including thoseof TED Tech, eight O eight DC
and Dell Women's Entrepreneur Network. Sheworked as a guest editor for Marie Claire
magazine and has been featured in publicationsincluding Essence, Lucky, and Uptown.
She regularly contributes her expertise on entrepreneurshipand leadership to outlets such as al Forbes,
(25:19):
Inc. Huffington Post, and Fortune. As an on air brand expert
for Serena Williams line for HSN,Rikia works closely with Williams and her design
team on messaging and social media integrationfor launches, special product rollouts, and
consumer engagement. In addition to allof that amazingness, she is a wife
(25:40):
to her best friend and husband,Bram, and mother of three amazing children.
Holy book, right there, Wellwe are so well, thanks so
much for having me. I'm like, why it was that? That was
definitely the long biome. It wasa good one though. I mean,
(26:04):
we have to read every juicy nuggetof your brilliance, you know. Oh,
thanks why I appreciate it and likeat a time like this, you
know, like it's it's great tojust have, you know, women lifting
up women. So I appreciate thebraggadocious air of your reading up my bios.
I enjoyed it. Thank you somuch. Braggadocious That is a word
(26:27):
that we need to integrate into moreof life. So tell us, Rikia,
what does it look like for youto live and amplify life? Oh?
Wow, what does it look likefor me to live and amplify life?
I mean, I think you knowit for me that a couple of
different meanings. As a mother,I see like amplifying life through my children.
(26:52):
I see amplifying life through you know, inspiring others and being a trio
Blazer and and and you know,being a and a woman of color in
an industry that it's moving so rapidlyand sometimes you know, sometimes with a
ton of barriers. So I thinkamplifying life to me is like, you
know, just having more life.I've been seeing the hattag more life all
(27:15):
over Instagram because of Drakes Want ofDrinks and I think Rihanna song. So
I think for me, it's likebeing able to be excited about what I
do all of the time, beinga being in a place where you know,
I'm thriving and I'm also happy.I think sometimes we take the happiness
out of the things that we do, we take the joy out of it,
(27:36):
and we're just grinding. We're talkingabout hustling, We're talking about growing
and building and making and creating andall of these things that I think for
me, amplifying life is doing allof the things that I do, but
doing it in an enjoyable way,being excited about it and being really happy.
I love that happiness. Let's diveinto that. Yeah, yeah,
(27:57):
you have such a feel that energyand excitement within you. And I'm curious,
have you always been this way orwas there a moment in your life
where you awakened to the necessary essentialelements of happiness. Well, I think,
(28:18):
you know, I'll say I generallyI was always a happy kid.
I always remember people always saying,oh my gosh, what You're always so
happy, or you're always so jumpy, or you're always doing this. So
I think generally I wasn't a happykid. But I think we all get
to moments of our lives where wefeel completely helpless. And I know I've
been. I've hit the wall acouple of times throughout my life. I've
(28:41):
had so many different ebbs and flows. As an entrepreneur, you know,
we're generally risk takers and the peoplethat are like, you know, trailblazing.
But I don't, you know,with entrepreneurship, it could be one
or two things. You can,you know, risk taking, jump off
the bridge one day, and thatbridge could be you laying in water and
treading in water, or it couldbe you blanding on a pile of rocks.
(29:03):
So I think for me, I'veseen both sides of the fence.
I've been I've had some really lowloads and I've had some really high hides.
But I know that, you know, as I got into later on
in my life, like I've nestledin my thirties, you know, later
on in my thirties, but Ithink in my mid thirties and I was
(29:25):
to say this, you know,being transparent, I just really started to
learn how to reset my mindset andthe you know, be the master of
my thoughts. You know, I'veread somewhere that you know, I think
we had like sixty thousand thoughts aday, and I'm like, you know,
I have to be really conscious andI have to be mindful about having
like fifty five thousand race offs aday because we can easily, you know,
(29:48):
only have one. But I tendto look more at the positive side
of things and being like grateful forwhat I had in front of me,
and you know, not worrying aboutall the other ships. You know,
I'm like, not just worrying aboutit. So I think happiness is sort
of relative for a lot of people, and sometimes for me it's a it's
different. It's different. It's thatI walked out of a meeting not sweating,
(30:12):
or I didn't love. You know, I'm happy that I didn't lose
my temper. You know, Ididn't lose it, you know, like
ten minutes ago. So I thinkit's relative. And so when you say,
like, have you always been thisway? I think it's been different
forms of happiness happiness. I thinkcontent, you know, with one form
relief who was a form of happinessfor me at one point. And now
(30:37):
I'm at a time where I amjust conscious about all the things around me.
I'm as conscious as I've ever beenabout all the things around me,
and super mindful of how to controlthe things around me, even even the
variables and the balls that are thrownat curveballs sometimes amazing. I have been
(30:57):
going through a lot of this myselfas well. I've been talking to a
few friends, like those of usthat are super ambitious, right, We're
always striving for something else, andthere's always this desire to like do more
and be more. And I washaving a conversation with a friend that's like,
how do you balance that that likestriving to like grow a business and
(31:22):
impact people and you know, foryou be a mom and grow great children
and you know, be really happyand present with exactly where you are right
now in the moment, And sothat's kind of one thing I've been looking
at a little bit. So foryou, what do you how do you
manage that? Like, how doyou how do you calm that desire for
(31:47):
yourself to like do more and bemore and expand and all these things and
still be in this happiness. Youknow, I think there are a couple
of different things that I do.I'll say that, you know, there
are times when you know, I'velike gone down the black hole online,
you know, like, oh,let me check my instaceeeds this morning and
see what people are up to.Let me make sure I'm posting my content
(32:10):
on my Facebook and I'm pleading,and I'm doing all these things and you
know, publishing an article on LinkedIn. And when you do that, you
then start looking at what other peopleare doing. And I think sometimes we
compare ourselves to other people and lookat where they are in their lives at
that moment, and we you know, sometimes I would say, subconsciously,
(32:31):
we'll just sort of size ourselves upand say, you know, we're not
where we want to be, wherewe're supposed to be doing all these amazing
things, and we're constantly you know, striving, as you said, for
greater and I think for me,it's being able to pull a step back
and be in the moment. Ilearned from a media coach a while back
(32:52):
because I also do on air forone of our clients, and she was
watching me on television one night andshe was like, you're not there,
Like you're just not there. AndI said, I have to be honest,
I'm thinking about this, I'm thinkingabout that, and I'm thinking about,
you know, my business growing,and I'm thinking about this contract.
There were so many things I wasthinking about at that time, and she
was like, I need you tostart living more in the present. I
(33:14):
need you to do breathing exercises aroundliving in the presence. So what I
do now before I do anything major, whether that's walking into a meeting with
a client, whether that's you know, completing a contract or standing you know,
going on air or doing a photoshootfor one of our clients, I
take, you know, at leastfive minutes to myself where I can really
(33:35):
breathe and visualize myself just being inthat moment. And it takes a lot
to do that. So what Ido before I do anything, before I
walk into the house before I gobike riding with my kids, before I
you know, sit down with myfourteen year old to have a serious conversation
or to you know, just havea conversation with her around motivating, you
know, around motivation. I putmyself in that moment, so they're breathing
(33:59):
exercises that I do, and thenI kind of have to like I don't
want to say psyched myself out,psyched myself up, but I essentially,
I essentially do you know, Italk about everything that's happening right then and
now and sort of throw away anddiscard anything that's happening, you know,
in the next ten minute, fifteenminutes or you know, further out.
(34:20):
But for me personally, it's aboutliving in the moment, being in the
present, and totally immersing myself inthe moment, in the present. Awesome,
Oh my gosh, that was justso good. You know, I'm
all about mindfulness and focusing on what'shere. And I'm curious for you,
(34:43):
what do you find to be thebiggest hurdle, challenge, obstacle, whatever
word you want to put when itcomes to really being president, Like,
what do you find pulls your attentionaway the most or the most powerfully from
the president. How do you navigatethat? I mean, you know,
as an entrepreneur, I'm thinking ofeverything. I'm thinking of the hr side
(35:07):
of my business. I'm thinking ofyou know, you know, the hiring.
I'm thinking of who's not supposed tobe there anymore. I'm thinking about
growth, you know, I Ithere. Everything is a constant distraction for
me. It is it is veryhard to be in the present, live
in the moment, and be supermindful around those things. So I think,
you know, the things that pulledme away the most, And again
(35:30):
it depends on the day. Youknow. The other day, you know,
I'd like gotten got into this placebecause I was in a conversation talking
about you know, diversity and diversityand media, and I felt myself getting
really sad about all of the thingsthat you know, I've had to go
through as an entrepreneur, as awoman in the media landscape, that some
(35:52):
of my my peers that don't looklike me or don't sound like me have
had to go through. So inthat moment those I was so distressed and
overwhelmed by the conversation that was goingon in our country at that moment that
it was really hard for me tobe present. It was really hard for
me to it was really hard forme to focus on being present, and
(36:13):
that it was me being able totake up, take up, take a
bike ride with my kids and sortof snap out of it. But I
think for me, I'm dealing withso many different variables, you know,
in my industry and you know,being in media, you know, clients
and day to day operations of runninga business and being an entrepreneur and a
mother and a wife and all ofthese things. You know, I used
(36:36):
to call myself the octopus woman andWe're an octopus to remind myself, like,
you have all of these things todo. You have to be somebody's
mother, you have to be somebody'swife, you're somebody's daughter, you're somebody's
you know, fifth or you're aleader, you're an entrepreneur, you're all
of these things. So I neededthat that said octopus as a symbol to
remind me that I was all ofthese things. So saying, you know,
I'm saying all of those things thatI'm involved in, I have a
(36:59):
constant distract, so they're never justone thing. It really, it really
depends on the day and the hourthat it is of the day. Who
amazing, Thank you. That's agreat metaphor. I like thinking about it
that way. With the octopus.I feel like, right, I feel
(37:20):
like octopus that are symbol for something, like they symbolize something. I just
going to look it up. Youknow, I love this shit. Yeah,
look it up. Wild Bree islooking up. Um, I am
killing my spirit animal. Let's movein a slightly different direction because you have
a lot of PR and media expertise, and we've I can't recall off the
(37:43):
top of my head, but Idon't really have a great memory on anyone
else that we've had that's really inthis industry. And I'm curious your thoughts
on women putting themselves out there andwomen, you know, um, putting
themselves on media and the challenges thatwomen face when it comes to putting themselves
out there. Yeah, I thinkfor women and and people in general.
(38:07):
You know, we're in a we'rein a climate of you there, there's
no resumes anymore. You know,your brand is your CV. Your brand
is what people are constantly evaluating,whether you're going into you know, you're
going into an interview or you're applyingfor colleges, or you are pitching a
(38:28):
client, or you know, insome cases you're implying you're applying for certain
insurances. People are looking you uponline constantly, um And I sometimes check
Google to see what people are searching, you know, on me. And
you know, I've I've seen thingscome up about you know, my husband
and my children. So you knowthat you're in a constant and it's this
(38:49):
constant climate of like sizing you upand being evaluated online. So if you
know that you're being evaluated online,be consistent and be true to who you
are. And I think that fora lot of you know, a lot
of I think for a lot ofwomen that it's taking a step back and
maybe having your own think tank.You're evaluating, Okay, who am I?
You know? What what are thethings that people say about me when
(39:12):
I leave a room? What arethe things that I want people to say
about me when I'm entering the room? Does that come across on my online
presence? Is that you know?That? Is that if that prominent in
my profile? You know, Ilook at you know, online presence all
of the time, and I lookat what people call themselves or what people
are posting. But I think dependingon your industry or you know, the
(39:35):
people that you appeal to, youhave to be true to that brand and
you're auosed to be consistent. Soit's not just you know, being true
and being your your your best selfor being your transparent self, but it's
being it's being consistent if you wantto if you want it to be something
that's going to be impactful, orif you want it to be something that
you can leverage later on. SoI think when online meet and you know
(40:00):
and I don't, and I mightnot be answering the question, but I
think as we're looking at ourselves onlineand you know, from from a communication
standpoint, it's just you just haveto be careful, thoughtful, um and
strategic when it comes to the presencethat you're building for yourself online, whether
that's your outed is, whether that'syour tweets. Sometimes when people search to
(40:22):
you, your tweets might come up. Um other times that they search to
you know, depending on what's outthere. You know, your ID profile
will come up if it's public umyou or your LinkedIn profile will come up
or in some instances, your youknow, your Facebook. It all depends
on how they're searching you and whatthey're they're typing in. So I always
say to people, be consistent acrossthe board, be your authentic self,
(40:45):
make sure that it's organic and nowit not only speaks to the content that
you love, but what is youraudience responding to? Why are people why
are people following you? Why arepeople reading about you? So it's feeding,
it's feeding net, it's staying trueto your So I know that a
lot of women's fears about being theirauthentic self online, of course, or
(41:07):
things like judgment or you know,disownment, or their friends are going to
stop talking to them, or someone'sgoing to tweet back at them about how
wrong they are about what they justposted, or any of those things.
So what is your advice to womenwho are craving to be their authentic selves
(41:27):
online and build this presence and havethis part of themselves that are like,
ah, you know, what ifI get burned at the stake and what
if people disown me? And whatif all my friends abandoned me? And
da da da da da da dada da. Do you have to what?
Like, what do you tell yourwomen or your clients that are kind
of in that space. Well,I would say it always depends on the
(41:50):
client. You know, I havemy youngest client, give a twelve year
old social activius, so what Itell her might be different there, you
know what we're telling some of ouryou know, older corporate clients. Um.
But what I usually will say isthere that might happen. You aren't
going to get comments where people arenot going to like you. They're going
(42:14):
to disagree with you. And I'vealways said, don't see the trolls.
But you have to be in aposition if you're if you're someone that is
going to or about to or isin the middle of embarking in saying,
kay, I am going to buildmy online presence or I want to you
know, tweak or refine my messagingonline. You have to be with you
(42:34):
have to be okay with the factthat not everyone is going to agree with
you, and not everybody's going tolike what you put out there, and
and sometimes people really don't care whatyou have to say at all. So
you have to be willing to sayI'm going to be the risk taker.
And and you know, in mycase, you know, I deal with
a lot of entrepreneurs. I alwayssay the definition of an entrepreneur is the
risk taker. So you're going totruly be a risk taker, you have
(42:58):
to be willing to take that risk. What I will say is that for
some of my clients UM ones thatand I believe in research and I and
I do believe in you know,think pink and hosting things among friends for
first I've had clients in you know, some situations where I've said, you
know, builds are really cool,the build a WhatsApp group and some of
(43:19):
the things that you really want topost online that you think might be great
for your audience might not be great. So why don't you put it on
your What's because some of us likeposting online. It's like a release.
It's like our it's like our therapy, Like we want people to know that
we've had a bad day and wewant people to know. UM sometimes for
motivation, you know, not tofeed your haters and things like that.
(43:39):
But that might not be appropriate foryou, That might not be appropriate for
your brand. You're the people thatare following you might not want to hear
you say things like, you know, don't feed the haters or don't you
know, don't feed the trolls.So you have to have outlets so that
you can you know, inspire.Um, you have to have outlets online.
That's it's feeding you and feeding youraudience at the same time. But
(44:02):
for me, you know, ifit's no if there's there's no copying and
pasting to this, I believe intaking a book spoke approach to every brand.
So if you're a chef, Imight tell you to I might say,
stay away from these outlets and payattention no more to to pendrance.
If you're a television producer, youknow, I might I might tell you
(44:24):
to use one outlet over the other. If you're you know, a supermodel,
I might say the super visual andyou know, just focus on the
three outlets. So it all dependson who you are and what you're doing.
But in the general sense, it'syou know, picking things that you
can respond the most two and youraudience wants to respond the most two and
(44:45):
then carving out what that authentic contentis around that and not only you know,
feeds your soul, but also feedsthe people that you're outlets, I
mean, feeds the audience that you'reengaging. But essentially you're you're a risk
taker. You have to be ableto you have to be able to take
that risk and say sometimes people arenot kind of like what I say.
Wow, thank you, that wassome really good points. I appreciate you
(45:07):
sharing that with us and with ourcommunity. Yeah, I do have a
question. I've been thinking about thisa lot, and I would love to
know your perspective. Let's blow upthis idea of a brand real quick.
I've noticed since the rise of socialmedia that it is true that even individuals
(45:29):
are brands, whether or not theyrun the business, and they have to
be thinking about themselves and how they'reputting themselves out there as such. And
you know, there's these kids thatare posting, you know, stupid things
online and then their college applications arebeing denied because a college finds out about
it. Right, So we've gotto be aware of what we're posting and
(45:52):
putting ourselves as This idea of abrand is a great way of being aware
and being consistent. But I'm curiousto the downside, especially for women's psychology,
I feel like we already have sucha stigma of wo to be perfect
and needing to present ourselves in ain a certain way even before social media.
(46:12):
I'm curious. Do you feel likethis notion of a brand is perpetuating
the need for women to be perfectionistsand to be consumed with her looks and
you know, obsessed with what peoplethink about her even more so? Oh
absolutely, I mean, you know, as a mother, that's something that
I'm faced with, you know,constantly. You know, my children,
(46:37):
you know, are seven, nineand fourteen. And for my fourteen year
old, she's not really online asmuch she you know, she has you
know, she has an Instagram,but it's mostly of her drawing. And
we've had we've had real conversations aroundyou know, and this is you know,
to a child saying they are notwritten in pencil, they're written in
(46:58):
ink. So what you put onlineday, there's whether it's a video where
you know, a snap, ofcourse you think it. It disappeared that
somebody else spring grabbed it and sentit to twenty other people before you were
able to delete it. So I'vehad to have those real conversations with my
kids, you know, I've hadto have those real conversations with my kids
because I had two daughters, andI want to make sure that they know
(47:22):
what it's to come, even ifthey're not, they're not online as much
right now, but what is tocome? But I think for a lot
of women it is this, youknow, we we we this woman a
good friend of mine set the otherday that we all have this this sheet
mentality where you know, we're justheavily influenced by other people. If one
(47:45):
person doesn't like it, then it'sa domino effect and no one likes it.
So I think as we are livingin this sort of sheat mentality space
and we're all sizing one another upand comparing ourselves online, it is not
good for our not good for ourpsychology. Um, you know, I
see the things that are trending themost online right now, like you know,
(48:07):
health and fitness, which I thinkare great. I think that you
know, we're all you know,eating a lot healthier and we're all working
out, but they're also there's alsoyou know, some some downs, you
know, some downside of that,because everybody's looking at who can work out
the bed, who can had themost satched weight, and you know,
(48:27):
who's drinking the most tee to tostay fit, and who's eating the most
salads, And it's like, atwhat point does that bubble does that bubble
verse. So that's why I'm reallyyou know, when I when I'm talking
to clients, I am very I'mvery transparent with them, and sometimes it's
not a nice conversation. I willtell them, you have no business being
(48:50):
on Instagram. Build your Facebook communityand you're a thought leader. Stay on
Twitter, you're a great writer.We do not need to tell your story
through all of these images. Butagain, it's it depends. So it's
knowing where you have the authority tovoice and where what you're an expert in
and what kinds of content you putout. I don't think that everybody has
to tell their story through pictures.I think some of us are very you
(49:14):
know, with great quick wit,informative and authoritative, you know, using
Twitter and publishing articles on LinkedIn.So it's really knowing you're laying and what
your voice is, where your voicematters to both and not where you feel
like you're having the most fun.If that makes sense, Yes, that
(49:35):
definitely makes sense. I've loved Instagramfor most of my business, but this
past year I've been so checked outof it because I'm no longer interested in
showcasing my life as this ideal lifestylefor people to look up to. That's
not where my content lies, That'snot where my power lies. And so
I've been doing that of navigating,well, where is the best place for
(49:58):
my content in mind nation? Andyou know, I have a mask to
following on Instagram? So what doI do with that? How do I
manage that? You know, likewhat types of pictures do I share?
So I'm glad that you said that, And I feel like this is so
relevant to so many of us whoare seeing the flip side of building a
brand online. Is this constant expectationof how you have to appear and how
(50:23):
you have to look and how youhave to be showing up every day.
And I feel for a lot ofus it's slowly killing us. Yeah,
And I think it. Listen,it's it's good for some people in it.
In it is it? I think, what's the old thing? Like
what good's good for the goose isn'tgood for the gander. I hear my
grandmother things like that. It's like, and it's true, you don't have
(50:46):
to My mother used to always say, we're Kia. You cannot be on
every ship that sails, and youcan't like, you can't be that person
it's like, Okay, I havea you know, like a huge Instram
following, and I want to beon Twitter. I want to be on
Facebook, you know, I wantto be on Pinterest. I want to
be snapping. I want to beupdating my eyes, but I want to
we have fathing like, yeah,I want to be at all. Yeah,
(51:09):
we we have to. We havepeople that you know, like we
ap clients that want to be onall of those things because I'm like and
sometimes I'm like, are you serious. You're on snaps and you have ID
stories, you have an Instagram,you have a Facebook personal page, you
have a Facebook fan page, youhave a You're tweeting constantly. So it's
like at some point you do haveto pull back because you're going to super
(51:30):
saturate the market. People do gettired of everything. But you also have
to know and that's why it's good. You know, I would say,
you know, we're experst you know, in communication, so you know,
with my team, it's like wefocus and we research on where it's you
know, where your brand is gettingthe most engagement, and we stay focused
on those channels. Yes, youhave to be able to communicate with people
(51:52):
in different mediums. To tell differentstories to appeal to those audiences. Because
we know that there's a you know, a different demo or you know in
sell or Snap and Facebook and penentrant, yet they're all different outlets. But
you have to also know what isgoing to be best for your brand and
for your audience because you might beyou might have a massive idea following,
(52:14):
but you're getting more impacts through yourlinks in because people are making business connections
for you or the people that thepeople that are moving the needle on and
making most of the decisions are readingyour your opinion pieces and saying, hey,
I like this person's thought. Weshould partner up and we should work
together. So you have to reallyunderstand what's your goal. Is your goal,
(52:36):
you know from building contents, isto motivate and inspire people. Is
it to you know, make morebusiness connections? You know, is it
to be popular because a lot ofus right now are really struggling with that,
Like I want to be popular,like you know, my life in
my currency, I want to Iwant to make sure that I've gotten like
nine hundred LIFs on my photo,But is that nine hundred life on your
(52:57):
photo really doesn't really matter? Ifyou get nine hundred lights in your photo,
or is it more impactful for fiveinfluencers to read an opinion piece that
you WoT? Yes, I lovethat. Yeah, No, this is
really really good. I feel likethis is important true smack to some of
our millennial listeners are building their brandsand building their online presence, and we
(53:23):
love this conversation so much, butwe have to wrap it up. So
here's what we're gonna do. We'regonna put a pin in it. We're
gonna put a pin in it,and we're going to take this to the
extended cut conversation. So for anyonewho wants to learn more about Urikia and
your incredible work in the world,where can they go? They can follow
(53:45):
my business page, guide Blue Media, which is Skai Blue Media, so
we're on Instagram mostly telling the behindthe theme stories and Facebook. Or they
can send an email info at skybumediadot com and be added to our newsletter
and hey, do you want toknow more about me? Just personally?
(54:07):
I'm just Ricky oriminals R A KI A R E Y n O l
V. And I have most ofmy conversations on Twitter and Instagram. Amazing
glad you know your outlets yay.Well, we are going to talk all
things octopus and ask rikias some morein depth questions on the extended cuts.
(54:31):
You can join us over there atbe amplified dot community. You can also
find us on all the socials atthe amplified co. We particularly love Instagram
And until next week, go beamplified
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