Not-So Kind Regards

How to focus your creative spark as a multi-passionate

• Maddy Birdcage & Caroline Moss • Season 4 • Episode 3

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Identify as a multi-passionate entrepreneur or marketer? This episode is for you.  

Maddy shares her personal experiences managing a neuro-spicy mind, offering insights on finding strength in multi-passionate tendencies while overcoming perfectionism and self-doubt. You’ll learn how to channel your many interests into successful ventures and the importance of surrounding yourself with the right team. This episode is packed with empowering strategies for both multi-passionates and perfectionists alike, making it a must-listen for anyone seeking to tap into their unique strengths. 

Episode Highlights: 

  • Exploring the strengths and challenges of multi-passionate minds. 
  • How neurodiverse traits like ADHD influence creativity and entrepreneurship. 
  • The importance of having a supportive team for execution. 
  • Understanding perfectionism vs. multi-passionate tendencies in business. 
  • Tips for preventing burnout while managing multiple passions. 
  • How to align business and life strategies with your values for success. 
  • Leveraging your diverse skill set to create a fulfilling career. 
  • The power of manifestation and tuning into your intuition. 

Resources:  

Where To Find Us:  

To work with us, book your discovery call at https://www.birdcagemarketing.com.au/start-here

To discover the school, visit https://birdcagemarketing.com.au/

Speaker 2:

Welcome to the Not so Kind Regards podcast. I'm Maddie Birdcage and I'm Caroline Moss.

Speaker 1:

We are done with the digital fluff and pleasantries and we're here to talk straight about brand building, digital marketing and personal growth.

Speaker 2:

This episode is, of course, brought to you by Birdcage Marketing, the forward-thinking business growth and digital marketing brand that started this all. If you are a small, medium or large size business, don't know how to get started or need to tighten up your digital marketing efforts, we are currently taking on new strategy and virtual marketing manager clients. Let us shape your strategy, give you the action steps you need to implement and then hold your hand as you and all your team implement the exact process that will take you from where you are now to where you want to be. To get started, book your discovery call at birdcagemarketingcomau and let's do this. Now back to the episode.

Speaker 2:

Hey Caroline, hey Maddie, so today I'm really excited to talk to you about the inner workings of my mind, the inner workings of my mind, the inner workings of a lot of our listeners' minds. I'm talking about multi-passionate, probably neuro-spicy, adhd, maybe even autism spectrum, diagnosed or undiagnosed, but I want to break down what is going on in our brains and how we can actually overcome a lot of the challenges that multi-passionate people face.

Speaker 1:

I'm really excited to talk to you about this as well, because I know so many people in my personal life, so many clients, so many students. All identify with this type of personality, as we'll recall it, and when you know how to work with it, you can find the strength in it, can't you?

Speaker 2:

Absolutely. For a very long time, I thought that I always did things wrong, and it's still something that I'm most certainly working through. But with the help of you guys, my team and my own mindset work, I've definitely discovered that there are a lot of advantages to having this sort of brain, especially in the creative or entrepreneurship space.

Speaker 1:

And can you let everyone know what sparked this idea for this?

Speaker 2:

podcast. Yes, so some of you may know that my sister has been working with us for a couple of months now maybe six or so months and we were on our Monday morning team meeting call and I don't even remember how the conversation got started, but Max and I basically Was it Max?

Speaker 1:

like stretching or laying down in the middle of the call.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, she was, yeah, lying down in the middle of the meeting because she was really excited to say things and she knew she had to, like, get moving in order not to just like blurt things out and interrupt people. But I think it's got to do with the idea that Max and I have no understanding of people that don't just jump in and go straight for it. When you have an idea, why don't you just do the thing right? And that is one of the superpowers of people who I'm going to call. I'm using the term multi-passionate, but it kind of encapsulates this whole ADHD feeling shiny object syndrome. That whole kind of does lots of different things, is interested in lots of different things, but also changes direction quite frequently. So we really couldn't understand why people aren't just jumping in and doing things that they want to do. And then you guys pretty much the rest of you voiced up and said that we're actually the opposite. We're the perfectionists who struggle to take any action at all unless it's going to be absolutely perfect.

Speaker 1:

Yeah. It was funny in that meeting specifically, you were like oh, I forgot that people don't operate like. Max and me and the rest of your team, which is us, are all. We sit in the perfectionist camp, yeah.

Speaker 2:

And so I think it definitely requires a bit of push and pull from each personality type, and that's why it's so important with who you surround yourself with, not just as people that you hire internally as a team, but also people mentors that you bring on board. And I know we attract definitely a multi-passionate type. We attract both, but I seem to resonate obviously a lot more with the multi-passionate clients that come through our doors, and you, especially in the last, I'd say, 12 months, have gotten very good at working and mentoring these multi-passionate to give a different perspective. But then I think seeing you come out of your perfectionistic tendencies as well has allowed you to then be able to mentor the perfectionists amongst us and show them the strategies that you use.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, definitely. How do you identify between being a multi-passionate and perfectionist? Do you think this is something we all just innately know who we are, probably as we get a little bit older?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I think we're probably told it in school. I first want to say that we all have elements of both. I definitely have perfectionistic tendencies in particular aspects, but I lean mainly towards the multi-passionate. You would probably identify as multi-passionate if you were told growing up you do things very quickly probably. Maybe that you do things rushed, that you're highly distractible. Perhaps, or, like me, you only like to do the things that you like to do. So for me, I had feedback in school and in my first jobs which was if you don't want to do something, you won't do it, and that's a result of being multi-passionate. You also are the type you probably had multiple different businesses, probably from when you were a child. Growing up, you've had a lot of hobbies and you are interested in lots of different things. You find it difficult to put yourself into a particular box different things.

Speaker 1:

you find it difficult to put yourself into a particular box, would you say most multi-passionates are high achievers as well, because like that's something as a perfectionist you really identify with. No, I don't think so. It's not about achieving, it's just about following the impulse.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I think you actually have a lot of multi-passionates that are low achievers, I dare say, because they haven't been taught how to harness the power that their mind actually has, and whether that's from schooling. I think they're probably better at school these days, but maybe when millennials were going through school and older, I don't think they were good at working with those sorts of kids students. So I think there's actually a lot of low achieving multi-passionates and probably a lot of high achieving perfectionists.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, because I feel like school caters to the perfectionist, not the and, if you think about it, the perfectionist was always a good student. Right, getting things done on time, getting them done to a high standard. If anything school really encourages that, it doesn't encourage the multi-passionate.

Speaker 1:

So what drives multi-passionates? It's just the urge.

Speaker 2:

It's impulse, it really is impulse, and it's feeling and it's intuition. But actually, if you are ADHD and on the autism spectrum as well, what actually, things that you think are gut feelings are actually pattern recognition. You have, like this supercharged brain in your head that is an expert at recognizing patterns and picking up on things, even if you don't realize that. That's what your brain is doing, and because of that you're able to identify opportunities, because you kind of know what's going to happen next. Wow, yeah, that's cool. It is very, very cool. The other thing is, though, it's difficult for us to stay very focused on a task for a long period of time, and that's most certainly me. I love the idea of starting up a business, starting projects, starting a new hobby, starting things, but the follow-through can be challenging for me. It's something I've definitely learned to work with, though, and to actually surround myself with the right people to make sure that the follow through still happens, and that has most certainly been a secret to my success.

Speaker 1:

I believe. Can you expand on that for us? Yeah, because obviously when you're starting something, it's that new, it's a freshness, it's a dopamine hit, it's a rush, but then at what point does it start to like fizzle for you? And then how do you bring that back into your work routine?

Speaker 2:

Relying on other people, I feel is the answer to the multi-passionate.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, You've always said this that your strength is in who you've hired and nurtured within the business. Is it that's what you've hired and nurtured within the business? Is it that's what you've?

Speaker 2:

said oh good, because I've also made some bad hiring decisions. You've kept the good ones, the good ones are sticking around.

Speaker 2:

Absolutely. We have a team of A-plus people right now, but I think that's probably the easiest way to overcome the lack of follow through. So for me, I have brought the right people in pretty much every area of my life. Where I know I'm not good at financial management, I love planning the financials. I love setting the big juicy goals. I love even forecasting Not so good at record keeping, budgeting all of that. Not so good at record keeping, budgeting all of that and so my mother manages my personal and my business accounts, plus Olivia, my assistant, works on that as well with things like projects within the agency. My role is always we've identified that my role is always to bring the new idea to the team for you guys to kind of workshop it a bit and bring it back to a realistic timing, deliverable, understanding what actually needs to be done, and then it's actually to go off and execute it and make it happen.

Speaker 1:

Yeah. So with that piece it's, I feel like the important part is not having just a team of yes people. It's yeah, it's yes, but these are all the things we need to work through, and this is what's on our plate now and this is the timeline that we think is achievable, and it's all these questions that we have to work through, rather than like, okay, let's drop everything and go do that thing For sure there is the other end of the spectrum, though, and having a team full of no people is also.

Speaker 2:

I believe that was my biggest mistake that I made. Yeah, so I liken the energy of the multi-passionate to be like a flame, like a fire. If you think about, in Australia especially, we have lots of bushfires and we have this burning off. That happens right. So the fire brigade will pre-burn particular areas of the bush in a controlled way, and that's how you need to think about your focus and your energy. You want it to be the back burning. You don't want it to be the out of control fire that just rages everywhere and causes destruction. You want it to be this controlled fire where you're using the power of this flame, but you're directing it, you're guiding it to where you want it to go, and you also with the backburning.

Speaker 2:

I don't know why backburning is such a relevant example, but with backburning you also don't want to snuff it out. You also don't want the flame to go out completely. You actually want it to burn, to keep moving. Yeah, and so in the past I have had managers in roles that completely turned out the flame on me and that led to detrimental effects in my business as well. But it's because of that experience that I've actually learned to lean into this multi-passionate energy and not snuff it out, not let it flame freely through the bush, but to actually control where that energy goes, and that's what I'd really love to be able to. That's what I want to share in this episode today how to control it.

Speaker 1:

How to direct it, if you said, because it's like you can't, if you control it, you might be keeping it in the box, but you want to give it a pathway that has some boundaries and frameworks around it.

Speaker 2:

Let's talk about that. So what I really want to talk about is the biggest enemies of the multi-passionate, and the first one is burnout. If you are multi-passionate you identify as multi-passionate you will have experienced burnout, if not once, then many, many times before in your life. I know I certainly have, and I'm even going through a light period of burnout right now, I would say, with our studios opening up, with having so many brands managed, and what we need to do is make sure that we, again, we guide where that flame goes, because if you spread that flame too thin as well, it doesn't have, it doesn't fulfill its purpose. And so I get very strict with myself as to how much stuff I will take on. I didn't used to. I used to say yes, yes, yes, yes. Now I really listen into my gut, my intuition, and it's like if it's not a hell yes, I will automatically say no to it. I'll be like no, it's a no.

Speaker 2:

The other thing if you are a multi-passionate and you're like, yeah, but my gut's telling me it's a hell yes to every opportunity that comes through, then what I need you to go back to is your life strategy, or as I well, I call it a life strategy, but it's your vision board, and this is why we have the vision board teachings in Birdcage Marketing School. It's why we encourage our clients to get really aligned with what it is that they're looking for out of life. You need to have your pillars of what your values are, what your goals are, and every time an opportunity or an idea comes to your mind, I need you to run it through that life strategy to make sure it's actually aligned with where you want to go, or is it just another distraction?

Speaker 2:

for you, Because you're kind of in this stage now where not you specifically, but starting to identify and build this skill of being aware of when it should be a hell no, and you're actually saying hell yes and like you're starting to build your own skill of building frameworks and the path or the directional thing that we're talking about, yeah, and I think this kind of leans into this idea that you don't need a rigid set of rules, which, I guess, leads me to my next point, which is this idea that multi-passions often feel like they break trust with themselves, that they're letting themselves down, that they're not doing the things that they promised themselves they would do. What I've noticed with myself is that they promised themselves they would do. What I've noticed with myself is I love to set myself a really good list of things that I must do all the time, and then I just don't want to do them and I literally can't bring myself to do them, and then I feel angry at myself because I've let myself down, I break the trust with myself. That is a very dangerous cycle, because that's what leads to very severe low self-worth and, as we know, we manifest from our self-worth, and so we don't want low self-worth. We attract in everything based on our self-worth, so we want high self-worth.

Speaker 2:

So the problem is, when multi-passionates set these rules to themselves, they set themselves up to fail. What you instead need are guidelines, not hard and fast rule. You need guidelines and you need a framework, and that's why things like the life strategy works because it's a guideline. It's not telling you exactly what you must do. It's simply saying does what you want to do align with the strategy that you've set? And it's the same with your marketing. That's why we have a marketing strategy, because it's guidelines.

Speaker 2:

Your marketing strategy also can't be and your life strategy. You can't just look at someone else you know some coach online who's like I grew my business by doing all of these things and this is what you have to do and do exactly this. You can't do that because you won't do that and you're going to sign up to a course and learn these things and learn this framework, get these templates, and then you're not going to do the thing and then you're going to be like well, I guess I'm a failure. Instead. This is why I believe our method works so well. We're not telling you exactly what you have to do all the time. We're not telling we are giving you very direct steps, but we're not saying you have to post this type of content, you have to do this type of post, you have to use this type of platform. It's very much more about shaping what's already in your head and in your heart and putting that into an actual plan. Rather than taking our plan, you're creating your own plan using our framework.

Speaker 1:

Definitely, and I think I resonate with the setting yourself a big list and then being disappointed when you don't achieve it all. I think that's a hard one for everyone, because just get overwhelmed by your list and you get this sprint of spirit. You're like I'm going to go achieve all these things and then you can't. I guess what would be the first step for people to like find that middle ground, go not like you want to set yourself goals because you want to be striving but you don't want them to be set and then just constantly disappointed. Is that more of a mindset shift rather than a physical thing that you have to do?

Speaker 2:

It's a good question, I think. Number one when you set yourself goals and you give yourself 12 months to do something, like it's good to set smart goals, as they say. You know timely is part of that, but I don't think I've ever set a goal in the period of time that I've wanted to achieve it. I've either super speeded it and it's happened like a few days later when I've given myself six months to do it, or it's taken me eight years to do something. But I think what's important there that is most certainly a mindset thing where it's just because you don't reach something in the specific amount of time that you imagine does not mean you have failed. It just means you haven't achieved it yet. That's number one. But number two be more fucking realistic with what, what you can do. And it's difficult because on one hand, I'm like, be delusional as you can, but only be delusional if that excites you rather than stresses you out.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, and what I would say there, too. What came to mind is if you're setting these goals and you're like I'm so disappointed, I didn't achieve it, but I'm taking all these steps to achieve it, then that's what you should be celebrating yeah, versus. If you're like I'm so disappointed, I didn't achieve it, but I'm taking all these steps to achieve it, then that's what you should be celebrating yeah, versus. If you're setting the goal and then not taking any aligned action whatsoever, then that's where the disappointment can come from.

Speaker 2:

Most certainly the journey, not the destination. That's a big learning for me as of late.

Speaker 1:

And that's a big thing. In manifestation, too, it's showing up every day like the person you are, you want to become. Yeah, and that's that self-worth thing as well. Exactly.

Speaker 2:

As someone who's very driven by financial gain and driven by the numbers, it still is a huge learning that I'm working through, where I'm trying not to whatever. Yeah, it's almost like I've achieved so many goals, in the last 12 months especially. And then now I'm at this point where, like, for example, one of my goals was to fly in a private jet, even if it's a 45 minute flight, and I promised myself that this time, when we go to europe next month, that I was going to do that. I'm literally in the process of booking a jet. Right, I've got the quotes, I've chosen the citation JEC4 or whatever the fucking plane is, literally have it ready to go and could push the button and could go and do that tomorrow, but I think I've decided I don't want to do it anymore because I can do it. I could do it if I wanted to.

Speaker 2:

So you've tapped into the feeling yeah and so. This is the feeling. Yeah and so. This is the thing about manifestation. It's actually not about the thing, ever, it's never, never about the thing. It's not about the bag, the car, the job, the house, the partner. It's not about that. It's about the feeling that you get from that, and I've saved myself a shitload of money by realizing I already have that feeling. I don't need to go in that private airplane, I'm just happy to sit in economy, save myself some cash, because the feeling is already there.

Speaker 1:

So it was. It's like an aspirational identity and you've already identified with that person, whether that's through external validation or whether that's through this practice that you've been doing to build your self-worth.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, and I think, just even knowing that I could go and book that plane tomorrow, but I'm like I don't think I want to anymore. So yeah, I got I can do it, I could, I can do it. I could go to a lot of things, but I kind of just I'm like I don't want to now. Yeah, it was kind of a pain to like book an airplane. It's kind of easier just to book flights like tickets.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, you've said that seeing things to completion is a really big obstacle for multi-passionates. So if people are in that stage of like they're constantly doing a different course and constantly switching industries and constantly switching careers and switching businesses, and how do they rein that in and direct that energy into achieving something? Don't?

Speaker 2:

Do, but don't so my job today, that I do and my business is a culmination of all of the different interests that I've had over my life since being a child. And I would say, if you're lost on what's my career, what's my business, what's this Number one, take the pressure off, because I want you to realize that there are actually. You can't make the wrong decision. You can't make the wrong decision because if you keep working on your energy, on your self-worth, you will be divinely guided. This is getting a bit spiritual, but you will be guided into doing what your purpose is. If I think about all the different businesses I've had, they've all led me to being where I am, in combination with the career in working in marketing agencies. But as a result of working in agencies for big brands but then having my side hustles, I was like, well, we need an agency that caters for people with small businesses, and I was one of the first agencies to work with small businesses 10 years ago. How do you direct the focus?

Speaker 1:

to finish things, yeah, To finish, or at least follow it through to a place where you're satisfied with yourself.

Speaker 2:

I think, yeah, number one is take the pressure off. You can't make the wrong decision. You either succeed or you learn. There is no failure. That's number one. And then the other thing is when you then look back on your life, you will see this red thread that I like to say, I like to imagine this red thread through all of the experiences and all of the endeavors that I've been on that have led me to this point right now. Right, so you can't make a bad decision. Number one it might just take you longer to get where you want to go, but you're not going to make a wrong decision.

Speaker 2:

But number two how can you bring in all of your different passions and all of the different things that you're good at into one job, into one career? Because that's what gives you the edge. Here's an idea what if you'd love playing the piano but you also love dogs? You could then become a dog trainer that uses piano music to train the dogs. What an edge Like. That's literally just off the top of my head. But this is like use all the things you're good, good at, use all the different skills and put them all together, and that's whether you're an entrepreneur, whether you want to be in a in a career and build your career within someone else's business. There is no time like right now to be able to put all of the things that you're interested in together and to make money from it, especially if you start, then, creating social media content and sharing that with the world. That's the trick.

Speaker 1:

The other thing I would say that might be a bit controversial to you is it's okay to be paid for one of your passions and have the rest be hobbies, yeah.

Speaker 2:

Like hobbies are good For sure. That's why I've started horse riding. I've started crafting with my kids. You should have seen the horse stable we made. I had to move it for the shoot today. That's why I've started horse riding. I've started crafting with my kids. You should have seen the horse stable we made. I had to move it for the shoot today. That's fun. Yeah, out of cardboard box. I love crafting. Yeah. Yeah, that's something I had to unlearn the fact that I didn't always have to make money from my hobbies, because that's actually. I think that is really good advice, caroline.

Speaker 1:

Yeah Well, that's conditioned into us and that's something I've been kind of keyboard warrior-ing on Instagram lately is there's a big business coach I guess you'd call him and he's just putting out all of this content now like really double downing on this message that, like everything you do is output Every minute you're wasting.

Speaker 1:

You could be making more money Like you shouldn't, especially between the ages ages of 20 to 30. You should just be working your butt off and like, not like who cares about having a life outside of work. It's like you're going to be over skilled that everybody else is going to be this and it's like actually, I want to counter that and say like I think you can have more skills if you're not burnt out, and more skills than other people if you have things that you're passionate about outside of work, and then when you're at work, you can focus and you can really give like 100% for eight hours a day. 100%. I think your focus probably starts dropping off around that. Seven to eight hours for anybody, unless you're on some. I know who you're talking about. It's.

Speaker 2:

Alex Hormozy and I've actually I've seen your comments and I've seen the content and it actually I probably agree with him a little bit, quite a bit actually, and I would love to get into this with you because now that I'm over the age of 30, I need to start slowing down a little bit Absolutely, but I don't necessarily disagree that between the ages of 20 and 30, it's hustle time.

Speaker 1:

Like you. That's what you you did this video that said, where he said, focusing on men, that it should be like 12 hour days, six days a week. See, I don't. He said normalize 12 hour days, six day work weeks.

Speaker 2:

His and my ideas are skewed because you couldn't switch us off if we wanted to. And I think this is where his message gets lost. He's saying normalize the 12 hour days, and yet what he doesn't realize is not everyone loves what they do as much as he does, or as much as I do, because if I were to actually quantify the number of hours I used to work, it would be 12 hours plus a day. If I were to like think of the editing from the phone, from the little screen to the big screen, to the thinking, to the brain, like all of that stuff, I would have been doing 12 hour days easy with a young family, but you couldn't have stopped me if you wanted to. People tried. They couldn't because I was so passionate about it, and I think it's like, for the people that want to do it, let them do it, but for the people who don't want to do it, don't make them feel like they have to do it.

Speaker 1:

That's where I have a problem with the word normalize. It's like, okay, let's create a space for people who have their own businesses, but my brain goes to well. No one's going to normalize me working for somebody else for 12 hour days, six days a week, even if it means I'm going to be more skilled than everybody else. Even if it means I'm going to get a promotion, even if it means all these things, Because that's just a road to burn. I mean.

Speaker 2:

I would argue in corporate America that's probably normal. No-transcript.

Speaker 1:

I saw something that was like you have a French employee and it's the month of August and she's like why are you calling me at the beach?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, it's wild. Like you go there, the shops close in the middle of the day for three or four hours especially. The further south you go, the further you get to the coast, the more relaxed it is. So by the time you get to the Greek islands there's not much happening. But up in Germany they do work a little bit harder. But even my grandfather, who was the president CEO of a huge company hotel chain over there, would still come home for lunch for a few hours every single day. He would drive at least 45 minutes from the office back to the house, have lunch, have a snooze, then drive back to the office. Yeah, and I think he'd probably work a bit later. Maybe it was seven or eight o'clock, but there was these huge breaks in the middle of the day and that was normal. Yeah, I like that idea. I feel like the europeans have got it.

Speaker 2:

Australians, we're not bad I think we're okay, australians, the middle, middle ground see back to alex's statements, though, talking like I know him, what I would say is that I, from my selfish perspective, I would, I would like the idea of normalizing working 12, 14 hour days, because I got so much shit from my family not my husband, but from other people around me for being like why are you working so much? It's not healthy, it's not good for you, it's not this and, yeah, it probably wasn't that good for me, but at the same time, it's what I wanted and needed to do at that period of my life.

Speaker 1:

I don't want to do that anymore, but so in retrospect, you go back and do it all over again. Yeah, fuck, yeah, I probably would have hustled harder, even like knowing everything about your physical health.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I would have put the hours in. I didn't start my business until I was 25. So I would have started when I was 20, for sure, maybe not 20, but maybe when I had the inkling of wanting to do it, which was about 23, I'd say I would have started. Then I would have worked just as hard. I reckon I would have worked more productively, though Like I wouldn't have gone around in circles as much as I did, I wouldn't have people pleased as much.

Speaker 1:

I wouldn't have. You can only know that now that you have that self-worth and the manifestation practice and all of that it's like I just believe there's seasons.

Speaker 2:

Some seasons require you to dig in and to do the long hours, but then other seasons you're required to step back and to take the time. And I feel like right now I'm actually in the season of stepping back a bit, but I'm being forced to dig in right now because we have I've loaded my plate up too much. But at the same time, had I not done, had I had we not launched the second studio, had we not had this party planned, had we not done all of it, I would have also been miserable. So there's no fucking winning.

Speaker 1:

I guess my issue is knowing so like cortisol is a very hot topic right now in the like wellness world and I think it's overused. But I do know quite a bit, especially like with women's hormones and how cortisol affects us and that's the stress hormone. And that stress hormone happens even when it's like good stress and like there's a normal amount of cortisol we can have in our bodies. But when you go really high, highs and you go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, like you're gonna have that drop later and that's not like it's as you can find a middle ground where it's like sustainable, that's the best thing for your overall health I don't know if that.

Speaker 1:

But like the thing is, that might be what wellness asks of us, but that's not what, like, society asks of us, and I think those two things are always kind of in and like economy and I don't know as well. Yeah, I mean, I feel like I think it comes back to what your values are Absolutely. So you know, if your value is work and production and money and like that's what you put your value in, not other people, I think that's an important distinction, because some of the arguments with me on social media was like well, everybody only puts value of men on what they can produce, and I was like I really don't love that. I think you as an individual need to set your own values. Yes, hence the life strategy.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, it's you to do, and so maybe when you are younger, it's like I just want to upskill and produce, and like I definitely had two head spaces where I was like I just want to travel and be adventurous and I just want to climb the ladder as well and get upskilled, because that's like what I saw my parents do too and that's what my value was. But then I also have this like very adventurous side of me that was pulling me that direction too.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I agree, it really does just like. We live in a time where we have more choice than ever, like, as women, as men, you can, literally, I truly believe that you can make a very good living, if not get fucking rich and happy, helping other people with what you're passionate about because of social media. That is the age in which we live, and so you need to decide. Do you want to do that? Do you want to hustle for yourself? Do you want to hustle working within a business? Because there's neither is worse. Trust me, I've done both. I think I couldn't go back to being an employee personally, but there's also a lot of benefits to being an employee that I see, especially if you're working in a good company like ours. But it's also, yeah, it's like what do you want?

Speaker 2:

I did a poll on Instagram recently. Reminds me of the notebook what do you want? I did a poll on instagram recently. Reminds me of the notebook what do you want? It's not that simple. I did a poll on my instagram story a few weeks ago being like what inspires you, what drives you? Like very only like? Two people said like luxury lifestyle. Most people said they just don't want to check the prices on things. That was the motivation for most of my audience on my personal Instagram. It was that. Or then it was like make good money but have flexibility. That was a big one as well. And then for some people it was like just to live off grid and have chickens and a farm. You know, know, and it's like they all all three of those are ease.

Speaker 1:

One is like ego and validation. Yeah, yeah, because luxury good. Some people would put that value and that means I've made it, that means I can live an easy life. And all the other some people would say, like if I'm living off grid, that means I'm living an easy life. Yeah, whether like a compostable toilet sounds easy to some people and other people.

Speaker 2:

Yeah.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, not checking price tags. That just means like I'm not stressing about money. I know the money's there. Yeah, like I know I can make it more if I need to. That's what everyone's looking for is just like ease.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, well, see, I look at luxury. That's something that most certainly I don't know. I feel like something's shifting, but that was what was driving me for a very, very long time. But I look at that because I know that when you buy luxury it's an easy experience, like when you walk into a Celine store. Everything's fucking easy. That is a magical world that you walk into.

Speaker 2:

Thank you Good customer service service, good customer experience if you have a problem with, like, I've got some gucci shoes that I have to send back like what, almost 12 months later because I've hardly worn them but the heel is twisting, sure no problem. When? When can we pick it up from you? You know, like, wow, yeah, that's what it's like when I've flown business class versus economy. If I miss my flight gets shifted or something. They prioritize you like, rightly or wrongly so, but it's like if you pay more, you generally get treated better. That's how the luxury ties up to me for ease. But ease has always been one of the main pillars of my life strategy. That's what I'm always chasing ease. I think that's what most people are right. Is there any other? Is there anything else? Purpose, fulfillment, I guess, yeah. Growth.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, like creative purpose, legacy, things People are like. I have a legacy.

Speaker 2:

I don't know, Legacy's not doing it for me yet, but maybe I'm not old enough With Birdcage how do you see your kids relating to that in the future?

Speaker 2:

I see Forrest, my son, my eight-year-old. He's already posting videos on the edits. I have to hold my tongue and be like wow, that's wonderful, because they're literally just cap cut templates with screenshots of like I mean, mean, I'm glad he's not putting his face on camera necessarily all the time, but it's just like screenshots of like roblox games and he's like stoked if he gets 500 views and I'm like what the fuck is this? But I'm like wow, congrats. Like amazing adelaide I don't know she's well. Actually adelaide said she wants to be a yoga instructor and she did a yoga class for me recently.

Speaker 2:

She directed you yep instructed yep, and I'm like instantly, I go to like my instant reaction is, oh my god, she's gonna be this like content creating yoga instructor and travel the world and lead meditation retreats and like, yeah, that's what I imagine for them you just see, they take a skill and then they just excel at it.

Speaker 2:

Well, I just see that they can do anything they want to do because of the internet. Yeah, like you, they can go and do anything. I know some people like friends of ours. They've said, oh yeah, my son says he wants to be a youtuber, but I told him to get real and go get a real job and I'm like, hmm, send him my way.

Speaker 1:

I'll make him a YouTuber. I think that's hard right now for teachers, because they're like oh, every student just wants to be a content creator, but it's like it's not like when everybody in primary school just wanted to be a professional athlete, like it's a lot more attainable. You actually everyone can actually be.

Speaker 2:

I actually saw a video the other day. That's like everyone. Everyone is a content creator, even like your mother, who's taking photos of her friends at the restaurant.

Speaker 1:

Like she's creating content and everyone has a circle of influence.

Speaker 2:

Exactly, and it's like just how big does that circle get, and then how well do you monetize it?

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I think the big takeaway is defining your values, like Maddie said, your life strategy. Yeah, because once you understand that one of your values might just be creativity and so if you're living in that value, it might be changing careers and trying and starting up different businesses and, who knows, you could become somebody who creates businesses and then sells them like I thought I would do that, but then I got bored with that too you know, it's like if actually we talk about this in the Pilates studio I work at, I'm a Pilates instructor as well.

Speaker 1:

I'm a little bit of a multi-passionate, yeah, and this is what we talk about in our value system as well. It's like for two people, like adventure might be one person's value and venture might not be others. So somebody gets invited on a trip overseas last minute that would be perfect. The same person gets invited. That would not be aligned with them and they might feel pressured to do that. So it's all about aligning your values and not saying, oh, but I would do that. Or asking your friend or asking a family member, unless they have the same values as you. Only it's like your decision compass.

Speaker 2:

That's what you're trying to build and it's always got to just come back to that, and the biggest trick I would say is, like, if you're confused as to what your goals are, what your direction is, what your purpose is, what did you used to love doing as a kid?

Speaker 1:

think back to that, because that's literally all I do for my job now so working with you is always like making me think really deeply about these things. Can I tell you about, like, what I did in primary school? So I was like the news anchor. Yeah, I like entered a competition for news anchoring. I did a story on oranges and how you create orange juice, because I'm from Florida and there was an orange orchard next to me or field, whatever you call it.

Speaker 1:

I was like, yeah, the student class president, I, whatever you call it. I was like, yeah, the student class president. I was like very high achieving, I was like safety patrol, all these things. And so now it's like getting back to that person who I was just like incredibly confident and I would just chase anything I did, and it was the perfectionism has taken over, but I think I was, yeah, that very high achiever. And then I started letting like doubt and conditioning and all these things creep in. And now it's unlearning all those things and going back to her, the little fifth grader, who was just like, yeah, I'm going to go on camera, I don't care what anybody says, I've got no fear.

Speaker 2:

Like my voice matters, I'm going to be loud, I feel like so many of us in the team have gone on this similar journey and makes sense. We're all around the same age, but it's like that's right. It's like we think about who we were when we were, like even Maria, for example, she has recently enrolled in a fashion styling course that she's doing. You know a lot of bosses would be like, oh my God, is she going to leave? Is she going to? No, I'm so excited because I understand how much value doing something outside of work, which I guess leads into the hobby thing. I know that what she learns through this whether it's going through someone else's program and seeing what the program feels and looks like and how they work, or if it's things that she learns about how to work with clients that she can then bring into client service in the agency like I get excited about that. But it's like I know in high school she struggled.

Speaker 2:

People used to always comment why you're so dressed up all the time? Are you stuck up? All that kind of stuff. And since being back working at Birdcage in the last 12 months, she's like stepped back into her most authentic self and I'm the same thing. It's like I used to. You know, I had my own doggy monthly magazine, which I told you about. I, like, had so many businesses, I had a library, I had all these things. I used to make content using the VHS camera, like all of this kind of stuff. I used to sing, dance, perform all of the things, did you?

Speaker 1:

do a Spice Girls music video though? Probably.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I actually my sister is like on a mission to find this bit of audio that she once found on the Windows 98 of me singing the Neighbours soundtrack. Neighbours everybody, yeah, she once just went on the computer and opened a file and was like what the fuck is this? And it was me singing and she's like she can never forget it. And then in high school, high school just fucks you up, doesn't it? Yeah?

Speaker 1:

because I think you start caring more about what other people think. Like we had middle school in america and I had a friend who had an older sister and she's like, okay, so if you want to be cool in middle school, like you don't do this, you don't do this, you don't do band. I was in band, I had to drop out of band. You don't wear limited to. That was like a little girl's brand and like I was obsessed with it and I was like, okay, I gotta start wearing like Hollister, abercrombie and Fitch and stuff and like, yeah, it's like you go through this whole trying to fit yourself into a box, yeah, and then that leads into your 20s.

Speaker 2:

And then, by the time you get to your 30s, you're like, for fuck's sake, yeah. You're like, I don't, I just want to be five again. Yeah, maybe it's. Do you think having children brings that out as well, because you kind of see yourself in your children? Yeah, you reparent yourself.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, as you're, as you're parenting, learning to parent your child, and you learn, like you start noticing all the things that make you really happy when you're hanging out with them and the things that light them up, and you're like, oh gosh, I like miss this part of me or like this part, like the really playful silly side is like that used to only come out of, like the nightclub, but it's like that can come out.

Speaker 2:

I struggled with that for so long being able to play. I never I probably still don't enjoy playing with small children. But like, yeah, it's like crafting. Like who knew that I loved crafting so much until I had to make a capybara habitat with Forrest for a project? And we were sitting there as a family one night and I was hot gluing and doing all the things Time for focus and I'm like I fucking love this, I love it. And so now we hot glue everything.

Speaker 1:

Great Maddie comes out into the kitchen. Who wants to hot glue?

Speaker 2:

yourself today. Adelaide and Forrest love it, so Jack does not. He has to clean up. Anyway, well, I hope my very hot, multi-passionate episode gave what I really want people to take away from this. If you identify like me, I want you to know there is hope for you. Yet you can still be so wildly successful and so wildly happy doing what you want to do. But you have to number one, tune into yourself. You need to tune into yourself. You need to understand what your values are, what your life strategy is.

Speaker 2:

Do the vision board exercising in the mindset in Birdcage Marketing School. It's not just a simple vision board. There are layers to this thing, but by the end it'll spit out this, this, basically this plan for your life, a strategy for your life. The next thing is you need to realize that you need to get you can't do it on your own, no one can do anything on their own but multi-passionates especially you need to have. Go find yourself some perfectionistic friends and get them to help you in the places where, like it's like a jigsaw puzzle, right. And then the other thing is like, be kind and gentle to yourself, like you were actually made to have different passions, to see opportunities where other people do not, to go and try the things like that. Visionary yeah, to be a visionary, that is your. I mean, if we don't want to look into human design and manifesting generators as well, that's me as well. It's like your job is literally to try all the things.

Speaker 1:

Create something out of nothing.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, but if you want to then let that become successful, you need help in executing it. It doesn't have to be a team that you employ. It can be a mentor, like you can work with caroline, for example, through the school. That's why she is such a great mentor to a lot of our students, because she knows how to handle us, because she's had a lot of practice with me. I really, if I could say anything to my younger self, it's that, like you're not a failure, you're not doing it wrong. In fact, the way you do it is actually your superpower.

Speaker 1:

So you need to know how to channel that. Go out there and channel your superpower. Thanks, bye, bye.

Speaker 2:

Thanks, bye, bye. To help many more business owners and content creators reach their goals, just like we hope this brought you one step closer to yours. Remember, connect with us on TikTok, at Maddie Birdcage and at Birdcage Marketing, and the same handles on Instagram again, and if you really want to learn how to work with us, make sure you head to our website and book a call. We would love to speak with you.