S1 Ep10 - The Recap

Welcome to the Rebrand Revolution. In the final episode of season 1, Sidonie revisits some of her personal rebrand-revoluton-revelations and the big takeaways that presented themselves across a debut season that investigated everything from the Inner Critic, to Potential, Authenticity to Self-Care, and wraps it all up in a bow.
Expect some home truths and some big questions to ponder.

• Show Notes

  In this episode, I reference the following:

  Audre Lorde wrote, “Caring for myself is not self-indulgence; it is self-preservation, and that is an act of political warfare” in her 1988 book A Burst of Light.

  I talk more about self care and Audre Lorde in S1 Ep 5.

• Audio Transcript

  This podcast is recorded on Kaurna Country. We acknowledge and pay our respects to the Kaurna people as the traditional owners and custodians of this land.

  You are listening to Rebrand Revolution, the podcast where we take today's pop culture cliche and turn it into tomorrow's empowered call to action. My name is Sidonie Henbest. Thank you for joining me. Episode 10. How on earth did we get here? I cannot believe that over the course of the last couple of months, we have recorded and released nine episodes, and this is our number 10 for Rebrand Revolution. I've had a ball making this season of Rebrand Revolution, and whilst I knew I loved words before I started, and have always been deeply curious about the meaning and, I guess, examining the way language comes into being. But if you'd asked me where this would go this series, I'm not sure if I could have told you quite the journey where you would end up taking. It's been a bit of a revelation, really. I suppose you could call it a rebrand, revolution, revelation, if you like. But like all good things, it feels like sometimes the best thing to do is wrap a bow around something. So I've decided that season one after 10 episodes, is going to come to an end, but not before we revisit some of the big takeaways and the good bits, I think, really, that have come out of the season and perhaps ask some questions about where to next. So without further ado, here we go. Season One. Rebrand, revolution, the recap.

  This season has been an opportunity to start a conversation and to start a process of unwrapping and discovering the meaning behind some of the pop culture buzz words that float around and well, smack us in the face quite honestly on a day to day basis, and because this is me, none of them turned out to be inconsequential words or even very small words, although some of them have proven to be pretty surprising. And because I'm a, you know, kind of "go big or go home", kind of gal, the first one we tackled was Inner Critic, which is certainly, I think, still one of the all time most popular words that we've unpacked. But over the course of the season, we've also looked at things like potential, community, self care, imposter syndrome, passion, triggered, and most recently, authenticity. Of course, there are loads of words we've left out. There was always just going to have to be a first list. But when considering how to approach a recap of this season, I guess I thought about it from a couple of different perspectives, and one was to ask myself, what is it that really surprised me about Rebrand Revolution and the process of unpacking these various terms? And I think there have been two real surprise revelations that have come out of creating the series, and the first actually comes from a fairly spontaneous choice of mine in episode two, and for reasons that honestly, I can't entirely recall, I decided to invoke the title of a famous Western film, The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, and use it as a sort of methodology or framework to unpack the words on Rebrand Revolution. And it's turned out to be a total gift. Having to go through the discipline of finding something good about a topic I had already decided I was pretty negatively disposed towards has been a really interesting exercise. I'm not going to lie at times it was really tough, and I felt almost begrudging towards the process, but having done it without fail, every single time it showed me something that I wouldn't have seen otherwise. And it was truly illuminating, not the least, because, sadly, I think the art of discourse is all but dead these days. We very rarely see opportunities, certainly in the public domain and in the broadcast or spoken form, where people are actually disseminating complete arguments, or whether they're presenting different opinions. Media and information trends and tends these days towards rants and single, dogmatic opinion pieces. So whilst I never really meant intentionally for it to be such a useful thing, publicly acknowledging the good in these terms, has really helped me, and I hope helped you, realize the benefit in considering a topic from more than one perspective. Revolutionary, I know! The second surprise revelation of the series for me came in the form of the history component. Specifically, I suppose, gaining an appreciation for how and why words have entered our modern English lexicon in the first instance, and then the process through the podcast episodes of pinpointing the moment their common usage meaning changed and it started to mean something different. And in many instances, we got to witness amazing moments, powerful historical moments of social change that are wrapped up in this language. And fascinatingly, we also saw that time and time again, there was an economic benefit to the modern buzzwords, but more on that later.

  So what were some of the outcomes, or the common reframes or questions that came up during the series. Well, part of the framework was that we offered something every episode. But I suppose the ones that have really stuck with me over time, and I find myself talking about time and time again after the fact is number one is trust. Trust in our own wisdom, trust in the sense of awareness that we feel, even if it's something we can't put our finger on, but that sense of knowing, sometimes, that sense of discomfort that we experience, but that it is innate to our own understanding and our own realization about what things mean to us and the impact that they're having on us, I would also add to that, our ability to read a situation. I think we have a far more advanced set of capabilities in that regard than we let ourselves realize a lot of the time, certainly in the moment. And it's invariably in hindsight that we say, actually, I knew that that was the case. One of the big and beautiful outcomes for this in terms of really crystallizing something I suppose I would have told you I always knew, is that individuals are powerful, beautiful and unique expressions of humanity. And they are, without a doubt, the best bits, the secret sauce of community, of connection, of authenticity, and very many of the other best bits of being alive and being in this world. And they are also best when tempered by remembering that we are part of a collective. Individuals are better for remembering that they are one of many. And I believe that at the same time, the collective is better for remembering that it is made up of many, ones. Things like kindness, accountability and consideration for others are really necessary for our survival and our safety. Because this is not a solo game people. We are deeply reliant on other humans, both for safety and for our ability to thrive. You know, biology aside, we need other people to keep on, keeping on.

  One of the other things that became really evident and powerfully so I think during some of these episodes, was to realize that that groups, whether we're talking about community or society at those sort of different levels, is very much a better place when it holds space for difference, for diversity, for the things that make human beings human. This leads me, inevitably, to ask the question of, what is it that are my big takeaways? What do I know now that I would not have known in the same way had I never done this episode or this show? And I've narrowed it down to three, you'll be glad to hear. One of my big takeaways from Rebrand Revolution series 1 has been the remembering and the recognition on a new level, in a way that I think is both exciting and a little bit terrifying, is that language limits and liberates. Both possibilities are ever present. It is up to us to be conscious and aware of our choice and choose our words accordingly, whether it's the language we use for ourself, about ourself to ourselves, or the language we use towards others. It's a choice. One of the other, I want to say epic, because it feels large - it feels like a great, big thing that is still to be really understood, and maybe that's what we'll get into in season two. But one of the big takeaways for me in all of this has been that none of this is by accident. Language that makes us feel small or unworthy or ashamed or separate. I think it is important for us to realize and without absolving ourselves of responsibility here, but to recognize that the language is perpetuated by forces that benefit from status quo, in other words, from things not changing. And sometimes it might be us that benefits from not moving forward. But by and large, I suspect we all know that usually those are forces that are outside of us. Sure our brains have a bias towards negativity and self criticism, and that's all about survival thanks to the lizard bits in our brain, and it's important that we stay alive. But I can't help but thinking this is about more than just being alive. This life and being alive at a time where we don't die prematurely - we by and large, have the the opportunity and the privilege of living a long life - it therefore has to be about more than that. And to me, in simple terms, that's about thriving. To expand, to inspire, to connect, to leave others and the world in a better state than we found it. And in that way, I've come to realize that there is no mistake that terms like imposter syndrome, inner critic and even self care arrive in their modern buzzword form at a time when women and minorities were and are stepping into positions of power, when they become a cohesive and collective force of change in the world against the historic status quo. And that's why this is a revolution.

  Language, and our choice of language is a revolution. We have the power in our words every day, and even in these times of mass, global despair, fear and chaos, we actually have the power to choose what we say in our own heads, to ourselves, about ourselves, to others, about others, because whilst very many people right now in the world face genuine peril and terror and the prospect of having their rights at risk of being taken away, things that profoundly limit our potential and safety as human beings. The only thing people can't get to is what goes on inside of our head, and therefore, as that is only ever ours, I think we really have to step up and own that now more than ever. The third of my big takeaways is, is to say this, make no mistake, right? This language staff, these buzz words, they might be dressed up as fluffy and cute and apparently harmless and lol. "I just really want to talk about how limited I feel by my inner critic..." But the fact is, people, this is a trap, a Trojan style trap. This language and these words and these reels we watch where people rant about this stuff might seem harmless. It might just seem like something to do whilst we drink a coffee or wait to pick up the kids, but it's anything but harmless, and while we may have not wheeled the horse right up to the city gates just yet, maybe, just maybe, this trojan horse has not made it inside. Either way, it's not too late for us to change our own behavior.

  I started this podcast to offer people something that could serve as an invitation to pay attention, to be aware, to enjoy having awareness, and to start to question the things that we don't usually question. And I think you are here listening and spending time with me, and I'm so thankful for that, and I don't take that lightly. Your time is precious, and I deeply appreciate you spending it with me. But yeah, I think you're people who already know that we should be aware. That paying attention and actually just subtly changing our conscious awareness of language and what we're what we're using, when we're using it, and how we're using it, has the ability to profoundly affect the world around us, but also to profoundly affect our own disposition and our own experience. And I think you probably share my hope that things can be different and that we can change things. And to continue this trojan analogy, I don't really want to be Cassandra in this story, because, of course, she knew the future, but she was also cursed with never being believed. And time will tell, I guess. But if I was Cassandra and in this story, I was trying desperately to convince the power brokers, the big men of Troy that something really sinister was within our midst. I would actually turn away from the men, and I would go to the women and the workers and the others, those whose number keep a city alive and operating, but whose voice is often ignored, and I would ask them this question, Who benefits from the status quo? Who benefits from you being small, afraid without power? Who benefits from your silence, your disconnection from your own wells of wisdom and awareness, who benefits from your exhaustion, your fear and your feelings of futility? Language, specifically, words that make us feel "less than" are a really powerful tool.

  Throughout this series, we have seen that these words, and often their history, is something rooted in a desire to understand humans and the world around us better, and often have really beautiful and powerful and good roots. But in the hands of those who like their power base, dare I say it, white and male, they have become a collar and a leash. A method and a tool to limit and, most concerningly, self police. I started this series by saying that this is a really important time that we live in, and I think it's to this assertion that I should probably return at the end of this recap. At this very moment, information is crossing the globe at a rate and at a volume that is quite beyond our human comprehension. It is both incredibly exciting and absolutely terrifying. It is an extraordinary burden, responsibility and opportunity all at once. The opportunity is for us to remember who we are, that we are sentient beings who actually really know what's going on. It's also to remember that we do have agency at all times over our own self-talk. About what we say about ourselves, to ourselves, about others and to others, that whilst the world around us might be full of many, many things we genuinely cannot control, taking agency of these small things is an act of defiance, "a radical act of self care", to quote Audra Lord, and is where the revolution is at.

  I think we're immensely lucky that we live now, right now, as terrifying as it may be, and I hope that you'll join me, and I know you will, because that's why you're here, in helping others see the opportunity, see the responsibility, and know that actually, no matter how small or dislocated from the big stuff we might be, this is actually our way of being significant in the change. I'm going to be back. There's going to be a season two. I'm cooking that up right now, and I'm certainly hoping to bring in some other voices to add to this conversation as part of that. In the meantime, I've always encouraged you to start a conversation, but I'm going to ask you to do something more now, and I'm going to ask you to really switch on your own awareness and recognize that responsibility and the difference it can make to us to notice and take care of the language we use. It has been my singular pleasure and a serious privilege to be able to make this podcast this season, and I thank you from the bottom of my heart for listening, whether you are a long time listener who's been here since episode one, or this is all new to you. I look forward to sharing more of it. Please remember that you have the power to make powerful change. My name is Sidonie Henbest. This has been Rebrand Revolution, and before you go, if you haven't already, can I ask for one little favor. Would you mind subscribing to the podcast on your platform of choice and share an episode? Share your favorite episode. I look forward to being back with you very soon with Season Two. I promise you it won't be a long break, but in the meantime, as I always say, stay curious.

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