Susan Friedmann [00:00:31]:
Welcome to Book Marketing Mentors, the weekly podcast where you learn proven strategies, tools, ideas, and tips from the masters. Every week, I introduce you to a marketing master who will share their expertise to help you market and sell more books.
Today, my special guest is Judy Kane. Judy is the author of "Your4Truths: How Beliefs Impact Your Life". She's a transformative coach dedicated to helping individuals get past barriers that keep them stuck or cause them discomfort. She helps people change limiting subconscious beliefs that hold them back. Through speaking engagements, workshops, and individual client work, Judy empowers others to achieve their goals.
Judy, what a pleasure it is to welcome you to the show, and thank you for being this week's guest expert and mentor.
Judy Kane [00:01:25]:
I am so happy to be here and looking forward to the conversation.
Susan Friedmann [00:01:29]:
I'm excited about this. As I told you before we went on the air, you know, the whole idea of the subconscious doing all sorts of things that hold us back has been something that has been of, you know, personal interest. And I looked at your website and I love the statistic on your website that says 95% of a person's behavior is controlled by their subconscious mind. I think that's an excellent place to start. And let's talk about how do these subconscious beliefs impact us?
Judy Kane [00:02:02]:
What happens when we come into this world is we are little sponges. For the 1st 7 years, we're just acquiring subconscious beliefs. And the reason it matters is those form the basis for how we interpret events in our world, the behavior of other people, and what we think of ourselves. And it's our default system. Unless you're consciously focusing on something specific that may or may not be different, It's that set of beliefs that is pretty much controlling how you respond to everything in your world.
Susan Friedmann [00:02:41]:
Where did they come from? You said up until 7 years old, but, you know, then what?
Judy Kane [00:02:47]:
Certainly. People get them after they're 7. If there are impactful situations, those go in as well. But for the most part, we are getting these subconscious beliefs by observing our, you know, immediate family or listening to what they say. Sometimes they don't say it. It's just how they behave. Or other places where we interact and they have an impact on us. Schools, other institutions, neighborhoods, All those things can help form the subconscious beliefs that end up in us.
Susan Friedmann [00:03:22]:
I think sometimes inadvertently parents and teachers say things that have this effect that you don't realize. I remember being told, well, you're not good enough to go to college. I was like, What? And this stuck with me for a while and I'm like, Hell, why not? I'm gonna go to college. I really did. And I was like, I'm gonna prove you wrong.
Judy Kane [00:03:47]:
Yeah.
Susan Friedmann [00:03:48]:
But that could have also held me back.
Judy Kane [00:03:50]:
Absolutely. Good for you for not paying attention to that, but it can, you know, if children are told that they're stupid or they're no good, or they don't have anything interesting to say, or they're a klutz or no good at math, all the things, they'll believe it because they don't know any better and they assume you
Susan Friedmann [00:04:11]:
do. It's so funny because being an author and now a speaker, that too was, you know, my father, I got a bad report one time that my writing wasn't good and my comprehension. So he thought, Well, I'm going to help her do better. And my chore was to write every weekend, And I had no idea what to write. And I used to stare out of the window trying to get some inspiration. It was a painful exercise. Which sort of amuses me now, the fact that I've got 18 books and it's like, okay. So something happened even though it felt painful at the time, in retrospect, I learned so much.
Judy Kane [00:04:57]:
Yeah. Clearly, if you'd, you know, written 18 books, that got unblocked.
Susan Friedmann [00:05:02]:
Yeah. It took a while, let me tell you. So let's talk about how do these subconscious beliefs actually show up in our lives?
Judy Kane [00:05:14]:
Yeah. A lot of times the subconscious beliefs are not consistent with your conscious beliefs, right? So people don't always know what's working against them, But they might notice that they have patterns where they either have this same reaction whenever they think about doing a certain thing, or they notice they have patterns in relationships that they've had through life and they might not be what they would choose. Good for them if they are, but if they are noticing that the relationships are not going well and they all seem very similar, That's a clue that you've got some subconscious beliefs that might be working against you. Or people could be working really, really hard doing all the right things to be more successful in their business, and it doesn't seem to have much of an impact. There's something there in their subconscious usually that is helping you avoid one of the byproducts of reaching that goal, perhaps. An example would be, I worked with a client once who was a coach and knew how to do fabulous coaching. She was doing all the right things, but she couldn't get her business to grow. And it turns out that she had subconscious beliefs about the only way to have a successful business was to work 20 fourseven.
Judy Kane [00:06:38]:
So her subconscious was protecting her work life balance by keeping her business small and changing it to know that she could have a successful business and a balanced life made a big difference in what she was seeing with her business.
Susan Friedmann [00:06:54]:
With somebody like that, which is a very interesting example because I'm sure many of our listeners can relate to that, what needs to change there? How do you change a belief that you've had, let's say, for 30, 40 years, and then change it so that it's going to do what you would really like it to do, but you've been standing in your own way?
Judy Kane [00:07:19]:
When I work with people, or when I'm doing presentations and such, the first thing to identify is what is it you really want to be happening in your life? A lot of times people make decisions about what they don't want or they make decisions to avoid some consequence. So the first thing is to decide what it is you really want to be happening. And sometimes that takes people a little bit of thought. They don't always know what that is. But once they figure out what they wanna be happening, then we go through and try to figure out how exactly will that look. Right? What are some examples of how that would play out in your life? And sometimes that can be enough to make that shift. If you've given up really clear detailed examples, sometimes your subconscious will kind of shift into that going, oh, I see. Other times, people need help with somebody who can help change those subconscious beliefs for them.
Susan Friedmann [00:08:17]:
And that's a lot of what you do, correct?
Judy Kane [00:08:19]:
It is. Yes.
Susan Friedmann [00:08:20]:
Yes. Let's talk about self sabotage. Mhmm. Because I think that's something that many listeners, and I know I've done it, and I know many of my clients do it, is that we hold ourselves back. Procrastinating, or where does all this come from? What's happening here? Why are we doing this?
Judy Kane [00:08:43]:
Usually, it's because there's something attached to the outcome that is, in your subconscious opinion, not good for you. It might be that if you're talking about business or writing or being successful in some way in a business context, It might be that you've got conflicting beliefs about money. Most people do. Money is a measure of success, usually. You grow up with other beliefs about money, like it's not okay to want more than you need because that would be greedy, or you don't want to be like those people who have too much. We don't like how they behave or it's the root of all evil or you have to work really hard for it. I mean, there are all sorts of beliefs about money that come with caution. Right? It could be that when you self sabotage, it's your subconscious's way of protecting you from those results that don't seem like they would be good for you.
Judy Kane [00:09:43]:
But you can also be doing this because of some other fears. Right? I mean, it's all based on avoiding a consequence, but it could be a fear of being seen or visible. It can also be not ready to be in the limelight, not feeling like you really deserve to be seen and heard. And the visibility part of it could be very unsettling for people if you've got beliefs that you don't really know what you're doing or don't have something important to say. There are all sorts of ways that people would procrastinate, reasons that they will do that, or self sabotage to avoid consequences to what that success would do in their life.
Susan Friedmann [00:10:29]:
It's interesting that you say that because that brings back up a memory for me that early on in my career in the speaking business, I'm very involved in the National Speakers Association, I saw these people being so super successful and doing 200 speeches a year. They were making money and, you know, as you say, being in the limelight, being famous. And then their family life sucked. Many of them were divorced, they had kids who were troubled, some of them even had kids who committed suicide. I mean, it was really drastic. It was, like, the two sides to this. And I was like, I don't want that to happen to me. I know that consciously, I held myself back for fear that that would happen to me because my family life is very important to me.
Susan Friedmann [00:11:27]:
That's something that I value. When I saw these people and I was like, is that what I have to give up to be successful?
Judy Kane [00:11:35]:
So if your subconscious believes that's true, in your case, it was conscious, but for some people, it's they're not aware of it, but the subconscious is going, This is not what I want. You know, I've got other priorities.
Susan Friedmann [00:11:48]:
So a lot comes up for authors. They write the book, they publish the book, now I've got to put it out to the world. And this imposter syndrome, which I don't know, is that considered the same as self sabotage, or is that sort of another subconscious belief that I'm not good enough for this?
Judy Kane [00:12:11]:
I think of this imposter syndrome more in the category of beliefs about your own value than I do about avoiding a consequence, doubting your knowledge of the subject. If you're writing a book, or particularly if it's nonfiction, you want to be credible. You want to be informed. You want to put value out there for the readers. There's that room for doubt of do I really know enough to talk about this? Are there other thoughts about this subject that I'm not taking into account? There are all sorts of questions you could be asking yourself that make you pause once it's out there and maybe not do all of the, promotion that you would otherwise do.
Susan Friedmann [00:12:55]:
Which goes back to what you were talking about being seen or being visible because that's what you're inviting, you know, the invitation is to be seen. And if you want to be successful, you need to be out there. I mean, the book is not gonna sell itself as you well know. It's really you and obviously your passion, but also the fact that, yeah, it's a sort of a vulnerable situation that you put yourself in because there's that fear of criticism and judgment that comes along with all of this potential fame.
Judy Kane [00:13:32]:
And sometimes that can also be connected with your usually in childhood, you learn if love is conditional or not, Thinking that you're only held in high esteem if everything is perfect or the way people want it could make you very worried about people's opinions of you.
Susan Friedmann [00:13:53]:
Yeah. So that's that anxiety, that fear. I think there's a lot of interconnection with these as well.
Judy Kane [00:14:01]:
Oh, absolutely.
Susan Friedmann [00:14:02]:
The self sabotage, the anxiety, the imposter syndrome that they all seem to. And then, as we said, that procrastination, why aren't we doing things? I know that there was a challenge, and I've got clients like this too, that it's a challenge to get the project finished.
Judy Kane [00:14:21]:
Because then you'd have to see how well it's received. Right? If you can put on putting it out there, you avoid the critiques, you avoid the seeing the results. Did anybody buy it? Did anybody like it? That can be something that people dread knowing the answer to.
Susan Friedmann [00:14:41]:
Yeah. Again, all of this visibility comes with, we're going to be judged whether we like it or not. Everybody's judging everybody about something or other, some more than others. But it is that vulnerability of the judgment, of the criticism that you want to avoid. So is that one of the reasons that you might hold yourself back and not complete a project?
Judy Kane [00:15:05]:
Absolutely. As long as you can put it off, then you don't have to see how well it did. Right? And you could also have some perfectionist tendencies. Well, it just needs a little more of my polishing here. And I know I can say this better there. And you can go back over it and over it. But at some point in time, you need to say, This is good enough. Right? This has got the message I want to put out there.
Judy Kane [00:15:29]:
Let's let the world see it.
Susan Friedmann [00:15:31]:
And I think that's really hard for a perfectionist. I mean, I know that I often wordsmith an article or even the book is like wordsmithing it to death. Mhmm. It's like, okay, I can't do any more with it, or a presentation that I spent hours on, one little thing, and yet there's nothing perfect that we need to strive for. You know, excellence or getting it done is better than perfect from what I understand.
Judy Kane [00:16:04]:
Right. Well, there's a point in time where it's good enough. Right?
Susan Friedmann [00:16:08]:
Yes. And only you can say that. Yes. I mean, unless, of course, you need it to hear it from somebody else. And sometimes, you do need to hear it from somebody else, an editor or even a colleague, you know, a beta reader of your book. So, yes, you might have to get that endorsement from the outside before you really believe it yourself.
Judy Kane [00:16:31]:
That's very true. You know, and then that support, because sometimes our inner voice isn't the cheerleader we would like, which is another indication you've got subconscious beliefs that aren't necessarily helping you along the way. But, yeah, getting that other person's opinion can be helpful, can be reassuring. But you've gotta believe it yourself, or you're not gonna take the final actions of putting it out there.
Susan Friedmann [00:16:55]:
So have you got any techniques that you could share that how can we be our own cheerleader?
Judy Kane [00:17:00]:
Notice when you're not, that would be a good place to start. When you take a look at what you're telling yourself, if it's not supportive, do a fact check on it. Is it really true that you never do any of this stuff right? Is it true that you're always awful at whatever the thing is? Do some fact checking on your self talk, both for the tone and the accuracy. That's one place to start. The other is look for the patterns of where things aren't going the way you would like them to go and kind of back chat from that as to what might be going on.
Susan Friedmann [00:17:37]:
Because when you were saying, Is it true? All of a sudden, it reminded me of Byron Katie because she talks about that all the time, you know, asking herself, Well, is it true? So Absolutely. Do you find though that we do have patterns, that we keep repeating the same thing over and over again, expecting a different result?
Judy Kane [00:17:57]:
Yeah. The definition of insanity, right? Absolutely. And that's one of the big places to look for clues. If you've got subconscious beliefs that are getting in your way, holding you back, limiting you in some way is those patterns. Because if you procrastinate on one job and it's not your normal way of approaching things, that's probably not a subconscious belief that was causing that. But if it's your way of operating where you're always procrastinating either with everything or things that are a certain type of behavior or action. That's a big clue that you've got subconscious beliefs that are, for some reason, not happy with possibility of you getting this thing done.
Susan Friedmann [00:18:43]:
Yeah. I always think about, you need to make it fun. It's gotta be fun and enjoyable. And if it is, then find something else. Because I know in marketing your book, there's not one way of doing it. There are multiple ways and some people don't want to speak in public. Okay. So maybe coaching or doing some other marketing activity that you don't have to speak on stage.
Susan Friedmann [00:19:08]:
I mean, people get scared to death about speaking on a stage. And it is. It can be. It's extremely stressful. But some people love it. They love the limelight. Other people have a hard time with that. Finding out what you enjoy doing, I think that's at the crux of it.
Susan Friedmann [00:19:26]:
Would you agree with that?
Judy Kane [00:19:28]:
I totally agree. If something doesn't resonate with you, it's not going to fall well on the audience ears. You gotta find the ways that are comfortable for you. You've really got to know that what you have put out there has value because people will hear that even if you consciously think it, if your subconscious isn't on board with that. The message comes out a little bit garbled. It doesn't resonate with the audience. But I think, definitely, when you're doing the marketing, you've gotta find the ways that are comfortable for you, that are fun for you, that are meaningful for you.
Susan Friedmann [00:20:06]:
Comfortable and fun. I think those are great words to use with that. What about mistakes that we make? Again, is this part of this whole pattern? We do it again because we make the mistakes and expect to do the same thing over and over again expecting that same result? Is that
Judy Kane [00:20:28]:
Well, you know, depends on the type of mistake you're talking about. Like, some mistakes are self sabotage. If you consistently write the wrong dates in your calendar, or you never get to meetings on time, or the stuff you need to take to interact with somebody, you you can't find the materials when you need them. Those are all kind of symptoms that the result is something that your subconscious doesn't think is good for you. Nobody's perfect. Right? So if they are just general mistakes that happen every so often with anybody, I think that's a different situation where if you've got a good, healthy appreciation for yourself, your value, where you can take those in stride. But if you make one mistake and obsess about it for weeks about how awful that one mistake was, that's kinda blowing things out of proportion. I would look to other, like, self worth types of beliefs there.
Susan Friedmann [00:21:30]:
Yeah. It's so easy sometimes to get obsessed with something that you did incorrectly. And you're like, oh my goodness, I can never do that again. And what do people think? And all of this head trash that goes on.
Judy Kane [00:21:45]:
Yeah. I remember being in middle school, and then I have 2 daughters, and I remember each of them going through middle school, and how painful that age is. You feel like you're under a microscope and people really aren't paying as much attention to what you're doing or wearing well they weren't back then. Now with social media, it might be different. But you have a warped sense of how much attention people are paying to you. So the mistakes can seem catastrophic at the time. One of the things I really appreciate as each year that I grow, my perspective changes. And you can kind of balance out these things that seemed awful in the momentor would have if you were youngerand kind of put them into a different perspective now, which I really appreciate.
Susan Friedmann [00:22:36]:
Doctor. I think you touched on something interesting there because social media, I think, could be doing a lot of damage Because you see other people and they're always talking about how successful they are rather than, hey, this didn't work for me, and this is what I learned. Rather, look how many books I sold or how brilliant I am, that's in in your face, and you're thinking, wow. I'm not good enough.
Judy Kane [00:23:00]:
Yeah. It's also that makes me think about risk taking. We grow up in families that have different tolerance or acceptance of risk. Worrying about something not working is a side effect of that, whereas if you grew up in a family where it's, well, let's try this and see how it works. Right? Or you gotta do it a lot of times to get good at something. Right? And knowing that makes it easier to try things. Whereas if you were brought up where it was not okay to do it wrong, that's going to have a big impact on your ability to try things when you grow up.
Susan Friedmann [00:23:40]:
Fascinating. I'm sure we could talk about this for hours, Judy. I'm loving it. How can our listeners find out more about you and the work you do? Talk to us about that.
Judy Kane [00:23:53]:
Sure. I've got a website, alignedconsciousness.com. And on that, there's a lot of information about the process I use. There are some free downloads on the resource page. You can book a free phone call if you've got questions. Wanna know more about what I do, or how it might help you. All of those things are available on our website. And I have a book, oh, by the way, that you can get wherever books are sold. (Your4Truths: How Beliefs Impact Your Life )
Susan Friedmann [00:24:23]:
That's the 4 truths. Correct?
Judy Kane [00:24:25]:
Yes. Yes. Your 4 truths.
Judy Kane [00:24:28]:
Thank you. Yeah. It's all spreading. No spaces in there, and the 4 is the numeral 4. That's right there too. There's a link to that on my website as well.
Susan Friedmann [00:24:38]:
Perfect. And we'll put those in the show notes so that people can get there quite easily. Judy, as you know, we always ask our guests to leave our listeners with a golden nugget. What's yours?
Judy Kane [00:24:50]:
We've been talking about all the things that hold people back, And a lot of times people just assume it's the way they are. It's just the way they have to live this life. And I always encourage them to understand that if something is not playing out in your life the way you want it to, there are things you could do to change that. Don't just accept the limits that you've put on yourself. Know that if you want something different, you can go out and make that difference.
Susan Friedmann [00:25:18]:
Beautiful words of wisdom. Yes. Listeners take that to heart. And, again, so much juicy information that it's well worth listening to this several times over to really get all the nuggets that Judy shared with us. So thank you, Judy, so much for sharing your wisdom. And by the way, listeners, if your book isn't selling the way you wanted or expected to, let's you and I jump on a quick call together to brainstorm ways to ramp up those sales because you've invested a whole lot of time, money, and energy, and it's time you got the return you were hoping for. So go to BookMarketingBrainstorm.com to schedule your free call. And in the meantime, I hope this powerful interview sparks some ideas you can use to sell more books.
Until next week, here's wishing you much book and author marketing success.
