Enjoy this episode & transcript below where Kimberly Spencer, Master NLP Mindset & Communications Coach and CEO of Communication Queens, discusses how you don’t need trauma to inspire others with your story.

In this episode of the Communication Queens podcast, host Kimberly Spencer, a former screenwriter turned master communications coach, passionately discusses the power of personal storytelling in podcast guesting. She introduces her new book, "Make Every Podcast Want You," which offers NLP communication strategies and practical tips for becoming an irresistible podcast guest. Kimberly shares a heartfelt conversation with a client who doubted the significance of her own story, emphasizing that everyone’s experiences are valuable and worth sharing. Through her own journey of overcoming trauma, Kimberly inspires listeners to embrace their unique narratives and connect authentically with others.

What You’ll Learn in this Episode:

• The importance of personal storytelling in communication.
• Validity of personal experiences and overcoming feelings of inadequacy.
• The impact of trauma on storytelling and self-perception.
• Encouragement to embrace unique life journeys, regardless of perceived drama.
• The societal tendency to compare trauma and its effects on self-worth.
• The role of authenticity in effective storytelling.
• The significance of sharing experiences for personal growth and healing.
• The potential for stories to inspire and connect with others.
• Strategies for becoming a compelling podcast guest.
• A call to action for listeners to share their own narratives.

FYI Transcripts may contain a few typos. With many episodes lasting 30-minutes, it can be difficult to catch minor errors. Enjoy!

Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Podcast Addict, Castbox, Amazon Music, iHeart Radio, Pandora, Youtube, or on your favorite podcast platform.

Kimberly Spencer 00:00:05  Welcome to the Communication Queens podcast for the visionary leaders, speakers, service providers and podcasters who are looking to stand out sharing their story. I'm your host, Kimberly Spencer, former screenwriter turned master communications coach. On this podcast, I'll be coaching you on how to share your own transformation story. To that, you increase your visibility, influence, and income on podcast interviews. Let's get your voice heard.

Kimberly Spencer 00:00:31  Hi guys, I am so excited to share with you the fact that my book Make Every Podcast Want You how to become so Radically Interesting You'll Barely Keep from interviewing yourself is now available on Amazon. So this episode is sponsored by my book. I am so excited to have birthed this book, baby into the world. So click the link below and you will get your copy. I am so honored and excited to have been on this journey with you. This is the book that combines all the NLP communication strategies that we talk about on this podcast, along with podcast guesting strategies, tips, tricks, and how you share your story so that you serve, connect, and sell with your message.

Kimberly Spencer 00:01:09  This book combines all of that to make you a radically interesting and masterful podcast guest that every podcast will want to have, including the top 1%. So let's get you booked on those top 1% of podcasts. When you get your copy of Make Every Podcast Want You how to become so radically interesting, you will barely keep from interviewing yourself. Click the link below to buy it now. Welcome back to another episode of the Communication Queens podcast. I am Kimberly Spencer. I am so honored to be here with you today. I was having a conversation with a client of mine, and she was sharing with me about her story and just having some doubts about her career, and like putting herself out there and getting visible and thinking that she didn't have enough trauma, enough challenge to actually be of service. And she literally said, well, Kim, you've experienced, you know, childhood sexual abuse. You, you know, experience, sexual assault. You experience, you know, divorce, you experience all, you know, being bought out of a business and having multiple businesses and being an entrepreneur since you were 19 and all of these things.

Kimberly Spencer 00:02:24  And like, my life isn't that interesting. I was a mom and I had a job then. My kids grew up that I was divorced, and now here I am starting a new career in my mid 50s and I was like, Queen, first and foremost. You do not have to have heaps and heaps and heaps and heaps of trauma to go on podcasts, to share your story, to be of service. In fact, I'm so glad that you don't. First and foremost Like first and foremost, like, let's just lay it out there. So glad that you don't. So glad that you didn't have to overcome all that shit. It's just, you know, let's have a hot moment of gratitude for the things that you didn't have to face. And our egos get so sensitive about comparison. And so if you've ever thought like, because I know we've had some extraordinary stories on this podcast of just resilience and healing and growth and expansion and, you know, the darkness of the soul and the great leaps into into the atmosphere and the stratosphere of success.

Kimberly Spencer 00:03:35  And you don't have to have that to be successful on podcast interviews. Now, yes, having a story is valuable, but everyone has a story. And yes, I have said and probably will say is that to get on the top 1% of podcasts, you do need to do cool shit with your life. Like master something. If. Especially if you want to get on a global top 100 podcast, mastery is essential to master the art of whatever it is that you're interested. Be a masterful coach. Be a masterful mom. Be a masterful wife. Be a masterful sex therapist. Like whatever it is that you're doing, be be a masterful business owner. Be masterful at supporting your team. There has to be a level of mastery to get on those top, top level. And yes, story is important, but you don't have to have the trauma of the trauma stories to successfully serve other people. In fact, I'm so glad that you don't because there will be people. And this is exactly what I said to my client.

Kimberly Spencer 00:04:47  I told her there will be people who may hear my message, and they will be a little uncomfortable with what I share because it's not pretty. It's not all glossed over. There's not like I mean, I'm a very optimistic person and I will always find a silver lining in every challenge. and I also share, you know, certain things really matter of factly as to how they happened and what happened and what what I took them to mean initially, and what I now make the meaning of them now. And it's very different. But not everybody will resonate with that because especially, certain people who may not have had to forgive somebody, or maybe they struggle with forgiveness and they don't see how I could forgive somebody like my father. and I do, and I hope that others would as well. But some people may not, because perception is projection, right? So I told her, I said this there will be people who will not resonate with my message. There will be people who see me. They see the success that I've had.

Kimberly Spencer 00:05:58  And I don't have a college degree. And because I don't have a college degree, they will immediately, you know, ignore me. And that's okay. That's 100% okay, because that's why you're here. They may not have faced trauma. They may not have had heaps of childhood adversity. They may not have. They may have gone to college and they may have followed the traditional path. And that's not me. And so I won't resonate necessarily as much with them as you might. And I told her, I said, you follow the traditional path. You did the college, you got the the job. You then did the were a mom and then just were a stay at home mom for a while. Like you rocked out that role and then your marriage fell apart. And you, you feel like you did everything right. And still there was a giant explosion in your family, in the marriage of your family. And she was like, oh my gosh, that. That's right. And I said, yeah, I haven't had those struggles.

Kimberly Spencer 00:07:04  Thank God. So each struggle is to their own. And whenever I see anyone comparing trauma or comparing stories and maybe you've done this when you're listening to a podcast, you're like, oh my God, they've endured so much. Like, oh my God, how did they even get through it? especially if you listen to somebody like Blythe Cox's interview on the Crown Yourself podcast. Oh, oh my God, oh my God, my God. I've heard a lot of stories, but damn. So it's very easy for our egos to compare trauma to say, oh I haven't, I haven't suffered enough. And so my story is therefore irrelevant or not as impactful. Non fucking sense. Excuse my French nonsense because you are thinking that there are other people out there who are dismissing the validity of their own story because they don't feel, in their egoic sense that they have suffered enough, that they have struggled enough. Yet every day is a struggle for them. They struggle with maybe boredom. They struggle with apathy.

Kimberly Spencer 00:08:07  They struggle with malaise. So for those people, you can be the voice. You can be the voice who's like, I never felt like my suffering was as valid. That's the thing with our egos. Our egos love to have validity or invalidity. It swings the pendulum either to like we're completely valid in all our suffering and all our stories, where we are completely invalid and cannot share our stories because they have not suffered enough. And it's bullshit just laying it out there because your story in exactly how your story is will serve an impact. Exactly who it's supposed to meet. I used to have this with, sexual trauma. And yeah, we're going to go there on this podcast. So heads up. Brace yourself. I used to think that because I was only molested once in the whole time, that it was a big mistake. Yes, it was horrible. Yes, it was a giant mistake. Yes, it traumatized me. Yes, I had issues definitely coming from it, for years. And I invalidated my experience because I said, oh, it wasn't consistently oh, it wasn't, you know, years of abuse.

Kimberly Spencer 00:09:29  Oh, it happened once. But imagine all the other children out there who are invalidating the one time that had happened, which is basically, by the way, making an excuse for the one time that it happened, which is inexcusable once is enough. So I would dim that down. Same with the story of sexual assault when I was 24. I struggled with PTSD from that because it wasn't as bad as I thought sexual assault had to be. I thought it had to be this whole movie like, you know, back alley, corner, thrown into a wall, all that, you know, all the drama that you see in the movie. No, it was quite the opposite. It was a simple no. And my no was not honored. And then it was a simple like, no, get off of me. And my no is not honored. And it was a simple no. And I crumbled in shame. It was not this gigantic fight. It was not this dramatic, Hollywood, brutal scene.

Kimberly Spencer 00:10:36  It was a couple nos, but my nos were not honored until I elbowed the guy. And then it was. But then I struggled with was I just sexually assaulted? Was like, what is that considered rape? Just what he just did to me. Like, yes, yes it is. Rape is sexual penetration without permission, period. And because of the experience, I struggled to go to the gym. I knew he worked there, I felt embarrassed, I was terrified of seeing him again, of bumping into him. And I didn't know why. I didn't know why because I it wasn't bad enough for me. It wasn't brutal enough for me. And I invalidated my own experience until I didn't, until 2018 when I was like, Holy shit, that that is what happened. Like that is what happened. I am owning my experience. My no was not honored. My no is dismissed. I, you know, there was penetration without permission with very clearly without it. There was that experience again.

Kimberly Spencer 00:11:52  Without it, it was not listening. So yes. But in you sharing your story in exactly the way that it happened for you, it allows you to put aside the egoic assumptions that it wasn't bad enough. And damn, that is a belief. That is a belief. It's a belief that can only be dismantled by the sharing of your story, because there are other women out there who it wasn't bad enough, who it was only one time, and we make excuses for that in society to be quite, very transparent. Oh, it was just once. Oh, we only hit me once. No, that's that's absolutely unacceptable. So understanding and honoring your story in exactly the way that it is and accepting it as I'm going to say this, and I'm warning you, it may be triggering, but your story, as is, is perfect for those who need to hear it. Because maybe you're out there today and maybe something has happened to you. And it was only just one time. It was only once.

Kimberly Spencer 00:13:07  But it's haunted you. And by me being able to share my story of it was only one time and it haunted me too. There's now empathy. There's now compassion. There's now permission that it that it is what it was. And you can feel bad about it, however it it happened to you or for you. So it's in this moment that I'm reminded of the show Modern Family. And if you've ever watched the show, great show. There was an episode where the two gay dads were trying to get their adopted Vietnamese daughter into this hoity toity preschool, And they thought they were like, oh yes, you know, two gay dads with an adopted Vietnamese daughter. Like, we are a shoo in for this, as if we're, you know, throwing down the diversity card for sure. And as they're there in the interview, they see a lesbian couple with an adopted. I'm not sure I forget whether it's a son or daughter. but an adopted child, who I believe was black. but I do remember that the one of the lesbian women was in a wheelchair, and they looked at each other like crap, so that like, because there is always going to be someone who has experienced more.

Kimberly Spencer 00:14:27  Like someone could hear my story. It's only one time. It only happened once. And they were, you know, they did have the back alley experience. They did have multiple occasions. They did have multiple experiences of the of different forms of abuse. Maybe they came from a war torn country, like maybe they came from a space where they had bombs going off every day. I didn't live with that. I grew up in Burbank. Like my trauma does not resonate with that, but it doesn't invalidate it. And this is where being able to have the courage to share your story as it is, is so essential because your story is going to give those people permission who are just like you. And there are many people out there who are just like you. There are many people out there who have suffered, who have experienced a challenge and then who have invalidated it, especially women. Oh my God, as women were so good at doing that to ourselves and invalidating our experiences. Please. Like let's just collectively stop and own what what what happened? What was wrong bad, fucked up about what happened.

Kimberly Spencer 00:15:46  And then Giving ourselves the permission to accept it as part of her past. That it wasn't any worse or any better, but it was what it was. It is what it is. My favorite saying of these past few years it is what it is. And in that acceptance, we have the truth where it's not our egos trying to downplay an experience that happened to us because we didn't think it was bad enough. Where we are accepting ourselves and acceptance is an emotional vibration. Acceptance is on the pathway to courage and by having the courage to share your story. Accepting it as as it was and letting it be what it was. That in and of itself is so powerful for all of those who are still struggling in shame and guilt, and in all of those lower vibratory emotions around those pieces of their story that they have not yet accepted because of the belief that it was not bad enough. This is why when you do a Ted talk, it's not about like share your trauma because there will always be someone's trauma that trumps yours.

Kimberly Spencer 00:17:08  There will always be someone who had it worse. It doesn't make what you had right or wrong, good or bad, any better. It just is what it is. And if we can accept the cards that we were dealt, accept that the past and that it happened, and then share our stories and the past and how it happened and what we learned and how we grew and how we evolved and how we transformed, and how we had compassion and how we forgave. I know I'm at that space. I don't know, not everybody else is. But when you get to that space, oh it's Glorious. It really is. But also, it has to be rooted in the acceptance of it was what it was, and the defiance of the belief system that it wasn't bad enough. So I probably shouldn't share that it wasn't horrible. I mean, it was horrible, but it wasn't. You know, the movie scene that we expect. So when I told my client this, she was so grateful and she saw her story in a whole new light.

Kimberly Spencer 00:18:24  Accepting the divorce for being what it was for. It tore her family apart. It estranged her to her child from her. And eventually she got back and reconnected with her estranged daughter after a good year of healing. And that's her story that she gets to share. It's not my story. My story is different. But for those family members, for those people who.

Kimberly Spencer 00:18:55  Went.

Kimberly Spencer 00:18:56  Through their life thinking that they did all the right things, marrying the right person, doing the college, you know, getting the job, becoming a mom, you know, doing, doing all the right things. And then suddenly their life turns upside down. Her story is going to resonate with them. My story is different. And that's okay. It's important.

Kimberly Spencer 00:19:18  That.

Kimberly Spencer 00:19:19  Yes.

Kimberly Spencer 00:19:20  And that.

Kimberly Spencer 00:19:21  We. Yes. And both. Both are valid. Both are essential because people out there are struggling and they're suffering and they're facing challenges and.

Kimberly Spencer 00:19:35  Seeing.

Kimberly Spencer 00:19:36  You a few steps ahead of where they are. That's how you get to really light your light out and light the way for for people who are in that same space, who are in a similar arena of life, maybe not exactly the same circumstances, but a similar arena, and you're choosing to get in.

Kimberly Spencer 00:19:57  It.

Kimberly Spencer 00:19:58  And share your story.

Kimberly Spencer 00:20:00  And.

Kimberly Spencer 00:20:00  Let the critics fall where they may, because they're just up in the stands and you're choosing to lead the way. You're choosing to be that guiding light through their darkness. Every story is going to resonate with a certain person. Every story is not going to resonate with everyone, but we all resonate with what we resonate with. So I encourage you to take from this episode to trust yourself, to trust your story, to trust what you're learning and what you learn from it, and to trust that what you experienced was enough to be able to share it, and beyond.

Kimberly Spencer 00:20:48  That.

Kimberly Spencer 00:20:49  Go also. Live an epic future. Go live an epic life. Go create something amazing and start down with that path of mastery. As always, my fellow sovereigns, I hope this episode resonated with you. If it did, please take a screenshot of it and share your breakthrough, your your takeaway and I look forward to seeing you in the next episode. As always, your story has the power to save at least one life.

Kimberly Spencer 00:21:15  So get out there, stand out and be heard.

Kimberly Spencer 00:21:18  Thank you so much for listening. If you love this episode, subscribe! Leave us a review and share it with your friends. For more tips on guest podcasting, storytelling and communication strategies, follow us on social media at Communication Queens Agency and visit us at Communication queens.com. I look forward to seeing you in the next episode. And in the meantime, remember your story has the power to save one life. Let your story and your voice be heard.