 Hey guys, so I'm here with Kathleen Fillmore. I've recently worked with her a bit on my book and on my skills, as well as marketing as a speaker. She's been very, very helpful for me, extremely so actually, and I wanted to invite her to this podcast in order for her to share some of her wisdom. So you guys know that I'm an introvert. You know that I'm a business owner, but also one of my biggest passions is speaking. And that's exactly why Kathleen is here to help us get our message right, learn how to market ourselves better as speakers and tell a bit about her story and why she thinks that speaking is the best thing ever. So, can you introduce yourself quickly Kathleen. Oh, hi. Thank you so much, Robbie. And I really loved your book, by the way, and I love the way your mind works as well. So it's fun to work with you. Speaking is, I kind of fell into speaking. I've been teaching English as a second language to refugees and I met someone who was out there speaking and getting paid for it. And I thought, well, it's a different way to share my, my, my gift, you know, what I have to say. And I'm an introvert too, but the thing about introverts is we've got something to say because we are thoughtful people, and we can hold an audience so we may not dance around the stage like other speakers do. There's just two different types of speakers and they're both very, very successful. I moved to Nova Scotia as kind of a career change to write a book in late 1990s and ended up starting the Canadian Association of professional speakers at the Atlantic branch. When I started in Toronto, I'd been to three meetings and that was enough to get it started in Nova Scotia when it's still going. And then I really got into the field and I learned it so much. And as a constant learner, that's my greatest joy is to learn and learn. And I learned so much from these extroverted people who were just such exciting people to work with and help. And that's how I got started in the field and I never looked back. I'm still doing writing, but fundamentally I own the Speakers Bureau, and, and I also am a marketing consultant to speakers, and help them develop a platform so that's, that's where I am right now and I'm in Toronto, in Ontario now so. Let's say, let's say somebody is listening to this is a business owner or aspiring to be a business owner, and they're asking themselves right now. Okay, what, what does this have to do with me. Why am I, why should I listen to this I'm not a speaker. I, I'm not even sure I'm going to be ever going to be a speaker. I think you beg to, to differ on that right. I do really because I've never really been a speaker but but the thing is, if I've got something to say you can't stop me from speaking period like if I've got something to say and I do, but a lot of things. I'm going to speak, because it doesn't matter it's not about me. The thing about speaking is it is the sphere of highest influence. And we mentioned Obama, you know, who's who's an introvert and perhaps doesn't love getting up there speaking but when he speaks we all listen to him. So it is the sphere of highest influence no matter what you're doing or what you're in. Everyone listens to speaker and their wisdom and they have an elevated perception of speakers, unlike they have a writers, but they really admire speakers for sharing their wisdom. So I think it's a field to to explore. And what I love about it myself personally is that Robbie you're never going to come to me and say wow Kathleen, I'm now the top speaker in the world, because actually there's no such thing. So what's great about that. There's always someone better than you in some way. And so what's great about that is it's a constant stretching exercise and I think as business owners, as marketing people or whatever we're doing. We like to have that stretching exercise you just keep growing and growing and growing and you never get there how wonderful is that you are always learning at the same time. That's perfect. Yeah, for me, the biggest challenge in speaking. There are two main challenges. The first one was what do you do when you speak in front of an audience. And you just really, really, really don't know what to say or how to how to how to feel or how to think. You're just stuck there in front of the audience. And you just feel like I shouldn't be here right now. But everybody's, everyone's eyes on you. It's too late. You can't escape. And I've had my share of experiences where I've literally got so scared that I just hung up on the on the on the speaking gig. One of my biggest challenges and the second one is how do you how do you continuously grow your audience, because I get bored very quickly. I mean, I'll be happy to speak in front of 100 people. But if I speak in front of 20 people, I'll probably get bored at this point. And frankly, I'm not sure how to get 100 people to listen to me. So what do you think about those two points? Well, I think there are two, those are two very creative and different types of sabotage that we're talking about here, frankly. But they would one last quick point. Yeah, usually it would usually have it would they would usually coincide. Maybe that's why I said them together. What would usually happen is I'd set up an event 50 people would sign up or 100 people, and then 10 or 15 or 20 would show up and I'd be so disappointed that I wouldn't want to be there. And maybe maybe they're related somehow. Well, I had a friend I used to do seminars and also talent showcases as well. And one time at a seminar hardly anyone showed up but a friend who I used to work within the prison system talking to two prisoners said to me, I just always honor whoever is there. I'm meant to be there and you just honor that one or two or three or four or five people is not about you. That's the thing that's a really important thing to understand it's not about you. And if you get scared and paralyzed and mess up and who doesn't do that every speaker bombs at some point is a very humbling experience, and every speaker recovers from it. But, but you can guarantee that at some point you'll bomb. Yeah, and you just have to make sure that that you have a backup I used to since I'm so scripted as a speaker. I my speech all written out and so at the bottom of the podium on the little shelf in the podium I would put my entire speech in case someone had a heart attack in the audience or whatever, and I would be disrupted and frozen. So I always have my whole speech there. And, and, and that was my safety gauge right and it really helped me. But I think you really have to tell yourself before you go on there is about what you have to give to the audience, which is a lot, and be vulnerable tell them, tell them if you're scared. You have to not only deliver to the audience you have to receive the audience you have to make yourself vulnerable. And the best speaker I ever heard messed up terribly like I he went with a whole sheaf of papers. You kind of thought maybe drop someone along the way when he went to the podium and first sold out luncheon at that they at a root C club in Toronto. It was. And then he didn't look at the audience and there were no hand gestures at all and he just kept reading and reading and then on page three I thought oh my God he's going to lose this. And on page four, it was as if he'd been struck by lightning, because on page four. He was caring about how we were going to react to his speech. He was a lawyer who volunteered to go into Guantanamo and rescue someone who had been arrested when he was a child and he felt that wasn't fair. Many people disagreed with him. So he was nervous for three pages as extreme introvert. And on page four he stopped caring and just told us why he did that and why he cared and what the conditions were like and so on and it was riveting and he got a huge standing ovation and probably many people there didn't agree with him but didn't matter. That was just that was the most amazing speech I've ever heard. It was electrifying because he was completely in the zone. Do you see what I mean? He had to completely give up any attempt to control the crowd. Yes. And in fact, who is what was he doing but judging himself anticipating judgment and judging himself and being worried about that. Right. Yeah. And but if everyone felt that way and everyone bowed to those fears, there wouldn't be many great speeches. And how do you find that electrifying message because it seems I have a lot to say. I have a lot of ideas, a lot of experience. And then when it actually comes time to to give the speech, sometimes there's this voice inside me that just says that's not good enough. You shouldn't talk about that. You know, no matter what I think about it's like that's not the best that you shouldn't be talking about that. And then I'll ask my conscious like, Okay, what should I talk about. Okay, figure it out. That's not it though. And then if I try talking about it in front of the audience, I'll just feel fake. I'll just feel like I'm rehearsing something that that's not really coming from the heart. Well, I think as you get more experience in this field and as you get perhaps a little more scripted that you know how many points you want to make about what topics and so on because I think you kind of go in there a little bit with stream of business. And so I think when you're more scripted you'll know what belongs in there and what doesn't, because you'll practice ahead of time and so on and you'll imagine the audience there but honestly, it's not about you. It's not about you. You're just the vehicle is giving the message right and it's about them and the value that you bring to them. And if you had and if something pops up and they all talk about this. Oh, well that makes me feel vulnerable. There's nothing more powerful in today's world and thank you to Brenny Brown for bringing this to the forefront, then being vulnerable. And part of that most brilliant speech I've ever heard and I've heard the best in the world was was that he was vulnerable he wasn't polished. He wasn't practiced. He was nervous. And it made it all the more powerful that he was brave enough to do that anyway. Right. So, just admit it, you do have to receive the audience as well as deliver to them right. You're right. It's too, it's too self centered. It's not. Yeah, it's not thinking about the audience. It's me, me, me. Yeah. And your lies to you all the time you need to understand your ego lies to you all the time so don't listen. Right. Is that your argument for why you want to have a scripted speech at least as a backup. Like, you know, I'll wing it. It's okay. I don't need to rehearse. Oh, yeah, the winging. It's never a good idea for one thing. It's really hard to sell. And for me as a third party, I could say, well, Robby's really great. No, trust me. No, trust me. He's great. Now listen to me. Wait, he's really great. But if I don't have a platform, then I don't have anything to promote. Right. There's a certain discipline to create a platform as a speaker, and that consists of your bio, your photo of course it consists of the groups that you've spoken to what they've said about you with the feedback has been. But most importantly for me as fundamentally a writer. That's your message. Right. Someone who just had incredible wisdom and and global knowledge of companies and countries and what's going on with different countries around the world. Usually successful business came to me, but he didn't really have a strong platform. So, as I said to him, when your platform is better, it's easier for a third party to sell you. Right. So if people come to you they want you already. And it's not a hard sell but for me, I have to say well he talks about this and that's so powerful. And here's the benefit you'll get. So you put your speeches on a promo page, and you need five. Well, anywhere from three to five bullet benefits. Here's how you benefit. Here's how you benefit. Here's a benefit. It's always a good idea to put that benefit right in the title of your speech. Right. I came up with a title for her because she was promoting women in retail at the very high end of retail like head of HR and PayPal those kind of people. And she was launching in New York, but she didn't really have a title for her launch. So I said, well, how about born to disrupt.com and you get on this very moment. And it was well before the meat to movement, but it made all the difference for her, you know, and so now you say born to disrupt. Oh, what's that about? Well, it's about women rising, right. And then you're going to read on and say, now you're engaged. See, I've touched the heart. Now, now you need to appeal to the intellect. Here's what you'll learn. Here's what you'll learn. Here's how you'll gain. And that's basically what you do. Do you think when you are creating your message that you should start with the message you want to promote and then find people who are interested in that? Or do you think it's better to start with an existing audience and custom tailor a message to their interests? Well, you can do both to a certain extent, but I was working with a woman who's very well known in the tech world and she's got an amazing story and she's already a pretty big name. But when we were working on her platform, she kept saying, well, here's what this group needs. And I said, don't try to fit into the market. Chart your own path. So I think you need to go into your heart and say, okay, if I had three minutes left to live, what would be the message that I'd want Kathleen to get out on my behalf? So Robbie, if you had three minutes left to live, what would you want your daughter to know? Your wife to know? What would you want your family to know? What would you want your colleagues to know? And when you boil that message down, it's like simple words like live a better life, like care about people, whatever, know who you are. It's nothing sexy, but then you know what you stand for. And that can be built into a really strong message. What would this mean to the tech world? What would this mean to the manufacturing world? Because this is a fundamental message. So you just go drill deep and know what your fundamental message is to the world, what do you care about most? And then you dress it up for the market. Damn, that's powerful. Yes, because that also identifies your market, doesn't it? These are the people that you attract anyway. These are the people you attract anyway? Well, I would think, yes. Yeah. Wow. Yeah, I mean, that's really good. Like part of the language, but it really cuts through the bullshit when you, yeah, when you ask that question, because I like that it's limiting. It's like you got three minutes and like, oh crap. And I'm thinking for like three seconds, like, okay, two minutes, 55 seconds remaining, better come up with something. And that's good. And when you said, when you said your daughter, that really hit me. Great. Right. Like what message would you have? Because honestly, these days, the good thing about COVID is we have all been confronted with our own mortality, which we love to deny. But now we're taking a deeper approach to life, right? And so what would that message be? And it's required us all, I think, to be a little more introspective and reflective of that things. I remember talking to someone on the phone years ago, and I'm easily bored like you are. And he was talking about customer service. And you know, I'd rather you swore at me, Ravi, than said things like the engagement customer service. I mean, like, I can't stand that language. I can't stand it. So I, I've lost my patience a little bit. And I said, look, you've got three minutes left to live. There's a tornado behind you and is coming for your house and you may not survive. I'm fine here in Toronto. What's the message you wanted to the world? And he was really taken it back. And he kind of after a long pause, he mumbled something about customer service. And I said, you've got two minutes now and you don't give a damn about customer service. But you can see like his fundamental message was probably about caring about other people, which could go to customer service, but he just couldn't get to the fundamental of that, right? That's not what he would talk about if you had three minutes left to give a message. Can you imagine? I mean, some people, I guess. Your daddy stood for employee engagement. It reminds me of, did you watch Friends? No. There was a character there named Chandler Bing and he works at an office, like the typical corporate office in the 80s and 90s. And all he did was the reports. So the whole joke about that, his job is that everything that he would ever talk about is like, how's the reports doing? Oh, doing good. How's the analysis on that report? And I can't for the life of me remember what they called it, but it was all about data. Like there was no life to it. It's just, how's that number doing? Oh, the number is great. Chandler, fantastic. Did you get me the reports about that number? Oh yeah, that number is doing very good. Like zero life. And that's what I've been feeling, by the way, as a business owner. The more my business grew, the harder, like when you reach a certain point in your business growth, it's hard to not look at whatever is happening below you as numbers. Because when you have five or 10 clients, you know, there's Dave, there's Bob, there's Jill, there's Harry. When you have 150 clients, you don't know the first name of half of them. It's a bit harder to find a soul. And I guess your question about the three minutes to live in your message, like that's beautiful because that's something that's actually scalable. That's a message that works when you talk to one person, but it would work in front of a million people as well. Yeah. And also you'll always know what you stand for because you'll get a bad gig. I mean, think of the people who had to speak on September 12, 2011, right. They had to throw out their speeches and come up with something really deep and meaningful for people. They kept engagement, right. But you'll have a time where you've opted into a gig where people are having drinks after dinner. You don't want to do that because they won't pay any attention. They just want to socialize. They don't know you and they won't pay any attention and it'll be a rough gig, right. There will be times when you say, why am I doing this? You always want an answer to that question, right? I think it's actually a beautiful question to ask yourself. Just like the three minute question is to ask yourself, let's say I had a speech prepared and 9-11 happened. Would that speech still be relevant the day after? No. No, but can you connect deeply enough with yourself to find a speech that so speaks to the spirit? Absolutely. That it would be relevant the day after? Yeah. Like that's a sign you've got impact when you speak. Yeah. That's, I guess, I mean, wow, that really helps because I've done a speech a few weeks ago in front of about 130 people. And it was one of the best speeches I ever gave. And I was like, why? Why is it that this speech? Like a full hour flew by and literally they had to stop me because I was, it was too long. I thought I was slated for 40 minutes. I had to go through 10 topics. By the 30 minute mark, I've been through two topics out of 10. And I was like, and they're like rushing me. They're like, Ravi, you're almost done. I'm like, what? I thought it was like 10 minutes. And they're like, no, you've been speaking for like 35 minutes already. So yeah, that really, like that really explains it to me because that's a message that like that was the message for my daughter. If that makes sense. That was what I would like to leave to her. Well, sometimes all you have time for is a sentence or a word or a phrase and that's what you want to go after and you never, never want to go over. It doesn't matter how brilliant your speech is. If we're if we're having lunch at 12 o'clock and you're at 12 and five seconds afterwards, we don't know how much longer you're going to go and we are disengaged. I'll tell you. And so would you be and so have you been. So it's really important. I mean, that's where the discipline comes in. You keep your time. That's, that's a professional, right. Nice. Yeah. And always. Overboard make sure to let them know when you're done, when you're going to be done. Well, just say, you know, I just want to just want to leave one final note with you if you're okay with this. It'll take two minutes and so on. But you have to honor them. Yeah, because they've opted for a certain time and leaving them wanting more is not a bad idea. What is what is the best. What are the best ways you found for somebody who's a speaker who wants to be a speaker, and they have some experience but they're not. They don't have traction yet they're not known as speakers yet. They've just done it a bit they know they're good at it but they still don't have their audience. What would your advice be for them on on the path to building those first 1000 fans. Great. Well, as you and I spoke just before, you know, just your speech and your message should probably define your audience. So the guy who cared about people and public customer service well then customer service. If that message could be turned into something useful in customer service then he'd know like retailers need him and so on and so on. And so we kind of defines your audience and it should be a paying audience it should be a healthy marketplace and it should be a diverse marketplace as well. Right. So once you have to find your audience and you reach out to them. You can reach them through their magazines by posting an article. You can reach them online, doing the same thing and, and sharing your wisdom with them. You can offer to do a free event when you're starting out and that's not a bad idea until you're comfortable that you're a good speaker until you, and you've gotten good testimonials about that. But I sure wouldn't stay stuck there at all. I would create a platform and go out there as a paid professional speaker. So putting your fee is an interesting question because if you go too low, you hurt yourself. I have bid on on booking proposals where I've been the lowest bid, and I didn't get it for that reason. Same thing when speaking world lowest bid. It is that right highest bid same thing you might say okay well then I'll put my bid high but if you don't have the material in the background and and an experience to support that. You'll lose that as well so you've got to find that sweet spot in terms of fee levels and they're all over the place these days. And this new market is is wild. Some pay less for virtual events. Some pay the same. It's going to be very interesting in 2021 for sure to see how this unfolds because it's not stable yet. It's going to be stable for another year and then we'll see trends starting to come that no virtual event. Here are the fees that you can get for that and here's what side of line. And same with in person events I imagine that the fee for in person events will go up. Frankly, I think so. Because they're more just supply and demand they're the more rare so they're more rare. Yeah, and they're more treasured. And you really appreciate the speakers right there. I mean that's a huge value. So in this new in this new post COVID economy where everything is, you know, if it was moving digital quickly now it's 10 times faster. So how do you navigate as a zoom speaker? Or like do you immediately go to try and sell it? Does that even work in today's market where you know you can go to YouTube and search for a video about anything? Should you start off by charging for your online speeches or should you build an audience first? What would you recommend? You should use your charge and you're not credible if you don't charge. Frankly, I mean how much do you value free? Not that much. If you're selling a program then you give out free stuff to and place people to come in and get your program perhaps but when you're selling the speech it's a different thing. So you have to put yourself there out there as a professional and you have a fee attached to that and you talk to other speakers and see what they're charging if they'll tell you. But most speakers are charging about half the fee. In Europe it's different. I talked to someone the other day and he was charging 5,000 and I looked at his material and I said should be 12,500. So, you know, that would be my assessment based on his material and what he had to offer. But there are different markets. So the market you really want to approach is the North American market. The US market is the highest in credibility. And it's going to be hit on like crazy soon. But they've got such a COVID thing going on there. So I would start out looking at countries like Australia and New Zealand and so on who are economically I think in better shape because they haven't had such a so much COVID. So such high stats. So you'll know I mean start out small but don't stay small for very long once you get credentials once you get testimonials from people over to speech. And charge from day one and charge from day one. And the other thing about the US market while I think it's kind of tanked in a way because of, you know, just such a cry about COVID. But the thing is that they don't take a sitting down. I mean that is one entrepreneurial country and partly the reason for its great entrepreneurialism is that they don't get as much government support as we get in Canada for example or as you might get in Denmark and in other countries. They have very little and so in my view. So so I think they they really really have to feed their children. And so they'll be entrepreneurial. And so that's a good side effect of what I feel is it's not great policy. But that's a good side effect. So they are the best marketers in the world, as far as I'm concerned. And they will come back because, you know, you've had a lot of money and you've also been without money and when you're without money. There is an itch in you that says, Oh my God, like enough of this. Right. Yeah. Yeah. And you will rise from whatever depths you've gone to, and you will earn money. And that's the US see you kind of personify that that culture in a certain extent to a certain extent. So they're going to be itchy to start hiring speakers and start saying, Well, what the hell we're going to do that. But we're going to do this anyway. We need it as a company. And I think that's probably a smart decision. Our, I mean, our company started the beginning of COVID. We were having, we were like me and my partner like celebrating every day, and everybody was like locked down, depressed. Yeah, yeah, this is shutting down and we're like, Oh my God, this is a boom, like everything's amazing. Because, yeah, I mean, it takes it takes a special kind of crazy to thrive in this economy. But I know for me, because I'm kind of messed up mentally of like a really weird mental background. The more chaotic things get on the outside, the more I'm calm on the inside. Because, because it's more of a natural state of being if you look at nature nature is not organized. It's organized in its systems, but but it's it's, it's a jungle, like literally. And, and the animals that survived the best are the ones that are like extremely adaptable and you could like throw them anywhere. And they'll, you know, they'll do great. These animals you put them in a, in a cage or you put them in a, in a house, they'll die of boredom. They'll start messing things up. I mean, it's so interesting. I mean, COVID has been a gift in the sense that it's created. We are all more flexible. So like, if, if I have to break a routine that that I've had for 20 years or something, I said this nobody dealt me anymore at all. Like, oh yeah, that's fine. I need to do it this way, not that way. And so I think it's been a gift to us in many, many ways. And I think that that for someone with your skills, it's just really great. All you need to do is just add that little layer of discipline as well and structure and and add that to your speech. And, and you'll be just amazing because this is one field where you don't want to break all the rules. Yeah, yeah, I mean that that was if there if I had one Achilles heel is that I'm like the best person at screwing myself over, because I, what would happen is I would do something, it would work. And because it works, you know, success is not exciting because success is exciting on the first day, but success creates commitment so every time you succeed in something it creates habits. So if you had a speech that went really well there it's more likely that you'll do the same speech tomorrow. And so every time I gained any level of success. I just ask myself subconsciously like how do I mix it up so that there's chaos again. And I can't tell you how many times I've destroyed my progress because of this habit. So I suck at message consistency. Well, but, but, but you're also learning, you know, I mean the thing is you have to understand that your greatest strength is also can also be your greatest weakness at times. And so things just turn inside out and your greatest weakness can end up being your greatest strength at times. So we live in a world of duality so there's there's sabotage and everything and there's also greatness and everything. And you just need to get away from the drama of the sabotage right because you love a challenge there are other ways to find a challenge it's a challenge raising a child, trust me on that. And so, so you can turn that into a challenge and and and not rely so much on chaos to do that for you because there's a little bit of sabotage in that as well. And also chaos can get exhausting, not only for you but for other people. Yeah, that's why I've always had a lot of trouble keeping an audience because I mean just look at my YouTube channel it's got like 600 views, and it shifts constantly it goes from business coaching to life coaching to just general philosophy and and there's no, there's no consistency so anytime somebody starts to follow me, they're like oh I like this guy's content, they can't go back because the past is different. And then next week I'll decide to do something else and they'll lose interest so I'm gathering. I think I'm like I have one of the worst like subscriber to to view ratio I have almost 4000 subscribers. I recognize almost all of them and many of them followed me in different times in my life many of them became customers paying me thousands of dollars. But I kind of lost them due to both inconsistency of uploading as well as inconsistency of messaging. And that's why I say discipline because honestly, those of us who really love our freedom. The truth is discipline feels a little like a street jacket right but the truth is we need it that those are parameters and unbridled curiosity and stream of consciousness is not going to sell and it's only going to infuse other people because you're talking to yourself basically. So you need a structure around that. And if it feels confining well and that confinement is exactly what you need to modify your personality, right. Where so many people most of the world needs to break out of confinement but you people like you and me, we need to adopt some of it. That's why. Yeah, because I'm a creative person. And obviously you are as well. And like the best analogy I've heard is the, the canvas idea that if you had a canvas without borders, it would, it would not work. And yeah, I mean that's like I'm married. And I hate being married, but that's why I love it because it's not that I'm romantically like interested in other people but more in the sense that it's, it's limiting like you have to account for somebody else you have to live. You have to make decisions together you can go with any crazy idea you've got. Same thing with my business partner you know I can't just do anything I want to have to consult with him and he might strike down an idea that I really want to go for and. But it's like, I'm like, it's gonna sound funny I'm like gas, like if, if it's contained, then it kind of bounces off and continues the momentum but then if you release the containment, it just spreads off into nothing. So I need, I need to push back against something to, like I'll be like, like to my partner like Nadav I my schedules to packed I need to free it up. I don't have time for creative stuff. And then he'll help me, I'll free up my schedule completely. And then I'll like do the little round for a whole day, not do anything. And you need that pushback you need to push against something to, to be creative so I guess it's the same thing for me with with being consistent in my messaging it's like, like suck it up, stop being selfish and and start putting some some borders, or else you're not you're never going to be able to consistently help a growing audience of people. Well, you won't reach the place that you want to reach and you're a very gifted person so that would be a shame right. You just want to fly as high as you're able right you want to complete whatever your mission is in this life and and and unless you stop putting blocks in your own way trust me life will put them there for you. You don't need to do that yourself right. And so unless you stop that I'm doing that limits the growth that that you can achieve with with your with your story and your kind of rise as a as a consultant for speakers. What would you say is the biggest thing you've learned personally throughout your experience. Well, I so enjoy hanging out with these amazing people. And, you know, sometimes they can the field attracts people who are a little bit egotistical but honestly I don't work with people like that I want to work with thought leaders who are thoughtful people. I think that what drew me towards it is is just the great experience of meeting all these different people around the world who are so accomplished and so amazing. And I helped them stay steady and in a very fluctuating field right and what the future holds for speaking. It's hard to tell that I will tell you this the future holds speaking. It does and so there will be lots and lots of opportunities for people. I think you just have to start by going inside and finding out what you really care about and why that should matter. The best. The best guide I ever had was that you and be writing school where I went for the summer and I would read my precious words to him and he'd look at me and say so. I would be furious. What do you mean so but then I thought what a brilliant question. And so, you know, when you're writing your speech when you're delivering your speech will not when you're delivering maybe but when you're writing your speech say so who cares about this who cares. And you really have to be honest with yourself and ask yourself that question who does care about this. And if you don't have an answer then you write another speech. Or you go deeper. What are you go deeper and finding answer. Beautiful. Yeah, do you want one last question before we wrap up so do you have you been feeling that the world has, you know, you said speaking as the future, and I agree extremely. I feel like the world has sort of started splitting into silos where in the past, you know, we would all have some common stuff, you know, people would all be watching the news together people would be watching TV together You also get the feeling that it's almost it's almost like everybody kind of finds their niches so you know you could like card games and and personal development and you tend to gravitate towards like one two or three people and you just listen to those people all day long religiously and that's like your only source of of media. Is that something you've noticed also I have to some extent but on the other hand we're also more diverse than we used to be I mean I grew up in a city, small city in New Brunswick and everyone in my family had blue eyes and so whenever we had a reunion it was like looking at a seawall. And now I have a family that that all my grandchildren are are come from different cultures like Chinese and Philippine and Latino and so on and to me it's made the world much richer, but I do see in the older days people didn't move away from their parents because their parents had no one to look after them. And so once once the younger generation was able to move than the younger generation got a whole new education that the older people didn't. And so I think now we are such a diverse society that while there are silos within that diversion still there's enormous diversity so if you're going to be racist where would you start It almost almost feels like like in 20 30 years none of us like everybody would be like enlightened or something. Oh yeah and so I really think that that that we are moving towards that frankly I think that every generation improves on the other I know that when I was growing up. Fathers did not take time to watch to take the children to school, no one put their children to school children just found their way. And there were certainly no seat belts or anything so I think that the way we treat children is via the government restrictions and so on and has improved so much it tells you where we're headed I think. Yeah. Yeah, I mean it's it's I love it I mean it's There's never been a time where a person with an idea and a passion can go so quickly from just being nobody to having a huge audience, living off of their passion. It's it's it's like so accessible today that it's crazy. The only the only challenge is conveying that to the, you know younger people. I mean I talked to my to a good friend of mine was a business owner and I was like, do you realize that at this point where we're at and we're like 26 27 like, I told him at this point where we're at. It would, it would be extremely easy for us to build a lifestyle where we work, like two hours a month and make $2,000 a month. Yeah, like it's a matter of like sitting on it over a weekend coming up with a plan, executing it and give it a month or two and you're there. Yep. So yeah, that's really beautiful. Kathleen, where can people find you and who should, who should look for you if they like this message. Well, I have a newsletter that send out by email I've got quite a following on that so if people are interested. I don't pitch on it I just give them good advice and what I see going on in the market right now. They can sign up for that by emailing Kathleen with the C A T H L E E N at speakers with an S both in speakers gold gld.com. And, and I'm always happy to have a discussion with anyone and you know it's my way of giving back to the community that's been so good to me I'll have a quick discussion with anybody and give them good advice and, and I'm also happy to discuss the possibilities of working with people I don't work with a lot of colleagues because of some other things going on, including the Bureau which is is most important but, but I'm happy to do that as well to explore that as well so. Yeah, and you've been, and you've been amazing to me I mean we we met like what like a week ago I think via a cold email. And, yeah, you've been a gift that keeps on giving for sure. Well thank you thank you and I appreciate the interview that was really fun. Yeah, absolutely. Thanks a lot Kathleen I'll make sure to put put a link in the bottom so people can't like they can't sign up just by filling a form or something they need to email you manually. Well, they can sign up on my, on my website speakerschool.com for sure if they if they're interested in the newsletter or if they want to approach me directly that's fine and my phone number is 416-532-9886 if they want to call. Beautiful, beautiful. It's just, it's the only sad part is that nobody ever calls. I used to be scared of putting my phone out there until I realized that nobody calls, like. Yeah, that will. That's not not often that it's really true well I don't answer my landline. So, because it's public and so well, but I'll always get back to people. Beautiful. Okay, so I'll put the links in the below the below the this video to make it really easy for people to sign up. But either way, you can search for Kathleen Fillmore K C A T H L E N Fillmore. Just search up on Google and it will be the first result you'll find. Great. Awesome. Thanks a lot, Kathleen. My pleasure, Robbie. Bye. Okay. Bye.