Interview with Brenda Bryan
In this episode, we will uncover 3 keys:
- The importance of inner work and authenticity in personal and professional development.
- The role of storytelling in personal transformation
- Empowering women through voice
A Podcast Transcription
Episode 24: The Legendary Brenda Bryan the founder of “The Raise Your Voice Speakers Club”
Intro
Odiva Vasell: (00:00)
So, welcome, welcome, Brenda, today. Um, I just wanted to meet you again because the last time we spoke, it was so inspiring. What you do, you have a mission to raise women’s voices and get people heard, and that is a very powerful thing and a much-needed thing, yeah, in the world today. So, I just wanted to take a moment out to ask you a few questions about that, and I think I’d like to start at the beginning, if that’s okay.
Brenda Bryan: (00:40)
Anywhere you want to start, I’ll follow along, trust me.
Odiva Vasell: (00:44)
So, how did you get started in what I understand to be your niche? But I’ll let you explain what it is and how you got started.
The importance of inner work and authenticity in personal and professional development.
Brenda Bryan: (00:56)
Well, my niche is I help women, women entrepreneurs. They hire me to help them have greater impact, influence, and income by becoming good public speakers, learning the craft of delivering their story, delivering their message to their niche, and knowing how to make an offer and then how to have people say yes. I mean, that is the big one we all have, right? To be known, liked, and trusted enough for people to say yes, I want to know more. So, my work is to help people really learn what it is to stand in their authenticity, their vulnerability, and the truth of who they want to be, using their dreams, their voice, their passion to help change the world. So that we can make the world a place where we all kind of want to live because there are some things happening that aren’t so good, as we well know. And so, our time now is for women to stand and represent themselves and to represent the values that we hold dearly in order to create a world that children can grow up in and be safe in, all people can grow up and be safe in. Yeah, not there yet, but the more we call out and use our voice as part of our vote, as part of our message, as part of building our own business, as part of building our own economy—you know, I think it’s really important for women to have an understanding of their own economy, and their own economy often comes in the form of bartering, sharing, trading, and asking for more and receiving more and standing in the value of what they have put good time and effort in on. And, of course, we’ve been told that we don’t matter so much that we actually believed it, and some part of this still believes it, and that is the part that I’m interested in changing because without women changing the world, the world is not going to be here as long as it could be. Mother Earth will just hiccup us out anyway. I’m not, you know, it’s like, it’s like, you know, in the scheme of things, you know, the joke is that we think we have power. The real issue is that Mother Earth will just be tired of our shenanigans and then go, yeah, a little storm here, a little volcano here, a little tidal wave there, and that’s it. We’re gone. We’re out of here. And so, you know, what can we do in the moment to be in harmony and responsibility to the quality of life that supports the best for everybody, not just for me, not just for my household, but for my community and for the world? That’s what I’m interested in: this large review of respect and equality.
Odiva Vasell: (03:51)
Got the bigger picture, yeah, amazing. I love what you said about Mother Earth. That stands so true today because we don’t pay quite attention to what the messages we’re getting from Mother Earth are, and it’s like wake up, yeah, yeah. So, tell me a bit about how you got started in public speaking.
Brenda Bryan: (04:14)
I’m glad you asked that because I was having, you know, because you texted me this morning and I’m like, well, where did I get started with this? First of all, kind of where I got started is, I’m dyslexic, and so when I first started in schools, reading and writing and spelling and all that was really hard for me. So, being a creative and knowing that I’m a survivor, I started to do workarounds, and, you know, so I found all kinds of ways to be actively engaged with things that weren’t really academically. And one of the ways I did that was in high school. I actually really started my public speaking when I became the president of a group called Allied Youth, which was for educating people on drug and alcohol use and abuse. So, that brought me to be a provincial leader, and then it led into all kinds of other things. But that’s where I started, really rallying people and recognizing the power of my words. So, I really became very aware of the responsibility of how much words matter and how we use them and how our emotional intelligence is part of how we use them. And so, it led me, you know, I went to Nova Scotia College of Art and Design where I graduated with a degree in Communications, which is now kind of what you would call branding. And right after graduation, I joined up with the part of the second wave of the feminist movement. And so, that was where I really took wings in terms of finding my voice. One of the first things I did when I went to my first Women’s Center was joined in a women’s encounter group where we sat on the floor and talked story. That was back in the early ’70s, and that has not changed. Women still need to talk story and need to share their story. And, I mean, as you saw in this last, what, two years, three years, you know, the #MeToo movement, all right? When you think about that, when you think about how many women have been holding on to the shame and the guilt and the pain of not being able to speak to how they’re being abused, right? To me, that’s an important element of why we as women need to create a safe and sacred space for each other and hold sacred space for each of us to tell our story so that we can, one, take the story and use it as an empowerment element, but two, not feel the shame and guilt of not being allowed to actually speak to what’s happening to us. What a great in-service it is. It’s a disservice to all human beings to not be able to tell the truth about what their experience is and be believed. Now, you know, lots of different things happen with that, as we well know, power over and the way people use power. But until we can actually dig into ownership of our own story, it’s pretty hard to stand in an empowered place.
Odiva Vasell: (07:38)
That’s so powerful, and what you said about the power of words and speaking forth is interesting. How you got started in high school—I also started my public speaking in high school. You said that it was your passion. It sounds like it was your passion that drove you. You were thinking about the speaking. You were just really passionate about this cause, and then you became the president of this organization, and then you just started speaking out and rallying people. Tell me more about this women’s group that you said sat on the floor.
Brenda Bryan: (08:16)
Yeah, well, you know, it was this little, was it actually the first Women’s Center I went to. It was actually in the throes of shutting down, but there were about 10 of us, you know, in like in 1972, if you don’t mind, across from where I lived, and we would basically started this to share what was going on. I had just kind of graduated and started the job in a corporate world where I was being treated like a piece of shit. I had one of the award-winning portfolios, graduating tops in my class. I go into a corporate environment, and I’m a piece of shit, being made right, inappropriate behavior, belittling, not taking any of my ideas seriously but yet using them, you know, using them anyway but taking credit, men taking credit for my ideas. It was just kind of… I was so disheartened because in college, I had amazing male instructors who were so empowering for me, and then to get into the corporate world, no voice, no say, no money, no rights. So, I found it amazingly difficult, and I left. I was working for one of the top advertising agencies in the city I lived in, and I just couldn’t stand it. I’m a full conceptual designer, right? I know how to take something from the beginning seed to its end actual production. That’s what I was trained in. And so, they would give me these little projects of designing a logo. So, who’s it for? We don’t need to know that. You just need to design a logo. It’s like, well, that’s not how my creative process works. And to have no information and just, “We’ll just come up with a logo and tell them how it’s going to work.” It’s like, I need to talk to the client. I need to know what their objectives are. I need to know who they’re marketing to. I need to know, you know, it’s not a color issue. It’s not, you know, there’s, you know, Nike was paying a million dollars for a logo, right? You know, that little checkmark that Nike’s so famous for. I mean, you know, they actually tried to rip that off of a graphic designer and pay her 50 bucks, right? And she took them to court, yes, right? But so that’s the kind of stuff that kind of ripping off of people with lesser power and taking their ideas and then using them to make millions and millions and millions of dollars on the backs of people who they’re only willing to pay fifty dollars for a logo to. It’s like, you know, give me a break. Anyway, so my journey has been one of, like, I left the corporate world, struggled to earn a living because, you know, men weren’t hiring. They were like, “Well, do you design in pink?” I said, “Have you looked at my portfolio? Could you look at this? Could you hear what I’m saying?” So, absolute frustration. And then I was working with this guy, his name was John Harrison. He was a little nymph, he was a trickster in a lot of ways, but he had a power to him. He believed so much in his own ability, and he taught me how to do that. But he handed me this book that was the red book, and it was the feminist guide to what was happening in the United States. I was living in Canada at the time, and I read it, and I went, “This is what I’m looking for.” And that’s when I somehow, and I don’t know how I did this, beyond the Women’s Center which had closed down, I, you know, we were rallying in different parts of the city, building relationships, and so that’s when I stepped into the women’s movement. And that’s where I took my degree, my communications degree, and used it to help promote women academics who were writing material but, you know, at this level, right? They were talking to each other. They were trying to talk to others, but they weren’t getting them. And so, I got in the mix with a whole bunch of academics and basically helped them to design the language and the visuals for educational material around, you know, how to form a union, how to create a collective, how to do consensus building, making… I mean, at all these educational, what it is to be a feminist, what is it, what are we looking for, what are we trying to do, what are the things that we’re trying to change. And so, I got to work with them who, you know, in all of the things that they were doing. So, that’s how I earned a living, and we opened up.
Odiva Vasell: (13:04)
It’s like a lot of fun.
Brenda Bryan: (13:05)
It was a lot. I mean, it was, you know, when you find your tribe, right? When you find, like, when you come home, you know it, right? Have you ever come home, and you went, “Oh, these are what I’m looking for. This is what I’m looking for.” So, 16 years of working in a women’s movement and doing all kinds of great things, all kinds of actions, all kinds of disobedience, all kinds of stuff, and you know, all kinds of growth, and started a women’s newspaper called Pandora, and which just recently actually got closed down because of interesting issues. And then a women’s housing co-op and then the Women’s Center. So, I was involved with a lot of fundamental ways that we were building communications, and we were building safe housing and a safe way for women to build their lives. And what I was discovering in that journey was after a period of time, I started to notice how we didn’t have the emotional intelligence skills. And that was back in the ’80s, right? So, we’re talking, you know, between ’72 and ’86 is when I left. So, it had all that time where we were working on all these things. And what I started to recognize was that we were still pointing the finger at others and saying, “If only they’d change, my life would be different.” And I really felt the disempowered notion of that, right? Because if you’re expecting somebody else to change for you when there’s no motivation for that to happen, that’s not going to happen. So, what motivation do we need to have in order to change our lives and to be responsible? Because we’ll still be in the victim position until we do that. And so, I really started to be in the inquiry, like, what tools do we need for this to be different? Because I was already doing conflict resolution and mediation for all my organizations. I love conflict resolution and mediation, by the way, you know, because so often we’re on the same page. We’re just, you know, hearing through different filters. And I was one of my gifts. I could see where the sameness existed, and I could see where the stuckness was, and I could walk them through unlocking the stuckness, you know? And so, I was like, okay, something has to be different. And so, I had a personal medical thing, and I ended up going to Vancouver, BC, for recovery, meeting up with a dear friend of mine who wanted us to go somewhere and study together. And she handed me this catalog from a place called Heartwood Institute. And on the front cover is their logo and the lodge. And on the inside cover, when I opened it up, there’s this woman sitting in a field holding a baby fawn. And I looked at that picture, and I went, “I want that. I mean, every life, I want that. I want to be that gentle and that connected with Source and nature that a fawn would sit with me, and that would be how I show up in the world, that I’m a safe place for things to show up.”
Odiva Vasell: (16:38)
Safe place for things to show up.
Brenda Bryan: (16:40)
Safe place. So, it’s like, okay, how am I gonna make that happen? And within three months, I was actually at their doorstep, starting a new career. And this time it was in transformational coaching. And my first day there, I went to my first sweat. The Lakota or Lakota man, I was doing, not Lakota, Arapaho Cheyenne. Radford was Arapaho Cheyenne.
Odiva Vasell: (17:09)
Is it physical sweat or…
Brenda Bryan: (17:10)
Not the kind of Native American sweat, the, you know, the inipi.
Odiva Vasell: (17:15)
Oh, the TP?
Brenda Bryan: (17:17)
Not the TP. That’s where the prayer meetings sanctum, but the sweats are in a turtle shape. So, they get willows, they bend them, and then they cover them with… There’s a whole process for building a lodge, which I’m really efficient at, by the way, building a lodge and going in and bringing hot stones in and pouring water on them and praying. And it was my first one, and it was for a man by the name of Dakari, who was suffering from bone cancer. And they did seven healing sweats with him, and I went to every one of them. And then they did prayer meetings for him as well. So, I went to those as well. And so, I got totally entrenched in the Native American tradition. And as part of that, I fell in love with drums and listening to the drum and the power of drums. And so, for the last 35 years, I’ve been teaching women how to make handheld trance drums for…
Odiva Vasell: (18:17)
You said you had to go off to a drum meeting. Now, what state was this Hope organization in?
Brenda Bryan: (18:23)
California is where Heartwood Institute was, yeah. Heartwood Institute in the northern mountains of California. They have since changed their objectives and their missions. They’re no longer a Healing Arts school. They sold, like, many years back now. But I got to be the operations manager there for almost 10 years, where I got to actually take my feminist viewpoint in my work as a community organizer and the new work that I was getting from my five years of study at Heartwood and incorporate them into community communication skills. So, I actually put together a course on how to live in community and how to communicate and how to facilitate and how to mediate and how to do all that stuff. And so, I got to actually take a living process, 240 acres of land, 150 people day in and day out, and teach them how to be effective communicators and responsible communicators. And the organization flourished from that. So, it’s not something you read in a book; it’s actually something you do in live and in person. So, everybody got to really embrace and embody how to be empowered to use their voice for effective communications.
Odiva Vasell: (19:55)
Yeah, effective communication and leadership go hand in hand.
Brenda Bryan: (19:59)
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And so, to be empowered, right? To, you know, we worked hard on the staff manual, of course. And because there were so many bad practices. Really, what they hired me for was to help them align their mission statement with their personal actions because the two people who had bought the school after it had been functioning for, I don’t know, 16 years and struggling, they were in from Chicago, and they were Chicago businessmen dropping into a hippie commune, and they were totally fish out of water. So, I was respected because I was a student and I was well known and doing things that I do, you know, helping people.
Odiva Vasell: (20:43)
Any of your students kind of go off to do different things that you know of?
Brenda Bryan: (20:48)
Oh yeah, they’re all over. I got an email. I had been promoting the drum-making workshop a couple of years ago, and I got a Facebook message from somebody in Africa who said, “I have my drum with me, and I’ve had it for 15 years. It’s one of the most empowering tools that I use in the work that I do here.” And so, all of these things matter, right? Where people are touched by something and then take it into how they use it to empower their work. And that’s really what I’m about anyways. It’s not about my work; it’s about what can I do to help you tap into what is most effective and lights your passion up and is something that you really want to stand for. And, as we spoke earlier, you know, speaking is not about speaking because when you’re passionate about what you’re doing, there’s a compelling nature to needing to speak to that and lean into it. And that is a driving force. So, it’s not about the speaking any longer. It’s about who can I serve and how can I benefit them with the message because I’m showing up to let them know I’m here, and I can help them through that pain, whatever that is, to get the results they’re looking for. And that, to me, is compelling.
Odiva Vasell: (22:11)
How do you bridge that? How do you bridge the drum and the vocal communication?
Brenda Bryan: (22:19)
I think always our communications need to be coming from a sense of our own center and our own awareness, right? So, the more we’re tapped into a presence, seeing our own truth and our own purpose. What the drum does is it helps you drop down past the conscious mind and into that place where the voice of your purpose can speak to you. And when you can tap into that voice, helping you to make your decisions and helping you to understand that you’re on the right path or that, you know, you have choices. When you can tap into that deep belonging and the beingness of that knowing, then what you do, then what happens from there is… I’m looking for a couple of words, and they don’t…
Odiva Vasell: (23:09)
Phenomenal, magical.
Brenda Bryan: (23:11)
Well, it’s definitely magical, but it’s also decisions made from passionate desire versus…
Odiva Vasell: (23:18)
Confidence is in knowing.
Brenda Bryan: (23:19)
Confidence is in knowing. And so, that’s where I bridge the gap is because not everybody does drum making with me or anything like that. But those who do use it to empower their voice and to empower their sense of place and their sense of belonging. Because when you drop in at that deeper level of awareness of self, you now know how to hold yourself in integrity with the words that you’re using. And that’s an important piece to me. You know, my core values are self-expression, creativity, and freedom and honesty. Those are top core values for me. So, honesty being one of the key pieces, which, you know, drives most people nuts when they work with me because I don’t hold back on telling them what I’m feeling or seeing, not because I’m trying to have power, but because they’ve hired me to help them become better, to become more who they want to be. And to do that, there has to be a truth that supersedes anything else. And, of course, you know, we build up that trust. You build up the relationship. You build up a sense of safety for people so that they can hear what it is that they’ve not been willing to hear up until that point.
Odiva Vasell: (24:42)
Oh, okay. So, now what only what they’re putting out, but what they need to hear. And you’re saying here what you mean. Are you talking about coming from inside or intuitive voice or…
The role of storytelling in personal transformation
Brenda Bryan: (24:56)
Yeah, I mean, you know, that’s the whole piece, right? It’s the inner work that changes the outer reality. We know this, but often we don’t know how to translate what the inner experience is in a way that helps us to change what we’re doing, what we’re doing. And so, that is the work that has become, you know, that’s what transformational work is, right? You know, change is an inside job. And when we change our sense of, you know, which is why the storytelling, which is why I opened up with that storytelling because storytelling is a powerful way to become aware of the story we’re telling and the story that we need to change to be telling. There’s always another story to tell and then always another perspective.
Odiva Vasell: (25:43)
Interesting perspective because people always think of storytelling as telling what happened in the past. There’s very few talk about making that story, making the next chapter of your life, right?
Brenda Bryan: (25:57)
Right. Because everything, you know, here’s in my viewpoint, there are no mistakes, right? Nothing happens to you just because it happened. I mean, some things are random, yes, we know that. But the reality is how we used to look at it becomes part of our perspective. It becomes part of our ability to empower ourselves. So, learning how to take a story and recognize that, yes, this happened, and I didn’t have a choice over it. But what happened since? Oh, first of all, I survived. Second of all, I’m aware when people are in certain kinds of energy. Third, I know that I need to be taking better care of myself. Four, I don’t walk down dark alleys by myself anymore or, you know, or I leave people earlier when I notice that they’re narcissistic or they’re abusive or whatever. It’s no longer that I have to stay for love when I’m not getting loved in truth. So, how do we do the inner awareness piece that lets us stand into a greater empowerment of the story we’re choosing to tell?
Odiva Vasell: (27:04)
Awareness of the energy before the actions take place so that you can bring yourself to a place of safety.
Brenda Bryan: (27:13)
Yeah, um, right and more of—
Odiva Vasell: (27:17)
Those boundaries, boundaries are key.
Brenda Bryan: (27:19)
Boundaries are key, and we have trouble, you know, with boundaries because we don’t want to hurt somebody’s feelings. But I think that is kind of like, that is part of the unwinding of the training, right? To get to where it actually, to create healthy relationships, we have to have healthy boundaries. To have healthy boundaries, we have to know ourselves. We have to know what’s right and wrong for us. We have to be able to tap into our intuition and listen to, you know, once when things start to, you know, when flags come up when you’re having a conversation or when you notice certain kinds of abusive language or off-colored jokes that might not be the right language, you know, in this state of mind. But there are these jokes that are just like, that’s not funny, that’s abusive towards, you know. And so, how do you step up and step into saying, “Hey, I’m not interested in that kind of conversation”? And I’ve said that boundary a lot, you know, to people I love dearly who wanted to stay in the victim position. It’s like, you know, I’m more than willing to hold space for you, and the minute that you’ve got something new to tell me—this is the tenth time I heard that story—the boundary now is when you’ve got something new or a new perspective on that story. I’m more than willing to show up for listening. But until then, I don’t want to hear the same one looped around again. Go deeper, listen deeper, ask more questions, you know. And the power is in the question, and it’s always in the question. And I don’t know about you, but I haven’t, you know, I’m just learning how powerful the right questions.
Odiva Vasell: (28:53)
Questioning is yes, yes, yes, yes.
Brenda Bryan: (28:58)
Right.
Odiva Vasell: (28:59)
And, um, I think questioning really hit home for me at the beginning of this year, which has blown by, 2022, or maybe it was the beginning of 2021 because the years are starting to fly faster, it seems. And, um, asking the question I started with asking how am I feeling on a regular basis because I was not aware of how I was feeling. I could be feeling uncomfortable, I could be feeling stressed, I might even be feeling joy, but I was so focused on what had to be done next that I never took the time to give myself space and say, “Okay, this doesn’t feel good, I need to stop.”
Brenda Bryan: (29:43)
Yeah, but that’s where the power lies. Yeah, but that’s where your power lies. That’s part of the tools with Mary Morrissey is noticing what you’re noticing now. You know, as a transformational coach and a breath therapist and a clinical hypnotherapist, I’m really aware that the emotions and the feelings are all part of it. But how do we translate what we’re feeling into a different choice? And so that’s why it’s important to notice what we’re noticing, for one, but then to notice whether it’s a longing or a discontent. And then the step, the third step, “What is so? Is this making me happy or does it make me miserable? What’s going on here?” And then to make the next step, which is kind of “What would I love?” So when you step into “What would I love,” you’re stepping into how do I now choose a path that is more invigorating for me, more fun, more aliveness for me, right? And, you know…
Odiva Vasell: (30:42)
Kids, we can have fun too.
Brenda Bryan: (30:44)
Well, well, yeah, what are you thinking? But that’s part of where we give away our power, right? It’s to not see that living life through joy and happiness is our choice we can make and that we can succeed in joy and happiness. It doesn’t mean that we have to wait until we’re retired to go have a vacation or wait until we’ve got x amount of money in the bank before we can actually say, “Well, I can take a breath and enjoy life.” Right? We don’t know what life’s going to offer at any given moment. And so, if we’re waiting to retire or we’re waiting for something to be different in order for us to step into our lives, my thing to you is like, “What are you waiting for? It’s never going to come until you choose to go there.”
Odiva Vasell: (31:38)
And what I’m finishing now and enjoying is this new mindset that our existence and our purpose is to exist and love existing from the old mindset, whereas when I have this, this, and this accomplished, then my existence is validated, then I can start to enjoy life. It’s no.
Brenda Bryan: (32:07)
But that’s the shift that we’re making in consciousness, right? It’s not.
It’s not down the road; it’s right here and now in the present moment. You know, today’s the gift that we get to be
present for. Today, this moment, this… this moment that you and I have to connect and enjoy each other and just, and to
find value in our conversation. This is the moment we get. And so, I want to play
in that, in that as being part of what makes my day happen, in the best possible way. I wanted to tell you a
little bit more about my Raise Your Voice Speaker’s Club before we get, because like we can go down a lot of rabbit holes with me.
Odiva Vasell: (32:46)
But I will say one more thing about the questioning. When you put the questions out there, the answer comes back to you.
Maybe not. I always say, not that day, not that week, but the answer will come back to you, and it’s just knowing that
process of allowing the space.
Brenda Bryan: (33:01)
Allowing, yeah. And, and actually also, you know, asking the question not in the state of
the problem but in the state of the, of the, of the solution, right? How do we ask the question that is geared towards
the solution versus staying stuck in the vibration of the problem, right? How do we do that? Not to me is the fun part of the
consciousness that we’re in right now.
Odiva Vasell: (33:22)
All right, okay. So, tell us about your program.
Brenda Bryan: (33:25)
Well, you know, the reason I started the program was because I was asking Spirit for guidance on how do I become effective at what I need to do, and I never saw myself as a speaker’s coach. That was not on my radar until a program I was operating didn’t want to rise, and okay, Creator, you got something in mind for me. Now I’m asking you what is it? Show me
the way because I know you’ve got a plan, and I would like to hear it so I can hear it, not just elude to it. Tell me where you want me to go. So two days later, I went out to a networking thing, and all these women who I love, you know, I’ve been hanging out with for a long time, about 70 women in the room, and half of them were saying, “I don’t know what to say about my introduction. I really hate public speaking. I’m too nervous to speak,” and I was like, “I went damn, I can help with that one. That one I can help with.” And so, I I, uh, I, uh, I basically said, “Okay, that was the guidance I’m gonna follow.” So that’s four years ago, that’s when I started Raise Your Voice because I actually started out as the Be Bold, Be Brave, Be Powerful Speakers Club, and since then, it’s turned into Raise Your Voice Speakers Club to empower people to be brave, to be powerful, and its whole purpose is to create a safe and sacred place where women can come and learn what their voice is because until you have a chance to
experiment and explore and discover, you do not know what your true voice is. Now,
me, I’m always experimenting and exploring, and I don’t care about falling on my face because I’m falling on my face, right? So failure is the way you learn, yeah, you know, so it’s like that’s not an issue. So because I’ve been an entrepreneur for a long time, like close to 40 years, because I’ve been doing the emotional intelligence work, you know, the advocacy for personal growth work for 35, and then I’ve been doing speaking, and when I came to Portland for one of the first things I did, because I had spent the previous 12 years in Hermit land, buying properties and renovating them all by myself. It was a very, you know, me and my partner, that’s what we were doing, and I was taking a rest from running a community of 150 people for 10 years. So I stepped back, went into hermit land, and um, and so I stepped into uh, when I came to Portland, I said one of the first things I did was I joined Toastmasters because I knew that I couldn’t be a hermit and function as a successful entrepreneur. I needed to change my approach. And so one of the first things I did was I found an absolutely, I was so blessed to find the right Toastmasters Club for me. They were actually in walking distance, which is one of the reasons I chose it. But my mentor there um, was an amazing man. He was 80.
Odiva Vasell: (36:28)
Oh, they had mentors.
Brenda Bryan: (36:29)
Yeah, well, he was the president of the club at the time. Dick, uh, Dick Morris, and he’s, he’s since passed, but he was an amazing man who took me under his wing. So during my seven or eight years in Toastmasters, I won lots of prizes and stuff like that, and I got acknowledged for what I was doing. Um, but they didn’t teach the fundamentals of speaking to sell or show you how to make a business out of it. So I went into that because I loved speaking, and I saw in one of my first coaches, that’s what she said. “You’re born to speak. You’re a natural-born storyteller.” You know, I know that to be part of my charisma, especially when I turn it on.
Um, you know, is that I, I can reach people in ways that a lot of people can’t, and that’s my, that’s my time in with being dyslexic and working in the feminist movement and working, you know, working in all these different places that I worked in the community that I have this ability to tap into that innate light that shines in everybody.
Odiva Vasell: (37:43)
So what does the program look like now?
Brenda Bryan: (37:45)
The program is wonderfully, developing, and it’s been a lovely four years. So it’s a minimum of six months, and we meet four times. We meet four times a month for an hour and a half essentially. And then people get to, to learn the art of speaking and be, and make presentations and be evaluated and get feedback. And then, and then come back and do another presentation with the feedback, and they, they build up an embodiment of their message. And it also has a structure that helps them to understand where their story fits in that um, you know, how to, how to make an offer. Um, you know, what kinds of offers, you know, how to construct their programs so that it’s so that it’s, it’s, it’s speaking to the, the, the things that their ideal client is looking for. You know, how to, how to, how to do the craft of speaking because it’s one thing to write something. It’s another thing to be on stage presenting it. And then to do so to develop your own style and um, know when to use, you know, gathering questions and humor and, and statistics and slides. There’s so many ways to engage an audience, uh, that um, helps them to know, like, and trust you. And um, I see a lot of speakers who do not know how to engage the audience.
You know, they’re there, they’re there for their, they’re there for their purpose, which is that’s what they’re doing, but
Odiva Vasell: (39:22)
Nerves can be a part of that too.
Empowering women through voice
Brenda Bryan: (39:24)
Yeah, yeah. But my, but my, yeah, absolutely, but my emphasis is on of course, I’m working with women who usually are heartfelt people who are looking to show up authentically. But also for them to design, to develop their personality in such a way that they’re true to themselves and the message that they want. And so that’s the fun part, right? Is that we all get to be true to ourselves.
Odiva Vasell: (39:50)
And the name of the program?
Brenda Bryan: (39:52)
Is the Raise Your Voice Speakers Club. Yeah, so it’s, it’s, it’s, you know, it’s done online at this point. Um, and, you know, I’ve got a workshop coming up that’s going to be in person in a couple of weeks on, um, three keys to uh, rock your keynote. And I’m excited about it because we’re basically it’ll be the first time I’ve done something in person in, in a while.
Odiva Vasell: (40:14)
Yeah, and I know what that must feel like, missing the stage and missing getting out and being on the platform, so.
Brenda Bryan: (40:23)
But it’s that, it’s that ability to take, to take over a two-day period, will take their, their
their sense of where they want to go and break it down into, into chunks that they’ll be able to create the stories, create the program, you know, have lots, you know, know what their niche is and have lots of ability to kind of use what they’re writing on those two days to be
part of their social media campaign, right, part of their, part of their Instagram work, part of their blogging, right? Because, because what they’ll get to do is really dig down deep and, and really own their passionate why. Look at look at, kind of like, the storytelling art that needs to be involved. And I love Sage’s storytelling Arc that I mean, I’ve, you know, I’ve been, it was, as part of Toastmasters, I spent two years in a storytelling Club just telling stories. And so all kinds of storytelling arcs, but theirs I love because it turns it into what’s, what’s the, what’s the way that it, that it turns back on to your experience relating to your client’s experience, right? So there’s that depth of why you tell a story and its purpose within your.
Odiva Vasell: (41:33)
Oh yeah, the key points, yeah, yeah.
Brenda Bryan: (41:35)
Right. And so I love that. And um, you know, I was doing that in another format, but I just love their, I love their story arc, their mountain climbing the mountain peace. And then the third part is, is it’s really about kind of like being able to really identify the pain points of your clients and then what others, what are the results that you’re getting and how can you, how can you that um, turn that into, into something that that excites them about the potential that they have when they, when they get to work with you.
Odiva Vasell: (42:07)
Fantastic! So when is the next workshop?
Brenda Bryan: (42:10)
The actual job is the 18th and 19th of November. It’s going to be in the Portland area, but, uh, but I’m hoping that I’ll actually bring it to an online presentation. I want to deliver it in person first, um, just because I kind of, I’m wanting an in-person opportunity, and I’ve got about six or eight people who are all part of my program in some way who are going to be part of it. And then, you know, so, that’ll be just a nice kind of, you know, uh, eight to twelve people that I’ll be able to spend two days with and watch them flourish. Yeah, how much fun is that?
Odiva Vasell: (42:46)
Yeah, it’s this is fun, and this is so very, very needed in these times. And, um, we both have a passion for women using their voices. And, um, as I told you before, I have a passion especially for the multicultural and multilingual women that I’ve worked with in the past. Um, and the universe has just been bringing more and more women before I was working with business men and women, but now more and more women are coming to me, and they’re, they’re tired. And like you talked about the corporate situation where they are hired because they have so many skills. You know, they have this high level of skills, and then they get there in the boardroom and in the meetings, and they don’t want to speak up. And I’ve, I just finished coaching, well
we’re not finished, but I’m coaching a PhD, and she said before I give this presentation. Now she’s doing this presentation that is about cellular, you know, development, and it’s such a high level it’s like 90 words that even English speakers don’t either I’m like okay we pronounced that, okay that’s it. And she said before I start this presentation because she gave me the presentation, we went over it, it was in perfect English, and she said before I start, should I apologize for my English? And I said never, never. I mean, could you imagine her male colleagues doing that before a presentation? I’ve worked with some men, and they have those
feelings, but when they go out there, they just boom boom boom, you know, and a part of their confidence is not caring if they get it wrong or not.
Brenda Bryan: (44:46)
Well, they don’t speak to it. They care. Like, that’s part of the problem with the authenticity in the Bible.
Odiva Vasell: (44:52)
But I mean, in the sense that they’re willing to take a risk.
Brenda Bryan: (44:56)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Odiva Vasell: (44:58)
Rather than sit there and be quiet because that’s not even an option. So working with these women and getting them to a place where, you know what, I have a lot to say, is there where my heart is at and um.
Brenda Bryan: (44:13)
Yeah, we share that. That is, you know, that is the work that we get to do because, yeah, and so
congratulations that voice come to come to life in a way that she gets to step into her power.
Odiva Vasell: (45:27)
Yeah. So my program is called the ‘Find Your Unique Voice’ program, and my next uh Workshop will be um Thanksgiving, the 24th to the 27th, and I’m doing it that way because maybe some people will be on vacation, but I uniquely want to reach out to people in other countries who are not celebrating Thanksgiving.
Brenda Bryan: (45:57)
Thanksgiving, yeah.
Odiva Vasell: (45:58)
Maybe they have the day off because their American conglomerate is, you know, giving
them the day off, and I just, I have a heart for these women. I know they’re out there around the world, and they have so much potential not just in speaking but in business to share their product, to share their service, and are holding back because of this perceived inadequacy.
Brenda Bryan: (46:30)
Well, we’re drowning in the perceived inadequacy that has nothing to do with the truth of who we are, and it’s, you know, and it’s not even factual. If it was factual, we’d see, you know, and this is where a lot of women, you know, you’re working with a PhD. I mean, basically, how many women have four degrees and still are trying to improve their worth, right? So, we go back to the
inner work, right? Because we can create the list of credentials, but that doesn’t give us the
confidence or the sense of self-worth that doing our inner work and recognizing that we get to change the story, that we get to use different words about ourselves, and we get to stand for ourselves in a different way. And so, you and I both know that this is an important aspect
of women changing the world is for them to be able to use their voice.
Odiva Vasell: (47:29)
And the beauty is we’re right now in such a fantastic time because we don’t have to knock on corporate’s door and say, “Hey, I’m wearing the best suit, I have the best resume, will you give me a job?” We can say, “This is who I am, and this is what I have to offer.” It’s direct now, you know?
Brenda Bryan: (47:56)
We have the best time. This is the best time in my 50 years of working for the empowerment of women, you know, 50 years. It’s a good 50 years. This is the most amazing time for women to say, “If not now, then when?” and that this is the time for us to step up. And we don’t know how to do it? Great. You and I know how to help them, and we’re not the only coaches out there who have some way in which we can help you find your voice, feel empowered, and live to your genius and step into your wisdom and your magic. You know that, uh, if not me or not you, then who? Who are you going to call upon to help raise you to another level of you, honoring the gift of you on this planet at this time? Because to me, that’s what it’s really about.
Odiva Vasell: (48:50)
Absolutely. And I will just close on Madam CJ Walker. Yes, I don’t have the quote in mind. I’ve written it down somewhere. I don’t have the quote in my mind right now, but we are talking about the obstacles that we had to overcome to build our business and to be heard. And, see, can you
imagine? Can you imagine? But we’ve done it before.
Brenda Bryan: (49:22)
Yes, and we’ll be doing more and more and more and more still. I mean, women actually didn’t have rights to getting our own credit card until 1974. I mean, when you think about it, it’s like how much more? We got a lot we got distance to cover, baby, and you and I are going to help people make that journey in a way that’s in integrity with the quality of life that they seek.
Odiva Vasell: (49:52)
Okay, and I will stop there. And we’ll stop the recording there and just give kisses to whoever’s watching.
Brenda Bryan: (50:01)
Contact us. We’re more than willing to give you support in turning into that beautiful badass that you are. That’s all we can tell you: you’re available for your badassery. We’re available to see that you do it. That’s what I think.
Conclusion
The discussion serves as a guiding beacon for those seeking to break free from self-imposed limitations, reshape their narratives, and fully embody authenticity. Your voice is more than a sound—it’s an instrument of change. As we collectively navigate life’s complexities, let’s embrace the empowering journey of self-expression, sharing our stories, and supporting one another in living authentically. Join us in acknowledging that your voice matters, your story is worth telling, and your authenticity is your power—resonate it boldly with the world.