On today’s Engaging Marketeer podcast, we have Caroline Carey. Caroline helps people work out the real reason they were put on this earth because everybody’s soul has a purpose, everybody is here for a reason but most people don’t know the reason why. Darren talks to Caroline how she does that, what kind of people seek her help and what is the process to finding out why are you here.
The full podcast is available now on all platforms but here are some key topics.
Caroline talks about her podcast
Darren: So have you started your podcast?
Caroline: I’ve got a podcast called Soul Purpose, I started it at the beginning of last year and I just did a few sessions and I wasn’t getting it really, it wasn’t really working for me. Then I decided to do the course, I joined the Rob Moore Progressive group, I was interested in that and then there was the course last October which was all about the podcasting and I thought you know what I’m going to take a listen, have a look at this and see what’s what, and I was very inspired by it. And I thought well let’s give it a go and I sort of got it into gear, ploughed on in first gear for a little bit, trying to find my way with it and then I started to ask people if they would be interviewed for it and that was a turning point for me.
I had interviewed people previously for a film that we were hoping to make and some of the people speaking on that I thought, “This is really interesting, this is my topic, this is my subject” so I asked them if they would mind me using it for a podcast and they were quite happy for me to. So I used a couple of those, edited them so they fitted and then continued from there asking people if they would come on my show. And I’ve been really enjoying it so I’ve now got it into about third or fourth gear. I’m doing over twelve hundred downloads a month at the moment and I’m told by the podcast folk that that’s quite good.
Darren: That’s pretty good, particularly for something that’s very niche as well, you’ve got a very specific audience.
Caroline: It’s very nice but I am managing to ask people who’ve got good followings. So it’s a lot of fun, I’m enjoying it, I’m meeting people, old friends and people I’ve worked with from years ago and I haven’t seen for ages. So I’m really enjoying that connection that we’re having and getting feedback from other people about how they’ve enjoyed the show and we touch on some really interesting topics.
How Caroline got into podcasting
Darren: What prompted you to want to start the podcast?
Caroline: It was my husband actually suggested that I did some recordings of me reading the last book that I published. So I’ve got six books out there and I thought “That’s quite a good idea!” I started to do it, I got a bit stuck with it and it’s a lot to read but I thought I’ll start doing some aspects of my work, I have a particular body of work that I created and I thought well I’ll start sharing that to begin with and get myself into gear with it but then that all sort of stopped. And it is rolling again but I haven’t yet gone back to recording the book, that will come in time, I will start to do that again.
Using the podcast to develop customer relationships
Darren: I’m always interested when people start podcasts that are related to the business and the industry that they’re in. What kind of successes have you seen with that in terms of reaching out to potential clients or establishing better relationships with existing clients?
Caroline: I don’t know yet, I think it’s quite early days for the podcast, even though it’s been quite solid now for about four months, I think it is still early days but I do think people are connecting with me, I’m certainly getting people getting in touch and saying “I heard that podcast and that was really helpful for me, I’m interested in some of the work that you do.” So I’m just waiting to see really at the moment I’m enjoying doing it. I don’t have the big professional mic and I don’t have the fabulous website for it all yet, I’m just having a nice time with it but it’s become an important part of my work.
And I have stretched myself rather thinly with the amount of different things that I do and the podcast has become one of them. It’s important for me, I’m realising to focus on the things that really work and other things can have their place but it’s quite a lot to deal with. But I’m very fortunate to have a husband who’s an editor, he can actually go into my podcast and go let’s just shift that little bit. I like to try and do them in one go, I think it just feels much more authentic in that way. But there are times where I’ll have switched off the recording and then say something really fabulous I think “Oh damn it! I wish I’d recorded that.”
Using the podcast to help with business
Darren: You’ve touched on it, there’s a question I want to ask actually, with people that start podcasts to help them with their business and because they enjoy doing it, how much of your time does it actually take?
Caroline: Well there’s booking the client in and, I have to say, I really like to exchange emails and look at calendars together and things like that. I’m not very good at these calendars, I’m useless with those because I just want to have a conversation with you, I find I just I just can’t connect to that. My calendar’s all over the place I mean I have lots of grandchildren, lots of big workloads, walking dog loads so it’s quite difficult to work that out for myself, but that’s beside the point.
So there is that that setting up the time with people, I tend to do about an hour on conversation itself and then obviously, if Ben is helping me to edit, he’ll spend some time with that which he can do very quickly and then it’s posting up so I wouldn’t say it’s a massive amount of time. I mean Monday morning Monday afternoon I try and get my podcast out there and that’s my intention every week, to have one ready.
Darren: That’s one a week you’re doing?
Caroline: Yes I’ve got quite a few stacked up, ready to go and I try and keep one step ahead of that. So, at the moment, I’m posting one every Monday.
Darren: Of course the main thing is you enjoy doing it, it’s not a job.
Caroline: I do and I like listening back to it and I’m choosing a subject that’s really dear to my heart and the thing is, I’ve created a whole body of work about people finding their sole purpose, what is genuinely theirs to bring into the world. That’s what I had to do for myself, I kept asking the question what is mine to do? What’s mine to bring here? All the training that I’ve done and my qualifications at school, which were none.
I studied that and I worked with that and I kept asking that question. When I look back on when I did find what was mine, and I feel really comfortable and happy with it, when I look back at the journey I’ve had to take, that’s the map that I created in order to then share that with others.
So I created the map, got it in a form that was readable and understandable and now I share that with others so that they can find what what’s theirs and really go through the soul-seeking journey of asking that question but also looking at some of the blocks. Some of the things that inhibit us, where our light is diminished or we don’t have the self-esteem that we might need in order to fully bring our gifts into the world.
So we look into that journey, what is it that’s holding us back. And once I work with people like that, then they start to move on and to go “Okay, this is what’s mine to do” and then they have the support of myself and the community to nurture that and to ensure that it is in some way successful. Not always in the ways that they expect it to be but in ways that they’re going to find some kind of fulfilment.
What was holding Caroline back before she started this process
Darren: So this is something you’ve created yourself, after you’ve been through the process. So what made you want to do that and what was it that was holding you back?
Caroline: Well I had a tendency to put other people, like teachers, facilitators, leaders on a pedestal and somehow believing that they had all the answers until I started to turn around and think actually you know I’ve got some answers here. I’ve got something that’s potent and a story that’s worth telling and ways that I’ve had to overcome certain difficulties. Physical difficulties like not having enough money for things, having a big family of children, I have six children so looking after a big family I’m quite stretched a lot of the time, being a woman in some of the work that I do.
And also having a story that has probably diminished a lot of my own light. So I was sexually abused as a child, I got pregnant at 16 and I had rather dysfunctional relationships with men who were not always best for me, my mother would say it’s like you have a tendency to choose ‘lame dogs’ and that wasn’t very nice of her. But we struggled and that’s not because it was about just about them, I was unhealthy myself, I wasn’t managing life very well.
But as time moved on and I worked with programs and things that that really helped me. I danced and I got very creative and I started to ask for help and really start to move on with a sense of a business. I’m a bit of an entrepreneur, I want to be self-supporting, I want to work for myself, I want to be able to bring in a decent income. I’ve had to work really hard to engage with that and to be the person that I want to be and it’s only through sheer determination and showing up, doing the thing that I love the most that’s really helped me to bring my light into the world
I’ve shared my story, I was a very shy child at school, in the classroom I would never speak up, I didn’t have a voice. I felt very shut down in myself and it took a long time for me to be able to speak up. I can do one-to-one quite well, in groups I would always find it really difficult but unless I was making my particular offering, unless I was bringing what was mine, what I loved into the space then I could be talking till the cows come home. I was I was very free and it was almost like I was channeling something. Something was coming through me that was saying “Yes do this, you’re good at this!”
So having that tendency to put others on a pedestal, I had to drop that, let that go and start to build myself up to really focus on what it was that I loved.
About Caroline:
Caroline is a Soul Worker/Doula who helps others identify their purpose and what it is they have to bring to life. She is also the host of the Soul Purpose podcast in which she is joined by guests to discuss their journey and how they found their purpose.
Website: https://middleearthmedicine.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/CarolineCareyDance/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/CarolineECarey
Soul Purpose Podcast: https://shows.acast.com/how-to-find-our-soul-purpose
About your host:
Darren has worked within digital marketing since the last century, and was the first in-house web designer for video games retailer GAME in the UK, known as Electronics Boutique in the States. After co-founding his own agency, Engage Web, in 2009, Darren has worked with clients around the world, including Australia, Canada and the USA.
iTunes: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/engaging-marketeer/id1612454837
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/darrenjamieson/
Engaging Marketeer: https://engagingmarketeer.com
Engage Web: https://www.engageweb.co.uk