New York Times best-selling author and entrepreneur Amy Jo Martin joins the podcast this week to discuss reinvention, rebuilding, and how self-kindness impacted her journey to becoming a renegade.
Jaclyn chats with the incomparable best-selling author and entrepreneur Amy Jo Martin about her boisterous career, how she came to realize self-kindness was the key to a better life, and what it takes to reinvent yourself.
Amy Jo Martin is the author of New York Times best-seller "Renegades Write the Rules", Founder & CEO, Speaker, host of the acclaimed Why Not Now? Podcast, an educator, and an investor.
She’s the Founder and CEO of Renegade Global, as well as Founder of Renegade Global Ventures.
She has worked closely with world-renowned brands such as Hilton Worldwide, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, Nike, Shaquille O’Neal, Dell and many others.
Prior to becoming an entrepreneur, Amy Jo worked for the NBA’s Phoenix Suns during the wild wild west days of digital and social media – there were no rules or regulations in place so she helped write the rules. She went on to found one of the first-ever digital agencies, Digital Royalty, and pioneered personal branding online as we know it today.
This podcast is one of the many ways we live out our organization's mission to educate and inspire people to choose kindness. Visit our site kindness.org and sign up to become a part of our global community which spans more than 100 countries. It's free to join and when you do you'll be the first to get access to our latest research, tools, and even episodes of this podcast. Let's build a kinder world, together. Contact us at podcast@kindness.org or on social at @kindnessorg.
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Amy Jo Martin
Intro: Kindness. Why kindness? Because it makes a difference. For connection. Kindness can change lives. It's contagious. The science says you'll be glad you did. Kindness is the key to a healthier, happier world.
Jaclyn: Why kindness? While no one answer is the same, one thing is clear. Kindness is something we all know, but do we know why it matters?
I'm your host, Jaclyn Lindsay, co-founder, CEO of kindness.org. And you're listening to Why Kindness?
Hi friends, and welcome to another episode of the Why Kindness podcast. This one is particularly special for me. Uh, I'm about to introduce a woman who I would call a friend, a mentor. She's played an advisory role to kindness.org. Uh, and she is definitely one of the change-makers that is out there paving the way for what it means to build a better, kinder future. Amy Jo Martin is the author of New York Times bestseller Renegades Write the Rules, founder and CEO, speaker, host of the acclaimed Why Not Now podcast, an educator, and an investor.
Does this woman do it all? I think so. Amy Jo has built two seven figure companies over the past decade. Both with eight figure valuations. She's the founder and CEO of Renegade Global, a human innovation company that unlocks positive disruption for both individuals and corporations, as well as founder of Renegade Global Ventures, a fund focused on getting more renegade women's seats at the cap table.
And I myself am a renegade, and I'm sure we'll get into some of the amazing work happening there. She's worked closely with world renowned leaders such as Hilton Worldwide, Dwayne The Rock Johnson, Nike, Shaquille O'Neal, Dell, and many others. You're about to hear the remarkable story of Amy Jo Martin and why kindness matters to her. So with that, I am so thrilled to welcome my dear friend, Amy Jo Martin.
Jaclyn: Hi Amy Jo.
Amy Jo: Hi.
Jaclyn: I am going to take a page from you, uh, because we always open the show up by just saying, why kindness? And, I know from your own podcast, you open up with a very similar question to your guests, with "Why not now?", but what would you say to why kindness?
Amy Jo: Why kindness? Kindness is the only way forward, in my opinion. So we're at a pretty critical moment in time where, well, I'm sure we'll talk about this, but I believe we need to reinvent, not just innovate. And the only productive way to do so, one of the main ingredients has to be kindness.
Jaclyn: Okay, so let's, let's get into that. When you think about kindness for your own life, how it's shown up, be it through reinvention or anything else.
What are the first things you're conjuring?
Amy Jo: Yeah, I think back to the discussions you and I have had over the years and at the very beginning of this journey for kindness, as well as it was a tipping point for me individually as well, and, um, just looking at how it has to start as an inside job, in my opinion, like almost everything.
And, um, with reinvention, there's a lot of reflection that's needed to reinvent. So I look at reinvention as separate from innovation. Innovation's great, it's incremental change and progress over time. We've been doing that. However, a lot of things aren't working as we wish they were, or they're just simply broken. So it's time to do a do over, right? A complete rebuild. And so instead of renovating the house, let's rebuild this thing. But the good news is, it's a re, we've done it before. It's not our first rodeo. So we can take all of those assets. And all of that adversity that we've been through, convert it into, you know, these assets to rebuild the new infrastructure, but we have to reflect and that reflection, if you kind of imagine it as almost like excavating and digging deep as an individual, and we have to do this before we can do it to our systems and our infrastructure and our policies and our brands and companies and teams and families and relationships, we have to do it with ourselves.
And so looking at ourselves, requires kindness. Um, because there's really zero intrinsic value in the judgment for what's happened in the past or the shame or the whatever. And so to move forward and excavate and get all those, mind that amazing, you know, those assets, those gems. We have to have kindness to ourselves because it's not easy, right?
Jaclyn: No, no. It's putting the oxygen mask on first. Um, is there a tangible example you can think of where you've excavated? What is that, what's that experience been like in going and doing the inside work? What's, yeah, something that you've done?
Amy Jo: Yes. Oh my gosh, so many and it's constantly happening, right? So um, it's not easy to go in and I look at it as kind of almost underground, right?
So if we're reinventing wheat, we're going down to the studs, if not deeper. And, um, there have been so many different seasons in my life where I've reinvented aspects that are contagious to others, like career, you know? Um, however, if I try to leapfrog that reflection process and fast track it, to action again, um, even if it's ref, it's active reflection, um, then I end up right back learning those same lessons, if not worse.
And so the time that comes to mind would be, you know, I've flirted with burnout several times in my life and I get a little more effective, I think, in spotting it and dealing with it each time. Um, but it is, usually a red flag that I am not being kind to myself and taking the time to really understand why.
Why am I pushing so hard? Why haven't I put myself first, talking about kindness? And everything else becomes a priority, um, except for maybe what I truly want. And so, it all comes back to that first step of, are we willing to go there and ask the hard questions? And be friendly about it because you can reinvent and blow something up or you can be a little friendlier, but it's not going to likely be easy.
Um, but we have to start here. So, so just, you know, with my first company, I definitely was chasing things outside of myself, you know, more recognition, more following, more money, more whatever. And that story that I was telling the world that I was living started to elbow out the real me, which is not a kind thing to do to yourself, even if it's not intentional, you know, there's something being missed there.
So that was probably one of the biggest moments where, oh, there's a disconnect here. And you know, it all kind of came to a moment in time where everything I thought I wanted, I had, and I felt emotionally and physically bankrupt. But on the outside looking in, it looked real good. Yeah. Yeah, so, there's just a, a truth about, that's related to kindness, that I was thrown into those, you know, the excavating, the reflection, the, okay, dig deep because we want to solve for this.
Um, You have to be willing to spend the time and care about your future. Otherwise, that pattern keeps going.
Jaclyn: I am struck by this because what you stand for so precisely is, is the idea of being a renegade. You've built your career on this idea of disruption, I would say reinvention before we knew that was the right word for what you are doing.
Um, and yeah, even someone like you, who's a renegade, who's so aware of that bought in to what society might've said is the standard of success. Or like to you, there was maybe something that was a disconnect from your real self to what you were living. Um, I'm curious when you think about that time. Where do you think that got lost?
Your true self into what you were chasing? What may it be, whatever, what success was at that time, the money, the career, the title, the followers, you know, the acumen on social, like whatever that was, where, If you had to say that disconnect came from, do you know how it began?
Amy Jo: Great question. And I think I've, um, a lot of therapy, a lot of coach, I have a coach in every pocket.
I've got guides like, come help me world. It takes, it takes a village to, you know, to get you from point A to point B. And I would say my relationship with time, my relationship with money and my relationship with fear were biggies. And at the end of the day, I think the, so we can dive into each one of those buckets.
There's some juicy stuff in there. But, at the end of the day, really, I look at progress over time and, and the only way I've been able to kind of make some big strides is to let go of what other people think. Because there's so much noise and I would have never done it. But it's easy to slip back and it's like this, you know, magnet because we're human, right?
It's life work. Um, but you have to really like yourself and trust yourself, to listen to yourself as the true north versus all of the influence around you. Um, yeah. So it's, it's constant daily work.
Jaclyn: Yeah. What, you know, for the person who's like, it sounds great to want that or to live like that, but what's the practical way to do it?
What are the Amy Jo tips and tricks of how you've been able to keep doing this work of like staying true to your North Star versus whatever the world's North Star is?
Amy Jo: I think constant checking in self-awareness, constant desire to be learning and curious. Um, constant coming back to that anchor, um, whatever that looks like for you.
And, um, one of the things that I think we can easily do is, is get going so fast because we're distracting ourselves from whatever it is that we need to deal with. And when we are able to be operating more in our capacity, what we're uniquely qualified to do, right, why we're on this earth, we can talk about that zone where passion, purpose, and skill collide.
That's when we are most kind to ourselves, the planet, each other, um, that's where joy lives, that's where effectiveness lives, that's where economic impact will be for the greater good, that's where, you know, you're, it's like an airplane, the higher it flies, the more efficient it becomes, and the less fuel it requires because it belongs up there, right?
Like, that's what it was designed to do, so when we're doing what we're uniquely qualified to do and we're not shaking at bandwidth trying to get everything done in a day because we think we need to because everybody else, we think everybody else wants us to do all those things or guilt or whatever. When we're up here, we're, we're contributing to society in a much better way, but we're being a lot more kind to ourselves. Right.
So yeah, it's I used to push from a place of trying to prove myself, I think, small town girl from a trailer park. I will prove everybody wrong, female in professional sports and entertainment and tech industries. Like, Oh yeah, I got this. And that chip on my shoulder then started to convert toward pressing from a place of purpose.
It's more sustainable. I think that resentment or even anger converted into purpose is extremely powerful. Um, but you can't convert that unless you reinvent why you're doing it.
Jaclyn: Yeah. Okay. And one of the buckets. You said is fear. And I think good night, we could have a whole series of shows just on what that looks like probably.
But for you personally, how did fear play in for you?
Amy Jo: I think in the beginning, it's usually the spark of motivation for me. It's usually will, it'll, it'll get me across that starting line, right? And I'm really good at, seeing the potential in other people before they see it in themselves and getting them to take action, um, getting them to find it within themselves.
And so I, I love that's my zone, right? That's my superpower per say. Um, and sometimes fear is the best way to at least start listening and then dig a deeper and it's amazing fuel to maybe make a spark. Um, but for like the renegade mentality, one of the things that it's a daily practice, but what's the worst thing that can happen if you try X, Y, Z?
Well, I like to go identify the biggest worst case scenario because I can reverse engineer and immediately get myself into a pragmatic, logical mindset versus emotional because our psychology, like psychologically, we go to the scariest thing ever. And when you start then asking yourself, Okay, what if this thing just doesn't work?
Then what? Then what? Then what? Then what? The amount of time it takes to get from green lighting that idea to the worst case scenario. Becomes more clear that that's going to take a while. There's more opportunities to pivot, change course, take out insurance, and you also immediately put fear in the backseat.
And it's an amazing way to get psychologically safe and at least go across the starting line.
Jaclyn: It's all you gotta do. I love it. It's such a good framing. Definitely have, I personally haven't thought of it like that. And so that's a really strong takeaway. Uh, I am eager to talk a little bit about when you were younger because I know you well, I know you've written about this, spoken about this publicly, your black mountain moment and that was this like response to a question of like first memory.
So if you can, you can share that for anyone who might not know it, but then I want to ask, what is your first memory and relationship with kindness and or unkindness and what comes to you there.
Amy Jo: Oh my gosh, I can't wait to talk about that part too. Um, black diamond, yes! So, I am, uh, When people say, what do you do?
I love to answer from a place of who and why versus what. The what, we'll get to as humans, right? Like we're very literal beings. And so don't worry, but you know, I guide Renegades down the black diamond mountains of business in life. And what does that mean, right? So I literally take it very seriously and I'll show you, show you to what extent but let me take you back to a moment that I alluded to, one of the worst days of my life, it was me standing in front of the departure board at JFK.
I had been on 210 flights that year, averaging four hours of sleep a night and my marriage was on the rocks, my relationships were on the rocks, my health was on the rocks. And I'm staring at the departure board and I'm like, okay, where am I? Finally figure out I'm in New York. Where am I going? Ooh, finally figure out I'm going to Vegas.
Walk over to fuel up for the day. And that means coffee, right? And I go to sign my name on the receipt, and I'm just blank. My hand wouldn't, I was just frozen. And I had nothing. And, of course, the barista's looking at me, I'm looking at them, and there's a line behind me. And finally I just scribble something.
I walk over and I sit down, and this was the moment where I realized and, you know, early thirties, emotionally and physically bankrupt millionaire was who I was. And it was not a good look. And so all those carrots that I talked about that I chased outside myself, time or money, you know, recognition, all the different things.
Those carrots were not fulfilling me at all. I'd wind up empty and I don't even like carrots either, ironically. Um, so here I have this company on my hands. I have employees in 10 different countries. We're reaching seven figure, eight figure then valuation. This is a rocket ship. New York Times bestselling author who barely made it through reading and writing in second grade in the trailer park.
Like, like what is, this is my life. Um, looks great from the outside, but total disconnect on the inside. So I call, I had, I sync with Simon Sinek and I say that because I didn't know him at the time, but we were able to connect. He had reached out to our office, um, with my first company and I was like, this is, this is perfect timing.
Hey, Simon, I need to find my why, can we meet? And we met in person and I remember hitting record on my phone, I was like, this is going to be good, can I record this? You're going to tell me my why because I realized I didn't know why I was doing what I was doing. I was helping all these very high profile brands and individuals get more exposure and humanizing their, their brands and growing substantially.
But why? Right? And, and. It was constantly this winding up empty. And I was helping them do the difficult things down those black diamond mountains, like show up, fully show up, which means usually skinny dipping in the pool of public opinion, right? That's a phrase that a friend of mine, Kenny Tomlin, always says.
It's hard to show up. But Simon sits me down and he said, what's your earliest childhood memory? I said, Simon, really? We have time for this. Like I'm in dire straits. I need help. He's like, my game, not yours. Childhood memory. I had a great childhood. First thing that comes to mind was my dad and I at the top of a black diamond mountain, skiing.
And he said, how old are you? And I said, I don't know. I wasn't a mom yet. So you just like this, this age? Um, and he said, well, were you scared? I said, no, because I was with my dad. And he's, he's a very good skier. And he said, make a pie. If you want to slow down, make fries. If you want to speed up and if you get into trouble, I'll pick you up because I was literally between his skis anyway.
And, he said, did you skip the bunny slope? And I said, absolutely. My family's not a big fan of the bunny slope, but a lot of people do. He said but wait, so you weren't scared. No, not everybody does this and just leapfrogs to the top. And he said, has it ever occurred to you that you help guide a lot of people down these black diamond mountains but you don't let anyone help you?
And I was like, and he was spot on because I can tell you, Jaclyn, for me, it'd either be a home run or a complete burnout crash. And there was nothing in between because I was like, I got this. I got this I could do it on my own. And, and I was like Simon That's it. High five. Amazing. Stop recording.
We figured out my why. You really are the why guy. I'm gonna go get a tattoo of a black diamond on my wrist because I don't want to forget. And he said, oh no, you're not. Try this thing on and we'll see if it's your why. You'll know. It'll come back to you when you forget or get busy. And he was right. And I think kindness comes, it, it's, It just revolves around this story because we have to be kind enough to ourselves to realize.
To contribute to this world, we want to be the best we can and give our unique value and gifts. And in order to do so, we have to have our guides. And none of us can pretend like we do any of this alone. And so that was kind of a moment of chip on my shoulder, external, lightning renegade to internal power and bravado that's quiet sometimes, not all the time.
And to let's, let's do this from a place of purpose, not trying to force. That's a long story, but.
Jaclyn: That's a good one. It's worth it. Um, okay. So at that moment, you have this breakthrough, you, you and I came on to each other's scenes a little bit after that, but tell us like, then what happens? So like, you get this clarity.
Amy Jo: Yeah. Well, yeah, it's kind of like that reinvention, it's a, it's a messy process to undo something you've built that has a lot of gravity. It's not necessarily undo, but to redo. And you even look at companies that do this, or marriages, or, you know, our relationship with one thing, time, money, fear.
So, I had to kind of, it's like surgically, you start to look at every spot, try and um, shift course, and I ended up exiting the company. As, as through that exit, I realized I need to learn how to sleep. I need to learn how to, to figure out who I was, um, and what I like. And, and so I did. I, I, that's when I moved to San Diego, started living on the boat and learned to captain.
And I started listening to a lot of podcasts and doing a lot of learning. It was the election year 2016. And I had been at the social media game from the very, very beginning and had seen the shift from this kind of innocence, kindness, helping each other with the click of the button, we could save someone's life during the Japan earthquake.
In 2011, but then this shift into a lot of dissonance with the election and people's opinions and I just was curious and that's when we started to connect and I started wondering, could we scale serotonin online through social media? As you do, right? I'm like, I, I was not sure what I was going to do next and I thought, I was watching, you know, My favorite show, maybe going to yoga, trying to figure out how to even have any time, completely fish out of water.
Listening to podcasts and, and that's when I started to learn more about the spread of serotonin. What serotonin was and ended up doing a clinical study, and that's right when I think we met. And so, we were like, perfectly matched. And I was so thirsty to learn from you.
Jaclyn: Back at you. Well tell us about the study.
I would love to, yeah, hear about what it was.
Amy Jo: Yeah, so, as a renegade, I'm like, I have no idea how to do this, but I bet I could find someone who does, because I just learned about guides the hard way. So I found this, this gentleman, Dr. Ziv Cain, and we did put together a clinical study to see, does what we share online impact behavior offline?
Not just how we feel. Because intuitively we're probably like, yeah, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to know that's probably the case. We can prove that. But I was more curious about behavior. And so we did, we put together a trial and started to look at, you know, if you think of serotonin, what's cool about it is if you do something nice for me.
And then you get hit with serotonin, so do I, but so does anyone who just witnesses that act, right? And I'm like, oh, we're open sourcing serotonin. This is amazing. We can do this. Think of social media. How many potential people could witness a kind act? This is awesome. Let's propagate this stuff. And, um, and so what we started to do is create two different scenarios, a control and an intervention group.
And, the groups didn't know what they were, they knew they were in a study, but they didn't know what for and we put them into these different scenarios and, um, acts of kindness and spread of serotonin was highly in one and the other was just every day all day. And then we'd measure the change in the difference over time between each group.
Not only do you of course have an emotional. feeling and impact, um, based on what you're exposed to online, but also what you're doing and saying and sharing and what you're receiving, but also your behavior changes offline. So if we can't, if we wouldn't litter in the physical world. Why would we litter in the virtual world?
Because now we know it impacts our physical world. So, yeah.
Jaclyn: I love that. That is such a good soundbite. Yeah. Why would we litter? Um, that's amazing. Social media, you were considered queen of social media. You have like so much there. You've taught people what it means to own their own brand for themselves and who they are.
And I've learned so much from you, along the way. I'm curious what you would say around the connection and role of social media in our world. And like, how can it be used for good? Or like, how do you have a healthy relationship with it? When we think about the impact on mental health and well-being and what it can do, the anonymity of it and what it can propel around fear, hate, misinformation.
You know, it feels like we're learning so much more about the risk and ramifications of it. So you've been with it. I feel like since day one, you were just someone who knew the scene. So like, tell us what you would think about or say to that.
Amy Jo: It's such a great question, especially fast forwarding. So it'll be about 15 some, 15 years, day in, day out, you know.
Um, so you see a lot of change over time with technology, but the, uh, my theory has always been social communication, it's really communication, not media, more of a dialogue, right? It amplifies what already exists. And so it's, it's definitely an accelerator, but the, the future of technology is the future of humanity.
And when we look at whether it's artificial intelligence or it's XYZ social media app, it's not the technology that's good or bad. It's, it's the humans that just make the decisions about the technology and also how to use it right as users. So it could be as like, I look at AI right now and as someone who speaks a lot about humanizing brands and also the future of technology and its impact on humanity and we can be obsessed with the opportunity, or we can be obsessed with the challenge.
We get to decide, right? And it all starts here as an inside job. And we have such an opportunity right now. I was looking back at a keynote that I gave in 2016 titled The Future of Technology is the Future of Humanity. And I shared some of the, this research and shared a lot of, of different things.
And, um, just now I think people are booking me to talk about it and more. I'm like, where were you when this is, you know what I mean? This isn't new, it's hit a stride, but this is not new. It's just much more relevant to the mainstream. And we get to, we get to decide where it goes. So we better be playing offense.
And speaking up and, um.
Jaclyn: Yeah, yeah. So the speakingup, playing offense, for the lay person, what does that look like? You know, us, us against them if you think of the user against the big corporate, um, or the big company behind it, the humans on the inside of that, that are behind the product. I love the idea of separating the tech, not being bad, but then what does it look like to navigate it if you're the user?
Amy Jo: So it's great. And I think we, at every, every stakeholder, the user, corporate brands, the governing bodies that do or don't exist, the tech, the startups, it always starts with the humans behind the brand, the heartbeat of that logo, because if, if we have healthy, meaning mind, body, soul, healthy, kind people who are creating, then we will have a healthier outcome at scale.
And we know how powerful this is. So, um, one of the things, you know, as we look at the inside job, once again, our relationship with time is huge. Back to bandwidth, we've got 24 hours in a day. And a lot of us are chronically late, we're shaking because we're so tapped at those 24 hours, trying to do a million things, over-programmed.
Not ourselves. This is where health issues come up. This is where not being kind to each other comes up. If we can start to shift that relationship, it also shifts our relationship with this thing and what we put into it, what we take out of it, how much time we spend into it. And that's where, as, let's just say, users, we have to be in control of our time being spent on these devices versus it controlling us.
And so it's highly addictive, right? So you have, you know, not only are we fatigued, but we're also addicted. And that's a cocktail for drama right there. Um, so being very cognizant with yourself. How am I using this tool? What's the impact on me psychologically before, during, and after? How many times am I picking this up?
When I go in there, do I feel better? When I leave, if I were to use that time elsewhere, what would I use it for? And am I being effective because it's powerful? And it's kind of back to those boundaries, of you have to let go of what you think everybody else wants you to be, say, and do. And when you do that, you have arrived.
You are closer to living in that what you're uniquely qualified to do zone. And that takes a lot. It takes a lot of mental strength, it takes a lot of kindness to yourself, and it takes a lot of boundaries. Huge boundaries. And so, you know, the bandwidth, we're tapped here, we're trapped at capacity because we're so over-programmed.
We're boxing ourselves in, um, and as a mom to a four-year-old who also travels a lot, then you have guilt in there and you have every other thing you want to throw in this box. But if we can ease up on those margins on bandwidth. And not be so exhausted and so, you know, running hot, as I call it, then, um, then we can actually start thinking and feeling and breathing.
Things get easier and we're kind, we're a more kind individual. And so if we're trapped in here, and believe me, I'm a huge advocate of social media. I've built my entire career off of it, right? But it has its place and it has its time and it can have a quicker negative impact than positive if you're not cognizant.
Jaclyn: Love it. I want to talk a little bit about what you're doing with Renegade Global. I've had a front row seat, obviously. Um, I've watched you build it. I've been a part of it, a member. I'm now part of the collective. The work that you're doing is transformative on so many levels. There's so many layers that I think would motivate and inspire people listening.
But I'm curious if you can share what you're seeing through Renegade Global as far as the link between people being empowered, taking this, this self-kindness, the inward work and how they're taking it out into their life for work, the like day to day of how they're showing up with who they are and what their contribution is.
And it may not be traditional corporate work, just how they're showing up to who they are. What are some like highlights or special nuggets you could share with us.
Amy Jo: Oh my gosh. So I'm obsessed, um, healthfully obsessed with what we're building together. Um, it's not me, there, there's a huge crew here and you are one of the key individuals.
So I think everything for me starts as an experiment. And you can't fail when you're experimenting, right? So we put it in a petri dish and see what it wants to be. Um, and this experiment has kind of taken on a life of its own for sure. Um, and what started as one thing usually evolves into the next, but the vision was always there and the intention was there.
And so my, one of the goals is for me has always been, can we, democratize access to money, influence, power, for the greater good of a positive impact on our society, in our own homes, with our families. You know, economic impact overall. And I knew that was like out here. I wanted to try and somehow make a dent in that world.
And I'm fortunate to have been around and, um, learned from just some iconic progressive leaders that were such visionaries. And so with our experiment with Renegade Global, you know, we have created an ecosystem that started as, as curriculum within a community. Very diverse set of, um, backgrounds and individuals and value proposition that everybody brings.
But we now have nearly a thousand people with over that, when you add our corporate individuals to who are like-minded, like-hearted, very focused on reinvention, um, whether they associate it with that or not, um, who have created action, taken action to create leverage for each other to truly accelerate what it is that they're wanting to do.
So when we look at, you know, getting, well, starting with women, we started with women, getting more women's seats on cap tables, board seats, standing on stages, I knew that could be a good direct route into democratizing access to deal flow, opportunity to invest and learning, democratizing the flow of capital, hug imbalance there as we know and also rounding out that picture of having a different mind at the table, whether it's a board seat or whatever.
And so as we've gotten together and learned and grown together through why not now ideas that each of us have and the curriculum that's been tested over time, we're on our 11th version now.
Um, it's turned from that into, hey, we actually have a lot of leverage here, a lot of influence and a very diverse set of networks, let's launch a multifamily office together and treat ourselves. Democratize our financial, you know, collective and treat ourselves as ultra high net worth. Get that access and get that value because we've collected together.
Let's start investing together through special purpose vehicles with Renegade Global Ventures where I have incredible access to deal flow because I've been investing over the years. And now can open it up, but so can other individuals. And this is from men, too. We're very men friendly. Huge, huge bridges.
And so, that then opened up, we're launching our Renegade imprint. If you want to write a book, why don't you write it under this imprint? We'll all get together and leverage that as a go to market engine. Um, so on, media, podcasting, so on and so forth. And so that created just this momentum, and a lot of these individuals that come to Renegade, they're in corporate and they're executives and they have a lot of influence and they have a lot of responsibility and they have a lot of pressure and challenges.
And so they've seen the transformation they've made personally and professionally and they've brought that into their companies and in some cases, you know, we're hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of employees deep for fortune 50 brands. That have a matrix that you would think you can't navigate with this stuff that could come across as fluffy.
But it's actually saving time, money, and talent. And, and so it's just become this thing that you harness and you try not to wrangle too much. But you also, the biggest X factor has been the diversity of intellectual capital. Um, it's not just empowerment, that's table stakes. If we're not doing that, what are we doing?
It is about leverage. It is about knowledge. It is about curiosity and it's a lot about action, so.
Jaclyn: It's amazing. Oh, goosebumps. I'm so excited. Um, I can't even believe it, although I'm not surprised because obviously I know I could sit and talk to you all day. We're like almost at an hour. And, uh, there's like a few things we like to do to help close out, um, and end on a really wonderful high note.
And there's so many more things I wanted to talk about you as a mom and, and just I think what I would say is if you could share any final things that you think would be so important for people to hear about why kindness, be it related to you, family, upbringing, anything, what are final things you would want to share that you feel would be important?
Amy Jo: I usually go with my intuitive hit first thing that comes to mind and I am thinking about You know, Lincoln, my son, he was born, um, three months early. I was on, I was on an airplane and luckily was able to land during a layover and he was born two pounder. We spent three months in the NICU. He's healthy and you would never even know he splashed into the world that way.
Now as a four-year-old, but that moment when you get close and you have those really intense up close, intimate moments with mortality and how delicate life can be. Um, I think you get clear quickly, um, that we get one shot at this. This is the big show. There are no do overs. Play full out. It's all hard.
Life is hard, even the easy route is hard, so we might as well go the big, like even playing small is hard, so play big, you know, that's being kind, and that's honoring what you, whatever that looks like for you, um, it doesn't mean going faster, it doesn't mean more money necessarily, or, it's like that thing that you know you need to do, go do it, go do it, right, that's being kind to yourself, but it's being kind to the planet, and this, all of humanity, um, because we have more people living in that area, we're gonna have happier people who are doing what they're uniquely qualified to do.
So I realized that when Lincoln was born and, um, I recommitted and it, I haven't stopped.
Jaclyn: You haven't. Thank you. I think that was. Yeah, a beautiful final closing thought. Um, okay, so we like to do like a round robin of like really quick on the spot questions, a little game showy. So, define kindness in one word.
Amy Jo: Oh, kindness is power.
Jaclyn: Kindness is power. You heard it here, folks. Kindness is power. Yes. Yes, it is. Um, okay. Um, if kindness, if kindness were a song, what song would it be?
Amy Jo: Um, what's the learning to fly song? I was listening to it last night on, on a run. Um, Tom Petty, Learning To Fly. I don't know why, or maybe Wind Beneath My Wings. I don't know. I'm on a weird tangent here.
Jaclyn: This is good. No, that is good. These are good. We get so many good song choices. So this is, I'm loving it. Um, what book are you reading?
Amy Jo: That's really like kind of like mushy.
Jaclyn: Or listening to. No, it's good. Um, okay, book you're listening to or reading.
Amy Jo: Oh my gosh. Our team at the moment is re-listening to Essentialism.
Jaclyn: Oh. So good. So good.
Amy Jo: Deep into finishing my manuscript right now for my next book. So I try not to read too much because I don't want it in my head at the moment.
Jaclyn: But Essentialism is essential. If you haven't read it.
Amy Jo: So essential.
Amy Jo: So essential. Um, who would you credit for teaching you or inspiring you about kindness?
Amy Jo: My mom. One hundred percent, yeah, she could be your mascot.
Jaclyn: We love that. Hey mom. Um, and final one, if you could have everyone around the world do one kind act today, which kind act would you have them do?
Amy Jo: I would have them look in the mirror and say to themselves, you are enough.
Jaclyn: Yes. Okay, so then to close, we end on action together and this is because, um, well, we always want to remind people the power of kindness and every kind act makes a difference. And so through our sponsors Verizon, we're doing a call for kindness campaign.
And you can text, call someone live if should you feel inspired. We've had lots of people do that and surprise someone. Um, or you can tell us who you're going to text or call and do it after. But it's just anyone you want to let know they matter to you. Um, and they they mean a lot to you. So yeah, who's coming to mind?
Amy Jo: Oh, I just had three people come to mind.
Do I do it right now? Do you want me to do it right now?
Jaclyn: Yeah, yeah, it's very fun and spontaneous and we always get lots of good-
Amy Jo: I know my mom's on an airplane. So I'm gonna spare her but I need to call so this is Scott O’Neill.
Jaclyn: Oh, speaker, speaker if he answers
Amy Jo: He does this to me. Sometimes he'll just facetime-.
Okay, but he has been a beacon and kind of a bright light and official, unofficial mentor. Um, I know he's in the states right now, that's why I thought. He and I used to work together in the NBA many years ago.
Scott Voicemail: Hello, this is Scott. You're reached my voicemail. Please leave a message.
Jaclyn: Oh okay, yeah, let's do it.
Amy Jo: Gonna leave a message.
Scott Voicemail: please record your message. When you've finished recording, you may hang out.
Amy Jo: Do you think he checks his messages? It's very possible.
Jaclyn: Text him and say, I’m- yeah.
Amy Jo: Hey Scott, it's your friend, Amy Jo here. I'm, I'm doing a live podcast and we were asked at the end, um, to call someone who has been so kind in our lives and also reciprocate that. And so I'm on the kindness, the Why Kindness podcast, and I'm calling you live right now, but you didn't answer.
So this is your voicemail and Jaclyn says, hello.
Jaclyn: Hi, hi Scott. Thank you for being amazing in Amy Jo's life. We love you.
Amy Jo: Thank you so much for being you. And, the true, true beacon and, uh, definition of what leadership looks like. So, appreciate you. Bye. So, um, yeah.
Jaclyn: That was amazing.
Amy Jo: Yeah, he, um, he's based in London.
Scott is the CEO of Merlin Entertainment, which owns, it's a conglomerate that, um, has Legoland and all the amazing, talk about kindness, like amusement parks and, um, and he's, he's incredible, incredible human.
Jaclyn: I love that. Okay. Well text him and say I left a voicemail so he knows.
Amy Jo: And so the reason I thought of Scott is that this is kind of a page from his book.
He spoke to the Renegade community and asked us all to reach out to someone who has made a big impact on our life. Um, I think he suggests a family member at first, if you're, if that comes to mind. And so we all did it and it's amazing to see this come full circle. So I thought of him.
Jaclyn: Thank you so much for joining us on this week's episode of the Why Kindness podcast sponsored by our friends at Verizon. To learn more about everything you heard today from our wonderful guest, definitely check out our show notes.
We hope you're leaving this episode inspired and reminded that every kind act truly does make a difference. We'd love to hear how you're choosing kindness in your day to day. We write back to every email, so let us know what you think, and please leave a review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. This podcast is one of the many ways we live out our organization's mission to educate and inspire people to choose kindness.
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