159: Amena Brown - On Writing A Talk Like a Poet

Hey everybody, and welcome to This Moved Me, a podcast about creating talks that move the world. With me, your host, Sally Koering Zimney. Together with some fabulous guests, we will have a casual conversation about the art of public speaking, because a good talk can move the world and it'll be fun. Yeah, I would think making alien cows meaningful. That's not a small task. I love your giggle.

Wow.

Oh my gosh, so waiting for everybody to figure out the alphabet. Hey movers, it is Sally here on This Moved Me, and I am so excited to bring you this week's podcast interview with the amazing Amina Brown. And Amina and I met at the Story conference earlier this fall. And I know that if you've been listening to this show, you've met some of the other amazing people who I've met there— Brad Montague, Jason Jaeger, just to name a few. And Amina is the first in a series of a few people from Story that I get to share with you. And the reason I wanted Amina on the show is she is a powerhouse performer. She is a spoken word poet, a a speaker, an author. She's got a new book coming out, um, right now it's out, so you can go check it out. But she's— her skill as a poet, as a spoken word artist, is so clear and present in her work as a speaker. And I think that, that the joining of those two worlds is something for us to explore, that we as content creators can learn from the poets. Like, how do we take some of the best and the brightest moments as a poet and bring that into our work as a speaker? How do we choose our words carefully? How do we keep our words visual and imaginative and use metaphor and all of the gifts and skills that poets bring? Like, how— we need to do that more, right? We're not just up there kind of shooting the breeze. Right? How do we bring that kind of intentionality? So I was really excited to bring Amina on the show. She's a delightful person. We had so much fun and she shares some of her poetry. So, uh, I'm really excited for you to get to know Amina a little bit and for all of us to think more like a poet as we work on our talks. Here she is, Amina Brown. We are making it a reality. Yeah, I mean, I loved Story so much, and I've talked a lot about Story on this podcast because it was such an ex— a performative experience, inspirational and moving. And, and Harris does such an amazing job of pulling together what is an experience and so thoughtful about curating each moment that I, you know, I walked away from it, I was like, I want to talk to the world, all of the people. I want to bring everybody on my show and share just what happened and what these moments are and how we bring more of that into our lives.

Yeah, totally. Yes.

So, uh, Amina, just so you know, I'd like to dive right in But I do want to hear, like, just set the foundation for everybody about your story.

Okay.

Like how you got to the point where you, you're a spoken word artist and you're out speaking at conferences. And I know music's a big part of what you do. You're a performer. So yeah, what was the journey that led you here?

Oh my goodness, that's such a big question.

I know, I know.

Started with some collard greens. So, it probably did, really. Well, I think really I grew up in a house full of books. I feel like that's like the beginning of my origin story as a writer and eventually becoming a performer, but I just, I was a big nerd. I just loved reading books. My mom was a big reader, so she just had this like, I remember it was like a wall unit that was made of bamboo. This sounds very '80s, right?

Yeah, totally.

And she had just all these books on there. I mean, it was like the gamut, you know, Toni Morrison and Alice Walker and James Baldwin. She just had so many books on there. And I just, you know, kind of was sneaking behind her, just trying to read everything that was on there, you know, even though I was very young. Trying to do that. So there were a couple of times I pulled out a book and I was like, "This is beautiful, but I don't understand what this means," you know? And I think really growing up just in a house full of books and with a mom who really valued words, taking us to greeting card stores and bookstores and the library and stuff like that, I really think that just created this real honor that I had for writers and communicators and for how you can use words well. So I just— I wanted to be a writer early on as a little girl. I just thought— I just looked at this book and like, I'm reading, you know, Ramona and Beezus and, you know, some of those old school books, reading Maya Angelou's early autobiographical work. And I just thought, man, whatever you have to do to have your words in one of these, I want to do that. I was a very shy kid, so I really— it kind of surprises me looking back that I became a person who's talking on stage because I was very shy. Very withdrawn kid, very, you know, writes in the notebook. You know, I was not a ham in any way growing up, you know. So the fact that really the love of writing is what led me to stage as far as speaking and performing is actually a cool piece of transformation.

I love that, that it was the writing that brought you out front, because I think most people see that they're either one or the other. Like I'm a writer or I'm a speaker and ne'er the two shall meet. And I happen to love the content creation side of it. I mean, I write, but of course don't consider myself a writer, which is silly, I suppose. But I think that combination, the nexus of both of those, is really powerful and beautiful because the words are— that's the heart and core of it.

Yeah, it's like you have to have a respect for words in order to do any of this type of work. You know, if you don't have a respect or a love for words, I don't know how you can do it because that's what all of this is about. It's about how you can take the words that you have in order to communicate a point or a passion or a charge. Even to people. So I, I love that. I love that I get to work with words every day. I'm sure you do too.

I do, I do. I totally love it. I was just saying yesterday, we were— I was talking about authenticity, and I said I, I think one of the pieces that we forget in authenticity is the importance of editing, right? That in the process of finding your voice, and it's a process of like digging deeper, that we have to be really disciplined editors and not just take the first go at whatever it is that we're doing, to like keep digging. Because our particular point of view and our voice and the thing that makes us us is in there, but we have to edit our way to it. And most people don't fancy themselves editors. And like, that's just a really important skill. And I'd never really put those things together before, editing and authenticity. It's like, huh.

That's good. That's good. I think sometimes as writers, and sometimes even as speakers or stage communicators, we fear the editing process because the editing process feels like the moment that either you have to tell yourself you're not as awesome as you thought you were, or if someone else is being another set of eyes on it, that they're telling you you're not awesome. But if we let the editing process work for us, it totally makes whatever we're writing or communicating better and sharper and clearer. Yes.

And it's just that word process. Everything's a process. The creative process, the writing process, the editing process. It's just— there's a lot of process. And you have to work the process and get through it and kind of keep your nose to the grindstone. OK, so I totally took us off on a tangent there. And you're telling a story about how you came to be where what you're doing. So I'll focus us back in, right? You grew up in words and around words and with a love and respect for words.

Yeah, I started writing poetry when I was probably maybe like 12 or 13. I mean, outside of class, just in my own, you know, notebook scenarios there. And my mom let me know pretty early on that she was the kind of parent who did not believe in privacy. So she told me, just so I would know, you know, whatever you write in this house, I'm reading it. If I come across your journal, your notebooks— I mean, of course, this is old school stuff. I actually was writing notes to my friends in class. Whenever I'm talking to like high school or college students and I'm like, yeah, no, we didn't have text message. We had to literally write text.

We had to literally write it.

Literally write it.

And they're like, brains, they're like, what?

That's crazy. They're looking like, what, what century was this that you did? Like, they're just looking like you're immediately so ancient. I'm like, I'm not ancient, I'm a young person. I'm so cool, you guys, you have no idea how cool I am. Totally that, you know. So my mom was like, if I find it, your little notes to your friends, whatever it is, I'm reading it. And she came across one of my poetry notebooks and she was just like, "I love this. I really think you have great work here." I, you know, she was just very, very encouraging, which really was awesome because that's a moment, that's a very vulnerable moment, you know, the first time someone is reading your work, and she totally could have just squished me, you know, with her words, and she didn't. But she was like, you know, my mom was like, oh, it's not just like I'm encouraging you to keep writing. Like, what about these contests? And what about getting your work copywritten? Like, my mom was the first person as a teenager to take me into the library to the copyright section to fill out the forms to copyright my poems. You know, she was like, awesome ownership of your work. You know, like, this is her taking me as like a 14-year-old, you know, into the library to do this. So my mom had way bigger vision for me than I had for myself. So I would write all the time. I would compete in speech competitions sometimes, but I would never compete with my original work. I would always memorize Paul Robeson or James Weldon Johnson, Maya Angelou, a lot of those just amazing poets. I would perform their work, and I would never win the competition. I'd always get, like, third place or fourth place, and it burned my mom up, you know, the entire way home. I get home, my mom's like, "Those judges don't know what they're talking about." Right, yeah. "Let that girl win because she did her own poem, Amina. Why don't you do your own poems?" You know, kind of stuff. And I'm like, "Mom, you know, that's cool and everything, but like, you're my only fan. You're the only person that thinks my poetry's awesome. I'm not embarrassing myself and doing this." So she took one of my poems without telling me and submitted it to a competition. If it won the competition, it was one of those, like, it had a local component, and if you won locally, you had to go to your local competition and perform your work in order to receive, like, your award. And then you had to go on and compete, you know, on a state level, and then you had to go on, you know, if you made it that far, you'd go on and compete at the national level. So my poem won the contest, but my mom didn't tell me until it was, like, a couple of days before I needed to, like, go there. And she's just like, "Oh, I entered you into this contest, and look at this, you won! And we're gonna have to go there, 'cause, you know, they're gonna want you to perform your poem," you know? So she sort of— Mom muscled me into that. Yeah, she did! So I went there that Saturday and performed my poem. I was shaking like a leaf, I was so nervous. And I just fell in love with it. I fell in love with performing my own work, and I know I never would have done that if she wouldn't have pushed me, you know?

Yeah, moms, they are like making the world work, I think, all the time. That's so cool. Yay, Mom. So you did not imagine yourself as a performer until that moment?

Yeah, I really thought, really right until maybe I was about to graduate from college, I was still thinking I was going to become a novelist. I really wanted to be like young Toni Morrison, you know, young Alice Walker. That's more of what I envisioned for myself. I enjoyed writing poems, so I figured I would always write poems, but I thought— I definitely think about that as a vocation or as something, you know, that I felt like this calling to do. I just thought, you know, I really love this and I feel like I do this well. I'll keep doing that until my, you know, career as a novelist takes off. We know how that goes.

Yeah.

And so it just sort of surprised me on my— well, first of all, I discovered that I'm actually just not that great of a fiction writer. So it turns out I'm just better at writing poems than I am writing fiction. I've been joking with my friends that I'm going to take my really bad novels that I've started that are just— they're terrible. And I'm just thinking maybe I'll do like a series on Amazon one year and just go, You know what, guys? I'm just gonna put my really bad novels out here, and they're $3.99. I hope you enjoy how bad they are. Maybe it will encourage you to write something better.

Yes!

You should! That's a great idea. So I totally might sneak on Amazon and just put my really bad novels out there, but I think as I was realizing, man, I'm not that great at the fiction form, and I really got into not just writing poetry, but when I moved to Atlanta, Atlanta has a really thriving— still does to this day, but coming here in the late '90s had a really thriving poetry scene. So I just started going out to the open mics, and I'm 19, so I'm listening to the real adults, like the grown people, you know, perform. And that's really where I cut my chops, learning how to take something you've written to be able to perform it on stage. And I think that experience of performing spoken word poetry, and then I got into doing slam poetry competitions, I think that really informed a lot of what I now am as a speaker. I think even when I'm speaking, it still keeps some of that performance style, some of the storytelling that's involved when you perform poetry. So it was like a rough-and-tumble journey there of sort of thinking, you know, "Oh, I'll be a novelist," and then realizing like, "Oh, I'm not very good at that. Maybe I should do the poems. That might go better." And I did journalism for a while. I did arts journalism. So I did corporate communications writing for a while. So I really had an opportunity to do a diverse, you know, I guess I've had a diverse experience in the types of writing that I've been able to do. So that's been fun and good, because I think that helps you discover what you love, what you do well, what you don't like, but all of it's sharpening you, helping you to communicate better.

Yeah, for sure. That's a great way of putting it, that it does sharpen you. So you just made this wonderful connection that I wanted to dive into because you do both. You are a poet and a slam poet and a spoken word artist, and you go out and give, you know, what we would call talks or presentations and conferences. I've seen you do that. So help me bridge these two worlds, which I know there's a lot in common with it, but what do you think we as more traditional speakers can learn from the art of the spoken word artist, right, from the poet? What can we bring from the beauty of that world into our world to deepen our work as speakers?

Oh, that's a great question. I think, I think a part of what speakers can learn from the form of spoken word is just the economy that you have to have with your words. That when I'm— before I was really doing more like speaking or even longer poetry sets, I would be invited to a lot of events where I only had the one poem. I literally had 3 minutes to communicate something. And so I think when you're doing a talk and you have 30 minutes or 45 minutes, and maybe on the shorter end of like a TED-style talk, you'd have 18 or 20 minutes. But sometimes as speakers that could fluctuate from that 18 to 20 minutes to you having an hour, you know, to talk. So you have a lot more time to sort of build your points and the stories you want to tell on those things. And I think one thing that spoken word has really helped me to do is in slam poetry, when you're competing with spoken word pieces, you have 3 minutes with a grace period of 10 seconds. Otherwise, you get a time penalty. In a slam. So I think the discipline even of going, I have this story I need to tell, and I only have 3 minutes, so I've got to really shave away a lot of just superfluous things, and I really got to hone down to what— what— how do I— how do I open so that I immediately capture the audience, that I immediately win them to want to listen to everything else I say? And then how do I close strongly without rambling on and on? Because I don't have time to ramble on and on. So I think even the discipline of having to, in a lot of ways for spoken word poets, having to master the form of that 3 to 4 minutes of a poem really helps. You know, I think it would be a great exercise for a lot of speakers, particularly those who are used to doing sort of the longer talk. To say, you know, if I have to give a talk on how to be more creative in your work, what could I do in 3 minutes? And I think that exercise would sort of force you to really have to really dial down, you know, what is this that I need to say? How can I impact the audience in an emotional way and in a way that makes them want to take action about the things that I'm saying? And I think too, the other thing with spoken word poetry that would help a lot of speakers, and I know has helped me, is with spoken word, you have to show more than you tell. So you don't have—

Yeah, say more about that. I love that.

You don't have the luxury of— like, I always laugh about this, Sally, because I very rarely now do commissioned work. I maybe only do 1 or 2 commissioned poems a year now, but I used to do a lot more of them. And people would come to me, and especially for a conference, you know, about leadership and they'd go, well, can you include words like transformation? And can you include words like synergy? And those are words that in a lot of our business and corporate and marketplace kind of spaces, those words totally make sense to us. Those words are important, right? But when you say those two words as an example, nothing comes to your mind. No visual of any kind. You say synergy and like I hear, I see the word in my mind, synergy, and maybe I think of something like electric a little bit, but it takes me a little longer to think of the image in my mind that goes with that. And for spoken word poets, you really have to lean more on concrete images, on how you can evoke the senses in the person that's there in the audience. So I can't use words like synergy and transformation in a poem that will be good for the most part. I'd have to think about, well, if I'm going to say synergy, maybe it's— I don't need to use that word. Maybe I need to be talking about— maybe I need to be talking about the ways that birds, certain species of birds, are able to follow each other when they fly. Like, as soon as I say that phrase, then you see that image in your mind. You remember a time that you were with your grandparent looking up at the birds, you know, in their V formation, you know, getting ready to fly south for the winter. Like, it conjures up an immediate image to you. Or if, you know, I were going to talk about transformation and I'm going to talk about dough and the process of baking bread and yeast and all those things, how, how that takes these simple things like flour and eggs and and transforms them, right? If I'm going to use that imagery, as soon as I start talking about the dough and the baking bread, you've already smelled it, right? Like it's already come to your nostrils now, a time that you remember that smell of baked bread, you know, in your house or in a favorite restaurant that you went to. And so I think spoken word really helps me to lean on how can I, how can I show the listener, the person who's sitting there in the audience? How can I show them what it is I want to say and not just use a lot of words that their brains are having a hard time smelling or tasting or seeing or wanting to touch? And I think poetry itself can really help a lot of us as communicators. Right.

Yeah. I mean, you're talking about tapping into the senses, which is of course what a good poet does. And I think that we undersell ourselves as speakers when we think, like that's a poet's job versus our job.

Yeah.

I was at a conference a few weeks ago and they had a woman doing one of the keynotes and she was talking about memory and that as speakers our job is to ignite the memory of the people in our audience. Of course, because we want them to remember what they're saying. But the way that we do that, what— how I've always talked about it is it's emotion, right? We have to, you know, create an emotion and an emotive connection there. But she went even farther and said that it's actually— you want them to imagine something from their own lives in their head. You want them to picture it, and as soon as they are imagining something or picturing something, then they will remember it. And I I was like, oh, so that's our job as speakers, is not just to feel something and want them to feel something, but we have to help them imagine something.

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah, I love that. That's so true, which is one of the things I love about being a performer and a speaker. That is an awesome honor to be able to do that. And I think that is what makes what we do a conversation with the audience, you know, when done well. It's us, it's this constant sort of leaning back and forth that we are communicating things, but we're leaning to the audience to find out what are they imagining? What are they communicating back to us as they're sort of taking the words we say and kind of running that through the filter of their own life and experience and thoughts? So I love that. That's a part of what makes me really excited doing this.

I totally agree. It's so fun. Okay, so let's talk about your story talk in particular, because we got to sit down next to each other at the big family dinner for those of us who were involved, which was so cool because I had just watched you and I had written down all I— like, I take tons of notes when I watch people speak, but when I watched you, I didn't write anything except wow. Like, that's all I was like, wow, I loved it. I just thought the whole thing was so grounded and beautiful. And you, you did everything that you're talking about here in terms of what we as speakers can learn from poets about the economy of your words. And it was emotive and it was compelling in terms of wanting us to take action. And the metaphors and how you personified how your grandma became this person that I felt like I knew. I mean, it was so— it was really beautifully done. But I know that you, like, the process of how you pulled that together, you know, you were kind of like, I wasn't exactly sure what I was going to do. So totally that. Yeah, tell me about your process. There?

Well, I think a part of it that's nerve-wracking about events like Story Conference, but nerve-wracking in a good way, is that you, you are preaching to the choir when you go into a space like that. So it's different when, you know, you're a creative, let's say, and you're gonna go do some speaking, and there will be some other creatives or people who would consider themselves creatives in the room, and but maybe the majority of the people don't consider themselves to be that. So when you start talking them through, you know, the creative process and how they can be more creative in their life, they're like immediately inspired. You know, you're giving them the 101 talk, but when you're in front of a crowd of people who are entrepreneurs, are creatives, are innovating, you know, in all of their respective fields, it's it can be intimidating because you're like, well, I can't give them the 201. I've got to sort of step up here and give them like a 301 or 401, you know, like they already know the 101 and the 201. I don't want to step up here with a bunch of clichés that they heard 10 years ago, you know. So I just remember feeling really intimidated by that at first, like, okay, you know, how am I going to do this? And then How do I do this in a way that feels very true to me? And I have to pace when I'm building my talks and sets. So I was pacing around, thinking through, you know, and Harris, who leads Lead Story, you know, he and I had kind of, you know, talked and I had sort of spitballed, kind of like, I was like, I told him, I said, I think I'm going to go one of two directions with this talk. I said either my grandmother is going to come up because my grandmother and my great-grandmother are just coming up a lot in my work. I think as I am sort of coming into myself and into my voice, I'm realizing how much they are responsible for that and how much of the women that they are has just built into me. So I was like, it would be not strange at all for that to come up here. I was like, or I will do a talk about all the things I learned from being broke. And I was actually hoping it was going to be that broke talk because that's a talk I've been really wanting to do, you know, because I think that's something when we're in creative entrepreneurial environment, we don't talk about a lot because I don't know, it's like we don't want to admit like how much you actually struggle with money when you're in your own business. You know, you're not always getting paid on the 1st and the 15th. It's very feast or famine. You know, we all don't have some benefactor to come in and start us off with $50,000 when we open our business, you know. So I was really, really working hard on that being the talk and it just wasn't coming together, Sally. I just kept like messing around with it and working on my points and I just couldn't get it to come together. So I went back to the idea about my grandma. And I thought, okay, because I was almost like making this list, like, what are the lessons I've learned from being broken? I was writing some things, but they weren't coming together. And then I sort of did this other, like, what are the lessons I've learned from my grandma? And it was like, it was like all these things, you know, came up. And I just thought, well, this is it. And this feels very natural and very true to me. It doesn't feel like I'm having to be someone else, you know. And I figure at an event like that, you've got plenty of people there who have the statistics for you, who have the studies, and, you know, those parts. I was like, "I bet that part's covered, but I'm the only one here with my grandma." Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

So I might as well tell that story. So I just tried to think about, you know, if there was a school of grandma, what are the lessons that my grandma taught me? And even after I finished, like, going over the talk, feeling 100% certain that's what I was supposed to do, even that day, Sally, I was still feeling like, "Is this really enough?" Is that enough? Like, you're getting in front of this crowd of people to basically tell them about cake and going to the pool and, you know, your grandma. Like, is that enough for this crowd? I don't know. And then I just had to, first of all, you know, give myself the talk that I think a lot of us as communicators have to do on the side of stage, you know. I had to give myself this talk like, I have to walk out on stage and be myself. And this, this story, these lessons, this is me being my total and complete self. And you never know how telling a story can inspire other people and make them sort of factor that into, you know, the lens that they are living their life from. So I had to give myself the talk, but I got out there and I was shaking like a leaf. And I told, I told you this, Sally, but I had an iPad that had all my notes on it. And I got out there, and the podium was sort of a bit of a ways away from where the microphone was. And I'm not a Countryman microphone person. It's just, oh, that microphone over the ear grinds my gears. I just, ugh. I can't deal with it. I'm like, I need my old-school wireless mic on a stand.

Give me handheld.

My stuff, you know? So I put the mic on the stand intending to— because I was opening and closing with a poem— so I intended to perform the poem from the mic and then take the mic off and walk. But I got out there and I had to set the iPad down, but it was like so far away from the mic that I couldn't see it. I thought I'd be able to, so I really had to wing it without being able to see my notes. I mean, I could see my slides but I didn't have my notes. I just had to, like, go. And bless that it went well, but that was why it looked like that. That was why I stood at the mic the entire time. I didn't take the mic off. I was— I literally almost, you know, you were asking earlier about how spoken word sort of informs speaking. And when you're doing spoken word, you don't have a good way to stop in the middle of a poem. Even if you forget it, or, you know, you're thinking you were going one way and then you realize you're saying lines to another poem. There are many times I mess up that I just have to, like, keep going. I just get in the zone, and that's what happens when I speak, too. So I just got out there and got in the zone and just got myself to that last poem and just walked off like, "You didn't even look at your notes. Why did you not get up?" Yes!

Oh my gosh. It, it never would have occurred to me that you were flying without, you know, the instructions or whatever, because I thought you seemed so grounded in what you were doing. And, you know, now knowing you just slightly a little bit more, it makes total sense to me because the groundedness of your poems, I think, seeped into the rest of your talk because it's, it's, they are such grounding, uh, pieces and they ground you in who you are. And so, you know, and because your talk was so much about, it was about your grandma and, and what you learned, like you can speak from that without your notes, but you, that economy of words is just, now you have learned that skill. That's, that's part of who you are, and that is such a gift. That's such a gift. So I thought it was awesome. It was so fun to watch. And I'm kind of wondering, Amina, before we get to our This Moved Me moments— and, and this is, you can, you can say I'm not up to it right now, but would you be willing to share one of your poems? Oh man.

It's morning.

You're in your robe. I'm totally like, I am absolutely surprising you with this. I didn't— if there's a short one that doesn't cost too much emotionally right now at this time in the morning.

I think I have one, which is actually about my grandma a little bit. I can't remember if this is— this might be one of the ones I shared at Story, but some of that's a blur now because I was out there like, oh, what's happening?

So I—

this is a shorter one. But this— and it's actually one of the newer poems that I've written. It's called "Start with Your Roots." And it is actually one of the only poems in my new book, "How to Fix a Broken Record." People ask me all the time, like, are there going to be poems in there? And this time, for some reason, this was the only poem that made it. But I was writing this poem and thinking about— I did do this as story. I'm remembering now.

I was going to say, it sounds familiar.

Anyway, I wrote this poem in thinking just about growing up in the South. Both sides of my family are from North Carolina, so I didn't grow up there, but that's where, like, all our family roots are, and I've lived most of my life in the South, so I wanted to write a little bit about that and write a little bit about my grandma and just all the lessons that she's taught me. So I'll read this. Start with your roots. Back porch, harmonica, washboard, rhythm of picking beans, grandma saying, Close the screen door behind you. It's okay to be proud to be from the South. To rep for hot summers, cobbler and watermelon sticky fingers, Big Mama and Grandpa, Mamaw and Papaw. To never wish for better luck or four-leaf clovers because New Year's and Black Eyed Peas and collard greens. Because an itch in the palm of your hand means a payday is coming. Because an itch on the nose means a surprise visitor is coming. Because you protect your mama's back when you don't step on a crack. Because when you see gray hair, You say yes ma'am, no ma'am, yes sir, no sir, because no matter how old you are, you always respect your mama's house, grandma's hands. Kisses on mama's cheeks, dirt under granddad's fingernails from tending his garden. Daddy smelling like homemade oil changes and pork chops. Take that with you. Carry it wrapped in wax paper like grandma's chicken and chocolate cake. Take it in the car, on the bus, on the train, on the plane. Remember why she does this. Remember, she knows the sting of sit in the back, of colored sections, colored entrance, colored water fountains, the long wait on road trips between stops and countertops that may not serve your kind here. She wraps food in wax paper the same way she hopes her prayers caress the brown skin of her children and children's children to keep them safe from noose and bullet and eyes and hands filled with hate. Take that with you. Read it on crinkly pages like the family Bible with records of deaths and births and weddings and generations. Breathe it in like the scent of candied yams and rain coming and magnolia trees, pig smokers, and fried everything. Hold it in your chest like Grandma's voice singing it is well, like Granddaddy giving thanks and holding hands at the head of the table. From there, you can grow, become your own tree, spread your branches and limbs, make your own generations, create a safe place to lean on and find shade. Be spring, embrace summer, fall, but always survive winter. Bloom, then plant seeds. So they'll be here long after your tree ceases to go through the seasons. Start with your roots and always return there.

Oh, woo!

Yes!

I just closed my eyes there and took it in and absolutely loved it. Thank you. Thank you for doing that.

Thank you, Sally.

Especially since I just threw it on ya.

Yeah, I was like, oh, let me find something really quick. Oh, geez.

Geez, Sally, a little warning here. Sorry. Oh my gosh, that made me really happy. All right, Amina, it's time very quickly for a This Moved Me moment. Something that has moved you recently that, uh, has, you know, helped you stay connected to your creativity, your inspiration, whatever it might be. So I'm gonna start since you just did a poem.

Okay.

I'll just give you a second. So I'll start. And my This Movie Moment is this podcast called Heavyweight from Gimlet Media. I don't know if you've heard of it or had a chance to listen to it. No.

Okay.

It's so funny. It's really a funny show that gets at serious things. So essentially— It's about taking people back to, like, a conflict that was never resolved. And this really funny sort of awkward host goes with them and helps try to mediate the conversation.

It's— Wow.

I know. So it's simultaneously delightful and also kind of heart-wrenching because I don't like conflict, but I— like, it makes it bearable. And it's so fascinating to watch these people, like, 20 years later, try and figure things out. It's kind of amazing. And he starts every show with, like, a really funny phone call to his best friend who is always annoyed with him.

It's really funny.

So it's called Heavyweight. It's on Gimlet Media, and they just started their second season. And so I'm jazzed about it right now.

That's awesome.

Yeah. How about you?

I would have to say mine is the movie The Big Sick. Hmm. I am late in watching it. I actually wanted to see it when it was in theaters and my husband and I had just a day, one of those like just day in, like we just, there's food in here, there's drinks in here.

I love it.

Stay inside this house for at least 24 hours. And we decided to watch The Big Sick. And oh my gosh, like, first of all, um, to your point, actually, I really echo your sentiments about the podcast you were talking about because The Big Sick is a comedy, but there's some plot in there that's not funny at all, but they found this way to sort of embrace even the comedic and awkward moments involved in that. But a comedian named Kamau, it's semi-autobiographical, or it could be completely autobiographical, but I know it's autobiographical in some regard of his life and how he fell in love with his wife. And he's a Pakistani man So it's awesome to see an Asian man as a leading man in this film. And he's a Pakistani man with Muslim parents, very traditional parents who are ready to arrange a marriage for him. And he is just not dealing really well with that and happens to fall in love with a woman who is the total opposite of the women that his parents have been trying to hook him up with. And in the middle of his relationship with this woman, Emily, who's a blonde white woman, so she's utterly the opposite here of what his parents want, she gets sick. You are watching throughout the film how they are navigating this, how their families are navigating that story. And it just, it just touched me on a craft level how beautifully used comedy was in the film, even though there were these hard portions of the story, you know, that were not for a comedic value. And just those themes there of love and recovery and healing and what happens when we end up living a life very different than maybe the tradition that we come from or what other people expected of us. So yeah, I started out what I thought was gonna be like an eat donuts day and then my husband and I, I'm in there like, "This movie, oh my God." And my husband's looking at me like, like, well, I don't think this is having the intended result.

I was hoping we'd be like snuggling and, you know, ugly crying, right? Oh my gosh. Okay, I haven't seen this yet, so you might have been late, but I'm really late, so I will check it out.

Yeah, you should watch it, but with a box of tissues. Okay, there'll be like a little ugly crying probably.

Well, I love that. I feel like That's the powerful combination. When you can make people laugh and cry, that's really powerful, you know? Yeah.

Okay.

I've kept you over time, but I am so thrilled to have taken some time to connect and chat with you, Amina. I admire your work. I think you are just a beautiful person, and what I've seen on stage just has moved me so much. So it's a thrill to have you on the show.

Thank you so much, Sally. And I wanted to also say, um, for any of your This Moves Me podcast listeners, that's the best English accent I have, you guys.

That was really good.

Um, yeah, it's the best I have. Um, just wanted to make sure that they know that my new book, How to Fix a Broken Record, is out now. And, uh, it is full of so many stories that I look forward to sharing with everyone. And that was a part of me working through my new content when you and I met, Sally.

I know. I know.

Some of the new content from this book. So I'm really looking forward to it.

I'm so glad you mentioned that.

And— Yeah.

I'm really excited for you. I can't wait to see what happens with the book. Where can they go? Where can they find it?

They can go anywhere books are sold. Support your independent bookstores. You can go on your regular sites that you might normally do to— whatever you— wherever you go to buy books, it is there on Amazon and independent booksellers, Barnes Noble. And of course, you can visit aminabrown.com for all of the information.

Awesome. Okay, good. I'm glad you got that in there, Amina. Awesome. This is fun. I can't wait. We'll do this again.

Yes, Sally. Yes.

I would love it. Actually, I wish you were local. Then we could just get coffee. Oh. Me. We recorded that a while ago, but I remember her doing her poem and just, like I said, kind of closing my eyes and going to a different place. And I feel like people who have a way with words can transport you like that. So hopefully you've gotten some great takeaways from this conversation about how we can bring more of the intention of the poet to our work in the content, how we can help our audience imagine something, create a more visual world that really connects us. It's really important. And so I loved connecting with Amina and sharing her with you. I hope you enjoyed it. I've got some exciting things coming down the pipeline before you move on to your next podcast, because that's what I do. It's closing and everybody's just like moving on to the next thing. Before you do that, just know that coming down the pipeline next week, I'm bringing you Taylor Kroonquist, and Taylor is from Nuts and Bolts Speed Training. Maybe you've heard of them. They are PowerPoint experts, and I saw Taylor at the Presentation Summit this past fall and was kind of blown away. And I'm not a PowerPoint person, but even Even PowerPoint people are blown away by what he does and the shortcuts that he has figured out. He's also a digital marketing expert. We kind of found that middle ground between people who don't know PowerPoint but need to, and of course how to connect with an audience online, because that's really the space. That's the space I'm in. Moving into, and it's the space that I know many, many people are, because it's a way to reach more people. And so I know Taylor's been really incredibly helpful to me, and I'm so excited for you to hear this conversation. He's in Bali and I was in Minnesota. It was like our lives could not be more different, but we had a really fun conversation. And so I'll share a slice of that with you. So excited for that. That's coming down the pipeline. And also, I'd love for you to go check out over on my website, thismovedme.com. You can see I'm trying to put some new content out into the world, and an online course is coming down the pipeline. I've been talking about this for a while, but it's gonna happen. And so I'm starting to build that out. And I am gonna be putting more content out there in order to lead up to that. I'm so excited about it. Right now my focus is on content development for us as writers and speakers. How do we write compelling content that is not boring, but it's interactive and engaging and audience-centered? And so there's, there's a lot to dig into there, and that will all lead into my my online course about that very thing. So head over to the website, join in on my email list, subscribe here on the podcast if you haven't already because you get kind of sneak peeks and early connections on all that stuff. I would love to stay connected. Alright friends, movers, keep moving the world with your tux. See you next week.