How to Find Your Voice to Say What Matters

In this episode of the Soulfully You Podcast, Coach Chris Rodriguez delves into the importance of owning and expressing your unique voice. Whether you're a business owner, leader, or simply someone looking to make a meaningful impact, this episode provides tools to help you stand out and make your voice heard.

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• 00:00 Welcome to the Soulfully You Podcast
• 00:44 A Lesson from College Days
• 01:09 The Story of Abraham Lincoln's Actor
• 03:41 Finding Your Authentic Voice
• 04:00 Components of Your Unique Voice
• 04:26 Voices That Inspire You
• 09:13 Telling Your Unique Stories
• 12:04 The Unique Way You Tell Your Story
• 14:23 Tone and Mood in Your Voice
• 18:54 Posture and Energy: The Physical Aspect
• 21:14 The Importance of Owning Your Voice
• 22:57 Closing Thoughts and Thank You

Transcript

0:05

Hey friend. Welcome to the Soulfully You Podcast with Coach Chris Rodriguez. I'm a movement and mindset coach, and I believe in a deeper way of living, a more soulful way of being. Join me each week for conversations about how to put a little more soul. Into our work, our relationships in our everyday lives. Back in college, one of the last classes I had to take to graduate was directing my degree was creative arts. And we had to take a series of classes from music theory to acting stage production, audio production. And all those went together to build our final project, of leading a showcase where all of the directors in this class, we all took one scene. It was a cool, challenging, formative experience for me. Some of the things I've learned in that class, I still use'em to this day and everything that I do, but I remember my professor telling me this one story about this one production she was doing and. It was about Abraham Lincoln and she cast her lead. It was the senior boy, and he was tall, slender, and physically. He had the right build to play. Abraham Lincoln when she auditioned him, not just was he physically what he needed to be to play the role, but his audition. Was amazing. He crushed it. He was a good actor. As a rehearsing, he would have these moments where he'd have to have a dialogue with another cast member, and every time he went up to partner with somebody else. And it was time for him to read his lines. He would shrink, his body would physically shrink and he wouldn't project his voice. So they kept running the scene again and again. And finally my professor took him aside and said, Hey, what's going on? It seems like every time I put you in a scene with somebody else, you shrink. You don't project. But when you're speaking and given a monologue by yourself, you have energy, you project. And you act like the person that I cast. He said to her, well, I'm really self-conscious about my height, so every time I come and I stand next to somebody else, I feel like I need to shrink down and be on their level. What she said to him was, listen. You gotta own your height. I cast you because of your height. God gave you this height, and every time you shrink your body, you're changing your posture and you can't project your voice. You need to stand tall, own who you are, open your chest and speak. So they ran the scene again. He stood tall. Opened his chest projected and it changed everything. The play was a success and he crushed that role. When I'm working with clients or when I'm looking at my own life. with the people around me, I see that same story happen in so many different ways, feeling like we have to shrink ourselves to be on the same level with other people. Being self-conscious of the God-given abilities and person we are. Out in the world and we mute our voice. We hide our voice. We act as if we don't have something to say. Maybe you're a business owner or entrepreneur. Maybe you're a leader. In today's episode, I want to talk to you about how to find your authentic voice. Own that voice. And stand out amongst the crowd. not just the way it sounds, though. I am gonna talk about that. I want to talk to you about finding your voice and your relationships and your work life. When I'm teaching this idea of finding your unique voice, there are five components. One are the voices that inspire you. Two are the unique stories you want to tell. Three are the unique ways that you tell those stories. Four, the tone and the mood that you want to express your voice. And five. Your physical posture and your energy. Let's break those all down. The voices who inspire you, there's two books that I love that kind of paint this picture for me. One is a book by Adam Grant called Originals, where he essentially says there there isn't a such thing as being. An original at something. What people do is they take the different things that they learn and they perfect them, and they look at'em in new ways, but the inspiration for that originality is borrowed from the people that went before you. It's borrowed from the things that you've learned, and you might implement'em in a different way, but originals really aren't original. And the second book is a book called Stand Out, and there's an idea in there. I love where they talk about taking two maybe opposite things, two things that you might never think, go together and put'em together. So one example they use is like, maybe like a. Washing machine and a ballerina one is loud and you know, mechanical and one is graceful and quiet and soft and smooth. But what if you took the concept of both of those elements and put'em together and created an idea that takes the grace of a ballerina with the mechanics of a washing machine, what new idea can come from that? I think a lot of times when we're looking for our voice, we are thinking like, oh, this thing is just generated from me. But there are voices in your life who inspire you. Any good writer will tell you the very first thing that they ever wrote was an imitation of what somebody else wrote. Stephen King talks about this in his memoir on writing where he liked these little comics, and he would just rewrite'em and sell'em for 5 cents at his school. You have to have a blueprint to learn language. Right to learn the language of the thing you're trying to create and the voice you're trying to express. I remember being a little kid and watching a preacher on TV with my mom. It was a black gospel preacher and, you know, he was doing the hooping and hollering and the, and ah, and, and all those things that you see in the black church. And I was like, yo, who, who taught him that? Like. Why does he sound like that? And he said, well, I mean, his pastor did it and his pastor's pastor did it, and they just watched each other do this over the years. And now it's this kind of sound that comes from the black church and black preaching and it's beautiful. But that's another example of you get inspired by what you hear. When I was looking to find my unique voice, and I'm talking about specifically the sound of it, I remembered my story of code switching and knowing that being a kid from inner city, New Jersey and the way I talked to my friends and the way I talked to my brothers was very different than the way I spoke when I was working at the bank. It was very different when I was speaking to customers at the restaurant I was managing. It was very different than the way that I spoke to some of these execs and VPs at some of these companies. I led workshops at. And what I found was when it was time for me to kind of share an idea that was my idea. I didn't quite know how to do it in a not code switchy way. So I had to go back and say like, yo, who inspired me? I. Who were the voices that when I was young I was listening to and it was guys like Biggie. It was guys like Tupac, it was rapper, Foxy Brown, like the, the hip hop artists of New York and New Jersey were really an inspiration to me for finding my voice and I had to. Make a commitment to myself that I was gonna figure out how to not code switch. I was gonna figure out there's a way that I can maybe not use as much slang or Ebonics or whatever, but I needed to figure out a way that when I show up and I'm sharing my voice in a workshop at Google, that. That energy is not different than when I'm doing a yoga class for my black men, or when I'm just kicking it with my brother, and we're just having a good time. Obviously, there's things that I talk about with my brother than I'm not gonna talk about with, with these execs and CEOs and everything, but I wanted to find. Who I was before, I felt the need to change my cadence, to change my tone, to change the way I deliver what I have to say. Some of that is what you're experiencing right now and every time you listen to the podcast, so the voices will inspire you, the stories you tell, there are causes that you are passionate about. There are experiences in your life that are unique from the experiences of any other person who knows you. Me and my biological brothers and sisters, we've all had very different experiences. Even me and my brother that I'm closest to in age, and we grew up in the same house. My experience and his experience are totally different. And what people will make you think is, oh, because you are this person or because you came from this family or because you're this demographic of people That experientially, you don't have something nuanced or different to say than somebody else. But that's not the case. When I'm looking for the unique stories I tell, I go back. I think about my family, I think about my history. I think about what are the wins I've experienced in my life? I think about what are the pains and the losses I've experienced in my life. And then I connect that to a specific group of people. Alright, so who can learn from my wins? Who can learn from my failures? And how can I tell these stories in a way that can shape and benefit someone else? Right. So the unique stories that you want to tell, those can be the lessons for the people you want to serve. I think in the age of trends and viral and the same. We think that the thing that everybody else is talking about is the thing that we should be talking about, and I just want to. Just speak to you and say like, nah, it ain't gotta be like that. Highlight and elevate the stories that matter to you. Highlight and elevate the stories and the problems that people ask you questions about. There are two experiences that made this idea of me even putting together a framework for people to find their voice. It came about one is when one of my former students came up to me and said, I have found my voice in public speaking and my profession. I haven't found a way to share my voice that is embodied where I feel comfortable and connected with my physical presence. When I speak, when I share an idea, the other experience it was one of my clients coming back years later. She's a therapist, and she said, I've been listening to your podcast. I've been listening to the way that you share your voice, and I want you to teach me. Right. So I tell these stories because there are people in my life who are asking for'em. The unique way you tell your story, this is a combination of the delivery of like, okay, who was I before the code switching? Who was I before I felt like I needed to get corporate? How did I express myself? That's a part of it. Another part of it is the medium in which you share your stories. For me, a podcast is a really good medium because I process through speaking and through conversation. For some people, it's easier for them to write For other people, it's easier for them to share the story through building and art and creating For some people the way you might want to share your stories, the unique stories you want to tell is through creating experiences that give people an opportunity to feel the story. I think of one of my homegirls, Lotus, she's gonna be on the podcast, in the next few weeks. And she creates these art experiences for companies and organizations. She also helps create documentaries for organizations and causes that she believes in. She doesn't always have to be the person speaking and telling the story for her. It's elevating others to share their story. So when you're thinking about the unique stories you want to tell. Maybe you are not the mouthpiece who is, who's doing the work that you believe in who might need a little financing, who might need a little help, networking and getting their voice out there. I had this experience, one of my clients, he said, Hey, I wanna work with you. And as we started working together, he started looking at some of the resources I had and he said, Hey. My skillset is actually in building this, and I really believe in what you do. So is it all right if I helped you build this in a way that helps you get greater results and helps you actually do the thing that you want to do, right? We can think outside the box about the way we want to share our voice. And maybe sharing your voice is through the mouthpiece of other people. Tone and mood. Okay. Tone and mood is hard. So in the United States where I'm based out of. We tend societally to see the people. And this is a generalization, but we tend to see the people who we want to lead things and we want to influence us generally. We like those people to be, I'm gonna use the Enneagram as my archetype, but I'll break those. I'll break it down. So Enneagram three is an achiever or a performer. We like those people to lead us, right? Best foot forward type people very, um, knows what they want. Very driven in that way. We want Enneagram eights, challengers. To lead us. So those are the people that, again, very driven, very assertive. They will climb, they will step, they will claw. These people end up running a lot of these companies. They will sometimes they'll bulldoze you again, all eights, all challenges. Ain't ain't gonna run over you. But they value challenge and they value being challenged. And challenging the status quo. We want some of those people to lead us generally. And then sometimes we want like a Enneagram seven, like a, an enthusiast to lead us. Not every time, because sometimes, you know, they can bounce off the wall and go different places, but those enthusiasts that, um, that really are the life of the party and that. Partner it with a drive and an excitement. We want those people generally to lead us. Yes, we'll follow you, because you're gonna give us a, a good experience, but that is not the full spectrum of archetypes of people. There is a book I love. By Susan Kane called Quiet, and she talks about the power of introversion in that book And the way in which we've lost appreciation for the introverted leader. And everybody's not an introvert. Right. Some of us are extroverts, some of us are ambiverts. I'm more of an ambivert, lean more towards the introvert. But we can all tap into the quiet of ourself. We can all tap into that kind of mood or mode. And I feel like I'm speaking specifically to a certain type of person who. Yo, sometimes you don't gotta go and, stomp and shout to make your voice known. Sometimes you just have to stand in who you are and quiet strength, And let people be influenced from behind the scenes with this kind of silent strength. I know I just spent a lot of time just valuing introverts and like, yes, that's the way to go. I want to speak to the, the extroverts and the, and the value of that kind of energy, that kind of mood. I think it's important for my folks who are expressive, who have that drive, who need to speak, who want to bring energy and life, and kind of that life of the party energy or any of those kind of things, you know, just extroverted or challenging or driven or whatever. There is a belief that you don't fit in some of maybe the softer settings, right? I spend a lot of time in yoga communities. I'm a certified yoga teacher. I and sometimes. The music I play in those classes is not just right, like I'm not playing eastern slow meditation music, I'm playing soul. I'm playing funk. Sometimes I'm playing hip hop because I believe that some of the softer practices need to be infused with energy and excitement. So if you find yourself and you're an extrovert and you find yourself in these spaces where it's like they, you kind of always have to tell you to sh shush and be quiet. Maybe the question to ask yourself is like, okay, there's value in that at times, but how can I inject energy and excitement and joy? Into maybe a somber environment, right? Owning your own unique mood and tone, even in settings that seem like it don't fit. Okay. Lastly, posture and energy. Okay. So the example I gave in the beginning of this guy who was shrinking down as he would speak, and it literally made his voice shrink. We don't realize how much we shrink. We look in the mirror and we're kind of sizing up our body, right? Like, we're like, Ooh, my belly. I don't like the way that looks. And we're looking in the mirror and we're doing all these postural things. Out of a lack of confidence in physically who we are. I want you to take a minute and just breathe with that thing that I just said. Acknowledge that, you know, there, there might be some discomfort with physically who I am in a space and even in in my body, right? Sometimes there is a lack of confidence in the words that we're about to say. Sometimes there's some fear in what we're about to share. And our body follows suit and then our voice follows, right? And then we just kind of shrink and we're not clear. So what I wanna offer as an approach is use your body to help you gain confidence. So literally opening your chest long spine. Taking some deep breaths, breathing through the nose, expanding through the belly, getting that oxygen to the brain right before my clients record anything, any video, any podcast. I have'em do some breathing. I have'em doing some shaking. I have'em doing some bouncing. I have'em put on a get hype song and just dance a little bit. And then I have'em when they're recording. If they're in a space where they can do it, I have'em stand and record when I'm recording this podcast, I'm standing, I'm at my standing desk. For the most part, sometimes, you know, I need to be in bed and just chilling out. But for the most part, I try to stand because it's gonna give me that energy. I'm a Jersey Jamaican, Puerto Rican. I talk with my hands. I got to, you know, we, we talk when we walk, right? Like I have to. I have to be up and you can hear, even as I'm expressing the postural things that I do to bring my energy up, you can probably hear the volume of my voice going up, right? Sometimes we gotta use our body to get us hyped, change our energy. What's the context for all of this? Okay, so. Some of you may never put out a podcast or a YouTube video or Instagram post. Some of you may never record music like I've done, or, you know, do a performance on stage, right? Like none of that stuff that might not apply to you, but there's gonna come a time in your life where you have to have a hard conversation with somebody. You are gonna have to say something that you don't want to say there's gonna be other times where you're gonna be in settings where you physically don't feel safe and you need to speak up. All this stuff matters right there. If we own the fact that there are stories that I need to tell, if we own the fact that we have a unique way and cadence of going about telling those stories, if we. Own the tone and the mood that we wanna share those stories. If we get our bodies ready with our posture and kind of hyping ourself up and getting ourself centered before we share, if we tap into all those voices that inspire us. The ancestors, the elders, the authors, the people doing the thing that. We want to do the people in our life who have the confidence to say things boldly. We tap into those voices. We put all this together. That's how you find your voice. And if nobody told you that. What you have to say matters and the way you say it is needed. I want to be the person to tell you that somebody needs to hear what you have to say and the way that only you can say it. Thank you for listening to the Soulfully You Podcast with Coach Chris Rodriguez. If you like the show, help others find me by subscribing and leaving a review on your favorite podcast platform. And don't forget to connect with me on Instagram at Coach underscore Chris Rodriguez. For more episodes along with all of my coaching programs, visit me@www.coach chris rodriguez.com. Special thanks to my team behind the scenes music by Dan Smith. And remember, whatever you do, wherever you find yourself today, make sure you put some soul in it.