Show Up and Shine: Episode 2 – The Matt Young Podcast is now LIVE!

The Podcast all about finding your authentic voice, overcoming your fears of public speaking, and exclusive tips and tricks on how to become a fantastic public speaker

Joining me on today’s episode is Matt Young. He is a former Broadway dancer, touring with shows like, A Chorus Line, On the Town, and West Side Story across The US, Canada, and Europe – and he is an acting and speaking coach. So he’s been teaching people in TEDx Suva, Pacific Voices in Unison, and he is the head tutor and founder of Tukuna Acting Club in Fiji. He’s next teaching course is nailing your American accent, partnering with Brisbane local acting hub The Factory.

He’s also an Australian now, he’s career brought him to Australia where he met his husband 21 years ago, and the cool thing about Matt is that he has two grown adopted sons, who are actually brothers. 

In this episode with Matt, you’ll learn:

  • How learning to speak with one’s authentic voice brings power, strength, and truth through acknowledging one’s identity, origins, and experiences. And how he feels there’s bravery in sharing experiences. 
  • You’ll also learn what he does to recover after mental blocks, or ‘brain farts’, that threaten to derail him when he’s on stage, and the strategies that you can use to get back on track as well
  • You’ll also learn the acting techniques he uses when coaching corporate students, and how they make an impact on how the student connects, even with the blandest and most boring content 

So let’s welcome our guest Matt Young!

Read the show notes below:

Show Up and Shine Up – Episode 2 – Featuring Matt Young

Duration: 44 minutes, 02 seconds

Intro:

Welcome to this episode of Show Up and Shine, a podcast, all about helping busy business owners get out of their own way in order to take the time to be more fully present to the nudging’s of their inner voice, articulate their key messages, and show up to share their wisdom with authenticity and heart.

A bit about Bec:

I’m Bec, a professional singer, actor, mum, wife, and all-round creative business boss, who runs Bec Djapovic Creative, where me and my team help you boost your confidence, get more visible, and make a bigger impact in the world with clever copywriting, high-quality voice-overs, and speaking coaching – so that you can achieve your dreams in business and life, without losing your humanity or burning out.

The Authentic Matt Young Q&A

Bec’s Bit: We met years ago when I was teaching performing arts, and I was gallivanting around in a number of places. I had an online side hustle for coaching talented teens and emerging performers, and you were a guest on my blog. I interviewed you in the written form. So now when I heard you’re back in town in Brisbane in the hometown, and that you’ve moved back from Fiji, and I last connected to you when we were doing The Story Chunder. So it’s been a while.

Yeah, no it’s great, I know we know each other from you know different lives, different pasts – which is something I wanna talk a lot about today. Which is mainly origins and exploring you know, our pasts to bring us into our most present self, which makes us our most powerful self I think.

Yeah, Oh my gosh, I totally agree, and you know, I’m so excited that our guests are going to learn from you. They’re going to hear about your story, learn from your many skills.

Q1: Before we dive in, I do want to know, and I want to do some celebrations. So what was one thing that you did this morning that was like the highlight of your day?

Matt’s answer: Well, the highlight of my day, personally was just eating peanut butter toast because I love peanut butter on toast, so that made me feel very happy, and then I actually have this practice, I borrowed it from a social media coach named Heidi Dean who’s in New York. We both went to New York University, I don’t think we went at the same time, but basically people think I’m on social media all the time, but what I really do is I get up and during drinking my cup of coffee I just response to five things on Twitter, five things on Instagram, and five things on Facebook.

Aside from scheduling things, that’s pretty much my only planned social media time for the day.

That’s great, because it does look like you are everywhere and you’ve got a few different projects on the boil that we’re going to chat about. So they’ve all got their own branding, their own place on the net. So it’s cool to know that there’s only the five things that you do in each of those in the morning. That’s a great routine and yet love peanut butter – oh, it’s delicious!

Yeah I grew up in America so you know peanut butter is like a big thing in America.

Q2: Everyone heard a little bit about you in the intro, but tell everyone, a little bit about The Story Chunder, cause we’ve just touched on that now

Matt’s Answer: So I’ve been a performer for many years as have you, and then, when I was living in Fiji I became a speaker coach as well, looking at what transferable skills I can use from my life as a musical theatre performer, into a new environment where there wasn’t a big performing arts industry. So what I’ve learned the most in Fiji, because I worked with groups like Pacific voices in Unison, who brought Islanders from other South Pacific Islands who brought their stories to the climate conference 23 in Bremen, Germany, and so I became fascinated, I mean, I guess it’s something we’ve always known.

I mean we can talk about how we’re in Brisbane, on the land of the Jagera and Turrbal people and these stories have been being told here for decades, upon decades, upon decades, like tens of thousands of years, and somehow we’ve forgotten this knowledge – I mean I’m half Polish.

So, you know, I always look back to some of my Eastern European roots and this oral tradition of storytelling. We have all this knowledge, but sometimes if we don’t pass on that knowledge we forget who we are and where we came from. So when I came back into Brisbane, I wanted to bring some of that storytelling with me and I’m not the first person to do a storytelling event in Brisbane, or in the world – So I started something called The Story Chunder.

I decided to work specifically with people that were in the performing arts or in the arts industries, so that they could tell a bit more about themselves, to a captive audience. And we could learn a bit more about their story and that is therefore going to inform us when we look at their art, when we hear their music when we see them in theatrical productions.

I think that’s really cool, and a lot of the time, as an artist or an actor you are, working off someone else’s fine words or someone else’s script. So you’re not tapping into what your beliefs are about the situation or sharing much about yourself. You of course try and do it by taking the words from the other person and make them as honest and as applicable to your own life experience as possible that makes you a compelling actor, or compelling performer.

But I think it’s really cool that you’ve given this space for performers essentially, to access that part of them that probably, just doesn’t get heard enough unless they are actively creating their own art, finding their voice that way. So that’s really cool.

People from outside the arts sector might not realize this, so I just want to share this – that we still have to pitch like any other business person when we want to get a show presented. We need to pitch why that show is important to be told at this moment, which always includes telling a bit about the truth about where we are in this moment and where we come from. So I guess the story that we want to share, because we’re looking to share universal stories and that plays a big part into my speaker coaching as well, because I’m not really a content coach.

I’ve had people do TEDx talks, around the world, et cetera, et cetera. I help them refine their content but I’m not going to listen to the interview and then write them a speech in their words because I can’t do that. So by empowering people to start to tell their own stories, and bring some of their history, personal history into their stories. Because again, I get it, I’m a father, I’m a gay man, I’m an adoptive parent, like these are all things from a performer Broadway dancer, all four things are interesting and there’s always presence in anything I do as a speaker or as an actor.

I love that, and you know, on the form you’ve said that, the key takeaway that you’d love our listeners to walk away with is that learning to speak in one’s own authentic voice, brings them power, strength, truth, and through acknowledging one’s identity, origins, and experience and bravery in sharing experiences, is the key.

Q3: So I’m curious, when was the time that you didn’t feel like this?

Matt’s answer: Most of my life, I’d say I really only found my authentic voice probably about five or six years ago. And what I mean by that is, we all start to have those telephone voices that we use, like “Hi, this is Matt” – because I’m from America and I live in Australia, so I’m using this like hybrid accent I’m kind of talking up in my head and trying to be polite and trying to be liked, but I’m a physically large man, 100kg, tall 1.75m, so there’s a perception when people see me, about what my voice I should sound like.

So I found that I was pushing my voice up, pushing my voice up, pushing my voice to try and apologize perhaps for my size or for my presence. Through the voice work where I’ve dropped into my body. That’s the voice that you’re hearing now, I speak on a much lower pitch compared to 5 or 6 years ago, and I was using it primarily just as a presenter and as a teacher. And then I thought this is actually how I feel all the time, so I’m going to start honouring that I can have a fully embodied voice in my everyday life.

Oh, I love that. Like a fully embodied voice in your everyday life.

This came from a lawyer friend of mine, in Sydney. She was really working hard to find her place in a sort of male-dominated space. She found that at the end of every trial she would lose her voice for like a week and a half, and so what was happening was she was straining her voice. She was putting it all forward, she was trying to sound more aggressive or more masculine or whatever it was that was going on in her mind. So we found by dropping her pitch by a musical tone again, have her sit on her voice instead of above her voice, it started to even out that problem.

It’s so interesting, the full embodied voice.

Having great access to where your voice sits and how you’re speaking, can impact a room significantly. When I’m teaching, and I know lots of teachers out there would do the same thing. If they want to engage the class more presently or get the attention in, instead of going like, “Hey, listen to me”, and yelling for the class’s attention. They’ll bring it down to a little bit of a softer, and a softer place. But having control of the dynamics of your voice and then feeling how you can access them is really, is really key.

I think there’s a lot of what you’ve said that resonates with the work that I’m doing with women at the moment. So we do a lot of embodiment practices before we get into speaking, and part of the pre-stage rituals that we do are like moving into your body so that you can feel where that sense of authentic natural power sits and where your voice can then produce itself.

Even now I’m quite frantic. I was talking to you before, like trying to set up the podcast and I had my husband asking for things and you know, I’ve come into this conversation and I could feel my voice is like maybe two times above where it wants to naturally sit in and you know, being pregnant, it’s not helpful cause your diaphragm’s like up near your ears or whatever.

It’s really interesting, and I think, there’s a call for authentic speakers now in the market, especially with so many things being online. Like a lot of the teachers are saying, the more authentic that you are, the more that you can just show up as yourself, use your own kind of voice. Then you’re going to attract the people who want to work with you, and you’re going to have deeper transformations for them. You’re going to have deeper relationships and deeper experiences. And I think that’s super, super key.

Absolutely, I agree, even as an acting coach, authenticity is so important now because we can stream everything, and we see so much reality television. There’s a very high ‘BS’ metre right now, in the world in general. You can watch our politicians, there’s a lot of examples of how we’re losing faith in people that used to have authority, because we are used to seeing this authenticity,

If someone is saying something on television, for example a political leader and they’re not connecting to their voice, and they’re not connecting to the actual story, they’re just reading a line, we’re getting really better at seeing that because of all the media we’re absorbing everyday, through streaming services, through the internet.

Yeah we’re able to pick up on that it’s ‘BS’, like you said, we can just go “no”, and then we flick onto something else, you know? There’s a call for authentic leadership isn’t there.

Q4: We talked about you being an actor and we’ve touched on some of the acting things that potentially you use when you’re coaching a person. So what are more specific techniques that you might use when coaching a person on fine-tuning their presentation?

Matt’s answer: The first thing always is what is your warmup ritual? And I would say 95% of the time, I get like a blank stare or someone says, “I don’t have one”- and I always say this is crazy! Like if you were going to go run for 10km, you wouldn’t just walk out the door and start running, you would stretch, you would make sure that you had something to eat, you would drink some water, you would open up your athletic instrument.

I’m a huge advocate – so when I teach someone, or a group, I’ll spend at least 20 minutes to a half an hour showing them a routine and talking them through what that is. That then can be condensed down to 10 minutes, to five minutes, to three minutes, but we need to start by learning the entire process. This is something we do as actors as well, we don’t just go in to do a musical and not do your stretches or your vocal eases, right? I think that that’s probably the most important thing, just always remembering that, and I have to remind myself all the time as a public speaker, I can’t just go out there and be like, “Hey LALALA” – because did you hear my voice went way up? I wasn’t sitting in my voice.

These are a lot of techniques that I borrowed from singing teachers, people I’ve seen and coached, and acting coaches that I’ve had along the way. It’s just these ways of not only grounding myself vocally, but also getting rid of all that unnecessary energy that drives our nerves, et cetera, et cetera…

Yeah, it’s really good. So becoming centred and then exercising the tools that you need to then be an authentic speaker. 

Q5: You mentioned getting into your body and I wonder if you can share one activity that you do, like whether it’s doing a yoga stretch or star-jumps, or what do you do to encourage yourself?

Matt’s answer: It’s a bit of both. I regularly practice yoga, but it depends on the presentation I need to do. For acting on camera, sometimes I will do 25 squats or 25 push-ups, just to get that energy up, and then take a few deep breaths to centre it. Then hopefully at that point, I’m so concentrated, that’s when I’m in my strongest power, but at the same point, I’m sure some of us have experienced this, where you have your speech and it’s minutes and seconds before you’re going on and 30 seconds before you’re going out and you’re still reading that speech to yourself, “Ladies and gentlemen, honourable members, blah blah blah” – That’s when you know, we need to do the rehearsal, and the rehearsal should have been done way before 30 seconds before you go on stage.

So I find in those 30 seconds, or three minutes before, I do a meditation to calm myself, to assure myself and to empower myself, is more successful, because I will have rehearsed everything. I will know all those things if I go in there with a frantic energy, and I need to say these words, and I’m worried about mispronouncing this name – that’s where I lose control. So it might be a meditation followed by (if I need to have very high energy) some star ups or something like that, and then three deep breaths, and then boom, on you go. 

Three deep breaths and then boom!

Bec’s Bit: How would it feel to speak with ease and flow from the wisdom of your body? What would that change in the way you show up for meetings, presentations, negotiations, or one-on-one conversations? What could it do for your career, your business, your life? Well, if you want to clarify your message, and learn to share it powerfully, with authentic confidence, you need to try WomanSpeak. WomanSpeak is a transformational public speaking training that addresses the unique fears and doubts women have about sharing their voices. We create a safe space where women celebrate and support each other in speaking up and learning.

My WomanSpeak public speaking circles are created to support women like you, to find and amplify your authentic voice. My circles provide a safe space for communities of brave women to show up and shine, and celebrate others along the way. The nurturing circles also allow you to continue improving and enhancing your public speaking practice. In my introductory circle, you’ll learn the unconventional WomanSpeak practices that have helped thousands of women across the globe feel empowered to speak up and share their ideas. These unique practices actually help rewire your nervous system around public speaking, turning fear into confidence. For more information head to becdjapovic.com/womanspeak-intro-event. 

Now back with the show!

Now I love that, there’s a certain moment before you’re on stage, the setup and the three deep breaths and then boom, you’re on. There’s that moment when you take that leap of faith, then you’re on and you just have to trust that you’ve done the preparation number one. Number two, that you’re going to be able to keep going, if you do forget something.

Q6: Tell me about when you’re on stage and you do have a stumbling block where you get a blank or something. Tell me about a time when you’ve experienced that, and then how did you move through that?

Matt’s answer: It actually happens a lot to me. I present as a very confident person, but I’m very anxious. Anxiety has become more of a thing as I grow older and, as I sort of seem to be perceived as an expert in my field – so that’s a lot of pressure. I do stumble, and I would say not always, but often I say that, and it’s probably not true – it’s a 5% or 2% stumble. 

I just want to interject here because there’s two points that you’ve said about positioning yourself as the expert, and then there’s a lot of pressure that comes with that. I totally get that. One really helpful thing is being able to reframe that and to just be part of the conversation, like contributing to the conversation, you’ve just got different things to share, which I think takes a lot of the pressure off.

Number two, it happens often and I stumble, but I think that’s because the expectation from an acting perspective is that you’ve got the next line that you need to nail, in order to serve the story, in order to let the next person know when their time to come in is. To serve the script. I think that maybe plays into it there, and so there’s a certain amount of freedom that we get to have when we are presenting. 

This is something that I tell people all the time. If you’re melting down, you’re up there, you’re starting and you’re melting down. It’s okay to acknowledge that, and say “oh you know, I’ve had a busy day today, or something else is on my mind. Let me rephrase that, let me start again. Let me go back to this point”, giving yourself permission.

I was in a play in 2014, in Brisbane, and it was our first public audience and it was a big play where I had about 80% of the dialogue, it was essentially a monologue, and we had bits of the script on the stage. The full script was in the desk drawer, and I got to a point and I was telling the story, and I couldn’t quite remember where I was in the story, or if I’ve said that already, or was I jumping ahead.

So nobody knew the play, because it was a new play, so I walked up to the desk, I opened the draw, I took out the script (this all probably took place in about 3 seconds, but felt like 30 minutes), and there I was with the script, trying to find the line, and I’m so flustered at this point because I can’t find the line, so I just looked up to the stage manager, in the back of the theater. I said “I don’t know where I am, could I have the next line please”, and this was with a live audience. Then they yelled out the five words that prompted me, and then I jumped back into the show.

For me that felt like the biggest failure or whatever the audience didn’t mind at all, because the audience understood in that moment, I sort of gave them permission to go, he’s just stumbled and he’s acknowledged it and now we’re moving on – so it didn’t interrupt the storytelling for the audience, with me breathing deeply and panicking.

I think that was a great lesson that if you’re delivering a speech and trying to get to a message and you do stumble, or you forget something, you can always say, “oh I missed something, let’s go back to this”, and then continue forward from there. 

I think a lot of people are forgiving because it’s a very common fear or a common block that’s going to happen when you get up there. So if you’re in the audience, you can understand because you can put yourself in that position and go, “Oh, well, he’s so brave being up there anyway”, I’m sitting here and listening, kudos. I can forgive that because I’m still understanding and getting something from the conversation. 

One other trick about how to keep yourself motivated or focused and get rid of those nerves is, and this is an actor thing, is I always have a super-objective, for stated intention for a speech. Often business-wise the intention may be that you’re trying to raise money for something. At the end of my speech I want to have a hundred people contribute $1,000 or whatever it is. It might not be a realistic goal, it might not be something that you can achieve, but by stating it out loud and giving in a number, like I want 100 views on my webpage, or whatever it is that takes the pressure off you, and we’re trying to action the audience, to move into action, and that action is to contribute this money. Not only give me a hundred dollars, but come up to shake my hand, and commit to that $1000 or whatever it was, or the cause of my speech. That then gives you something to work on where you’re not worrying about yourself, what does my voice sound like, what do I do with my hands? All the things that we often worry about. 

For the people listening who might not be actors or come from an acting background, that’s what Simon Sinek describes as finding your why. Then having an objective, like even in training – I’ve just done an adult training presenters course, that talks about having an objective. Stating what your objective is and you said, putting it into a sentence.

For example, by the end of this 40 minutes, people are going to have more awareness around this, or by the end of this 50min speech, people are going to feel compelled to come up, shake my hand and contribute $100 to the project or the cause. It’s such a great thing. It keeps you on track. It keeps you focused and keeps the focus off yourself, which is so cool.

Q7: I want to dive a little bit deeper into what you do as a trainer and, as a coach. When working with people in Fiji, did you have to work with people with English as a second language, or any other blocks they may have had towards improving on how they speak? Like for example, did you make it smoother, such as standing them in front of a mirror or anything like that? This is a question from someone in our audience.

Matt’s answer: That’s a great question. I don’t really advocate looking in a mirror very often, of course it’s a helpful technique, but I want people through embodiment exercises, start to know what feels right. Oftentimes people want to film themselves, and watch it back, and go and get criticisms, which I of course will do. For me, it’s about going back to that breathwork, and that bodywork and a lot of it is about that super objective in the storytelling.

In Fiji, English is the official language of Fiji, but we speak several different languages there, including a version of Hindi which is a dialect that’s quite specific to Fiji. What I found with a lot of my clients, whether they’re Russian speakers, or Fijian speakers, or Hindi speakers is that, I love to include people’s base language, or mother tongue in their speeches. If I’m telling you a story, and I say, “as my mother used to say”, at Christmas we have this reading in Polish and it goes like this, [speaks Polish], you know what I can’t say it, not even going to bother. I would practice that, and then I would translate it for them.

Why do you do that?

Matt’s answer: I think that a lot of us, again, it has to do with the origin and with universality humanity. Especially in the corporate world, there’s been in the past this pressure for everybody to be the same way, look the same way, speak the same way, and use the same techniques. I still get that thing where men will shake my hand and they’ll turn their hands, so that they have their hand on top of mine, for the advantage. 

I hate that. That’s like the dominant thing, it’s “bs”, isn’t it?

It’s like they’re stuck in the 70’s or the 80’s, it’s so obnoxious right?

So I like breaking out of that by sharing some of your origin, you know what I mean? Like, I use my mother a lot my mother is very present in what I teach and in what I speak about, because whether you have a relationship with your mother, or not, that’s something that’s primal and universal, we can all relate back to that idea of what it is to be a son or to be a daughter, and then therefore to be a parent as well. You would guess that almost everybody is going to be able to relate to that, because they have some feeling about their mother.

That’s what it’s about, it’s about building the relationship and rapport with the audience.

Yeah, so I do find that when we speak in our native tongue, as well as if we’re a non English speaker in an English speaking environment that just gives people a window into where we come from. Especially a fluent speaker, this is also why I said with the Polish I have to practice, because I’m not a fluent Polish speaker, but I mean, a lot of people are fluent in more than one language. So when they can say you know, “blah blah blah”, and my grandmother said, “blah blah blah”, and that means… (And I say blah blah blah, not to be flippant, or disrespectful or gender-based to mother tongue) And then they can translate into English. And then, there’s this sort of ancient mysticism that exists around sharing that bit of your culture.

Yeah, it’s huge you sharing that bit of culture, in any sort of sense where you have to be open and vulnerable. Like I remember listening to the relationship coach, who’s that fantastic Belgian woman. She is phenomenal, and she has clients sit in the office and if someone is more closed off or withdrawn, they’re having trouble expressing what they have to say, and then if their language, like English is not their mother tongue. She’ll say, well, say that in Spanish so that you can really get the essence of like, tap into the truth of that for you, in order to then transform what’s happening in this relationship. It’s so powerful when you can speak your truth, from that point, that impacts so much on an audience’s experience.

Yeah, and I also find, because there were several people that I worked with in Fiji that whether they were from Fiji or from other non-English speaking European countries, that we’re living there. I can coach actors in a different language, even if I don’t know that language, because by working with the actor and by understanding what the story is, they can give me a rough translation of what they’re working on. You can see if they connect to it, you know what I mean? Like I don’t have to know Hindi to see when an actor is connecting to something in Hindi. Like talking about the loss of their child, or whatever, you can see that authentically, or you can if it’s not authentic, you can see if they’re trying to manipulate it. That was a big lesson for me as well, just to have the strength, to acknowledge that what I do as a coach, especially with acting is that I don’t need to speak the language, to help people find that voice.

That’s really cool, and helping people find that voice is crucial. Especially if the person’s a business owner, like a lot of my audience that will be listening. One thing, as you were speaking, I was remembering a coaching client who I was helping with her podcasting. I’d written her intro script, like in collaboration with her and some of the language that I was using wasn’t necessarily her own. So that was tweaked and whatnot.

One of the techniques that we used was, and I don’t know what it’s called. I think it’s like a replacement or something. So if you’ve got to say a sentence that feels a bit like you’re not connecting to it or it’s unauthentic or something like that is to use visualizations, to drop into the essence of the meaning of that thing to make it feel more true for you. So that you could say it from that more truthful perspective, you get what I’m saying? She was blown away by that. I was like, Oh, that’s a really cool technique to use. 

I use that a lot with my business clients, especially because sometimes you have to present something that’s a little bit dry, like maybe your pie charts, or what the profits were for the last year. Where you might feel like this is a little bit drier or boring. So then I’ll say to the speaker, so what are you passionate about, do you like soccer? Oh my gosh, that my team, my team, my team, you know what I mean? And then you’re like okay great! So when you get to this bit and you’re talking about the profits for the first quarter, think about your team. 

Yeah. That’s so cool. I love that. Think about your team. Think about something that you’re really passionate about. It also helps to use stories, use anecdotes or use metaphors in that dry presentation to make it better for yourself and for the audience.

Even just mentioning when my team was behind in the first quarter, they rallied to win, and we’re rallying in the second quarter of our year, et cetera, et cetera…I was a sporty person, so I find that something that excites me – I was a swimmer.

You were awesome!

Q8: Let’s talk mindset. We’ve talked like embodiment, we’ve talked, getting your objective clear, we’ve talked about meditations. What do you think about self-talk? Do you coach your clients on self-talk in the preparation?

Matt’s answer: Now this is where the mirror comes in. People will say it sounds hokey, or it sounds airy-fairy or all sorts of negative things that we then make into negative self-talk. It’s that classic power stance, standing with your hands on your hips, and your chest up, I think self-talk is so important, and recognizing when the negative self-talk comes in.

Being able to live with that and realize what’s true and what’s not, or I recognize that’s what’s happening and I need to let it pass away, and maybe substituting that with something positive. For example if people are going to call me out as a fraud, saying I’m not an expert in my field. Similar to what you said earlier, is that you look at that. I always talk about a snapshot with a caption, and you tear off the caption, and crumple it up, throw it on the ground. Then you, re-caption in with nobody has heard my story, or I have something unique to say.

I love that, it’s such a strong visualization.

Yes, that physicality of ripping the paper, crumpling it and throwing it to the floor, is something that’s very valuable to me, when it comes to that negativity.

You know, what’s valuable to me about reframing negativity is, I’m a big ‘journaler’, I write a lot. So I use these things called living mantras, which are like affirmations, but they’re asked in a question. So some of them would be, why does everyone want to hear what I have to say? Why is everyone so receptive to my authentic voice? It kind of primes your brain, and I mentioned this in my visibility bundle, which is on the website, Becdjapovic.vipmembervault.com. You can grab a visibility bundle in there.

It’s like stating the affirmation in a question and it gets your brain primed to look for more evidence that people are receptive to what you have to say. Saying things like the expert might question might be, why is it so easy to just show up and have my voice as part of the conversation, something that I’m passionate about? Well then, you start to think, well, because it’s fun, and because I’ve got one life, and because I want to do this, and because it might help someone.

That brings me back to origins, back to history and origins. The life that I lived as a 48-year-old gay man, who has been married, I’m with my partner for 21 years, we were legally married since 2015 in America, 2017 in Australia. We’ve raised two children together, who are now young adults. This is a pretty epic story, I’m not talking out of ego, I’m talking out of being human. In your experience as a parent, as a wife, it’s a pretty epic story. We love to hear people’s stories about how they met their partner, or what it was like when their first child was born.

We love those stories, so origins are so important and in your affirmations as well. That’s sort of the answer to a lot of the questions in the affirmations, because I’ve lived this unique life experience, and it’s a gift to share it. The other thing I do is, I give gifts. I was just doing the musical, The Producers, at The Brisbane Powerhouse, and our props mistress, Nina Litman, and Nina would say, “what are the two gifts you’re going to give today”, and I say, my gift to the audience is to tell the story clearly and precisely, as the author intended, and my gift to the other actors, is to listen. So we came up with two gifts before every performance, I had something to give to the audience and something to give to the actors.

Yeah, I love that and I have to say, I saw it on opening night and you did, it was so clear, you gave that clear performance, you and Mark on stage, that’s another actor for those listening. You guys had such good chemistry and you were so present. It was so clear that you were following that objective as the character, and it was a gift for the audience. So thank you for that. We’re going to wrap up the interview.

Q9: I’m just wondering if people want to hear more about you, follow what you’re doing as an actor, follow what you’re doing as The Story Chunder event host, join some of your acting classes, join some of your public speaking classes, where can they find you?

Matt’s answer: I am sort of all over the place honestly.

My website: mattyoungactor.com and that has links to most of the things that I do.

I am more present on social media, so look me up, @mattyoungactor on Twitter, Instagram, or Facebook

My acting classes are all through Tukuna Acting Club and that’s a tribute to the acting club I started in Fiji and Tukuna means to say or to tell in Fijian. 

Oh, fantastic, and you’re going to be doing some classes at The Factory I saw as well, a Brisbane based acting school 

For actors I am working with The Factory, which is in the West End. I worked with the Creatives Hub as well, which is another acting school. I’m doing a bit more coaching for actors as well, and then of course The Story Chunder right now is on a bit of a hide because I’ve been busy with other things. The story Chunder and the reason I use the word ‘chunder’ is because I just wanted people to feel free to just vomit out whatever story that had to tell without having to write notes or getting nervous about it. You know what I mean?

The Story Chunder

Awesome, thanks so much. It’s been so great having you as part of the podcast, Matt. 

Thank you, it’s been wonderful, cheers!

Thank you so much again Matt and for everybody listening, I just want to remind you to share the podcast with someone else, if you’ve found value in it.

If you like what you’ve heard today, then we’d really appreciate it if you would review the podcast because your positive reviews and recommendations will help us reach more people with this message.

Bec is a dynamic singer, actor, and dancer, all while being a fantastic mum and wife. Bec is helping individuals and businesses make an impact and create connections through strategic storytelling, vibrant voice-overs and public speaking training

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