 Welcome to Keys to Success, which is live on the ThinkTech live streaming network series weekly on Thursdays at 11 a.m. We are your hosts. My name is Danelia, D-A-N-E-L-I-A. And I'm the other half of the duo, John Newman. Welcome to today's show. The goal of this show is to provide professional and personal development tools and profound insights on how to achieve success in life, career and or business. Marina Keaton, CEO of Your Connection Hawaii, was our guest on our last show and her words of wisdom can be accessed on Newman Consulting Services website, NewmanConsultingServices.com or our landing page, Danelia.org. Tourism may come to mind when many people think of industries in Hawaii. And while it is the strongest industry in Hawaii, the state's economy is rather diverse. Manufacturing, for example, is a strong industry in Hawaii and is primarily concentrated on Oahu. Products being produced include apparel and there are jobs available for individuals who can sew. The textile industry has part and full-time positions available. The majority of the sewing and food service jobs available are located in Honolulu. Please call 5960200 if you are interested in applying for these open positions. As a community service, Newman Consulting Services is assisting in increasing employment opportunities in our community by connecting the manufacturing industry and unemployed or underemployed individuals. Again, the number you can call is 5960200. Our theme for the day is building a family business. Joining us today as our honored guest is Dana Lam, Pop Jazz Vocalist. Mahalo for joining us today Dana. Thank you so much. Great to be here with you today. Lovely to have you. So let's get right to it. Please share with us a little about your family and how you got involved in the career of music. Okay. Well, I had been an at-home mom for about nine years. And I had a career in interior design in San Francisco prior to that. And when my daughters were finally in school in kindergarten, I had some time to myself to do something I had always wanted to do. So I started taking voice lessons. And within a year, I was performing professionally at the age of 40. That's great. Yeah. Age of 40. At the age of 40. You're 40 now. Thank you. And I had no idea I didn't take voice lessons to think of getting into the career. But it just came so naturally and listened to Diana Crawl on the radio. And I think to myself, that's the kind of music I want to be singing. So living in the Northern California area, I started a career and was very fortunate to work with some wonderful musicians for about 12 years. So before you started pursuing this career, did you really enjoy singing, obviously? Did you sing at all? Or did you know you had a voice? I didn't even know that I had a voice. Wow. In fact, my first lesson with my vocal coach at Sonoma State University, Suzanne Pitzen, said, Well, have you ever heard yourself sing? I said, No. She said, Well, you should go into a recording studio and record a little song and then play it back so that you can hear how you sound. That's great. It was sort of a foreign idea to me. You know, and I tell that to some of my friends now who are getting into singing and music. And I just found that syncopation and that swing that jazz music brought. And then, of course, the improvisational qualities that defines jazz. Yes. You know what I love about what you just said was that eventually somehow we find our path in life. Yeah, exactly. We really do. And you're never too old. Yes, that's right. And that was going to be my next question. You know, when did you start, but you shared, you started at 40. And the thing is, but did your family encourage you or discourage you? You know, my family has always been supportive. We've always been supportive of each other and anything that we're interested in doing. You know, that's just kind of who we are. That's wonderful. We've got very close relationships with both our daughters and our husband and I. My husband and I. That's right. That's right. We've married for 34 years just on the tail of you guys at 35 years. 35 long years. Oh, that's what Mary was saying. Longer for long years. I mean, we were told that an older fellow said, you know, my son marriages a partnership of three rings. You know, it's the engagement ring. And then it's the wedding ring. And then comes the suffering. Oh, God, John. Oh, it doesn't have to be that way. No, but you know, actually, I think the problem that a lot of people have, and we all are faced with challenges, you know, in personal life and family life and business life and it helps to have some tools. Yes, absolutely. And the basic tool is communication. Absolutely. And communication can be the universal solvent. Yes. And you know, there's a very simple technique to having good communication that I find as I go through life and I meet people and I talk about this. Not too many people know, you know, but it's being a good listener. It's really being there in the present moment and able to duplicate what the other person is saying. So that you can really create some understanding with that person. And with that, maybe come some, you know, reality, common reality, and then that's what grows the affinity with another person, you know. So if you understand this little technique, you can really make friends with almost anybody. That's true. Okay, so let me qualify what I said. He's going to backtrack. He's going to backtrack. Yes. He's going to backtrack with ring. Enjoying. Yes. Okay. So we enjoyed too. Oh good. Glad to hear it. So I mean, hey, you know, what's worth living if you're not enjoying life, right? Yeah. Right? Finding balance. Okay. So how did your family become involved in this whole process? Well, I'll just kind of come up to present time if I may. I mean I found that the stage was a very comfortable place for me I never would have thought that in a zillion years but I actually took some classes that increased my ability to be comfortable on stage in front of people you know there's some techniques you know you kind of walk around the stage you make it your own you know you've got that wonderful communication with your fellow musicians and with your audience. So with that I started putting on shows producing shows I produced albums I became MC for shows and then I became an instructor and I helped children we had a teen jazz camp and I became director of that in Sonoma for three years which was just a ball and you know directed charter school choir worked a lot with children in the community. Oh that's so rewarding isn't it? Yes. I love it, children and music. So anyway my mother was getting elderly and she wanted to move back here to her homeland and she needed care so we all decided to move back three and a half years ago and care for her and I had started over the last few years sort of expanding my community characters. I started out with Hula Rosie your hostess of Aloha who's from New York by way of Florida originally from Hawaii and it all started with my mother's opera wig. She walked into my room one day she said honey do you want this? She was holding up this disheveled mat of brown curls. I'm like mom what am I gonna do with that? She just throw it away. I said no no don't throw it away I'll put it in my closet so sometime later I pulled it out put it on and along with her anatomically correct coconut bra that she gave me. Hula Rosie was born. That's great. And so yeah it just started you know doing parties and engaging people and Hula comedy Hula and so she came with me here back to the island and we've been having a ball. So family has been involved ever since the beginning. Yes absolutely and that's a part of where well we talked about earlier communication because you know John and I work together as well so you know we have our moments but communications are key because when you work together and then you're home together you know you've got to be able to have that strong communication between you as a family in order for you to strengthen your relationship not let it wither away even though you're working together. Right. That's critical because we all have our opinions and you have to separate the business from the personal. Exactly you know and there are things that happen that kind of restimulate us and make us upset about certain things and get our temper rising right and that never does any good for any kind of relationship you know and we're all human so being able to take ownership and responsibility and apologize for that helps to keep the air clean which is so important because with any relationship over time if you don't handle that stuff and you keep sweeping it under the carpet or rug that stuff builds up and it tends to pull a relationship apart. So if you understand these things it helps you know when you're working as a family in a business. And I think also comedy is very important in the fact that what I mean is that having a great sense of humor being able to laugh about the difficult times you know and laugh about just have a good relationship with everyone in the family when you're working together because you have to be able to go through the challenge and then laugh about it and say we've learned from this and move forward. Absolutely yeah yeah. So Dana in your opinion what would be the single most difficult challenge of a jazz vocalist would have in today's in today's world. Well certainly just a dwindling market you know and dwindling work really dwindling venues. So that is what kind of caused me to really expand my career and when I made that decision to start branding Hula Rosie as your hostess of Aloha as somebody who can bring light and love and levity through comedy and entertainment my husband and my youngest daughter Carly decided to support this mission and so my daughter had been working full time with lovely couple who have a roofing business and she said mom you know I think I need to come to work for you full time and that was like music to my ears because you know starting a business all the social media that has to go into what it is we do and then creating the portfolio you know the foundation being able to show people what we can do and who Hula Rosie is with videos and whatnot I could not do it myself so my husband and I've been writing comedy together for a number of years so that was always easy we did a screenplay for a feature length film called Temporary Lunch Ladies that hopefully someday soon will actually be able to make that happen because it's a great story very entertaining and fun has a great message that runs through it but now that I have my amazing 23 year old daughter working with me it has made this dream a reality and she has stepped up to the plate and has impressed me every single day with skills just a natural ability to do so many things I can cry just because I feel so fortunate and well you know I guess one of the things is also you feel also feel responsible because you know you've got to really make this business work because you livelihood of your whole family absolutely how did you know yeah so we're like you know on track and every morning we're coming together and we're making a battle plan yes and we make a list okay what are we doing today we're doing for the week who do we need to get in touch with and that's a big part of growing a business is a knowing who those contacts are that you need to be getting in touch with and letting yourself become known to them so important absolutely so that went really quickly we're going to take a break this is keys to success on the think tech live streaming network series we're talking with Dana land pop jazz vocalist regarding keys to success my name is Danelia D.A. N.E. L.I.A. and I'm another half of the duo John Newman we'll be returning in a minute so please stay tuned for more keys to success hello ha I guess my tech here on think tech Hawaii with my favorite show he bought she talked every Friday from 1 to 1 30 p.m. please join us with my good old buddy Gordo the tech side and Andrew the security guy and remember let your be how you doing hello my name is Crystal let me tell you my talk show I'm all about health it's healthy to talk about sex it's healthy to talk about things that people don't talk about it's healthy to discuss things that you think are unhealthy because you need to talk about it so I welcome you to watch quok talk and engage in some provocative discussions on things that do relate to healthy issues and have a well-balanced attitude in life join me I'm standing energy man and I want you to be here every Friday noon think tech Hawaii calm watch the show be there I pity the full weight welcome back this is key to success on the think tech live streaming network series we encourage you to call our hotline at 415-871-2474 to join our conversation or tweet us at think tech H I if you have any questions or comments we've been talking with Dana Lane pop jazz vocalist my name is Danilia D A N E L I a and I'm another half of the duo John Newman welcome back to the show Dana yes darling I'm sandwiched between these two lovely ladies just having a good day today tell me you know share with our viewers what what are some of the major challenges that you and the family have run into and how did you handle those challenges oh gosh probably money and time right isn't that most people's challenges so you know my husband's a practicing architect and we have to keep him working so that we can keep our daughter until you know until we start making some money as new business okay so you know and and just you know keeping the eye on the target yes and we have found a little bit of help with something called an admin administrative scale which is a wonderful piece of technology for anybody who's wanting to set out and reach a goal at the top you've got a goal and below that is your purpose and then you've got policy plans programs orders valuable final product you know and all of these things kind of work together in getting you up to the ultimate goal right and when you're working at you're plugging things in oh I've got to make this list I got to go do this and this you know and you're working it up and down until it's perfect and then of course it changes you know week to week or month to month depending on you know your goal but it's been really helpful in helping us figure out how to maneuver you know there's brand new business of production you know what's interesting is because a lot of people think artists you know like like actors and actresses and just artists in general they just go out and they just do that thing and you know somebody else is taking care of everything and sometimes people don't understand that it doesn't matter what kind of profession you have there's all that behind the scenes stuff going on and you've still got to set goals have purpose be committed be driven you still got to have all of that no matter what career you choose absolutely sometimes people think well just do this or I'll just do that because it's easier yeah you know the experience has been it doesn't matter what you choose choose something you love because it will never be easier but it you you love what you do so it will help you keep that passion exactly and I've been lucky to be doing the music because ha you know it's it's an amazing gift to have that in my life to the degree that it is but the behind the scenes really comes down to promotion promotion and then some more promotion so I feel like for the last 20 years I've been constantly promoting myself and it doesn't matter what career you have you constantly promoting yourself people think it's you're selling yourself all the time and I think that's a that's not a positive way of saying it it's promoting and connecting with people and that's how we all grow as individuals exactly you have to let people know who it is you are and what you're doing right otherwise I mean I knew some brilliant musicians in the Bay Area and they were world-class but yet didn't get a whole lot of work because they didn't understand or they didn't want to do the promotion that's exactly right so true they figure I'm just talented so just go right there and do it but no there's a whole business in there that's associated and then of course we know those people who aren't quite so talented but are doing very well yeah because they've got great promotional that's right exactly exactly right so what is the best advice that you've ever received and what advice would you give young vocalists well this is the advice that I used and it helped me greatly I found out that the thing that can stop any of us from pursuing our goals in life are our own considerations and fears they can stop us dead in our tracks say that again that's a tweetable quote sorry let me say that again considerations and fears are what stop us you know there's no brick wall there's nobody in our way that's saying no you can't do this well sometimes there is but you just got it get out of my way but you know like when I was getting into field of entertainment at the age of 40 I mean you know I wasn't any spring check-in so you know the typical thoughts oh God old for this I'm pretty enough I've been doing this enough you know although well I liken it to that whack-a-mole game in an arcade that you see sometimes where these moles rear their ugly heads and you got a fat back you know before they can bring their heads up so it's much like that you know I'm not pretty oh you know I'm not young yeah you know you really just have to acknowledge those thoughts and let them go and keep you know your focus on what it is you really love I mean if it's something you really want to do badly enough you know you have to just go for it you know and I know it's not always easy there's lots of challenges and especially as I mentioned before time money right are to the biggest challenges but you know I've been fortunate to have the sport of my husband you know I couldn't have done it without him yeah that's wonderful and what the nearly and I we teach classes on motivation with these classes on building team building and we call it stinking thinking you've got to get rid of that stinking thinking yeah and be positive exactly you'll make it for the most part the only blocks that we have are the blocks in our mind and that fear just goes up immediately when we go through a challenge and the the important thing is understand that that is fear and you have to somehow push that fear out of the way and trust that it's going to be all right that's right and that's not easy to do because we just build so much stuff up here we do indeed and I mean it could even come down to a simple phrase that was said to us as a child when we were making a pretty picture some kid or teacher you know and that is enough to stick with us our entire lives it's amazing isn't that it really is how we hold on to that for so much so many of our years and when you finally let that go you actually breathe again I mean exactly it's amazing can I share one of the things that that you went through one of the challenges my baby she put a rubber band on her on a risk and every time she thought something negatives she pulled that rubber band and popped herself and by the end of one day her risk was all swollen and she realized wait a minute I'm thinking the wrong things yeah I've got to look in the mirror and do some self inventory and read to what I'm doing yeah because that challenge just by popping herself work a lot work a lot absolutely yeah that's an interesting oh yeah it's a really good way to and actually uh the next day I decided I was going to do it again but I had so much the fear I had less fear about the thing moving forward and positive thinking than I did about the fear of whacking myself again when I it was so painful so that kind of actually pushed me forward yeah it's like as soon as the negative thought came on I said no I'm not doing this again so I'm going to self loathe it exactly exactly so yeah so why don't you ask you a signature question bring it on you have a question what's the what's the motto no she's already okay all right so each and every one of our our guests that come on we ask a signature question and we ask what are your top three success habits one okay keep the goal in the forefront of your mind okay meaning expand on it a bit you know just keep thinking about what it is you ultimately want to be doing okay you know and having some sort of a written plan that you can refer to that keeps I mean whether you put it on your you know refrigerator or wherever you know so you can see it daily okay because it's easy to get distracted my life's crazy things going on all around us so I think really staying focused okay number two would be to have a workable plan okay you know I mean I couldn't just go out and become an astrophysicist I mean you know what can I do what I what do I love to do and where do I feel I can have some really nice impact that's important to me as a person in my profession is to really create a good effect on on people whether it's one on one or two group of people and and that's why the family is rallied around me in bringing these comedic characters to light okay number three um you know uh staying hydrated eating well and going to the jam because that hits the nail it's true you know I'm gonna do this for a while I gotta figure out you know I gotta make sure I'm feeling good yes you want to enjoy you want to be able to enjoy you know that's the it's amazing how not feeling good affects your mental state affects everything so you know we have to make the time to just walk or just work out or you always feel better I mean I always I was telling John you know I get up really early in the morning like at you know 4 30 or something and sometimes I wake up and I'm like oh I really just don't want to go work out I really I have to literally put my mind to how I feel after I work out that's what gets me out of bed yeah and so and then afterwards where I'm sitting you know sit there and I'll go well I'm so glad I worked out because I feel so much better yeah that's what people don't understand if they would just work out yeah that feeling that you get after they're working out is the key it is it's all about a I'm glad I did it absolutely so how do you maintain your daily motivation and inspiration despite obstacles setbacks and pushbacks well most mornings Carly and I will sit and we'll just do a battle plan for the day okay you do this and I'm gonna do this and try to stick to it it's easy to get pulled off you know to other directions but just come back on track and continue on on your list of duties you know for the day that's really important to me I'm all about lists right yeah all right well we're out of time we'll have to wrap it up Dana Lance words of wisdom with regards to Keester networking success to having a great family business can be found on Newman Consulting Services web page NewmanConsultingServices.com and landing page Janelia.org thank you to you our viewers and listeners for tuning in thanks to our broadcast engineers Uri Bender our floor manager Nick Sexton and to Jay Fadil our executive producer who puts it all together thank you Dana for joining us on the show sharing your insights to Keester success that were really really great thank you so much thank you so much happy to be here all right thank tech Keester success we'll be back on Thursday at 11 a.m. so please tune in and ask your friends and family to do so as well my name is Danelia D-A-N-E-L-I-A and I'm the other half of the duo John Newman