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Lia Valencia Key was raised in an impoverished Philadelphia neighborhood, and even lived in a homeless shelter with her mom, sister, and her brother in one room that she says is about the size of a broom closet.

When Lia was on the podcast two and a half years ago, she was just starting to share her story and just starting to really get back out there.  And in the last two and a half years, she has done some amazing things.  Her amazing jewelry has been worn on-air by Robin Roberts of Good Morning America, she’s been interviewed by Mel Robbins and her jewelry has been featured on QVC.

Lia would like to develop a keynote that she could give, and she and I have been in conversation about this. So, what’s you’re going to hear today is a little bit of strategic planning as we look at how we can bring the audience to a point where they’re really internalizing her message for themselves and where there’s an actual transformation that can take place in the people in the audience.

Take a listen to the episode!

Mentioned in this episode:

• Voice of Influence | Episode 33: Will You Stay Stagnant or Rise Up? with Lia Valencia Key
• Lia Valencia Key on Instagram
• Valencia Key Design on Instagram
• Valencia Key Website
• Valencia Key on QVC

 

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Transcript

People of influence know that their voice matters and that they can make it matter more.  I’m Andrea Wenburg, and this is the Voice of Influence podcast.

Today, I’m visiting with Lia Valencia Key who has been on the podcast before in Episode 33, about two and half years ago.  Lia was raised in an impoverished Philadelphia neighborhood, and even lived in a homeless shelter with her mom, sister, and her brother in one room that she says is about the size of a broom closet.  And at one point in her life, there was a real big turning point, and she talks about this in Episode 33.

I just really encourage you to go back and listen to Episode 33, because the way that she talks about this is fantastic and it’s so important; it is her signature story.  But her mom sits her down in fifth grade, realizing that Lia has been kind of going down the path that everybody around her is, and she wants to kind of bring Lia to a point where she can make a decision.

She basically told her that her predicament didn’t determine her destiny and that she believed that there is more inside of her.  But she had to make a decision if she was going to follow everybody around her and just keep doing the thing that everybody expects, or if she was going to lead herself and determine to get out of this particular situation that she was in, and follow her dreams, and actually go and achieve the things that she wanted in life.  That was an incredible moment because at that moment in her life, she really turned everything around.

Lia started getting good grades, getting on the honor roll.  She not only graduated high school, she graduated college and became a teacher, got a master’s degree, went on and did all these other things.  Then she had a vision for having a jewelry line.  She does hair and makeup for On-Air Talent – that means people like QVC and other places – and she has done some pretty amazing things in that realm.  And then she wanted to create her own jewelry line that would be inspirational to people.

So, when she and I talked two and a half years ago, she was just starting to share her story and just starting to really get that out there, and in the last two and a half years, she has done some amazing things.  First of all, her jewelry has been worn on air by Robin Roberts of Good Morning America and many other On-Air Talent.  And she was asked by the co-founder of IT Cosmetics to come with her to the Mel Robbins Show, where she was being interviewed about being a mentor.  She asked Lia to come on the show with her.

So, Lia was interviewed by Mel Robbins, and then she auditioned for The Big Find for QVC.  They were looking for jewelry manufacturers, creators who would be able to sell their jewelry on QVC, and she was one of the people that was chosen for The Big Find and was featured on QVC with her jewelry – her dream come true – in February.

Now, Lia is really creative and really passionate, and I love creative, passionate people because they have so much to offer.  I think everybody has a lot to offer, but I understand the unique problems of the creative, passionate person.  And one of the problems that we have when we’re both creative and passionate is that it can be difficult to articulate what exactly we’re trying to say.  There’s so much we want to say.  There’s so much perhaps wisdom that you have and certainly that Lia has; so many amazing experiences, so much she wants to share.  She would love to be able to share those things to inspire both people who are… like, women who are in corporate or even kids who are in fifth grade like she was.

So, she would like to develop a talk.  She would like to develop a keynote that she could give, and she and I have been in conversation about this a little bit and then I said, “Well, would you like to come on the podcast and actually flush a little bit of this out?”  And so, what you’re going to hear today is you’re going to hear a little bit of strategic planning, listening to some of Lia’s passion and some of her story.  And we’re going to look at how we can bring the audience to a point where they’re really internalizing the message for themselves, where there’s an actual transformation that can take place in the people in the audience.

This is a short conversation.  There’s plenty more to be done, but we thought that you might enjoy hearing us kind of work through what her talk could be about – how to structure it, and how to really bring about some transformation and invite transformation in the audience.

So, here is my conversation with Lia:

Andrea:  All right, Lia Valencia Key, I am so excited to have you here again on the Voice of Influence podcast.

Lia Valencia Key:  I’m so excited to be here again.  You kicked me off!  You’re my first, first-ever podcast.  So, thank you from my heart.

Andrea:  Okay.  So, here’s what I’d like to ask.  There are some different places where you share your message – you talk about it when you’re selling your jewelry, and you also talk about it with adults.  So, in terms of speaking, you could talk to people who are in corporate or people who are just living their lives and they may be feeling stuck in these expectations that other people have for them and what they think that they should be, and you’re here to share something with them.

You also could share it with kids at school, and that was something that you’ve talked about before and being interested in doing and sharing your story with other maybe fifth graders or you know, kids that are in a situation like that.  So, there’s different ways of looking at, like, each of your audiences.  What would you say a kid who was in your position in fifth grade… what are they stuck in – what’s their before?  What are they frustrated with that gets them to the point where they would actually listen to what you have to say?

Lia Valencia Key: So, for children, I can see it vividly.  I can see it for several things.  If I could take myself back to fifth grade Lia, one is this is where it’s going to be all the time.  Meaning wherever environment I’m in, this is what it’s going to look like so why should I try, right?  Why is school important?

Andrea:  So, they can’t even see beyond where they are?

Lia Valencia Key:  Right, because when you’re younger, unless someone clicks that in for you, no one tells you you can see beyond.  It doesn’t even make sense.  I wouldn’t even get it, right?  So, I think it’s really powerful to share to youth, no matter what their environment is – it doesn’t even have to be in an impoverished environment; it’s just youth as a whole – that your now is not what your future looks like.  And the beauty is right now you are the route artist that can create the picture of your future, so what do you want to create?

And I think giving the youth the power to choose and know that you can create it so what do you want to create?  And allowing them to see that all of this is a culmination of where you can go in the future and that your mistakes don’t determine where you’re going to be in the future.  So, for example, if I was a horrible child and I was the one that’s always expelled in school, that doesn’t mean that right at this moment they can’t create a whole another future for themselves, because no one’s telling them that, you know.

And the funny part is I used to be a teacher, fun fact.  And what we always tell them is, “Oh, you’re getting expelled.”  “Oh, this is not good grades for college.”  “Oh, this is going on your record,” right?  So, we’re making this thing so permanent and when we make it permanent that means that if it’s permanent then I can’t change, so I just keep doing what I’m normally doing.

Andrea:  Yeah.

Lia Valencia Key:  But if this is not permanent and at any moment, if I can choose to go to another course, if life is a bunch of roads… if you want to visually map it out for youth – life is a bunch of roads.  Right now, you’re on this road, and if you look down that road, it’s looking real dark, lot of weeds, lot of danger.  But there’s another road that you can easily cross over to and that one looks a little like this, or then you can go to that road and that road looks like this, so which road do you want to choose?  And at any moment you can start to paint your road – I think that’s really powerful for children.

Andrea:  I totally agree.  Now, what keeps them from doing that, though?  Okay, I know I can start a new road, but what do I have to give up in order to do that?

Lia Valencia Key:  You have to change your path.  So that’s the beauty, right?  If you’re an artist, you have to paint a new picture.  Now, you can change and crumble that picture up, and start a new picture.  But when you start a new picture, you got to use new colors, right?  And so maybe you were using grays and blacks and browns and whatever those darker colors are, but you can paint a new, brighter picture and you can start using colors where, “I actually come to class today.”  “I actually listen to my teacher today.”  “Maybe I don’t understand the work.”

And another thing about giving youth the power is a lot of us don’t tell children, “It’s okay to not be perfect and to not know.”  I always used to tell my nieces, “Ask the teacher for help.”  Most of the time, people want you to ask for help.  Most of the time, people don’t ask for help.  And so giving them power that it’s okay not to know, it’s okay to be weak in certain areas; but where your power is, is standing up in that weakness, and then asking people to help you through that weakness.

And once you start getting help, you start to, of course, correct yourself because you’re like, “Oh!”  You know what I’m saying?  “Oh, someone will listen to me.”  “Oh, this isn’t a negative thing.”  “Oh, I really can read, but someone just needs to show me how I actually read.”  You know what I’m saying?  And so I think it’s giving children more of a visual picture that they can create their own power, and the power is within them.

Andrea:  Oh, yeah.  I think if you can help kids to see that they can decide what they want and that they have what it takes to get there, that’s incredibly powerful.  I think that one of the most important things that you can do when you’re speaking is to ask people, “What do you really, really want deep down?  What do you want for your life?  Not the path that you’re on right now, not the path that you’re expected to go down, but what do you want?  What do you want for your life?”  And then give them a chance to visualize it for themselves.  You know, “Who’s in your life?  Where do you live?  What kind of work are you doing in the world?  What kind of meaning do you have?”  If you give people a chance to really think about that for themselves, they might be able to say, “You know what, the picture that I’m painting really isn’t the one that I want, and it’s okay for me to think about painting a new painting.”

Lia Valencia Key:  I like that because this is what I want.  Thank you for helping me with this.  This is what I need.  Thank you because I need… like how do I get the people to the how, right?  So, this is helping me – asking the question of letting them resonate within themselves – because one person can talk to you all day, but if I get to myself, then I can hear you.

Andrea:  Yeah.  So, what you have is you have a ton of wisdom and inspiration to offer people; like, so many things, so many great stories, so many great analogies, and so much passion.  And so what we’re trying to do is we’re trying to take all those, like, dots of inspiration, passion, stories and whatever, we’re trying to figure out, “Okay, if we were to bring those dots into alignment so that we’re really giving people a chance to experience transformation, what would it take to bring people on a journey where they’re actually experiencing this change in themselves in a keynote like a talk or in a book or a curriculum?  What are the maybe five things that need to happen in my talk in order to help people along this journey of transformation that I know that I can bring them down?”

Lia Valencia Key:  Yes, this is what I want!  Okay, so we’re saying the first thing that we brought out for me to do or add is the asking of the question, “What do you want?  So, that you can see yourself first…”

Andrea:  Yes, give them a chance…

Lia Valencia Key:  I’m not actually creating the speech, but I’m saying wherever it lies.   Yes, I like it.

Andrea:  Yes, giving them a chance to picture in their own heads for themselves.  I think, though, that it probably starts with your signature story.  So, you probably start with, “This is where I come from, and this is what my mom said and it changed everything, and then I decided to lead my life.”  When you’re doing a talk, in that signature story at the very beginning, you leave an open… like there’s something that you don’t tell everybody yet, and you only tell it at the very end.

I can’t remember if we’ve actually looked at that before with you.  But you leave something, like if there was some piece of jewelry or something that your mom suggested that you wear, and then later on at the end of the story you tell about finding it years later.  Like, you bring it back to your mom again at the very end, somehow or another.

Lia Valencia Key: Oh, I love that!  That totally is perfect for me because I don’t have to share the part where even through all that my mother would say, “You sparkle like earrings.  Always wear your earrings because it represents the light inside you.”  So, we can bring that at the end, right?

Andrea:  Maybe, yeah, it could be that.

Lia Valencia Key:  It brings you from here where your journey lies all the way to… it’s back to the beginning and it’s full circle.

Andrea:  Yes, exactly.  That’s right.  You make it full circle so that everybody feels really satisfied when you’re done with the story, when you’re done with your whole talk.  So, you’ve opened the loop.  You’ve, like, gotten people really interested with your story and the fact that you’re in a different place now, and then you get them thinking about themselves, “So what do you want?”

So, sort of like little Lia turning on her heel and going, “Okay, here I am with my mom.  She just asked me what the heck I want.  You know, what do I really want to do?  Do I want lead my life or not?”  And then I turn on my heel, and now I’m looking at you and saying the same thing, “So what do you want?  What is it that you really want?  What do you don’t like about where you’re at right now, about what’s in your life right now?  What don’t you like?”  That sometimes easier for people to identify – most of the time, it’s easier for people to see that – and then give them a chance to imagine what they do want.

And then once they can imagine that, then you’ve kind of helped allow them to open themselves to, “Okay, so I’m curious about the next step.  What do I do about this?”  A lot of times, people are afraid of opening up the truth of what they really feel, because if they’re honest about it, they have to deal with these negative emotions and like, “Well, I don’t want to think about the fact that I don’t have what I want in some area of my life because that makes me feel bad.”  And so what you’re doing then is… it’s emotional, I guess, is what I’m saying, and you want to do it very carefully.  But giving them the opportunity to say, you know, “Okay, now that you’re open to thinking about what you do want, here’s what you need to do to get there or at least to start on that path.”

Lia Valencia Key:  I love this because I really want to create a keynote, and this is opening me up because I have all these things within me, like two and a half years ago.  But I don’t know how to unlock it in others, so this is really helping me because I don’t want to just talk at people.  I want to have it be impactful to their life, for them, not for me.  And so I really love when you say, talking about like, “What is not serving you in your life right now?  What are the things in your life that aren’t the right thing, you feel, and then what do you want?”  Because that’s what I do all the time, I’m a daydreamer.  My past time – one would call it “wasting time.”  Others and myself will call it daydreamer, and I am the most biggest daydreamer, and I daydream about what do I want.  And when you were saying those words, I’m like, “Oh, she’s actually saying what I do.  I daydream about the things that I want.”

Andrea:  I love the word daydream.  I love that.  I love all of your words, and how they’re different from mine, but they mean the same thing.  I think that’s fantastic, daydream.  I love it.

Lia Valencia Key:  It’s so visual, and you say it so I can hear it and people can see it.  But in those daydreams, I start to manifest my heart’s desires.  And when I am able to manifest my heart’s desires of what I want, then I can organize what’s of importance of what I want and then I can start acting on, “Okay, so then how do I get to that?”

Andrea:  Okay, so, what you just did then… what you’re saying what you do is you daydream or you realize what you want, and then you prioritize what you want and figure out what you’re going to do to get there.

Lia Valencia Key:  Yes.  And I don’t kill my dream.  And when I say daydream, it’s not thinking about what I want.  I’m literally daydreaming; like, it’s a whole different concept.

Andrea:  I like it.

Lia Valencia Key:  Like, thinking about what you want is like, “Oh, I want a pair of yellow shoes,” right?  That’s thinking about kind of what you want.  When I say daydream, I literally go into an awake zone of creating a picture or movie because it’s actually live, it’s actually happening.  I’m seeing everything as if it’s there.  Like, literally creating this movie or this picture of what’s happening, of what’s possible, of what’s in my heart, and I see it.  I see it live, and then I go from that to, “Whoosh, okay.  So then now what’s important or what’s closer to me?  So, certain things are really far out, but what part of that is closer to me?”  And then I take what’s closer to me, and then I start to make moves or concepts on, “How could that happen?”

Andrea:  Okay, “what’s closer to me” means what exactly?  What does that mean?

Lia Valencia Key:  Meaning, “What’s in my reach of do right now?”

Andrea:  Okay, so the easy win.

Lia Valencia Key:  Right.  The easy win, the easy win.  So, let’s go for my jewelry line, for example, because that’s right there, right?  So, I visualize the jewelry line, like I see people wearing my jewelry.  I see them walking down the streets.  I have two favorites – I saw myself literally on QVC sharing my heart and my message to the world.  And my other one is I see people in an airport – one of my favorite places is an airport – I see people walk in an airport.  I see one woman that looks super corporate, and she’s wearing Valencia Key jewelry.

And then I see another woman that’s working at the cash checkout thing at one of the little kiosks in the airport, and I see her looking at the Valencia Key jewelry, smiling because she knows that this lady has inspired her that, “Whatever you see me looking like, it’s possible for you.”  Like, I see that vision, right?  So then I say, “Huh, okay!”  Then I got to make the jewelry, right?  I’m a sketcher.  I love sketching.  So, the first thing I can do is sketch.  So, I start sketching these pieces that I see people wearing, right?  That’s the closest thing that I can do.

And then I go in order.  The next thing, “Okay, so then when you sketch the piece, what do you want it made of?”  Then I do research on materials of jewelry.  “Okay, so you decided you want to try three different types of jewelry then how do you make the jewelry?”  I would research how.  So then I go into these small processes.  It’s a super long process, but if you don’t get weary because you saw the dream so vividly, this is how you start to move into your picture of what your life should look like.

Andrea:  That’s great.  I love that.  Okay, so going back to the keynote, you know, and how you’d bring people through this journey, I think that you then start with your signature story with your mom and then share with people your steps; like, daydream, and then decide what’s closest to you, and then start taking steps or plan or whatever… however you want to label those three steps.  And then you talk about how you did that with Valencia Key jewelry.  Yeah, and you show the example.  Maybe it’s flipped around – maybe you show the example, and then you then you explain the steps.

But regardless, I mean, that’s what’s kind of the middle, like, “This is the plan – this is how you do this,” and then that sort of thing.  And then you sort of give people the opportunity – after you tell them about Valencia Key jewelry and your success – then you can give people the chance to say, “What don’t you like about your life?”  “What do you want?”  Give them a chance to daydream, and then to think about to make a choice about, “What’s the next thing?  What’s the closest thing to you?  What’s the easiest win that you could come up with?”  And then have them think about what’s the next action they’re going to take to do that.

Lia Valencia Key: I like that.

Andrea:  You’re giving them that opportunity in the moment to create their plan, to start painting a picture.

Lia Valencia Key:  Oh, I like it.  And I like calling it “repainting our picture”.  Yeah, I love that.

Andrea:  Yeah, it’s exactly what you said.  I think what would be even really cool would be they need to somehow post about it on social media and tag you.  I don’t know, something where there’s some sort of like feedback where they can email you.  I’m not exactly sure what that piece is.  But there’s some sort of like, “Today, right now, get out your phones and do this thing. What is the next thing for you, whether you just want to share it with me personally, or you want to share it with the world and tag me in it.”  It could be something like that, I don’t know, or it could be do it later, but it’s more impactful if they do something in the moment.

Lia Valencia Key:  Yes.

Andrea:  Because you’re building momentum.  You’re helping them, like, get out the starting gates.

Lia Valencia Key:  Right there.  And I love to…because this doesn’t just have to be about starting a business.  It can be about your personal want.

Andrea:  Totally.

Lia Valencia Key:  Like, maybe you daydream and you see yourself climbing Mount Everest, right?  If that’s a joy to you, that’s been in your heart, “Okay, what’s the closest thing?”  Like, just to put joy in your heart and start to bring your heart’s desires alive…  Oh, I love it.

Andrea:  And just naming it is so big for people, for them to admit it.  I mean, putting that on social media or telling you or writing it up on a board.  Let’s say you have this really big piece of paper up, or like a bunch of sticky note, big sticky pads, or something like that where people can come up to the wall… or write it on a sticky note, and then stick the sticky note on the wall.  And then you’ve got everybody kind of coming up with their thing.  They’re staking their claim on, “This is the thing that I want.”  And then they, you know, visually you can see everybody’s…  It depends on the audience.  It really does.

Lia Valencia Key:  No, I love it!  I just got chills!  And I also just got chills about, “This is the thing that I want.”  Something about that resonates to me because I’m trying to figure out what is this titled?  Like, I want it to be kind of universal where…  Yeah, if I’m in a corporate environment and we’re talking about business people, we can only go corporate, but I would love just everyone.  So, I love it because we all have wants, and I feel we don’t go after all of our wants.  I feel that, like I feel we suppress a lot of our wants and when we unlock going after our wants, there’s so much joy in it.

There’s a lot of challenges in it, but the joy supersedes.  Like, when you really can just manifest and stand into what you’ve daydreamed or what you said you wanted to do, and you can be standing physically there [in] like two and a half years – like we did – and really be standing in it, it’s magical.

 So I like that, “What do I want?”  Something about it…I’m thinking about the title or something, but I’ll figure that out.  That gave me chills, and I love having them physically do.  I was in a conference where – their was totally different – but they had people write stuff on a paper and pass it all to the front, and it was kind of standing for others so it was totally opposite.  But it was some power, and people together writing out their feelings and collectively bringing it together.

Andrea:  Mhmm.

Lia Valencia Key: I have to do that.  So this is the next step for me.  I think we started off, like, “Where do you want to go?”  This is the next step of when we talk about, “What do I want?”  This is what I want the next part of my journey to be – I want it to be me vocally helping people unlock living in their wants and living in their joy, and pairing that with – instead of me having a book – if you want to bring a piece of that home with you so as you’re on your quest of taking those reachable moments and accomplishing in them and sometime you get kind of stuck, looking at your bracelet or looking at your necklace or your ring and saying, “Okay, it’s possible. I could take a break, but then I can get back to it.”

 Andrea:  Motivation… reminding people about what they really want and that they can get it.

Lia Valencia Key:  Yes, exactly!  You get me!

 Andrea:  It’s exciting.  You’ve been through a lot, and you’ve accomplished a lot.  You have a lot ahead of you, and it’s just an honor to be able to partner with you on this journey in some way.

Lia Valencia Key:  And I want to thank you directly for seeing my heart and seeing my light…  I guess it was three years ago because it was before the podcast, and we met in person through a beautiful, amazing Toi Sweeney, and you saw my light.  I was able to work with you and you heard my message, you heard my heart.  And you knew you could give of me; you could pour life into me, and you took that on at the very beginning when all this was in the daydream works, right?  And you poured into my dream, and you were… you’re part of cultivating this.  And I’m so grateful to have you just believing in me and making me stronger to be able to touch more lives, because that’s what we’re doing.

Andrea:  I feel… when I see somebody like you, Lia, and your story – and I know that it’s powerful, I know it can change people’s lives – all I want is to do what I can to throw my gifts at it, and see if it’ll help and see if there’s something that might come of it for you.  And so, anyway, this has been a real joy, and I’m excited to see what the next two and a half years holds for you.

Lia Valencia Key:  Oh my gosh, I’m so excited.  I need to do these podcasts every two and a half years so we can see what’s happening there.  Well, thank you so much.  Anyone who’s listening, thank you for sharing your time with me, and thank you for always lifting me up.  This was a joy and an honor.

Andrea:  And where can they find you?

Lia Valencia Key:  You can find… valenciakeydesign is my Instagram where you can find all things jewelry, inspirational words, and quotes, and also how to wear a good layer piece.  I love to inspire through showing how to wear a good piece because I love a good fashion.  And then Lia Valencia Key is where you learn about me and you follow my life journey.  So, it’s all of me pouring out to all of you.  And QVC.com is where you can find my QVC jewelry and just type in Valencia Key when you go to QVC.com, or you can go to valenciakey.com and find other jewelry that’s not on QVC.

And it’s my prayer – not just about you getting the jewelry – but it’s about you living the message, living your purpose, walking into your joy, living a life of love, and me being honored to be along with you throughout your life’s journey.  It would just be an honor to me

Andrea:  Lia, you are not just a Voice of Influence.  You are helping others be a Voice of Influence too.  Thank you so much.

Lia Valencia Key:  Thank you!