Eileen:

Hello, and welcome to Soul of a Leader podcast, where we ignite soulful conversations with leaders. On today’s episode, Dr. Alicia and Dr. Eileen sit with Valerie Gobos to discuss energy focus leadership.

 

Alicia:

Welcome to Soul of a Leader podcast. On today’s episode, Valerie Gobos is an independent producer, actress, marketing agent, and entrepreneur. She heads up Gobos Film & Entertainment researching and representing screenplays, books, and life stories for the big and small screens. Valerie works with a variety of other producers, directors, animators, visual effects artists, AR, VR, and AI innovators, editors, and photographers, and musicians around the world for films, television, documentaries, music videos, commercials, and branded content, and the entertainment and advertising industry. She has done marketing for many impressive companies, including Universal Studios and Oprah Winfrey’s Harpo Studios. Welcome Valerie to Soul of a Leader.

 

Eileen:

Welcome.

 

Valerie:

Thank you. Thank you. I’m so excited to be here. Dr. Alicia, Dr. Eileen, it’s a pleasure.

 

Alicia:

We are so excited to have you.

 

Eileen:

And what an oppressive bio. Did we miss anything? I can’t wait to start talking about this background. That’s so exciting.

 

Valerie:

We can be here for hours actually, if you want to.

 

Alicia:

Yeah. I didn’t even put a dent in her bio, Dr. Eileen. I just said, “Oh my God. I’m so impressed with it.” And listen, we must say we are all powerful women on this episode today.

 

Valerie:

I love it. Female power, yay.

 

Eileen:

Yay. And it’s so great to hear the diversity of your net being spread into all that industry. Tell me how you got started. This is exciting. How did you get started in this wonderful fun industry?

 

Valerie:

Well, it’s really interesting. I always think about the older we get, the more adventures we have. And when I started out, I was really, really shy as a child. And so I was more in the fine arts. I’d hide in the art room and draw and paint and do sculpture and all this stuff. And then as I got into my 20s, I started coming out of my shell a little bit. And I started actually playing rhythm guitar, and then singing a little bit, doing a lot of backup harmonies and stuff. And then I ended up having the opportunity to… I don’t even know how it happened. I registered with a modeling agency, and I’m 5′8″. So the agent Marty [DeWalt 00:03:11] had said, “Do you want to be a stand-in for this actress, Maud Adams on this TV show called the Chicago Story?” Because she was 5′8″, I was 5′8″.

 

Valerie:

So it was just a fabulous experience being on set and being a stand-in, which is a really interesting job in the film and television business. And so I just got the bug and I just loved it so much. So I would do anything I could to be working on set. And sometimes when the actress wasn’t working, they’d give me a walkie talkie and I’d become a production assistant for all these different departments. So it was an amazing learning on set. It was really cool.

 

Alicia:

Wow.

 

Eileen:

Thank you. Thank you. So it was like your journey took one path and then you were going in and out like a labyrinth to find out where you’re at.

 

Valerie:

Yeah. That’s exactly it. And then being based in Chicago was a big advertising town. So I started representing directors because I fell in love with filmmaking. And then from there I started representing music producers, visual effects artists, animation people for the ad agencies, try to accommodate them for their TV commercials and their brand work. So I’d go back and forth, which I still do between advertising film and entertainment. Because they’re all connected a little bit.

 

Alicia:

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Others can’t see, but I can see your passion and your joy in doing what you do. So let’s talk a little bit about, how do you challenge others in that type of business? How do you challenge others to be their best? And not only just being their best, but to lead more effectively in that industry.

 

Valerie:

For myself to lead effectively?

 

Alicia:

Yes.

 

Valerie:

Well, I just feel passion. And I think that passion is that energy. And when you have that, it’s real. It’s not pretend. It’s not forced. And I think it just comes through and I’ve always been in the creative arts and all of a sudden I’ll get an idea, and I always follow through on my ideas. And it’s just so exciting because one thing leads to another, leads to another when you’re open to it. I’m fortunate enough to not be restricted. So my mind and my imagination just sometimes goes crazy and I always follow through on it. And then it’s like, “Wow, that was so cool.” And one thing leads to another leads to another leads to another.

 

Eileen:

Well, and with that, we have a saying of SAS leadership, which is servant, authentic, and spiritual. And when I hear you say an idea, I always think ideas are intuitive or some kind of energy is coming to you to say, “Move forward on that. Act on that.” And if you don’t, either you’re going to get pushed or you’re going to miss an opportunity. So you said it’s about receiving. So tell us a little bit about your energy and receiving, and how you move that forward when you hit that intuitiveness.

 

Valerie:

Yeah. I’m so glad you brought that up, Eileen, because… It’s funny, I did a seminar the other day with this group, and they were talking about listening to your higher self. It was something that I always seem to live by, but I never really realized that you should be tuning in like that. And I always think, “Where do these ideas come from? Where does this come from?” And I still don’t know. But I always just follow my heart, follow my gut, listen to it, and it’s exciting. I’m just so fortunate that I have that insight like you do, it seems, to do that. And every time you do that, all these great things will happen. And I’ll never forget the intuitive, I guess should be called a psychic, Sonia Choquette. I took a workshop with her once and she said [crosstalk 00:07:37].

 

Eileen:

She’s great. I know who she is.

 

Valerie:

We are all like radios, and you either turn the switch off or turn it on. And when you leave the switch on, you’re picking up on all these waves and all these ideas and all this energy all the time. And I love it. It’s just so much fun to trust yourself like that. It’s fun.

 

Alicia:

I like to be in that creative space because you get to explore. I like how you said you don’t really have restrictions. And I love that because you give yourself the opportunity to think outside of the normal realm of what people say, “Oh, you can’t do it that way.” Well, why not? And so I liked that. So talk a little bit more about how you keep the faith and the vision that you have because you’re so creative. And I know you talked a little bit about you just go ahead and do it when you feel it, but talk about what it takes to keep that faith in that particular vision once you start putting it together.

 

Valerie:

Yeah. It’s difficult. I won’t say it’s not. When you support yourself, like I do. And I’ve always supported myself, it sometimes gets scary because you think, “Uh-oh, I’ve got these bills due. What am I going to do?” And you don’t really have somebody to just say, “Oh, here I’ll pay your rent this month,” or something. So it does get a little concerning. What I do to remind myself of who I am, I love to take long walks and I take these long walks and I take really big steps and I swing my arms. And then sometimes I just put on music, and I love music so much, and I dance, and I work out, and I lift weights.

 

Valerie:

And it just grounds me and I’ve become so strong all of a sudden. I feel sometimes like wonder woman or something. I’m like, “You know what? Yeah, you can do it kid. You can do it.” And some days I might have doubts, but then all of a sudden, the next day I wake up and I go, “It’s a new day. I did it. Okay. I’m ready again.” We all have our ups and downs. I don’t know if it’s bio rhythm. I don’t know what it is, but it always comes back, thankfully. I don’t know if that answered your question.

 

Alicia:

Oh, no. Definitely. And let me tell you, I’m smiling because, Dr. Eileen and I, we both walk a lot, exercise, and I could tell you, I don’t care what anybody say, working out is the most healthiest form to mental health for me. Because I think a lot when I walk. I love to walk and work out. I don’t know what it is, it just gives you an explosion. And it gives you that confidence. Like you said, when you have faith in something, you got to keep going. And we’re entrepreneurs and you’ll be like, “Oh, did I make the right decision?” And you can go walk and be like, “No, I made it.” So I love the fact that you do that because, to me, it is rewarding to know someone else’s doing that too.

 

Valerie:

Yeah. Maybe it’s the physical thing of walking with your feet on the ground, and you’re swinging your arms, and then you own it, versus being crawled up in a ball or going in a car from here to here to here to here. It reminds you of who you are and you feel yourself and it’s just like, “I’m alive. I’m a real person. I’m here.”

 

Eileen:

What I loved about that is you’re out there and you’re swinging your arms and you’re walking. You, as a human, have the choice to change your thoughts. And you can change joy and just feeling the wind on your face and being with mother nature makes a huge difference. There’s up days, down days, but as you said, you can start anew every day. And it’s about the thoughts that come into your head to make you change and be grateful. And with everything going on today, Dr. Alicia and I are very grateful for the show. We came up with an idea, we implemented it, we moved it. We’re trying to plant good seeds out there on stories like yours. Successes, paths, labyrinths of life. So with that, could you share with us a story on how, like you said, you may have shifted your mindset at a particular time where you thought you were going, and now it’s different. Do you have an example?

 

Valerie:

For instance, today and yesterday. I’m producing a TV commercial, an ad campaign, which I really love, but I also have all these screenplays out there and I’m trying to sell them. I would love to see these things get made. And lately I’ve just been saying to myself, “Okay. Please, God, whomever, I need a miracle.” And it’s really funny. Today I sent an email to Plan B, which is Brad Pitt’s production company. And I hadn’t heard back from them in months, probably six months. And then today, boom, I got a return email. And I did the same thing with Leonardo DiCaprio’s production company, Appian Way, because I sent them some stuff, and it’s been months and days. And you always try to pace. You don’t want to bother people too much but you got to remind them that you’re there. And then today, boom, I got the return email. And I just said, “Thank you. This is a magical day.” And great that I’m here with you now. But up until then-

 

Eileen:

The miracle.

 

Valerie:

Yes. Up until then, it was like, “Am I going to ever hear from these people again? Or is this hopeless?” And then sure enough, I was like, “Thank you.” They didn’t buy anything, but at least they responded. So I don’t know if that answered your question, but…

 

Eileen:

It does. It does.

 

Valerie:

It’s like affirmation that I’m okay. I’m doing the right thing. Hang in there, hang in there, hang in there.

 

Alicia:

And I think what’s important what you said, “God, I need a miracle.” It’s having that faith in yourself but also knowing that there’s a higher authority of saying, “You know what? I need someone to help me. I need a response.” Because it does give you a sense of validation, you’re still present, I’m still here. And one of the things you mentioned earlier, sometimes you can be a little down a little bit. You don’t stay there, and the next day, “Okay, this is a new day.” And I think that’s important to recognize. You’re not always on a high every day, but it’s okay if you have a little moment. What’s important is you don’t stay at the low point or stay down. So with that, what are some of the values you use every day to keep yourself not stand at some of the low points or when you feeling a little down. Like, “Is anybody listening to me?” kind of thing. One of those days. What are some values that stick out for you?

 

Valerie:

Yeah, I’ve got a good one that I want to share. And when I grew up, my mom taught me at a very young age, you can either wake up and be happy or you can wake up and be miserable. And she said, “You know what? We might as well just be happy.” And it’s that mindset. And it’s really interesting, I have done so much meditation over the years that I really don’t even have negative thoughts come near me. And I used to see them as almost like a cartoon and animated bad thoughts coming towards me, and I just twing it away. So it doesn’t even get into my being and into my aura.

 

Valerie:

And I think we can all do that. We’re all capable of that because we can all wake up and say, “Well, always me, I’m miserable,” or, “You know what? I’m happy. It’s okay.” And now with COVID and all these things going on in the world, I literally wake up every day and I go, “Earth, thank you for giving me another day to be alive.” That’s a blessing. And I see these people that are complaining and depressed and miserable. And I wake up and say, “Thank you. I’m alive. I am so happy you gave me another day.”

 

Eileen:

That’s wonderful. I loved your analogy about seeing it like a cartoon because it can really take over of you. A lot of people, if someone says something to you, they’re offended, but you have the right to deflect that. And by saying it’s a cartoon, you could think of a word like, “That’s stupid,” or “You’re stupid,” and this stupid comes to you, and you can just deflect it. So I love that analogy. Thank you so much.

 

Valerie:

Me too. It’s almost fun. And all these things come at all of us all the time. Either somebody’s mad at you, somebody doesn’t like you, something happened and you just have to just say, “Oh, well.” Because if your intentions are good and hopefully all of us are really nice people. We can’t please everybody, but we’re not doing anything deliberately to help other people, to hurt them.

 

Eileen:

Right. Right. So, in your work, you lead teams, you lead productions, you may represent. Is there a story or an event that stays with you and you’d like to share about a leadership interaction you had?

 

Valerie:

Actually it was today or yesterday. I’m producing this TV commercial, and the agency is not real happy with what the production company’s getting. And it was really nice to be able to say to them, “Let’s put ego aside, let’s put pride aside, business is business. We all want some great end product. Don’t take it personally. Clear the air. We got to move forward.” I don’t know if that’s even a good one but that’s just so fresh in my mind because it happened yesterday. But just to coach people and say, “It’s okay.” And I’ve found so much that when people’s ego gets in the way, it messes things up. We’re in a creative industry and a creative business, all that creative energy has to flow, and we can’t get upset about it. We just have to all do our job, try to do it as good as we can possibly do it. And that’s all we can do.

 

Alicia:

Yeah, yeah. No, you brought out a good point. Being in a leadership role, you gotta stay high. And so at some point you have to keep the whole team or those that you… if you project management or something. You got to keep everybody at a level of peace, and the reality is no one’s perfect. And everyone’s trying to do their best. Nobody wants a bad show, a bad movie, a bad book. And so you do have to bring those things to the table to keep everything in perspective. One person said, “Sometimes leaders don’t look at individuals as being human or people. But they are.” And so some way in America or in businesses, we forget that people are human.

 

Alicia:

And so when you forget that, that means you forget how to respect them or the level of understanding is missing. So what is that moment in your time or your career where you had to sit back and say, “I’m going to act in love,” and what does that mean for you? When you say, instead of me going negative, I want to act in love. And what did you do when you said that to yourself? Because a lot of times people don’t know how to just be more peaceful and act in love. So what moment that you can think about, where you had to make that choice, “I am going to make an honest choice about whether I’m going to act in love?”

 

Valerie:

I’m not Mother Teresa, but I think I’m always acting in love. And I’m really glad that I’m able to express my emotions openly. And I’m really glad too that I can always try to be balanced. And I think when you’re balanced and you sincerely care about everyone, which I care about everybody I work with. I wouldn’t work with them. And I care about every project I have or I wouldn’t even be wasting my time. So I think that love that you talked about comes through. I’m not the kind of person that holds back. I’m so open to say, “I love you. I love working with you. Let’s just do this.” And so I think that comes through all the time because it’s just who I am as a person, and I’m really glad I can do that. I know so many people, they can’t even say, “I love you,” or “I love that.” And I love that. So maybe it’s just comes through.

 

Alicia:

It’s natural with you.

 

Valerie:

I think so. Yeah.

 

Eileen:

And I think people can feel it if you’re authentic and you’re really… There’s all love, there’s a different word for everything. There’s romantic love, there’s brotherly love, there’s just love of something like ice cream, you can use it all sorts of ways. But love of the human race or humankind, because we’re all in this together, is a whole different platform. And anybody’s a leader. There’s people leading families, there’s people leading at work. And Alicia and I do a lot of webinars on authentic leadership. We talk about it and we align it to our values deck that we have. And it’s also in our new book that we just published on Amazon, Echoes of Soul of a Leader. What happens when you work with someone, Valerie, who may not be so authentic? How do you deal with that? Because I’ve done it, I know Dr. Alicia has had to deal with it. It would be nice to hear your point of view because we all have to deal with it.

 

Valerie:

Yeah. It’s hard. It’s interesting because I’ve always worked by myself. I’m a loner but yet I work with many, many, many people. And I actually have a writer, and I like his writing a lot. And I was trying to pitch some of his screenplays, actually, and pilots for TV shows. And it’s interesting, he didn’t like the way I was sending emails. And he didn’t like certain things that I did. He didn’t like the way I was talking to the film companies. He didn’t like that I didn’t copy him on the emails. There was all this negative stuff going on. And I had to say to him, finally, I said, “You don’t like me. You don’t like the way I talk. You don’t like the way I’m emailing. You don’t like all this stuff so I don’t think we should work together anymore.”

 

Valerie:

And I said, “And it’s really unfortunate because I really like your stuff. But I think I’m just not the person for you.” It’s almost like a bad date or something [inaudible 00:24:23]. Okay. I guess you don’t like me very much. So I guess we should go our separate ways. And we went our separate ways. And it’s a shame because I really, really liked his work, but he just couldn’t relate to me. He didn’t understand who I am. But it works for me. So it didn’t work for us. What can you do? You can’t win them all.

 

Alicia:

And one of the things I like about that story is, sometimes when we as women, I could say, and we own our own business, and we’re entrepreneurs, and we have projects, sometimes we are just afraid to just be upfront and very authentic about something. And then what happens is when we ignore that, and if you continue a bad relationship in business, here’s what happens, that person continues to do that throughout a project. Well, I don’t like your emails. I don’t like the way you said that. Everything is nitpicking against you. And you said, “Well, I love his work.” But you didn’t sacrifice what you believed in. You said, “You know what? You don’t really like me.” You just name all the qualities of you, what you’re doing in your day-to-day business, about what he didn’t like. He couldn’t find one thing that he liked about you.

 

Valerie:

I know.

 

Alicia:

I think you did right.

 

Valerie:

I think so too.

 

Eileen:

I think so too.

 

Alicia:

Yes for Valerie.

 

Eileen:

Well, and there’s a difference. In business, sometimes we just have to be honest and authentic and that’s a great story. Because if you don’t like, Dr. Alicia said, they’ll just keep running over you if you don’t stand up for yourself.

 

Valerie:

Then he started making me feel paranoid. I thought, “Oh my God, he’s going to read one of my emails and hate it.” And I thought, “What am I doing?” I’m not your daughter. I’m not your child. We’re just trying to make something happen here. But when someone just doesn’t like you, they just don’t like you. Maybe they don’t like anyone. Maybe they’ll never like anyone. I don’t know.

 

Eileen:

How many years have you been writing emails? I’m sure they can’t be that bad.

 

Valerie:

Exactly. And we all have our own little style, and it works for me. Obviously it didn’t for him. So you can’t please them all. I have a couple of people in the industry, and they just don’t like me. And it’s so funny because I even said to them, I said, “Excuse me, hi. What did I do to offend you? Did I do something to offend you?” And then, “Nothing.” Well, no return email, no nothing. I think they just wanted to not like me. So what can you do? I can count them on one hand, and I’m not happy about it, but it is what it is.

 

Alicia:

Listen, sometimes people don’t understand the power of collaboration or partnership. And so when you’re in a partnership, it really is just like a relationship. You have to take the good with the bad and respect how a person does something. And you know what? You didn’t lose any sleep. I’m just glad you took care of him before you got all stressed out. Because our conversation would have been a little bit different.

 

Eileen:

[crosstalk 00:27:43] you go ahead. Go ahead, Valerie.

 

Valerie:

Yeah. Again, these people that just didn’t like something I did or said, or this or that, and I go, “Okay, well, I guess you can just go your separate ways.” And then you find other people that you’re compatible with.

 

Eileen:

And that’s what I always do. Is if there’s somebody that doesn’t like me, I’ll just say, “I’m sending you blessings, I’m sending you love, and I wish you the best.” Because you don’t want to hold on to that energy. You just want to send them blessing and love. And that’s what I do.

 

Valerie:

That’s true.

 

Alicia:

Yeah. Yeah. I don’t really get caught up anymore by who don’t like me and why I’m not doing it the way they want me to do it. I’m going to do it the best way that I know how. I love to work in teams and partnerships, because for me, you just get more out of it, and you grow, and you learn. And sometimes people just like to be control freaks. And so there’s a difference. And some people like to tell everybody what to do. And so sometimes those people don’t understand what it means to be irritating. They really don’t.

 

Valerie:

Or it’s just not compatible. I hate negative energy. Somebody starts beefy, I can feel it. I’m so sensitive. I have to walk away because at this point, it’s like poison.

 

Eileen:

It is. I have an imaginary bubble I put around me. We’re in HR, man. You have to have that bubble. I go, okay. Boom, boom. I see things deflect.

 

Alicia:

Yeah. We can only be who we are and try to do the best job we can.

 

Valerie:

Mm-hmm (affirmative).

 

Alicia:

Yes.

 

Eileen:

Yeah.

 

Alicia:

This has been great. So as we begin to end, are there some words of wisdom that you would like to leave for the listeners?

 

Valerie:

I think just to be truthful to yourself. Don’t ever settle for anything that you don’t love. Try to just follow that creative light and whatever makes you happy, just go do it, I think. And to trust yourself because it always works out when you really, really follow what you really sincerely love. It always will work out for you, I think. I see so many people that are in jobs they just don’t like. They hate it. Then they hate their life and they started hating everything. So I would say, just follow your dreams, follow what you want, and be truthful to yourself.

 

Eileen:

Wow. Thank you so much. That’s so wonderful.

 

Alicia:

Love it. Love it.

 

Eileen:

Love those words of wisdom.

 

Valerie:

Thank you.

 

Eileen:

That’s great. The energy we can just [crosstalk 00:30:41].

 

Alicia:

I’m like, you are just full of joy and love.

 

Valerie:

I know. It’s sickening, isn’t it?

 

Eileen:

No, it’s wonderful. We need it more.

 

Valerie:

I also want to say one more thing, that I love helping other people, and especially young people that are starting out in their career and they have no directions and they don’t know what to do. It’s so wonderful to try to help them because you can do one thing, make one phone call for one person and it just changes their whole life. And I love it. It really makes me happy. And I think it’s like giving back. It’s really nice.

 

Alicia:

Yes. Yes, it is. Yeah.

 

Eileen:

And Valerie, we had a guest on our show, which goes with this. Is that, that one nice gesture could mean so much and open doors, but she said her success was from the thousands of thousands and thousands of people who helped support her. And just think of that. Each one of us, as you grow in your career or your age, it’s always good to give back and bring someone. And thank you so much for sharing that because that’s really what a soul of a leader is. It’s about that servant leadership which you’re doing.

 

Alicia:

Yes, yes.

 

Valerie:

I agree.

 

Alicia:

It’s so rewarding to give back. You’re so right, you can just make one phone call sometimes, and that can change the life for someone just like that. And it costs you nothing to be kind.

 

Valerie:

Yep.

 

Alicia:

That’s great.

 

Valerie:

And I think to myself that hardly anyone really helped me, honestly. And I’m not feeling sorry for myself, but because I had to do it all myself, I think how nice it is to help someone else. [inaudible 00:32:31] And again it’s living in balance. And I think that’s very important.

 

Alicia:

Yes.

 

Eileen:

Yeah. The giving and the receiving has to be in balance or else you’re going to be off if the energy is right. Well, thank you so much for tonight.

 

Alicia:

Thank you.

 

Eileen:

We love you. Thank you.

 

Valerie:

Thank you so much for having me. I’m so happy.

 

Eileen:

Thank you for joining us on the Soul of a Leader podcast. We are igniting a new way of leading with your soul and interviewing ordinary people with extraordinary impact. Thank you for listening to the stories of our leaders who will help and guide you on your leadership journey. For more information on our podcast, please visit our website at www.soulofaleader.com. Thank you for listening.