August 11, 2025 • 43 mins
What happens when you set out on an 86-mile journey with no athletic background, no clear “why,” and only three days to complete it?
For Ian Hawkins — Speaking and Storytelling Coach at Netflix — the answer was far more than sore feet.
In this conversation, Ian shares his whirlwind trek along the historic Pilgrim’s Way from London to Canterbury Cathedral — a pilgrimage that most take a week to complete, but he compressed into just 72 hours. Along the trail, blistered and battling rain, Ian unexpectedly found himself face-to-face with unprocessed grief over his father’s death and childhood trauma.
With nowhere to hide, the miles became a space for deep reckoning — and a powerful reminder that we each have the ability to become the author of our own story. Ian also unpacks his three-part storytelling framework — crisis, decision, and resolution — and how it applies to everything from personal healing to leading change in organizations.
Whether you’re navigating your own uncharted territory or curious about the intersection of story and transformation, Ian’s journey is proof that the path forward often begins with the courage to take the first step.
Connect with Ian on his website.
And on LinkedIn: Ian Hawkins.
Thank you for listening to Hope Comes to Visit. If this episode resonated with you, please follow, rate, and share the show — it helps others find their way to these conversations.
New episodes drop every Monday and Friday, so you can begin and end your week with a little light and a lot of hope.
For more stories, reflections, and ways to connect, visit www.DanielleElliottSmith.com or follow along on Instagram @daniellesmithtv and @HopeComestoVisit
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
I would look at a menu and I would literally go
what do I actually fancy to eatnow?
Sticky toffee pudding with icecream.
I'll have that.
That will be my main meal.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
So there was no part of you that treated this as a
health journey.
You were not thinking I justneed food as medicine.
It was.
What does Ian want today?
Speaker 1 (00:18):
Danielle, have you any idea how many pubs there are
between here and Canterbury?
Speaker 2 (00:36):
If you've been carrying something heavy, if
you're looking for somethinglight, you have come to the
right place.
I'm Danielle Elliott-Smith, andthis is Hope Comes to Visit.
Today's guest is a speaking andstorytelling coach at Netflix.
He once promised himself hewould never be bored, and it's a
promise he's kept.
As a fledgling writer, heworked on flagship BBC comedy
shows.
As a filmmaker, he's dodgedmuggers in Panama and flown in
(00:58):
helicopters over live volcanoes.
As a business journalist, hiswork has appeared on CBS, bbc
and Reuters.
He's worked with some of thehighest profile comedians,
politicians and sports people onthe planet.
Not bad for a comprehensiveschoolboy from Essex.
I'd love to welcome Ian Hawkins.
Let's take a quick moment tothank the people that support
(01:22):
and sponsor the podcast.
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(01:45):
consultation.
Ian, thank you so much forbeing here with me danielle.
Speaker 1 (01:49):
It's so lovely thousands of miles apart, and
yet we're able to communicatethrough the magic of of
technology.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
This is what it's for it really is, and this is one
of the things that delights meabout being able to do this
being able to bring you from wayover there to people everywhere
and being able to share piecesof your story and sprinkling
hope in little bits and piecesall over the world.
(02:18):
I am delighted you're here whenI first heard about your story.
So we're going to get into whatyou do in a little bit, but I
want to talk about the hope inyour story that that inspired me
.
So there is this walk that youdid recently, pilgrims way yes,
(02:40):
Is that?
correct yeah, one, yeah okay, soyou did this extensive walk and
I want you to explain it to ourlisteners, but one of the
things that was so interestingto me about the fact that you
did this long walk, and in amuch shorter time than many
people do, it was because, whenyou initially set out on this
track, you did not know why youwere doing it.
Speaker 1 (03:04):
This is the thing I thought I've got everything I
need for this.
I've got my bag, I've got myshoes, I've got my tent, I've
got everything I need.
And the question people keptasking me was so why are you
doing it?
And I didn't have a good.
Why I didn't have a good?
Why Never mind the Simon Sinek,first find your why I was
walking off on that firstmorning thinking that's a very
(03:27):
good question.
Why on earth am I puttingmyself through this?
And let me quickly explain toyour, your listener, who, if
your listener cannot see me, andI should explain.
I am not a great ripplingmuscular specimen of a human
being.
I am, I'm sure, so you're not.
Speaker 2 (03:44):
You wouldn't consider yourself a a super athlete.
This is not something you do.
Speaker 1 (03:48):
You don't often train for far from it okay so I I
occasionally managed to do aquick 5k around the park which
is far better than I.
Speaker 2 (04:02):
I will tell you that this past weekend I sent my
fiance a picture after I did ahike and he said you look like
an athlete.
And I immediately sent it tothe rest of my family and I said
did you hear that?
I?
Speaker 1 (04:12):
just explain it.
It's if you know.
Speaker 2 (04:13):
Geoffrey Chaucer.
Speaker 1 (04:25):
The Canterbury Tales, which is this 600 year old book
and it is a story of a group ofpilgrims who set out from
Southwark Cathedral and they goon the road to Canterbury
Cathedral, which is 86 milesaway, and of course, in those
days you traveled on foot, youtraveled with a couple of horses
and you were in no particularrush to reach your destination.
(04:47):
These days I have commitments.
I went through my diary.
Part of the reason for doing itwas I went, I'll do it, and of
course, I'm self-employed, I runmy own business.
I can take time anytime I want.
I can take time any time I want.
I go through the diary goingwell, I can't do that weekend, I
can't do that weekend, I can'tdo that weekend, and I certainly
(05:07):
can't take the six or sevendays that the guidebook says I
should do it in.
And eventually I landed onsaying well, if I take off
Thursday and Friday, I canarrive on Sunday and I'll
squeeze it into four days and,as it turned out, I squeezed it
into 72 hours.
Speaker 2 (05:27):
Now this is something that people typically do in a
week, right yeah.
And so tell me, when you firstsee Pilgrim's Way, what makes
you say, well, wait a second,that's something I want to do.
So what had you, even lookingat your diary to begin with, to
say this is something I want todo?
Do you just occasionally get anitch to do something that
(05:51):
somebody says is hard to do?
Speaker 1 (05:53):
Well, sometimes I do think.
Yes, there is the call of theopen road.
I'm a bit like you, danielle,which is I love to travel, I
love to get out and see theworld and see what's going on.
There's a big piece of graffiti.
I live in London, right, andthere's a big piece of graffiti
near me that says do somethingdifficult.
I thought, actually, if you'regoing to put a message into
(06:17):
somebody's brain, that's prettygood.
And then I started talking tosome friends of mine who'd done
the Camino.
And suddenly that's a pilgrim'sway.
That's in Spain, northern Spain.
Everyone I know seemed to havedone it or was going on it or
knew someone that had done it.
And I thought why would I go toSpain to do this?
I live near Southern Cathedral.
(06:38):
My brother lives nearCanterbury Cathedral.
Why go all the way to Spainwhen I can just do the Camino
around the corner?
And that's where the ideastarted taking hold.
I thought, well, yeah, okay,let's do it.
I don't even need to get on abus to start this.
I can start from my front doorand I can walk up to look.
(06:58):
If I say the name of theseEnglish places, you mustn't
laugh at them, okay.
Speaker 2 (07:03):
I will not laugh.
First of all, I think I toldyou as soon as we got on I've
always loved accents anyway, andthere's something musical about
your accent.
So I'm listening to you and I'mclosing my eyes and I'm just
listening.
So I can't wait to hear thenames.
So go ahead.
Speaker 1 (07:19):
I'll take that.
I'll take that.
So I left and I thought I'mhaving breakfast with some
friends at a place calledElephant and Castle really.
Okay, put it in Google Maps.
Now it exists.
And I thought I'll go afterbreakfast.
So we get together, we havebreakfast, they all say so why
are you doing this again?
Why have you brought your tent?
Why have you brought yourbackpack?
I don't know why I'm doing it.
(07:40):
And then, at 9 am, I set outand I started walking right on
the Pilgrim's Way where theElephant and Castle joins up,
and I didn't stop until Ireached Canterbury Cathedral 72
hours later on the Sundaymorning.
It was 71 and a half hours.
All right, impressive.
Speaker 2 (07:59):
So I'm going to ask you a couple of questions about
this particular journey.
So, number one how connecteddid you stay while you were on
this journey?
Did you allow yourself to befully present and and listen to
yourself while you were there,or did you find yourself needing
(08:20):
to be distracted?
Right, because you youmentioned, we're so busy.
You're trying to put thiswithin your calendar.
Within this, I only have this,this finite period of time to
get this done.
It should be done in a week.
I should be able to mosey along, right, we think about, about,
(08:41):
about how long it used to take,right, and I should be moseying.
I'm not moseying because I'mbusy.
I've got stuff to do.
Did you allow yourself to slowto a pace where you could listen
to your own thoughts?
Speaker 1 (08:54):
I did.
And I hit on a compromise withthis, because I do have a
partner, I do have a mom and Ithought I can't just disappear
for four days and then pop up.
And and I thought I can't justdisappear for four days and then
pop up and knock on mybrother's front door.
So what I did was I created aWhatsApp group and I said
anybody that wants to follow me,I will be on the WhatsApp group
and I will drop the occasionalpin if I stop for something to
(09:17):
eat or if I stop for the night,because I did wild camping.
On the first night I stayed in amonastery.
On the second night I stayed.
Bizarrely, I got invited tostay in a church.
On the third night I stayed ina monastery.
On the second night I stayed.
Bizarrely, I got invited tostay in a church on the third
night.
That was not planned, but Iwould drop a pin when I stopped
for a meal or for something sothat anybody that wanted to join
that WhatsApp group could comein.
And I said at the top I saidyou're welcome to follow me on
(09:38):
the adventure and I'll send youthe occasional pic and I'll send
you the occasional update, butdo not expect me to respond to
stuff.
The point of this is to getaway from it all All right.
Speaker 2 (09:47):
So you're not.
I'm not having conversation,I'm not chatting and giving
people updates.
I'm not answering questions.
I'm just giving the occasionalupdate on this particular
adventure.
Speaker 1 (09:57):
Yeah, and it was quite nice.
I think I had about 20 friendsand family at the end who joined
me on that and it was quitenice at the end of the day to
sit there in a pub with my dietcompletely changed.
I would look at a menu and Iwould literally go what do I
actually fancy to eat now?
Sticky toffee pudding with icecream.
I'll have that.
(10:18):
That will be my main meal.
Speaker 2 (10:20):
So there was no part of you that treated this as a
health journey.
You were not thinking I justneed food as medicine.
It was.
What does Ian want today?
Speaker 1 (10:29):
Danielle, have you any idea how many pubs there are
between here and Canterbury?
Speaker 2 (10:34):
I can't even begin to fathom.
Speaker 1 (10:38):
So yeah, as I was walking through the countryside
and of course, every village hasa pub or at least one pub,
every village has a little shopor village has a pub or at least
one pub, every village has alittle shop or it has a cricket
pitch, and I would sit there andI would go on and I'd drop a
pin, I'd show them a picture ofwhat I was having for food and I
and people would say, oh, youknow, you've done really good
mileage today, or you know, keepgoing, and that kind of thing.
(11:01):
And that was enough of a enoughof a footstep in into being
sociable, without it taking awayfrom what I was doing, which is
going into myself and thinkingabout uh think, do all do all
the deep work that we never havea chance to, to sit back and
listen to.
Speaker 2 (11:18):
So the deep work is is the next question, because so
you mentioned the, the quote dosomething difficult.
One of my favorite quotes is dosomething every day that scares
you, and that's elizabethroosevelt.
Uh, and so I actually have thaton my refrigerator to remind me
that I do need to challengemyself.
And when you and I wereinitially communicating, you
(11:41):
mentioned that you didn'trealize it because you didn't
really know your why for doingthis beyond doing something
difficult.
Right, but you found yourselffacing some past trauma and you
were unaware that taking thisquiet time for yourself was
going to allow you to face somedifficult things from your past.
(12:05):
Will you talk about that?
Speaker 1 (12:07):
Sure, so I have been walking.
So the first day I did about67,000 steps I don't know if you
have a stepometer on your wrist.
Yes, it's quite a lot.
So I woke up the next day andmy feet were really sore, my
hips were sore, my legs weresore, I'll bet and I started
walking about 4.30 on themorning of the next day and my
feet were really sore, my hipswere sore, my legs were sore, uh
, and I started walking about 430 on the morning of the second
(12:29):
day and I promised my mum onething, which was that I would
not take any risks with the heat.
And of course, this happened atthe beginning of July.
So, uh, you know, about a monthago, and we had a heat wave,
which is not something theBritish people deal with
particularly well, are used to.
And I realised I got to thisvillage and I realised that if I
(12:51):
I had to be at the monastery byfour o'clock in the afternoon
because they closed the doors atfour o'clock.
Okay, and I thought it's 11o'clock now.
It's really hot.
I've run out of water, yeah,and it's about a five mile, so
it's about a five hour walk away.
(13:11):
If I really push myself, if Ireally push myself, I can do it,
but it is hot.
And we also had a guy over herecalled Michael Mosley, who is a
very well liked TV presenterand doctor, and he died of heat
stroke when he was on holiday TVpresenter and doctor and he
(13:31):
died of heat stroke when he wason holiday.
So that's quite a big thing andit certainly put me in mind of
you know do scary things, butdon't take daft risks.
And I did say OK, look, it's toohot, I'm cutting it too.
Fine, I will take the train,literally two stops on the train
, so I can get there on time andmake sure that I I can get into
(13:53):
the, into the um, into themonastery for the night okay the
next day I woke up and I and itwas, it was raining and
everything still hurt, and Ithought I'm gonna phone my
brother and just see if I canget on the next train and go and
see my brother a day early andcut this short.
And I got my map out and Ilooked at my map and I saw the
(14:15):
whole of the road in front of meand I was halfway through this
trip and I thought well, come on, this is this is all or nothing
fantasy at work.
Here.
You've taken five percent ofyour journey on a train.
Are you really going to throwaway 50% of success for 5% of
(14:38):
failure jumping on a train?
And then it came to me exactlywhy I had done this.
The reason why I did this wasbecause in everything you do,
there is always somebody sayingyou can't do that or don't do do
that or don't do this, or don'tdo that, or telling you what
you should and shouldn't do.
And the only reason why I wason that walk was because I
wanted to be there and the onlyperson that could stop me was me
(15:01):
, and that was the moment when Iwent.
But also the only person thatcan keep me going is me.
So I actually have to make areally clear choice Do I keep
going or do I stop?
And at that point the painbecame irrelevant, the aches
became irrelevant, the rainbecame irrelevant, and it was
just like oh well, you're wet,yeah I will be, because it's
(15:25):
raining.
Your feet hurt?
Yeah I would.
That's because I've done100,000 steps in the last 24
hours and none of it mattered.
All that mattered was that Isaid I was going to do it and
therefore I will do it.
And it's one foot in front ofthe other, until I bumped my
fist on the side of CanterburyCathedral and it was shall I do
(15:46):
it, shall I not do it?
And then it wasn't even aquestion, it was an was shall I
do it, shall I not do it?
And then it wasn't even aquestion, it was about, it was
an inevitability.
Speaker 2 (15:53):
What I love about what you just defined is that
you me, everyone listening weare the only ones who get to
specifically say for us,specifically define for
ourselves what success orfailure looks like.
It's not the outside world thatsays, well, because you did 5%
(16:15):
on the train, it wasn't really awalk right, you didn't really
do it.
You get to do it, you do ityour version.
And I think that and I thinkthis relates to the way I, I
people, in terms of of how theyapproach sobriety Right and I
(16:35):
know that recovery has been apiece of your journey as well
that people pile shame onthemselves or they allow someone
else to define for them whatsuccess or failure looks like.
You could have said, well, Imean, I did 5% on the train, so
I guess I might as well give up,and instead you said, no, I had
(16:58):
to, I had to deviate slightlyfrom my original plan, but no,
I'm going to keep going and I'mgoing to make this the way I
want it to be.
Yeah, and I love that.
Speaker 1 (17:12):
Sure, yeah, I mean sobriety.
I've been sober now for 10,over 10 years, coming out to 11
years Congratulations.
With the possible exceptions oftwo accidental liqueur
chocolates and my mother'sMadeira trifle, I thought, jesus
Mother, you have to put thewhole bottle in.
This is deadly.
But see, I'm not a fan of AA.
(17:35):
I've been to one AA meeting andI didn't enjoy it and I said
well because I don't, and that'sokay.
Speaker 2 (17:42):
And that's okay, because I don't like the idea
that if you accidentally have aglass of wine, you're suddenly
resetting the clock and you'reback to zero, exactly, and
that's part of what I'm, part ofwhat I say, right, and that's I
want people to know that,however you define, however you
(18:04):
choose to pursue your ownversion of recovery, that's OK.
Pursue your own version ofrecovery, that's okay.
I don't like the aspect ofshame that comes in when anyone
is pursuing recovery.
I really struggled when I wouldhear someone say well, my
sponsor told me that I relapsed.
(18:24):
Therefore, I have to walk intoa meeting and tell everyone
tomorrow morning and I know thatthat's not definitive for
everyone.
I know that it that's beensomeone's experience, and so for
me.
I initially went to AA and hadgreat experiences and then I
didn't.
So I want people to know if AAworks for you, fantastic, use it
(18:49):
, enjoy it, embrace it.
And the same thing forNarcotics, anonymous or whatever
.
Whatever works for you, use it.
But I like the idea of beingable to define your version of
success in whatever you decideto do, whether it's walking
Pilgrim's Way or pursuingrecovery, or whatever path
you're taking in your life,whatever journey you're on.
Speaker 1 (19:12):
I think if you want to achieve something hard or
something difficult, somethingthat seems like a long way away
and along 86 miles of road let'suse this as a metaphor along 86
miles of road you're not goingto travel each one of those
miles beautifully and perfectly,with excellent poise and
looking your best.
What matters, I think, is howyou deal with the setbacks and
(19:32):
how you deal with the littlefailures, and we know this.
We know that the diet is notruined when you have one cookie.
The diet is ruined when youhave the one cookie and go well,
that's it, the diet's over.
I've finished the whole pack.
Yeah, if you are a20-cigarette-a day smoker and
(19:53):
after a week of non-smoking youcrack and have one, well then,
congratulations, you're a onecigarette a week smoker.
Now the mistake is when you goback to 20 cigarettes in a in a
day.
Right and you give up yeah, andwhen you, when you give up,
giving up and you've, I alwayssay, if you're have a, what you
do is you have that biscuit, youhave that guilty biscuit.
Okay, you go hum, hum, hum, hum, hum and then, like Cookie
(20:16):
Monster, you shove your faceinto the biscuit and I say, no,
you're going to have to haveanother biscuit, but it's going
to be the perfect biscuit,you're going to have it.
So cookie got to remember we'rein America now.
You have a cookie.
Speaker 2 (20:37):
You put it on a plate with a doily, a knife and fork.
Speaker 1 (20:38):
You put on a tie.
You'd like a candle.
You eat that cookie.
You know, piece by piece, youenjoy it same with a cigarette
you have you.
You get up the nicest crystalashtray, you sit there, you
enjoy that cigarette.
You.
If I'm only having onecigarette a week, my god, I'm
gonna enjoy it.
Let every, every molecule ofnicotine flicker across your
synapses and then put it out andenjoy that cigarette so much
you won't need another one foranother week and become a one a
(21:01):
week smoker you mentioned thatin going on this, you found
yourself looking at past lifeexperiences heart surgery you
had had as a child and thenrecently, more recent, loss of
(21:36):
your dad trauma does notunderstand time, and it is a
feature of trauma that, onceyou've gone through it, it can
be very present.
And one of the things that youfind is, when you are by
yourself and you give yourselfthe time and the space to
process things, that you do havea chance to come face to face
(22:05):
with some of the things that youwould normally block out,
whether that is with going tosee friends, having a, doing you
know distraction techniques.
When there are no distractionsleft, you have to come face to
face with everything, and Irealized that one of the things
that I believe is reallyimportant is that we all need to
understand how our stories workand stories happen in a very
(22:27):
particular way, and if yourstory is unfinished or is
unstructured, then it's reallydifficult to to process
everything.
And I don't think of it in termsof getting over stuff, because
you don't get over stuff, butwhat you do is you learn to live
effectively with, with thescars and the and the bumps and
the dings.
So for me, a story is adistillation of data.
(22:57):
We live in big, complicatedworlds and a story is a
distillation of data such thatyou have a crisis, you make a
decision in response to that andyou resolve that crisis.
And if you don't make adecision in the middle, if you
don't have the chance to makethat decision, it's not a story,
it's just stuff that happens toyou, and a lot of trauma is
(23:19):
stuff that happens to you.
You're stuck in the crisis andyou have to be quite explicit
and say what decision am I goingto make about it?
Because very often you areresponding to it, not making a
decision around it.
And once you start moving intoa decision and you start coming
to a resolution, you then turnthe whole experience into a
(23:40):
story that you can own and yousay well, that's mine.
Speaker 2 (23:45):
So storytelling is something that you and I have in
common in terms of our passionabout it, our love of of hearing
stories, of telling stories.
I like the way you justdescribed sort of getting caught
in the middle.
There, If you were sitting andtalking to someone and you
(24:06):
recognize that they are caughtin the middle and they are not
yet owning their story, what doyou say to them to encourage
them to grab the pen again tosay all right, you're not, you
are in the middle of this, youare letting someone else author
this.
You have not yet said wait, asecond, pen and paper mine, pen
(24:30):
mine.
How do you encourage them tore-embrace that and write their
own?
Speaker 1 (24:38):
It's good, old-fashioned stoicism, I think.
I think we can't choose ourcircumstances, because stuff
will always happen okay, but wecan choose how.
Can't choose our circumstances,because stuff will always
happen okay, but we can choosehow we react to it, and that
that's what I would say toanybody.
I'm not a therapist, I'm astoryteller, and but I do think
(25:01):
that stories have a power thatgoes sometimes beyond anything
else.
We, we completely understandstories, the software that our
brains run on.
Nobody ever changes theirbeliefs based on data.
We change our beliefs, if atall, only through stories and
storytelling.
(25:22):
Whether it is people tellthemselves the stories I'm a
drinker, I'm a smoker, I'm a fatbloke and I'm bad at sport.
Well then, suddenly they haveto quit drinking, quit smoking,
and they take up the gym andthey go.
Oh, my news story is that I'm anon-smoker and a non-drinker.
My news story is I'm actuallyquite good at sport, it turns
(25:42):
out, and if you have the oldnarratives, that can hold you
back from fully achieving stuff,so I'm not sure that I would do
anything beyond say to somebodydefine the crisis that is in
front of you, tell me what hashappened.
You have no control over that,but what can you control and
(26:03):
what decisions are you going tomake in the face of that crisis?
Speaker 2 (26:09):
What chapter did the Pilgrim's Way walk add to your
story?
Speaker 1 (26:16):
After, did the Pilgrim's Way walk add to your
story?
I think it's probably a realinflection point.
It was the moment where I havebeen able to stop and look back
(26:39):
and for a couple of years nowI've been trying to write my
memoir and I haven't quite hadthe framework to hang it on.
Because where do you go Ifyou've been self-employed?
You've done contract work allyour life, like I have?
You go oh, I did this, then Idid that, and you look at all
the different stories and you godo you know what?
This is?
Just stuff that happened.
How do I find the thread?
(27:00):
that takes it all through.
And doing the walk, I came backand I thought that I've easily
got 80,000 words so I can sitdown and write about my life and
this walk and how the twothings mesh together.
So on one day I would bewalking along and thinking about
where I grew up and the schoolI grew up in, the teachers I
grew up with.
(27:20):
At other times I'd be thinkingabout my friends and all these
things seem to tie together inthese interesting ways.
You know, I'd be sitting in apub having something to eat and
I'd go goodness, there was atime when I couldn't walk into a
pub and come out of a vertical.
You know I I would have todrink absolutely everything in
(27:41):
there.
And how interesting I'm nowabsolutely fine about going into
a pub and not having analcoholic drink and and that
sort of spurred on all thesethoughts about around drinking
and why I drank.
And so I found that the storyyou know, full as it as it was
of of hardship and andinteresting meetings with
(28:04):
exciting people and lonelinessand connection and all kinds of
other things, had theseresonances across all kinds of
different parts of my life, andalso because of my my dad.
My dad used to be a Boy Scoutand loved the countryside, loved
the outdoors, and I thought,god, it would be lovely if he
were here to do some of this.
And of course in a sort ofsense he sort of was, because it
(28:29):
was his sense of adventure thatsort of carried me along quite
often, and he died very suddenly, and so I thought about him an
awful lot and I thought how niceit would be to sort of have him
.
He'd have loved this.
He'd have found the fact I wasin so much pain absolutely
(28:51):
hysterical.
Speaker 2 (28:53):
He would have given you a hard time about it.
Speaker 1 (28:54):
Yeah, He'd have got a feel of that.
Yeah, thanks.
Speaker 2 (28:59):
Ian, how do you define hope?
Speaker 1 (29:01):
How do I define hope?
I think it is a trust in thefundamental goodness of people.
Deep down, I think most peopleare, given the choice, given the
(29:24):
right circumstances, will dothe right thing.
And I know that sounds a bittwee and I know that sometimes
you look around the world andthink really it doesn't look
like it sometimes, but Igenuinely think people are
motivated for good reasons andit is the story that people tell
themselves.
Nobody fools themselves as wellas they fool themselves.
(29:49):
But I think hope isfundamentally that if people
understand each other, they dodo the right thing for each
other.
Speaker 2 (30:04):
I love that and I agree, which is why I do this
podcast, this podcast right.
I?
I think that in this day andage, we are inundated with a lot
of negative we we tend to see alot of the other side and I'm
(30:26):
hoping, hoping to remind peoplethat compassion and empathy and
and hope absolutely, absolutelydo exist and we don't
necessarily have to look veryhard because it it shows up in
so many different forms.
My, my hope, again, is that thestories that that we share on
(30:50):
the podcast are are ones thatcan meet people where they are,
and and I I love the simplicityof what you've experienced doing
something difficult.
Why do you think it's importantto encourage people to do hard
(31:11):
things?
Speaker 1 (31:14):
It's good for your character, because nobody
thrives when they're in theircomfort zone.
I tell you, I did some stand-upin that in um, in new york, and
this is this is to your pointabout meeting people where they
are.
And before I went on, I said toone of the other comedians I
(31:34):
said what, what should I dobefore?
Is there anything I need toknow about a new york comedy
audience?
And he just went slow down, youtalk real fast, you've got a
funny accent.
Slow right down.
So I went okay, fine, fairenough, I I start speaking very
slowly.
Good evening, ladies andgentlemen.
(31:58):
Of course it completely threwoff all my timing and all of
these jokes which I had a sortof muscle memory for.
Suddenly I had to startthinking about the words that
were coming out of my mouth andI was thinking is this funny?
The audience was sitting theregoing this goes, that what's
happening here, and a couple ofminutes is everything all right,
(32:20):
and a couple of minutes tick byand no laughter is coming.
And I went okay, well, thetrick of stand-up is to lead
people to a laugh.
It's not to whatever you thinka joke is.
It's actually about leadership.
You're, you're a leader.
You're standing on that stage.
You've got the spotlight,you've got the microphone,
(32:41):
you're going to lead people tolaugh.
And I thought I'm not leadingpeople anywhere, I'm confusing
them and I'm scaring them, so soI'm sorry, I was told slow,
funny accent slow, slow person,funny accent.
but if this, if this is funny,why aren't you laughing?
And there's a couple thank God,there was this couple on the
(33:01):
front row and I thought I'mgoing to stop doing jokes, I'm
going to go and meet thisaudience and see where they are.
And I leaned over and she wasamazingly good looking and she
was dressed to the nines and shelooked fabulous and he looked
like he'd spent the afternoondoing.
She was amazingly good lookingand she was dressed to the nines
and she looked fabulous and helooked like he'd spent the
afternoon doing yard work andhad not got changed.
(33:22):
And so we did this whole thingwhere I said you know, your lady
is absolutely gorgeous.
You are going to have to raiseyour game.
And as a group, we all got himto decide what he was going to
wear next time.
He took his girlfriend out for a, a date, and it became very
sort of friendly.
It wasn't too catty, I think,and it was about.
It was about making sure thatyou know, we were complimenting
(33:45):
his girlfriend and we were justsaying you know, you're a nice
looking fella, but you need toraise your game and and match
her style and energy.
Meet her where she is.
Yeah, meet her where she is.
Yeah, meet her where she is.
And then by that time they sortof trusted me and it was always
good and they knew that theyweren't going to be picked on or
there was nothing mean wasgoing to happen, and it was
going to be cheeky and it wasgoing to be friendly.
(34:07):
And then I went back intomaterial and then they started
laughing.
But they understood you a littlebit yeah they clicked into my
voice and it was one of thosethings where you just go right,
I'm in charge of this room.
They're not having a good time.
They've paid good money to comein here.
What can I do?
And doing what I've done athousand times before isn't
(34:28):
going to work.
What will work?
Speaker 2 (34:36):
How can I make this important to these people in
this room?
Speaker 1 (34:45):
As a self-made self-employed individual.
Speaker 2 (34:46):
you've worn many hats and I'm familiar with that.
Which of those has been yourfavorite and or the most
challenging, the one that feltmost difficult?
I mean you say stand-upcomedian, and of everything you
listed, that's probably the onethat makes me sweat the most.
I have no problem speaking inpublic.
I occasionally will makesomeone laugh, but it's just
(35:09):
because I'm just talking.
But if I intentionally wasrequired to make people laugh,
that would give me anxiety.
Speaker 1 (35:17):
Yeah, it's such a weird one.
The expectation is what getsyou all the time, and I always
think that if you say tosomebody I am funny, they will
find you funny, and if you saydo you think this is funny,
they'll sit back and think aboutit, because it is not about
engaging on that level.
Comedy is always about status.
(35:39):
It's always about high statusplays and that's why hecklers
never work out.
How can a heckler ever win?
You can't, because you've gotno mic, you've got no light,
nobody's paid to come and see aheckler.
Speaker 2 (35:55):
You've got no mic, you've got no light, nobody's
paid to come and see a heckler,whereas the other 200 people in
the room have all paid goodmoney to see the guy with the
microphone in the spotlight andthe script.
I have been told many, manytimes that I mean I'm I'm
divorced.
But my ex-husband is a verygood friend of mine and he
always said he was the funniestperson in the family and my, my
eldest daughter she's 21.
Said he was the funniest personin the family and my, my eldest
(36:16):
daughter, she's 21.
She has now taken over thatthat title, and I have many
times been told I am the fourthfunniest person in that quartet
and I like to think I'm a littlefunnier than that.
But you know.
But my daughter is extremely,extremely funny and being told
she's funny is the highestcompliment you can pay her.
So, I know that she very much.
(36:38):
But going back to the questionI asked, the hats you've worn,
which has been the mostchallenging and which has been
the most rewarding.
Speaker 1 (36:58):
I think the most challenging was when I started
doing keynote speaking, so Iwant to talk to groups of people
about how to be a bettercommunicator and about why being
a better communicator, a betterstoryteller, is so important
and it's enjoyable because, itis difficult.
It is difficult because it isholding the attention of a room
for an hour.
It is a challenge.
It's further challengingbecause I'm used to going out
and getting laughs, and whenyou're talking to a room full of
(37:22):
people who are there for aconference, you need to give
them good value.
And so, rather than thinking,why is this, but can I make this
audience laugh four times aminute, you're thinking can I
deliver four useful bits ofinformation every minute?
How is this next line earningits place?
How's this next anecdote, how'sthis next story earning its
(37:43):
place in this hour?
How do you keep the energy upthrough that?
Because if you're not gettinglaughs, I get energy back from
the laughter, and if you're notgetting the laughs, what happens
to that energy?
So it's quite tiring being upthere and I I enjoy it.
I find it a huge challenge, butI also find it massively
(38:05):
rewarding because I know that bythe time I sit down, everybody
in that room should have atleast three things that they can
take away that will make them abetter communicator, if not
more.
I mean, if it's three as aminimum, then hurray and hurrah,
but if it's, if they've satthere and gone, actually, how
are we telling our story?
Where are we going wrong?
(38:28):
And storytelling again is isevery business is going through
this thing with AI at the moment, where they're having to
transform and change and do allkinds of new things.
And change is the mostdifficult, expensive thing that
any business can do, becauseyou're having to drag people
behind you and you're having totry and make the changes stick
(38:51):
and it takes time and money andeffort and everybody pulling in
the same direction and sometimesnobody's pulling in the same
direction and stories.
I think getting the story rightis the cheapest, fastest way of
getting change that lasts,because if you don't have the
(39:12):
story behind why the changeneeds to happen, it will never
work.
People aren't willing to do it.
No, no, because if you don'thave the story, behind why the
change needs to happen.
Speaker 2 (39:17):
It will never work.
Speaker 1 (39:17):
People aren't willing to do it.
No, no, and it comes up againto that idea.
You have a crisis, you have adecision in the middle what are
you going to do with that crisis?
And then you have a resolutionat the end.
And if the people you'reworking with, if you're sitting
there going, we need to change,we need to use a generative AI
in our marketing department andif everybody in your business
says, yeah, but at the end ofthe day we do this or we've
(39:41):
ended up like that, you knowthey're in a resolution, they're
not in a crisis, they're in aresolution.
And if you're in a resolution,you're at the end of your story.
Chapter closed.
End of the book.
People cannot change when theyare in a state of resolution.
You have to push them intocrisis so they can decide how
they're going to react to it,and that's the only way change
(40:02):
ever happens.
If you were an alcoholic, yousit there, you go, I'm a drunk,
I'm a drunk, and that will neverchange.
It's only when you say I needto do something about this.
Right, when you look in themirror and say this is I'd like
to change my own story.
Speaker 2 (40:18):
I'm exhausted by being me.
Ian, I'm so delighted thatyou've spent time with me today.
Where can people find you?
Speaker 1 (40:25):
You can find me at my website, which is mr-hawkinscom
, or I am on LinkedIn.
I'm all over LinkedIn, like acheap raincoat in a thunderstorm
.
Danielle, it's been such apleasure speaking to you today.
Speaker 2 (40:38):
Likewise, do you have any final words for everyone on
doing hard?
Speaker 1 (40:44):
things or hope.
Do you know what?
I'm going to say this?
Because I've been doing someconferences and working with AI
people for the last couple ofweeks and they kept saying to me
the most important thing acompany can own is its data.
The most valuable thing acompany can own is its data, and
because I am contrary Danielle,I thought there's got to be
(41:08):
something else.
I realized the most importantand valuable thing that a
company can own is its story andits narrative, and that, I
think, is the most importantthing that any a company can own
is its story and its narrative,and that, I think, is the most
important thing that any humanbeing can own is to know who you
are I so love that you saidthat as you were, I was trying
to trying to get that to youpsychically.
Speaker 2 (41:30):
I was hoping that was what you were going to say.
Please tell me me story.
Please tell me story story andheart and hope, and it has been
wonderful having you here today.
Thank you for taking time.
Thank you for coming across theworld and spending this last 45
minutes with me and with ourlisteners.
(41:53):
You are a a gift.
Speaker 1 (41:54):
Thank you very much danielle, next time you're in
london, hit me up.
We'll take the uber boat up theriver and we'll go and have a
fancy pants coffee somewhere.
Smart and smart and sprawnsy I.
Speaker 2 (42:06):
I would love that, or we can, we can hit the pub and
and show them whatnon-alcoholics do is this your
idea of fun?
Speaker 1 (42:13):
Believe it or not?
Yes, Absolutely.
Speaker 2 (42:16):
Thank you again, and thank you, friends, for spending
this time with us and andlistening to and owning your
story.
If this has resonated with you,I so hope you will turn around
and share it with the people youlove.
Thank you again for being here.
Don't forget to subscribe andwe will most definitely see you
back here next time.
Until then, take good care ofyou.
(42:40):
Naturally, it's important tothank the people who support and
sponsor the podcast.
This episode is supported byChris Dulley, a trusted criminal
defense attorney and friend ofmine here in St Louis, who
believes in second chances andsolid representation.
Whether you're facing a DWI,felony or traffic issue, chris
handles your case personallywith clarity, compassion and
(43:02):
over 15 years of experience.
When things feel uncertain, ithelps to have someone steady in
your corner.
Call 314-384-4000 or314-DUI-HELP, or you can visit
dullylawfirmcom to schedule yourfree consultation.
I would look at a menu and I would literally go
what do I actually fancy to eatnow?
Sticky toffee pudding with icecream.
I'll have that.
That will be my main meal.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
So there was no part of you that treated this as a
health journey.
You were not thinking I justneed food as medicine.
It was.
What does Ian want today?
Speaker 1 (00:18):
Danielle, have you any idea how many pubs there are
between here and Canterbury?
Speaker 2 (00:36):
If you've been carrying something heavy, if
you're looking for somethinglight, you have come to the
right place.
I'm Danielle Elliott-Smith, andthis is Hope Comes to Visit.
Today's guest is a speaking andstorytelling coach at Netflix.
He once promised himself hewould never be bored, and it's a
promise he's kept.
As a fledgling writer, heworked on flagship BBC comedy
shows.
As a filmmaker, he's dodgedmuggers in Panama and flown in
(00:58):
helicopters over live volcanoes.
As a business journalist, hiswork has appeared on CBS, bbc
and Reuters.
He's worked with some of thehighest profile comedians,
politicians and sports people onthe planet.
Not bad for a comprehensiveschoolboy from Essex.
I'd love to welcome Ian Hawkins.
Let's take a quick moment tothank the people that support
(01:22):
and sponsor the podcast.
When life takes an unexpectedturn, you deserve someone who
will stand beside you.
St Louis attorney Chris Dulleyoffers experienced one-on-one
legal defense.
Call 314-384-4000 or314-DUI-HELP or you can visit
DulleyLawFirmcom that'sD-U-L-L-E-LawFirmcom for a free
(01:45):
consultation.
Ian, thank you so much forbeing here with me danielle.
Speaker 1 (01:49):
It's so lovely thousands of miles apart, and
yet we're able to communicatethrough the magic of of
technology.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
This is what it's for it really is, and this is one
of the things that delights meabout being able to do this
being able to bring you from wayover there to people everywhere
and being able to share piecesof your story and sprinkling
hope in little bits and piecesall over the world.
(02:18):
I am delighted you're here whenI first heard about your story.
So we're going to get into whatyou do in a little bit, but I
want to talk about the hope inyour story that that inspired me
.
So there is this walk that youdid recently, pilgrims way yes,
(02:40):
Is that?
correct yeah, one, yeah okay, soyou did this extensive walk and
I want you to explain it to ourlisteners, but one of the
things that was so interestingto me about the fact that you
did this long walk, and in amuch shorter time than many
people do, it was because, whenyou initially set out on this
track, you did not know why youwere doing it.
Speaker 1 (03:04):
This is the thing I thought I've got everything I
need for this.
I've got my bag, I've got myshoes, I've got my tent, I've
got everything I need.
And the question people keptasking me was so why are you
doing it?
And I didn't have a good.
Why I didn't have a good?
Why Never mind the Simon Sinek,first find your why I was
walking off on that firstmorning thinking that's a very
(03:27):
good question.
Why on earth am I puttingmyself through this?
And let me quickly explain toyour, your listener, who, if
your listener cannot see me, andI should explain.
I am not a great ripplingmuscular specimen of a human
being.
I am, I'm sure, so you're not.
Speaker 2 (03:44):
You wouldn't consider yourself a a super athlete.
This is not something you do.
Speaker 1 (03:48):
You don't often train for far from it okay so I I
occasionally managed to do aquick 5k around the park which
is far better than I.
Speaker 2 (04:02):
I will tell you that this past weekend I sent my
fiance a picture after I did ahike and he said you look like
an athlete.
And I immediately sent it tothe rest of my family and I said
did you hear that?
I?
Speaker 1 (04:12):
just explain it.
It's if you know.
Speaker 2 (04:13):
Geoffrey Chaucer.
Speaker 1 (04:25):
The Canterbury Tales, which is this 600 year old book
and it is a story of a group ofpilgrims who set out from
Southwark Cathedral and they goon the road to Canterbury
Cathedral, which is 86 milesaway, and of course, in those
days you traveled on foot, youtraveled with a couple of horses
and you were in no particularrush to reach your destination.
(04:47):
These days I have commitments.
I went through my diary.
Part of the reason for doing itwas I went, I'll do it, and of
course, I'm self-employed, I runmy own business.
I can take time anytime I want.
I can take time any time I want.
I go through the diary goingwell, I can't do that weekend, I
can't do that weekend, I can'tdo that weekend, and I certainly
(05:07):
can't take the six or sevendays that the guidebook says I
should do it in.
And eventually I landed onsaying well, if I take off
Thursday and Friday, I canarrive on Sunday and I'll
squeeze it into four days and,as it turned out, I squeezed it
into 72 hours.
Speaker 2 (05:27):
Now this is something that people typically do in a
week, right yeah.
And so tell me, when you firstsee Pilgrim's Way, what makes
you say, well, wait a second,that's something I want to do.
So what had you, even lookingat your diary to begin with, to
say this is something I want todo?
Do you just occasionally get anitch to do something that
(05:51):
somebody says is hard to do?
Speaker 1 (05:53):
Well, sometimes I do think.
Yes, there is the call of theopen road.
I'm a bit like you, danielle,which is I love to travel, I
love to get out and see theworld and see what's going on.
There's a big piece of graffiti.
I live in London, right, andthere's a big piece of graffiti
near me that says do somethingdifficult.
I thought, actually, if you'regoing to put a message into
(06:17):
somebody's brain, that's prettygood.
And then I started talking tosome friends of mine who'd done
the Camino.
And suddenly that's a pilgrim'sway.
That's in Spain, northern Spain.
Everyone I know seemed to havedone it or was going on it or
knew someone that had done it.
And I thought why would I go toSpain to do this?
I live near Southern Cathedral.
(06:38):
My brother lives nearCanterbury Cathedral.
Why go all the way to Spainwhen I can just do the Camino
around the corner?
And that's where the ideastarted taking hold.
I thought, well, yeah, okay,let's do it.
I don't even need to get on abus to start this.
I can start from my front doorand I can walk up to look.
(06:58):
If I say the name of theseEnglish places, you mustn't
laugh at them, okay.
Speaker 2 (07:03):
I will not laugh.
First of all, I think I toldyou as soon as we got on I've
always loved accents anyway, andthere's something musical about
your accent.
So I'm listening to you and I'mclosing my eyes and I'm just
listening.
So I can't wait to hear thenames.
So go ahead.
Speaker 1 (07:19):
I'll take that.
I'll take that.
So I left and I thought I'mhaving breakfast with some
friends at a place calledElephant and Castle really.
Okay, put it in Google Maps.
Now it exists.
And I thought I'll go afterbreakfast.
So we get together, we havebreakfast, they all say so why
are you doing this again?
Why have you brought your tent?
Why have you brought yourbackpack?
I don't know why I'm doing it.
(07:40):
And then, at 9 am, I set outand I started walking right on
the Pilgrim's Way where theElephant and Castle joins up,
and I didn't stop until Ireached Canterbury Cathedral 72
hours later on the Sundaymorning.
It was 71 and a half hours.
All right, impressive.
Speaker 2 (07:59):
So I'm going to ask you a couple of questions about
this particular journey.
So, number one how connecteddid you stay while you were on
this journey?
Did you allow yourself to befully present and and listen to
yourself while you were there,or did you find yourself needing
(08:20):
to be distracted?
Right, because you youmentioned, we're so busy.
You're trying to put thiswithin your calendar.
Within this, I only have this,this finite period of time to
get this done.
It should be done in a week.
I should be able to mosey along, right, we think about, about,
(08:41):
about how long it used to take,right, and I should be moseying.
I'm not moseying because I'mbusy.
I've got stuff to do.
Did you allow yourself to slowto a pace where you could listen
to your own thoughts?
Speaker 1 (08:54):
I did.
And I hit on a compromise withthis, because I do have a
partner, I do have a mom and Ithought I can't just disappear
for four days and then pop up.
And and I thought I can't justdisappear for four days and then
pop up and knock on mybrother's front door.
So what I did was I created aWhatsApp group and I said
anybody that wants to follow me,I will be on the WhatsApp group
and I will drop the occasionalpin if I stop for something to
(09:17):
eat or if I stop for the night,because I did wild camping.
On the first night I stayed in amonastery.
On the second night I stayed.
Bizarrely, I got invited tostay in a church.
On the third night I stayed ina monastery.
On the second night I stayed.
Bizarrely, I got invited tostay in a church on the third
night.
That was not planned, but Iwould drop a pin when I stopped
for a meal or for something sothat anybody that wanted to join
that WhatsApp group could comein.
And I said at the top I saidyou're welcome to follow me on
(09:38):
the adventure and I'll send youthe occasional pic and I'll send
you the occasional update, butdo not expect me to respond to
stuff.
The point of this is to getaway from it all All right.
Speaker 2 (09:47):
So you're not.
I'm not having conversation,I'm not chatting and giving
people updates.
I'm not answering questions.
I'm just giving the occasionalupdate on this particular
adventure.
Speaker 1 (09:57):
Yeah, and it was quite nice.
I think I had about 20 friendsand family at the end who joined
me on that and it was quitenice at the end of the day to
sit there in a pub with my dietcompletely changed.
I would look at a menu and Iwould literally go what do I
actually fancy to eat now?
Sticky toffee pudding with icecream.
I'll have that.
(10:18):
That will be my main meal.
Speaker 2 (10:20):
So there was no part of you that treated this as a
health journey.
You were not thinking I justneed food as medicine.
It was.
What does Ian want today?
Speaker 1 (10:29):
Danielle, have you any idea how many pubs there are
between here and Canterbury?
Speaker 2 (10:34):
I can't even begin to fathom.
Speaker 1 (10:38):
So yeah, as I was walking through the countryside
and of course, every village hasa pub or at least one pub,
every village has a little shopor village has a pub or at least
one pub, every village has alittle shop or it has a cricket
pitch, and I would sit there andI would go on and I'd drop a
pin, I'd show them a picture ofwhat I was having for food and I
and people would say, oh, youknow, you've done really good
mileage today, or you know, keepgoing, and that kind of thing.
(11:01):
And that was enough of a enoughof a footstep in into being
sociable, without it taking awayfrom what I was doing, which is
going into myself and thinkingabout uh think, do all do all
the deep work that we never havea chance to, to sit back and
listen to.
Speaker 2 (11:18):
So the deep work is is the next question, because so
you mentioned the, the quote dosomething difficult.
One of my favorite quotes is dosomething every day that scares
you, and that's elizabethroosevelt.
Uh, and so I actually have thaton my refrigerator to remind me
that I do need to challengemyself.
And when you and I wereinitially communicating, you
(11:41):
mentioned that you didn'trealize it because you didn't
really know your why for doingthis beyond doing something
difficult.
Right, but you found yourselffacing some past trauma and you
were unaware that taking thisquiet time for yourself was
going to allow you to face somedifficult things from your past.
(12:05):
Will you talk about that?
Speaker 1 (12:07):
Sure, so I have been walking.
So the first day I did about67,000 steps I don't know if you
have a stepometer on your wrist.
Yes, it's quite a lot.
So I woke up the next day andmy feet were really sore, my
hips were sore, my legs weresore, I'll bet and I started
walking about 4.30 on themorning of the next day and my
feet were really sore, my hipswere sore, my legs were sore, uh
, and I started walking about 430 on the morning of the second
(12:29):
day and I promised my mum onething, which was that I would
not take any risks with the heat.
And of course, this happened atthe beginning of July.
So, uh, you know, about a monthago, and we had a heat wave,
which is not something theBritish people deal with
particularly well, are used to.
And I realised I got to thisvillage and I realised that if I
(12:51):
I had to be at the monastery byfour o'clock in the afternoon
because they closed the doors atfour o'clock.
Okay, and I thought it's 11o'clock now.
It's really hot.
I've run out of water, yeah,and it's about a five mile, so
it's about a five hour walk away.
(13:11):
If I really push myself, if Ireally push myself, I can do it,
but it is hot.
And we also had a guy over herecalled Michael Mosley, who is a
very well liked TV presenterand doctor, and he died of heat
stroke when he was on holiday TVpresenter and doctor and he
(13:31):
died of heat stroke when he wason holiday.
So that's quite a big thing andit certainly put me in mind of
you know do scary things, butdon't take daft risks.
And I did say OK, look, it's toohot, I'm cutting it too.
Fine, I will take the train,literally two stops on the train
, so I can get there on time andmake sure that I I can get into
(13:53):
the, into the um, into themonastery for the night okay the
next day I woke up and I and itwas, it was raining and
everything still hurt, and Ithought I'm gonna phone my
brother and just see if I canget on the next train and go and
see my brother a day early andcut this short.
And I got my map out and Ilooked at my map and I saw the
(14:15):
whole of the road in front of meand I was halfway through this
trip and I thought well, come on, this is this is all or nothing
fantasy at work.
Here.
You've taken five percent ofyour journey on a train.
Are you really going to throwaway 50% of success for 5% of
(14:38):
failure jumping on a train?
And then it came to me exactlywhy I had done this.
The reason why I did this wasbecause in everything you do,
there is always somebody sayingyou can't do that or don't do do
that or don't do this, or don'tdo that, or telling you what
you should and shouldn't do.
And the only reason why I wason that walk was because I
wanted to be there and the onlyperson that could stop me was me
(15:01):
, and that was the moment when Iwent.
But also the only person thatcan keep me going is me.
So I actually have to make areally clear choice Do I keep
going or do I stop?
And at that point the painbecame irrelevant, the aches
became irrelevant, the rainbecame irrelevant, and it was
just like oh well, you're wet,yeah I will be, because it's
(15:25):
raining.
Your feet hurt?
Yeah I would.
That's because I've done100,000 steps in the last 24
hours and none of it mattered.
All that mattered was that Isaid I was going to do it and
therefore I will do it.
And it's one foot in front ofthe other, until I bumped my
fist on the side of CanterburyCathedral and it was shall I do
(15:46):
it, shall I not do it?
And then it wasn't even aquestion, it was an was shall I
do it, shall I not do it?
And then it wasn't even aquestion, it was about, it was
an inevitability.
Speaker 2 (15:53):
What I love about what you just defined is that
you me, everyone listening weare the only ones who get to
specifically say for us,specifically define for
ourselves what success orfailure looks like.
It's not the outside world thatsays, well, because you did 5%
(16:15):
on the train, it wasn't really awalk right, you didn't really
do it.
You get to do it, you do ityour version.
And I think that and I thinkthis relates to the way I, I
people, in terms of of how theyapproach sobriety Right and I
(16:35):
know that recovery has been apiece of your journey as well
that people pile shame onthemselves or they allow someone
else to define for them whatsuccess or failure looks like.
You could have said, well, Imean, I did 5% on the train, so
I guess I might as well give up,and instead you said, no, I had
(16:58):
to, I had to deviate slightlyfrom my original plan, but no,
I'm going to keep going and I'mgoing to make this the way I
want it to be.
Yeah, and I love that.
Speaker 1 (17:12):
Sure, yeah, I mean sobriety.
I've been sober now for 10,over 10 years, coming out to 11
years Congratulations.
With the possible exceptions oftwo accidental liqueur
chocolates and my mother'sMadeira trifle, I thought, jesus
Mother, you have to put thewhole bottle in.
This is deadly.
But see, I'm not a fan of AA.
(17:35):
I've been to one AA meeting andI didn't enjoy it and I said
well because I don't, and that'sokay.
Speaker 2 (17:42):
And that's okay, because I don't like the idea
that if you accidentally have aglass of wine, you're suddenly
resetting the clock and you'reback to zero, exactly, and
that's part of what I'm, part ofwhat I say, right, and that's I
want people to know that,however you define, however you
(18:04):
choose to pursue your ownversion of recovery, that's OK.
Pursue your own version ofrecovery, that's okay.
I don't like the aspect ofshame that comes in when anyone
is pursuing recovery.
I really struggled when I wouldhear someone say well, my
sponsor told me that I relapsed.
(18:24):
Therefore, I have to walk intoa meeting and tell everyone
tomorrow morning and I know thatthat's not definitive for
everyone.
I know that it that's beensomeone's experience, and so for
me.
I initially went to AA and hadgreat experiences and then I
didn't.
So I want people to know if AAworks for you, fantastic, use it
(18:49):
, enjoy it, embrace it.
And the same thing forNarcotics, anonymous or whatever
.
Whatever works for you, use it.
But I like the idea of beingable to define your version of
success in whatever you decideto do, whether it's walking
Pilgrim's Way or pursuingrecovery, or whatever path
you're taking in your life,whatever journey you're on.
Speaker 1 (19:12):
I think if you want to achieve something hard or
something difficult, somethingthat seems like a long way away
and along 86 miles of road let'suse this as a metaphor along 86
miles of road you're not goingto travel each one of those
miles beautifully and perfectly,with excellent poise and
looking your best.
What matters, I think, is howyou deal with the setbacks and
(19:32):
how you deal with the littlefailures, and we know this.
We know that the diet is notruined when you have one cookie.
The diet is ruined when youhave the one cookie and go well,
that's it, the diet's over.
I've finished the whole pack.
Yeah, if you are a20-cigarette-a day smoker and
(19:53):
after a week of non-smoking youcrack and have one, well then,
congratulations, you're a onecigarette a week smoker.
Now the mistake is when you goback to 20 cigarettes in a in a
day.
Right and you give up yeah, andwhen you, when you give up,
giving up and you've, I alwayssay, if you're have a, what you
do is you have that biscuit, youhave that guilty biscuit.
Okay, you go hum, hum, hum, hum, hum and then, like Cookie
(20:16):
Monster, you shove your faceinto the biscuit and I say, no,
you're going to have to haveanother biscuit, but it's going
to be the perfect biscuit,you're going to have it.
So cookie got to remember we'rein America now.
You have a cookie.
Speaker 2 (20:37):
You put it on a plate with a doily, a knife and fork.
Speaker 1 (20:38):
You put on a tie.
You'd like a candle.
You eat that cookie.
You know, piece by piece, youenjoy it same with a cigarette
you have you.
You get up the nicest crystalashtray, you sit there, you
enjoy that cigarette.
You.
If I'm only having onecigarette a week, my god, I'm
gonna enjoy it.
Let every, every molecule ofnicotine flicker across your
synapses and then put it out andenjoy that cigarette so much
you won't need another one foranother week and become a one a
(21:01):
week smoker you mentioned thatin going on this, you found
yourself looking at past lifeexperiences heart surgery you
had had as a child and thenrecently, more recent, loss of
(21:36):
your dad trauma does notunderstand time, and it is a
feature of trauma that, onceyou've gone through it, it can
be very present.
And one of the things that youfind is, when you are by
yourself and you give yourselfthe time and the space to
process things, that you do havea chance to come face to face
(22:05):
with some of the things that youwould normally block out,
whether that is with going tosee friends, having a, doing you
know distraction techniques.
When there are no distractionsleft, you have to come face to
face with everything, and Irealized that one of the things
that I believe is reallyimportant is that we all need to
understand how our stories workand stories happen in a very
(22:27):
particular way, and if yourstory is unfinished or is
unstructured, then it's reallydifficult to to process
everything.
And I don't think of it in termsof getting over stuff, because
you don't get over stuff, butwhat you do is you learn to live
effectively with, with thescars and the and the bumps and
the dings.
So for me, a story is adistillation of data.
(22:57):
We live in big, complicatedworlds and a story is a
distillation of data such thatyou have a crisis, you make a
decision in response to that andyou resolve that crisis.
And if you don't make adecision in the middle, if you
don't have the chance to makethat decision, it's not a story,
it's just stuff that happens toyou, and a lot of trauma is
(23:19):
stuff that happens to you.
You're stuck in the crisis andyou have to be quite explicit
and say what decision am I goingto make about it?
Because very often you areresponding to it, not making a
decision around it.
And once you start moving intoa decision and you start coming
to a resolution, you then turnthe whole experience into a
(23:40):
story that you can own and yousay well, that's mine.
Speaker 2 (23:45):
So storytelling is something that you and I have in
common in terms of our passionabout it, our love of of hearing
stories, of telling stories.
I like the way you justdescribed sort of getting caught
in the middle.
There, If you were sitting andtalking to someone and you
(24:06):
recognize that they are caughtin the middle and they are not
yet owning their story, what doyou say to them to encourage
them to grab the pen again tosay all right, you're not, you
are in the middle of this, youare letting someone else author
this.
You have not yet said wait, asecond, pen and paper mine, pen
(24:30):
mine.
How do you encourage them tore-embrace that and write their
own?
Speaker 1 (24:38):
It's good, old-fashioned stoicism, I think.
I think we can't choose ourcircumstances, because stuff
will always happen okay, but wecan choose how.
Can't choose our circumstances,because stuff will always
happen okay, but we can choosehow we react to it, and that
that's what I would say toanybody.
I'm not a therapist, I'm astoryteller, and but I do think
(25:01):
that stories have a power thatgoes sometimes beyond anything
else.
We, we completely understandstories, the software that our
brains run on.
Nobody ever changes theirbeliefs based on data.
We change our beliefs, if atall, only through stories and
storytelling.
(25:22):
Whether it is people tellthemselves the stories I'm a
drinker, I'm a smoker, I'm a fatbloke and I'm bad at sport.
Well then, suddenly they haveto quit drinking, quit smoking,
and they take up the gym andthey go.
Oh, my news story is that I'm anon-smoker and a non-drinker.
My news story is I'm actuallyquite good at sport, it turns
(25:42):
out, and if you have the oldnarratives, that can hold you
back from fully achieving stuff,so I'm not sure that I would do
anything beyond say to somebodydefine the crisis that is in
front of you, tell me what hashappened.
You have no control over that,but what can you control and
(26:03):
what decisions are you going tomake in the face of that crisis?
Speaker 2 (26:09):
What chapter did the Pilgrim's Way walk add to your
story?
Speaker 1 (26:16):
After, did the Pilgrim's Way walk add to your
story?
I think it's probably a realinflection point.
It was the moment where I havebeen able to stop and look back
(26:39):
and for a couple of years nowI've been trying to write my
memoir and I haven't quite hadthe framework to hang it on.
Because where do you go Ifyou've been self-employed?
You've done contract work allyour life, like I have?
You go oh, I did this, then Idid that, and you look at all
the different stories and you godo you know what?
This is?
Just stuff that happened.
How do I find the thread?
(27:00):
that takes it all through.
And doing the walk, I came backand I thought that I've easily
got 80,000 words so I can sitdown and write about my life and
this walk and how the twothings mesh together.
So on one day I would bewalking along and thinking about
where I grew up and the schoolI grew up in, the teachers I
grew up with.
(27:20):
At other times I'd be thinkingabout my friends and all these
things seem to tie together inthese interesting ways.
You know, I'd be sitting in apub having something to eat and
I'd go goodness, there was atime when I couldn't walk into a
pub and come out of a vertical.
You know I I would have todrink absolutely everything in
(27:41):
there.
And how interesting I'm nowabsolutely fine about going into
a pub and not having analcoholic drink and and that
sort of spurred on all thesethoughts about around drinking
and why I drank.
And so I found that the storyyou know, full as it as it was
of of hardship and andinteresting meetings with
(28:04):
exciting people and lonelinessand connection and all kinds of
other things, had theseresonances across all kinds of
different parts of my life, andalso because of my my dad.
My dad used to be a Boy Scoutand loved the countryside, loved
the outdoors, and I thought,god, it would be lovely if he
were here to do some of this.
And of course in a sort ofsense he sort of was, because it
(28:29):
was his sense of adventure thatsort of carried me along quite
often, and he died very suddenly, and so I thought about him an
awful lot and I thought how niceit would be to sort of have him
.
He'd have loved this.
He'd have found the fact I wasin so much pain absolutely
(28:51):
hysterical.
Speaker 2 (28:53):
He would have given you a hard time about it.
Speaker 1 (28:54):
Yeah, He'd have got a feel of that.
Yeah, thanks.
Speaker 2 (28:59):
Ian, how do you define hope?
Speaker 1 (29:01):
How do I define hope?
I think it is a trust in thefundamental goodness of people.
Deep down, I think most peopleare, given the choice, given the
(29:24):
right circumstances, will dothe right thing.
And I know that sounds a bittwee and I know that sometimes
you look around the world andthink really it doesn't look
like it sometimes, but Igenuinely think people are
motivated for good reasons andit is the story that people tell
themselves.
Nobody fools themselves as wellas they fool themselves.
(29:49):
But I think hope isfundamentally that if people
understand each other, they dodo the right thing for each
other.
Speaker 2 (30:04):
I love that and I agree, which is why I do this
podcast, this podcast right.
I?
I think that in this day andage, we are inundated with a lot
of negative we we tend to see alot of the other side and I'm
(30:26):
hoping, hoping to remind peoplethat compassion and empathy and
and hope absolutely, absolutelydo exist and we don't
necessarily have to look veryhard because it it shows up in
so many different forms.
My, my hope, again, is that thestories that that we share on
(30:50):
the podcast are are ones thatcan meet people where they are,
and and I I love the simplicityof what you've experienced doing
something difficult.
Why do you think it's importantto encourage people to do hard
(31:11):
things?
Speaker 1 (31:14):
It's good for your character, because nobody
thrives when they're in theircomfort zone.
I tell you, I did some stand-upin that in um, in new york, and
this is this is to your pointabout meeting people where they
are.
And before I went on, I said toone of the other comedians I
(31:34):
said what, what should I dobefore?
Is there anything I need toknow about a new york comedy
audience?
And he just went slow down, youtalk real fast, you've got a
funny accent.
Slow right down.
So I went okay, fine, fairenough, I I start speaking very
slowly.
Good evening, ladies andgentlemen.
(31:58):
Of course it completely threwoff all my timing and all of
these jokes which I had a sortof muscle memory for.
Suddenly I had to startthinking about the words that
were coming out of my mouth andI was thinking is this funny?
The audience was sitting theregoing this goes, that what's
happening here, and a couple ofminutes is everything all right,
(32:20):
and a couple of minutes tick byand no laughter is coming.
And I went okay, well, thetrick of stand-up is to lead
people to a laugh.
It's not to whatever you thinka joke is.
It's actually about leadership.
You're, you're a leader.
You're standing on that stage.
You've got the spotlight,you've got the microphone,
(32:41):
you're going to lead people tolaugh.
And I thought I'm not leadingpeople anywhere, I'm confusing
them and I'm scaring them, so soI'm sorry, I was told slow,
funny accent slow, slow person,funny accent.
but if this, if this is funny,why aren't you laughing?
And there's a couple thank God,there was this couple on the
(33:01):
front row and I thought I'mgoing to stop doing jokes, I'm
going to go and meet thisaudience and see where they are.
And I leaned over and she wasamazingly good looking and she
was dressed to the nines and shelooked fabulous and he looked
like he'd spent the afternoondoing.
She was amazingly good lookingand she was dressed to the nines
and she looked fabulous and helooked like he'd spent the
afternoon doing yard work andhad not got changed.
(33:22):
And so we did this whole thingwhere I said you know, your lady
is absolutely gorgeous.
You are going to have to raiseyour game.
And as a group, we all got himto decide what he was going to
wear next time.
He took his girlfriend out for a, a date, and it became very
sort of friendly.
It wasn't too catty, I think,and it was about.
It was about making sure thatyou know, we were complimenting
(33:45):
his girlfriend and we were justsaying you know, you're a nice
looking fella, but you need toraise your game and and match
her style and energy.
Meet her where she is.
Yeah, meet her where she is.
Yeah, meet her where she is.
And then by that time they sortof trusted me and it was always
good and they knew that theyweren't going to be picked on or
there was nothing mean wasgoing to happen, and it was
going to be cheeky and it wasgoing to be friendly.
(34:07):
And then I went back intomaterial and then they started
laughing.
But they understood you a littlebit yeah they clicked into my
voice and it was one of thosethings where you just go right,
I'm in charge of this room.
They're not having a good time.
They've paid good money to comein here.
What can I do?
And doing what I've done athousand times before isn't
(34:28):
going to work.
What will work?
Speaker 2 (34:36):
How can I make this important to these people in
this room?
Speaker 1 (34:45):
As a self-made self-employed individual.
Speaker 2 (34:46):
you've worn many hats and I'm familiar with that.
Which of those has been yourfavorite and or the most
challenging, the one that feltmost difficult?
I mean you say stand-upcomedian, and of everything you
listed, that's probably the onethat makes me sweat the most.
I have no problem speaking inpublic.
I occasionally will makesomeone laugh, but it's just
(35:09):
because I'm just talking.
But if I intentionally wasrequired to make people laugh,
that would give me anxiety.
Speaker 1 (35:17):
Yeah, it's such a weird one.
The expectation is what getsyou all the time, and I always
think that if you say tosomebody I am funny, they will
find you funny, and if you saydo you think this is funny,
they'll sit back and think aboutit, because it is not about
engaging on that level.
Comedy is always about status.
(35:39):
It's always about high statusplays and that's why hecklers
never work out.
How can a heckler ever win?
You can't, because you've gotno mic, you've got no light,
nobody's paid to come and see aheckler.
Speaker 2 (35:55):
You've got no mic, you've got no light, nobody's
paid to come and see a heckler,whereas the other 200 people in
the room have all paid goodmoney to see the guy with the
microphone in the spotlight andthe script.
I have been told many, manytimes that I mean I'm I'm
divorced.
But my ex-husband is a verygood friend of mine and he
always said he was the funniestperson in the family and my, my
eldest daughter she's 21.
Said he was the funniest personin the family and my, my eldest
(36:16):
daughter, she's 21.
She has now taken over thatthat title, and I have many
times been told I am the fourthfunniest person in that quartet
and I like to think I'm a littlefunnier than that.
But you know.
But my daughter is extremely,extremely funny and being told
she's funny is the highestcompliment you can pay her.
So, I know that she very much.
(36:38):
But going back to the questionI asked, the hats you've worn,
which has been the mostchallenging and which has been
the most rewarding.
Speaker 1 (36:58):
I think the most challenging was when I started
doing keynote speaking, so Iwant to talk to groups of people
about how to be a bettercommunicator and about why being
a better communicator, a betterstoryteller, is so important
and it's enjoyable because, itis difficult.
It is difficult because it isholding the attention of a room
for an hour.
It is a challenge.
It's further challengingbecause I'm used to going out
and getting laughs, and whenyou're talking to a room full of
(37:22):
people who are there for aconference, you need to give
them good value.
And so, rather than thinking,why is this, but can I make this
audience laugh four times aminute, you're thinking can I
deliver four useful bits ofinformation every minute?
How is this next line earningits place?
How's this next anecdote, how'sthis next story earning its
(37:43):
place in this hour?
How do you keep the energy upthrough that?
Because if you're not gettinglaughs, I get energy back from
the laughter, and if you're notgetting the laughs, what happens
to that energy?
So it's quite tiring being upthere and I I enjoy it.
I find it a huge challenge, butI also find it massively
(38:05):
rewarding because I know that bythe time I sit down, everybody
in that room should have atleast three things that they can
take away that will make them abetter communicator, if not
more.
I mean, if it's three as aminimum, then hurray and hurrah,
but if it's, if they've satthere and gone, actually, how
are we telling our story?
Where are we going wrong?
(38:28):
And storytelling again is isevery business is going through
this thing with AI at the moment, where they're having to
transform and change and do allkinds of new things.
And change is the mostdifficult, expensive thing that
any business can do, becauseyou're having to drag people
behind you and you're having totry and make the changes stick
(38:51):
and it takes time and money andeffort and everybody pulling in
the same direction and sometimesnobody's pulling in the same
direction and stories.
I think getting the story rightis the cheapest, fastest way of
getting change that lasts,because if you don't have the
(39:12):
story behind why the changeneeds to happen, it will never
work.
People aren't willing to do it.
No, no, because if you don'thave the story, behind why the
change needs to happen.
Speaker 2 (39:17):
It will never work.
Speaker 1 (39:17):
People aren't willing to do it.
No, no, and it comes up againto that idea.
You have a crisis, you have adecision in the middle what are
you going to do with that crisis?
And then you have a resolutionat the end.
And if the people you'reworking with, if you're sitting
there going, we need to change,we need to use a generative AI
in our marketing department andif everybody in your business
says, yeah, but at the end ofthe day we do this or we've
(39:41):
ended up like that, you knowthey're in a resolution, they're
not in a crisis, they're in aresolution.
And if you're in a resolution,you're at the end of your story.
Chapter closed.
End of the book.
People cannot change when theyare in a state of resolution.
You have to push them intocrisis so they can decide how
they're going to react to it,and that's the only way change
(40:02):
ever happens.
If you were an alcoholic, yousit there, you go, I'm a drunk,
I'm a drunk, and that will neverchange.
It's only when you say I needto do something about this.
Right, when you look in themirror and say this is I'd like
to change my own story.
Speaker 2 (40:18):
I'm exhausted by being me.
Ian, I'm so delighted thatyou've spent time with me today.
Where can people find you?
Speaker 1 (40:25):
You can find me at my website, which is mr-hawkinscom
, or I am on LinkedIn.
I'm all over LinkedIn, like acheap raincoat in a thunderstorm
.
Danielle, it's been such apleasure speaking to you today.
Speaker 2 (40:38):
Likewise, do you have any final words for everyone on
doing hard?
Speaker 1 (40:44):
things or hope.
Do you know what?
I'm going to say this?
Because I've been doing someconferences and working with AI
people for the last couple ofweeks and they kept saying to me
the most important thing acompany can own is its data.
The most valuable thing acompany can own is its data, and
because I am contrary Danielle,I thought there's got to be
(41:08):
something else.
I realized the most importantand valuable thing that a
company can own is its story andits narrative, and that, I
think, is the most importantthing that any a company can own
is its story and its narrative,and that, I think, is the most
important thing that any humanbeing can own is to know who you
are I so love that you saidthat as you were, I was trying
to trying to get that to youpsychically.
Speaker 2 (41:30):
I was hoping that was what you were going to say.
Please tell me me story.
Please tell me story story andheart and hope, and it has been
wonderful having you here today.
Thank you for taking time.
Thank you for coming across theworld and spending this last 45
minutes with me and with ourlisteners.
(41:53):
You are a a gift.
Speaker 1 (41:54):
Thank you very much danielle, next time you're in
london, hit me up.
We'll take the uber boat up theriver and we'll go and have a
fancy pants coffee somewhere.
Smart and smart and sprawnsy I.
Speaker 2 (42:06):
I would love that, or we can, we can hit the pub and
and show them whatnon-alcoholics do is this your
idea of fun?
Speaker 1 (42:13):
Believe it or not?
Yes, Absolutely.
Speaker 2 (42:16):
Thank you again, and thank you, friends, for spending
this time with us and andlistening to and owning your
story.
If this has resonated with you,I so hope you will turn around
and share it with the people youlove.
Thank you again for being here.
Don't forget to subscribe andwe will most definitely see you
back here next time.
Until then, take good care ofyou.
(42:40):
Naturally, it's important tothank the people who support and
sponsor the podcast.
This episode is supported byChris Dulley, a trusted criminal
defense attorney and friend ofmine here in St Louis, who
believes in second chances andsolid representation.
Whether you're facing a DWI,felony or traffic issue, chris
handles your case personallywith clarity, compassion and
(43:02):
over 15 years of experience.
When things feel uncertain, ithelps to have someone steady in
your corner.
Call 314-384-4000 or314-DUI-HELP, or you can visit
dullylawfirmcom to schedule yourfree consultation.
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