October 17, 2023 • 51 mins
Can the power of storytelling transform your life and bring about personal growth?
My guest Kyle Gray is a world-class presentation coach, story strategist, and author. From a humble beginning as a musician and singer-songwriter, to becoming a linguistic adventurer in South America and Southeast Asia, Kyle shares his fascinating journey into the realm of startups and how he harnessed the amalgamation of storytelling and marketing.
Kyle paints a vibrant picture of his life-changing experiences, from facilitating high-ticket workshops to overcoming chronic autoimmune diseases. Through these experiences, he discovered the deep connection between personal health, wellness, and the pivotal role of mindset. He further reveals how story work can serve as an engine to inspire clients and aid people in transforming their identities.
Tune in as Kyle enlightens us about the profound impact of emotions in storytelling and their importance in effective communication. He shares valuable tips on crafting compelling presentations, differentiating between a signature talk and a Ted Talk, and tailoring your message to resonate with specific audiences.
Join us as we navigate through the labyrinth of self-limiting beliefs and the insidious imposter syndrome, emphasizing the significance of genuine self-expression. Listen and learn from Kyle as he shares inspirational stories and insightful thoughts - a thought-provoking episode not to be missed! A journey of exploration and transformation through the power of storytelling awaits you.
Connect with Kyle here:
https://www.thestoryengine.co
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https://geni.us/FinallyThriving
Join my Finally Thriving Group Program waitlist here:
https://www.finallythrivingprogram.com/waitlist
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:18):
Your life is your greatest work of art, and it all
relates back to the sacrednessof the sacredness.
Welcome everybody to IntegrateYourself.
I'm your host, alison Pillow,and you can find me at
alisonpillowcom.
And finally, book finallythriving bookcom.
Today I'm here with a veryspecial guest and a good friend
(00:39):
of mine, kyle Gray.
He is a world-classpresentation coach, story
strategist and author who helpscoaches, startups and executives
use storytelling to bettercommunicate their unique value
and improve sales with theiraudience.
He combines timelessstorytelling with cutting-edge
marketing to ensure you've gotthe right story to tell while
(01:02):
presenting on a sales call or ina conversation both online and
offline.
Thank you so much, kyle, forcoming on the show.
I do want to mention that youhave a book called the Story
Engine that people can also findon Amazon and probably on your
website too, and a podcast aswell.
Thanks, kyle, for coming on theshow.
I'm so excited you're here.
Speaker 2 (01:24):
I'm delighted to be here.
Thank you so much for having me.
I'm grateful for this.
I'm grateful.
You know we've been friends inperson, We've met before, and
it's always magical to be ableto create something online with
somebody that you know from reallife.
So I'm honored that you wouldhelp me on the show today and
I'm excited to explore with you.
Speaker 1 (01:44):
Me too.
Me too.
Well, kyle, I just gave you anice formal introduction, but
there's so much more to yourstory on a personal level and
what you've experienced, too,through your work, and I'd love
for you to share more about thatwith my audience.
Speaker 2 (02:01):
Absolutely Well.
My work and my art, you know,boils down or distills down to
the struggle of adequateexpression, and that was first
manifested when I was younger,as a musician, as a singer,
(02:24):
songwriter and as a kid thatprobably, you know, if I had one
of my like childhood traumas isjust maybe not knowing how to
show or ask for the right amountof affection and not being able
to ask for that.
And so being able to play musicwas kind of a way to be in
(02:46):
those emotional spaces that wassafe, and for a long time I
thought that the only way I wasgoing to be a successful human
was by being a successful singer, songwriter.
I had to do this and I wantedto write lyrics that would
inspire people and influencepeople and change their
(03:06):
perspectives, and I wanted towrite chord progressions that
were as good as the classic popchord progressions but somehow
different, as if I was going tobe the one that figured out the
new pattern.
And for when I was younger, Iput a lot of pressure on myself
to start writing these greatsongs and supporting myself.
(03:27):
I applied for performing artsschools and did all these things
, but I ended up putting so muchpressure on myself for it that
I kind of burnt myself out onthe art and along with this,
during our in between this andalong this kind of up and down
of the art, I've also spent alot of time living in other
(03:50):
countries, particularly in SouthAmerica and Southeast Asia, and
through living in South AmericaI've learned to speak both
Spanish and Portuguese, which isalso a struggle to adequately
express myself, of routinelyputting myself in foreign places
where I'm not that good atspeaking the language and just
(04:12):
immersing myself in a world thatI don't know and I don't
understand.
And I was very good at that, butdidn't think that learning how
to speak Spanish or learning howto that you could drop me in
the middle of a random countryand I would probably be able to,
like, figure myself out and and, like you know, be okay.
(04:34):
I thought those are just, youknow, decent and interesting
skills, but not very businessyskills.
And during this time I startedto hear about people who could
travel the world, live anywherethey wanted and work from a
laptop and be able to grow abusiness, and I was like that
sounds amazing, but I'm not abusiness person.
(04:54):
I speak Spanish, yeah, but butyou know, I thought when I
thought of business.
I thought of like people inblue starch shirts that have
MBAs and are in tall glassbuildings, you know doing stuff.
And so it took a couple of years, you know, to even kind of open
(05:16):
me up to the idea of trying,and my first, my first real gig
in this world was blogging andcontent marketing and telling
the story of a startup and howit was growing, and this also
tickled my my desire to travel.
It was a remote job that I wasactually able to live in
(05:39):
Thailand because my boss livedin Australia and that's a
similar time zone, so I was ableto travel around the world and
I was working, working for thestartup.
It was hard work and I wasthrown deep end.
I was a good writer, but likewriting writing papers and ideas
for college professors is avery different thing than
(06:01):
writing really good content forsearch engines and Twitter
ability and being having likereally competitive content, and
so it was very challenging, butI started to feel kind of like
there was something about thatthat was the same as like
writing songs and like puttingmy ideas out there that I really
enjoyed and started to enjoy itmore and more and began to make
(06:24):
a name for myself as a writer,and I used my writing skills to
insert myself into otherbusinesses and support them, and
usually it were businesses thathad something that I wanted to
learn from them.
I started working andconsulting for a company called
self publishing school after thestartup, and through
(06:44):
understanding their systems andhelping them build a content
marketing strategy, I learnedenough to write and publish my
own books and started publishing, self publishing my own books,
which one of which you alreadymentioned which became the
foundation for an incrediblebusiness and brands that has
since supported me and enabled,enabled me to fulfill a lot of
(07:08):
those early stage dreams.
But the real are one big turningpoint, and and finding turning
point was a little bit after theself publishing and learning
how to write books that I sawanother person give a
presentation about how to usespeaking from the stage as a way
to grow your business quicklyand powerfully, and it reminded
(07:32):
me of what it was like to be onthe stage as a, as a musician,
and I was like, oh my gosh, Iwant to do this.
And so I went up to them.
I, you know, offered my skillsas a writer and offered to start
writing for them and helpingthem out to learn how to become
a better speaker, and I wouldconsume everything I could and
write for them.
And this company was in a veryearly stage but it was growing
(07:56):
quite rapidly and they startedhosting these workshops where
they would charge $10,000 forsomebody to come for two days to
either set up their positioningto be a great speaker or to
write a great presentation.
And one of the first personthey called to help facilitate
these workshops was me, becauseI was doing all the writing and
writing that, all of theirprocesses and systems and all
(08:18):
these things.
So I was also running my ownbusiness doing copywriting,
helping other people writespeeches, but, and I was
inserting myself into severalother businesses, several other
people, the likes of which wedon't have to talk about.
But it was a lot like this storyof of.
First I learned a tremendousamount and how to fulfill and
(08:42):
serve people you know and makesure that they have a good
$10,000 experience.
Probably one of the mostimportant things is I got to see
hundreds of people that paid$10,000 for something which is a
trip to the mental gym thatmost people will never make,
they won't even dare to make,and I have the blessing of just
seeing some people.
(09:02):
You see them and you're like,of course you'd pay $10,000, you
know, for something.
And some people you knowthey're like, wow, you really
like, you know you mortgage thefarm to make this happen because
you believe and you knowwhatever like.
However, what value theyderived I'm not sure from each
(09:22):
one, but it was just amazing tosee who you could enroll in
something like this and itstretched my mind and in the
ways that I'm very grateful forand after so, finally, after our
one final thread I know I'mgoing for a really long time.
Speaker 1 (09:43):
I'm so.
I'm loving this story, yeah.
Speaker 2 (09:46):
So there's the final kind of thread that brings this
all together, that we use thisinto.
Who I am now is as I'mfacilitating these workshops and
as a result of probably somethings that happened and you
know, while I was travelingaround and getting sick and and
eating dirty food in SouthAmerica and swimming in the
(10:08):
Amazon and stuff like that and Iwas like I'm not going to do
that I got very sick In my mid20s.
I couldn't hike more than aquarter mile without serious
knee pain.
I had extreme jaw pain.
I would sleep, you know, duringthe night.
I would grind my teeth and makethese crazy sucking I really
just terrible noises and wake upwith these crazy headaches.
(10:30):
I started to be afraid to eatsandwiches because I would have
to open my mouth so big and thenI would wake up.
You know, no matter how muchyou know work I did, I would
always feel anxious that Iwasn't doing enough.
And no matter how many TonyRobbins books I was reading, I
couldn't like fix my attitude.
And one of these workshops thatI was helping facilitate it just
(10:53):
happened to be filled withhealth and wellness experts and
I sat down next to one woman andshe's like hey, my name is Dr
Grace and I help people overcomechronic autoimmune diseases,
and I, at this point, haddiscovered that I had got health
problems which also led to athyroid autoimmune condition,
known as Hashimoto's disease,which has become an incredible
(11:17):
tutor and guide in my life,which led me to this particular
person and I said oh, your, yourclients must want this.
They try and do this, but thathappens describing what my life
had been like for the last of awhile, and she's like oh my God,
you need to come work with me.
You see, she was incrediblysmart and talented at what she
did and that was actuallybecoming a problem and a
(11:39):
roadblock rather than asupporter, because she couldn't
properly express the value inwhat she did.
And so we started workingtogether.
She would take me through herHashimoto's protocol and I
started going through our,helping her create signature
talks, ghost write books andreally frame up her products and
services with good storytellingand messaging in a way that
(12:01):
really landed in the hearts ofher clients and overcame those
big objections.
And through working withsomebody like this, I discovered
, you know, and and within a fewmonths, like a lot of the
problems that had plagued mehave faded away, had melted away
the anxiety and the pain and Ihad a new lease on life, and now
(12:22):
, at 34 years old, I feelstronger than I did at 24.
And I feel I have the blessingof knowing what it's like to not
have a full grip on my healthat a relatively young age, so I
can start building thefoundations of good health later
on, instead of having one ofthose all of a sudden things
(12:44):
when you're in your late fiftiesor whatever happens.
No thanks, I know who knows, whoknows what will happen.
I'll do what I can right now,but I have a value of it, yeah,
yeah.
And so, through actuallystarting to learn more about
personal health, I went througha lot of transformations and
(13:07):
this ultimately, throughlearning about health, led me to
learn more about mindset andwell being, which eventually led
me to a very different kind ofstory work where we which is the
thread that connects us ofbeing able to tell good stories
and see how you know the storiesyou tell on the inside
(13:29):
influence you, and this was avery good thing for me and was I
could recognize the importancein it for my own personal health
.
But I started to see a lot ofreally interesting parallels
between creating a goodexperience and inviting a
decision from the stage toworking with somebody who's
(13:52):
struggling with their identityfor whatever reason.
And now I straddle those worldsof the stories that you're
telling yourself and using thisas a tool to take what's once
(14:12):
made you feel ashamed or limitedand actually use it as rocket
fuel to inspire you.
And then, once we are inspired,using that to create a
presentation that will createthat same level of enrollment in
your ideal clients.
Speaker 1 (14:30):
That's beautiful.
Wow, what a beautiful journeythat you shared.
I love that so much.
I love hearing about people'sback stories, how they came to
be doing what they're doing now,and it's just so interesting to
me.
I always love this show calledVH1 Behind the Music because I
always wanted to know, like whatyou know, how this person got
(14:52):
to be doing what they're doing.
You know, it's just sointeresting to me.
That is really cool, and Iwould think that you know it's a
very valuable thing to helppeople with identities because,
like we tend to, so many peoplesay and I used to be one of
these people I'm not astoryteller.
Everybody's a storyteller.
(15:12):
We tell ourselves stories allthe time, right, and it's a
matter of what stories you'rebelieving about yourself versus
what stories are really true,like, where is the truth within
all of those stories and whatnew stories can you create from
that?
And so there's a lot of valueto that, both in the business
and in personal life.
(15:33):
It can really transform aperson's entire perspective.
So, yeah, that's really amazingthat you're helping people with
that, kyle.
Speaker 2 (15:44):
And thank you for that.
I appreciate that honesty andreally one of the things you
said is one of the most common,you know, objections that I hear
right away is oh, I'm not astoryteller, I don't have any
good stories to tell, andusually what people mean when
they say that is they're likewell, I've never climbed Mount
Kilimanjaro with no pants on,you know, or whatever you know
(16:07):
random adventure that they feelis worthy of a story.
But it's being able to reflectthe emotions and the experience
that your audience is feeling.
It's much less about who youare and it's more about can you
listen to your audience andunderstand what they need and
(16:27):
share who you are in a way thatmeets them, instead of trying to
be somebody that's impressiveor to tell a story that hikes
you up.
It's a form of listening andit's a form of empathy that we
can use to say, hey, Iunderstand you, instead of hey,
listen, look at how cool I am.
(16:49):
And when we can change thatperspective, that's when people
start to go from oh, I'm not astoryteller too, oh, I have some
good stories.
And it doesn't have to be theseaction stories like stories
about changing a stereo in yourcar or a conversation you have
with a child, or you know justlike these tiny moments can be
(17:14):
springboards into these deep,powerful emotions that will
drive decisions that too oftenwe're afraid to go to because we
don't actually know how tonavigate stories.
Well, we, there's kind of anatural sense we have, but we
don't know what to say or how tosay or why we're saying it, and
(17:36):
so it ends up just kind ofending up like a traffic jam
where all these ideas try tocome out at the same time and we
end up tripping all overourselves.
Speaker 1 (17:45):
Oh yeah, oh yeah.
I can relate to that and I.
It is a form of connection,because you're connecting with
your audience.
You're also giving people anexperience that you're having on
an emotional level or pad tohelp them connect in with
themselves, and I find that alot of times I don't know why
I'm telling people a story orinclude you know a lot of the
(18:06):
stories I included in my book aswell People would come back to
me and say, wow, I got so muchout of that.
Thank you for sharing that.
I never know what people aregoing to get from it, but it's
always something that I neverexpected, but it's such a great
seed or nugget for them to growfrom that too, and you know a
(18:28):
way to relate and connect.
You know that way too, becausesometimes we feel like we're all
going through this on our own,but we're all doing we all have
very similar stories too, at thesame time.
So, but it's a uniqueexperience, right, and so that's
what makes it different.
But I love that you're helpingpeople with that.
(18:50):
That's such a that's a veryvaluable thing to be able to do
for people, because, you know,at this point too, I think it's
a powerful time to be able to beable to share and voice your
stories so that we're notholding it in ourselves, you
know, for the trauma, all of thememories, all of the
(19:14):
information.
We're actually being able torelease that and help people
with their own lives that way,through the lessons we've
learned too.
Speaker 2 (19:24):
You know, it's probably no coincidence that the
condition that I was affectedby is a thyroid condition in the
throat and, despite thefanciful journey that I had just
shared with you, that I hadabsolutely no idea what was
going on or where it all linesup.
(19:45):
Very nice now, but it was awild wrap and but yeah, all that
.
All that being said, thatthere's being able to connect
with a good story and connectwith that identity, it can be
(20:08):
something a lot more simple whenyou understand the frameworks
of why would I tell a certainstory?
Or to know this story frameworkhelps somebody establish trust
with you, or this is a storythat we would tell to overcome
an objection.
When you can start to applyframeworks and see the stories
(20:31):
you're telling through a system,then all of a sudden, there's
visibility in this world thatseemed totally opaque before.
All of a sudden, as you'renavigating around well, I don't
know what people saw in thisstory when you can understand
the strategies and theframeworks that really start to
(20:54):
add these up, you can getvisibility into this world,
recreate these things andengineer more of it into the
future, which is really whatI've been practicing and
internalizing a lot of which ishow I've become good at what I
do, to just be able to ask abunch of questions and drive out
(21:14):
of you like what we worked onand just trim it into the right
format.
Speaker 1 (21:21):
Yeah, can we talk about the story framework a
little bit?
Speaker 2 (21:25):
Sure.
Speaker 1 (21:26):
Yeah, can you tell me more?
Speaker 2 (21:30):
So there's a number of different frameworks and
really the core of my process isI love working at Google Docs
and I've broken down everysingle part of what it takes to
create a high convertingsignature talk into basically a
line by line template and format.
(21:52):
So each one of those lines islike a little Lego piece that we
add up to make a greatpresentation, and I have
practiced using these Legopieces and talks now for half of
a decade and with hundreds andhundreds and hundreds of people,
so I know them really well andcan conjure them up with just a
(22:14):
few questions, and so I help,when people don't know these
frameworks or don't know thepurpose and why to do these
things, that I act as theprompter and I start to look for
the information that I knowthese things need by asking you
about okay, what's your goal?
(22:35):
First thing we want to do is wewant to have a goal so we know
which framework to apply.
Do I want to create trust andintroduce myself to somebody?
Do I want to teach them andopen up their beliefs and
possibilities to a better worldand maybe get them excited to
work with me?
Do I want to close out my talkwith a powerful story that
(22:57):
leaves them with the rightemotional feeling but doesn't
feel like pushy and salesy andawkward.
So once we figure out that goal, okay, now we can work from
there.
We'll pick a story framework.
Let's say I want to build trust.
Okay, build trust with who?
Then?
Who's your ideal client?
I'm going to start asking abouttheir ideal client and what I
(23:20):
like to do when we reallynavigate the ideal client,
especially for the coaches outthere, when you're learning a
lot of these story works as alife coach and the research that
you've done, going into thedarkest places of your client's
minds is the greatest treasureyour room you could ever imagine
(23:41):
as a marketer and a salesperson, and so you want to go into
those rooms that you'veexperienced with your clients.
What does it feel like to betheir problems?
What are they scared of?
What are they afraid of willhappen if they don't solve their
problems?
Who do they think they are?
What are the expectations thatthey have on themselves?
(24:02):
What are they afraid of willhappen if they fail?
What does that feel like?
What does it feel like in yourbody when you think about that
and we try to get them?
It's almost like it's almostgrowing in reverse of what a
coach would normally do, ofgetting somebody into a bad, or
somebody comes in a bad statethat want to feel better.
I've tried to push you intothat emotional state.
(24:24):
That is like what our idealclient is feeling.
Because then I'm going to askyou when I can tell that you're
in it.
When are other times in yourlife that you felt just like
this?
And there will undoubtedly bestories that arise that most
people say I haven't thoughtabout telling this story ever,
or in a very long time, becausewe can't always.
(24:46):
You're one of themisconceptions that we have, and
when we just sit down in frontof a blank screen and I want to
write a speech now is if we feelneutral.
We don't have access to all ofour memories and all of our
brain.
All of the time we need tosmell, to go to certain places
(25:07):
we need to end up.
Feeling can unlock certainregions of the brain.
So if we can get into a feelingthat feels like our customers,
we can access stories that wewouldn't normally be able to
feel, and we can do it in goodand bad ways.
So we start digging those up andagain and these are usually
(25:27):
some resistance.
There's identity behind thesestories that we need to
integrate and there's work thatwe need to do before we even
start sharing it, because weneed you to feel aligned with it
, and so this is where a lot ofthe classic story work that I'm
sure you've gone into with theaudience, so I'll spare them the
detail on this for now we starttelling that, transforming
(25:51):
their inner identity story andgetting them proud and excited
so that they can show what andeven if they don't change any of
the words that they say, but byfeeling more aligned with who
they are and why they're doingthis, they could, they could
give the same talk and getbetter results.
But of course, we're going tochange the words they say
because now they're going tohave better storytelling
(26:12):
frameworks to do it.
So they, they enroll themselves, they show up stronger and they
share the story that we craftedthrough just asking questions
and being creative.
Speaker 1 (26:26):
Yeah, that's really important asking the right
questions.
That's a really important pointto make and I love.
I love that because it is aboutthe emotions, it's about the
emotional connection aspect ofthe story within yourself that
you're sharing and people canfeel that.
They can feel it when you'renot, when that's not there,
(26:47):
right, and so that's the energythere that you're, that you're
putting out there.
I had a question, as you weresaying that, kyle.
So with coaches, yes, it can bevery valuable to put yourself in
the shoes of the client.
In most of us as coaches Iwould assume, because I've
experienced this myself haveexperience with their clients,
(27:09):
are experiencing because theythat was kind of like their past
experience as a you know theirclient.
What their clients are goingthrough oftentimes were
something they had experiencedin the past and now.
That's why they're helpingclients with that, which makes a
lot of sense.
So we can have a lot of empathyand compassion for that.
What's the difference when youare like a more of a performer
(27:32):
or a speaker in front ofthousands of people and it's not
really a client, client, coachrelationship as much?
Is there a different approachto that or is that kind of a
similar thing?
How would you be able tonavigate that?
Speaker 2 (27:51):
Good question.
So this, once again, we have tobreak it down to what is your
goal.
So, before speaking in front ofa thousand people, there's
probably one or two reasons thatwe're we're doing it, or
there's one of two ways that wecould go, and I work with people
in one way and I know otherpeople that work with people in
other ways, so you can go theTed talk way.
(28:15):
In a Ted talk, we want to haveas many people as possible
feeling inspired by the messageand it's going to be broad and
it's going to be big.
Or the signature talk.
What I do is I want a very fewspecific people in that,
(28:37):
thousands of people to feel likeI'm reading out of their
journal, that I snuck into theirhouse last night and read their
journal and wrote this speechfor them, and I want to inspire
a tremendous amount of action ina very specific group of people
(28:57):
rather than inspire everybodyin there.
So these are the two goals, andwhat I would do and how I would
teach and the stories I wouldtell would vary based on that
goal.
Speaker 1 (29:14):
I like that.
Yeah, and it seems to me thatyou mentioned music in the very
beginning.
Musicians might go about it ina similar way to with big
audiences, like that they wouldbe connecting with people
through those, inspiring peoplein similar ways.
Speaker 2 (29:35):
I suppose, yeah, that's something I've been
thinking about lately a lot Likehow is it connection made?
A lot of times of course throughmusic, but when they're up on
stage, this brings to mind theslight back track, but I think
(29:56):
it's really important to mentionand you highlighted something
that we like to serve clientsthat were like us and we share
our story because it resonateswith people like us and this is
a great advantage in a lot ofways If we can tap into who we
are and reach out to people likeus.
(30:20):
There's value to be had here,but there's a great pitfall and
danger here that more peoplesuccumb to than the advantage,
and that is thinking that Ireally have to market to the
person I was four years ago.
So four years ago I struggledwith.
(30:43):
You know, I could have usedmaybe a speech coach or I had my
own identity problems, but Ididn't have a lot of money, I
wasn't ready to invest in thesethings and you know I wouldn't
have made the best client for meright now.
But I had problems.
You know the problems that I hadare the same problems that a
(31:09):
dentist or a high performinglawyer or the CEO of a seven
figure startup would all have.
They articulate them a littledifferently, but they are the
same.
But many people do not.
They can't make this bridge,this gap of my problems are the
(31:33):
same as theirs, because they seethis difference between them so
they wouldn't ever reach out ortry to reach these people and
instead they just try to marketto people who were like them.
And so I just see too manyparticularly coaches trying to
market to mostly themselves andnot really being able to enroll
(31:56):
any clients or feel thatdifferent or especially enroll
clients that pay them what theyreally want or deserve to be
paid and get the results thatthey're looking for.
Speaker 1 (32:09):
Yeah, that's a great point.
So what I hear you saying isthat it's not exact it's.
It's better to look at thebroader spectrum of people.
Even though it's not exactlywhat you experienced or the
exact person Like it's it's,it's across a broader spectrum
of people who could beexperiencing similar things, but
in different forms.
Is that what you're saying?
Speaker 2 (32:31):
In a way yeah.
So we all have the same problemslike imposter syndrome.
Everybody knows what that feelslike.
Right, we've all heard that onebefore.
Okay, good news, bad news Eightfigure CEO, they have imposter
syndrome.
You know, day one tick tockinfluencer, you've got imposter
(32:52):
syndrome.
It's going to keep coming, nomatter where you know and and
but how the eight figure CEO isgoing to articulate what that
problem is and how it feels like.
It's going to be very differentthan how day one tick tock does
.
It's the same problem.
And somebody like you if you,if you work with imposter
syndrome, your solution couldapply to both of them and a lot
(33:16):
of people these are the also thekind of people that market to
themselves are like I could sellmy coaching and help anybody,
and so you try and find anybody,and it's usually the day one
tick tock influencer, but youdon't even give yourself a
chance to even think about.
Well, I could never help a youknow an executive with the same
(33:36):
thing Because I'm not, or youknow they wouldn't even try, so
they wouldn't even go down thewrong.
Exactly Right, Weird Right.
That's funny.
So we feel comfortable justmarketing to ourselves.
But and there is a utility inthat, but there is also a
(33:59):
pitfall and a danger.
Speaker 1 (34:02):
I love that, kyle.
That's such a great, that issuch a great perspective and
really opens my mind up tosomething greater, to appreciate
that.
Wow, yeah, and it is.
It is like us limitingourselves in a lot of ways,
right, because there's so manypeople that you could be helping
and it's funny because go ahead.
(34:23):
I didn't mean to cut you off.
Speaker 2 (34:25):
Oh, no, worries, here's.
Here's like another exercisethat somebody could do.
This is something that's reallyfun to share.
Go, take the time All of youlistening in you do this to put
aside at 60 minutes in yourcalendar and ask yourself the
question what would I do ifsomebody paid me $100,000 to
(34:49):
help them with that problem?
What would be possible?
We could fly out and visit them.
We could contract Creed to comeplay a concert in their front
yard, and that would be awesome.
Probably can't get much more ofa fan than Creed, but we could
get them.
You know, like really, or likewhat kind of great people could
(35:13):
you fly in?
Could you take them on a bet,like if you had a hundred
thousand dollar budget to makean impact in somebody's life,
what could you do and actuallystart to like write out what
that plan would be, becausehere's the thing, like I said,
the eight figure CEO.
You know, imposter syndrome isone problem and it just any
(35:35):
problem that you solve can beapplied, and the more
transformational and who, thebetter, because the more
abstract and it's just a matterof matching the language with
the client.
So you could have somebody come, come and go in your life.
You, you may have had it.
I may have had it like I couldhave been on a phone call with
(35:58):
somebody that was ready for aone hundred thousand dollar
program and if I didn't have mymy, my sheet out, I hadn't
thought about and I wasn'tprepared to make a one hundred
thousand dollar offer.
Then I wouldn't even.
I wouldn't even feel guilty ofhow dumb I was for missing the
(36:18):
opportunity afterwards, becauseit would never have registered,
it would have come and gone, andI will Well, that wouldn't even
hit the radar.
And there's so many people thatare making that mistake.
You know, not on a hundredthousand dollar level, but
they're, they're cappingthemselves.
(36:38):
You know, in so many ways, when, when, even it just doing the
exercise of like what that wouldbe like.
But now I'm ready, I haven'tmade a hundred thousand dollar
offer yet.
I'm getting pretty, I'm gettingclose.
Like it's not, it's not astretch, but it's, it's ready.
And so it's not a stretch,right.
And I would never notice if, ifthe person came by and I wasn't
(37:02):
ready.
Speaker 1 (37:03):
Yeah, that's, that's a really good point.
Yeah, so preparing yourself forthe best case scenario, I think
is the, is the way to go, right.
It's it's like we limitourselves by by not acting as if
it's already happened, right.
Speaker 2 (37:21):
Yeah, and a lot of people you know.
I'm so grateful again for thoseworkshops that I worked at and
saw hundreds of people pay tenthousand dollars for something
and some people left and theyfelt good and some people left
and they didn't feel good and Ilistened to them and why they
(37:43):
did and why they didn't.
But I saw this many people dothis and I know, like there's
peers that you and I have, thatwe're friends with, that won't
even dare venture into, likewhat a ten thousand dollar
program because they think thatthey need to do this or be this
or, god forbid, go back tocollege or you know, get
(38:04):
whatever certification, getanother thing.
Speaker 1 (38:07):
Not enough.
Someday I'll be worthy of this.
Speaker 2 (38:09):
Yeah yeah, it's rampant, it's all over the place
.
They won't even dare letthemselves enter this realm.
I, this, this didn't happenwith like a coach, but I I asked
this question to like just afriend, a muggle of sorts of
like what would you do ifsomebody offered you a hundred
thousand dollars to help you?
And she said I would check tomake sure that they were
(38:31):
mentally stable?
Wow you know, like, like, thinkabout that.
I was that say about you, youknow, or what you think about
yourself, you know.
And again, this was somebodywho really didn't have any sales
or coaching experience.
But it was a very interestinganswer and too many of us are
(38:53):
trending in that direction, eventhough it may not be as extreme
as that one, and it's just astory you're telling yourself.
Speaker 1 (39:01):
Yeah, because there's plenty of people that would pay
that for the right, you know,for the right person.
And I was, I was sure, a storylike years ago when I started
personal training, I wasapproached by Bruce Springsteen
and he asked for my card.
Speaker 2 (39:18):
And I was, I was like , wow, this is it.
Speaker 1 (39:21):
You know, it was one of those situations where I was
like I'll do it, yeah, I'lldefinitely do this, but I was
not in a position to believethat that I could do that, you
know, at that time.
And so it didn't pan out, butit was like, oh, ok, so once, in
a way, that kind of thing isyou are attracting those
opportunities and you're you'renot ready for it on an emotional
(39:45):
, mental, spiritual level, right.
Speaker 2 (39:48):
Upper limit problems.
Yeah yeah, you'll, you'll,you'll sabotage yourself or you
know, and this, like I say thisright now and I'm like dropping
these notes, look out for thosepeople.
I do this all the time too.
I did this last week.
I pretty much I astoundedmyself at how foolish I can be
with my predeterminations andjudgment.
(40:11):
So I was at invested a lot ofmoney to go to this event in
Texas and it was an eventsomewhat between like a festival
or a party that you and I mightfind each other at and a very
high end business mastermind.
And I can remember there wasone like really particularly
(40:31):
beautiful woman there that I sawher right away and I was like
this person does not want to,you know, talk to me.
And I had just like writtenthem off just just because of
that and you know they hadmentioned somewhere along the
line.
I had like found them inpassing again and like said, hey
, you said a cool thing earliertoday.
(40:52):
I appreciate it that she waslike cool, like you know.
See you on the dance floor.
A little bit later, made alittle invitation, but again,
like you know, I wasn't thinkingthat much of it and a little
bit later I went and starteddancing with her and showed her
some of the crazy dance movesthat I've learned living on a
Hawaiian island for a long time,and she totally lit up and was
(41:15):
having the most amazing time andit like ended up becoming like
this, very playful and likelight, you know, friend, and
ended up thanking me afterwardsLike I've had a really hard time
trusting men for a long time.
And you were one of the firstpeople and I was like, oh my God
, I can't believe I created thisexperience and this was
somebody that I immediatelywrote off, you know.
(41:37):
And what else am I doing thatin my like?
What else am I doing that to inmy life?
Is is what leaves me thinkingabout.
You know, how is that happeningin my business?
How is that happening in myhealth?
How is that happening in myfriendships?
(41:58):
How is that happening in mycreativity?
What is the universe sodesperate to give me that I'm
saying no, not for me.
Speaker 1 (42:09):
Yeah, that is very profound.
Yes, I love that so much.
Thank you, kyle.
That's amazing, wow, and it'sgot me really thinking about
that in my own life too.
It's like time to level up, youknow, and as we level up more
and more, we start to build theskills, the self worth, that,
(42:29):
the stuff from within to feellike we are comfortable in those
higher levels.
Right, but it takes that firstlove, first awareness of that,
like what's happening, what arewe doing?
How are we practically, youknow, integrating this in our
lives on a daily basis, with thepeople we talk to, of how we
(42:49):
think about ourselves?
It's a great, those are greatquestions to ask for everything
you do, yeah.
Speaker 2 (42:57):
And it's just.
You know, these are the kind ofquestions that I really feel
like it kind of reminds me of, Iknow, such a white guy thing,
but quote the matrix orsomething.
But early on, when, when Neo islike trying to do kung fu
against Amorphias, he's justlearning the moves, and then
(43:20):
he's like exhausted, likeAmorphias asks him do you think
that's air you're breathing?
And he like holds his breath,and Neo has just been like
burdening himself, thinking, youknow, he just thought he needed
to breathe because he was usedto having to do that, but it
actually wasn't an issue.
(43:41):
And that's when he starts torealize like whoa, have I been
limiting myself, you know?
And things start to open up.
And this is the same thing, youknow, do you think that's air
that you're breathing as you'rewheezing and struggling, you
know, and do you need to do that?
Speaker 1 (43:59):
Yeah, exactly that movie is is also profound in
many ways Like it is.
There's so much greatness inthat movie to tell people about
what they are living in, whatkind of illusions they're living
in, what kind of storiesthey're telling themselves, what
kind of limitations they'reputting on themselves as well.
Great, great example there.
(44:21):
I really love that.
Well, let's see, I want to justswitch gears a little bit while
we're coming up on the hour andlove for you to talk more about
like as well, if you want toput in a word about your book or
what you're doing currently,what you're helping people with
(44:43):
mostly most recently, and offersthat you're also offering
people.
Speaker 2 (44:50):
Thank you so much.
Yeah, I would love to share.
So right now, I've been veryfocused on working with a very
small group of very high impact,high intelligence entrepreneurs
and just have a very smallgroup of people that I want to
go very deep with and I want tounderstand everything that's
(45:12):
going on in your business and beable to take you through the
process that I was just sayingto help you come up with
powerful stories faster than youcould on your own, better than
you could on your own and,believe it or not, we're even
going to have fun while doing itand being able to implement
those quickly by speaking infront of different audiences,
(45:36):
speaking on podcasts, speakingon these things and being able
to make an offer.
So those are the people thatI'm looking for and helping you
express that.
So, if that's, you come find me.
And for everybody else, I have atremendous amount of free
resources in storytelling oralmost free resources, if you
count the book that are going tohelp you articulate who you are
(46:01):
, why you're doing what you'redoing, whether you're doing it
on the stage, whether you'redoing it on a blog, whether
you're doing it on the podcast,I have content that's going to
be a good fit for you.
You can find that all atthestoryengineco.
That's where you can learn moreabout my books.
You can check out my podcast.
I have a blog there just about250 podcast episodes where we're
(46:24):
almost coming up on the 250thand a bunch of long form
articles and infographics allthat good stuff on storytelling.
So come check me out there andfind me.
I do a lot of reels and contenton Instagram have a lot of fun
and it's kind of goofy funcontent more than just.
(46:44):
It's a mix of practical and funstuff but all in storytelling.
You can find me at HeyKyleGrayon Instagram.
Speaker 1 (46:52):
Wonderful.
Yeah, I like what you're doingon Instagram lately with the.
I've seen I can't remember hername, but she does a similar
thing with a split screen andthen the singing with other
people.
I love that so much.
That is really cool that you'redoing that and playing around
with that and showing people howthey can have fun and through
(47:13):
expression.
Really that's what it's allabout, right.
Speaker 2 (47:18):
Integrating my own imposter syndrome by having fun
and being goofy and putting thatstuff out there, and I share
all of these things with you inthe field of transparency, that
I've struggled with themprofoundly this whole journey.
So I'm right there with you, myfriends.
Speaker 1 (47:41):
Me too.
Me too, I'm there with you too.
Thank you, kyle, so much forcoming on.
This has been an incredibleshow and I appreciate you so
much.
I really appreciate and loveour connection, so thank you for
coming on and sharing yourgifts.
Speaker 2 (47:56):
Likewise, allison.
Thank you so much for having meand thank you everybody for who
listened through this wholething Appreciate you and I'd
love to be in touch.
Speaker 1 (48:05):
Thank you, kyle.
Let's get this over to you yourlife is your greatest work of
(48:26):
art, and it all relates back tothe synchronus peaks.
The synchronus peaks, I supposeso.
Your life is your greatest work of art, and it all
relates back to the sacrednessof the sacredness.
Welcome everybody to IntegrateYourself.
I'm your host, alison Pillow,and you can find me at
alisonpillowcom.
And finally, book finallythriving bookcom.
Today I'm here with a veryspecial guest and a good friend
(00:39):
of mine, kyle Gray.
He is a world-classpresentation coach, story
strategist and author who helpscoaches, startups and executives
use storytelling to bettercommunicate their unique value
and improve sales with theiraudience.
He combines timelessstorytelling with cutting-edge
marketing to ensure you've gotthe right story to tell while
(01:02):
presenting on a sales call or ina conversation both online and
offline.
Thank you so much, kyle, forcoming on the show.
I do want to mention that youhave a book called the Story
Engine that people can also findon Amazon and probably on your
website too, and a podcast aswell.
Thanks, kyle, for coming on theshow.
I'm so excited you're here.
Speaker 2 (01:24):
I'm delighted to be here.
Thank you so much for having me.
I'm grateful for this.
I'm grateful.
You know we've been friends inperson, We've met before, and
it's always magical to be ableto create something online with
somebody that you know from reallife.
So I'm honored that you wouldhelp me on the show today and
I'm excited to explore with you.
Speaker 1 (01:44):
Me too.
Me too.
Well, kyle, I just gave you anice formal introduction, but
there's so much more to yourstory on a personal level and
what you've experienced, too,through your work, and I'd love
for you to share more about thatwith my audience.
Speaker 2 (02:01):
Absolutely Well.
My work and my art, you know,boils down or distills down to
the struggle of adequateexpression, and that was first
manifested when I was younger,as a musician, as a singer,
(02:24):
songwriter and as a kid thatprobably, you know, if I had one
of my like childhood traumas isjust maybe not knowing how to
show or ask for the right amountof affection and not being able
to ask for that.
And so being able to play musicwas kind of a way to be in
(02:46):
those emotional spaces that wassafe, and for a long time I
thought that the only way I wasgoing to be a successful human
was by being a successful singer, songwriter.
I had to do this and I wantedto write lyrics that would
inspire people and influencepeople and change their
(03:06):
perspectives, and I wanted towrite chord progressions that
were as good as the classic popchord progressions but somehow
different, as if I was going tobe the one that figured out the
new pattern.
And for when I was younger, Iput a lot of pressure on myself
to start writing these greatsongs and supporting myself.
(03:27):
I applied for performing artsschools and did all these things
, but I ended up putting so muchpressure on myself for it that
I kind of burnt myself out onthe art and along with this,
during our in between this andalong this kind of up and down
of the art, I've also spent alot of time living in other
(03:50):
countries, particularly in SouthAmerica and Southeast Asia, and
through living in South AmericaI've learned to speak both
Spanish and Portuguese, which isalso a struggle to adequately
express myself, of routinelyputting myself in foreign places
where I'm not that good atspeaking the language and just
(04:12):
immersing myself in a world thatI don't know and I don't
understand.
And I was very good at that, butdidn't think that learning how
to speak Spanish or learning howto that you could drop me in
the middle of a random countryand I would probably be able to,
like, figure myself out and and, like you know, be okay.
(04:34):
I thought those are just, youknow, decent and interesting
skills, but not very businessyskills.
And during this time I startedto hear about people who could
travel the world, live anywherethey wanted and work from a
laptop and be able to grow abusiness, and I was like that
sounds amazing, but I'm not abusiness person.
(04:54):
I speak Spanish, yeah, but butyou know, I thought when I
thought of business.
I thought of like people inblue starch shirts that have
MBAs and are in tall glassbuildings, you know doing stuff.
And so it took a couple of years, you know, to even kind of open
(05:16):
me up to the idea of trying,and my first, my first real gig
in this world was blogging andcontent marketing and telling
the story of a startup and howit was growing, and this also
tickled my my desire to travel.
It was a remote job that I wasactually able to live in
(05:39):
Thailand because my boss livedin Australia and that's a
similar time zone, so I was ableto travel around the world and
I was working, working for thestartup.
It was hard work and I wasthrown deep end.
I was a good writer, but likewriting writing papers and ideas
for college professors is avery different thing than
(06:01):
writing really good content forsearch engines and Twitter
ability and being having likereally competitive content, and
so it was very challenging, butI started to feel kind of like
there was something about thatthat was the same as like
writing songs and like puttingmy ideas out there that I really
enjoyed and started to enjoy itmore and more and began to make
(06:24):
a name for myself as a writer,and I used my writing skills to
insert myself into otherbusinesses and support them, and
usually it were businesses thathad something that I wanted to
learn from them.
I started working andconsulting for a company called
self publishing school after thestartup, and through
(06:44):
understanding their systems andhelping them build a content
marketing strategy, I learnedenough to write and publish my
own books and started publishing, self publishing my own books,
which one of which you alreadymentioned which became the
foundation for an incrediblebusiness and brands that has
since supported me and enabled,enabled me to fulfill a lot of
(07:08):
those early stage dreams.
But the real are one big turningpoint, and and finding turning
point was a little bit after theself publishing and learning
how to write books that I sawanother person give a
presentation about how to usespeaking from the stage as a way
to grow your business quicklyand powerfully, and it reminded
(07:32):
me of what it was like to be onthe stage as a, as a musician,
and I was like, oh my gosh, Iwant to do this.
And so I went up to them.
I, you know, offered my skillsas a writer and offered to start
writing for them and helpingthem out to learn how to become
a better speaker, and I wouldconsume everything I could and
write for them.
And this company was in a veryearly stage but it was growing
(07:56):
quite rapidly and they startedhosting these workshops where
they would charge $10,000 forsomebody to come for two days to
either set up their positioningto be a great speaker or to
write a great presentation.
And one of the first personthey called to help facilitate
these workshops was me, becauseI was doing all the writing and
writing that, all of theirprocesses and systems and all
(08:18):
these things.
So I was also running my ownbusiness doing copywriting,
helping other people writespeeches, but, and I was
inserting myself into severalother businesses, several other
people, the likes of which wedon't have to talk about.
But it was a lot like this storyof of.
First I learned a tremendousamount and how to fulfill and
(08:42):
serve people you know and makesure that they have a good
$10,000 experience.
Probably one of the mostimportant things is I got to see
hundreds of people that paid$10,000 for something which is a
trip to the mental gym thatmost people will never make,
they won't even dare to make,and I have the blessing of just
seeing some people.
(09:02):
You see them and you're like,of course you'd pay $10,000, you
know, for something.
And some people you knowthey're like, wow, you really
like, you know you mortgage thefarm to make this happen because
you believe and you knowwhatever like.
However, what value theyderived I'm not sure from each
(09:22):
one, but it was just amazing tosee who you could enroll in
something like this and itstretched my mind and in the
ways that I'm very grateful forand after so, finally, after our
one final thread I know I'mgoing for a really long time.
Speaker 1 (09:43):
I'm so.
I'm loving this story, yeah.
Speaker 2 (09:46):
So there's the final kind of thread that brings this
all together, that we use thisinto.
Who I am now is as I'mfacilitating these workshops and
as a result of probably somethings that happened and you
know, while I was travelingaround and getting sick and and
eating dirty food in SouthAmerica and swimming in the
(10:08):
Amazon and stuff like that and Iwas like I'm not going to do
that I got very sick In my mid20s.
I couldn't hike more than aquarter mile without serious
knee pain.
I had extreme jaw pain.
I would sleep, you know, duringthe night.
I would grind my teeth and makethese crazy sucking I really
just terrible noises and wake upwith these crazy headaches.
(10:30):
I started to be afraid to eatsandwiches because I would have
to open my mouth so big and thenI would wake up.
You know, no matter how muchyou know work I did, I would
always feel anxious that Iwasn't doing enough.
And no matter how many TonyRobbins books I was reading, I
couldn't like fix my attitude.
And one of these workshops thatI was helping facilitate it just
(10:53):
happened to be filled withhealth and wellness experts and
I sat down next to one woman andshe's like hey, my name is Dr
Grace and I help people overcomechronic autoimmune diseases,
and I, at this point, haddiscovered that I had got health
problems which also led to athyroid autoimmune condition,
known as Hashimoto's disease,which has become an incredible
(11:17):
tutor and guide in my life,which led me to this particular
person and I said oh, your, yourclients must want this.
They try and do this, but thathappens describing what my life
had been like for the last of awhile, and she's like oh my God,
you need to come work with me.
You see, she was incrediblysmart and talented at what she
did and that was actuallybecoming a problem and a
(11:39):
roadblock rather than asupporter, because she couldn't
properly express the value inwhat she did.
And so we started workingtogether.
She would take me through herHashimoto's protocol and I
started going through our,helping her create signature
talks, ghost write books andreally frame up her products and
services with good storytellingand messaging in a way that
(12:01):
really landed in the hearts ofher clients and overcame those
big objections.
And through working withsomebody like this, I discovered
, you know, and and within a fewmonths, like a lot of the
problems that had plagued mehave faded away, had melted away
the anxiety and the pain and Ihad a new lease on life, and now
(12:22):
, at 34 years old, I feelstronger than I did at 24.
And I feel I have the blessingof knowing what it's like to not
have a full grip on my healthat a relatively young age, so I
can start building thefoundations of good health later
on, instead of having one ofthose all of a sudden things
(12:44):
when you're in your late fiftiesor whatever happens.
No thanks, I know who knows, whoknows what will happen.
I'll do what I can right now,but I have a value of it, yeah,
yeah.
And so, through actuallystarting to learn more about
personal health, I went througha lot of transformations and
(13:07):
this ultimately, throughlearning about health, led me to
learn more about mindset andwell being, which eventually led
me to a very different kind ofstory work where we which is the
thread that connects us ofbeing able to tell good stories
and see how you know the storiesyou tell on the inside
(13:29):
influence you, and this was avery good thing for me and was I
could recognize the importancein it for my own personal health
.
But I started to see a lot ofreally interesting parallels
between creating a goodexperience and inviting a
decision from the stage toworking with somebody who's
(13:52):
struggling with their identityfor whatever reason.
And now I straddle those worldsof the stories that you're
telling yourself and using thisas a tool to take what's once
(14:12):
made you feel ashamed or limitedand actually use it as rocket
fuel to inspire you.
And then, once we are inspired,using that to create a
presentation that will createthat same level of enrollment in
your ideal clients.
Speaker 1 (14:30):
That's beautiful.
Wow, what a beautiful journeythat you shared.
I love that so much.
I love hearing about people'sback stories, how they came to
be doing what they're doing now,and it's just so interesting to
me.
I always love this show calledVH1 Behind the Music because I
always wanted to know, like whatyou know, how this person got
(14:52):
to be doing what they're doing.
You know, it's just sointeresting to me.
That is really cool, and Iwould think that you know it's a
very valuable thing to helppeople with identities because,
like we tend to, so many peoplesay and I used to be one of
these people I'm not astoryteller.
Everybody's a storyteller.
(15:12):
We tell ourselves stories allthe time, right, and it's a
matter of what stories you'rebelieving about yourself versus
what stories are really true,like, where is the truth within
all of those stories and whatnew stories can you create from
that?
And so there's a lot of valueto that, both in the business
and in personal life.
(15:33):
It can really transform aperson's entire perspective.
So, yeah, that's really amazingthat you're helping people with
that, kyle.
Speaker 2 (15:44):
And thank you for that.
I appreciate that honesty andreally one of the things you
said is one of the most common,you know, objections that I hear
right away is oh, I'm not astoryteller, I don't have any
good stories to tell, andusually what people mean when
they say that is they're likewell, I've never climbed Mount
Kilimanjaro with no pants on,you know, or whatever you know
(16:07):
random adventure that they feelis worthy of a story.
But it's being able to reflectthe emotions and the experience
that your audience is feeling.
It's much less about who youare and it's more about can you
listen to your audience andunderstand what they need and
(16:27):
share who you are in a way thatmeets them, instead of trying to
be somebody that's impressiveor to tell a story that hikes
you up.
It's a form of listening andit's a form of empathy that we
can use to say, hey, Iunderstand you, instead of hey,
listen, look at how cool I am.
(16:49):
And when we can change thatperspective, that's when people
start to go from oh, I'm not astoryteller too, oh, I have some
good stories.
And it doesn't have to be theseaction stories like stories
about changing a stereo in yourcar or a conversation you have
with a child, or you know justlike these tiny moments can be
(17:14):
springboards into these deep,powerful emotions that will
drive decisions that too oftenwe're afraid to go to because we
don't actually know how tonavigate stories.
Well, we, there's kind of anatural sense we have, but we
don't know what to say or how tosay or why we're saying it, and
(17:36):
so it ends up just kind ofending up like a traffic jam
where all these ideas try tocome out at the same time and we
end up tripping all overourselves.
Speaker 1 (17:45):
Oh yeah, oh yeah.
I can relate to that and I.
It is a form of connection,because you're connecting with
your audience.
You're also giving people anexperience that you're having on
an emotional level or pad tohelp them connect in with
themselves, and I find that alot of times I don't know why
I'm telling people a story orinclude you know a lot of the
(18:06):
stories I included in my book aswell People would come back to
me and say, wow, I got so muchout of that.
Thank you for sharing that.
I never know what people aregoing to get from it, but it's
always something that I neverexpected, but it's such a great
seed or nugget for them to growfrom that too, and you know a
(18:28):
way to relate and connect.
You know that way too, becausesometimes we feel like we're all
going through this on our own,but we're all doing we all have
very similar stories too, at thesame time.
So, but it's a uniqueexperience, right, and so that's
what makes it different.
But I love that you're helpingpeople with that.
(18:50):
That's such a that's a veryvaluable thing to be able to do
for people, because, you know,at this point too, I think it's
a powerful time to be able to beable to share and voice your
stories so that we're notholding it in ourselves, you
know, for the trauma, all of thememories, all of the
(19:14):
information.
We're actually being able torelease that and help people
with their own lives that way,through the lessons we've
learned too.
Speaker 2 (19:24):
You know, it's probably no coincidence that the
condition that I was affectedby is a thyroid condition in the
throat and, despite thefanciful journey that I had just
shared with you, that I hadabsolutely no idea what was
going on or where it all linesup.
(19:45):
Very nice now, but it was awild wrap and but yeah, all that
.
All that being said, thatthere's being able to connect
with a good story and connectwith that identity, it can be
(20:08):
something a lot more simple whenyou understand the frameworks
of why would I tell a certainstory?
Or to know this story frameworkhelps somebody establish trust
with you, or this is a storythat we would tell to overcome
an objection.
When you can start to applyframeworks and see the stories
(20:31):
you're telling through a system,then all of a sudden, there's
visibility in this world thatseemed totally opaque before.
All of a sudden, as you'renavigating around well, I don't
know what people saw in thisstory when you can understand
the strategies and theframeworks that really start to
(20:54):
add these up, you can getvisibility into this world,
recreate these things andengineer more of it into the
future, which is really whatI've been practicing and
internalizing a lot of which ishow I've become good at what I
do, to just be able to ask abunch of questions and drive out
(21:14):
of you like what we worked onand just trim it into the right
format.
Speaker 1 (21:21):
Yeah, can we talk about the story framework a
little bit?
Speaker 2 (21:25):
Sure.
Speaker 1 (21:26):
Yeah, can you tell me more?
Speaker 2 (21:30):
So there's a number of different frameworks and
really the core of my process isI love working at Google Docs
and I've broken down everysingle part of what it takes to
create a high convertingsignature talk into basically a
line by line template and format.
(21:52):
So each one of those lines islike a little Lego piece that we
add up to make a greatpresentation, and I have
practiced using these Legopieces and talks now for half of
a decade and with hundreds andhundreds and hundreds of people,
so I know them really well andcan conjure them up with just a
(22:14):
few questions, and so I help,when people don't know these
frameworks or don't know thepurpose and why to do these
things, that I act as theprompter and I start to look for
the information that I knowthese things need by asking you
about okay, what's your goal?
(22:35):
First thing we want to do is wewant to have a goal so we know
which framework to apply.
Do I want to create trust andintroduce myself to somebody?
Do I want to teach them andopen up their beliefs and
possibilities to a better worldand maybe get them excited to
work with me?
Do I want to close out my talkwith a powerful story that
(22:57):
leaves them with the rightemotional feeling but doesn't
feel like pushy and salesy andawkward.
So once we figure out that goal, okay, now we can work from
there.
We'll pick a story framework.
Let's say I want to build trust.
Okay, build trust with who?
Then?
Who's your ideal client?
I'm going to start asking abouttheir ideal client and what I
(23:20):
like to do when we reallynavigate the ideal client,
especially for the coaches outthere, when you're learning a
lot of these story works as alife coach and the research that
you've done, going into thedarkest places of your client's
minds is the greatest treasureyour room you could ever imagine
(23:41):
as a marketer and a salesperson, and so you want to go into
those rooms that you'veexperienced with your clients.
What does it feel like to betheir problems?
What are they scared of?
What are they afraid of willhappen if they don't solve their
problems?
Who do they think they are?
What are the expectations thatthey have on themselves?
(24:02):
What are they afraid of willhappen if they fail?
What does that feel like?
What does it feel like in yourbody when you think about that
and we try to get them?
It's almost like it's almostgrowing in reverse of what a
coach would normally do, ofgetting somebody into a bad, or
somebody comes in a bad statethat want to feel better.
I've tried to push you intothat emotional state.
(24:24):
That is like what our idealclient is feeling.
Because then I'm going to askyou when I can tell that you're
in it.
When are other times in yourlife that you felt just like
this?
And there will undoubtedly bestories that arise that most
people say I haven't thoughtabout telling this story ever,
or in a very long time, becausewe can't always.
(24:46):
You're one of themisconceptions that we have, and
when we just sit down in frontof a blank screen and I want to
write a speech now is if we feelneutral.
We don't have access to all ofour memories and all of our
brain.
All of the time we need tosmell, to go to certain places
(25:07):
we need to end up.
Feeling can unlock certainregions of the brain.
So if we can get into a feelingthat feels like our customers,
we can access stories that wewouldn't normally be able to
feel, and we can do it in goodand bad ways.
So we start digging those up andagain and these are usually
(25:27):
some resistance.
There's identity behind thesestories that we need to
integrate and there's work thatwe need to do before we even
start sharing it, because weneed you to feel aligned with it
, and so this is where a lot ofthe classic story work that I'm
sure you've gone into with theaudience, so I'll spare them the
detail on this for now we starttelling that, transforming
(25:51):
their inner identity story andgetting them proud and excited
so that they can show what andeven if they don't change any of
the words that they say, but byfeeling more aligned with who
they are and why they're doingthis, they could, they could
give the same talk and getbetter results.
But of course, we're going tochange the words they say
because now they're going tohave better storytelling
(26:12):
frameworks to do it.
So they, they enroll themselves, they show up stronger and they
share the story that we craftedthrough just asking questions
and being creative.
Speaker 1 (26:26):
Yeah, that's really important asking the right
questions.
That's a really important pointto make and I love.
I love that because it is aboutthe emotions, it's about the
emotional connection aspect ofthe story within yourself that
you're sharing and people canfeel that.
They can feel it when you'renot, when that's not there,
(26:47):
right, and so that's the energythere that you're, that you're
putting out there.
I had a question, as you weresaying that, kyle.
So with coaches, yes, it can bevery valuable to put yourself in
the shoes of the client.
In most of us as coaches Iwould assume, because I've
experienced this myself haveexperience with their clients,
(27:09):
are experiencing because theythat was kind of like their past
experience as a you know theirclient.
What their clients are goingthrough oftentimes were
something they had experiencedin the past and now.
That's why they're helpingclients with that, which makes a
lot of sense.
So we can have a lot of empathyand compassion for that.
What's the difference when youare like a more of a performer
(27:32):
or a speaker in front ofthousands of people and it's not
really a client, client, coachrelationship as much?
Is there a different approachto that or is that kind of a
similar thing?
How would you be able tonavigate that?
Speaker 2 (27:51):
Good question.
So this, once again, we have tobreak it down to what is your
goal.
So, before speaking in front ofa thousand people, there's
probably one or two reasons thatwe're we're doing it, or
there's one of two ways that wecould go, and I work with people
in one way and I know otherpeople that work with people in
other ways, so you can go theTed talk way.
(28:15):
In a Ted talk, we want to haveas many people as possible
feeling inspired by the messageand it's going to be broad and
it's going to be big.
Or the signature talk.
What I do is I want a very fewspecific people in that,
(28:37):
thousands of people to feel likeI'm reading out of their
journal, that I snuck into theirhouse last night and read their
journal and wrote this speechfor them, and I want to inspire
a tremendous amount of action ina very specific group of people
(28:57):
rather than inspire everybodyin there.
So these are the two goals, andwhat I would do and how I would
teach and the stories I wouldtell would vary based on that
goal.
Speaker 1 (29:14):
I like that.
Yeah, and it seems to me thatyou mentioned music in the very
beginning.
Musicians might go about it ina similar way to with big
audiences, like that they wouldbe connecting with people
through those, inspiring peoplein similar ways.
Speaker 2 (29:35):
I suppose, yeah, that's something I've been
thinking about lately a lot Likehow is it connection made?
A lot of times of course throughmusic, but when they're up on
stage, this brings to mind theslight back track, but I think
(29:56):
it's really important to mentionand you highlighted something
that we like to serve clientsthat were like us and we share
our story because it resonateswith people like us and this is
a great advantage in a lot ofways If we can tap into who we
are and reach out to people likeus.
(30:20):
There's value to be had here,but there's a great pitfall and
danger here that more peoplesuccumb to than the advantage,
and that is thinking that Ireally have to market to the
person I was four years ago.
So four years ago I struggledwith.
(30:43):
You know, I could have usedmaybe a speech coach or I had my
own identity problems, but Ididn't have a lot of money, I
wasn't ready to invest in thesethings and you know I wouldn't
have made the best client for meright now.
But I had problems.
You know the problems that I hadare the same problems that a
(31:09):
dentist or a high performinglawyer or the CEO of a seven
figure startup would all have.
They articulate them a littledifferently, but they are the
same.
But many people do not.
They can't make this bridge,this gap of my problems are the
(31:33):
same as theirs, because they seethis difference between them so
they wouldn't ever reach out ortry to reach these people and
instead they just try to marketto people who were like them.
And so I just see too manyparticularly coaches trying to
market to mostly themselves andnot really being able to enroll
(31:56):
any clients or feel thatdifferent or especially enroll
clients that pay them what theyreally want or deserve to be
paid and get the results thatthey're looking for.
Speaker 1 (32:09):
Yeah, that's a great point.
So what I hear you saying isthat it's not exact it's.
It's better to look at thebroader spectrum of people.
Even though it's not exactlywhat you experienced or the
exact person Like it's it's,it's across a broader spectrum
of people who could beexperiencing similar things, but
in different forms.
Is that what you're saying?
Speaker 2 (32:31):
In a way yeah.
So we all have the same problemslike imposter syndrome.
Everybody knows what that feelslike.
Right, we've all heard that onebefore.
Okay, good news, bad news Eightfigure CEO, they have imposter
syndrome.
You know, day one tick tockinfluencer, you've got imposter
(32:52):
syndrome.
It's going to keep coming, nomatter where you know and and
but how the eight figure CEO isgoing to articulate what that
problem is and how it feels like.
It's going to be very differentthan how day one tick tock does
.
It's the same problem.
And somebody like you if you,if you work with imposter
syndrome, your solution couldapply to both of them and a lot
(33:16):
of people these are the also thekind of people that market to
themselves are like I could sellmy coaching and help anybody,
and so you try and find anybody,and it's usually the day one
tick tock influencer, but youdon't even give yourself a
chance to even think about.
Well, I could never help a youknow an executive with the same
(33:36):
thing Because I'm not, or youknow they wouldn't even try, so
they wouldn't even go down thewrong.
Exactly Right, Weird Right.
That's funny.
So we feel comfortable justmarketing to ourselves.
But and there is a utility inthat, but there is also a
(33:59):
pitfall and a danger.
Speaker 1 (34:02):
I love that, kyle.
That's such a great, that issuch a great perspective and
really opens my mind up tosomething greater, to appreciate
that.
Wow, yeah, and it is.
It is like us limitingourselves in a lot of ways,
right, because there's so manypeople that you could be helping
and it's funny because go ahead.
(34:23):
I didn't mean to cut you off.
Speaker 2 (34:25):
Oh, no, worries, here's.
Here's like another exercisethat somebody could do.
This is something that's reallyfun to share.
Go, take the time All of youlistening in you do this to put
aside at 60 minutes in yourcalendar and ask yourself the
question what would I do ifsomebody paid me $100,000 to
(34:49):
help them with that problem?
What would be possible?
We could fly out and visit them.
We could contract Creed to comeplay a concert in their front
yard, and that would be awesome.
Probably can't get much more ofa fan than Creed, but we could
get them.
You know, like really, or likewhat kind of great people could
(35:13):
you fly in?
Could you take them on a bet,like if you had a hundred
thousand dollar budget to makean impact in somebody's life,
what could you do and actuallystart to like write out what
that plan would be, becausehere's the thing, like I said,
the eight figure CEO.
You know, imposter syndrome isone problem and it just any
(35:35):
problem that you solve can beapplied, and the more
transformational and who, thebetter, because the more
abstract and it's just a matterof matching the language with
the client.
So you could have somebody come, come and go in your life.
You, you may have had it.
I may have had it like I couldhave been on a phone call with
(35:58):
somebody that was ready for aone hundred thousand dollar
program and if I didn't have mymy, my sheet out, I hadn't
thought about and I wasn'tprepared to make a one hundred
thousand dollar offer.
Then I wouldn't even.
I wouldn't even feel guilty ofhow dumb I was for missing the
(36:18):
opportunity afterwards, becauseit would never have registered,
it would have come and gone, andI will Well, that wouldn't even
hit the radar.
And there's so many people thatare making that mistake.
You know, not on a hundredthousand dollar level, but
they're, they're cappingthemselves.
(36:38):
You know, in so many ways, when, when, even it just doing the
exercise of like what that wouldbe like.
But now I'm ready, I haven'tmade a hundred thousand dollar
offer yet.
I'm getting pretty, I'm gettingclose.
Like it's not, it's not astretch, but it's, it's ready.
And so it's not a stretch,right.
And I would never notice if, ifthe person came by and I wasn't
(37:02):
ready.
Speaker 1 (37:03):
Yeah, that's, that's a really good point.
Yeah, so preparing yourself forthe best case scenario, I think
is the, is the way to go, right.
It's it's like we limitourselves by by not acting as if
it's already happened, right.
Speaker 2 (37:21):
Yeah, and a lot of people you know.
I'm so grateful again for thoseworkshops that I worked at and
saw hundreds of people pay tenthousand dollars for something
and some people left and theyfelt good and some people left
and they didn't feel good and Ilistened to them and why they
(37:43):
did and why they didn't.
But I saw this many people dothis and I know, like there's
peers that you and I have, thatwe're friends with, that won't
even dare venture into, likewhat a ten thousand dollar
program because they think thatthey need to do this or be this
or, god forbid, go back tocollege or you know, get
(38:04):
whatever certification, getanother thing.
Speaker 1 (38:07):
Not enough.
Someday I'll be worthy of this.
Speaker 2 (38:09):
Yeah yeah, it's rampant, it's all over the place
.
They won't even dare letthemselves enter this realm.
I, this, this didn't happenwith like a coach, but I I asked
this question to like just afriend, a muggle of sorts of
like what would you do ifsomebody offered you a hundred
thousand dollars to help you?
And she said I would check tomake sure that they were
(38:31):
mentally stable?
Wow you know, like, like, thinkabout that.
I was that say about you, youknow, or what you think about
yourself, you know.
And again, this was somebodywho really didn't have any sales
or coaching experience.
But it was a very interestinganswer and too many of us are
(38:53):
trending in that direction, eventhough it may not be as extreme
as that one, and it's just astory you're telling yourself.
Speaker 1 (39:01):
Yeah, because there's plenty of people that would pay
that for the right, you know,for the right person.
And I was, I was sure, a storylike years ago when I started
personal training, I wasapproached by Bruce Springsteen
and he asked for my card.
Speaker 2 (39:18):
And I was, I was like , wow, this is it.
Speaker 1 (39:21):
You know, it was one of those situations where I was
like I'll do it, yeah, I'lldefinitely do this, but I was
not in a position to believethat that I could do that, you
know, at that time.
And so it didn't pan out, butit was like, oh, ok, so once, in
a way, that kind of thing isyou are attracting those
opportunities and you're you'renot ready for it on an emotional
(39:45):
, mental, spiritual level, right.
Speaker 2 (39:48):
Upper limit problems.
Yeah yeah, you'll, you'll,you'll sabotage yourself or you
know, and this, like I say thisright now and I'm like dropping
these notes, look out for thosepeople.
I do this all the time too.
I did this last week.
I pretty much I astoundedmyself at how foolish I can be
with my predeterminations andjudgment.
(40:11):
So I was at invested a lot ofmoney to go to this event in
Texas and it was an eventsomewhat between like a festival
or a party that you and I mightfind each other at and a very
high end business mastermind.
And I can remember there wasone like really particularly
(40:31):
beautiful woman there that I sawher right away and I was like
this person does not want to,you know, talk to me.
And I had just like writtenthem off just just because of
that and you know they hadmentioned somewhere along the
line.
I had like found them inpassing again and like said, hey
, you said a cool thing earliertoday.
(40:52):
I appreciate it that she waslike cool, like you know.
See you on the dance floor.
A little bit later, made alittle invitation, but again,
like you know, I wasn't thinkingthat much of it and a little
bit later I went and starteddancing with her and showed her
some of the crazy dance movesthat I've learned living on a
Hawaiian island for a long time,and she totally lit up and was
(41:15):
having the most amazing time andit like ended up becoming like
this, very playful and likelight, you know, friend, and
ended up thanking me afterwardsLike I've had a really hard time
trusting men for a long time.
And you were one of the firstpeople and I was like, oh my God
, I can't believe I created thisexperience and this was
somebody that I immediatelywrote off, you know.
(41:37):
And what else am I doing thatin my like?
What else am I doing that to inmy life?
Is is what leaves me thinkingabout.
You know, how is that happeningin my business?
How is that happening in myhealth?
How is that happening in myfriendships?
(41:58):
How is that happening in mycreativity?
What is the universe sodesperate to give me that I'm
saying no, not for me.
Speaker 1 (42:09):
Yeah, that is very profound.
Yes, I love that so much.
Thank you, kyle.
That's amazing, wow, and it'sgot me really thinking about
that in my own life too.
It's like time to level up, youknow, and as we level up more
and more, we start to build theskills, the self worth, that,
(42:29):
the stuff from within to feellike we are comfortable in those
higher levels.
Right, but it takes that firstlove, first awareness of that,
like what's happening, what arewe doing?
How are we practically, youknow, integrating this in our
lives on a daily basis, with thepeople we talk to, of how we
(42:49):
think about ourselves?
It's a great, those are greatquestions to ask for everything
you do, yeah.
Speaker 2 (42:57):
And it's just.
You know, these are the kind ofquestions that I really feel
like it kind of reminds me of, Iknow, such a white guy thing,
but quote the matrix orsomething.
But early on, when, when Neo islike trying to do kung fu
against Amorphias, he's justlearning the moves, and then
(43:20):
he's like exhausted, likeAmorphias asks him do you think
that's air you're breathing?
And he like holds his breath,and Neo has just been like
burdening himself, thinking, youknow, he just thought he needed
to breathe because he was usedto having to do that, but it
actually wasn't an issue.
(43:41):
And that's when he starts torealize like whoa, have I been
limiting myself, you know?
And things start to open up.
And this is the same thing, youknow, do you think that's air
that you're breathing as you'rewheezing and struggling, you
know, and do you need to do that?
Speaker 1 (43:59):
Yeah, exactly that movie is is also profound in
many ways Like it is.
There's so much greatness inthat movie to tell people about
what they are living in, whatkind of illusions they're living
in, what kind of storiesthey're telling themselves, what
kind of limitations they'reputting on themselves as well.
Great, great example there.
(44:21):
I really love that.
Well, let's see, I want to justswitch gears a little bit while
we're coming up on the hour andlove for you to talk more about
like as well, if you want toput in a word about your book or
what you're doing currently,what you're helping people with
(44:43):
mostly most recently, and offersthat you're also offering
people.
Speaker 2 (44:50):
Thank you so much.
Yeah, I would love to share.
So right now, I've been veryfocused on working with a very
small group of very high impact,high intelligence entrepreneurs
and just have a very smallgroup of people that I want to
go very deep with and I want tounderstand everything that's
(45:12):
going on in your business and beable to take you through the
process that I was just sayingto help you come up with
powerful stories faster than youcould on your own, better than
you could on your own and,believe it or not, we're even
going to have fun while doing itand being able to implement
those quickly by speaking infront of different audiences,
(45:36):
speaking on podcasts, speakingon these things and being able
to make an offer.
So those are the people thatI'm looking for and helping you
express that.
So, if that's, you come find me.
And for everybody else, I have atremendous amount of free
resources in storytelling oralmost free resources, if you
count the book that are going tohelp you articulate who you are
(46:01):
, why you're doing what you'redoing, whether you're doing it
on the stage, whether you'redoing it on a blog, whether
you're doing it on the podcast,I have content that's going to
be a good fit for you.
You can find that all atthestoryengineco.
That's where you can learn moreabout my books.
You can check out my podcast.
I have a blog there just about250 podcast episodes where we're
(46:24):
almost coming up on the 250thand a bunch of long form
articles and infographics allthat good stuff on storytelling.
So come check me out there andfind me.
I do a lot of reels and contenton Instagram have a lot of fun
and it's kind of goofy funcontent more than just.
(46:44):
It's a mix of practical and funstuff but all in storytelling.
You can find me at HeyKyleGrayon Instagram.
Speaker 1 (46:52):
Wonderful.
Yeah, I like what you're doingon Instagram lately with the.
I've seen I can't remember hername, but she does a similar
thing with a split screen andthen the singing with other
people.
I love that so much.
That is really cool that you'redoing that and playing around
with that and showing people howthey can have fun and through
(47:13):
expression.
Really that's what it's allabout, right.
Speaker 2 (47:18):
Integrating my own imposter syndrome by having fun
and being goofy and putting thatstuff out there, and I share
all of these things with you inthe field of transparency, that
I've struggled with themprofoundly this whole journey.
So I'm right there with you, myfriends.
Speaker 1 (47:41):
Me too.
Me too, I'm there with you too.
Thank you, kyle, so much forcoming on.
This has been an incredibleshow and I appreciate you so
much.
I really appreciate and loveour connection, so thank you for
coming on and sharing yourgifts.
Speaker 2 (47:56):
Likewise, allison.
Thank you so much for having meand thank you everybody for who
listened through this wholething Appreciate you and I'd
love to be in touch.
Speaker 1 (48:05):
Thank you, kyle.
Let's get this over to you yourlife is your greatest work of
(48:26):
art, and it all relates back tothe synchronus peaks.
The synchronus peaks, I supposeso.
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