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264-SYB-Susan-Moe.mp3: this mp3 audio file was automatically transcribed by Sonix with the best speech-to-text algorithms. This transcript may contain errors.

Carol Cox:
If you’re an analytical left brain thinker like me, get ready for an episode that’s going to give you a different perspective on your content. You’re speaking in yourself.

Carol Cox:
More and more women are making an impact by starting businesses running for office and speaking up for what matters. With my background as a TV political analyst, entrepreneur and speaker, I interview a coach purpose driven women to shape their brands, grow their companies and become recognized as influencers in their field. This is speaking

Carol Cox:
Your brand, your place to learn how to persuasively communicate your message to your audience. Hi, and welcome to the Speaking Your Brand podcast. I’m your host, Carol Cox. I hope you’ve been enjoying the past few episodes that I’ve been doing around this idea of having emotional courage in your thought leadership and finding the emotional heart of your message. That was last week’s episode finding the emotional heart of your message. The week before that was on the four layers of thought leadership. These really go well with today’s episode on the role of symbols and metaphors in our stories. Now, if you’re an analytical left brain thinker like me, you tend to probably live most of your life in your head and have, like, very logical kind of textual way like literally text like words. Way of looking at the world. That is definitely the case for me. I’m an avid reader. I always have been, and this is the way that I process a lot of information. Well, if you’ve been listening to the podcast, especially for the past few episodes, you can see that I’m on my own journey to get in touch with my intuitive, creative right brain side. Because of course, when we can tap into these different aspects of ourselves, it’s just going to give us more depth and dimension, not only as speakers and entrepreneurs, but really just as human beings. My guest today is Susan Moe, who’s an MBA trained former business executive who is now a clairvoyant reader. She helps her clients understand themselves better through their own symbols and metaphors. Susan is a longtime and loyal podcast listener, and she reached out to me at the end of 2020, asking if she could do a reading for me.

Carol Cox:
Now, I had never done any kind of reading before in my life. It just had never crossed my path. But I was curious and eager, so I said yes and we had one, and it was really powerful and revealing, and I share a bit about it in this episode. Susan and I talked about her journey to the work she does now that reading that Susan did for me and two of the symbols that stuck with me. And then at the end, after our conversation, I’m going to share with you a realization that I had about one of the symbols after Susan and I talked for this recording. So make sure to stay to the end to hear that. Susan and I also get into the energy exchange we have with our audiences as speakers and releasing the need to please our audiences in feeling like they need to have a certain outcome. I know that this can be a stumbling block for a lot of us when we’re presenting, whether in person or virtually where we feel like we really want our audiences to get certain things out of it. And if they’re quiet or if they’re just less participatory, we’re not sure what exactly is going on. So Susan and I talk about that and then we get into how we can use symbols and metaphors in our presentation content to form a stronger connection with our audience. And Susan has a great example of doing that.

Carol Cox:
Now let’s get on with the show. Welcome to the Speaking Your Brand podcast, Susan.

Susan Moe:
Thank you for having me. I’m super excited to be here. I’ve been a fan for years, as you know, so it’s fun to be on this side of the mic.

Carol Cox:
Well, I am so excited to have you, Susan, and I so appreciate that you reply to the email newsletters that I send out, and you let me know that you’ve listened to episodes and what you’ve enjoyed about them, and you let me know on social media. And I know, as you know, as a podcast host that is so meaningful to me. And I know that as a podcast listener of other people’s podcasts, I try to do the same thing because it is so nice to hear from listeners. So thank you so much for being a longtime listener. And Susan, you and I had connected. I don’t know. It was back in 2020, maybe about two years ago, and then we kind of have stayed in contact since then. And I’m going to share with the listeners a little bit later in our conversation, a session that you and I did just over a year ago. And some of the things that came out of that about this idea of the role of symbols and metaphors in our stories, but in our life stories as well. Before we dig into that, Susan, tell us about the work that you do.

Susan Moe:
Thank you so much. Yeah. So I am a clairvoyant teacher, a meditation teacher and intuitive coach, and I basically help people tune into themselves as spiritual or conscious beings. And I do that with my clairvoyant readings and I teach classes and I have a monthly membership where we get into the nitty gritty about that kind of thing. So it’s all things metaphysical. I am all about that, but it’s not just having that awareness, but it’s really, how do you bring that into your everyday life? So my mantra is basically mindfulness and meditation are great first steps, but it’s what you do with that mindfulness, with that new awareness, because, you know, the point of meditation is not to become good at meditating, it’s really to become good at life. And this work is how you do

Carol Cox:
That in the program that you run is. Called the practicum, which I love that name, because to your point, like you wanted to see, like how can we practically apply this in our everyday lives?

Susan Moe:
Exactly. And that’s how we become better parents and coworkers and spouses and children and all the things. And when you have those enhanced relationships that just creates a positive impact on the world far beyond any of us will ever imagine.

Carol Cox:
So Susan, how did you get in to to doing this work? Is this something that you’ve been doing for a while? Did you can you see back from when you were younger that this was almost inevitable, that you would end up doing this?

Susan Moe:
No, I mean, ironically, I grew up constantly experiencing deja vus and precognitive dreams, and I was super sensitive energetically, but I just assumed that everybody was like that, so I never really gave it a second thought. But when I was 30, I ended up getting cancer. And through that healing, of course, I did chemo and radiation and all that good stuff. But I also did some alternative therapies, and at some point someone gifted me a psychic reading and that just cracked me open nice and suddenly realized I. That’s what I have. And when I received that reading, I had just graduated with my MBA with every intention of becoming CEO of a Fortune 500 company, and suddenly my previous goal didn’t matter anymore. I was all in on discovering this new really remembered part of myself. So I eventually completed a two year intensive training program, sort of like a master’s in energy work, so that I could control my psychic abilities rather than just waiting for dreams or deja vous to hit me randomly. Of course, the problem then was that everyone knew me as its type AAA personality who burned the candle at both ends, super competitive and achievement oriented. And what was I going to do? Hang up a shingle and now I was now a professional psychic, so I worked really hard to overcome that embarrassment. But what I had learned through that program changed my life so dramatically that I knew I wanted to help others. And so I sort of just quietly did it at first and then word got around and just from referrals. And I’ve been doing this now for about 20 years.

Carol Cox:
Susan led us to find some terms here for the listeners. So what does it mean to be a clairvoyant and how does that show up in the work that you do with your clients?

Susan Moe:
Yeah. So sometimes people will say clairvoyant or psychic interchangeably, and there are ways that each of us receives our information from our intuition. So if you’re clairvoyant, you are clear seeing if you’re clear audience, you would hear that information or clear sentences, you would feel it. And cognizant is when you just know things. So. So I am clairvoyant. And so I I see

Carol Cox:
Ok and so many different directions that I can go in. Let us do this. Let’s talk about that session that you and I did together. So I think that will give the listeners like some tangible examples and ideas of of what we’re talking about. And then we’ll get into how symbols and metaphors play into our lives and into the stories. And then as speakers, as content creators, how can we then use that in in what we’re doing so that we can build more of a connection with our audiences? So Susan, I remember this was back in late 2020, so a little over a year ago now you actually reached out to me via email and you said something to the effect of like, you had this sense that you wanted to do a session for me. Do you remember

Susan Moe:
That? I do. I remember it very clearly. And ironically, about five or six months earlier, I had this very, very strong, intuitive you need to reach out to Carol and talk to her about this. But then the brain takes over. And I was like, No, no, no, no, no. And then something happened about that six months later, and it just hit me like a ton of bricks. You must reach out to her to overcome your embarrassment. And and it ended up working out that we were able to have a session together. So I’m really glad that I listened to my intuition on that one.

Carol Cox:
Well, thank you for doing so. And I must say that I’ve never had a psychic reading. I’ve never had a clairvoyant reading. I have never done that before, and it really has just never crossed my path. Like it, just, you know, and so you have now you crossed my path. And so here was the invitation was being extended to me. So of course I said yes because I was very curious about it. And so we did the session. It was on the phone. So audio only video and it was on the solstice. So it was December twenty first twenty twenty. I remember that which of course, you know, the solstice has a lot of meaning to me as well. Tell us a little bit about how how you start the session and then I’m going to relate some of the things that came out for me really powerfully from it.

Susan Moe:
That’s great, and thank you so much for remembering it was on the solstice. I didn’t remember that. And isn’t that interesting that today is one twenty two, also a very potent number. So, you know, that just kind of goes to show you how these things work. But typically, when I’m giving a reading and also talking about symbols is I’ll give two readings. The first one is a rose reading. And the reason why I use a rose is because the rose has been used as a symbol for everything from love to funerals and everything in between. So it’s what? They call a neutral symbol, if you were to use something like a dollar sign or a flag or a cross. Those are to charge, so they’re not going to be effective. So I will give a rose reading using that symbol. And then interestingly, when, as you said, we were not on video and the reason that is that is OK is because in a reading, we’re having a soul to soul connection, a soul to soul conversation. So I give readings to people all over the world and I don’t need to have their physical body there. And I was so excited when you wanted to talk to me about symbols, because that is the language that our souls use to communicate with each other as in symbols. So when I am working with the different layers of someone’s aura, I will just sort of, I don’t know, communicate to you as a soul and ask you, what is the main thing you’re working on? And then you as a soul will will send me a symbol and then I will interpret that symbol.

Susan Moe:
And I have a funny story to share with you about that one time. And usually the symbols. And maybe you remember from your session, I don’t know. But they they’re usually very, very different in every layer. And one time I was giving a reading to this guy and every symbol that he was showing me was about this movie movie, the Gladiator. And I don’t even know if I’ve even seen that whole movie through, and I was so embarrassed because every single time and I thought, Oh my God, he’s going to think I’m just making this up. And and at the end, he mentioned to me that that was his all time by far favorite movie. He’s watched it over 20 times, and those symbols meant something very, very personal to him. And he could understand why, why I was saying that. So that’s a little bit about how we can how we as souls use symbols to communicate even with pets. If we have a pet that we want to communicate with. You can send them symbols. So symbols are really, really powerful.

Carol Cox:
Oh, OK, that’s fascinating, Susan. So yes, I remember I took a lot of notes during the session while while you were communicating these things to me. So I had the rose reading in my notes, and then we started getting into different Oh oh, the seven chakras energy layers is what we went through. That’s right. Well before we hit record today on this podcast, I said, I have a couple of them that really stood out to me that I wrote down and you said to me, Well, good because I don’t remember anything from the session, so tell me about that.

Susan Moe:
Yeah. So I am known as being a very disciplined, energetic reader. So when I’m done with the session with anyone, I will make sort of energetic separations with them and it doesn’t erase the reading from my mind, but it sort of releases it sort of when you wake up in the morning and you know, you’ve had that vivid dream, but you just can’t recall it. So I know that you and I had a session, but I released the reading and that’s really nice because people can really trust me. And also I can have friends because they’re not worried that I’m going to remember all their innermost thoughts and feelings.

Carol Cox:
Well, also, Susan, I can imagine that, you know, some of this work may be heavy, like some of them may be heavier than others, and having to carry that energy could be a lot for you just, you know, in your body and in your mind. So I can imagine it’s almost like setting a boundary for yourself.

Susan Moe:
Yes, it’s almost it’s actually like energetic hygiene. So and you’re right, people don’t typically seek out a psychic or clairvoyant reading or intuitive coaching because things are just one hundred percent perfect for them. It’s usually under some pretty extensive circumstances, so I typically help people when they’re going through life changes or transitions in life. So that’s true. But it’s it’s like you, you take a shower every day. So this is energetic hygiene, so you just clear off that energy so I can be neutral and not either try to fix them or cure them, but also not take on all of their energy as well. That’s absolutely right.

Carol Cox:
Hmm. That’s a good practice for all of us to do, really, when we’re maybe even thinking about as a speaker, you know, and especially in person in front of audiences, there is so much energy that’s going on like your you as a speaker at transmitting energy to your audience, you’re picking up energy from the audience members. And I know I hear this so much from our clients and I have experienced this. You may deliver the same exact presentation, either in-person or virtual to three different groups of people. What audience loves it? They’re super interactive. They’re super engaged. The next audience, nada. Like, you can’t get them to say a word. And it’s just like different audiences. Different groups have different energies and I imagine and then as a speaker, you know, I’ve had to learn like basically like not to take things personally and to try to manage my energy in my speaking engagements.

Susan Moe:
Well, that brings up such a beautiful point, and I would encourage all speakers to learn how to keep your aura nice and tight around your body. Because what we tend to do is speakers are as people, is we trying to send that energy through the whole room and try to sort of read the room. But that dilutes your energy. And I’m sure maybe you have had this experience, maybe not now because you’re such a pro, but maybe in the beginning where. You give a speech and then that night, you can’t sleep because you are just hyped up, and that’s because you’ve taken on all of the energy of the people in that room. So when you can learn to release that number one, it helps you have more neutrality not to take things personally, but it also it also frees you up and it frees up the audience too, that they don’t need to do anything to make you feel good, that they just get to sit and you’re trusting them to have whatever experience they need to have, and you don’t need to control that.

Carol Cox:
Yes, that’s an excellent point, Susan. Oh, I’m so glad that that came up. All right. So good. For those of you listening, we’re going to get into how you can use symbols and metaphors, but I want to use these examples to kind of give you a sense of this. So one of them is this was for the heart chakra. And you said that the image that came up for you were this was that you saw me in a tunnel which trains kind of with my back against the wall and that like I couldn’t get through, like I was kind of stuck there in the tunnel. And then I think you said about the movie The Polar Express, which is this magical train that children take to go to like we’re Santa Clauses, you know, like Christmas land and the train takes the pigs up. The children serve some hot chocolate and they are welcomed and loved when they get on the train because a lot of them have, you know, family lives and things that are not going well. And you said to me, this is what I wrote down, that these trains can stop and pick me up and serve me and help me to find my tribe. Oh my God, it’s like making me like, choke up as I’m reading it. And you said that I have the power to signal to the train to stop and let me on. And then and so this idea of like, welcome aboard. I will be supported by the conductor and the other people on the train.

Susan Moe:
Yes. And just two things on that. Number one, the reason why you’re getting choked up is because that touches you in the heart that that resonates with you. So and the thing to remember is that you showed me the image. So I’m not just pulling these things out of the hat like so. So that’s also why it feels like a connection with you because you’re showing me the image and I’m interpreting it for you. And now that you mention it now, now I can see that I am certain that maybe you can even clarify what the notes. I bet you that you felt like you needed a conductor or that you were the conductor or something, but that maybe you needed to be held in the guest and you get to you get to have that any time you want. But I love that. You know, you sort of get the chills and that’s telling you you’re being connected with.

Carol Cox:
Yes, it is so true. And so here’s one more note that I wrote at the top of the page as I wrote, I can’t extend to others what I don’t have. I have to get on board first and feel warm and cozy and be served. Absolutely, yes, because I’m so used to be in the driver’s seat like like that Type-A personality, that achiever, a personality like, I’m going to get it done, like I can get it done all by myself. But you know, as I’ve obviously gotten older and matured, I recognize that I can’t do all these things by myself.

Susan Moe:
Right, right, right. And even like what we were talking about before, when you’re speaking, you get to enjoy the experience of being a speaker as well. So when you when you’re on the train, when you’re having your energy all around you and you give up control over how the audience receives you or anything in life, you actually get to enjoy that experience as well. And then they do too.

Carol Cox:
Oh, that’s perfect, Susan. There have definitely been times speaking engagements where for whatever reason, you know, it hasn’t been that enjoyable. And I know that obviously in speakers, we have so much latitude like we can make the experience our own. We create the content, we can add music to liven up the experience like we choose what we want to share. And so if we’re not having a good experience, we have to think of like, how can we make this better for ourselves?

Susan Moe:
And I would also say that it doesn’t matter how much music, how many slides, how many props or anything. If you energetically are trying to control the people’s response to you, it will feel effortful and it will feel arduous and it will feel stressful. But when you relinquish that control to just allow the universe to have whatever needs to happen and allow the participants to have whatever their experience they need to have, that’s I think it’s almost like the freeing of the energy is how you can have fun, right?

Carol Cox:
It’s almost like letting go of wanting to be liked or like people pleasing and like wanting an attachment to a certain outcome. In this case, the outcome of how people feel about your presentation?

Susan Moe:
Absolutely. And I experienced that every time I go into a session with someone, it’s like, if I’m like, Oh my god, I love Carole Cox, I love her podcast. I really want her to have a good experience. Blah blah blah. Like, you’re not going to have a good experience. So I just have to say, Well, I show up. I’m doing the best that I, you know, know how, and I’m just going to allow Carole to have whatever experience she needs to have in. Session.

Carol Cox:
Ok, that is OK. So helpful, Susan. So then the other symbol that really stuck out to me is the head chakra. This was under the head chakra, the crow perspective. And you said something freeing the cage like getting the crow out of the cage, like almost like a bird’s eye view and this crow perspective. So do you, Suzanne, anything you can add to that?

Susan Moe:
Yes, this is great. This is such a good example of how symbols are personal. Sort of like what I was saying with that gladiator movie. So if I am seeing The Crow and then if I get my brain all mixed up and well, the crows are, they represent death and they’re scavengers and they’re scary. And then I’m not going to share that. Maybe I’m going to misinterpret that. But you showed me the crow, and I just related that to you, that information to you with with neutrality. And who knew you love crows and ravens and all that. So that’s why it’s relevant for you. And so this is an example of how I teach my students to keep a dream journal because every night we are having a soul to soul her soul to our higher selves connection. And that’s why we remember those images in the symbols, in our dreams. But you know, people will go to a dream book and say, You know, what does the Crow mean? If you were to have a dream about a crow and a crow is going to mean something to me, that’s going to be different for you. So I encourage people to keep a journal. A dream journal. And then you will start to notice patterns of what those symbols are because they mean something unique to you. Like for me, I know when I wake up and I have had a haircut dream, I know big changes are happening. You might wake up and think I need to get a haircut like. So it’s very, very nuanced and personal, so symbols can be universal like a brand. If you think of the siren of Starbucks or a Nike swoosh or something like that, or they can be very, very personal and everything in between as well.

Carol Cox:
Hmm. Yeah, I do love crows I’ve had for a long time. We have crows here where we live in Florida and during the migration season, they’ll be like huge flocks of them, you know, that will swarm over the lake and like, you know, do their dance together. And I just love to watch and I love hearing their their squawks, you know, from a from across the lake. And crows traditionally have symbolized loyalty, teamwork and transforming people’s lives and keeping them safe. Like, I read that somewhere. And so for me, I like one of my top values is loyalty. Like loyalty to people, for sure. I know that’s one of my top values, so I maybe it’s not a surprise that I have this attraction to crows,

Susan Moe:
But also what you mentioned about the transformation because you help people transform their lives and then, by extension, transform the lives of others. So that also makes perfect sense.

Carol Cox:
All right. So those are those were the two kind of symbols that really stood out from the reading that we did together. Susan, I am so grateful that we did that together. And so let’s talk about then kind of using symbols and metaphors in the stories that we share or, you know, in in the work that we’re doing. And so beyond kind of what we talked about, like the universality of symbols or how, you know, symbols can be a way to connect with each other. How do you see a way for us to start intentionally doing that in our content?

Susan Moe:
And we all know that we are humans are storytellers. That’s why we’re doing this. And but before we actually had words, we used pictures to tell stories. I mean, there are cave drawings that are depicting scenes that are more than 30000 years old. And then you can fast forward today and you can practically have an entire conversation using emojis which are just digital symbols, right? We’ve gone really far. And so we talked about the universal symbols and even like the skull and crossbones that tells us danger or poison or something like that. And the thing is that symbols aren’t just pictures. They can be words or numbers or stories or sounds even. And so as just one example, as a personal one, my my father is a huge forty niner fan. So we have an agreement already that whoever transitions first can communicate with the other person, whoever is still in their body with the numbers. Forty nine and bonus points. If you get a forty nine, er, T-shirt or a sticker or something like that. But when you’re speaking to a group, you can also create a symbol that is bridges that universal to the personal, and you can even do that with a story or a symbol.

Susan Moe:
Just last month in my practicum, I told this story about this three day wilderness retreat that I had been on in the freezing cold January rain and all day and night whenever we were out by ourselves, I was worrying about these two women that didn’t have a tarp. And were they going to catch pneumonia? Are they going to get eaten by a bear? They weren’t, and they actually were. Having a great time, and so when I when I told this story afterwards, so many people mentioned to me, Oh, I have my own tarp ladies story because these ladies didn’t have a tarp, and that’s why I was worried about them. And so now in our group and or if you’re giving a speech to someone, you can create a bonding experience with them through this symbol. So now anyone who took that class, all they have to say is this is a tarp ladies moment or this is a tarp ladies experience and we all have that universal language. So I think that that is really important to remember as well.

Carol Cox:
Oh, I love that example, Susan. I can imagine, you know, being a speaker and sharing something like that, and it’s almost like then the audience and you become like, this kind of like the secret club where you know what that means. And then I and of course, I’m like thinking of the practical side. And then on social media, you can be like, All right. So for those of you who attended my session, which your tarp, lady story and other people looking at it, maybe like, Oh, like, I want to know what this is, and it provokes that curiosity.

Susan Moe:
I love that you can even have like a hashtag tag tarp, ladies. That’s awesome. And I think that just goes to the point of when you’re speaking the power of symbols. People come up to me, you know, 10, 15 years later, and we’ll will mention the symbols that came up in their reading. And like I said, like, I have no recollection of them, but it it helps them. And they so when we use symbols in our teaching or coaching or speaking, it really helps people remember the message. You know, they say a picture is worth a thousand words, and for me, it feels like symbols are multilayer there. They’re like a thousand layers deep.

Carol Cox:
Yes. Yeah. And I’m thinking about even for slide content. So, you know, if you’re using slides and your presentation content, of course, I always say, like, don’t do a lot of text because we don’t need to read the text on the slides. You know, use a really nice image to fill up the slide or what have you. And then also, you could use a symbol because I think it’s that like we will remember visuals a lot in our minds from say, like something that we’ve seen more so than we’ll remember text whatever the words were.

Susan Moe:
Absolutely, absolutely. And it’s the same same with symbols. It’s you will remember the symbol and the story around the symbol more than you will those actual words. And that’s what we what the difference is between a picture and a symbol, especially if it has some context to it, is that we may remember, Oh, there was a I remember that picture, it was that rainbow or whatever it was. But when you have a symbol, it has more, more meaning and more context around it. So it’s a deeper, richer experience. And that’s why that’s probably why we all as souls talk to each other with symbols, but it’s really powerful when you’re speaking as well.

Carol Cox:
And that’s probably why emojis now are so popular and we’ll use because you can say a lot when we want, you can say a lot with an emoji or several emojis. And it also then allows you to indicate tone, which is obviously so hard in text communication. And I know that they say like, you’re not supposed to use emojis and professional emails or like things like that. But I will do like a smiley face or something because I want to make sure that people understand that the tone of what I’m saying is like in a certain way versus what could be interpreted because it’s only text.

Susan Moe:
Absolutely. And then you have like GIPHY or Jaffe’s or whatever they’re called. Those are like emojis on on drugs, right? Like right, right there in your face. So.

Carol Cox:
So then metaphors are, you know, we hear these all the times and we think and we forget about them, like building a business is like some a mountain. You know, you have to like, put your foot one step in front of the other or whatever it happens to be. It’s like metaphors and analogies or things where you know, people can kind of like visualize. Like you can probably see yourself like climbing a mountain or rowing the boat across the rapids. And like, you know, it’s the churning of the water and you’ve got to figure out where you’re going. So those are some metaphors that just come to mind. What? What is? So I’m trying to think of something for the to help the listener. So imagine that they’re putting together their presentation content, their keynote talk, whatever it happens to be. And they think, well, maybe a symbol or a metaphor would be useful to include in here. Is there a way to kind of help them figure out what would make sense?

Susan Moe:
That’s a great question. I think, for for me, I always try to go within and to ask myself and to use my intuition. So, for example, the crow is very personal to you. I mean, if you so if you tell a story around that symbol and create some context around it, that is going to be helpful. So we have this tendency to always want to look outside of what is a symbol that’s going to work for these people. It’s like you come back home, come, always come back to you. I remember I was working with a coaching client recently, and I kind of think of sometimes metaphors as like symbols like that are in motion. And she when I first started working with her, she she showed me this and maybe you can guess what what her challenge was. So she showed me these pictures of which I kind of think is a metaphor of her. Her out in a desert trying to water a plant with the a little eye dropper full of of water, the parched desert and trying to water this plant can you can you maybe guess what she was telling me with that symbol or metaphor?

Carol Cox:
Well, like Parched comes to mind, right? Like, like she’s she’s feeling that she’s lacking somewhere.

Susan Moe:
Yeah. So basically, what it was is that she came to me so utterly depleted that any form of self-care that she thought that she was supposed to do was basically like drip, drip, drip, drip, drip. And so all through our coaching, then we can track that with that symbol, that metaphor, like every time something comes up and she shows me that that picture, I can say, Wow, the oasis is growing or we’re coming back to that, that fantasy that you’re going to be able to give what you don’t have. Like you were saying earlier, when you are so depleted, you don’t have anything to give. So what are some ways that we can amp up, halt, stop the circuit, stop the show and really get that going? So yeah,

Carol Cox:
That’s really helpful. And I started imagining like, I see the oasis and I see, you know, the water expanding, and that’s so helpful. So it is helpful to think in terms of these visuals because I feel like they like they connect us in a different way than just like journaling words or, you know, thinking about things and more of a textual or linear way.

Susan Moe:
Absolutely. Because I mean, if you’re if you’re journaling and you’re eventually can get into that flow, but very often if we start, you know, like punctuation or anything like that, that would just put us right into our brain. And then we’re cut off from our heart and our soul, and our feelings could sort of cut off from the body.

Carol Cox:
So, yeah. All right, Susan, I just find this work fascinating. As you can tell, this is why you do what you do because you have you have this gift and obviously the years of experience that you have put in into, like understanding how to use your gift to help others. For the listeners, where can they connect with you? Give us your website and also, I believe you hang out mostly on Instagram, correct?

Susan Moe:
Yeah, I’m not actually super active on Instagram, but I am an ascended presence on Instagram, but I’m much more active. I have a weekly newsletter or three times a month or so that is at my website at ascendent presence. And then I teach classes and we have this practicum, this monthly session or, you know, anyone can contact me for a reading as well. That’s really fun, too.

Carol Cox:
Fantastic. I will make sure to include those links in the show notes so that the listeners can reach out to you. Susan, thank you so much for coming on the podcast. I’ve enjoyed getting to know you over the past couple of years, and I am grateful for the work that you do.

Susan Moe:
Oh, thank you. And likewise to I am. I’m the hugest fan, as you know from all of my emails, I’m like, You changed my perspective on this and not the other thing, so I’m super excited to be here.

Carol Cox:
Thanks again to Susan for coming on the podcast. I’m so appreciative of her for being a longtime podcast listener and for the work that she does. I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did. And after we recorded, Susan sent me a note that she wanted to add a little bit more to part of our discussion about as speakers like how can we enjoy the process of of speaking of presenting in front of an audience? And then she wanted to to make the point. And I completely agree with this that we also have to understand and intuit and read into what our particular audience needs. At that moment, it may be the same presentation content we’re giving to different audiences, but one audience for a variety of reasons may need something different from us at that time. Maybe they need something that’s really uplifting and energizing, but a different audience because of who is there. Maybe the time period that it is or something that has gone on may need something that’s much more reflective, self-reflective grounding and kind of holding space for them. And I think about the workshop that I did a couple of weeks ago on storytelling and this was for a group of women pediatricians and was a 90 minute workshop. So I taught them some key elements about storytelling that they can use and their advocacy work with patients and their exam room within their community with each other and so on.

Carol Cox:
I invited some of the women to share some stories with the group about why they became a pediatrician, patients they had that impacted them and so on, and they were really heartfelt messages. So you could sense that the energy in the room was was really holding space for those women as they were listening to the sometimes difficult stories being that positive energy for them, but not in a kind of rah rah. We’re going to we’re going to have a dance party way, but really in a way that that felt like that was what was needed in the moment. So that just wanted to make sure that here in this episode that we talked about that that yes, as a speaker, you want to make sure that you are enjoying in getting something out of the process, but also understanding what your audience need. Needs in the moment, and as you get better as a speaker, you’ll have a better sense of what that is in the moment. I mentioned in the intro that I was going to share with you a realization I had about one of the symbols from the reading that Susan did for me.

Carol Cox:
And so here’s what I realized after we did the recording. One of those symbols was The Crow, and you heard us talk about how a crow can be a symbol of loyalty and team building and also transformation. And then I went back to the notes that I had taken during the reading, and I also saw this that one of the things I wrote down that Suzanne mentioned around the Crow was this idea of being in a bird cage like feeling like, perhaps I’m I’m in a bird cage, and that’s where this bird the crow came from. And I didn’t even put this was all subconscious, but I was working on a presentation back in December. So this is a year year later now after the reading. So the reading was December 20 20, and I was working on this presentation in December 2021. And so I was putting together slides on thought leadership and this idea of the expert trap, which I first talked about in July of Twenty Twenty One. I did a podcast episode on the Expert Trap. It was episode two forty one. And at the time, I didn’t think about it as kind of like being birds in a cage like we’re kind of stuck in a trap. But when I was putting this presentation together, the slides, I was creating a slide for the expert trap and I was in Canva and I was thinking, OK, what’s what’s a good image that I could use for this? And then I thought of a bird in a cage and I thought, Oh, that’s perfect, because like as women, we kind of feel we feel maybe stuck in this expert trap is what I went through in this in that episode where we feel like we have to have all these credentials and degrees and expertise in order to have something of value to say about a particular topic.

Carol Cox:
And instead of encouraging more of us, more women to share ideas, share our stories, share our opinions because that’s how we’re going to affect change. And so this idea of being in the cage can seem very constricting. It can feel it seem very limiting, of course, but can also feel really comfortable. When a bird gets used to being in a cage, it can feel familiar they have food and water. They can feel very safe. And so that’s also what happens a lot of times is that we end up feeling safe in the cages that we’re in, even though we know that we would be better off out of the cage. So it’s just isn’t it just funny how the subconscious works? So all of these things obviously have been swirling around in my head, and Susan very much tapped into that in that reading that she did for me back in 2020.

Carol Cox:
And then all these things started coming out in twenty twenty one. So I hope you got value out of this episode. I would love to hear your thoughts on it. You can find me primarily on LinkedIn. The link to my profile is in the show notes Connect with me there. You can also find me on Instagram, or you can send me an email. Carole Cox is Speaking Your Brand. If you would like to talk about how we could work together on your thought leadership and your signature talk, I would love to do so. You can schedule a console call by going to Speaking Your Brand contact again. That’s Speaking Your Brand contact next week on the podcast, I’m going to be talking about how I have found and used my voice, so the specific things that have helped me, especially over the past five years, because this month, February is the five year anniversary of the Speaking Your Brand podcast. I can’t believe I’ve been doing this for five years. I can definitely imagine doing it for another five and beyond that until next time. Thanks for listening.

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