Soulful Speaking
What if public speaking could be a transformative and soul-stirring experience instead of a nerve-wracking obligation?
Soulful Speaking features heart-to-heart conversations, breakthrough coaching calls, inspiring stories of transformation, and guest experts who do speaking and speaking related things a little differently.
You’ll learn how to show up the way you do 1:1 with your closest friends in front of soulmate audiences of any size: from TikToks to TED Talks.
Speaker, actor, author, and intuitive speaking and leadership coach Lauri Smith created this show to change the conversation - and your experience - around public speaking from one that’s rooted in fear, competition, and conforming to one that’s filled with transformation and soul so you can say YES to that voice inside you that’s calling you to create your legacy.
Soulful Speaking
From Stage Fright to Spotlight: Speaking Through Sensitivity
What happens when a highly sensitive person takes center stage?
In this episode of Soulful Speaking, copywriting soul genius Joanne Homestead shares her journey from a terrified five-year-old clutching a microphone to a confident entrepreneur embracing her authentic voice. Along the way, she invites us into a deeply human exploration of fear, presence, and transformation.
Together, we explore:
- Why some of our earliest speaking experiences leave lasting marks
- How teaching became Joanne’s improv playground
- The hidden challenges (and gifts) of being a highly sensitive speaker
- What to do when the spotlight feels more like an alien abduction
- Why soulful visibility begins with listening to your own needs
This episode is a love letter to the late bloomers, the empathic entrepreneurs, and anyone who's ever wondered if they were “too much” for the stage. You’re not. Your presence is powerful—and your story deserves to be told.
TAKEAWAYS
1. Your speaking journey might begin before you even realize it.
(Joanne’s began at age 5—and not by choice.)
2. Bravery isn’t the absence of nerves; it’s showing up anyway.
3. Empathy for your younger self can be a powerful healing tool.
4. Memorized speeches can shut down connection. Presence invites it in.
5. Teaching is speaking with heart—especially when it’s tailored in the moment.
6. Sensitivity isn’t a weakness—it’s a superpower in speaking and connection.
7. Every classroom, audience, or moment is different. Adaptability is leadership.
8. Soulful self-care looks like breaks, breath, and maybe even fiction books.
9. You don’t have to shout to be heard—you just have to resonate.
✨ Connect with Joanne:
Website & Free Storytelling Guide: deskplantcreatives.com
Follow on LinkedIn: Joanne Homestead
Story Magic
A Soulful Speaking Playshop for loving rebels on a soul-driven mission.
Join me for Story Magic — a live, interactive Soulful Speaking Playshop where you’ll learn powerful secrets from the ancient art of theatre for telling engaging, dynamic stories.
Take the Speaker Alter Ego quiz to find out which protective mask hides your natural radiance so you can learn how to get present, connect deeply, and share your vision when it matters most!
https://voice-matters.com/speaker-alter-ego-quiz/
Thank you so much for listening!
Take the free quiz and learn which Soul Sucker™ you need to release to free your voice: https://voice-matters.com/soul-sucker-quiz/
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Hey everybody, welcome back to the Soulful Speaking podcast. I am so excited about my guest today, joanne Homestead. In my words, she is a copywriting soul genius. In some of her words, she's your expert email copywriter, holistic copy coach and obsessed storyteller. Holistic copy coach and obsessed storyteller. And she is going to share her own story with us today.
Joanne:Joanne, where did your soulful speaking journey begin? When did it begin was a long time ago. I actually have a picture of when I first started my speaking journey on stage. I think I was five years old it must've been around that age, five or six years old and at the time I started going to a Saturday morning Chinese school.
Joanne:I grew up in New Jersey and my mom was a Chinese school. I grew up in New Jersey and my mom was a Chinese school teacher there, and so she signed me up for the. They had a public speaking contest for all the students every year, and so she signed. She signed me up for that, and I have that picture of me standing on the stage. I'm so small, I think the microphone pole, you know, it's like this, much taller than me, and then the microphone is like coming way down here and that is that's. That's where I started, and since then, every year, I had my. My mom signed me up to do this every year. I definitely do have memories of not wanting to do it, getting really nervous, and I did not enjoy the spotlight. I did not enjoy being on the stage.
Joanne:I did not enjoy having to speak something to people just staring at me.
Lauri:What do you feel now as you look back over it, feel back over it and even look at that picture?
Joanne:I feel like I have a sense of empathy for her sympathy or empathy. You were so little and you were so young and you just got up there and just did the thing you were so young and you just got it. You just got up there and just did the thing you were told to do and feeling like I'm sorry, you didn't have a choice in that I love that.
Lauri:It's so wise and loving to have that kind of empathy for the child that you were and the child that is still in you now. Is there anything else you would say to that inner little girl now to help her?
Joanne:That's such a great question. What would I say to her? I have to picture her. Just words of encouragement, really, like you did the best that you did and you got up there and you're so brave, you're so brave.
Lauri:Yeah, yeah. And you are brave. You didn't stop, even though those were moments where you didn't have a choice. Continue taking us on your journey. What happened?
Joanne:have a very vivid memory of my last time that I spoke on the stage in the setting of being at training school and doing this public speaking contest every year. I was in middle school at the time. I think I'm going to say seventh. It must have been eighth grade, I think. So I'm an eighth grader now, like 13 years old, and again, were you compared to the microphone then?
Joanne:Well, I had. I remember I had a huge growth spurt at the age of 13. I used to be. I remember I was always the shortest and the smallest in the whole grade at school, from preschool all the way up to seventh grade, and then in eighth grade I just shot up taller than all of my friends. It just happened in a year and I got in front of everyone to do my speech.
Joanne:We, we, we write a speech, we memorize it and then we, we present it at the contest. And I forgot my whole speech. I was so nervous and at this point, at the age of 13, you're super self-conscious. At this point I was a nervous wreck and I couldn't remember my speech. But I kept trying to. I kept going, I just kept trying to go. I didn't want to just stop and leave the stage. I felt like I had to continue. So I stumbled through the whole speech and it took me a long time because I was so nervous I couldn't remember. And then I remember sitting down, feeling so embarrassed, like, oh my gosh, that was, that was awful, I'm so embarrassed.
Joanne:And there were, there were, I think there were only four contestants that year, three or four contestants that year, and a girl came up after me to do her speech and she actually forgot her whole speech and she said her first line, but she said it so beautifully and so well she forgot the entire rest of her speech. She actually placed in front of me because she said it so beautifully as I I was just stumbling through my words and stuttering and just pausing so much and I just remember thinking like what that is so unfair. I stood up there to really give it my, give it my all, even though I had I couldn't remember it Um and so that that kind of feel like that's like the cap and the sandwich of um, my speaking in in that realm of of Chinese school. And then went through high school, which where we did some, we had to do some public speaking in class that I really didn't like. And then when I got to college I am not sure what happened, but there was a trend, there was a transformation there my friend, one of my really best friends in college, wanted to try out for this play that one of the student clubs was putting on at our university.
Joanne:And she can, she can rope me into anything. I'm serious, like anything. She's like hey, you want to do this. Hey, do you want to try out for this play? I said yes, apparently, because I was like, yeah, sure, maybe I'll find, maybe I'll find like a little minor part, it'll be fun you know, I love the community aspect of like that, that theater feel.
Joanne:So I said, okay, sure I'll, I'll try out. So I tried out for you know, a really minor part, and then the student who was putting it on said like, oh, I'd love you to be in this, the minor part, but I also have this other part for you in the play and it's like the main part protagonist and I do not remember saying yes, but I must have said yes because I ended up doing. I ended up doing that part and so I was able to. I had the opportunity to get on stage and act out for the whole. I mean, yeah, it was basically in the whole play, in front of I think there were 500 people in the audience and to this day I still don't know how I did that.
Joanne:Yeah it's interesting. The first kind of chapter feels like it was forced into it and traumatized and the second chapter is roped into it, and then I had a lot of fun with it, I think, because it was. It was different than I feel, like the public speaking, where you're just, you just stand, you have your speech, you got to memorize it and you get. You just get in front of that podium, that microphone and you're just speaking it, whereas I feel like in a play there's like interaction, there's, you know, there's relationships happening.
Joanne:I felt that that was just a very. It had a very different feel, also because my my friend was in it. I felt more comfortable and I know I knew some of the other people in the play as well, but we all got to know each other so well through that process. It felt like we just bonded. It's like when you go and travel with a friend for two weeks, you know you just have a new bond. Either you have a new bond or you just like break up, Like that's it, you're not traveling with me anymore.
Lauri:Yeah, my husband and I went on our first vacation together like two or three months after meeting and afterwards everybody was like well, we thought you were either gonna break up or come back married. Actually, we ended up somewhere in the middle. We are married now, but it wasn't like we got. We eloped in hawai three months. Yeah, yeah.
Lauri:And it feels like the theater I've found this to be true Theater can have, like what you see in the movies, with the backstabbing and like killing off the understudies so you can get their part. And the other side of it is this like you belong. You don't need to be like anyone else. You can all be different and you belong. And as you're talking, it's like you already trusted the belonging with your friend and then you found this feeling of belonging and togetherness with everybody else, of belonging and togetherness with everybody else.
Joanne:Yeah, absolutely it was. Definitely it was such a fun experience. And then I remember afterwards we all went out to celebrate, we went to go sing karaoke and I very clearly remember that moment because I was so proud of what I was able to do and I was so proud of all of us together to be able to put on something like that. That was my first experience with theater like that and I really loved it. And I just remember being so present in that moment, really loved it, and I just remember being so present in that moment we were at, we went out celebrating and we're singing karaoke all together and just just feeling so, just like, so proud, and that belonging feeling too yeah, and I love the presence.
Lauri:I feel like theater and sports were two places that really taught me what the word present meant, what in the moment meant. Things that now people are talking about flow, state with everything, and I first learned them in theater and sports. I also want to highlight for people listening I am not a fan of memorizing your whole entire speech for the exact reasons that she's talking about.
Lauri:So we may have learned that in high school speeches or high school debate clubs, and I actually don't believe that's the best way for speakers to go, because it takes a lot for actors to learn their lines and then behave as if they didn't already learn them, and part of what makes that possible is the play with the other actors on the stage that it can come out like it's different every single time, because it is. It's the same conversation every night, but it's a different conversation every night, and at 13 years old or younger, that's a lot.
Joanne:I do. I do feel like that kind of like followed me into, you know, after college. I was a teacher for for many years, for 15 years. College. I was a teacher for for many years, for 15 years, 10 of those years standing in front of the classroom and teaching, and I feel like that's kind of like what you're talking about with. With this, it's like I I don't ever have a, I don't have a speech prepared. It's not like.
Joanne:I'm. I'm not writing word for word what I'm going to say, and they do have lots of textbooks that have scripts that I absolutely hate, because if any, if any school wanted me to like follow the script, I would say, no way, that does not happen. It doesn't sound like me, it doesn't connect with me. You know, I know how to say it in a way that's going to connect with my students. I know my students and so it is kind of like that. It there is like this playfulness with speaking in front of a classroom because you have my audience, my very little audience, little small ones. Um, it was elementary kindergarten through fifth grade. Like I can, like I can read their, I can read their expression and from their expression I can then decide like okay, are they getting it? Are they not getting it? What do I need to do? Do I need to pivot? It's very interactive and very much like improv. You're, you're really in the moment figuring out like okay, is what I'm saying landing with them or not? So yeah, yeah.
Lauri:Yeah, I love that, and that's I use the words intend, align, invite, and that's a beautiful description. When I say inviting, it's like you have an experience that you want them to have. So there's like what you want them to know. And as you're talking, the great teacher that you were didn't come from what was already in the textbook. It came more from how do you want them to feel as they learn this information. And you were listening to their nonverbal half of the conversation the whole entire time and then actually responding to it, not just going. Well, the third student in the fourth row doesn't have it Moving on.
Joanne:Just going to go with my script. Yeah.
Joanne:And that definitely, yeah, I really resonate with that, because that's how I like to explain teaching for me, personally, was creating learning experiences. Like to me, it's not teaching, I'm creating an experience, but it is really that playing with like every. You know, if I teach second grade for three years, it's not the same every year at all. It's different because they have different kids and they have they come with different backgrounds, they have come with different stories, they come with different personalities, and so I tailor it every like, every, every year, but also every day and every hour I'm tailoring like okay, where's the energy level? Where are they at? You know what? What can we? What can we? What kind of learning experience can we have right now?
Lauri:Yeah, and going from where they are, which is really like when people say teacher, Really like when people say teacher a student at one point.
Lauri:Like clued me into the fact that I was not a professor style teacher. I was more of a coaching style of teacher and I didn't even know what coaching was and I feel like that's what you're describing, like that's what you're describing. And I also flashed on what it had been like when I was in high school and my math teachers algebra, pre-calculus, calculus they were all actors whose day job was teaching math because you know weirdos who were born with the an amazing capacity for both. And when I got to college and I took my first calculus class five days a week at college and they had more of the like practically I am reading you the textbook style I was in shock. I was like I loved math when I was in high school, but I'm now realizing it was because I loved my teachers.
Joanne:They brought yeah, they brought their theatrical talents and skills and experience into the classroom, and that's, I think that is one thing that I really learned from my teaching education. I went to New York University NYU and NYU is very much known for their theater school there. I was in the education department, but I think there's just a lot of bleed through with you know theater, and so we were able to learn how how to use theater and pantomime and all these things in the classroom for our kids and I I loved it. I thought it was so much fun and that's something that I love bringing into the classroom because it is bringing that learning experience like what you're saying, like making math fun, anything fun. That's, I feel like, is the purpose.
Lauri:Yeah, in this moment, if I were to describe everything from algebra to calculus. Everything from algebra to calculus, it was like treasure hunt or, you know, solve a puzzle, and it felt more like a game than when it got to college. It was like well, I can actually do this myself, why do I need to come?
Joanne:to your class Like why?
Lauri:do I have to be here? One of them was at 1pm, the other was at eight. I think Two of the worst possible times when you have a five-day-a-week class to have somebody just reading the textbook essentially to you, because it's like no, really, I could have slept in and done this on my own. Yeah, I could have just read the book, yeah, or I could be sitting on the quad finishing my lunch with my friends reading the book in the beautiful sunshine, instead of being here in your class yeah, and listening to the droning, the droning noise.
Joanne:8 pm is way too late for 8 am, oh, 8 am yeah, which I'm good with.
Lauri:8 am now. When I lived in the dorms really early, five days a week, it was a little rough.
Joanne:Yeah, no, no one's up at 8 am in college time no nope, nope, just zombies yeah, yeah, so you're speaking.
Lauri:you moved from teacher to now you're an entrepreneur who speaks, and when I say speak, it's everything from standing at a podium to doing this podcast, to teaching a workshop, to TikTok videos. Tell us how that journey evolved.
Joanne:Oh, there's. You know, what I love about entrepreneurship is there are so many different speaking opportunities. What I love about entrepreneurship is there are so many different speaking opportunities. Like what you're saying, like podcast speaking to me is really fun when it's just like conversational, like this, because it just feels like we're having a conversation, doing like going live on I used to do Instagram and I'm doing more LinkedIn like doing lives to me is is also fun, because I just I just have like, okay, what's, what's the topic I'm talking about? And then, okay, I'm just going to go and just riff off of that. And then then there's the um, like being able to speak in other groups and do trainings and workshops.
Joanne:It's like my teacher said, that I love too, because then I am like that curriculum development, lesson planning to me is really fun, like, okay, this is, we're talking about the objectives we're going to walk away with. This is, you know, it's, it's got the, the pedagogy you can say which I love, can say which I love. The one speaking that I feel like has got, has got me, like that gets me all sweaty, is the one that I that I grew up experiencing was like being on this, being on a stage and just being up there and then speaking. I had the opportunity to get on a stage at an in-person networking group here locally here, part of the Renegade Motherhood Society, and we just we all got a chance to go up, walk up on the stage. There was spotlight, there was microphone and we can do our basically like our 30 second elevator pitch in front of the stage.
Joanne:I got up there thinking like, oh yeah, it'll be fine, like I, you know, I in our in-person networking group, usually we just we stand up in front of everyone, not on the stage, but we stand up and we give our 32nd pitch, which I'm I'm usually fine with. When I got on that stage, I broke out in a sweat and the spot. I was one very surprised by the spotlight was really spotlight. It was like blinding. I felt like I was being abducted by aliens. Don't take me, I'm just an entrepreneur.
Lauri:Would you have rather been abducted by aliens? In that moment.
Joanne:Yes, please take me. It was so bright and I also have photosensitivity to my eyes too.
Lauri:And so.
Joanne:I think it is even extra brighter than what people who don't have photosensitive would see. It was so bright and I just remember getting up there, I felt like I was in a movie, like I literally put my hand up to my eyes and shaded. I just shaded my face like this. I was thinking like I can't talk like this. So, yeah, the lighting. But then also I think what came back to me was my experience as a child and I got up there I said my thing, but I was kind of like, oh, that did not like.
Lauri:The feeling of it did not come across, it just felt very flat to me, and then I walked off stage and it was like well, that was an interesting experience as you're talking, from how you could feel with your students, like what's the vibe today? What's the state that they're in today? Lots of different. So an empath for people listening. You can literally feel what other people are feeling, either physically. So a lot of massage therapists are physical empaths.
Lauri:You walk in the room to get your massage and one of the reasons they know exactly where to go is that they're literally feeling in their body what you're feeling. You can feel energy of others. So what's the energetic state of the room? You can feel emotion of others, others, and when you were talking about how every single hour of every single day of every single year is different, I was hearing lots of empath tendencies which a lot of the world is telling us that we're too big, we're too much, we're too emotional. Therefore, get off the stage when, in reality, there's an opportunity to be one of the great teachers or experienced creators, because you can feel where everybody is. So an act of teaching your lesson differently on Tuesday in 2016 than you did on a Thursday in 2012 is an act of empathy. You're empathizing with where is the room?
Lauri:And I also hear like highly sensitive person, photo sensitive, which can create like having the blinding light in our eyes. I always used to hate speaking in networking groups where it's like you're in the restaurant, it's like a loft area. So you're in this loft and there's music playing in your loft and there's also a different music playing downstairs in the rest of the restaurant. There's the steamer making the coffee, there's the plates crashing, there's the front door opening and closing. All of that is stimulation for a highly sensitive person which is really challenging on the system, just like the light was for you. If you could go back and redo your spotlight experience in that networking event, what, if anything, would you do differently?
Joanne:I have them put like a. What is that? They got like a yellow gel five on the light.
Lauri:I would not have even known what color gel people, so she's got some chops when it comes to theater.
Joanne:I don't know where I picked that up from. I don't know anything about lighting, I just know they use terms like that. Wait a minute let's put a softer lighting on that, please.
Lauri:Thank you. Yeah, yellow, amber, something like that to make you feel a little less like you're being interrogated and a little bit more like you're being welcomed.
Joanne:Yes, very much an interrogation or abduction. Either way, not the most fuzzy, warm feelings that I'd like to have. What I like to do is I like to experience it a few times, like be able to prep myself, like if I were able to get up there beforehand, I feel like it would have made me more comfortable because I would know, like, okay, take 15 more steps to get to the center, and I have that time because I was just getting up there. You know all of these, it was all just so new, like, oh, I'm going up the steps, like in my head I'm already thinking gosh, are my, is my footsteps really loud? Okay, and then going to the center.
Joanne:This is taking forever, like it's. It feel it time slows down. It feels like it took an hour to get to the middle of the stage, but really it was probably three seconds. Like knowing all that beforehand I feel like would help me feel more prepared to to stand up there and then being able to just stand up there and just like look out, like because it is such a different experience sitting in the audience versus being on the stage. It was like a total like flip, like a one 80 flip. I was like Whoa, this is I'm not supposed to my thinking. Was I'm not supposed to be up here? This is I'm not supposed to my thinking was.
Lauri:I'm not supposed to be up here. Yeah, interesting. Yeah, I'm not supposed to be up here and the I feel like it. It's really intuitive that that's your answer. It's like theater people, as you know. Sometimes you rehearse in a different space, so you rehearse for five weeks and you're in a classroom with all the furniture removed on one of those carpets, and then you move into the theater and you add all the technical stuff and that's where your body gets to figure out. Oh, they put tape on the carpet and there were five steps taped out, but I wasn't actually stepping on all five because it was taped on a carpet so it was flat. And then when you actually have to walk up the steps that's why you do your technical stuff and those final rehearsals in the space, so your body can actually feel oh hey, those steps are smaller than I imagined yeah, no, yeah, knowing the height of the steps, how many steps does it take?
Joanne:And just yeah, Getting a feel, getting a feel for for that space and and I love how you you mentioned like empath, like for me I I never thought of myself as that until probably just a year ago I realized, and I think it was through my, my older son that.
Joanne:I realized because I'm seeing him and seeing how he, how he interacts, how he behaves, and my husband and I realized like, um, I think we need to, we need to like research this a little bit. Um, and then his, his preschool teacher had, um, recommended the highly sensitive child book to us, which was such a relief to us because we didn't want to tell the teachers, you know, like, oh, our child is special Because every parent says that, yeah, we're like we're just going to let him go. And you know, and it was very affirming for her to notice what he's like in school and say like, oh, we read this book before I recommend it. And we're just like thank you for saying that. So, and we read the book and it was very affirming, but it was through that that then my husband and I realized that wait a minute.
Joanne:He gets it from, somewhere, yeah from someone and then we're both pointing like it's you, it's not me, it's both of us.
Joanne:It's both of you, it's both of us and realizing, then I started to notice for myself, like anytime I go back to visit I live in Colorado, but anytime I go back and visit friends and family in New Jersey and we go to New York City, like being in New York now for me feels like too much, like the noise and smell and everything. And so just noticing all those little things for myself, I realized, oh, I should be highly sensitive, yeah.
Lauri:Yeah, so how do you take care of yourself these days as a highly sensitive entrepreneur? Speaker.
Joanne:That's the great journey. That's really the great journey I'm on. I feel like for myself of, um, I can, I can really get really intensely into my work, and then I need to remember that I, I can, I can like take a step back and just like breathe, rest, you know, take that time for me, um, as that can be very hard for me.
Joanne:I really like my work, and so when I get intensely into it, I can forget to take breaks. I can forget to do other things that I love. So, as of right now, I feel like this is a continual learning process. For me, is being able to take breaks in between calls Cause I, I, I. I have this tension between I want to get as much as I can out of my time, so I'm not going to take the break in between, and then the tension of like I, I need that, I need that, I need that space in between. So giving myself that space, so giving myself permission to really take the time to be like it's okay, joanne, it's okay to rest, it's okay, okay, okay to take five minutes to go outside and take a breather.
Lauri:Go look at the cup yeah, and it sounds like you're reframing instead of. Getting the most out of your time means filling every single moment of every day. Getting the most out of your time means you being well nourished so that you're really in whatever it is you're doing.
Joanne:Yes, finding that spaciousness to be able to have yeah, that what you're talking about. Like nourishment, I imagine a really warm bowl of ramen. That is how I want my day to feel. That hot bowl of ramen so good. Not the cup of noodle, okay.
Lauri:Yeah, let's, yeah, no, it's. If you're a college student listening to this, it's not the salty cup of noodle that you're eating all the time. It's like it's a true meal. We're talking with something besides sodium in it.
Joanne:Yes, the deep, rich broth. It's just so nourishing. That's how I want my spaciousness to feel, which I need dance party, go outside, do a bike ride, move my body, read a fiction book.
Joanne:That's something that I've been challenged to do by a friend Cause I read a lot of nonfiction, and I've been talking about giving myself this, this space, to just enjoy myself. I've had more fun. She said I'm going to challenge you to read a fiction book. He said it's been a long time. Yeah, I think I've had more fun. She said I'm going to challenge you to read a fiction book. I said it's been a long time. Yeah, I think I need to do that.
Lauri:Yeah, you've got some good friends, one who invited you into theater, the other invites you to read fiction books throughout your life. So your first chapter was forced and traumatized. What would you call your chapter now as an entrepreneur?
Joanne:Ooh, I don't know. I feel like it has the word like wild west in it, playing in the wild west.
Lauri:Yeah, the word play came to me because you're doing so many different kinds of speaking, including the one where you stand in the spotlight. Yes, which was it was a surprise again If you could reach the end of your.
Joanne:Wild West chapter and have the very last moment, be standing in a spotlight again, and it was a beyond your wildest dreams experience. How would it go? Hmm well, I think that I don't know. The feeling that I get right now is just like a like, a, a sense of accomplishment that's the feeling like a, a deep sense of wow, I just did that. A deep sense of wow, I just did that Nice and not only did I just do that, but it's, it's resonating it's.
Joanne:It's not just, it's not just flat, which is how how it felt when I got up there, like it has movement in it.
Lauri:Movement in it, like when you were teaching. Yeah, you can it like when you were teaching.
Joanne:Yeah, you can feel the movement. Yeah, beautiful.
Lauri:Beautiful. I'm going to share a little bit more of your bio and then ask you to tell people verbally where they can find you. For the ones who are driving and can't look at the show notes. Find you for the ones who are driving and can't look at the show notes. She's got over 15 years of experience creating captivating and aligned messaging. As a master teacher, she helps soulful entrepreneurs and coaches in wellness, well-being and mindset elevate their stories to connect, compel and soulfully sell with email style. And, as she's mentioned little bit glimpse of today, she's a mama of two little ones and loves a good cup of chai to fuel her creativity and passion for storytelling marketing. Joanne, where can people find you if they're loving your storytelling prowess and they want you to help them? Do that in writing.
Joanne:Come join my email community. It's called Flourish and you can join through my website, deskplantcreativescom. You'll see a pop-up there where you can get a free email storytelling guide, and this is not just something that will just collect dust, it's something that you will reference. I've gotten a lot of great feedback that it's something people can reference again and again. I still reference it sometimes for myself. It's got really good resources in it. Lots of you know plug and play segues in there, seven different kinds of hooks and examples. It's got 25 story prompts in there. It's really great. So I invite you to go grab that from my website on the pop-up or you'll see it kind of sprinkled throughout there and then that's just really in my email community I love telling stories of all flavors, but also give tips on email sequences, email strategy and copywriting tips on how to get better conversion from your emails.
Joanne:And then also, I am more active on linkedin now, so you can find me there too.
Lauri:Joanne Homestead, last name h-o-m-e-s-t-e-a-d and I can attest I at least once a year, radically go through and remove myself from tons and tons of mailing lists. It's it's nothing personal if I've removed myself from yours as I'm saying this, and there are a few that are so good that I stay on the list and when I'm super busy it might mean that I I delete a few and clean out my inbox for a few weeks and then or move them into a different folder to look at when I have more time and I'm sitting there going. I want some story spark and Joanne makes the cut Like. I watch her emails, I enjoy her emails. So even after your first gift, you're getting gifts delivered to your inbox that you can choose to look at when you're ready, just like I do.
Joanne:Thank you, you're welcome.
Lauri:I love hearing that ready, just like I do. Thank you, you're welcome. I love hearing that. All right, it is time now for our Pivo Pivot. Joanne, do I need to stretch? For this you can stretch. Let's take a little stretch.
Joanne:Okay, here we go. Okay, jo, my shoulders.
Lauri:Joanne, what is your favorite word?
Joanne:Oh my gosh soup. What is your least favorite word? Ooh, least favorite word Should, should.
Lauri:What turns you on creatively, spiritually or emotionally?
Joanne:Hmm, writing, definitely writing.
Lauri:What turns you off? Hmm.
Joanne:Is this a word? Disingenuous, not being authentic, disingenuous, not being authentic, disingenuous Is that the word?
Lauri:Yeah, okay. What is your favorite cuss word?
Joanne:Oh, this is like I'm laughing because my husband always is trying to get me to cuss and I I'm just like I I'm terrible when I say it. There's no like infinite. It sounds like I'm terrible when I say it there's no like infinite, it sounds like.
Lauri:Do you have a?
Joanne:substitute. Right now it's cheese and crackers, because my kids are really into watching bluey and that's what their parents say all the time when they want to cuss or biscuits nice, nice.
Lauri:What sound or noise do you love?
Joanne:Oh, my favorite sound in the world is the sound of the breeze going through the tree leaves, that leaf clapping sound. I love that sound.
Lauri:Yeah, what sound or noise do you hate?
Joanne:The sound of fingernails on the chalkboard or styrofoam rubbing together.
Lauri:What profession other than your own or the ones you have done would be fun to try?
Joanne:I've always wanted to work at a donut shop.
Lauri:What profession would you not like to do?
Joanne:You know, I thought maybe I'd like to be a librarian. But I, because I love, I love reading, I love books. But I volunteered in high school at a library and, I'm sorry, it was so boring. It's not my place, not for me. Sorry, librarians, just not for me.
Lauri:And Joanne, what do you hope people say about you on your 100th birthday?
Joanne:Happy birthday. What would I want them to say? To me. Thank you for doing life together.
Lauri:Nice. Thank you for doing this podcast together with me. I've really had a blast. I could talk to you for a long time. Thank you again, very much, thank you.
Joanne:Thank you, lori.
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