#1551 A Bigger Purpose - Kerryn Vaughan

in that direction. I lived up in the tro Valley. We used to play footy against Sale. That's pretty good.

And oh there's something else I'm missing anyway, that kind of thing you do?

shut up, you know. And then we get to school and it's kind of like, oh, even kinder and the kids are going, my mom says, your mum's fat. I don't want to play with you today. We don't like your hair, all that bullshit. And then we get into school and it's just compete, compete, compete, you know, and if you're not you can't shine. Like nobody can turn up as themselves and I don't know, be appreciated and celebrated for who they truly are. And I reckon that

really bloody sucks. So we get it beaten out of us. This is just my theory, might not be right, but we get a beaten out of us, you know, And unless we can form and unless we fit in with a gang, we don't want to be ejected from the tribe. So we just buddy, we become something we're not, just so so that we don't get rejected. And I reckon, I've done it. I'm going to say, I reckon, it sucks and it's bullshit. But of course I've been victim

to that bullshit, you know, And now I don't. But I do notice occasionally things that I feel like, God, I've got no choice, you know, I'm going to have to bloody fit into that. But I think, yeah.

I think the challenge is not belonging to a group that where you have to think a certain way, be a certain way, you know, where the power to disagree or think critically or be you know, somewhat atypical, where that's not taken away from you. You know, it's like if you belong to a group where if you don't think like us, talk like us, behave like us, and advocate our philosophy, then you're not part of us. You can't belong. Well, that's that's a fucking cult.

like an actual employee job. I've avoided work very fucking successfully and not better or worse than anyone, and not drastically different, but just thinking how can I be me but also still have connection with others? And I reckon One of the great questions is how can I have friends and people that I love and that love me, that are fucking nothing like me maybe, and that's okay, yeah, yeah.

I think that people won't take that first step and actually slam their stake into the ground and say this is who I am, like me or not because they don't want to be alone. And I get, I completely understand and agree with you that we all need connection, we all need belonging, you know, we've got to be part of something. But do we have the guts to say what I currently belong to is toxic and cult like, you know, because it's forcing me to wear a Maskt's forcing me to be who I don't want to be.

And how do I find that group where I actually can have a voice and be authentic and be me? And I think you can't find that until you actually take the step and be authentic and then hope that the right people are attracted to you. You know, like I look at I look at Tiff, and I like we're attracted to each other. You know, I think you're gorgeous. No, not like that, you know, well I did, now, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

You know, TIFF's obviously attracted to the same thing, and you're like that, HAPs you know, it's kind of like, this is who I am, and if you don't like it, I'm sorry. I Actually I have this mantra I want you to like me, but I don't need you to like me, do you you know? It's kind and I think we've got to have the guts to actually stand in that space first. And I reckon, that's really bloody hard because we've been told all our lives. Don't you

dare step out of line? You know you won't have a job, no one will marry you, no one will love you. Do you know you won't have friends? All of that kind of bullshit that people that have got filled with fear tell us, you know, to protect them, or that they think they're protecting us. I'm not sure, but I think it's tough. I feel sorry for people who can't be themselves.

a reason. I did a workshop on so we're recording this Tuesday. I did a workshop on Sunday, Karen, and it was just a private, twenty people, small group. Five hours though, and this lady came up to me. I remember her name, but I won't say her name. And she's like, because I was talking about it doesn't matter what you do, even if you've got the best intentions, you're the best person. You're coming from a platform of love and kindness and care. One, you're going to fuck

things up. Of course I fuck things up every hour. But two, there will also be people who don't like you, don't resonate with you, and potentially fucking hate you, right despite the fact that you are trying to be compassionate, aware and all of those things. And anyway, this lady comes up to me and she goes, oh, it's funny you say that. She goes, my first husband hates you. And this was in the break and I said, oh, well that's a pretty big club, so welcome, and I said,

has he ever met me? She goes, no, she hates you because I came home from a workshop, and she said, and not the same day, but pretty much the result of me coming home from what your workshop was realizing a whole lot of things, making decisions and leaving him so like he doesn't blame himself, he blames me, like he's got no part, he didn't do anything wrong, Like I'm the I caused the demise of his I'm like fucking talk about lack of awareness, ownership, you know, courage,

all that, but it's that's the thing, you know. And I mean, we have thousands of people listen to this every day in a bunch of countries. And and if I thought about if I went, all, gee, how do I have this conversation with Karen, how do I ask this question? How do I respond if I did all of that from the premise of not wanting to or not being okay at least with the possibility that I'm going to offend someone, even that I'll put a asterisk next too, because me offending one seems that like I

am responsible for other people's feelings. We can talk about that. Yeah, but I'd never do a fucking episode. I'd never have a conversation. I'd never write a book. I'd never do a workshop, because that's just part of it, you know. And So if you want a platform anyone listening, if you want to run workshops, you want a podcast, you want to do workshops, seminars, you want to be a front facing person with a public audience, and you don't want to get hurt, offended, disler, Well pick another job.

I can go and become a gardener and work for yourself, and don't because it's it doesn't matter who you are, how you are, someone's going to fucking hate you. Welcome to the club, right one.

be able to say, I freaking don't know. I actually I don't even know what to say with that, you know, because we try to be a big pompous know it all, none of us do. None of us know everything. So there's both sides. Yes, don't get a if you're going to you're going to offend people. People are going to hate you, and you're not always going to know the answers, and if you pretend to people call you out, people can see it.

interesting things in that. One is I know that I'm right, wink wink, nudgs nudge. I know that I'm right. Therefore everyone in the world who doesn't agree with me is fucking wrong? Or how BIG's your ego? Harps right? So there's that, and then just the idea, like the awareness that oh, maybe me saying, look, I don't actually know by the way, I fucked up one hundred things. I still get trapped in ego. I'm still an overthinker, I still have self doubt and I want you to love

me other than that, I'm a fucking warrior. I'm an alpha, you know. But the funny thing is that that hopefully, like I get more positive feedback, the more raw, real and vulnerable I am, even when I'm talking about my monumental fuck ups and flaws, like it actually creates more connection than disconnection. But chest beating and brag an arrogance creates the opposite of what people want.

Do we want? People want to show people that if you have courage and you admit you're wrong, you know you can actually achieve stuff.

class in Australia to skype with your class in Africa. Anyway, it kind of just went out of control and I had thirty laptops donated to me and I thought, well, I'm going to have to start a business. I don't know what to do with all these laptops. Then I had forty five schools in Africa signed up to do this skyping project. This is in a couple of weeks. Like. It just went off like that, and I had this great idea, Wow, how fantastic this business? You know, they

get pen pals online and everything else. It took me eighteen months. I finally sent these twenty eight laptops to Uganda a long story, but anyway, basically, I sent laptops to a country where the kids were sleep when our kids were in school, so I hadn't even thought about time zones. Spent eighteen months on this, but didn't think

about time zones once. And not only that, I sent laptops to a country ninety five percent of them don't even have power, so it was kind of like and so they had to take it down to a market, trickle feed it for twenty four hours, you know, and it was just a fucking nightmare. But what I learned was and so I said, well, what about if I put in some solar systems into some schools? And that was great, but I still couldn't skype, but at least

they could use the computers. And then what I learned from that was that the girls were sleeping over So they go to primary school, goes to P seven and then they go to high school. But if the girls don't pass, they get married off, so and they can't pass because they're going and getting all the water, you know,

and that kind of stuff. So by having the solar system, the girls were sleeping at the schools for two weeks studying to make sure because they've now got power to make sure that they pass for to go to secondary so essentially saving all these girls, well really saving their lives because their marriages are often result in death, murder and then But what I also learned from this was that I'm like, well, why the girls getting water? Like

what's happening here? And there's not a shortage of water in Uganda, but this is a lot of African countries, but a shortage of infrastructure to capture the water. So I started putting in water tanks into the schools so the kids they could catch the water instead of the girls getting them. I put you know, connected water down to villagers, put water wells and all that kind of

stuff in. So what that did is it kept the girls in school, and we were doing sanitary pads and that kind of stuff, so little girls would go off collecting water at lunchtime and missay out on all that school. They're getting sexually assaulted and raped all the way. They're girls as young as three, do you know this kind of stuff. Teenage girls are swapping sex for sanitary items so they could stay in school so they won't get

married off. You know, HIV just bloody rampant. So yeah, so that monumental fuck up of sending laptops to a country where it was never going to work my initial great project. So it turned into saving many, many, many lives, and not just the ones directly saved, but the families of these people, you know, because the girls could now get jobs. And yeah, so I like telling that story because I actually liked it. I fucked up, you know it great. They could have been skype buddies or zoom

buddies now and all that. But you know, and I didn't know all that, you know, I just thought, I, actually it's got there's a think all white man's white man's burden or something like that.

know it's what you know. But the point is, though I will say this, so you keep making these assumptions about things and unless you actually have the courage to put your foot in it, you know, and to put take a step forward and go, well, I don't fucking know, so let me find out. And then you're probably going to get punched in the chest and in the face

because you were wrong. You know. That takes a lot of guts, and without sounding like a wank, ride mine myself for having the guts to step up, do you know, even though I knew nothing about what I was doing.

But they live in one room mud huts and the men are coming home beating and raping the wives in front of in front of the kids. So the boys think, they all think, is this is how it is? You know, the girls aren't going Oh no, I think there should be a better way to do this, you know, because

there's the boys grew up thinking. With our school sponsorship program, which I've just wrapped up this year, but it went for eight years, we put through almost an equal number of boys as girls, and I got a lot of criticism for that. You know, the girls need to get through school and they need to you know, passy, why are we supporting boys? And my answer was because if the boys go through school with the girls under this program,

they might respect them. You know, we might actually get some respectful men coming out the other side.

but like they just are born into that. Yeah, And so I mean what you did is I'm sure there's still a way to go, but it's you know, helping turn that ship around, that cultural, that thinking, that behavioral kind of ship in the opposite direction. I mean that must How does that make you feel when you unpack that many people's lives where you know that for a very long time, that's just how it was.

You know? And it's kind of like I've really come to the conclusion and understood now that we've all got a piece of the puzzle to put in, you know, and we all have to do the best we can on that piece of the puzzle, and we simply can't do everything. And that was a hard lesson for me to learn because I was like, well, you know, I've never been to Africa, and yet I was making all these changes, and I was like seeing, wow, this is actually not as hard as people think, you know, to

really have a big impact. And so therefore you get a little bit full of yourself and I don't mean egotistically, but kind of like you're not putting a lid on your potential, and you go, fucking hell, I can change. I can do bigger and bigger and bigger. But the truth is you actually end up burnt out with compassion, fatigued, you know, because you start to realize that it's too big for me, and then you start to feel like a failure because now I can't do all the things

I wish I could. But and then then you've got to have a really good hard look that go, well, what have you done and how much has that change? And what the bit that you have done has had a big impact. You know, and it's and it's it's done because you did it, and if you didn't do it, it wouldn't be done. So that'll make sense.

of life, thinking I was in a bit. But because that was the personality of me, is I need people to like me, you know, and that was kind of where and I was a bit of an odd kid, you know, very ass bey, you know, gay, that kind of stuff, which I didn't know when I was a little kid, but I wanted to have friends come around and play bands, you know, with tennis records, and they just wanted to play with my sisters and play dolls, and so I had all these My animals were my

best friends, and so I kind of wanted someone to approve of me and like me. And you know, so being a being a muso on stage that was fantastic anyway. And then my second younger sister got cancer, and you know, I ended up working doing the Real Life for Life for the cancer cancel and doing warrigals first event, and it was really successful. And then people were sort of

praising me, and this shifted from ego to altruism. I started to realize far out, I've actually got the power to have a really big impact on society and be approved of or noticed for, you know, for doing good stuff, like doing really good stuff for other people. And that kind of got me. It really woke me up to how much power I had that didn't have to be about me. Do you know it actually felt good helping other people without even getting the approval. Does that make I was getting self.

I'm an only child. But it doesn't work, like there's no it doesn't feel that spiritual, emotional kind of well, like you still feel bankrupt because the things that you were doing for yourself is so short lived that then you've got to do another thing, you know, and you've got to find something else. I need another fix, I need more instant gratification. I need, you know, tell me about navigating all of this being on the spectrum like being aspy as you How is that a superpower? Is that?

I mean, I know you don't know any other way, but it's like it's like when people say to me, what's it like not having brothers and sisters, I go, I don't know, I've never fucking had them.

can just figure out, figure out anything. And I kind of I used to punish myself for being like that, you know, jack of all trades, master of none. You're a bloody dickhead. You know, you haven't got a degree, you haven't got this, You've got no expertise in this. But an actual fact, when I look back, it's it's been wonderful. That aspy thing too. I think, you know,

I didn't even notice where people criticizing me. When I think about it, do you know I've had so many When I was a kid, I got my uncle worked at Monash in the in the some research lab or whatever, and he brought me a stethoscope and home from the lab, and I put it round my you know, my neck, and I wore it up and down the street proudly, do you know. And because I was a tomboy, my neighbor called me doctor Tom. And it was a criticism, do you know it was It was a kind of

a you know, take the piss out of me. But I thought I was God's gift. I thought I was just so bloody special because people think I'm a real doctor, you know. And I was walking up down the street with this money's there, this go haha.

Even though before I said I want people to like me and approve of me, yeah, your friends, you know, I don't know, I got more enjoyment tinkering.

hyper sensitive, like they get offended. They read things into things all the time, and they get offended forty two times a day even though no one's trying to offend them, you know. So I think that walking up and down the street with your stethoscope thinking you're a doctor and people I'm sure some people thought it was cute and awesome and the odd person hung shit on you, but not knowing it's probably not the worst thing.

and he's just said, o'h come on. Anyway, I did an hour's workshop, and as I was doing it, I was thinking, oh shit, you need to know about funding. Ah shit, you need to know about this, and having this real realization that an hour was not short long enough to talk about how to really kick start a project. So I said to people, gives your email and I'll send you a pdf. I'll write up all this stuff. And I came home and started typing it up, and before I knew it, I had one hundred pages, you know,

and I'm like, well, this is a book. Somebody you might as well might as well have this as a book. And I'd already made magnificent kids that book, and I thought, well, I know how to do a book. I might as well just do that. And so you know, if I look back now, I think, God, there's things I would change in that, but I'm not going to because so many people have said to me that was the thing. That book was the thing that got me over the

line to kick start my project. And I could hear your voice, You could he hear you saying it to me. And there's another example of I'm not really bound by perfectionism. It's kind of like a lot of people would be caught up in oh, I can't really publish letters a book. It's not perfect, you know. But my thought was, well, why not must well just put it out there and you can have it so and that was thinking beyond myself. That was just thinking for the people at that conference.

As long as they've got a book, then that's great. But now I.

be no positive change for me. That's one of the I say that almost every workshop and every keynote I've got another keynote tomorrow, and I'll probably say at the end of that, you know, it's like all this stuff is, you know, hopefully a little bit informative and inspiring and educational, but none of it's worth anything if you don't do anything with it. Like knowing what to do is not producing results. Now, knowing what to do is not doing

what you know. So I think there's that. Why do you think it is that we have never been more informed or educated or well equipped in terms of online resources, but so many of us still are basically standing at the starting line waiting for some fucking magical sign.

But I just think we just don't do it. I run a leadership program called Confident leaders Program, and if I called it courageous leaders, no one had fucking come, you know, because they think I'll be making them do courageous things. But ultimately, what I talk about in that is confidence is and a lot of people say, oh, have I had your confidence? I wish I had confidence and confidence this and that, because I always see confidence

is a big picture. But I always say, if you can, if you've got confidence to take the next step whatever, just do it, like if you've got the ability to. But I have this metaphoring thing, and it's actually a baseball cap. It's not metaphoric. I've got a real one, but other people can't. Haven't got it, You'll have to use a metaphoric one. And it's a baseball cap with

c ap on the front. And everyone looks at me, and I use it as a gimmick because I put it on and people are like, you're fucking for real. You've got a cap that says cap like. And I think you're good because you remember me standing up here like a dickhead with this cap cap or And the C is courage, the A is action, and the P

is practiced. And I say, if you want to get anything in life, like anything, and you want to become confident, you have to take courageous action and you have to practice, and you have to practice and practice and practice and practice and practice, and you're going to fuck up and fuck the fuck up. But at the bottom of it is it's courageous act and practicing it over and over, you know, and it's I hope people see me in that hat and go what a fucking dickhead, and then

they remember it and it's bent into their brain. And I say, just anything you want to try, just pretend think of me and micap and put on your metaphoric caps. I've got my confidence gap on and take courageous action and I'm just going to get started. And none of us know all the steps, Like we just don't know all this, but do you know the next step? Yeah, if you know the next step, take it.

know that you're scared. I know it's uncomfortable. I know it's hard. Guess what that's okay. You're allowed to be scared. You're allowed to be uncomfortable, You're allowed to be uncertain, and you're still allowed to do those things that you're terrified of because how you turn down the volume on that fear is by being courageous and leaning in. You know you can't I say this too many times, sorry listeners, but you can't master what you avoid. You can't get

good at what you won't do. You know, you're not going to get stronger by fucking hiding under the metaphoric couch for ten years and waiting for everything to work itself out, because it doesn't. You know. So, Hey, you're inspirational. We need to get your back. How do people find you? Follow you, connect with you? Where do they buy your book? Where can they listen to your potty? Give us the quick spiel?