PERSONAL BRANDING is NOT What You Think | Jen Gottlieb

The HOPE acronym stands for Help one person every day. Because if you are nervous to put yourself out there and be seen online with your service or story or product or whatever it is that you have that you can offer to help people, if you're scared and you're not doing it, it's because you're thinking about the wrong thing, because you're thinking about you, about what you sound like, about what you look like, about if people will like you, if they will give you likes and comments and all the vanity metrics when really, if you're doing that and you have something that you are putting on the Internet for people to learn from, have an impact from, it's not about you. It's about that one person every day that is looking at the phone and consuming that content and needed to hear what you had to say that day.

Guys, help me welcome the one and only Jen Gotlib. How are you doing, girl?

I'm so good. So excited to be here with you.

Oh, my gosh. I'm. I'm finally. Chance. I actually got a chance to talk to you. You guys have been freaking nuts with your schedule, man.

Kicking butt, Kicking butt. I mean, it's fun. You know, when you're doing what you love, it doesn't feel like work. And I know that that's so cliche. Like, you know, when you love, when you do, it doesn't feel like work. But it's genuinely true. I find that when I'm doing the stuff that really fuels me, I. I don't get burnt out. It's when you tell me to do something that I hate, then I'm like, oh, like, hang this photo on the wall. I will get burnt out in five minutes. But when you're doing stuff that you love, it feels fun, it feels easy. So.

Yeah, well, I think that's true for everybody. You know, one of the things I love about your work and be seeing the new book and some other things that you got that you guys are working on is how authentic you got to that journey. I want to break it down for the audience a little bit because a lot of the. The entrepreneur audience, in at least in today's time frame, realizes they have to jump into a personal brand of their own in order for them to actually build a business over time. But yet most of us are a little skittish of building a personal brand. We don't know what our. What we should be talking about. How do we make ourselves stand out from the noise and all that kind of stuff. And you guys are like, the. The go to people when it comes to that kind of, like, thought leadership. So help me understand kind of a little bit about your own journey, why you care so much about helping other people, like, find that journey for themselves, find out really what kind of what their uniqueness is, so to speak, and then get themselves out there.

Yeah, well, my journey started from being totally inauthentic, and that's how I know the difference.

Right.

I was. I was on a TV show about heavy metal music for five years on VH1, where if you Google me, and now you're all going to go, and you're going to Google and I'm going to. But I keep it all on the Internet so everybody can see the journey. I was on the show and I was like, if you saw a photo of me, you'd be like, oh, my gosh, that's not Jen. Like, that is a heavy metal rocker chick. And I was an actress, and I just gotten off of a Broadway national tour, and I got this audition to go be on this show. And they needed this sexy metal girl for this talk show about rock and roll. I'm like, great. I could do that. I needed a gig. I auditioned, I got the gig. I was super thrilled. I'm like, I could play that part. So I start being. Playing this role of this girl that liked heavy metal music, was super into it. I didn't know anything about it. I don't like heavy metal music, but I pretended that I did, and I fit the mold perfectly. And before I knew it, I had built this brand online that was a complete and total lie because it was a talk show. So I wasn't playing a character in a movie where I could just be like, oh, this is Jennifer Gottlieb playing the character of. It was. I was me, and I was playing a version of myself that wasn't who I was. And so when you do that, or at least when I did it, there was this inner voice inside of me every single day. When I put on that costume that I wore that was like, jen, what are you going to do when all this goes away? Like, this isn't you. What the hell are you doing? Like. And I was having this internal battle with myself, but I stayed in it because it was a great job. I was on an international TV show, I was getting paid. It looked all great on paper, but there was something inside of me that said, this is a lie. This isn't you. You are living in authentically. And I spiraled in that with that inner battle. I Started getting severely depressed. I was. I had a terrible eating disorder. I was in a toxic relationship. And. And I believe that when you're that out of alignment and you're just like producing that sort of energy and that sort of vibration into the world, the universe will step in and a lot of the times it'll smack you back into alignment and for sure, most of the time, it'll hurt. And so the show went away. The show got canceled. The guy that I thought I was going to marry, that I was dating at the time, ended up leaving me for one of our friends. And I had no connections, no job. I had spent all my money because I was a hot mess. And so I found myself in this tiny little apartment with six other actors in New York City. And I had this little window and it faced a brick wall. And I lost everything. And I didn't know who I was anymore. And it was in that time. It wasn't overnight, of course. I wish I could say, like, yeah, it was in that moment that I realized I needed to just be myself. No, but it was over a lot of time after that. Shit to shift moment where I started to realize that if I didn't connect to who I truly was, then I was always going to be on this hamster wheel of trying to fit my square peg into some round hole and I would never be fulfilled. And it wasn't until I started really tapping into who real Jen was and allowing the world to see her that my business took off. I found the love of my life and all of these things started to happen for me.

Yeah, you have married a rock star, by the way. I love that guy to death. Chris, if you're listening, we love you, man. You know, it's really cool. I was thinking about, you know, one of our mutual friends, Randy obviously connected us probably a couple of years ago, and I went to one of your. One of your signature events and it was incredible. The energy there was crazy alive. People all like really vibing on, doing something amazing with the world and their own voice. And I think it was probably three quarters of the way through, maybe halfway through the. The event you put up on the. On the big screen, if you will, the Jumbotron, so to speak, all of these different video footage of showing you just starting, you know, you were. You were like. You were almost. I don't know anybody else that's really ever done that where they've gotten so authentic that they'll. No makeup on, no nothing. They just get out there and do it. So what was the catalyst or what was the why behind that? Because I find that that's probably pretty scary for a lot of folks.

Yeah. Well, the biggest thing that I find that holds people back from being seen online or, you know, they, like. I talk to a lot of people about this. I'm sure you do, too. And it's always the same story. It's. I'm not great on camera. I'm worried about what people think of me. I have to wait till I have the perfect lighting and the perfect outfit and the perfect makeup and the perfect hair, and I'll just do it tomorrow. And there's all these excuses because people are afraid to start. And I find that a lot of people are comparing their beginner moment, their first time, to other people's chapter 20 on the Internet, right? Looking at somebody that they've been admiring for years, that has been doing it for years and years and years, and they're saying, wait, if my first video doesn't look like that person's video, then I shouldn't even start. And what they don't see is the process that it took to get to that. And for me, I wanted to show people the process and really, like, open the curtain, because when I started, I was terrible. And I. Everyone starts messy. Everyone starts not knowing. Everyone starts from zero. Everyone started from zero followers. Everyone started from really not being that great. And it's over time that you get better. And that video that I show shows, like, we call her like, Baby Jen, like, like, like sucking. And then just like, each video gets a little better, and I'm a little less nervous and a little more confident. And it shows like what I talk about in the book the Confidence Continuum, which is when you take action even though you're scared, each time you take away a little bit of that power that. The fear, you get a little better. But the only way to do that is to start, and you have to be okay with being a beginner. And so that's why I showed that video. I showed it last week.

So far, no. And. And I think it speaks to a lot of folks because I. I find that a lot of folks are really trying to find their voice. You know, one of our other mutual friends, Rory Vaden, we were. He and I were chatting one time on a podcast, and I don't know what it was about the podcast, but in this podcast, he said, well, you know, what do you think's held you back all this time? And for the first time, I had this epiphany moment where I was like, Well, I think what's held me back all this time is trying to figure out if I'm worthy of a voice. You know what I'm saying? And as we started to dissect that, I kind of feel like that a lot of. I believe some of the most important voices on the planet have yet to be heard. Personally. There are a lot of. There are a lot of great ones, of course. I mean, obviously, you're now gracing the largest stages all over the place. I know your number one goal is to be the number one motivational speaker in the world, and I'm going to do my part to help you get there.

But why do you think people have such a hard time finding worth in this space, even though they might feel a yearning or a calling to kind of step into it?

Imposter syndrome, I guess, is what people call that. And it's. It doesn't discriminate. I have to say that even I was on that show on VH1, and we got to interview some of the biggest rock stars in the entire world, literally, like Slash and like, the guys from Metallica and, like, people that you think ooze confidence, right? You think rock star, you think they don't have imposter syndrome, Again, walk on that stage. Worthy. And knowing that they've got it all going on, every single one of them would walk into the dressing room, in the makeup room and be obsessing over. Was it good enough? Was it okay? Do you like these, booth, or should I wear these? I don't think my makeup looks perfect here. Can we fix it? I don't like what I said there. Can you delete it? I don't think it was good enough. Was it okay? Literally. And that was my experience. I was like, whoa, everybody poops. Everybody is a human. Everybody experiences fear. Everybody experiences unworthiness. Everybody. Like I. And. And maybe that's a blanket statement, but everybody that I've spoken to that has. And I've gotten to speak and even in our industry to people that are very successful and very out there, and I say, do you ever have imposter syndrome? And they all say to me, yes, I did. Yesterday. I walked on that stage, and I felt so scared. Like, why would anybody listen to me? And I'm like, okay, so I'm not going to spread this message that you need to overcome imposter syndrome or that you need to feel completely and totally worthy in order to take action, because that would actually probably keep you from taking action ever. So what I talk about is, like, the Law or the rule? I don't think it's a law yet. Maybe I'm going to make it one. The rule of 51%. I don't ever feel like I'm ever at 100% of belief in myself, ever. I don't ever take a stage where I'm like, I believe in myself 100%, I'm worthy of being here. No, sometimes I'm at 85%, sometimes I'm at 60%, sometimes I'm at 49%. Like, it all varies. But for me, in order to take action to that next level, I just have to believe a little bit more than I don't. Like, 51% of belief. Like, I could have that doubt. I could have that fear. I could feel unworthy. I could have it. It's normal. It's the human experience. But as long as I believe a little bit more than I don't, and I can get to that first action step and do it with that fear there anyway, bring the fear along with me, bring the unworthiness along with me, and I take action and I do it. When I get to the other side of that hard thing, I've just proven to myself that I'm more worthy than I thought.

Yeah, for sure.

That is what creates momentum. So I'll never say, like, stephen, you need to completely remove yourself of that unworthiness feeling. That is not normal. You should not have that. No, it's okay to have it. It's okay. We all get it. And that just means you're stretching and growing, and that means that you're human and you can bring it along with you, and you can make it part of your story, and you can be vulnerable and open enough to tell people that you're experiencing it, and that will actually make people connect with you. You more.

Yeah, no, I totally agree with you. In fact, even just watching your work and what you guys have been doing, a lot of our mutual friends all have dealt with that imposter syndrome. All our. We were obviously at my venue a few years back, or I guess it was that a year ago with Ed's. Ed's book launch. And he was even telling people in the green room, he's like, yeah, we. We all deal with this, you know, and every. And everybody's gracing large stages, been all over the place, traveling all over the place, you know, doing. Doing a lot of great work, you know. But I've. One of the things I've realized is, I know you talk about this in the book a little bit, but the importance of confidence through consistency and how that kind of leads us into the pocket break down kind of that, that mantra and then kind of what the pocket is so we can maybe help the audience understand a little bit more.

Yeah, well, confidence, I believe, comes from consistently sticking with the commitments you make with yourself. Right, that's. And that's. A lot of people say this like, right, confidence is self trust. It's not like something completely like brand new that I just thought of. But for me, when I think about creating confidence over time, it really is like sticking to those commitments and doing it time and time and time again. So every time I tell myself I'm going to do something and maybe that's a hard, scary thing, like, let's talk about maybe going live on social media. I say I'm going to do it and then I back out and I allow myself to not do it. Oh, you'll do it tomorrow. You don't feel so good today. It's okay, you don't have to do it. Every time I do that, I'm actually telling my subconscious mind that I can't trust myself to follow through. So I'm removing my own confidence within myself to follow through next time. But every single time I tell myself, you're going to do that live tomorrow, it's committed, it's in the calendar, you're going to do it. And even though maybe fear comes in and fear is like, nah, you don't have to do it today. You know what? You really have to do something else. Like, it negotiates. And I fight back that negotiation. I say, no, screw you, I'm going to do it. And I do it and I get to the other side and I get to my bed that night and I could say, like, I did the things I said I was going to do today. Yeah, that puts more coins in my confidence bank. That makes me more confident. But you can't just do that one time and expect to become more confident. It takes consistency. And in the pocket is a term that I love to use and we've all felt it. And some people think about it as the word flow. But I always say in the pocket. And when I, when I feel in the pocket, it's always like a moment in time in my life where like time stops. You know those times where it's like, you could literally be doing that thing all day and you would have no idea what time it is. You don't even care. You don't have lack of energy, you keep going and you wake up, it's like you wake up from a dream and all of a sudden it's o' clock at night and you've been doing it for six hours and you were like, whoa, that felt easy, that felt fun. We all have that thing. And I like to think back to moments in my life when I was the most in the pocket, because if I can go back to that moment when I was doing that thing and I can reproduce that daily, even if it's just for a few minutes, I can get really familiar with that feeling of flow and I can, I can reproduce it quicker and quicker and quicker in the future. And the more that we can spend time in the pocket, the more confidence we're going to create, the more consistency we're going to create because it feels easy and fun. Like what we were talking about when we first got on here. I was like, yeah, when you're doing what you love, it's not hard but if you're doing, when you're, if you're not in the pocket, it feels really difficult and you get burnt out and it feels shitty and you don't, you don't want to be consistent. So I'm always trying to get myself to do things that make me feel in the pocket. We can't always because obviously we have to do hard stuff that we won't want to do sometimes. But if we can make a choice of what we're choosing to spend our time doing, I'm like, let me do something that feels in flow, feels delicious, feels in the box.

Well, it seems like it. Also, with that level of consistency and making yourself really keep your commitments, you're going to take that 51% on the, your, you know, in theory your worst day and turn into a 71% minimum just through evolution, I've watched your stage presence continue to grow and grow and grow and grow and become a dominating force in a healthy way for the audiences that are, that are watching. You know, I've watched as you and your husband and have done different events. I've watched you on stage obviously literally say, hey, look, we're going to let our people join our mastermind. And there'd be a line up, a door for people trying to join the mastermind. And I think that's because you get results just in general from everybody I've talked to about what you guys have always done and where you guys have always leveraged yourself the best. Put all your time, put all your energy. It's always been about helping that unseen person become seen because there's an Interesting dichotomy of how you help people understand their own voice, which is why I love this work so much and so excited for it to come out here shortly. This book, I think, is going to change a lot of lives in the grand scheme of things, because I don't think people can. I don't think people know the process of becoming. Right. I think they get stuck in the. Maybe the stagnation of that first step of becoming, if that makes any sense. Yeah. So maybe. I know one of the things you also mentioned in the book is this making FMO your friend, you know? So let's talk a bit about that, because I feel like that's not another little stumbling block with people.

Yeah, fomo. Yeah, I think you're talking about. So fomo, like, fomo, really making friends with fomo. And. And this is. So you said we get results in our mastermind. Yes, we get results in our mastermind for sure, because of the community that we create. And the third part of my book is called Be Connected. It's all about creating community. That's what it's about. And our company's called Super Connector Media, because connection is key. And we're sitting here talking like we're friends, like, the reason, like, we've been able to help each other in our lives and in our careers because we're friends and we've made that connection. Over my career, I have found that number one thing that has helped me grow has not been a strategy that I learned. It's not been something that I studied and implemented or something like that. It's always been a person that either taught me something or gave me an opportunity or helped me find something within me that really helped me produce something on stage that was really special and spectacular. It's always people. So when I talk about FOMO in the book, it's one of the symptoms of fear. And it's not fomo, like, fear of missing out, but it's more like fear of missed opportunity. So maybe when you find yourself scrolling the Internet and you see someone that's doing the thing that you want to do and you start to feel that, like, jealousy, that envy, like, oh, that should be me. Why is that not me? And then maybe you can even start to feel bad and be like, I'm not even going to try, because they're already doing it. I had that experience when I was an actress in such a big way. And I tell the story in the book when the role that I wanted more than anything in the world that I had Been auditioning for, for years. I finally got to be in the show, and I was the understudy, meaning cover. Yeah, the girl that was the backup. And so I had to watch this other girl play the role that I so badly wanted to play and feel the feeling of FOMO every single day. And I had this moment where I was like, okay, I have two options here. I can either hate this girl and, like, be angry and pissed off about it and just, like, go sit in the dressing room backstage and, like, be pissy, or I can understand that. This girl, it clearly got the role for a reason, and so she's clearly doing something right. So what if I could just study her and be grateful for her and learn from her and study everything that she does so that when I could, like, use her to my advantage? Because every there. Everything that we want to do has been done by somebody else and has been done better by somebody else.

Yeah.

So instead of feeling FOMO and jealousy in comparison, what if you flip that into gratitude and fuel and showing you the way? And I, I, I mean, I started to appreciate the out of this woman because she was showing me how to say that line there, how to do that dance move in that moment, how to do the costume change quickly. I studied her, and because of that, I became better. And then I got my opportunity. And so that's how we can flip our fears into something that can be for us.

Yeah. No, dude, I love that so much. You know, I was also thinking about the importance of your, your inner circle. We talked about relationships a second ago.

Yeah.

And we had a mutual friend obviously, connect us probably a couple years ago and built a beautiful friendship and professional relationship in the, in the grand scheme of things as well. And I'm wondering, especially when it comes down to really learning to trust yourself, to see yourself with the right lens, to discover your authentic self, if that makes any sense.

Yeah.

How important is it to have people like an Amy and Marie and these, these other folks around you, your core group of people, to maybe kind of help you figure out what, what that thing is?

I'll give you an amazing example. The title of my book. I. So I. When I sold my proposal to this book, it was called something else. It was called Super Connector. And I was not bought. Even though it's named my company, I was not bought in on this name. I was like, this is not the name of the book. I didn't feel good about it. And my friend Gabby Bernstein decided to gather me, Amy Porterfield, Marie Forleo, and a Woman named Kris Carr. And we all went to do like a book mastermind together.

Just.

Just gathered together to learn from Gabby. She was so generous. She's like, I just want to teach you everything that I know about launching a book. Because me and Amy and Marie, we were all launching books. And we sit there and it's my turn to go and mastermind and. And Gabby. And everyone's like, okay, tell us about your book. I'm like, well, it's called Super Connector. And they all stopped me. I didn't even have to say I didn't like the name. Gabby was like, that is not the name of your book. But I felt married to it. The publisher bought this name.

Yeah.

I was like, no, it is the name of my book. It has to be the name of my book. I felt a complete limiting belief, a ceiling. I could not change the name of this book. And Gabby was like, that is not the name. It's not. You're not proud of that name. It is not the name of your book. And they all gave me this permission. This. It is okay for it to change. Because they've all written books before. They know that you can change the name of your book. And they gave me this permission. And then all of a sudden, Gabby said to me, and Gabby's actually the person that wrote the forward to the book. She goes, jen, what do you help people do? Just tell me what you help people do. This had to come from somebody else's mouth. I'm like, I help people be seen. And she goes, that is the name of your book. And I'm like, holy shit. That is so the name of my book. And if you read the introduction, there's a whole story of how this psychic that I spoke to years ago told me all I'm getting from the spirits is you have to be seen. And the words be seen, be seen, be seen, be seen. And then I'm like, oh, my God, the psychic be seen. I immediately. And because of my friends giving me permission and empowering me and telling me and giving me the ideas and really coaxing it out of me, I was able to write to my publisher, who gave me a lot of money for this book, this book proposal. I'm like, I have to change the name. It absolutely has to change. I don't think I would have had the courage to do that if I didn't have those people. So that's just a tiny example of how community and people in your life can not only. Like, that was a game changing moment.

Yeah. I want to flip this. I love that story, by the way. I didn't know that. That I actually didn't know that had taken place. That's a really cool story. I have to, like, chat with everybody else about that. That's awesome.

Yeah, I don't. I don't even think I've told that story yet, actually.

We got it now, baby. Yeah, like, no, I think one of the other things I want to look into is the flip side of that. Right?

Yeah.

Let's say you have that. Maybe you know that. You know that you know you have a message in your heart. You're. You're destined to communicate somehow, some way, but your current circumstances or your relationships or people around you aren't really supportive of you stepping into that. Okay, what are two or three things that that person should maybe consider doing to get themselves into a better position to basically step into that calling?

This is a really sad situation to be in. And I know because I was there. And many of us find ourselves, especially if you're. If you're listening to this podcast right now, I would bet that you are into personal growth, personal development, entrepreneurship. You're wanting to grow and achieve and do better. And unfortunately, that's a small, smaller group of people. So a lot of the times, what happens when you start to expand, or at least this happened to me when I started reading personal development groups, becoming an entrepreneur, or books becoming an entrepreneur. The people around me that were from, like, my quote unquote, former life when I was more. Had more of a scarcity mindset and more of a negative that I did more of a negative mindset about the world. They stayed that way and I started to expand. And so what happens when. When that happens is, is you hang out with those people and they don't necessarily understand. And it's very, very, very hard to grow and then stay in an environment where people want you to stay the same. And then you start to feel guilty, and then it's really difficult to grow. And I find that a lot of people are like, how do I either get out of these relationships or not feel guilty about being in these relationships? How do I move forward, how to create a new community? And what I did was I didn't break up with anybody, but I did shift my friend groups. And it's 100% necessary to do that, because if you stay in the same environment that you've always been in, you're going to do the things that you've always done. You have to shift your environment. So what I started to do is instead of telling my old friends, oh, we're not in alignment anymore, I don't think we should be friends anymore. I didn't do that. All I did was I delegated more of my time to making new friends. And so I decided I'm just going to prioritize my time differently. I'm not going to say anything to anybody and I'm going to prioritize the majority of my time spending at events, meeting new people, doing zoom calls with people even if they don't live near me, going to meetups and really putting more time and energy into the new relationships. And guess what happened? When you put more time and energy into something, you are, you're, without really realizing it, you're saying no to something else. And here's what happens. When a relationship is naturally supposed to end and relationships come into our lives for seasons and reasons, when it's supposed to end, the other person feels it too. And they, they're usually holding on just as much as you are because of expectations and oh, I've been friends with this person for so long. When I did that, those other people, they just slowly stopped calling me. It just, it just naturally faded. And I'm like, wow, I guess if I stopped calling them, they would just stop calling me. And a really, really crazy thing happened where there was no hard feelings. They just went off and did their own thing. And the few that were like, Jen, what do you got going on? I want to come along with you. They definitely did. And the ones that didn't, they just veered off. And then the people in my life, and this is for anybody that's like, but Jen, I have someone that lives with me in my house and they're so negative and it's so terrible and it's really hard. And sometimes we can't get away from those people and sometimes we can't do that with those people if they're a family member. And so what I've done, I understand that. And Jamie Krelima, one of our mutual friends, I'm sure you know Jamie, she writes in her book Believe It, I love this strategy. She's like, I just envision that that person has a volume dial on their head. And when they're talking some crazy shit, I just turn the dial down and I just turn it down to mute and I just smile. And then my people that are speaking life into me, I turn their volume up. And it's not always easy to do, but that's the strategy that I've been using. And over Time. When you consistently prioritize your time into a direction of the places that you want to be in, the people you want to be around, it will naturally attract more of that into your life and. And deflect all of the things that you don't want anymore.

Yeah. Dude, that is so good. I love. I love the whole. I'm going to use the volume analogy from. From now on, I'm tell Jamie I'll take it.

As long as you quote her.

I'll definitely do that. I don't. I don't. I don't do the whole still thing. That's. That's right. You know, one of the things I love in the book, too, is you have this HOPE acronym, which I think drives a lot of. I actually think the most successful personal brands operate in this zone now, which is of service. It's, you know, so they. They're less fearful of putting themselves out there because it's no longer about them. It's about who they're trying to serve.

Yeah.

Mind breaking down the HOPE acronym and kind of why you're so passionate about it and why you use it to drive as a driving force.

Yeah, it's everything for us. It's like the core value of our company. And for me personally, it's helped me to be able to put myself out there when I've been incredibly nervous and scared. And the HOPE acronym stands for Help one person every day. Because if you are nervous to put yourself out there and be seen online with your service or story or product or whatever it is that you have that you can offer to help people, if you're scared and you're not doing it, it's because you're thinking about the wrong thing. It's because you're thinking about you, about what you sound like, about what you look like, about if people will like you, if they will give you likes and comments and all the vanity metrics, when really, if you're doing that and you have something that you are putting on the Internet for people to learn from or have an impact from, it's not about you. It's about that one person every day that is looking at the phone and consuming that content and needed to hear what you had to say that day. The reason I didn't get writer's block writing my book, and people ask me all the time, like, did you get writer's block? I'm not a writer at all, and I did not get writers. But it was easy for me to write this book. And the reason that it was easy was because I used hope. Every time I went to sit down and write, I envisioned the girl that I was writing the book for across from me. I saw her. I saw her reading it. I knew her name. Like, her name is Kayla. She's a Pilates instructor from Wisconsin. She's in the studio every single day, but really has this dream of building this viral online brand where she could teach Pilates to everybody. But she's so scared to put herself out there, and she doesn't know the strategies and she doesn't have the community, and I just talk to her. And when you read the book, you'll hear it's my voice and I'm talking to you. But when you are focused on helping one person every day and talking to that one human being, you don't get nervous anymore. Because if you were sitting like me and you, we're friends, sitting here, having a conversation, I'm not getting nervous talking to you. I'm not worried about what I look like, what I sound like, because I'm just answering your questions.

Yeah. So if you're having a normal conversation.

A hundred percent, and that's what our content should be, and it removes the ego when you just start helping and providing value and figuring out how you can pour into that one person that's watching or listening or reading whatever you have to say that day.

Yeah, man, it's so good. You know, I was also just thinking, too. It's like in. In regards to helping one person every day, I'm gonna give you a scenario and maybe just give me your. Your. Your honest feedback. Amazing spirit of light.

Built a social media presence. And, you know, it's. It's. It's. It's rapidly growing, but they're not maybe as sure about their direction. There's. Maybe they're a little scared. Well, if I change my direction, what'll happen to the engagement in the community that I've already built? But yet I need. I know I need to change my direction to feel more authentic. What should they do?

We have to be okay with, like, not getting the likes and the engagement for a minute, like it should not. And I know that this is very, very difficult, and it's more easier said than done because Instagram and Facebook are genius. They're genius. And they make us addicted to the dopamine hit that we get from the likes and the engagement. And we. They make us feel like worthiness is dictated on the likes and the engagement, the followers. And yes, when you have a business, those are all great credibility markers. However, if you are focused on the impact and you're in it for the long game and you have patience, which is unbelievably important in this game, consistency and patience. And you really want to come out as a more authentic version of yourself, you can. It's possible. I know, because I did it. And my best advice would be to bring people along the journey and be okay with losing the people that like the version of you that you were not being authentic. So I used to have a full Instagram and Twitter and Facebook full of heavy metal fans. They, yeah, like all of them. They all were die hard heavy metal fans and they just liked my sexy pictures. And the only pictures that did well were the super sexy pictures of me lying, saying, not. Not that I'm not sexy, but like me and like a Metallica T shirt. I don't even know one word to a Metallica song. Like, I have no idea. I just was posting that and then I'd have to because they liked it. So I had to be okay with losing all of those followers. And it took. It was definitely a transition. But if you're in it for the long game and you bring people along for the story, and the story for me is, listen, that's not me. This is me. Let's come along the ride, let's listen. This is the story I was portraying a version of me that couldn't have been further from the truth. And now I'm going to show you real gen and like, it's an actual trajectory that you can watch on my pages. You can watch it on the Internet. And people are just, they're bought in. And some of my old heavy metal fans are obsessed with it. They love that. They're like, that's so cool. And some of them are like, peace, she's not a metal girl. Whatever, bye. And I'm like, you know what, everybody? That's not in alignment with who I really am. I'm actually thrilled that you go follow somebody else. That will create space for the people that like who I really am. Because it's too exhausting to keep up a front. It's exhausting. It's no fun, it's tiring. And when you're just being yourself and the people that you align with and the people that you bring into your audience like you for who you are, there's a couple of great things that happen. Number one, they evolve with you, you, because they love you for you. And everybody's ever evolving so your personal brand doesn't have to stay the same. All the time because it's your personal brand. We're changing, we're growing. Everybody's shifting into a new version of themselves every day. Like, who knows where we're going to be in five years. We can be selling something else. But if you bring people on that fall in love with you for who you are, they're going to follow you forever. You're just going to be like, I've been on the journey with Jen. I love it. I followed her since she was in fitness and now she's in this. And then like, it's been so fun and we're together. And then the other cool thing is that you like for your business, let's say, and this is, I know you've got a lot of really high performing entrepreneurs that watch this show. Let's say you're building a company and you sell and you exit and you spent all your time and energy building and exiting this company. If you have no social media following during that time and you sell your company and you want to go build another company again, it's going to be really hard. But if you've been building a personal brand and getting people aligned with you, like everyone fell in love with Steven and like everything that he is and, and all the things that you do in your amazing space and all the stuff you do in your business and all the stuff that you do in your personal life and they just love you for who you are. You sell your company, you exit this, you want to start something new, they're all bought in. You already have an audience that's like, sign me up, I'm in. I love Stephen for exactly who he is. Like, let's go.

It's.

You're investing in your future for sure.

No, that's so true. That transition is, I think it's vital. I think I even went through that similar transition probably about a year and a half ago. I was heavily focused on life mastery content. And I realized the only people that were actually coming to my events were entrepreneurs or people who aspire to be an entrepreneur. And then I realized, okay, well, you built all these businesses from nothing. You've managed to scale some of them to high and 8, 8, 9 figure kind of category. So why not teach that content? Why not, you know, be all of me? So I'll give you an example. So I did a, I did an event with Amberly Lago, probably beginning of the year, one of her events, and she invited me to speak at the event, which I was graciously accepted. I came out for the first time with a tool belt on my shoulder, you know, because my audience had never seen me ever talk about my construction background, ever, ever. And yet this time I actually came out with a tool belt on my shoulder. And I was able to use the tools and the stories within the construction industry to talk about, you know, how you can build anything and scale anything using those practical little props and stuff like that. And because of that, I was more authentic. Right. So the reason I say that is because let's take the same person I mentioned to you a second ago. They're now they're going to the transition they're trying to get. Well, I'm going from here. I know I want to go here, or at least I have an idea. I want to go here. But I'm not really sure what my authentic self or message is. Without giving too much away, because I know there's a lot of amazing content in the book. Help me understand maybe two or three things that they could focus on, like right now, outside of going to buy the book with the absolute. You should go buy the book right now. But help me understand two or three things that they can do right now to help discover, like, what their authentic self is.

Yeah. Think about some of the times in your life when you were the most in the pocket. Some of the times in your life when time stopped. What were you doing? Who are you talking to? What were you talking about? And even if you could go even back to your childhood, what did you want to be when you grew up, when you were a little kid? What did you absolutely love that maybe one day people told you that's not cool to like that anymore. Stop liking that. You're like, okay, I'll stop liking that.

Yeah.

What's a hobby that you do that maybe nobody knows that you're obsessed with? And you could talk about it all day long, but you don't think that there's anything lucrative and exciting about it, so you don't talk about it. The cool thing about the Internet now and the world that we live in right now, in 2023, you could become famous on the Internet and build a multimillion dollar business for your hobby. I've seen it. People that are obsessed with knitting, hula hooping, baking, sports cards, sports teams. There's people that have just like, I'm really obsessed with football. So I'm going to create a podcast all about football. Boom. Like, huge sponsorships. Huge. Like, so think about what it is that you really love to do and what superpowers you have that Maybe other people are like, you're really good at that thing and nobody else is at that. Has anybody told you that? Take some time to really tap back into times in your life when you felt like, wow, I could do this all day, and this feels easy for me and hard for other people and just start talking about it. The cool thing about social media, too, is we can experiment. We don't have to have it all perfectly perfect.

Yeah.

And I think that's a lie that people tell themselves. Oh, I have to have my brand totally figured out before I start it. Actually, I've found out a lot of my messaging and a lot of the things that I talk about online based on taking a risk and talking about something and seeing what happens with that reel.

Yeah.

And some reels that I never thought anyone would care about at all went viral, and I was like, wow, this is a topic that I need to talk about more.

Yeah, yeah. No, it makes total sense. You know, it's interesting that, you know, that Be Seen is coming out now. And the reason I say that is because I find that there's a lot of folks who, again, want to be seen who are unsure about how to get there. And the one thing I love about the book is it's a playbook. Like, it's a strategy. Right. It's. It's. If you don't know what to do or where to begin or what to say or who to talk to or whatever. Jen has put it in the pages. Like, there is a proven roadmap here to help you understand and clarify all of that stuff, as well as make sure you are not part of the noise, but you're part of the, I guess, the brighter light in the marketplace. Right. So for sure, one of the other. One of the final things I want to talk about a little bit because I thought. I thought this was also unique in your perspective that I've seen you to talk about, and that is this ability to not have a to do list. But it's a done list.

So walk me through where that came from and kind of why it's important, because I. I found it pretty stinking inspirational myself.

Yeah. So the badass list that I'm guessing that's what you're talking about. Yeah. The badass list is my answer to imposter syndrome. It's not my answer because, like I said, you're never going to make it completely go away, but I think we spend a lot of time just comparing ourselves to other people and thinking that everybody else is doing great things. And. And we forget all the great things that we've done. I do it. I'm personally so guilty of that. I'm like, oh, my God. Like, I am not good enough to launch this book. I'm gonna be completely honest with you. Like, there is, but I'm. I'm not sleeping right now because I'm so anxious about this. And I always sleep, and I am up all night thinking, am I worthy? Am I good enough? Are people gonna buy it? Are people gonna like it? I need to be totally open about.

I can answer. They're gonna buy the book.

Yeah. Thank you. But a lot of authors won't talk about that, like, the mindset that goes behind it. And so I use my badass list, and the entire chapter three is about this. And it's not just about writing a list of all of the amazing badass things you've done in your life. It's about how you use the list. So what I want everyone that's listening to do is to take a moment, write a list of all the badass things you've done, whether it's giving birth to a baby or running a marathon or making your first sale or maybe for the very first time, listening to a personal development podcast. And you never have before. And you're just like, wow, I feel like I'm giving myself a gift right now. It could be any moment. And read those moments out loud, but read them as if you're reading about somebody that you're kind of fomoing over on the Internet, like, somebody else that's not. You read that list like it's a resume of someone that you just are learning about. And I want you to ask yourself, is this person worthy of doing the thing that I'm afraid to do right now? I would guarantee you that you'll be impressed with that person, and I want you to sit and marinate in that impressiveness. Like, oh, my God, who is this person? This person's so cool. And then remember that that person is you.

Yeah, man. Well, you're. You're locking up badass all day long. Where can everybody find out more about you, more about the book? Like, where can we get this stuff?

Well, the book's going to be everywhere, but you can go to be seenbook.com if you want to get all the bonuses that come with getting the book. And. But Barnes and Noble, Amazon, Just go. Go grab yourself a copy. Grab one for a friend, and then you can just find me on Instagram. It's the easiest place, because I'm there. It's not my team. It's me at Jen underscore Gottlieb. And I'll be so excited to communicate with you in the DMs.

Love it. Love it. Thank you for coming on the show. I really appreciate you big time.

I appreciate you big time, my friend. Thank you for having me.

All right, take it easy. I hope you liked that video. And if you did, make sure you check out this next video right here.

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