Transforming Grief into Creativity and Joy featuring author SC Perot

Take Aways

• It takes courage to let go of societal expectations and pursue a path that brings joy and fulfillment,
• Throwing out the rulebook can lead to profound personal joy
• Community and connection are what sustain us
• And it is critical to protect one’s joy in the face of challenges, now more than ever. 

Resources

• Learn more about SC here.
• Follow her on instagram @scperot
• And buy her book “Styles of Joy” from Interabang Books!

Transcript

SC (00:04.834)

Hi I’m SC Perot. I’m a lawyer, professor, and author of the USA bestselling book, Styles of Joy. And this is No Time to be Timid.

Tricia  (00:25.838)

Hey there, I’m Tricia Rose Burt, and in this podcast, we talk to artists who show us how to find the courage to take risks, step out of our comfort zones, and use our creativity to make our work and change our world. Pay close attention, because this is No Time to be Timid.

Tricia  (00:46.634)

Welcome to the show. We’re so glad you’re here for this penultimate episode of the season. I like that word, penultimate. Even though it just means this is the season’s second to the last show, it sounds very important. And this episode is important because our guest today is exactly who we need to hear from in these unsettling times. 

SC Perot is the author of the USA Today bestselling book, Styles of Joy, a book which prompts its readers to examine the joy in their own lives. And while the book is about joy, it sprang from a place of deep grief. After leaving her corporate law career, then enduring a divorce, which resulted in losing family, friends, and her dog, and reeling in a post-pandemic world, SC experienced a tidal wave of loss. She found solace in walking, and while she walked, she listened to the uplifting music of Harry Styles. Before she knew it, she was seeing 17 Harry Styles concerts across five countries in 10 months. You know, I’m a storyteller and I love a good narrative arc. So picture this: a Stanford-educated, rule-following corporate lawyer, now bedazzled, sporting a boa, and dancing in a mosh pit with complete strangers.

SC wrote Styles of Joy to share her unexpected and joy-filled experience and to give us a framework on how to explore our own joy, asking us important questions about how we cultivate, adopt, protect, and spread joy. One of the lines in the book that resonated with me the most was, “these concerts gave me a reason to tap into my creativity, which had historically taken a backseat to my more conventional pursuits, i.e. the law.” How many of us put conventional expectations before our creativity?

SC is the embodiment of the No Time to be Timid Manifesto tenet, “Creativity is not a frivolous pursuit.” Some other takeaways from our conversation include, it takes courage to let go of societal expectations and pursue a path that brings joy and fulfillment. Throwing out the rule book can lead to profound personal joy. Community and connection are what sustain us. And it is critical to protect one’s joy in the face of challenges now more than ever. I have a soft place in my heart for people who walk away from one life to start another one, something I know a little bit about. So I’m just thrilled to have SC on the show. I’m so glad you’re joining us.

Tricia  (03:28.258)

Hey SC, welcome to the show. We’re so happy to have you here.

SC

Thank you for having me. It is such a pleasure.

Tricia

Good, good. Okay, so in your book, you say that you are historically a private person and this book is a real pivot for you. So what made you write the book? Because this show is called No Time to be Timid and that’s a very big step to take. 

SC

You know, that’s an interesting and loaded question.

Tricia

Wanted to start out big, SC, wanted to start out big.

SC (03:56.546)

I suppose I did too in terms of no longer being a private person. I share a good amount in this book and really open myself up, not in terms of the content, but I’m adjusting to being exposed to strangers for the first time. And that’s just a different way to live your life. And a lot of people do it very bravely and I’ve been grateful for their counsel. But you know, I never really felt like I had something I wanted to publicly say. And…

I think everyone that knows me knows I’m extremely opinionated in private and not online and not any public medium. I don’t keep my thoughts to myself, but I think the internet has made, it’s such a double edged sword. On the one hand, if you are exposing yourself by saying something publicly or publishing something, whatever it may be, you are opening yourself up to anyone’s opinion anywhere in the world. But on the other hand, it has made it so easy for people to share and it’s really changed this narrative of what it means to share something. And for me, I actually found writing this book way less daunting for that reason. Actually, I felt that I was trying to strike a chord by reintroducing authenticity and vulnerability into sharing. So on the one hand, it’s daunting, because anyone can chime in and on the other, it’s not as daunting because so many people are sharing in so many formats and ways. I think the last thing I’ll say is I didn’t sit down to write a book. 

Tricia

What did you sit down to do?

SC (05:50.06)

So I started writing for myself a little bit and really one of my favorite stories of how the book came to be, I really love telling it because it really does tie to some of the messages in the book, which is the power of one person to be a force for good. And maybe it’s inspiration, maybe whatever it may be. And I got a message from a high school friend I hadn’t seen in many, many years when I was on these adventures. And she said, you know, have you thought about writing any of this down? You should publish an article when Harry Styles’ tour is finished. And she used to work for a high profile magazine. So I really took that as a compliment. I thought, she really knows what she’s talking about.

So, I’d been logging my experiences with photos and videos, but principally for myself not to share with anyone else. And as I sat down to write an article, which I really thought was a fun idea, I thought, well, particularly with this post pandemic angle, I can write about watching live music in five countries and seeing people kind of reclaim this communal and collective joy. I sat down to write a New York Times Modern Love article. But unfortunately that word count is quite short. I think the last time I checked perhaps 1,500 words and then I ended up writing 98,000. So yeah, so yeah, I clearly had more to say.

Tricia

And I’m so glad that you said it. And so this is a question I’m excited about asking. So why did you go to law school? Because law school is a very wordy profession and a lot of writers who don’t realize they’re writers, at least consciously, go to law school because it’s so wordy. So why did you go to law school?

SC

So this is one of my favorite stories to tell. When I was graduating from Vanderbilt, from the undergrad program, one of my happiest memories of all time was I was crossing the stage, know, cap, gown, receiving my diploma, and I heard someone calling my name. And I was like, well, surely not, because my parents are up in the nosebleeds. We were in the basketball arena because it was rained out. And I’m like, my friends are in the back. Who could this possibly be?

And I look out and two of my favorite art history professors are cheering me on by name. And I just had this wash of just gratitude for having gone to a school like that where it was a small program and you got to know everyone and it felt like such a community. But as I filed back to my seat in the arena, I thought to myself, you know, I had this lightning strike moment of I have to go to graduate school.

And I looked up at the ceiling as in, wait, what? I mean, I hadn’t thought about it, but it was crystal clear. And I really think it was seeing those professors and realizing how much I loved the classroom and that was ending as well as my fun social life with my friends and what have you. Ultimately, shockingly, I hadn’t had the thought to pursue graduate school until that exact cap and gown moment. So then the fork in the road was business school or law school.

And I looked at the required exams to go to either of those program types, the GMAT or the LSAT. And frankly, I didn’t want to relearn calculus or whatever I would have to do for the GMAT. I used to feel shame that that was a fork in the road in my line of thinking. But I actually tell my students now that I’m teaching back at Vanderbilt, I’m like, well, that’s just paying attention to your natural aptitude. So that’s a perfectly logical pun intended with logic.

reason to choose one or the other. But in terms of how that ties into being a writer, you know, I had always really enjoyed, I mean, certainly if I were having to choose math versus English, I would always choose English. But I don’t think I ever considered myself to be a writer. And funnily enough, I still don’t consider myself a writer. I think being an author and being a writer are two very different things.

Tricia  (09:47.95)

Tell me what you think is different about it.

SC

Well, maybe it’s not imposter syndrome necessarily, but for me to be a doctor, you do all these things and to be a lawyer, you do all these things. But to be a writer is really ambiguous to me and it feels like a constant practice. This book is the only thing I have written and I haven’t written anything since. And I mean that very literally, like a thank you note.

It’s like I left all my words on the mat and even a thank you note feels challenging after that. I’ve dried out all my words. But more seriously, being a lawyer, it really stripped out my love of writing. Being an art history major, I had been trained to have very flowery language and God forbid you repeat phrases. I mean, that was so taboo. Whereas when you’re drafting contracts, for example, you have to use these same technical terms over and over again. And for me, I mean, it was so soul sucking. Well, this is this is more like calculus, actually, no one warned me so formulaic.

Tricia  (11:03.993)

And you’re building your time in six-minute increments. 

SC

Which is not a way to live.

Tricia

Yeah, yeah. I build my time in 15-minute increments and I was like, I got to get out of this one. Six minutes would undo me. 15 was hard enough. Right. And so is that why you decided to quit being a corporate lawyer?

SC (11:20.11)

So in the pandemic, it got to the point I just couldn’t will myself to do it anymore. I had the best job, great clients, great bosses. I loved my coworkers, still some of my closest friends to this day, but working from home, I mean, it really stripped out so much of what I loved about that job. And I remember calling a mentor of mine and I said, who was not at the firm, so I could speak very candidly about my thinking. And I said, you know, I love pro bono work and I love recruiting, you know, old habits die hard. I was a recruitment chair for my sorority in college. And apparently, you know, I enjoyed firing up those skills again in the professional context. And you know, and I said, and I love my colleagues and coworkers and I laid out all these things. And she said,

Well, I hate to break it to you, but you don’t love your job because you were not hired to do any of those things. And I thought, that is dead on the money. That is.

Tricia

You’ve never said once, I love law. You said I’ve loved everything else but it.

SC

She’s like, so you don’t like drafting contracts? I was like, no. She said, well, that is your job.

Tricia  (12:36.202)

You know, we need those people in our lives. 

SC

Absolutely.

Tricia

We need those people to tell us, you don’t like your job. So I love so much that what you stepped into was going to Harry Styles concerts, because there is a line that you wrote on page 269, and we’re going to talk about this a little bit more. But you said, I’ve always loved making jewelry. And these concerts gave me a reason to tap into my creativity, which had historically taken a backseat to my more conventional pursuits, i.e. the law. So when I was reading the book, I was going, this is giving her permission to be the creative person that she is. Harry Styles is escorting her into her creative self. And so it was just fascinating to watch you make jewelry, make a costume, make it this. You were just going in all these directions. I’m like, she doesn’t know what’s happening to her.

She’s becoming an artist or becoming the artist who she is. Give us a little bit about how you got introduced to Harry Styles because I think it’s fascinating that you went from billing your time in six minute increments to what you ended up doing. So talk a little bit about that.

SC

Tricia, you are the first person to call this out in this way about it being part of this through line to creativity. That was such a kind of throwaway sentence of, and actually the editor said to take it out. 

Tricia

No way!

SC

Yes! You are the first person of everyone I’ve interacted with around this book to bring up this one kind of element. And this is making me so happy. You’re so right.

Tricia

Yeah, that’s very funny.

SC

So yes, it was the costume making and the jewelry making and all these and the funny, drafting funny posters and this kind of quirky side that again was taking the backseat to these more conventional pursuits. And I want to say kind of before I get on this subject of why Harry Styles and how this all came to be, I think what’s fun about the part that you just highlighted is it really brings up this idea of how one role or one part of our lives can become so dominant that it really eclipses other parts of our personality. And it really brings up this tension of why can’t lawyers also love making bracelets? 

Tricia

Yes. Yes.

SC

Why can’t lawyers also like making costumes? I was getting this feedback of, you know, have you lost your mind? What’s with the feather boas? You used to be a corporate lawyer. And I’ll tell you, you’ll love this. This isn’t in the book. When I was doing one of the forms of legal review for the book, which was analyzing trademark issues or anything that might be around it, I hopped on the phone with one of my former bosses and she said, this is the manifesto for fan girl attorneys. She goes, do you realize I have seen Madonna 35 times?

Tricia

Oh my gosh.

SC

And I said, you’re kidding. And she said, and when you roasted golf and you said, what is the difference? She goes, I have to listen to these men, these partners all day. They bring their putters to work. They’re putting down the hallways, but God forbid I want to go see Madonna again. And she said, I love this project. I’ve got your back. We’re going to have so much fun working on this. And I just thought–  I had no clue that she, and I knew her already. I had no clue that was part of her passion, passion profile, joy profile, and anyway, it just really made me so happy, so.

Tricia

You love this part where you have a whole section about being judged, about how you’re being judged by all of these people for having this joy and having this passion. I think my favorite line is, “you traveled with someone with tattoos?” Oh my God, you’ve lost your mind. They had tattoos. But it is that either or, that it cannot be. You can’t be a crazy creative person and be a corporate lawyer at the same time. Why is that? Why can’t that happen? Why can’t one feed the other? 

SC

Absolutely.

Tricia

But I love the line, the opposite of joy is being judgmental. And I love that line.

SC (17:02.574)

Well, I certainly can speak to that after all of the, we’ll call it feedback I was getting from different corners of my life. But I really want to bring listeners along for this story. When I was going through this acute season of grief, which was due to a devastating divorce and I had stopped practicing law and also it was the pandemic, and all of a sudden I looked around and I barely recognized my life and I started processing everything I was going through by going on these very long walks around the Town Lake Trail in Austin, Texas. And I vividly remember starting one of those long walks by typing  “good energy” into the search bar on Spotify. And it was, I look back and I’m thinking that was kind of a cry for help because I needed, I needed some good energy. That’s exactly what I was in the market for. And I had never listened to Harry Styles.

But his third album called Harry’s House came out two days after I told my then husband I wanted a divorce. And so this new album was sprinkled throughout this good energy playlist that Spotify fed me. And that’s when I first listened to his music and it was such a mood boost. You know, it was bringing me so much joy. And I vividly remember saying to my mom, I said, this is working. This Harry Styles thing is working because I’m moving my body, it’s time and nature, so it endorphins, vitamin D, happy music, and along this beautiful lake. And it really was helping. Sometimes, I would do it twice a day. And it was a really surefire recipe for a good mood boost. But then I did what anyone would do, and I saw his show 17 times in five countries, and travel with strangers I met along the way. So the book resulted.

Tricia

Of course!

Tricia  (19:02.798)

We’ll get back to the second half of our conversation in a moment, but right now I want to tell you about our sponsor, Interabang Books, a Dallas-based independent bookstore, which was named one of the country’s top five bookstores by Publishers Weekly. They have a fabulous curated online collection and it’s just as easy to shop with them as it is with Amazon. Who doesn’t want to support an independent bookstore? Please show them some love and check them out at interabangbooks.com.

That’s Interabang, I-N-T-E-R-A-B-A-N-G, Books.com.

Tricia  (20:06.35)

Tell me one of your experiences that was one of the most profound for you in this Harry Styles journey. When was a moment when some kind of light bulb went off or some sort of shift happened for you?

SC

Well, I think it’s interesting as we discuss judgment. Maybe I couldn’t have articulated what was stirring inside of me at these shows. And I certainly have the writing process to thank for really uncovering what it was. But it was not just about Harry Styles. I mean, he’s one person. I was looking around and I was watching how powerful it was to see people in community with one another experiencing joy. And it made me critically think about communal and collective joy for the first time, which post-pandemic felt so special and so noteworthy because we were robbed of so many forums for this kind of community, whether it be religious worship, sports, live music, anything that brings us together to experience joy. And it really, it was so inspiring. And I just thought there was a particular show, it was my second show, and I want to tell listeners, I did not set out to go to 17 Harry Styles concerts. If you read the book, you see how it simply snowballed.

Tricia  (21:33.77)

It was bigger than you, SC. It was bigger than you.

SC

Something was coming and I was the most oblivious I can tell you that. But at the second show, I was with a lot of my dear girlfriends in Austin at the time, and we’re up in the nosebleeds, I think we’re second to the last row, having the time of our lives.

Tricia

What does having the time of your life look like? Are you dressed up? Are you dancing? What does it look like?

SC

We’re in costume, we got feather boas, you know, we’re just, but really I think the word for it is carefree. And I had this moment where I looked down the line of our friends and I thought, that’s my friend who’s struggling with breast cancer. That’s my friend who is in the thick of her PhD candidacy. That’s my friend who is dealing with really severe depression. That’s my friend who is in an abusive family context. That’s my friend who is the sole caretaker for her aging parents. And I looked and I just thought, but look at us right now. 

Tricia  (22:39.832)

Mm-hmm.

SC

And Harry Styles challenges the crowd every night. He says, I want you to have as much fun as you possibly can tonight. And I challenge you to have more fun than I will.

And it just, it gave me this perspective on entertainment that I had never had before, because I had never critically thought about the role that, yes, it’s pop culture, sure, but look at what it’s allowing people to do.

Tricia

What did it allow you to do? Like what were you doing that you’d never done before?

SC

Well, I think, and I’m skipping ahead because I really think one of the most powerful takeaways from all of this took me a while to really understand why it was feeding my soul in the way that it was. But I was already in a season of loss. I had lost my partner, my house, my job, my dog, a whole family, a whole group of friends, you know, and this idea of what I thought my future was going to look like. And it’s like I had the courage to say,actually, let’s go further. I want to be anonymous in a crowd where no one knows who I know, who I don’t know, where I went to law school. No one cares. I can tell you that. It doesn’t matter what you have or don’t have. And it was so cathartic because it really allowed me to get to the root of this healing experience because in this season of loss, I was left asking myself this big profound question, which is, who am I in any single room I walk into? No context, complete anonymity. If people ask me, you know, where is your greatest source of confidence? You’re a really confident person. Where does that come from? And I would point to that experience, is that I was able to navigate crowds and make friends along the way when no one knew anything about me. And it made me really proud to know that I can be a deeply kind person regardless of the environment that I’m in. And it was so, it really reframed the amount of things that I had lost in the identity shifting and stripping that came with divorce and changing my career and all these things, where it’s like, no, I can still stand on my own two feet, regardless of what my resume says, regardless of whatever, you know, preconceived notions people might have or not have or whatever it may be, or whatever people value. And to me, that was so profound and such a gift. And I wasn’t anyone’s neighbor or ex-wife or lawyer, well, I was no one’s lawyer at the time. But I wasn’t a graduate of a certain school. It just didn’t matter. And for me, that was the greatest gift of all these experiences.

Tricia  (25:31.532)

You talk about so many people that you met, but was there someone on the road that really helped you along to those realizations? Because many of the people were very different backgrounds than you, very different, you know, intellectual, emotional, financial, they were very, very different people than you. And yet you found some common ground. What was that experience like? And was there one person who really just kind of helped you see it? Like the one with all the tattoos?

SC

My friend Margo, sure. Well, there were a lot of people and I think I can certainly pick a few that stand out. But for me, we talked about how these experiences allowed me to kind of pull this cord of creativity and kind of see what happens. But also I really feel like I got back to my truest self because I think two of my greatest passions are people and storytelling. And so how thrilling for me to just never know who I’m going to get to talk to at any of these concerts. I mean, that’s like my dream. I mean, I keep in touch with more people I’ve met on airplanes than I could possibly count. Imagine that on steroids. I mean, it was just like I was a kid in a candy store. 

Tricia  (26:48.843)

What interests you about it?

SC (26:58.476)

Because I say to people all the time, I get enough of me all day, every day. I don’t need to be around people who are like me. I don’t need to be around people who are like me, dress like me, believe what I do. You know, I always say to people, what’s the worst that’s going to happen? You change your mind? Okay. Go forth and conquer. And for me, I remember at a particular show, I was talking to this couple, they were recently engaged and their names were, well, I probably shouldn’t say their names. They were recently engaged and they were telling me what it was like to leave the Mormon church, to come out of the closet and what it was like to date in the tiny gay population of Salt Lake City. And one of them is an undertaker. And I am like, I would like to know all about that. I don’t have a single reference point that I can relate, but I’m curious. And all of a sudden they start asking about my dating life. And we keep in touch to this day.

And they have been such cheerleaders for the book, such cheerleaders for every project that I undertake and do – undertake, sorry, that was a bad pun. – But for me, it’s just this reminder that you can have nothing in common with something on paper, but everything in common where it matters. And I think the interesting thing about an artist like Harry Styles is he puts a value set at the forefront of his fan culture. And that is all about inclusivity and kindness.

And I think fans take that very seriously and want to bring that to the forefront. And you really experience it in these crowds. People ask me, this is a very niche question that people ask me, but I teach in the human and organizational development program at Vandy. And they say, is there any overlap between your experiences at these Harry Styles shows and what you bring into the classroom? And I say, there is. The Venn diagram overlap might be relatively small, but this concept of psychological safety is very interesting to me. What happens when people feel free to be themselves and feel encouraged to bring their voice to the room? And that is what I was experiencing at these concerts, is everyone felt welcome and everyone felt safe. And what results is this beautiful love bubble of people being their very best versions of themselves and even letting their creativity flag fly, which is which was really a special experience for me

SC

You know, we have a manifesto for the show. The first one, which I think you can relate to is the riskiest thing you can do is play it safe. It’s because, you know, for me, it was like, I just kept trying to be safe and it was blowing up every time. But I think it’s the fifth one is, is creativity is not a frivolous pursuit. And I think that that’s, for me, looking at it through the, when I was reading your book, where again, I think there was, we have so many overlaps in our life experiences, but also, knowing I’m supposed to be doing something conventional, but I am not a conventional person. And so I want to be around these people who have boas and are costumed and because I can learn so much from these people. And it is just a thrill to read the book and watch you stepping into this creative person that you are. And so I was just sort of cheering you along. Every time you made a costume, I was like, you know, go SC go, you know, but talk to me a little bit about, you said you’ve always loved making jewelry. What were you making along the way growing up? And like, when did you stop making? Like, was there a moment you made, made, made, and then you stopped?

SC

That’s a great question. I loved summer camp growing up. So any kind of, I mean, if they would have allowed me to sit in the craft hut, I would have all day. And my sweet mom was so patient with the treasure that I brought back from summer camp. Beautiful decoupage plates, lovely, lovely things. But I actually picked up jewelry making in the pandemic more than anything. And that was a saving grace for me in the pandemic. I started this little jewelry business and it was just beaded things, necklaces, bracelets, but I would take orders. Simple, everyone can do it, everyone should, it’s very fun. And I was taking orders from friends all over the country and I started a little Instagram account and I would watercolor my little enclosure cards. So that was another outlet that I got to make these watercolor paintings for the little notes that I would write all of my customers. But it was, it brought me more peace and joy in those lockdown days. And it also gave me a way to connect with friends I otherwise wouldn’t. And it’s like, hey, how are you doing? You know, yes, I’ll make you the turquoise and yellow bracelet, but really, how are you? And it ended up, it just was my favorite thing. So I had all the materials and I still, I’ll have girls nights and whenever my girl cousins come over, we make jewelry and, but I had all the materials and I just thought, well, and this was before Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour. This was really before the friendship bracelet thing kicked off in such a way, which obviously I loved because I was like, the world needs more friendship bracelets. This is great. But I was making inside jokes, you know, and I would for, on bracelets or lyrics song names. I made three necklaces for myself that I wore to every show that it was one necklace per album. And so I had just the letters of the song titles, the track list down the album. And what I love is any non Harry Styles fan would look at it and it doesn’t say anything, but girls at the concerts would be like album one, two, and three, look at that. I mean, they picked it up. So, but it was just, it was a fun, creative outlet. 

Tricia

You found your tribe

SC

No question.

Tricia

and we get often raised that this is your tribe. And then you’re like, no, I don’t think so. I think actually my tribe’s over there and they look a little different. 

SC (33:08.546)

Or both and.

Tricia  (33:27.534)

Yeah, or both and, you know, I mean, have my feet are in so many worlds. If I had a dinner party and invited somebody from all of my worlds, it would be pretty interesting. There is a moment in your book that is particularly profound. When, well, there’s two things I want to say. One is, I love this quote because I could totally relate to it. “My friends were now having their third babies and I was now traveling with a near stranger to Los Angeles for a concert by a pop star whose tattoos I was suddenly too familiar with.” I’m like, you go girl. But that sense of my friends are doing all these other things and I am completely out here in another direction. How did that, how did you reconcile that? How did it work for you? Because a lot of times being an artist, we are different from the people, you know, we’re not part of the general population. We’re doing different things and looking at different things. And so how did you navigate that feeling of difference?

SC

Well, comparison is the thief of joy. And I think, going through what I had gone through, knowing that divorce was the right decision and something I had to do, I kind of got this really beautiful gift in that process, which was I sincerely did not care what people thought. Because I’m thinking I can onboard anyone to why I made this decision, and it’s just not their business. All of a sudden I expanded that line of thinking to, I think this should apply to all facets of my life.

Tricia  (34:55.8)

Yeah.

SC

If it doesn’t work for them, that’s okay, they shouldn’t do it. It works for me. So that’s that. And I just think this entire book, not just how it lives in the confines of the front and the back cover, but truly the whole story of how it came to be is the ultimate example of why you should trust your instincts. Something was working and yes, people thought I lost my mind and no, I did not think I was going to write a book. I was doing this just for myself. And at first I thought I’ve had some really low lows. Who cares if I need some really high highs, but along the way it was like, no, something else is bricks. This is feeding other parts of my heart. This is stimulating other parts of my brain. And I couldn’t articulate it at the time, but it’s interesting when people say, you must be so proud you wrote a book. Well, maybe. I mean, I’d have to kind of, it’s not untrue, you know, but really if you ask me, what are you proud of? I say that I protected my joy.

Tricia  (36:11.562)

Yeah.

SC

And I was listening just to myself. And look at this career that’s unfolded. Look at these experiences that I’ve had. But for protecting my joy, I would not be an author. But for protecting my joy, I would not have gone on this book tour. But for protecting my joy, I wouldn’t be on this podcast with you today. And but for protecting my joy, I wouldn’t have had time away from Austin where I had lived for five years that really helped me clear my head and realize I need to move cities. But I couldn’t have known that unless I had had these adventures and I wouldn’t have walked away from this dream house that I had been building to know that there was something more on this leap of faith. But I felt so confident in my own skin and within the confines of my instincts that I knew I was gonna be okay, you know, regardless of what my next chapter looked like.

Tricia

That it’s a very powerful moment in the book. And that’s the one thing I wanted. Another thing I wanted to ask you about is when you return to this home, which is supposed to be where you’re going to live all these years and do all these things. And you go, yeah, no, and get in the car and call the real estate agent and say, please sell it with everything inside. It is an amazingly profound and powerful moment. So just recount it for me a little bit, like what it felt like to go, this is not where I’m supposed to be.

SC

I had had months of listening to myself and I had never dialed down the noise of other people’s opinions more significantly. And a beautiful part of this adventure that I haven’t mentioned, I packed a carry-on bag for what was supposed to be nine days and I was going to four Harry Styles concerts, but then I met a friend in the bathroom line outside of Coventry, the Coventry England music venue in a Tesco grocery store. You know, this random, if you believe in random, way to meet someone. And my friend Margo is also American and she had extra tickets and asked if I wanted to keep going. And I had no reason why not. And so I had very, very little with me for 30 days. And it was so freeing.

Tricia  (38:37.678)

Hmm.

SC

So freeing, I felt so unencumbered. So the contrast, even this is before I knew I was writing a book, this is just how it unfolded truly in real time. I wheeled in my tiny suitcase that had sustained me for 30 days into this huge house that I had purchased with my ex-husband and it was supposed to be kind of our dream in this next live chapter. And I was reunited with so much stuff. I mean, birthday gifts, Christmas gifts, wedding registry stuff, just all things from another life. And I’m a very sensitive and sentimental person. And if something was not, you know, for example, I looked at the KitchenAid mixer and my former father-in-law has a favorite pie and my ex-husband surprised me with the KitchenAid mixer one Christmas Eve so that we could make it for his dad. It was so sweet. It was so thoughtful. He knew I loved to cook. It was a really nice gift. It was for the sweet reason to surprise his dad with his favorite pie. And that was lovely, but I don’t bake. And I have not used that KitchenAid mixer a single time since in nine years or whatever it was. And I looked at it and all I saw was a memory of that one Christmas Eve and it made me so sad. And I don’t need it. And it was just example over example over example, time after time after time. And to walk away, I mean, I moved to Nashville without a plate. And guess what? You just really don’t need that much stuff.

Tricia  (40:24.494)

I do know, I do know. And it’s a lot easier to be, I know I’ve said this on the show before, but there was a quote by Grace Paley saying what it took to be a writer, an artist, and it was one, a person who believes in your work, and two, low overhead. Because you can be way more agile. You can just be way more agile and do the work that you want to do and not be worrying about maintaining this home or the second car, whatever it is, just to streamline it, to not have those things that take you away from your creative work and your creative self. But it was a very, I was like, holy moly, that takes some guts. So that was a really wonderful moment in the book. Well, here’s my question for you that I ask all of my guests. What is the thing that you need the most courage for right now?

SC (41:24.95)

Wow. That is a great question. I’m in a very strange period personally right now. I mean, this book, I love it. I’m passionate about it. I’m proud of it. But my timeline for this project is not what other people are experiencing. You know, the story ends two years ago within the book. But then I had the whole writing process, but then that ended.

So now I’m in the release phase, which is the phase that requires the least amount of work for me, especially book tour ended last week. And I think I just need the courage to sit in the unknown. It was a really, this is my first book. This is my first, like we discussed at the top of the episode, this is my first public output in any form. And for me just not knowing what any day is gonna bring. At first, I really wasn’t handling it very well. And the courage to just sit in the unknown is something I’m working on. I am happiest when I am stressed to the gills. I love a project. I love adrenaline. I laughed with my therapist the other day. I was like, why am I fantasizing about studying for the GMAT? And she’s like, are you okay? But I love to really focus on something and it’s not that season right now, and I have to relax into that, which is very uncomfortable for me.

Tricia

I mean, I just look at you and it’s like your brain is going nonstop with ideas. And so I can’t imagine what you could be creating in this time of waiting.

SC (43:08.322)

Well, my favorite placeholder has always been a good dinner party. It scratches so many parts of my brain. I love to cook, and it’s such a challenge to cook for many people. When I say the more, the merrier, I mean, push me to the limit. I love it. And the creative element of hosting and menu planning and all those things, but also it’s all about connection and community and people in storytelling. So, of course, that’s always been a great way to blend a lot of things I love.

Well, you are spreading so much joy just existing and with your book. And we’re so excited that we had you on the show, SC. Thank you so much for joining us.

SC

Thank you so much for having me. It was really fun.

Tricia  (44:06.572)

SC is a poster child for No Time to be Timid. She found her joy and her creativity by pushing herself way out of her comfort zone. And she got me thinking about some questions. Is your creativity taking a backseat to more conventional pursuits? Remember, you don’t have to be like SC and me and walk away from your job to pursue a creative life, but are you making it a priority? When was the last time you surprised yourself and did something completely new? And are you protecting your joy? And are you trying to spread some as well? Using your creativity can help you do just that. 

Follow SC on Instagram at SC Perot, that’s P-E-R-O-T. Learn more about her at scperot.com and make sure to buy her book, Styles of Joy. Here’s a little paragraph so you can get a taste and some inspiration:

“It’s these days when we need joy vitamins the most, when we have to cling to joy life rafts a little tighter, when we have to cherish the mundane, let alone the extraordinary, when we have to give the microphone to the good, we have to take it where we can get it. It’s not flippant or trivial or superficial. It’s mission critical. It’s sacred. An intentional joy practice is about sitting in life storms and cracking open a yellow umbrella. We aren’t taking joy vitamins because we are ignoring life’s challenges. We’re putting salve on our broken hearts and clinging to even the tiniest winds because we are paying full attention.”

So go buy the book and make sure you buy it from our sponsor Interabang Books.

Tricia  (46:00.45)

Thanks for joining us. If you have any questions, feel free to reach out to us at podcast@triciaroseburt.com. And if you like what you hear, please review our podcast, subscribe to the show, and spread the word. It really helps build our audience. For more updates, you can follow me on Instagram and LinkedIn @triciaroseburt. And if you’d like to be added to my mailing list, please go to my website triciaroseburt.com. And remember, this is no time to be timid!

No Time to be Timid is written and produced by me, Tricia Rose Burt. Our episodes are produced and scored by Adam Arnone of Echo Finch. And our executive producers are Amy Grant, Nancy Perot, and Sage Wheeler. I’d also like to thank contributors to my Fractured Atlas Fiscal Sponsorship, which helps make this podcast happen. No Time to be Timid is a presentation of I Will Be Good Productions.

You can change yourself and change the world. It’s No Time to be Timid if you haven’t heard You can find what’s true, that’s what you deserve. It’s No Time to be Timid if you haven’t heard. Let’s go!