Joscelyn Duffy: The Evolution of a Successful Writer (#160)

Joscelyn Duffy the Evolution of a Successful Writer – Powered by Happy Scribe

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And I actually spent the greater part of two years in bed. I had two to three half decent waking hours a day, never became depressed. I used that time as introspection to learn, to grow, to gain wisdom, to observe myself, to observe others, to observe the world around me. So it’s about creating space and creating presence. You could say this, and then you go, well, wait a minute. I have family. I have real things going on. I have parents to take care of, illness, financial hardship. Whatever the case may be, be compassionate with yourself, because there are always going to be times in our lives where we’re dealing with these deeply human aspects. The greatest challenge in this life, I believe, is not to become deeply spiritual. It’s to become deeply human, which means grounding out those universal spiritual truths through the heart and into our everyday lives. This message is perfect as it is right now. In this moment in time, we have chosen to evolve. We are consciously making the effort to grow and grow and grow. Well, your message is going to evolve, and it’s a beautiful thing because guess what? Your audience is evolving with you.

You’re taking them on this journey with you. No one has the composite experiences that you have or that anyone else has that has shaped our unique voice. So you have a message and a service to an audience that no one else can deliver. That’s why it’s crucial. That’s why your message is important.

Hi phase world podcast listeners. I’m so glad that you’re all here with me. There are so many podcasts out there, so you have the chance to spend this 1 hour with anybody in the world, but here you are. I am here with Jocelyn Duffy and who is a communication and contribution strategist, author, ghost writer, creative consultant. We’re going to talk about all of that. And her sole purpose is to help people like you awaken and contribute the best in you so that you may help awaken the best in others as well. What a beautiful statement. Welcome, Jocelyn.

Oh, thanks so much for having me today. It’s wonderful to be here.

I’m so glad you’re here. I can’t believe how people are connected these days. Literally, this was through a comment on Facebook. And Nicole Janssen, Wonderful, who has appeared on my show as well. And I feel like I’m connected to her through her, and it’s just a beautiful thing through the world of podcasting. But, you know, Jocelyn, you have such an interesting background, in my opinion, and I would love the opportunity for you to kind of introduce yourself and maybe some of the things that you’re working on lately. As you mentioned to me, you’re going through this kind of a transformational phase. What are you excited about lately?

Oh sure. So my stories, it’s a deep one and a lengthy one. I’ll try to condense it, make it powerful. So my vocation found me and initially began in ghostwriting. So I have twice defied death in the face of lifethreatening illness. Not exactly the plan that any of us have for a young life. The first was a life threatening case of lupus in my late twenty s. And I was actually working as a product and marketing specialist in the financial world. So great opportunities early on, happy living a balanced life, running for marathons, just really enjoying every moment. But it still had this inkling that I was writing national newsletters, I was launching products, I was training financial advisors. There was something more, there was something that was missing, there was a creative aspect, there was an expression from the heart that wasn’t there. And I knew that. And I tried to find other outlets outside of work to create that. Still knowing that that wasn’t enough. So I kind of got that nudge from life and that tap. And then I got the mallet to the head in the form of a life threatening case of lupus.

And I actually spent the greater part of two years in bed. I had two to three half decent waking hours a day, never became depressed. I used that time as introspection to learn, to grow, to gain wisdom, to observe myself, to observe others, to observe the world around me. I had this conversation with someone the other day, they’re like they had gone through breast cancer. They said, what a gift. Like what a gift. And they were talking about the introspective element as well. And when we can see that the power in using those adversities to that purpose, to gain this wisdom that we can then contribute forward is incredible. And so I emerged from my healing and I started to share stories of people I’d encountered in hospitals. I mean when you’re sharing hospital rooms with people who are dying and you’re lining up in a blood lab with I remember meeting a gentleman who had just retired and he spent his whole life waiting to play golf with his wife and go on vacation. And he was diagnosed with terminal cancer upon retirement and due to complications couldn’t even walk. So his dreams had passed and he said, look, I can tell everyone just one thing, just do it now, don’t wait.

So I started to share these stories and the feedback was incredible. Just some of the people I was sharing them with. And he said, you need to write your stories. I said, okay, sure. I wrote Unshakable to the Core, which is my story of healing through lupus and the strategies that I used that’s available on Amazon. And then I thought, you know what, I was just in the space of sheer gratitude and I became so deeply spiritual that really all I wanted to do was just be I just was basking. I mean, looking at the sky and realizing how blue it was and how beautiful and warm the sun was on me and just feeling everything to the nth degree. And I wanted to share that sentiment with others. So I wrote a book that was a compilation of 25 short stories of people I’ve met who are living their lives with their passion and purpose. I wanted to show them the beauty and the potential that I saw within them as a thank you for being part of my life. Unbeknownst to me, that was the beginning of my career, my vocation.

Who are those 225 people, by the way?

So a lot of them were professional motivational speakers who were friends of mine. And from that book came the opportunity to ghostwrite, for autobiographies or memoirs, books about life strategies that these speakers wanted to share.

Oh, no way. So out of 25 people, there could be a few of those who reach out to you and said they want to write a book with you.

They absolutely did. And then referral upon referral. And here I am, 15 books later that I’ve ghost written, never having sought out any of them. So this was really a calling, an undeniable calling, to share this ability to really see who you are as a person and help share that into the world. So not only that full self expression from the author’s standpoint, but that contribution to humanity.

That really is a beautiful thing. And I know precisely that feeling of almost stumbling upon something when you’re not paying attention to it. You expected nothing of it, and something beautiful really comes through. And often it’s not just one time because you kept writing, you kept connecting with people, being in the present, showing so much empathy. I feel like people really connect to that because it’s the people with empathy telling the truth and the wins and the failures who actually surface to the top. Do you agree?

Yeah. And this is so fascinating because this is exactly what I stand for as well. This is not just us feeling from a spiritual perspective that we need to operate from the heart and act more consciously to all humanity. That is part of it. A big part of it. But, I mean, there’s economic research to support this, and there are researchers in France that support what they call the human economy, where we’re moving from the industrial age, we operated with our hands to the information age, we operated with our heads, to now operating with our hearts. So there is a world waking up to wanting this more authentic, empathetic, compassionate communication from the standpoint of what I’m teaching and really in our business itself. So I’m absolutely with you. Yes, 100%.

Yeah. That was a typical creator moment, which is you had mentioned that you’ve written ghosts, written 15 books, and I know you’ve written books of your own as well. And I’m fascinated by the creators track. Like, I think there’s a creator inside every single one of us. But I think people are so bogged down with their day to day lives, and I do feel for them. I’ve been there, I’ve done that. I’ve been the caretaker of my dad, lived in the hospital for three, four months and realized that I didn’t have much time to do anything else other than reading, which was my favorite thing to do, reading to my dad. And so just looking back on that, I want to explore your creative process. Like, how do you overcome the writer’s block, which Seth Golden doesn’t believe in? And in terms of not feeling like yourself even today, right? Like, you are way past the experience of the near death experience, and you’re like yourself now. How long did that honeymoon phase last? And how do you overcome your fears and your struggles nowadays?

So I think there’s two aspects there so the creative process and then overcoming the fears and struggles. And I think in a way, they’re actually both connected together. So it’s about creating space and creating presence. You know, you could say this and then you go, well, wait a minute, I have family, I have real things going on. I have parents to take care of, illness, financial hardship, whatever the case may be, be compassionate with yourself, because there are always going to be times in our lives where we’re dealing with these deeply human aspects. And it comes back to the simple things like to be mindful and to be grateful of what we have every day. I’m working with these fascinating global scale leaders, with these revolutionary messages who are operating from the heart. And I feel so grateful to be a part of their world. And I allow myself and make that conscious effort to be fully present with them, to be fully present in every moment of life. And it is a conscious choice. 95% of what we do is subconscious. Gerald Zetman. He is research at Harvard Business School. He concluded that 95% of the time we’re operating at a subconscious level in a state of autopilot.

So if you think about it, this is how difficult it is for us to be conscious, to carve out that time, but really tuning in and being present, either to create or to be with people or to be fully in life, it takes conscious effort just like any other habit. You have to build it up. And I did the same. It took me time to really go, okay, making sure I want to do this. Here’s an example. On a profound level, I became a Reiki master, and I had an intuitive healing practice after I was sick in my late twenty s. And that’s the work that I incorporate into my more pragmatic business work. These days. It’s about really tuning in and sensing what’s going on with someone on all levels. The physical, the mental, the emotional, the spiritual. Two years ago, I was actually told I was going to die in June of 2016, despite my pleas with three different doctors, that something was going on in my abdomen. They had no answers, and their only answer they had left was, you’re going to die. I flew across the country to a doctor. I trusted it, it turned out within ten minutes, he concluded that I had a blood clot in the main vein of my abdomen when I healed from that experience.

But by that time, it was several months of me not being able to hold down food. I was malnourished, I couldn’t eat, I had lost all my hair. My organs were shutting down. It was serious. I didn’t have to make a conscious effort of I’m doing reiki on myself, I’m talking to my organs. Everything that I did consciously the first time I had trained myself to do at a very profound yet almost automatic level. It was a part of my life I had to consciously say to myself, I am healthy, I am well, I am strong. And the first time this time it was a part of me and I could feel that energy, but I didn’t have to consciously think it through.

I noticed the power of having a conversation with oneself. And I know it might sound crazy when we talk about this on the podcast, or it might sound crazy when you even talk to your friend, but I can absolutely relate to that. And turns out, scientifically, there’s proof to how that actually works, where imagining you’re doing curl or exercising, imagining your body image being different, actually not just mentally, but physically takes you to a different level. I find that to be so profound. Right. Like, we have the ability to heal ourselves.

Yeah. And you’re combining two beautiful aspects there. You’re combining the mental aspects, so the mindset, and you’re taking the action. So having both of those together is so important.

Yeah, absolutely. And what I also find that’s interesting about you is that balance between thinking, acting creatively and actually running a business that’s very successful and that makes you very happy. Right. This is a place where many people want to be, but they feel so removed from or feel so unreachable. And that’s precisely why I love running this podcast, is to find real people who are so relatable that you can actually aspire to become and kind of closing that distance. I want you to maybe share some of the beginning stories of going from your corporate job, which we didn’t hear as much about, and transitioning and you were sick, and transitioning into the writing gig that you have. Could you tell us a bit about that stage? Recall as much as you can. I don’t know how many years ago that would be. Yeah.

I always love to say that the greatest challenge in this life, I believe, is not to become deeply spiritual. It’s to become deeply human, which means grounding out those universal spiritual truths through the heart and into our everyday lives. I really believe that’s our greatest challenge. So I went through both extremes of this. I mean, I was the gogetter. I graduated top of my university class. I was on executives for societies. I was varsity sports, just doing it all and having a wonderful time and set out in the financial world at great opportunities. Early on, was a product specialist within six months, training financial advisors twice my age, coast to coast at 21 years of age.

Where was this, by the way, with Edward Jones?

I was in St. Louis, Missouri, and then in Toronto in Canada. So incredible opportunities, but it was drive, drive, drive, drive. I was driven by the markets, and I was driven by this need to just do do. And then the blessing was getting sick. And then I kind of went to this opposite extreme where I just wanted to be. I’m like, wow, I’m exhausted. I’ve really been pushing so hard, enjoying it and being happy and just wanting to just be spiritual and feel and experience the world in this different way. And then, interestingly, being hit with a blood clot again two years ago. It really grounded me out in a way that I’m so grateful for, because I feel like I became deeply spiritual after the first hit of illness. And then this time really grounded everything out to a way that I’m able to fuse these profound spiritual truths into the pragmatic and the people I work with. I call them the redefiners, defies and challenging the status quo. And they’re redefining the way we live, the way we do business, the way we see leadership to operate from the heart. And they are grounding out these profound spiritual truths.

And their messages are revolutionary, but they’re not always sure, how do I communicate that? How do I make it relatable? So I think when you’ve done things like looked after your father or for me, shared hospital rooms with people who are dying, your ability to be present and to communicate on a deeply human level, it becomes exponential. You see what it means to be deeply human and to be with someone in their times of greatest suffering. And when you can bring that into the work and communicate from that perspective, I mean, even when we’re helping someone create greater ease in their business, we’re still easing suffering to a certain degree. We’re very blessed in the first world, but a lot of us are still suffering from psychological perspective or spiritual perspective, right? So we all have this capacity to serve. And I talk about finding our unique voice, and that voice is using our gifts, passion, knowledge and perspective to promote empathy, growth, and ease of life. For others.

Hi there. This is FEI Wu, and you’re listening to the Phase World podcast. Welcome. Today on the show, I’m joined by Jocelyn Duffy, who is a communications strategist, author, and ghost Writer creative consultant. Her sole purpose is to help you awaken and contribute the best in you. Yeah. So I think a lot of people probably I was also very impressed with just the amount of information and how you tailor that to your own brand, to how you help other people. But you’re here now, and you’ve been doing this for a long time. If I could just turn back time onto the five I don’t know if you’ve been doing this for longer than five years. Like, what was the message? Like, I want to help people get a sense for this is how you sound and how you’re right now, but how did you get here? What was that journey like when you first started? What was the first message? Like, how did that sound?

There was a profound nature to my work, but I don’t think I saw it. I didn’t have the confidence yet. I would say that our messages don’t come from us, they come through us. So it’s a matter of being open, right. Creating that space, creating that presence, and it’s amazing what can come true. You through that creative process, whether you’re looking to revolutionize an industry or create, you know, something that’s going to lighten the weight and the burden and the hearts of those you serve.

So do you remember the first client? I don’t know whether you want to reveal his or her name. The first client you had, how many years ago was that? What was the assignment?

Yeah, so Peter Davison was one of my first clients. He’s still a client. He’s one of my closest friends. Love him dearly. Peter Davison was an internationally renowned speaker, and he developed Parkinson’s disease ten years ago, which incapacitated his voice, leading him to become a serial author and become more in the marketing and communication realm from a writing standpoint. And he was one of the people in the book that I wrote, the good news report and wrote his story for him. And he said, I want to share my story, which was Gift of the hits. So his story of the hits of his life and how he could see the silver lining and really contribute that for us. He was one of those people, listen to what people are telling you and the people who are coming to you, they’re telling you how you’re meant to serve. And Peter was that for me. He showed me how I could help him reveal not just the lessons, but the strategy within his story. And that’s a model I used to this day. I call it the S Squared storytelling method. That when we tell a great story, it’s inspirational, but when we incorporate strategy, we empower our audience.

So working with peter. I wouldn’t say that what I’m doing today is that much different, but I’m more aware of it now and I’m able to take it to more depth and more dimension with my clients. So it’s ever expanding. And I’m really loving working with those who have transformational stories right, who really want to extract and can be witnessed to their own life. And that’s what Peter was willing to do, was be witnessed to his life and say, what have I learned that I can give to others?

And sounds like you guys already knew each other fairly well. You may already have been a friend when you first working together.

I was working a lot with the Canadian Association of Professional Speakers, so I knew Peter, but we weren’t close friends. But it’s incredible, say, when you work with people from a ghostwriting perspective or helping them develop their ideas or messages, I am welcomed into people’s worlds in a way that I’ve had people hand me six decades worth of their journal entries. There is such a level of trust and the bond is so instant, that my clients are clients for life and we’re friends because they trust me with everything within them and everything within their lives. To know that and to help them portray it in the best, most valuable way possible.

My next question, I think it’s kind of related to your line of services on your website. Jocelynduffy.com. There is a Work with Me section, and I particularly really like this section. You have three offerings the Message Mastery, your signature segment, and lastly, the Breakthrough. Some of my listeners really want to hear sort of the behindthescenes stories. So what I find fascinating with freelancers entrepreneurs like you is that I myself, as one I also struggle with as I’m recently working on the Work with Me section, that I see myself transform through the years of experience, especially in the past couple of years, to going from offering everything to oh, my God, that was such a mistake. Don’t offer everything. Know where your genius is and then do what you do best. So you narrow it down to these three, and I have questions for each. But tell us kind of how you decided on the number three of these things that you offer. Was that a struggle? I mean, was that very clear to you?

Honestly, I just listened to my clients and what they needed and the different levels of service and the different levels of investment they were wanting to make and how they needed me as a co developer of their ideas and their messaging. And I think I love what you talk about our services evolving, what we’re offering evolving. And I had a client recently say to me, Shannon Graham, whose book I just helped expand, Leadership Book, and he said, you’re not charging enough for your wisdom. So if you talk about how I’ve personally evolved, that’s a big part of it is. I was focused so much on the service I was giving and not so much on it was kind of like, hey, as a bonus, fay, I’ll help codevelop your idea with all this wisdom that I’ve been gifted through to lifethreatening, cases of illness and working in the corporate world and life because we have our unique perspectives and we come together, there’s such power and we can add such dimension to your ideas and your messages. So that is really showcased in these new programs is saying, hey, it’s not just me, the ghost writer behind the scenes, it’s me, the codeveloper of your idea, so let me be your ally.

Yeah, I love that. It’s like instead of guessing so for my listeners, instead of guessing what you should be offering, I think you have to start somewhere. Number one, don’t beat yourself up. If you made a little bit of money from something, you have to put a lot of work in. And to me that’s a learning process and we all make mistakes. We can all be so critical of ourselves but go through that journey. But then once you gather a number of clients, I think that’s intel to basically what are some of the offerings you could have and refine from there? So, Jocelyn, you brought up a really interesting thing, which is pricing. And I’m not asking you to reveal every detail because every project is different. That has been the number one struggle to and then that the most frequently asked questions among the listeners because I also have a segment where I talk about freelancing specifically from pricing yourself, even just on an hourly basis, people struggle big time and into like what you have, the service offerings. That’s even a bigger challenge to, wow, what am I doing and how much did I charge.

So what are your thoughts on that?

Yeah, I mean, I take into account what others are charging, I take into account the wisdom, I listen to what my clients are telling me and where their investment level is comfortable. But we’re going to have you decide your audience based on where you set your price right and to really own your value and have that reflect. And one thing I will add in here that I’ve learned and I’ve learned the hard way. When you set a price and it’s fair but own your value at the same time, if you have people coming back and say, well, this is a $40,000 project, and you say, well, I want it for 30, if there’s anything I’ve learned along the way, the person who challenges you to diminish your price up front will be exponentially more work through the entire project than someone who is a big yes from the GetGo huge lesson that I’ve learned, because I’ve just been like, okay, you’ve come to me for a reason. I’m happy to serve you. And I’ve put two to three times more work into the projects where someone wanted it for less than those who are like, I would have paid you double for this.

This is incredible. Thank you. Thank you. And the process is seamless and it’s easy. It’s still hard work because we’re developing your full expression, what you want to say to humanity, and we’re doing it in a way that meets the needs of your audience. It’s a lot of work, but it can be made easy and seamless, and that’s what I endeavour to do with my clients and have clients who are perfectly aligned in that way.

Yeah, I mean, I couldn’t echo that more. This is almost counter intuitive, but I hope that people who are even slightly experienced will know what we’re referring to when someone even just take a pause or gather their finances and choose to work with you. That’s such a different experience from the get go all the way through to the end, not to mention all the other future project opportunities, is that once they choose you, they give you that space and that trust to do what you do best. You get the work done quicker on budget, and you’re revealing the best version of yourself as a writer and kind of pour into that work. And then what I want to clarify is when you say, I do two to three to times amount of work, that work is not to make the work itself better, but is the work of dealing with the politics, miscommunications and all that crazy stuff.

Yeah, I actually had to go and restructure my contract to say that when we’re writing a book, for instance, you can’t restructure the entire thing after we’re halfway through because it’s literally like starting over again. It’s more work than starting over again, actually. So whether you’re doing podcasts, you’re writing articles for thirdparty sites, you’re doing videos, Facebook lives, whatever the case may be, get yourself out there. Speak from your heart. Speak for what you stand for. Speak to how you want to serve in a way that only you can look at your composite experiences and bring that into the conversation. Because we all have such a capacity to be teachers, and you’re talking about looking back at our work. Go easy on yourself, too. And sometimes I look back at work I did early on, and I go, wow, good. This concept in there, and that’s brilliant. I need to use that because it was washed in the middle of an article somewhere and I need to bring it to the forefront. And, you know, I love what Malcolm Gladwell says. Like, he writes a book and he puts it out into the world. It takes him two and a half years to write his books and he puts them out into the world and he just lets them go and serves their purpose.

And I deal with this all the time. When people are developing their books or their message. They’re like. They want to get everything in, as we all do. We want to say it all, but sometimes there’s much more power in saying less. And the rest of it, it’s not lost. We can use it, right? So you just have to get to a point where you are comfortable that this book or this message is perfect as it is right now in this moment in time, you’re going to evolve. You’re going to grow. If you’re like us and those listening, we’re in this personal development sphere where we have chosen to evolve. We are consciously making the effort to grow and grow and grow. Well, your message is going to evolve, and it’s a beautiful thing because guess what? Your audience is evolving with you. You’re taking them on this journey with you. So don’t worry about the fact that your message might have been less evolved five years ago because you’ve got people who’ve been following you all along, and they’re so grateful that you’re taking them on this journey of evolution with you. It’s such a beautiful thing.

And when you grow with your audience, you form this irreplaceable bond.

Hi there. This is FEI Wu, and you’re listening to the Phase World podcast. Welcome. Today on the show, I’m joined by Jocelyn Duffy, who is a communications strategist, author, and ghost Writer creative consultant. Her sole purpose is to help you awaken and contribute the best in you. And you are literally growing with your audience because sometimes that feeling of being surprised, I mean, never be surprised by your own age. When you think about your friends are getting older, children are growing up, it’s just unbelievable. And I realize as much as I’m transitioning, kind of transforming, reinventing myself, so are everybody else. So I think we need to give people a chance to participate, not even just to become the better version, which is be different. I love where you’re going with this because answering a question I brought up ten minutes ago, but in a much better way than I had imagined, which is, as creators, we so often just need to get out of our own way. And it’s really hard. And I would love for you to talk about that. A lot of to maybe speak to the bloggers, the podcast creators. There’s so many people listening to the podcast are sort of along that route, and people are thinking about blogging all the time.

How often do you write for yourself? I mean, how do you kind of condition yourself to do your work on a daily basis? It’s not easy as a writer.

Yeah, it’s not easy. I mean, I’m a little bit different because I’m writing nonstop, so I literally am in flow all day, every day. And walking is huge. It’s the simplest things. Do what you love and carve out time to do what you love. Einstein walked a lot. Steve Jobs walked a lot. You know, there’s a list of names of those who were such genius innovators, who walked. It’s the simplest thing, but it sets everything into perspective. So all those human concerns, those fears, those to Dos, everything just settles when you’re out on a trail in nature. It’s amazing. And you create space. I mean, creativity flows through space. These ideas are coming through us, not from us. So the best thing you can do is find your ways to create space. If you enjoy meditation, meditate. If you love to run, go for a run, get on a bike, whatever that case may be, playing with children. Just the things where we’re not caught up in those adult, everyday human experiences that we have. I mean, we have to deal with those, obviously. But allow yourself those moments of space. Carve out the time for someone who has other projects or other work on the go and has family, you need to carve out that time, perhaps to really set those hours aside.

Or even if you’re starting with 20 minutes, carve out that time. Make it you time. I mean, this is it’s not selfish work because this gift that you give yourself and gaining clarity of who you are and what you stand for and what you have to say is your contribution to humanity. It’s what I call like, the collective individual. You’re fully expressing expressing yourself as an individual, but you’re serving the collective. You always have the wants and needs of your family, company, community, and humanity in mind when you’re serving. So it’s a heart to heart service, and it goes back to that human economy factor.

I love your idea of the collective self, and I realize that’s very true of we are much beyond who we are, like what we’re born into, our names, even our body. I talk about the idea of seeing myself in a very abstract sense that’s kind of through my journey as a podcaster, because, for example, I’m the only child. I was born to be stared at. Like, kind of people have such high expectations, and you are you’re it for the family. But now I find myself continuously removing myself from that, you know, what I’m known to be. So what do you say to people who maybe have not reached to maybe you don’t want to use the word spiritual, but the level of self awareness that you are? I think a lot of people question the individual power. They question, I just wrote something, or why do I bother? It’s not going to reach a lot of people, or this episode is not going to get a lot of downloads. Why should I bother?

Yeah, I love that question because this is the foundation of my work. We all have an audience, and that may be a few hundred people. It may be a few hundred thousand, maybe a few hundred million. And no one has the composite of experiences that you have or that anyone else has that has shaped our unique voice. So you have a message and a service to an audience that no one else can deliver. That’s why it’s crucial. That’s why your message is important, right? And it takes time to find that audience, to find that home based. And if you’ve had a vast array of experiences, you’re not sure how they fit together. And that’s what I do with my clients, is I’m looking at corporate work and fitting it with lifethreatening, illness and the entrepreneurial spirit and communication. And it’s a matter of taking the time to put those pieces together and find this really unique offering where people go, wow, I didn’t realize that all those facets of myself or my life can fit together. And you’re showing people their potential while you’re realizing your own. And I think we overcomplicate self awareness sometimes.

We have so many models and methodologies, like how you get to know anyone else. You spend time with them, you observe and you ask questions. Do the same with yourself, right? Spend time with yourself, observe. If you be witnessed to yourself and your life, you will develop a whole new appreciation for who you are. I mean, take a third party perspective, and there’s psychology to support this. When you take that third party perspective to yourself, gives you an objective point of view to what you’ve really overcome, what you’ve created in your life, how valuable your experiences have been. Because, trust me, there is value in everything. And I’ve written for so many people with every experience possible and help them extract that strategy and those nuggets of wisdom that they’re now contributing to others. So, yes, is your message important? Absolutely.

So as we’re wrapping up, I want to ask a question, which is for you. Where would you like to take your brand? Whether that means it’s the upcoming year or third to five years from now or even longer, what are some divisions that you have now if you could add or remove from your daily routines to maybe try or accomplish something new? What does that look like?

So I’m really focusing on building my own thought leadership brand now. I’m great at being a servant, and I love to serve others, but I’ve been the ghost writer behind 15 books, and I can’t tell you most of them. So a lot of people don’t know who Jocelyn Duffy is or what Jocelyn Ducky stands for. So really, that’s my focus now, is getting the messages out through podcasts, through articles, and developing that thought leadership brand. And having written so many books, I mean, it’s such a wonderful experience. But when you’re writing books, I mean, I’m working with three to six clients a year on full books. We’re very involved. I love them dearly, but there’s only so many people I can work with. So I’m moving more into message mastery now, working oneonone with great leaders to help codevelop their ideas. It gives me more bandwidth to operate with greater people, and I will develop ecourses and everything else to make that easy for those who are starting out trying to figure out, how do I find my voice, how do I tell my story in a really powerful way that empowers my audience, how do I structure my messages?

So that’s all coming.

That’s super exciting. Thank you so much for sharing.

In summary, I love to talk about what are the two fundamental aspects of every great communicator, and I think we covered that beautifully today, and that’s both the technical and being tuned in. And by technical, I mean, like, being conscious to the meaning of words and how you’re using words to create meaning. Of course, there’s a grammatical and everything else. If you’re reading something and there’s grammatic layers, you’re losing your message or if you’re speaking it in a way that it’s not clear. So technical is important, but the tuned in is such a critical piece, and that’s what our world is asking for. You mentioned this earlier, you know, with some teachers who are just really in your face. This is how it is. This what you need to do. Tuning in is different. It’s really leading from that empathy, from that compassion. It’s speaking heart to heart. And it doesn’t mean that you’re not pragmatic. It doesn’t mean that you’re not saying, like, you need to do this now because, hey, trust me, I’ve nearly died twice. I’m telling you something of value. You need to go out and share your message. It doesn’t mean I’m not passionate about it, and I’m not going to scream it from the rooftops.

It just means that, hey, selfexpression is telling the world, this is who I am, this is what I stand for. If you’d love to join me, I’d love to have you. Right? Very different than seeking acceptance or needing to get somewhere from an individual standpoint. Right again, human economy, keeping that really conscious perspective of the needs of all of us as the collective.

Yeah, absolutely. And thank you so much for clarifying that, because especially for people who haven’t really experienced the journey of what you have done freelancing, and it’s really hard to articulate and especially to separate the two concepts. And I think we talk about unlearning a lot these days, which is if you believe that you’ve learned everything in school through your parents, through your previous experience, sometimes that’s just insufficient. So it’s necessarily insufficient in a way. I feel like I must as you were saying that, it makes me wonder, like, one more thing that comes to mind is there are people who are studying English or people who are learning majoring in something else and dreaming about becoming a writer. And I know that there’s a tribe of people out there helping writers. I think Jeff Gwen is one of them. But to teach people how to actually become writers, who can feed themselves first and become successful. What is your message to people who aspire to become writers like yourself?

Yeah, it’s so possible. It’s interesting you mentioned that because even my mother’s got friends who have daughters who have done their history degree or their arts degree, and they’re working in a library going, this it, is this all I can do? I’m like, you need to talk to Jocelyn. It’s funny because I have a marketing and business background, and that’s one thing I will say to any writer out there, any way you can educate yourself? I mean, we have so many means online now to learn marketing and to learn some aspects of business. Get a mentor, because when you can combine that with your writing ability, there are so many entrepreneurs in need of communication support, whether you’re actually writing the content or you’re consulting and coaching them through it, there is so much need. Our communication is at the forefront of everything we do right. That voice that we’re putting out to the world. So there’s huge opportunities. So for the writers out there who are starting out going, can I do this? Can I create something? Start doing some searches, under. If you know what you love, put those areas together. So if you love sports and you love writing, start doing some research on sports writing and see who’s out there.

Touch face with people. And it’s so fascinating to me. One thing I did early on in my career, which was so helpful, was that I was fearless in reaching out to those who were playing on the big stage. And sometimes we don’t think that they’re going to answer, but you’ll be so surprised. Like, I had everything from endorsements to mentors to collaborations while I was supporting New York Times bestselling authors and all of their clients in the first year of my business. So reach out to those people because guess what? Somebody helped them when they were getting started.

Absolutely. And how many years has it been, Jocelyn, that you’ve had your business?

Formally, I think now four years.

Oh, wow, that’s incredible.

Yeah, I was doing it part time before then, so formally, I launched in January 2014.

Wow.

Yeah. And consider too, that I spent six months in hospital and a year and a half recovering during that time. So when you set your mind to something and you decide, you know, whether you’re writing or anything else, you decide, I want to do this. And you connect and you share your information in the world, it is incredible how fast things can happen. There’s nothing but to do it right. That’s all you need to do.

Yeah, it’s so beautiful. Once put your foot down and just do it. Don’t wait. If Jocelyn people want to reach out to you, contact you, either to hire you to learn more about your work, or simply follow your blog. What’s the best way to stay in touch?

So I’m happy. If anyone like to join in on social media at Jocelyn Duffy. J-O-S-C-E-L-Y-N-D-U-F-F-Y. My website is jocelynduffy.com. And for those who are listening, I have a free gift. It’s called communicating value. Just a booklet to help you not only stand out, but fully selfexpress in a really hardtoheart way. And that’s [email protected] gift.

Oh, wonderful. But thank you so much, Jocelyn. It was such a lovely conversation and thank you so much for willing to share all the stories of your own becoming with us.

Thanks so much. Thanks, everybody, for listening.

Hi there, it’s me again. I want to thank you very much for listening to this episode and I hope you were able to learn a few things. If you enjoyed what you heard, it would be hugely helpful if you could subscribe to the Phase Role Podcast. It literally takes seconds. If you’re on your mobile phone, just search for Phase Role Podcast in the Podcast app on iPhone or an Android app such as Podcast Addict and click subscribe. All new episodes will be delivered to you automatically. Thanks so much for your support. Thank you.

You. You.