December 9, 2025 • 37 mins
Welcome to Wickedly Branded: Marketing, Magic, and The Messy Middle, the podcast where real conversations meet real strategies. I'm your host, Beverly Cornell, founder and fairy godmother of brand clarity at Wickedly Branded. With over 25 years of experience, I’ve helped hundreds of entrepreneurs awaken their brand magic, attract the right people, and build businesses that light them up.
In this powerful episode, Beverly sits down with TEDx coach and copywriter Cathlyn Melvin to explore the truth behind becoming visible, owning your message, and crafting what she calls a Power Idea, the foundational clarity that shapes every part of your brand and business. From navigating entrepreneurship as an introverted, neurodivergent creator to stepping onto the TEDx stage with confidence, Cathlyn breaks down the process of distilling your lived experiences into an idea that resonates, converts, and creates ripple effects far beyond the red circle.
Three Key Marketing Topics Discussed:
1. Power Ideas & Brand Clarity: Cathlyn breaks down the concept of a Power Idea, the deep, foundational message that becomes the backbone of your brand, content, and visibility strategy.
2. Visibility, Confidence, and Thought Leadership: Through her own TEDx journey, Cathlyn reveals the emotional and mindset work required to step onto any stage with impact, especially for introverted or neurodivergent entrepreneurs.
3. Transforming Lived Experiences Into Marketing Assets: Beverly and Cathlyn explore how stories, client transformations, and personal insights become the raw material for content pillars, brand messaging, and powerful talks.
Follow Cathlyn:
Cathlyn | LinkedIn
RightCat Creative | Instagram
RightCat Creative | Website
Dare to be Wickedly Branded
P.S. Take the first step (will only take you 3 minutes) to awaken your brand magic with our personalized Brand Clarity Quiz
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Beverly (00:11):
Did you know that landing a TEDx talk can shorten
your sales cycle, build instantcredibility and open doors that
you never even imagined?
Today's guest knows exactly howpowerful one idea can be.
I'm your host, Beverly Cornell,the founder and fairy godmother
of brand clarity.
At Wickedly branded, we havehelped hundreds of overwhelmed
(00:31):
overachieving consultants,creatives, and coaches awaken
their brand magic and boldlybring their marketing to life so
that they feel more confidentand attract their absolute
favorite, most profitableclients.
Today I am joined by thebrilliant Cathlyn Melvin.
She's a TEDx coach andcopywriter whose work has been
featured on TEDx, Thrive Globaland over 50 podcasts through her
(00:53):
company, Right Cat Creative.
She helps entrepreneurs turntheir lived experiences and
thought leadership intovisibility opportunities that
actually convert.
She's also the host of the groupprogram, Amplify, guiding
business owners just like youthrough the TEDx process.
Cathlyn, I'm so excited to haveyou, welcome to the show.
Cathlyn (01:14):
Thank you so much.
I'm excited to shed a light onwhat TEDx is all about.
'cause a lot of the time it'shard to find information about
how it works, what the processis, what it means.
Beverly (01:25):
A couple of my friends actually run the TEDx Detroit
events.
And it's always been somethingI've eye as a possibility.
But my closet introvert isabsolutely mortified.
I'm excited to break some ofthat, those myths down possibly
and learn how you got to thestage.
So go back to yourentrepreneurial journey, like
what led you to start Right CatCreative in 2021, and what did
(01:50):
those early days look like foryou and the brand?
Cathlyn (01:53):
First of all I wanna say I'm an introvert too.
I am very introverted.
I am neurodivergent.
I've got a lot of differentthings going.
I live with depression andanxiety, a lot of that stuff.
So I'm not like just a naturalextrovert who's yeah, it's easy.
Everybody can do this.
I've worked on it to get to thepoint where it feels easy now
(02:15):
and it feels natural and fun.
So going back, my first careerwas as an actor, I went to
school for theater.
Which.
Might surprise you knowing thatI'm an introvert, but actually
the majority of professionalactors identify as introverts
because it's a career that's allabout connection, which is
really similar to speaking.
(02:35):
Right.
Beverly (02:36):
Interesting.
My husband and I met doingmusical theater.
So fun.
So that's interesting that yousay that.
I love this one-on-one, like youand I having a chat today, I am
all about it.
I am so here for it.
It's one of my favorite parts ofmy work.
But you put me on a stage andhave a hundred eyeballs staring
at me and it becomes a wholelike, whew, I can do this.
And I do tend to channel theenergy well, however, I might
(02:59):
speak too fast or not really bepresent.
And podcasting actually has beena way for me to master some of
that a little bit to be morepresent in the conversation.
I'm so excited to talk moreabout this and I love that you
have this theater background.
I was a dancer for 18 years,like I was on stage.
Totally different though.
When you're talking and sharingyour ideas,
Cathlyn (03:21):
It's, especially when you're comparing a performance
art.
So I started out as an actor.
My first formal business was anarts education company that I
founded with another actor andeducator.
And we taught theater to kidsall across the United States.
We were in, 18 states of ourprogramming.
And when I was working with thatcompany, I was writing
(03:46):
everything.
I was writing script and lyricsand music, but I was also
writing our sales emails and ourblogs and our website content
and all our physical marketingcollateral, our brochures and
our postcards and everythingthat would go out to schools and
organizations.
The theater industry is acomplicated and multi-layered
one, and there were some thingsthat I didn't love about it even
(04:08):
though I loved the work of itwhen it came time for me to
leave that industry, you mightthink that I switched right
away.
To writing and marketing.
And I did not, I decided I wasgoing to go to law school.
So I had this vision of, thestability and the reliability,
and I think I would make areally fabulous attorney.
(04:31):
So I studied for the lsat, Itook the lsat, I retook the
lsat.
Then it was 2020 and I had beenaccepted and I got a full ride
scholarship to University ofFlorida.
And I was like, that's great.
And classes were gonna start inAugust of 2020.
And the world had changed.
My personal relationships hadchanged.
I had this long-termrelationship that ended and my
(04:53):
world just fell apart.
But I was like, you know what?
I'm not in the mental head spaceto make a new choice right now.
Law school is paid for.
They're paying for me to go.
I'm going to go.
So even when I started school, Ialready knew that it wasn't
really where I wanted to be.
And I went through a fullsemester and part of the second
semester and over winter break,my best friend and I had a
(05:15):
conversation.
She was like, you should bewriting.
We'll figure out how to makethat work for you.
And I was like, ah, I don'tknow, I'm gonna give myself to
this next semester.
And I didn't last through thenext semester.
About the end of February, I waslike, yeah, no, hit the withdraw
button.
And that's when I went full-timewith Right Cat Creative.
Beverly (05:33):
You told me before we started that the cat is actually
Tucker, your cat.
How Did you come up with thename?
Cathlyn (05:39):
So funny thing, Tucker wasn't actually my cat when I
named the company, but I wasliving with him.
He came with an old friend ofmine had moved to Chicago and
moved in with me.
We got an apartment together andshe brought Tucker and I fell in
love with each other right away.
I'm very much a cat person and Ilove affectionate cats.
So Tucker and I bonded and myfriend Felicia, who was Tucker's
(06:04):
guardian at the time, at onepoint was like, Cathlyn, when
you move away to Florida, wouldyou consider taking Tucker with
you?
And I was like no, he's beenwith you for eight years.
You are his person.
This is what he's familiar with.
And then COVID happened and myroommate.
Went to quarantine with familyin Wisconsin and I was left in
(06:25):
Chicago with Tucker for fourmonths, and it was just the two
of us.
So by the end of that I waslike, Hey, Felicia, remember
this conversation that we had?
And yeah, Tucker moved acrossthe country with me.
He rode down in a van wearinghis little harness, and hated
it.
Beverly (06:40):
Tucker adopted you.
Cathlyn (06:42):
He did.
It was very much one of thosesituations where he picked me.
Beverly (06:46):
I love that.
So how did you go up with RightCat Creative though?
Cathlyn (06:50):
So I originally wanted to be Blue Cat Creative, and
that came from, I have thisstamp and blue ink pad that my
sisters gave me when I was inhigh school.
And I've used as a book plate.
So for 20 years, I stamp all ofmy books with that blue cat I
wanted to be Blue Cat Creative,but apparently there's already a
Blue Cat Creative.
And there are actually a lot ofBlue Cat themed businesses.
(07:13):
I didn't wanna get stuck in whatdo I name my company?
I wanted to name my company andget started.
So I just made a list of otherone syllable adjectives.
And Right was the one.
Beverly (07:22):
So talk about who you help, specifically, who is it
that really needs to do a TEDxtalk and talk about an example
of someone you've helped andwhat that has looked like for
them.
Cathlyn (07:33):
I work with business owners.
Usually it's women who come tome.
I don't specifically advertiseto women, but usually I do end
up working with women and theyare women who have been in
business for a few years.
They've been doing all the rightthings, and they might feel like
stable or they might feel like,oh, I'm not quite stable and
(07:58):
either I need to do somethingdifferent to get to the next
level, or I need to do somethingdifferent to reach that
stability.
So they usually come to me whenthey're in that place and
they're like, I know I can do aTEDx talk, or I know I want to
do a TEDx talk.
And I have this general idea ofwhat I would like to talk about.
And that's really the first stepis that, what I call your big
(08:21):
idea, and it's not distilleddown, it's not clear, it's not
concise, but it's this sort ofcloud that floats.
So usually what happens whenpeople start with me is they
come and they share that bigidea, and then I synthesize it
and I listen and I say, okay.
I just heard four, maybe fivedifferent TEDx talks.
Beverly (08:38):
Yeah.
Cathlyn (08:39):
Because with TEDx, like the average TEDx talk is 12 and
a half minutes long.
Beverly (08:42):
So short, you have to be so short and make really
powerful thing happen in that 12minutes
Cathlyn (08:49):
and you can, but it's hard to do by yourself'cause
you're so close to it you tendto think that there needs to be
a lot of layering in it.
And something that I work on ispeeling back those layers and
Okay.
What is that core ideaunderneath,
Beverly (09:03):
you call it something on your website, what do you
call it?
The power.
Cathlyn (09:07):
Power idea.
Beverly (09:07):
Power idea.
Yeah.
I like the word even the poweridea.
It just makes me stand up alittle taller.
Cathlyn (09:12):
Yeah.
Beverly (09:13):
What got you to the TEDx stage Talk about you and
how you got to the stage andwhat was your topic and what was
that process like, just for youdoing it.
Cathlyn (09:22):
Like many of my clients, TEDx had been something
that was on my vision board orgoals list.
For a long time.
Way back in high school, I was acompetitive speaker and the
category that I really lovedcompeting in, one of the ones
that I went all the way up tonational competition in is
called Oratory.
And that style was basicallyTEDx style before TEDx existed
(09:46):
because TEDx didn't actuallyexist until 2008 or 2009.
So Ted started putting talks onYouTube in 2006.
And they blew up.
And I remember watching them andbeing like, this is what I used
to do.
This is fun, I could do this.
And then when Ted X started, itbecame more reachable because
(10:10):
Ted is like, Bill Clinton hasgiven a TED talk.
Shonda Rhimes, they're bighousehold names a lot of the
time.
Whereas with TEDx and thoselocally, independently organized
events, it's people like you andme aren't household names.
We have some gosh darn goodideas and people wanna hear
them.
So I was working as an actor atthe time.
(10:31):
I went all the way through myfirst business and it was
actually when I dropped out oflaw school.
And I had just started Right CatCreative that I decided to
apply.
I'd had this experience ofwithdrawing from law school and
a lot of things that had goneinto making that decision.
So my TEDx talk is called theBrave Leap Sideways.
(10:52):
And the idea is that it is soeasy for us all in
relationships, in our education,in our careers, to get stuck on
this treadmill that's goingfaster and we can't keep up and
it's not taking us anywhere.
And the only way to get going onthe path, that's the next right
path for us, is to take ourbrave leap over the handrail of
(11:14):
that treadmill and take a breathand figure that out from the
next step.
So yeah, that's how I ended updoing it.
I only applied to two events,and then that was in April of
that year.
And in November I gave my talk.
Beverly (11:27):
So you said you're an introvert.
Yeah.
You said that.
You like the oratory thing?
I'm getting mixed messages.
I feel like
Cathlyn (11:34):
I love having a script that's part of it.
Knowing what I am going to saybefore it is my time to say it.
Beverly (11:42):
Okay.
Okay.
Fair.
So as a dancer, I likechoreography, so I get that
like, when you have your ownchoreography, you know where
you're supposed to be.
I'm good, but if you leave me tomy own devices, I'm a big clutz.
But, do You believe that it canbecome a crutch too?
We're so bent on, likememorizing the words that
there's also this whole otherside of it of like humanness and
(12:03):
feelings and connection thatcan't be scripted.
Did you have to worry about thatat all with the Ted x?
Cathlyn (12:09):
I see this problem in my clients quite a bit, and the
problem is that we stop short.
We get so tied up in thememorization that we feel like
once it's memorized, it's ready,it's not.
Once it's memorized, then theperformance work can start.
Then you can start directingyour talk.
(12:30):
Then you can really focus onreleasing your brain from
thinking about the words.
The head of Ted, his name isChris Anderson, in his book, he
talks about something he callsthe uncanny valley, which is
when we're giving our talk andwe're so focused on our words
and it feels a little robotic,it feels a little stilted.
(12:51):
It feels like this doesn't feelquite human.
And that you need to keeprehearsing and keep rehearsing.
And I believe you need to keeprehearsing until you are super
duper bored.
Until you're like, this is eyerolling.
Why would anyone wanna listen tothis?
When you get there, the nexthill you get over is where you
break through that uncannyvalley and suddenly you're
(13:12):
connecting and suddenly it'snatural and soft and human
again.
Beverly (13:17):
The uncanny valley.
When I first started stepping infront of my brand and I started
to do more talking and more ofthe podcasts and guesting and
some of that, I definitely wasmore script driven.
But what came from that, is thatI have a lot of one-liners that
are just mine that I call likemy road markers.
Like in this part of theconversation, we're gonna talk
(13:38):
about the should suitcase andbecause I've talked about the
should suitcase enough I feelreally confident in where the
conversation's gonna go and I'mable to be more present.
But in the beginning I was like,the should suitcase is the thing
that society places upon us andtells us all the things that we
should do.
But now, I'm like, so who'scarrying the should suitcase do
(13:59):
you feel like you should show upa certain way?
Now it's just a differentconversation.
And maybe that is because I'vesaid it enough that I'm bored,
but now I can play with theidea, which is great.
Cathlyn (14:08):
And you create these building blocks.
These are the stories I alwaystell about my clients.
These phrases that I use.
These are my what I calltidbits.
That you can then pile togetherin an interview like this.
Or if you're on a panel or whenyou're writing a talk that
doesn't need to be memorized.
You can be like, okay, thisstory is gonna lead into that
(14:29):
anecdote, lead into these, thisgroup of statistics that I
always talk about.
But I had the same thing, myfirst few podcasts that I ever
gave years ago at this point, Igot questions from the host and
I wrote out answers, and I hadmy little paper right here so
(15:54):
that I could be literallyreading my answers.
It just takes practice oftelling those stories over and
over again.
Beverly (16:02):
I have a story bank now, like I literally have a
story bank of all the stories ofshow the examples of what I
wanna say.
Or I have client stories, so mystories of like my development
and the major areas of where Itook leaps probably through the
uncanny valley.
And then I have the clientstories that prove the point I'm
making.
So it's like a one two punchHey, do this thing, but then.
(16:24):
Here's someone who did it, andthis is what happened with that.
So now I have the story bank ofme, the story bank of them, and
then I have these like buildingblocks of things that I talk
about in there.
And somehow the magic happenswhere it's all weaved together.
And I can riff on any element ofthose building blocks using
those, going back to my stories.
(16:47):
But I feel like you have to saythe story out loud a lot to
fully own the story, which is soweird'cause it's your freaking
story.
Cathlyn (16:54):
There's a difference between having the intellectual
awareness of the story, this ishow the story goes, and just
being able to relax and let itflow.
And it's that relaxing and flowthat we wanna get to when we're
up in front of an audience.
Whether that's here where, helloaudience you're not here with us
(17:15):
in the room today, but you'relistening later.
Or whether you're giving akeynote live in front of 400
people.
In part of my actor training.
There all of these differentmethods of how an actor can go
about creating their work.
And one of the ways that I wastrained, you do all of this
table work first.
You do all this text work in, inyour script before you ever get
(17:38):
up so that you've alreadyintellectualized it to the point
where you can let go and you canlet that all drop out of your
head.
You don't need to be payingattention to it so that when you
step into the rehearsal room,all of that prep work is done
and you can move forward.
When I work with my clients andwe're starting to talk about,
(18:00):
okay, what do you want to put inyour talk?
I give them what I call mycontent support guide.
And it has a bunch of differentcategories of different types of
evidence or structure that youwant in your TEDx talk.
And we just brainstorm that allout.
And at first they might be like,okay, here is the story that
(18:20):
happened to this.
And that's where you're reallyYeah.
Getting the structure of thatstory.
But the essence of the storydoesn't come out until you're
super duper comfortable with itup here.
Beverly (18:30):
Yeah, that makes total sense.
So you went through thisprocess, did you think it was
easy to be a TEDx talker
Cathlyn (18:36):
For me, I went in with a really specific skillset.
I had been a competitivespeaker, for years I had written
10 minute talks.
I had memorized them, I hadperformed them.
I had this education as anactor, as a director, and I had
a whole career doing thosethings professionally.
So the thing that I reallyneeded help with is I know that
(18:58):
I can be a procrastinator.
Unfortunately, I knew that goingin, so I had a coach who we just
met every week, just so I wouldhave that external I need to do
the work because otherwise Ishow up on the call and I feel
the shame of not having done thework.
But a lot of it, my training andmy experience really fueled.
I have this free call that Icalled TEDx Demystify that I do
(19:20):
every few months.
And on that call I'm like, lookyou are not alone.
If you don't feel a hundredpercent confident in how to
pitch yourself to events, if youdon't feel a hundred percent
confident in how to distill yourbig idea into that one core
statement.
If you don't feel a hundredpercent confident writing a talk
(19:40):
that feels natural when it'sspoken out loud.
Because we're used to writingblogs.
We're used to writing emails,and those things are intended to
be read.
Writing a speech is a differentthing.
That's why there are people whospecialize in being speech
writers.
So there are all these differentskill sets involved in TEDx and
most people aren't going to feela hundred percent confident in a
any of them, let alone in all ofthem.
(20:03):
So it's okay.
And I encourage you to findeither a coach like me who can
help you in all of those areasor different people who you're
like, oh, you know what I reallyneed help with.
I really need help withpitching.
Cool.
So find someone whose specialtyis in pitching, pitching to
TEDx.
Beverly (20:22):
Yeah.
So is there somebody specificthat you've helped that just as
a story that you just love, thatyou saw them go from, holy crap,
I'm doing this thing and I havethis big goal to being super
successful and having a reallygreat talk and feeling so good
about themselves afterwards thatthey did this hard thing but
they did it well.
Cathlyn (20:41):
So one of my clients who gave her talk last year, her
name is Cynthia Barnes and.
She had a lot going on in herlife.
She had a lot going onprofessionally.
She had a lot going onpersonally at the time.
And she had gotten accepted tospeak at an event and she was
feeling overwhelmed by it.
And we got to, a couple weeksbefore the event, and when we
(21:06):
met up, she had this moment of,I can't do this.
It's too much.
I'm not ready, all of these likestories that had been bubbling
under the surface came out andshe felt like just stepping away
and saying, you know what?
I can't I'm sorry, but I have towithdraw.
And together we pulled at thosethreads to figure out, okay,
(21:27):
where are these stories comingfrom?
What is it that you really feelis that barrier that you can't
get over?
And when we figure that out, Iwas able to lead her through
some exercises.
By the end of that session shecried and she was like, I can do
this.
She really did feel confident.
And I don't get to see many ofmy clients speak live, but a
(21:48):
handful I've seen.
And I was in the room with her'cause she was speaking locally
here.
And afterward she was glowing.
And then a few months later sheposted this thing on LinkedIn
that she was like a number ofmonths ago, my TEDx talk went
live and it changed my entireworld.
She talked about how that talkhad become the foundation of a
(22:10):
book that she was writing.
It had changed how she wasworking with clients in a really
foundational way.
And that shift had given her theconfidence, do a bunch of things
in her personal life it wasreally emotional to go through
that whole process with her andthen see her walk out.
And see even now, a year and ahalf after she gave her talk,
(22:31):
how all of those ripple effects.
Are happening.
It's really beautiful.
Beverly (22:36):
That is the greatest gift I have is working with
clients that I'm on this journeywith them to discover more about
who they are, their confidence,have some momentum, have some of
those ripple effects with theirmarketing and their brand, and
feeling totally and fully inalignment with what they're
supposed to be doing.
To see them in their own magic,and maybe that's it.
(22:58):
It's the glow of it.
And I feel like there is thismoment with us as well.
I've had the moment where Irebranded and there was this
moment when I was gonna pushpublish in this new brand that I
felt so incredibly excited aboutand really felt was the most me
it's ever been so really deeplypersonal.
Cathlyn (23:19):
Very vulnerable.
Beverly (23:20):
Very vulnerable.
I'm pushing publish and I'mlike, what if they don't like
it?
What if they don't like me?
And I was so excited on one sideand I was so afraid on the other
side.
And after I pushed published andI took the deep breath and
everyone was like, oh my gosh,this is amazing.
This is so you wickedly brandedis so you, and such affirming to
(23:42):
that choice.
That those things that kind ofscare us sometimes are the best
things we can do to pushourselves forward, to build more
confidence, to feel more inalignment, to feel more
empowered in our truth I get towitness that all the time with
my clients who push publish on anew brand.
And to see it more aligned withwho they are to deeply feel
(24:04):
confident in sending someone totheir website.
Like they, for the first timefeel like they were actually
showing up.
And when you show up for a TEDTalk, you are showing up.
That's probably my biggest fear,to be honest.
Cathlyn is I'm gonna show up andit's gonna to be there forever.
It's recorded.
It's on the internet.
It's on the internet, and it islike a record of my complete
(24:26):
whatever greatness or mycomplete failure in it.
So it's that's what's scary tome is what if I don't do well?
Cathlyn (24:34):
And that's why you work with someone like me.
So that you make sure that it'sgreat.
Yeah.
And you're super duper proud.
Beverly (24:40):
I'm sure high performing women, mostly our
listeners here can understand isthis idea of I want it to be so
good and so perfect.
And so I'm afraid to even sayit's ready because it has to be
so perfect and so good and allthe things as opposed to just
you know what, like my veryfirst podcast wasn't great.
My podcasts now I think arereally good.
It's interesting how in our headwe can be and how freeing, like
(25:03):
when you talk about her, howfreeing it can be to fully show
up as you, to accomplish thisthing.
And to not let fear hold youback from something that was so
incredibly important for yourdevelopment as a human, but also
as a business person in thisworld.
Cathlyn (25:19):
understood this concept of what I now call a power idea.
And it's different from TEDxtalks about ideas worth
spreading.
And your idea worth spreading ispart, it's a small part of what
I teach and create about powerideas.
And one of the reasons that Isettled on power.
As that descriptor identifier isbecause having that awareness
(25:45):
and understanding and way tospeak about what the world that
you're creating gives youpersonal power.
Yeah.
It allows you so much room tostep forward and so much room to
create yourself and yourbusiness, let alone own the
power to create impact.
And if you don't know what yourpower idea is, which I believe
(26:08):
that talks about the challengesthat you see in the world right
now, what's wrong with thestatus quo.
It talks about what could bedifference, what sort of utopia
you want to create, and thenwhat do we need to do to get
there?
Like we as individuals, we associety, all of these different
components come together.
And when you can get that reallyclear and really concise and
(26:29):
really sticky, that's whatcreates the power in your
business to move forward.
Beverly (26:34):
I like that for a lot of reasons.
Because we always talk about youhave to have a really strong
mission statement and visionstatement and core values, and
then you have this people callthe elevator speech, but it's
like your one main idea.
And that is the main idea thatdrives everything.
That's where your contentpillars live.
That's where you blog from.
That's the thing that you wannabe known for.
So the power idea is like theone main idea we use.
(26:59):
Yeah.
But it is so incrediblypowerful.
It is.
People think it's, and I've usedthis example before when you
narrow your focus in such a wayand you own it a mile deep,
right?
It is freeing on how you talkabout what you do, who you
serve, and the transformationyou offer.
And the TEDx exercise, I'll callit, it's much more than that,
(27:21):
can only help you own that evenfurther, right?
So we help you find that inyourself and in your brand, and
in your marketing materials.
But taking that and creatingthis idea we're spreading, which
you say here, like it's morethan that, but this idea that is
completely yours is only goingto magnify the clarity.
(27:42):
And I could do it for a lot ofother people, but not for myself
because I was too close.
When I took the time to reallynoodle with the idea and like
really stretch it and do thethings that I do for my clients,
for myself we would take it adeep breath right now.
It was like a breath of releaseof knowing, a deep knowing in
your truth.
Cathlyn (28:03):
And you talk about going a mile deep when I'm
creating power ideas with myclients, there are two different
formats that we end up with andthe first one is called Your
Manifesto.
It's called your Manifestobecause it goes so deep.
It's an essay.
I have an example of one on myblog that is mine.
So we've got this manifesto thatcan really dig into all of the
(28:27):
components that go into a poweridea.
And then when we've written yourmanifesto, that's when we take a
step back when we say, okay,what is your core statement?
And your core statement then iswhat TEDx would call your idea
worth spreading.
It's one or two sentences.
It's very clear, it's verygraspable and you really need
both, because a lot of peoplewill think about everything is
(28:49):
figureoutable for Marie Forleo,or start with y from Simonson.
All of these like almost slogansthat these thought leaders have
and they reach for those, theysay, I want one of those.
But when that's what you reachfor first you're building a
castle on sand.
Yeah.
And it's gonna crumble.
You need to do the legwork ofcreating that manifesto of
(29:12):
really digging in and buildingup before you reach for the core
idea.
And you need your core statementbefore it turns into something
that you can print on a t-shirt.
Beverly (29:22):
Okay.
Hold on, stop the train for onesecond.
'cause I want everyone to listento this because we say this too,
without clarity, you have nofoundation for your marketing,
your brand, and you're justspitting the wind, essentially.
You're just throwing stuff onthe wall and hoping it sticks,
so this clarity, this core idea,the manifesto is the beginning
like understanding kind of thewhole truth of you.
(29:45):
And then the golden threadthat's through it is like the
core idea, right?
Then the core idea then becomesthe foundation for the TEDx
idea.
But in my world, that becomesthe foundation of your brand.
So this is very concurrent.
We are living in a very similarspace, Cathlyn, and what you're
(30:05):
saying is incredibly true andit's saying in a different way
that I don't always say it.
So for those that are listening,listen to the way cathlyn's
saying, because maybe that's theway you need to hear it.
But if you just build a logo oryou just create a tagline and
you haven't done some of thatwork underneath, it feels empty.
It feels shallow.
It's not strong and stable andlike the thing with which to
(30:28):
build upon.
Yeah.
And.
I feel, oh, I just feel likewhat you do is like such a great
extension on top of what westart, like we start the process
for you and then you build itand make it like a concept to go
out into the world with, likeactually speak the words, we
write the words, we get theideas, but you are like the
speaking of the words intoexistence in some way.
(30:51):
And that's so good.
Cathlyn (30:53):
You reiterated how we need the depth, we need the
foundation, right?
But we also need the corestatement.
You need both.
You need the manifesto to createthis strength and the
foundation.
And if you can't condense yourwhole manifesto into a sentence
or two, that is powerful andclear, there are people who
aren't gonna hear you becausethey're gonna stop listening.
(31:13):
There are people who aren'tgoing to share your work because
you haven't given them somethingthat's truly graspable and
shareable.
So you need both of thoseformats.
Beverly (31:25):
Graspable and shareable.
And what I found on social mediaand all the things that we do is
that the things that peoplewanna share are things that
uplift them, make them looksmart, make them look connected.
So this idea of shareable makesthem have value to their
community in some way, shape orform.
(31:45):
So that it's not just about you,even though it is about you.
It's not just about you, butalso like how it can help so
many others.
It's utopia that you wannacreate and the ways with which
to do that, which isinteresting.
So this season's question is allabout how do you bring
everything together for yourbrand?
So this is work for Ted Talkstoo.
(32:05):
You have your theater, you haveyour performance, you have your
oratory background and all ofthat copywriting.
There's some coaching going onhere.
How do you activate all thatinto your unique space?
To make right cat creative.
How does that all come togetherin such a way it's uniquely you
Cathlyn, and it's also sovaluable to people.
Cathlyn (32:28):
For me and my experience in this business I
started just as a copywriter.
And then when I was getting mycommunity behind my TEDx talk so
that they could spread it outwhen it arrived, people started
asking me, they started lookingat my background and saying, oh,
you are an actor, the director,an editor or writer, and I've
(32:49):
given a TEDx talk.
Can you help me?
And so that's really how theTEDx side of my business
organically was created.
And it took a couple years ofoffering both of those services
for me to really see whatconnected them.
Like I saw that they were bothmarketing, I saw that they were
(33:10):
both like ways of outreach.
But it was really when I startedthinking about what I ended up
calling your power idea that Isaw that is the foundation for
all of the words that we use inour business.
Whether it's in our copy,whether it's in our keynotes and
interviews and other things,whether it's in our social media
(33:34):
and emails, the blogs we write,like there has to be that thread
that all roads lead back.
When I say I'm a TEDx coach anda copywriter, people get it.
People know what those twothings are, but what I really am
is your power idea creator.
I create that foundation foryou.
Now, if that's what I wentaround calling myself, people
would be like, I don't know whatthat means.
And it probably wouldn't be veryeffective.
Beverly (33:56):
I beg to differ.
I think there would be somepower in that.
Yeah.
Cathlyn (33:59):
I'll keep thinking about it.
Beverly (34:01):
There's a lot of TEDx coaches, but how many power idea
creators are there?
Cathlyn (34:05):
I just feel like it is so essential, like the way that
I have created the componentsand the formats of the power
idea.
I don't know that you can getwhat I want you to get for your
business without all of thoseparts and pieces.
So for a TEDx coach, just belike, let's create an idea worth
spreading.
You don't have the foundationthen.
(34:27):
So it's more than just creatingyour TEDx talk or your power
talk It all has to cometogether.
Beverly (34:34):
So good though.
If you're listening right nowand you're thinking, oh my gosh,
I need this power idea.
I need to create a strongfoundation for my brand.
I would love for you to give usa review and let us know this is
resonating and connecting withyou because I think so many of
us do something we truly love.
We're brilliant.
I know my listeners arebrilliant and they're trying so
(34:54):
hard to make the world a betterplace, Cathlyn.
And they want to magnify theirimpact by having a strong brand
and marketing, also the toolslike a TEDx talk and how that
can magnify them, but they don'tknow how and they sometimes get
in their own way and there's allthese other external things that
are telling them, don't do itthat way, do this way.
If it's resonating that this hasto all start from a foundational
(35:15):
place so that you can growoutside of that, continue that
ripple effect from it that youtalked about with that
particular example you gave.
It has to be strong enough tohandle all of that.
And the power idea is huge.
We call ours the brand SparkBlueprint.
It's the spark.
It's this thing that starts itall.
We have different language forit, but it's incredibly
(35:36):
important and it servesdifferent purposes, but it's
incredibly important to get thatgolden thread to help you go to
the next step, whatever thatlooks like for you.
And that's why you need someonelike Cathlyn, or you need
somebody like me to help you seeyourself in a different way.
That's the thing is everyone'soh my gosh.
You see what's possible?
Yeah, I see what's possiblebecause I've been doing this for
(35:57):
a long time, but I feel like Ididn't think I deserved to know
what made me special.
I thought that I just did thework.
I just was a marketer and I justdid the work and the work to
speak for itself and all thosethings.
I did not think I had a story totell.
I didn't think that people wouldlisten to my story.
I didn't think that I hadanything unique to offer the
(36:17):
conversation.
But I have a lot to add to theconversation.
This is so important.
I think especially for women andI'm with you.
I mostly work with women, andwomen don't always feel like
they have a place at the table.
They don't always feel like theyhave a perspective that needs to
be shared, that it is new ordifferent.
And I just want you all tolisten, you all have something
really special to add to theconversation.
(36:38):
And it might just take some timewith Cathlyn to make it happen.
Don't live small, live big, Iwant you to live as big as
possible.
Hey there, you've just finishedpart one of the episode.
How are you feeling?
Excited, inspired, but we'rejust getting started.
Next Thursday we're droppingpart two, and you won't wanna
miss it.
Be sure to subscribe to ournewsletter, so you'll be the
first to know when it goes live.
(36:59):
Until then, take a breather, letthose ideas simmer, and we'll
see you next week.
Did you know that landing a TEDx talk can shorten
your sales cycle, build instantcredibility and open doors that
you never even imagined?
Today's guest knows exactly howpowerful one idea can be.
I'm your host, Beverly Cornell,the founder and fairy godmother
of brand clarity.
At Wickedly branded, we havehelped hundreds of overwhelmed
(00:31):
overachieving consultants,creatives, and coaches awaken
their brand magic and boldlybring their marketing to life so
that they feel more confidentand attract their absolute
favorite, most profitableclients.
Today I am joined by thebrilliant Cathlyn Melvin.
She's a TEDx coach andcopywriter whose work has been
featured on TEDx, Thrive Globaland over 50 podcasts through her
(00:53):
company, Right Cat Creative.
She helps entrepreneurs turntheir lived experiences and
thought leadership intovisibility opportunities that
actually convert.
She's also the host of the groupprogram, Amplify, guiding
business owners just like youthrough the TEDx process.
Cathlyn, I'm so excited to haveyou, welcome to the show.
Cathlyn (01:14):
Thank you so much.
I'm excited to shed a light onwhat TEDx is all about.
'cause a lot of the time it'shard to find information about
how it works, what the processis, what it means.
Beverly (01:25):
A couple of my friends actually run the TEDx Detroit
events.
And it's always been somethingI've eye as a possibility.
But my closet introvert isabsolutely mortified.
I'm excited to break some ofthat, those myths down possibly
and learn how you got to thestage.
So go back to yourentrepreneurial journey, like
what led you to start Right CatCreative in 2021, and what did
(01:50):
those early days look like foryou and the brand?
Cathlyn (01:53):
First of all I wanna say I'm an introvert too.
I am very introverted.
I am neurodivergent.
I've got a lot of differentthings going.
I live with depression andanxiety, a lot of that stuff.
So I'm not like just a naturalextrovert who's yeah, it's easy.
Everybody can do this.
I've worked on it to get to thepoint where it feels easy now
(02:15):
and it feels natural and fun.
So going back, my first careerwas as an actor, I went to
school for theater.
Which.
Might surprise you knowing thatI'm an introvert, but actually
the majority of professionalactors identify as introverts
because it's a career that's allabout connection, which is
really similar to speaking.
(02:35):
Right.
Beverly (02:36):
Interesting.
My husband and I met doingmusical theater.
So fun.
So that's interesting that yousay that.
I love this one-on-one, like youand I having a chat today, I am
all about it.
I am so here for it.
It's one of my favorite parts ofmy work.
But you put me on a stage andhave a hundred eyeballs staring
at me and it becomes a wholelike, whew, I can do this.
And I do tend to channel theenergy well, however, I might
(02:59):
speak too fast or not really bepresent.
And podcasting actually has beena way for me to master some of
that a little bit to be morepresent in the conversation.
I'm so excited to talk moreabout this and I love that you
have this theater background.
I was a dancer for 18 years,like I was on stage.
Totally different though.
When you're talking and sharingyour ideas,
Cathlyn (03:21):
It's, especially when you're comparing a performance
art.
So I started out as an actor.
My first formal business was anarts education company that I
founded with another actor andeducator.
And we taught theater to kidsall across the United States.
We were in, 18 states of ourprogramming.
And when I was working with thatcompany, I was writing
(03:46):
everything.
I was writing script and lyricsand music, but I was also
writing our sales emails and ourblogs and our website content
and all our physical marketingcollateral, our brochures and
our postcards and everythingthat would go out to schools and
organizations.
The theater industry is acomplicated and multi-layered
one, and there were some thingsthat I didn't love about it even
(04:08):
though I loved the work of itwhen it came time for me to
leave that industry, you mightthink that I switched right
away.
To writing and marketing.
And I did not, I decided I wasgoing to go to law school.
So I had this vision of, thestability and the reliability,
and I think I would make areally fabulous attorney.
(04:31):
So I studied for the lsat, Itook the lsat, I retook the
lsat.
Then it was 2020 and I had beenaccepted and I got a full ride
scholarship to University ofFlorida.
And I was like, that's great.
And classes were gonna start inAugust of 2020.
And the world had changed.
My personal relationships hadchanged.
I had this long-termrelationship that ended and my
(04:53):
world just fell apart.
But I was like, you know what?
I'm not in the mental head spaceto make a new choice right now.
Law school is paid for.
They're paying for me to go.
I'm going to go.
So even when I started school, Ialready knew that it wasn't
really where I wanted to be.
And I went through a fullsemester and part of the second
semester and over winter break,my best friend and I had a
(05:15):
conversation.
She was like, you should bewriting.
We'll figure out how to makethat work for you.
And I was like, ah, I don'tknow, I'm gonna give myself to
this next semester.
And I didn't last through thenext semester.
About the end of February, I waslike, yeah, no, hit the withdraw
button.
And that's when I went full-timewith Right Cat Creative.
Beverly (05:33):
You told me before we started that the cat is actually
Tucker, your cat.
How Did you come up with thename?
Cathlyn (05:39):
So funny thing, Tucker wasn't actually my cat when I
named the company, but I wasliving with him.
He came with an old friend ofmine had moved to Chicago and
moved in with me.
We got an apartment together andshe brought Tucker and I fell in
love with each other right away.
I'm very much a cat person and Ilove affectionate cats.
So Tucker and I bonded and myfriend Felicia, who was Tucker's
(06:04):
guardian at the time, at onepoint was like, Cathlyn, when
you move away to Florida, wouldyou consider taking Tucker with
you?
And I was like no, he's beenwith you for eight years.
You are his person.
This is what he's familiar with.
And then COVID happened and myroommate.
Went to quarantine with familyin Wisconsin and I was left in
(06:25):
Chicago with Tucker for fourmonths, and it was just the two
of us.
So by the end of that I waslike, Hey, Felicia, remember
this conversation that we had?
And yeah, Tucker moved acrossthe country with me.
He rode down in a van wearinghis little harness, and hated
it.
Beverly (06:40):
Tucker adopted you.
Cathlyn (06:42):
He did.
It was very much one of thosesituations where he picked me.
Beverly (06:46):
I love that.
So how did you go up with RightCat Creative though?
Cathlyn (06:50):
So I originally wanted to be Blue Cat Creative, and
that came from, I have thisstamp and blue ink pad that my
sisters gave me when I was inhigh school.
And I've used as a book plate.
So for 20 years, I stamp all ofmy books with that blue cat I
wanted to be Blue Cat Creative,but apparently there's already a
Blue Cat Creative.
And there are actually a lot ofBlue Cat themed businesses.
(07:13):
I didn't wanna get stuck in whatdo I name my company?
I wanted to name my company andget started.
So I just made a list of otherone syllable adjectives.
And Right was the one.
Beverly (07:22):
So talk about who you help, specifically, who is it
that really needs to do a TEDxtalk and talk about an example
of someone you've helped andwhat that has looked like for
them.
Cathlyn (07:33):
I work with business owners.
Usually it's women who come tome.
I don't specifically advertiseto women, but usually I do end
up working with women and theyare women who have been in
business for a few years.
They've been doing all the rightthings, and they might feel like
stable or they might feel like,oh, I'm not quite stable and
(07:58):
either I need to do somethingdifferent to get to the next
level, or I need to do somethingdifferent to reach that
stability.
So they usually come to me whenthey're in that place and
they're like, I know I can do aTEDx talk, or I know I want to
do a TEDx talk.
And I have this general idea ofwhat I would like to talk about.
And that's really the first stepis that, what I call your big
(08:21):
idea, and it's not distilleddown, it's not clear, it's not
concise, but it's this sort ofcloud that floats.
So usually what happens whenpeople start with me is they
come and they share that bigidea, and then I synthesize it
and I listen and I say, okay.
I just heard four, maybe fivedifferent TEDx talks.
Beverly (08:38):
Yeah.
Cathlyn (08:39):
Because with TEDx, like the average TEDx talk is 12 and
a half minutes long.
Beverly (08:42):
So short, you have to be so short and make really
powerful thing happen in that 12minutes
Cathlyn (08:49):
and you can, but it's hard to do by yourself'cause
you're so close to it you tendto think that there needs to be
a lot of layering in it.
And something that I work on ispeeling back those layers and
Okay.
What is that core ideaunderneath,
Beverly (09:03):
you call it something on your website, what do you
call it?
The power.
Cathlyn (09:07):
Power idea.
Beverly (09:07):
Power idea.
Yeah.
I like the word even the poweridea.
It just makes me stand up alittle taller.
Cathlyn (09:12):
Yeah.
Beverly (09:13):
What got you to the TEDx stage Talk about you and
how you got to the stage andwhat was your topic and what was
that process like, just for youdoing it.
Cathlyn (09:22):
Like many of my clients, TEDx had been something
that was on my vision board orgoals list.
For a long time.
Way back in high school, I was acompetitive speaker and the
category that I really lovedcompeting in, one of the ones
that I went all the way up tonational competition in is
called Oratory.
And that style was basicallyTEDx style before TEDx existed
(09:46):
because TEDx didn't actuallyexist until 2008 or 2009.
So Ted started putting talks onYouTube in 2006.
And they blew up.
And I remember watching them andbeing like, this is what I used
to do.
This is fun, I could do this.
And then when Ted X started, itbecame more reachable because
(10:10):
Ted is like, Bill Clinton hasgiven a TED talk.
Shonda Rhimes, they're bighousehold names a lot of the
time.
Whereas with TEDx and thoselocally, independently organized
events, it's people like you andme aren't household names.
We have some gosh darn goodideas and people wanna hear
them.
So I was working as an actor atthe time.
(10:31):
I went all the way through myfirst business and it was
actually when I dropped out oflaw school.
And I had just started Right CatCreative that I decided to
apply.
I'd had this experience ofwithdrawing from law school and
a lot of things that had goneinto making that decision.
So my TEDx talk is called theBrave Leap Sideways.
(10:52):
And the idea is that it is soeasy for us all in
relationships, in our education,in our careers, to get stuck on
this treadmill that's goingfaster and we can't keep up and
it's not taking us anywhere.
And the only way to get going onthe path, that's the next right
path for us, is to take ourbrave leap over the handrail of
(11:14):
that treadmill and take a breathand figure that out from the
next step.
So yeah, that's how I ended updoing it.
I only applied to two events,and then that was in April of
that year.
And in November I gave my talk.
Beverly (11:27):
So you said you're an introvert.
Yeah.
You said that.
You like the oratory thing?
I'm getting mixed messages.
I feel like
Cathlyn (11:34):
I love having a script that's part of it.
Knowing what I am going to saybefore it is my time to say it.
Beverly (11:42):
Okay.
Okay.
Fair.
So as a dancer, I likechoreography, so I get that
like, when you have your ownchoreography, you know where
you're supposed to be.
I'm good, but if you leave me tomy own devices, I'm a big clutz.
But, do You believe that it canbecome a crutch too?
We're so bent on, likememorizing the words that
there's also this whole otherside of it of like humanness and
(12:03):
feelings and connection thatcan't be scripted.
Did you have to worry about thatat all with the Ted x?
Cathlyn (12:09):
I see this problem in my clients quite a bit, and the
problem is that we stop short.
We get so tied up in thememorization that we feel like
once it's memorized, it's ready,it's not.
Once it's memorized, then theperformance work can start.
Then you can start directingyour talk.
(12:30):
Then you can really focus onreleasing your brain from
thinking about the words.
The head of Ted, his name isChris Anderson, in his book, he
talks about something he callsthe uncanny valley, which is
when we're giving our talk andwe're so focused on our words
and it feels a little robotic,it feels a little stilted.
(12:51):
It feels like this doesn't feelquite human.
And that you need to keeprehearsing and keep rehearsing.
And I believe you need to keeprehearsing until you are super
duper bored.
Until you're like, this is eyerolling.
Why would anyone wanna listen tothis?
When you get there, the nexthill you get over is where you
break through that uncannyvalley and suddenly you're
(13:12):
connecting and suddenly it'snatural and soft and human
again.
Beverly (13:17):
The uncanny valley.
When I first started stepping infront of my brand and I started
to do more talking and more ofthe podcasts and guesting and
some of that, I definitely wasmore script driven.
But what came from that, is thatI have a lot of one-liners that
are just mine that I call likemy road markers.
Like in this part of theconversation, we're gonna talk
(13:38):
about the should suitcase andbecause I've talked about the
should suitcase enough I feelreally confident in where the
conversation's gonna go and I'mable to be more present.
But in the beginning I was like,the should suitcase is the thing
that society places upon us andtells us all the things that we
should do.
But now, I'm like, so who'scarrying the should suitcase do
(13:59):
you feel like you should show upa certain way?
Now it's just a differentconversation.
And maybe that is because I'vesaid it enough that I'm bored,
but now I can play with theidea, which is great.
Cathlyn (14:08):
And you create these building blocks.
These are the stories I alwaystell about my clients.
These phrases that I use.
These are my what I calltidbits.
That you can then pile togetherin an interview like this.
Or if you're on a panel or whenyou're writing a talk that
doesn't need to be memorized.
You can be like, okay, thisstory is gonna lead into that
(14:29):
anecdote, lead into these, thisgroup of statistics that I
always talk about.
But I had the same thing, myfirst few podcasts that I ever
gave years ago at this point, Igot questions from the host and
I wrote out answers, and I hadmy little paper right here so
(15:54):
that I could be literallyreading my answers.
It just takes practice oftelling those stories over and
over again.
Beverly (16:02):
I have a story bank now, like I literally have a
story bank of all the stories ofshow the examples of what I
wanna say.
Or I have client stories, so mystories of like my development
and the major areas of where Itook leaps probably through the
uncanny valley.
And then I have the clientstories that prove the point I'm
making.
So it's like a one two punchHey, do this thing, but then.
(16:24):
Here's someone who did it, andthis is what happened with that.
So now I have the story bank ofme, the story bank of them, and
then I have these like buildingblocks of things that I talk
about in there.
And somehow the magic happenswhere it's all weaved together.
And I can riff on any element ofthose building blocks using
those, going back to my stories.
(16:47):
But I feel like you have to saythe story out loud a lot to
fully own the story, which is soweird'cause it's your freaking
story.
Cathlyn (16:54):
There's a difference between having the intellectual
awareness of the story, this ishow the story goes, and just
being able to relax and let itflow.
And it's that relaxing and flowthat we wanna get to when we're
up in front of an audience.
Whether that's here where, helloaudience you're not here with us
(17:15):
in the room today, but you'relistening later.
Or whether you're giving akeynote live in front of 400
people.
In part of my actor training.
There all of these differentmethods of how an actor can go
about creating their work.
And one of the ways that I wastrained, you do all of this
table work first.
You do all this text work in, inyour script before you ever get
(17:38):
up so that you've alreadyintellectualized it to the point
where you can let go and you canlet that all drop out of your
head.
You don't need to be payingattention to it so that when you
step into the rehearsal room,all of that prep work is done
and you can move forward.
When I work with my clients andwe're starting to talk about,
(18:00):
okay, what do you want to put inyour talk?
I give them what I call mycontent support guide.
And it has a bunch of differentcategories of different types of
evidence or structure that youwant in your TEDx talk.
And we just brainstorm that allout.
And at first they might be like,okay, here is the story that
(18:20):
happened to this.
And that's where you're reallyYeah.
Getting the structure of thatstory.
But the essence of the storydoesn't come out until you're
super duper comfortable with itup here.
Beverly (18:30):
Yeah, that makes total sense.
So you went through thisprocess, did you think it was
easy to be a TEDx talker
Cathlyn (18:36):
For me, I went in with a really specific skillset.
I had been a competitivespeaker, for years I had written
10 minute talks.
I had memorized them, I hadperformed them.
I had this education as anactor, as a director, and I had
a whole career doing thosethings professionally.
So the thing that I reallyneeded help with is I know that
(18:58):
I can be a procrastinator.
Unfortunately, I knew that goingin, so I had a coach who we just
met every week, just so I wouldhave that external I need to do
the work because otherwise Ishow up on the call and I feel
the shame of not having done thework.
But a lot of it, my training andmy experience really fueled.
I have this free call that Icalled TEDx Demystify that I do
(19:20):
every few months.
And on that call I'm like, lookyou are not alone.
If you don't feel a hundredpercent confident in how to
pitch yourself to events, if youdon't feel a hundred percent
confident in how to distill yourbig idea into that one core
statement.
If you don't feel a hundredpercent confident writing a talk
(19:40):
that feels natural when it'sspoken out loud.
Because we're used to writingblogs.
We're used to writing emails,and those things are intended to
be read.
Writing a speech is a differentthing.
That's why there are people whospecialize in being speech
writers.
So there are all these differentskill sets involved in TEDx and
most people aren't going to feela hundred percent confident in a
any of them, let alone in all ofthem.
(20:03):
So it's okay.
And I encourage you to findeither a coach like me who can
help you in all of those areasor different people who you're
like, oh, you know what I reallyneed help with.
I really need help withpitching.
Cool.
So find someone whose specialtyis in pitching, pitching to
TEDx.
Beverly (20:22):
Yeah.
So is there somebody specificthat you've helped that just as
a story that you just love, thatyou saw them go from, holy crap,
I'm doing this thing and I havethis big goal to being super
successful and having a reallygreat talk and feeling so good
about themselves afterwards thatthey did this hard thing but
they did it well.
Cathlyn (20:41):
So one of my clients who gave her talk last year, her
name is Cynthia Barnes and.
She had a lot going on in herlife.
She had a lot going onprofessionally.
She had a lot going onpersonally at the time.
And she had gotten accepted tospeak at an event and she was
feeling overwhelmed by it.
And we got to, a couple weeksbefore the event, and when we
(21:06):
met up, she had this moment of,I can't do this.
It's too much.
I'm not ready, all of these likestories that had been bubbling
under the surface came out andshe felt like just stepping away
and saying, you know what?
I can't I'm sorry, but I have towithdraw.
And together we pulled at thosethreads to figure out, okay,
(21:27):
where are these stories comingfrom?
What is it that you really feelis that barrier that you can't
get over?
And when we figure that out, Iwas able to lead her through
some exercises.
By the end of that session shecried and she was like, I can do
this.
She really did feel confident.
And I don't get to see many ofmy clients speak live, but a
(21:48):
handful I've seen.
And I was in the room with her'cause she was speaking locally
here.
And afterward she was glowing.
And then a few months later sheposted this thing on LinkedIn
that she was like a number ofmonths ago, my TEDx talk went
live and it changed my entireworld.
She talked about how that talkhad become the foundation of a
(22:10):
book that she was writing.
It had changed how she wasworking with clients in a really
foundational way.
And that shift had given her theconfidence, do a bunch of things
in her personal life it wasreally emotional to go through
that whole process with her andthen see her walk out.
And see even now, a year and ahalf after she gave her talk,
(22:31):
how all of those ripple effects.
Are happening.
It's really beautiful.
Beverly (22:36):
That is the greatest gift I have is working with
clients that I'm on this journeywith them to discover more about
who they are, their confidence,have some momentum, have some of
those ripple effects with theirmarketing and their brand, and
feeling totally and fully inalignment with what they're
supposed to be doing.
To see them in their own magic,and maybe that's it.
(22:58):
It's the glow of it.
And I feel like there is thismoment with us as well.
I've had the moment where Irebranded and there was this
moment when I was gonna pushpublish in this new brand that I
felt so incredibly excited aboutand really felt was the most me
it's ever been so really deeplypersonal.
Cathlyn (23:19):
Very vulnerable.
Beverly (23:20):
Very vulnerable.
I'm pushing publish and I'mlike, what if they don't like
it?
What if they don't like me?
And I was so excited on one sideand I was so afraid on the other
side.
And after I pushed published andI took the deep breath and
everyone was like, oh my gosh,this is amazing.
This is so you wickedly brandedis so you, and such affirming to
(23:42):
that choice.
That those things that kind ofscare us sometimes are the best
things we can do to pushourselves forward, to build more
confidence, to feel more inalignment, to feel more
empowered in our truth I get towitness that all the time with
my clients who push publish on anew brand.
And to see it more aligned withwho they are to deeply feel
(24:04):
confident in sending someone totheir website.
Like they, for the first timefeel like they were actually
showing up.
And when you show up for a TEDTalk, you are showing up.
That's probably my biggest fear,to be honest.
Cathlyn is I'm gonna show up andit's gonna to be there forever.
It's recorded.
It's on the internet.
It's on the internet, and it islike a record of my complete
(24:26):
whatever greatness or mycomplete failure in it.
So it's that's what's scary tome is what if I don't do well?
Cathlyn (24:34):
And that's why you work with someone like me.
So that you make sure that it'sgreat.
Yeah.
And you're super duper proud.
Beverly (24:40):
I'm sure high performing women, mostly our
listeners here can understand isthis idea of I want it to be so
good and so perfect.
And so I'm afraid to even sayit's ready because it has to be
so perfect and so good and allthe things as opposed to just
you know what, like my veryfirst podcast wasn't great.
My podcasts now I think arereally good.
It's interesting how in our headwe can be and how freeing, like
(25:03):
when you talk about her, howfreeing it can be to fully show
up as you, to accomplish thisthing.
And to not let fear hold youback from something that was so
incredibly important for yourdevelopment as a human, but also
as a business person in thisworld.
Cathlyn (25:19):
understood this concept of what I now call a power idea.
And it's different from TEDxtalks about ideas worth
spreading.
And your idea worth spreading ispart, it's a small part of what
I teach and create about powerideas.
And one of the reasons that Isettled on power.
As that descriptor identifier isbecause having that awareness
(25:45):
and understanding and way tospeak about what the world that
you're creating gives youpersonal power.
Yeah.
It allows you so much room tostep forward and so much room to
create yourself and yourbusiness, let alone own the
power to create impact.
And if you don't know what yourpower idea is, which I believe
(26:08):
that talks about the challengesthat you see in the world right
now, what's wrong with thestatus quo.
It talks about what could bedifference, what sort of utopia
you want to create, and thenwhat do we need to do to get
there?
Like we as individuals, we associety, all of these different
components come together.
And when you can get that reallyclear and really concise and
(26:29):
really sticky, that's whatcreates the power in your
business to move forward.
Beverly (26:34):
I like that for a lot of reasons.
Because we always talk about youhave to have a really strong
mission statement and visionstatement and core values, and
then you have this people callthe elevator speech, but it's
like your one main idea.
And that is the main idea thatdrives everything.
That's where your contentpillars live.
That's where you blog from.
That's the thing that you wannabe known for.
So the power idea is like theone main idea we use.
(26:59):
Yeah.
But it is so incrediblypowerful.
It is.
People think it's, and I've usedthis example before when you
narrow your focus in such a wayand you own it a mile deep,
right?
It is freeing on how you talkabout what you do, who you
serve, and the transformationyou offer.
And the TEDx exercise, I'll callit, it's much more than that,
(27:21):
can only help you own that evenfurther, right?
So we help you find that inyourself and in your brand, and
in your marketing materials.
But taking that and creatingthis idea we're spreading, which
you say here, like it's morethan that, but this idea that is
completely yours is only goingto magnify the clarity.
(27:42):
And I could do it for a lot ofother people, but not for myself
because I was too close.
When I took the time to reallynoodle with the idea and like
really stretch it and do thethings that I do for my clients,
for myself we would take it adeep breath right now.
It was like a breath of releaseof knowing, a deep knowing in
your truth.
Cathlyn (28:03):
And you talk about going a mile deep when I'm
creating power ideas with myclients, there are two different
formats that we end up with andthe first one is called Your
Manifesto.
It's called your Manifestobecause it goes so deep.
It's an essay.
I have an example of one on myblog that is mine.
So we've got this manifesto thatcan really dig into all of the
(28:27):
components that go into a poweridea.
And then when we've written yourmanifesto, that's when we take a
step back when we say, okay,what is your core statement?
And your core statement then iswhat TEDx would call your idea
worth spreading.
It's one or two sentences.
It's very clear, it's verygraspable and you really need
both, because a lot of peoplewill think about everything is
(28:49):
figureoutable for Marie Forleo,or start with y from Simonson.
All of these like almost slogansthat these thought leaders have
and they reach for those, theysay, I want one of those.
But when that's what you reachfor first you're building a
castle on sand.
Yeah.
And it's gonna crumble.
You need to do the legwork ofcreating that manifesto of
(29:12):
really digging in and buildingup before you reach for the core
idea.
And you need your core statementbefore it turns into something
that you can print on a t-shirt.
Beverly (29:22):
Okay.
Hold on, stop the train for onesecond.
'cause I want everyone to listento this because we say this too,
without clarity, you have nofoundation for your marketing,
your brand, and you're justspitting the wind, essentially.
You're just throwing stuff onthe wall and hoping it sticks,
so this clarity, this core idea,the manifesto is the beginning
like understanding kind of thewhole truth of you.
(29:45):
And then the golden threadthat's through it is like the
core idea, right?
Then the core idea then becomesthe foundation for the TEDx
idea.
But in my world, that becomesthe foundation of your brand.
So this is very concurrent.
We are living in a very similarspace, Cathlyn, and what you're
(30:05):
saying is incredibly true andit's saying in a different way
that I don't always say it.
So for those that are listening,listen to the way cathlyn's
saying, because maybe that's theway you need to hear it.
But if you just build a logo oryou just create a tagline and
you haven't done some of thatwork underneath, it feels empty.
It feels shallow.
It's not strong and stable andlike the thing with which to
(30:28):
build upon.
Yeah.
And.
I feel, oh, I just feel likewhat you do is like such a great
extension on top of what westart, like we start the process
for you and then you build itand make it like a concept to go
out into the world with, likeactually speak the words, we
write the words, we get theideas, but you are like the
speaking of the words intoexistence in some way.
(30:51):
And that's so good.
Cathlyn (30:53):
You reiterated how we need the depth, we need the
foundation, right?
But we also need the corestatement.
You need both.
You need the manifesto to createthis strength and the
foundation.
And if you can't condense yourwhole manifesto into a sentence
or two, that is powerful andclear, there are people who
aren't gonna hear you becausethey're gonna stop listening.
(31:13):
There are people who aren'tgoing to share your work because
you haven't given them somethingthat's truly graspable and
shareable.
So you need both of thoseformats.
Beverly (31:25):
Graspable and shareable.
And what I found on social mediaand all the things that we do is
that the things that peoplewanna share are things that
uplift them, make them looksmart, make them look connected.
So this idea of shareable makesthem have value to their
community in some way, shape orform.
(31:45):
So that it's not just about you,even though it is about you.
It's not just about you, butalso like how it can help so
many others.
It's utopia that you wannacreate and the ways with which
to do that, which isinteresting.
So this season's question is allabout how do you bring
everything together for yourbrand?
So this is work for Ted Talkstoo.
(32:05):
You have your theater, you haveyour performance, you have your
oratory background and all ofthat copywriting.
There's some coaching going onhere.
How do you activate all thatinto your unique space?
To make right cat creative.
How does that all come togetherin such a way it's uniquely you
Cathlyn, and it's also sovaluable to people.
Cathlyn (32:28):
For me and my experience in this business I
started just as a copywriter.
And then when I was getting mycommunity behind my TEDx talk so
that they could spread it outwhen it arrived, people started
asking me, they started lookingat my background and saying, oh,
you are an actor, the director,an editor or writer, and I've
(32:49):
given a TEDx talk.
Can you help me?
And so that's really how theTEDx side of my business
organically was created.
And it took a couple years ofoffering both of those services
for me to really see whatconnected them.
Like I saw that they were bothmarketing, I saw that they were
(33:10):
both like ways of outreach.
But it was really when I startedthinking about what I ended up
calling your power idea that Isaw that is the foundation for
all of the words that we use inour business.
Whether it's in our copy,whether it's in our keynotes and
interviews and other things,whether it's in our social media
(33:34):
and emails, the blogs we write,like there has to be that thread
that all roads lead back.
When I say I'm a TEDx coach anda copywriter, people get it.
People know what those twothings are, but what I really am
is your power idea creator.
I create that foundation foryou.
Now, if that's what I wentaround calling myself, people
would be like, I don't know whatthat means.
And it probably wouldn't be veryeffective.
Beverly (33:56):
I beg to differ.
I think there would be somepower in that.
Yeah.
Cathlyn (33:59):
I'll keep thinking about it.
Beverly (34:01):
There's a lot of TEDx coaches, but how many power idea
creators are there?
Cathlyn (34:05):
I just feel like it is so essential, like the way that
I have created the componentsand the formats of the power
idea.
I don't know that you can getwhat I want you to get for your
business without all of thoseparts and pieces.
So for a TEDx coach, just belike, let's create an idea worth
spreading.
You don't have the foundationthen.
(34:27):
So it's more than just creatingyour TEDx talk or your power
talk It all has to cometogether.
Beverly (34:34):
So good though.
If you're listening right nowand you're thinking, oh my gosh,
I need this power idea.
I need to create a strongfoundation for my brand.
I would love for you to give usa review and let us know this is
resonating and connecting withyou because I think so many of
us do something we truly love.
We're brilliant.
I know my listeners arebrilliant and they're trying so
(34:54):
hard to make the world a betterplace, Cathlyn.
And they want to magnify theirimpact by having a strong brand
and marketing, also the toolslike a TEDx talk and how that
can magnify them, but they don'tknow how and they sometimes get
in their own way and there's allthese other external things that
are telling them, don't do itthat way, do this way.
If it's resonating that this hasto all start from a foundational
(35:15):
place so that you can growoutside of that, continue that
ripple effect from it that youtalked about with that
particular example you gave.
It has to be strong enough tohandle all of that.
And the power idea is huge.
We call ours the brand SparkBlueprint.
It's the spark.
It's this thing that starts itall.
We have different language forit, but it's incredibly
(35:36):
important and it servesdifferent purposes, but it's
incredibly important to get thatgolden thread to help you go to
the next step, whatever thatlooks like for you.
And that's why you need someonelike Cathlyn, or you need
somebody like me to help you seeyourself in a different way.
That's the thing is everyone'soh my gosh.
You see what's possible?
Yeah, I see what's possiblebecause I've been doing this for
(35:57):
a long time, but I feel like Ididn't think I deserved to know
what made me special.
I thought that I just did thework.
I just was a marketer and I justdid the work and the work to
speak for itself and all thosethings.
I did not think I had a story totell.
I didn't think that people wouldlisten to my story.
I didn't think that I hadanything unique to offer the
(36:17):
conversation.
But I have a lot to add to theconversation.
This is so important.
I think especially for women andI'm with you.
I mostly work with women, andwomen don't always feel like
they have a place at the table.
They don't always feel like theyhave a perspective that needs to
be shared, that it is new ordifferent.
And I just want you all tolisten, you all have something
really special to add to theconversation.
(36:38):
And it might just take some timewith Cathlyn to make it happen.
Don't live small, live big, Iwant you to live as big as
possible.
Hey there, you've just finishedpart one of the episode.
How are you feeling?
Excited, inspired, but we'rejust getting started.
Next Thursday we're droppingpart two, and you won't wanna
miss it.
Be sure to subscribe to ournewsletter, so you'll be the
first to know when it goes live.
(36:59):
Until then, take a breather, letthose ideas simmer, and we'll
see you next week.
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