With Rebecca P. Murray, communications coach, director, producer, conference facilitator, emcee, parody songwriter, singer, actor, author, and retired dog-whisperer. Rebecca delivers high-energy virtual and live training for those ready to become confident, creative, and compelling leaders and team players. She also delivers edutaining skill-building through playshops & keynotes, consulting, and adult continuing education at Western Washington University. Her popular one-woman show, The Confidence Equation™, incorporates characters, comedy, song, and a big take-home message highly relevant for today’s audiences.

Rebecca has produced everything from 30-second TV commercials to mini-documentaries and live-streamed events. She infuses irreverent humor, inspiring stories, and entertaining musical theater excerpts into content-rich, high-stick events. As a power-skills edutainer, speaking coach, and director/producer, she knows everyone can be a star. She’s determined to put clients at ease and bring out their very best – whether they’re in front of another person, a camera, or an audience of thousands.

In this episode, Rebecca shares her wonderful experience of working with pets, from when she had her first puppy to being a dog-whisperer and pet trainer, and how she relates it with leadership. She also shares the importance of looking out for the body languages and gestures over words, whatever endeavor it may be.

Join us for this engaging conversation where you will walk away with great insights and tips on how you can fully achieve confidence — a must have for a great leader.

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Biggest takeaways (or quotes) you don’t want to miss:

• “There’s no better way to learn about leadership and confidence than to be trained by somebody in relation to your own pet relationships.”
• Why is confidence an important trait for a leader?
• “When watching yourself back, try not only to be objective but also to be hugely appreciative of yourself.”
• What is “traumatic stress syndrome”?
• It’s important for a speaker to have a mindset that is 100% audience focused.

“Doubt is actually what kicks off the equation, because you can’t have courage without doubt. And usually, what triggers doubt is an inspiration, an idea, so we grab onto an idea.”

-Rebecca P. Murray

Check out these highlights:

• 04:19 How Rebecca started her love for pets and how she became a pet trainer.
• 14:47 The biggest challenges people face in relation to confidence.
• 19:12 How video is used as part of a training tool for their pets.
• 28:46 What is one thing that Rebecca tries to not do during a podcast?
• 42:35 Rebecca shares the Confidence Equation.
• 46:10 Listen to what Rebecca has to say with doubts.

How to get in touch with Rebecca:

On social media:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/rebeccapmurray/

Learn more about Rebecca, by visiting her website here.

Imperfect Show Notes

We are happy to offer these imperfect show notes to make this podcast more accessible to those who are hearing impaired or those who prefer reading over listening. While we would love to offer more polished show notes, we are currently offering an automated transcription (which likely includes errors, but hopefully will still deliver great value), below.

GGGB Intro  00:00

Here’s what to expect today…

Rebecca Murray  00:02

If you are the speaker, having a mindset that it was 100% audience focused, it’s really easy when we’re on stage and we’re feeling the nerves and the spotlights on us to to, to get pulled into our own self, how I’m feeling, projecting on the audience what what they’re thinking of me and it’s all about us this whole ego crazy thing. If we can shift the focus to our audience, I’m there to serve you. I’ve done my research, I know who you are, I know what you’re expecting of me. And I’m here to to give that to you and more to exceed your expectations. Just that mind shift changes everything.

GGGB Intro  00:52

The adventure of entrepreneurship and building a life and business you love, preferably at the same time is not for the faint of heart. That’s why Heather Pearce Campbell is bringing you a dose of guts, grit and great business stories that will inspire and motivate you to create what you want in your business and life. Welcome to the Guts, Grit and Great Business™ podcast where endurance is required. Now, here’s your host, The Legal Website Warrior®, Heather Pearce Campbell.

Heather Pearce Campbell  01:29

Alrighty, welcome. I am Heather Pearce Campbell, The Legal Website Warrior®. I’m an attorney and legal coach based here in Seattle, Washington, serving online entrepreneurs throughout the US and the world. Welcome to another episode of Guts, Grit and Great Business™. I am super excited to have our guests with us today. Rebecca Murray. Welcome, Rebecca.

Rebecca Murray  01:50

Thank you, Heather. It’s been a long time coming. I’m glad we’re finally here together.

Heather Pearce Campbell  01:54

Right. I know it took us a little bit to get scheduled. And yeah, we are. And I love the title for those of you that are not watching Rebecca on video – edutainer. So for those of you that don’t know Rebecca… as a director and producer, it is Rebecca’s job to put clients at ease and bring out their very best in front of another person, a camera, or an audience of 1000s. She has produced everything from 30 second TV commercials to many documentaries, and live streamed events and feels strongly that everyone has the ability to be a star. Her biggest thrill comes from teaching clients how to protect, perfect and project an image that truly reflects how they see themselves, their brand and their organization. Rebecca infuses fun into her presentation coaching edutainment team building and her one woman show through her company, showcase your shine, get ready to maximize your red carpet potential with our guests. Rebecca Murray. Welcome, Rebecca. I’m so happy to have you here.

Rebecca Murray  03:02

Thank you. And I also am happy to be here. And before we got going this today to find out more about you, Heather, and all these things that we have in common.

Heather Pearce Campbell  03:15

Turns out we do have a few things in common and the latest I actually eager to jump into this one because we were talking. Rebecca could I’m sure talk with us about many topics today. I know we spent quite a bit of time connecting in a call before deciding to schedule on the podcast. And it was so much fun. And what we ultimately decided on was the topic of confidence, right? And part of what came out which I didn’t know because it wasn’t in your bio, was that you have worked for years as a dog trainer and actually a pet trainer because you’ve worked with other animals besides dogs. And I was just telling Rebecca, we just adopted a puppy couple months ago now. And so we’re kind of on the tail end of the COVID Puppy craze, but it’s still caught us.

Rebecca Murray  04:05

Right? There’s no better way I think to learn about leadership and confidence than to be trained by somebody in relation to your own pet relationships. So for me going back to when I had a senior dog that, that I actually met him, his name was Murphy. He was seven years old. He was my husband’s dog. So he was already easy, broken in and bordering on a senior citizen. So that when he passed away at 15 years and three months, then my heart was broken into pieces. In fact, I was in such a state of trauma losing him that my husband almost put me in a hospital was just a wreck. And so everybody said you need to get a puppy, you need to get puppies, I finally did, like I went to a breeder and got a puppy. And then I had what is called new puppy Shock Syndrome. That’s what I call it anyway, where I was just in shock over how difficult this puppy was, how bad he was, how aggressive he was. So I found a place to take him for training, realize it’s actually me who gets the training, and learned through that, that it was a lack of leadership, my leadership specifically, that was contributing to all of the problems that I was having with little Max was his name. And in learning about dog behavior, and how to become a better leader, a better pet parent, I was all in I said, this is what I want to do next with my life. I want to become a dog trainer, a pet trainer did that for 12 years. I trained 1000s of dogs, worked with hundreds of pet parents and generations of their dogs, actually, you know, when would pass away, they would call me I would come out and help them with the puppy. And boy did I learn so much not only about myself, but how what it means to be a confident leader. I mean, somebody can call themself a leader. Anyone can say that. But it’s really the confidence that a leader projects that determines if they’re the kind of leader that we want to follow.

Heather Pearce Campbell  06:31

Yeah. Oh, it’s so true. And, you know, we just worked probably a month and a half, maybe two months ago, we spent five or six hours with a local trainer in our home, working with Maggie, mostly working with us, right, exactly, as you say. And it was just so fascinating and so much fun. To watch her demonstrate, you know exactly how something should be done in a way that makes it clear for the dog to understand. And my daughter who’s four is quite intuitive. Actually, both my kids are really, really like just over the moon pretty much about any pet. My son really loves horses. My daughter, you know, loves all the things doggies, kitties, bunnies, you name it. Of course, my son is now totally sold on this puppy as well. But it turns out my daughter is better at getting Maggie to do what she wants. She’s learned. And you know, I don’t know if it’s just because she’s a little girl and she listened a few moments longer. You know, Aiden’s a pretty busy, little guy. His brain goes lots of places. But she knows the difference between her strong voice and any other voice. Right. And so she knows. And I’ve actually put her in charge of doing some of Maggie’s daily brain games. And you know, and she had to learn right away. What got Maggie to respond versus Maggie just totally ignoring her. Right? Yes, yes. So she would stand calmly, and you know, get a little stronger voice going. And it was just really fascinating to watch her figure that out and to be able to execute it now where she can get Maggie to do anything. And not only that the other day, she because I told her I said, Henley I want you to do brain games with Maggie. She went and ran Maggie through the whole routine. And did not say a word. Didn’t vocally say a word, why Maggie still did everything that she wanted. And she said to me when she was done, Mom, I didn’t use my words. And she still knew what I wanted her to do. And, you know, and I thought, it’s so fascinating because our dog trainer actually told us that is how intuitive pets are is that they see in visual images. So if you convey something to them visually, that’s actually how they best interpret it. And it’s why we screw it up all the time is because we’re saying something vocally, we’re actually holding a different image in our mind. Like we’re thinking about what a crazy puppy they are, while we’re telling them to calm down. They see our image of like, You’re a crazy puppy and so they act crazy. Right? Right. If it’s incongruent, if it’s not cohesive, they’ll pick well and humans are exactly the same way.

Rebecca Murray  09:40

We’re exactly the same way. If somebody is telling us something about their body language is saying something else. We are going to react to the body language and believe the body language and the gestures over anything that they say.

Heather Pearce Campbell  09:52

Right and even for anything, that’s true, and even if their body language is not telling us much if they’re intentions or their thoughts are different than what you know. Like, you can just sense it, you can tell that what they’re saying is not authentic, it doesn’t land with you, whatever, right? I think we all have kind of a sixth sense in that way if we tune into it, but it was really interesting to watch my daughter in a very short time learn to demonstrate those skills and then totally take them to the next level. I you know, I delighted me and I you know, as much as I was surprised, I was also not surprised.

Rebecca Murray  10:32

That she’s only four you saying and how old? How old is the puppy?

Heather Pearce Campbell  10:36

Puppy is about to turn seven months and about another week.

Rebecca Murray  10:40

Oh my gosh. So the puppy and what breed is this puppy?

Heather Pearce Campbell  10:44

She is a mix. She’s 40% cattle dog, Australian cattle dog. She’s about 20% Shepherd 20%. Lab 10%. Ciao of all things you would not know. And then another 10% that is kind of undetermined. She looks like she has some hunting dog in her shoe. And she’s got like really dark eyeliner around her eyes. She’s a beautiful dog.

Rebecca Murray  11:08

Did you do a DNA test to figure all this out? 

Heather Pearce Campbell  11:10

Yeah. Yes, yeah. 

Rebecca Murray  11:12

Well, isn’t that wonderful? And what your daughter and your daughter’s name again is Henley. Henley. I can already see Henley in school and beyond the leader of any group that she’s in, she will rise up and she will take control and everyone will look at her and she will have that powerful presence where people were like, I don’t know what it is about her. But I will follow her. That’s what she has developed. And it’s part of that she already had. And the dog training just allowed her to express it. Yeah, wonderful to see that in her.

Heather Pearce Campbell  11:55

Well, it’s you know, the pet ownership, it is really fascinating like to view that through the lens of leadership, right? Because when I was listening to our dog trainer, and you know, she used a lot of the same language and it was like dogs need a leader, even though we know that, like the thing that I immediately learned that our trainer told me is like, you touch her too much like, in order to get her to respond to your voice. You cannot be touching her while you give her commands, petting or, you know, trying to help her calm down like no, you have to be hands off. Right? And that was kind of an epiphany of like, oh, yeah, she needs to train to my voice. She’s not going to do that if I’m good sending other signals or touching her being physical with her. Right? Because it’s going to stimulate her in other ways. And she’s not going to be just paying attention to my voice.

Rebecca Murray  12:49

Yeah, exactly. Exactly. Right. And like your daughter demonstrated so well. You don’t even need to use your voice. You can just use your eye contact, your gestures, your body language, your powerful presence, to let the dog know. Yes. This is good. Come over here. Sit, stay all of those all of those things. Yes. Well, and going back to leadership too, because I do. I find myself always making excuses like, Okay, I’m gonna use a dog analogy here. All right, okay, I’m going to use a dog and LSU okay. And so we talked, we look at the some of the complexities of being a leader in an employment situation, for example, and, and make analogies to what we see in successful dog training and also households where the dog is running the house, where the dog is running over the leader, “the leader of the house” all of the children, it’s utter chaos. And really, the solution to that issue in a household with a pet, the solution and a business with employees is for the leader to rise up and and step into their brilliance and get some help if like, like a dog like a dog parent would, you know, seek out coaching, seek out mentorship so that you can step into your brilliance as a leader?

Heather Pearce Campbell  14:19

What, especially in the people scenarios, right? What do you feel like are the biggest challenges people face when it comes to confidence? Or maybe it’s really just around expressing confidence, right, demonstrating confidence, what do you in your experience of coaching and working with people in all of your experience on, you know, video and in the production directing side of the world? What have you learned?

Rebecca Murray  14:47

Well, part of it is being open to feedback. And I think going back to the dog training, where I learned to give appropriate feedback and lots The positive feedback versus the negative. Can you imagine a dog trainer being successful? No, no, no, no, no bad dog, Bad dog Bad dog, right says, This poor dog is going to run away every time they see you. Because it really there’s two states for a dog. It’s the happy, confident dog, or it’s the terrified dog. And what we talk about in terms of shaming, you know, we, you might see videos on dog shaming, it’s really, there’s no way to shame a dog, that there’s absolutely a way to confuse and cause fear inside of a dog. And that’s actually what we see. It’s not being shamed. But people can be shamed. It’s the same triggers. It’s the same triggers and a person, it’s fear, confusion. Those are the things that that shut down the brain in terms of receiving feedback. So when I work with a client, for example, for the first time, many, many of my clients will say, I look terrible on camera, I hate my voice. I don’t like how I look, I want bla bla bla bla bla bla. So well, after today, that will be the last time you’ll be able to say that, where you really believe it. Because after our session, you will see yourself differently. And part of somebody’s seeing themselves differently is having a someone like you or me, for example, on the other end of the camera on the other side of the camera, giving them that positive reinforcement that they’ve never heard before or never believed. And I will always have a client. If I’m taking pictures, I will have them look at their beautiful image in the back of the camera. And then I’ll say you can go ahead and say it now. Say what? I’m beautiful. Okay, I’m beautiful. No, I want you to stay it like you believe it. You believe it? Right? Yes, I believe it. Rebecca, I’m beautiful. So protecting that image, that’s the other in the the bio that you read. It is I think in terms of protecting what how we come across, not letting anything, get out on social media or out into the world that doesn’t really show you how you want to see yourself and that all connects with self confidence when you see an image that looks confident. And you’re like, oh, that’s me, then then it’s feeding back to your own brain of you know, an inner belief. Mm hmm. That reinforcement, right?

Heather Pearce Campbell  17:55

But it all starts I think with our inner beliefs. I’m curious, talk to us about your transition from dog training, right and learning this whole connection with confidence and leadership into because now what you’re doing right is quite a bit different than that. I mean, I know that the dog training wasn’t even in your bio. I love that. It’s there, though, in your background. How did you get into the line of work that you’re doing now?

Rebecca Murray  18:24

Well, it started in working with pets, what I realized was how powerful video was to help people understand how to work with their pets. Because it is a scary and confusing thing for a lot of pet parents. You know when in working with families, sometimes the family is on the brink of of imploding. Because things are so in have been in such turmoil for many, many months, they say on statistically on average, from the time that someone starts thinking about getting rid of their pet, because it’s there’s so much chaos. They keep that pet in the house for another eight months. And it just gets worse and worse and worse. So in working with these pet parents, and using video as part of a training tool training for themselves, working with their pets, recording the training, so that everybody let’s say somebody wasn’t there for the training. That way the dad, the mom, who the kids, whoever was absent can be a part of that. I realized, wow, I want to learn how to use video more purposefully for many kinds of businesses. So this particular business and as we’re I was a dog trainer was managed by a dealership, they sold to a manufacturer and I had to decide was I going to continue working in that capacity or do something else. Now I live up in Skagit County, which is 50 miles north of Seattle. It’s about halfway between Vancouver, BC and Seattle, Washington. And it’s a pretty small community, far away from the big city of Seattle or Vancouver. And so I’m thinking, Okay, well, I’ll just go to work for somebody else. And what I didn’t realize was, the wage is up here. For someone like me, I would have to take a drastic pay cut. So here’s what I decided then that was in the beginning of 2013. I said, either I can take a pay cut, and work for someone else, who could also sell their company and I’d be back in the same situation that I was, or I could take a pay cut, and work for myself. Because I knew I would have a steep learning curve, I didn’t really know much about video, all I knew was that I wanted to learn. And I believed that I could, it would be a steep learning curve, but I would find the resources to, to learn the skills and this is what I felt was my superpower, I’m very good with people. I’m good at meeting people, I always have been when I was a little girl, I used to sell things door to door and have no fear whatsoever, I sold life insurance for seven years, I would drive myself out to these remote business parks, park the car and tell myself, you are not allowed to get back in this car until you have walked in introduced yourself to every single business in this business park, then and only then can you get back in the car and thrive. Oh, and it was hard. And some days I didn’t want to do it. And some days I didn’t like doing it. There’s a lot of rejection, of course. But I learned to overcome it and realized that my success in it being in my mid 20s, selling life insurance of all things the this invisible thing to people much older than myself, I thought you know, if I can do this, I can do anything, I can do anything I choose. And so now fast forward, I was 51 when I started my video business, I knew that nobody would hire me in this business because I didn’t know very much B, the age factor C, I didn’t want to drive out, I didn’t want to drive, you know, out of the county every single day as I’d been doing as a dog trainer for years and years. So I said, Okay, I’m going to start my business. And how I’m going to do this is I’m going to join the chambers. I’m going to jump into the community get to know as many people as I can. And then I would get a business card, I would call them up afterward. And I would say Hi, Rebecca, I met you at the whatever it was networking thing. I’m wondering if… I’ve taken a look at your website. I don’t see any video, I’m wondering if you’d be interested in talking to me about utilizing some video and getting it on your website? Sure. Yeah, we’d like to talk. And I knew I didn’t know much back then. So I couldn’t charge I didn’t feel like I could charge much. So essentially, I put myself into an internship situation where I said, you can pay me this little amount, I’ll do these videos for you. And, and that gave me an opportunity to learn, build my skills, build my confidence. And every time I did that, I, the next person I sought out, I could ask for more money. And I knew I would do better, then you know again and again. And finally I built my business to a point where I didn’t have to be called I didn’t have to call people they called me. And now I’m transitioning into speaking so I’m actually for the most part, referring business to other video production companies in town. Now there are several in town and they’re all wonderful. So that’s wonderful for people looking for videographers. But what I do now is focus more on, although I do have a studio, that’s where I’m speaking from right now. And I do work with some clients, you know, producing podcasts and have photo sessions. It’s that’s just work that sort of comes to me and a sort of long, long term things. What I love doing now is speaking and training and helping other people gain the skills to be on video to do a podcast to speak in front of 1000 people on a stage. And then I also have my one woman show the confidence equation, which is all about it’s sort of a musical slash comedy slash TED Talk. It’s all in one.

Heather Pearce Campbell  24:47

I love that that’s the entertainer title, right? Yes. Yeah, super fun. So you’ve actually been using video then for quite a while. I love that it started in doing your work with a Um, the dog training. That’s super fun. I remember really early on in my legal career, because I had got an AST with another attorney in our office to speak at a CLE. I was pretty young, I was, you know, not overly enthusiastic about being pegged for this. And so we hired a, I don’t even know what her title was a speaking coach of some kind, right? And so she came in, and we had to videotape. Right, my presentation, and that was so painful. I remember, like having to watch that back. And it was like, I highly, do not recommend the experience. I’m joking, because obviously, it’s really beneficial to have to do that. But at the time, it felt so painful. And it was super helpful visually to see what was going on. Because when you are presenting, I don’t think that many times we’re even aware of some of the little things that we’re doing right that other people are going to catch up like, catch on to really quickly. So from that perspective, it’s just such a powerful tool. 

Heather Pearce Campbell  26:08

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Rebecca Murray  28:46

One of the things that I consciously do when I’m on a podcast is not do what I call the bobblehead because one of the things that I I tend to do when I’m talking to somebody is yes, yes. Yes, yes. Yeah. And then I would watch myself back and I’m like, Oh, stop with the bobblehead. And it is really, it’s really hard not to do it. But the only way you know to stop is to painfully watch yourself.

Heather Pearce Campbell  29:12

All right, and I you know, as a podcaster, I tell everybody, you should definitely do your own editing for the first few episodes. It’s mostly like I don’t your same bobblehead. And I’m like, Oh, I’m probably doing that. I don’t even pay attention to myself on the video because I’m so focused on the audio, right? But even the process of doing my own editing for the first handful of episodes, oh my goodness. So it’s so good. Again, so painful, but such a good exercise to go through because it really informs the way that you pace yourself. You try to pay attention to certain things that you maybe weren’t paying attention to before, right. So helpful and always so helpful to have the feedback and advice from a coach who has walked so many people through the process of sorting this out. I think the thing that is so unique about video is across the board, I think it’s a little bit like public speaking. Like most people don’t want to do it. Right, right, even though they know they should. It’s one of those things that they’re like, Oh, I know, I should have a video on my website, I know, I should be doing more video in my social media marketing or whatever. But it just tends to be a big resistance area.

Rebecca Murray  30:35

I totally agree. I totally agree. And part of that is that I don’t want to be in the spotlight for a lot of people. I’m afraid of how I will come across, because I don’t have the belief in myself that again, those those other things that I that I look good that I sound good, I’m afraid I won’t seem intelligent, all of these things. And, you know, I’ll tell you, the watching yourself back, that’s one of the great things about Zoom is that it makes it so easy to record and watch. And watch also with not only the more objective, try to be objective with yourself, but also hugely appreciative of yourself. So what I tend to, to do, and this is what I tell my clients to do, when you see yourself this is goes back to the dog training. When you see yourself doing something that you think was brilliant, you say it out loud, you are brilliant. I am brilliant. And you start training yourself to speak to yourself that way. Again, going back to the dog training, you catch them when they’re doing something, right. Good job, right then in the moment, good job and using video in that way. Good job, you’re so smart. You’re funny, you know, talking to yourself that way, trains you to appreciate yourself and it builds your confidence. I do know how it feels though, to resist watching one’s self and generally I sounds weird. Generally, I love watching myself on video now. I mean, I can’t wait. As soon as I’m done with the presentation. I can’t wait to watch myself. Because I’ve trained myself to appreciate myself. And I’m always looking for where I can improve like you, like you say in the filler words, my overuse of the word so and I’ll write those those kinds of things. The one time that I’ve resisted to the point of not watching a video of myself was when I went to a oh, it sounded Seattle, it’s called laughs Comedy Club. And I did a five minute set it laughs. There were three hunt. This was right before the pandemic shut everything down the month before actually, it was February of 2020. There were 350 people there. And I felt like the first half of my set was fine. And the second half I bombed. So this was the fall down comedy not stand up comedy. And I recorded it. I was terrified and horrified to watch it. And three months later, I mentioned it to somebody and he’s also a speaking coach and he’s come on, it’s not going to be as bad as you think you’ve made it into this big monstrous thing. People are heckling you or whatever you’re thinking. But it’s, I dare you to watch it tomorrow. So I went ahead and oh my gosh, my stomach was hurting while I was you know, pressing play. But he was absolutely right. It wasn’t as bad as I made it up in my head to be. It was still bad, just not as bad.

Heather Pearce Campbell  34:04

You know, it’s so interesting, even when you were talking about first of all, I love the reframe around the way that we talk to ourselves, right? How many of us are ever really doing that, like, quick job? You’re brilliant. That was awesome, you know? And how much better would we all feel just going through our day if we were noticing the highlights and not the low lights. But what came to mind when you said that piece about dog training and the importance of being positive and clearly how this translates to ourself on video really doing anything, but also with children and like I just want to reflect how backwards we get it. I think the assumption not only for ourselves, but then it passes along to the way that we parent our children is that the assumption is that we are just going to do everything right. Right that we know what’s right that we should be doing what’s right. And so the attention then goes to when we’re doing things wrong. And that’s what we notice. Yeah. And it’s just so backwards. It’s so backwards for our self esteem. It’s so backwards for our children. It’s, you know, I’ve read many books on parenting because of my own parenting journey and realizing that like, those negative reflections, and especially for certain children are like $50 bills, $100 bills, like, why are we not energizing in the same way we do? The negative stuff, but clearly, we need to do it much better, even bigger, even better. The positive stuff? Yes. Right.

Rebecca Murray  35:42

Yes. And to make the negative stuff more neutral. Yes. And the negative like, this is just, you know, I want you to redirect over over here. Going back to dog training. I mean, imagine the dog trainer who puts so much emphasis on the No, and just a little emphasis on the Yes, right, then the dog, the dog, it throws the dog off balance, because they’re just bracing for the next horrible No, or the angry face or whatever it is the body language that they’re seeing. Versus the fully relaxed brain, at face. Yes, good job in giving feedback to human beings, whether they’re under the age of 12 human beings, or over the age of 30 human beings, it doesn’t really matter, filling up the bank account with the positive. So that when we do have a correction to make something, to tell that person just to shift the way they’re doing something, because the way they’re doing it isn’t helping, then they aren’t bracing for the awful, you know, they’re not bracing, they’re receptive. They can take it, they can move forward, and they’re not feeling bad about themselves. Like, oh, my gosh, I’m a loser. You hate me. I know, you’re mad at me. All of that crazy wasted energy on on one’s self. Right on oneself.

Rebecca Murray  36:01

Right. Well, and it’s still I think it’s so important to remember that, you know, at any age, it’s so important to reframe the way that we, you know, think about redirecting somebody or asking them to redirect and how powerful it is to start from the standpoint of looking at what’s going right.

Rebecca Murray  37:35

Yes, yes, yes. Filling up the bank account with all the right, right, right, right. So when we do have a redirect, it’s just, it’s just neutral. Is that just to redirect? You know, I was talking to a young man yesterday in the tech field, and I was telling him about one of my employees, my video video, and the video capacity. I hired him when he was 17 years old. And now he’s 24 and working full time for somebody else. But if I do need him as a second camera, again, I’m trying not to do that much of that work. He would just tell his employer, hey, I’ve got to go work for Rebecca, because he’s almost he’s like a son to me. But what I would, when we would go out on these shoots, and then I would review his footage. And if there was something that he did in terms of capturing footage, that wasn’t what I expected. I always took it on myself. This is because I didn’t give clear direction. I was not clear. Now I’ve learned I need to be clear. But I do also need to talk about this. I’m not going to do it when I’m upset. I’m not going to do it. When I’m like, Oh no, how do I fix this? I’m going to find another time when we’re together where it may be a day, or three days or a week, and where we can just talk about it in a very, like neutral, very neutral way for the benefit of future production. But I think in many work environments, the feedback you know, going in for your 90 day review your annual review, you get the call, I need to speak to you come to my office after work, whatever whatever it is, and all of a sudden, this fear and insecurity starts bubbling up in us. What did I do wrong? Am I going to be fired? My first 90 day review I actually was fired. So it’s like post. What do you call that post 90 day review? Traumatic stress syndrome. Yeah. But in many companies the review is a very stress filled engagement. And how can we how can we use some of these dog training? Best practices in our businesses to make it more of a neutral and positive experience for people?

Heather Pearce Campbell  40:15

Yeah. Well, it was interesting because in watching the dog trainer when she came to our house, like there was a level of stern at times, right when there was some really persistent unwanted behaviors. But when she was doing something, right, like her whole demeanor would change. And it was like, fun. And she was just doing everything in her power to show the dog like, Yes, this is right, this is the correct way to do it. Yeah. And, you know, it was like that element of fun, really stuck with me, you know, it’s important for pets, it’s important for people. So I’m curious, in our few minutes left, what tips do you have for people because I know, you know, beyond the confidence piece, there’s like, really practical things that we do wrong or get wrong in our, you know, whether you’re on video, whether you’re on a stage, I know you work with speakers, what are what are some quick like two or three tips that you find are most helpful for people to hear?

Rebecca Murray  41:18

Well, in terms of, if you are the speaker, having a mindset that it was 100% audience focused, it’s really easy when we’re on stage, and we’re feeling the nerves and the spotlights on us to get pulled into our own self, how I’m feeling projecting on the audience, what they’re thinking of me, and it’s all about us, this whole ego crazy thing. If we can shift the focus to our audience, I’m there to serve you. I’ve done my research. I know who you are, I know what you’re expecting of me. And I’m here to give that to you. And more to exceed your expectations. Just that mind shift changes everything.

Heather Pearce Campbell  42:08

Right, yeah, you’re there to serve. And, you know, and hopefully connect through that service, rather than it being like you said, this ego thing of overly concerned about self.

Rebecca Murray  42:20

Yeah, yeah. Yeah. There was one last thing I wanted to share. And this goes back to, in fact, a question I wanted to ask you, this goes back to my one woman show called The Confidence Equation. And here’s the equation. The equation is courage equals knowledge plus experience, which takes us to confidence, which is mc squared. That’s confidence in me. But doubt, is actually what kicks off the equation. Because you can’t have courage without doubt. And usually what triggers doubt is an inspiration, an idea, so we grab onto an idea. And then the doubt comes in, it’s already been done, probably better than you could ever do it. But the one step then is to use doubt as a fuel as a trigger for courage to step forward and courage and whether you fall on your face like I did, at that comedy club, or not, I learned something I gained knowledge I gained experience. And that’s what can lead me into the confidence zone. That’s it.

Heather Pearce Campbell  43:35

I love your point about doubt. I think a lot of people mistakenly think like, at some point, I will have arrived, I will be done with this internal conversation where I’m experiencing self doubt. Right. And I know, for people that work in this area and do a whole bunch of coaching, it’s like no, you just have new doubts related to a whole new level of performance. Right? Yes. So yes, get comfortable with dealing with it and being in that conversation you know?

Rebecca Murray  44:06

Yes, doubt. When you feel the doubt, you know, you’re onto something big you know you’re doing something right when the doubt comes in. It’s just a matter of turning to the doubt and going yeah, you’re right and stopping you in the tracks are saying thank you doubt. Now it’s my opportunity to step forward to learn something new.

Heather Pearce Campbell  44:23

Yeah, I love that. So Rebecca, talk to us and I know you said you’re doing less video production these days but you’re doing speaking a lot of still presenting I assume both on virtual and then you know, possibly as we’re reopening here in the real world. Fingers crossed right back on real stages. Yes, yes. For folks that would like to connect with you and learn more about that and what you’re up to where do you like to send them?

Rebecca Murray  44:54

To rebecca R-E-B-E-C-C-A P as in Pierce. That’s right. murray.com rebeccapmurray.com. Or showcaseyourshine.com will take you to the exact same place. That is my website, also on LinkedIn, which is just Rebecca P Murray. And I would love to connect with you there. I do have regular classes that I am teaching, focused largely in the STEM community. That’s where a lot of my clients are engineers, this is one thing, Rebecca, you can take any engineer and turn them into a Steve Jobs in terms of the way they speak. And that was the biggest compliment I’ve ever received in my life, by the way. I mean, because I adore the late great Steve Jobs. But that is exactly what I do. I love that.

Heather Pearce Campbell  45:44

So you heard it, you can connect with her on her website or on LinkedIn, one of my favorite platforms as well. We will share those links and anything else you’d like us to share Rebecca in the shownotes, which can be found at legalwebsitewarrior.com/podcast, just find Rebecca’s episode there. Rebecca, what final thoughts would you like to leave our listeners with today?

Rebecca Murray  46:08

It’s what we just talked about at the end. I think when the doubt comes in, embrace it. Don’t run from it. Because when you feel the doubt, you know, you’re on to something great.

Heather Pearce Campbell  46:20

Oh, that’s such a great point to end on. Thank you, Rebecca. Such a pleasure to have you here today. Thanks so much for sharing a little bit about your story with us a bit about confidence and video tips. If you’re interested in learning more, pop over to Rebecca’s links. And thank you so much for being with us today. 

Rebecca Murray  46:38

My pleasure.

GGGB Outro  46:42

Thank you for joining us today on the Guts, Grit and Great Business™ podcast. We hope that we’ve added a little fuel to your tank, some coffee to your cup and pep in your step to keep you moving forward in your own great adventures. For key takeaways, links to any resources mentioned in today’s show and more, see the show notes which can be found at www.legalwebsitewarrior.com/podcast. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast and if you enjoyed today’s conversation, please give us some stars and a review on Apple podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get your podcast so others will find us too. Keep up the great work you are doing in the world and we’ll see you next week.