Michael Trotta and Amy talk about the ways that old stories can keep us stuck, but also the ways that these same stories can serve as an initiation, and show us places where we can grow. With a special nod to the story of St. Patrick's Day.
Michael Trotta is a mentor, storyteller, natural learning specialist, proud dyslexic, unapologetic troublemaker (the good kind), artist, hopelessly addicted fly-fisherman, and host of the Story Mischief podcast.
After ten years in education, Michael set out to prove to himself that it was possible to create a life and living on his terms. One more deeply rooted and aligned with his passions and values. In the nearly twenty years since, he's been using a unique blend of mentoring, myth, nature, and mischief to help people get unstuck and do the very same thing for themselves.
From businesses to coaching retreats, writer's workshops to community gatherings, small groups to 1:1, Michael knows how to use stories to generate inspiration, conversation, and transformation, inside and out.
It's a well-known fact he was raised by coyotes and is now raising one of his own on the bones of an old farm nestled along the banks of a tiny trout stream somewhere in Westchester County, New York.
You can learn more about Michael and his work at www.StoryMischief.com
Amy Hallberg 0:01
If you are someone who is captivated by story, wants to be a teller of stories, wants to be a writer of stories, then this podcast is for you. It's a conversation I recorded a little under a year ago with Michael Trotta who is a masterful storyteller, a masterful mentor, and a bit of a trickster. I hope you'll enjoy.
You're listening to Courageous Wordsmith. I'm Amy Hallberg, story coach, book writing mentor, and author, and these are conversations with real life creatives. Because if you want to be a real life creative, it helps to know what that looks like for you. Welcome to Courageous Wordsmith.
Well, thank you so much for being with me here today Michael, I am so happy to have you here.
Michael Trotta 1:01
My pleasure. Thank you for having me.
Amy Hallberg 1:03
So I think it would be good to just start with how I first became aware of you, which is that I was going through life coach training and you were one of the master coaches who taught our classes. You were teaching a lesson on metaphors as a tool for understanding our world, and I just thought that was fascinating. So do you want to, do you want to just talk a little about that?
Michael Trotta 1:24
Well, the tool and the idea behind it is simply that the outside world is a projection of our inside world, and they can serve as metaphors for things that are happening within us. So when we can look at something outside of ourselves and identify the story that we're applying to it, we can get a better sense of how we're thinking and moving through the world. It's basically telling us something about our identity and our relationship to the world.
Amy Hallberg 1:55
And in your bigger practice, you do a lot of work with exploring stories and what they reveal about our bigger worlds, so do you want to talk about that a little bit?
Michael Trotta 2:05
I believe that we're all living out of a story, and that there are things that are specific to each individual that makes them who they are. And I come from a long background of teaching, and of teaching wilderness skills and mentoring, and in that process, I learned a lot about indigenous cultures. And in that process, I learned a lot about about initiation and the purpose of initiation. Now I know this might seem like a distant, "where's he going away from stories?" But actually, a lot of myths and fairy tales are stories of initiation. And they're about bringing something youthful and innocent into a place of knowing, and, and being, right? So a lot of fairy tales, in fact, most of them are about someone being initiated into their gifts, into their genius. And as a teacher, way back when, one of the things that I recognized that I was good at was really recognizing what it was about each individual person that just made them special and could kind of connect them to that. And I did that really unconsciously, but I knew that that's what I was good at. And when I started to become conscious of it, I started to look for answers, like how do you hone that? And one of the things I found was that myths and fairy tales from all over the world tell stories about coming into relationship with your genius, or I call it your medicine. And so I've started since then, developing my ability to not only learn from those stories, but to use those stories as a way to teach other people about how to come into relationship with the thing that makes them uniquely who they are.
Amy Hallberg 3:53
You know, and for a personal note, so I will forget many things about my life coach training actually, I've learned what I needed to and I forgot them. But what I remembered about the class I had with you was that, I was one of the people who was coached on the call, and I was really, really afraid of something. I had just left my teaching career and I was just, you know, a little bit shell shocked and scared. And you asked me to come up with a metaphor, and the metaphor I came up with was that there was this labyrinth and in the middle of the labyrinth was this Minotaur. And you were like, "That's great." And we talked about the Minotaur a whole bunch and then you were like, "Okay, I suggest you go online and find that Minotaur and get a picture of him and put him up." And it was a really empowering thing to do because, okay, here's this Minotaur.
Michael Trotta 4:42
Yeah.
Amy Hallberg 4:42
Okay, and what is the Minotaur? The Minotaur is the thing that's lurking, that's gonna get me and I don't know where that Minotaur is, but he's there. I was like, "Oh, hi Minotaur. I see you." You know, and it just, it just kind of deflated the whole thing. Fast.
Michael Trotta 4:56
Yeah, yeah, I had a recent experience very much like that where somebody was coming into my orbit, let's just say, and they were disrupting what I was trying to create, and I found it really frustrating, and I wasn't sure what to do about it. And I had drawn a boundary and I was like, "Look, this isn't gonna work for me."
Amy Hallberg 5:16
Right.
Michael Trotta 5:16
But it was really riled up by it, and then I started to realize, based on the patterns and behaviors that I was seeing in this person, I was like, "Oh, they're kind of like that trickster character who just shows up to disrupt the status quo." And ordinarily, I love the trickster. It's like, you know, my whole story mischief, it's all about that mischievous turn it upside down, and cause creation happens from that. But when it was happening to me, I didn't like it so much, you know, but I was able to do something similar, where it's like, oh, this person's showing up as that character, as that, that archetype and I don't have to make it personal. I don't have to make it about, I'm doing it right, or I'm doing it wrong, or they're good, or they're bad. It's just an energy that's kind of coming into my space and it's disrupting the status quo, and I know that whenever the status quo gets disrupted, it's an opportunity for growth. So it completely transformed my relationship with that experience, which was not a comfortable one the first day or two.
Amy Hallberg 6:21
No, no, having been a teacher, having been a coach, no, because you planned and you have a set idea of-
Michael Trotta 6:26
Right.
Amy Hallberg 6:26
But you know, that's also something about the nature of story, right? You have a plan. At the outside of the story, the character has a plan, and the plan will be derailed or it's a shitty story. So, you know, I mean, there is something to that idea of the story isn't about what you think it's about. And in a good retreat or exploratory experience, you don't know the outcome. Right? So it's not what you think it's about. The invitation I extended to you, I mean, like I said, I love your podcast, I love your take on things, you make me think. But I was always like, you know, I think some of what you do and some of what I do, there's some convergence, and so I was, you know, you know, in my mind, kind of, I kind of keep an eye out on some people and go yeah, when I see an opportunity I'm gonna invite them on. So-
Michael Trotta 7:12
Yeah.
Amy Hallberg 7:12
All this, just to say that I went on Facebook on St. Patrick's Day, and you had a post that I just thought was really interesting. And I'm guessing you might have taken some flack for it.
Michael Trotta 7:25
Oh, I definitely did.
Amy Hallberg 7:26
Yeah. So, so just to say, and you were very clear on this, you're not an expert. This is not some kind of official proclamation, it's just playing with ideas and being the trickster, but you made a statement that was a little, let's say, what unorthodox?
Michael Trotta 7:42
Yeah, yeah. It actually goes back. I mean, it's not, I'll talk about that in a minute, it was me questioning, as, as somebody with Irish heritage, I was questioning the celebration of St. Patrick, who was a Welsh saint. And it occurred to me, you know, why do we have this Welsh guy that is like the pinnacle of our holiday that everybody associates with Ireland when he wasn't even from Ireland himself. And the myth behind him is that he drove the snakes out of Ireland, and there were no snakes really in Ireland at the time he would have been there. And really, what's behind that story is that he was driving the pagans out of Ireland. And in my research it wasn't him alone, but he's sort of like the figurehead of a movement of removing that faith or religion, if you want to call it that, and largely, I would say, the indigenous people that, that practice those things. And, you know, while I get that today it's a point of pride and connection and it's meaningful to not only the people in Ireland, but to Irish people all over the world, it seemed to me to be another example of where the colonizer, the one who came and took over, is being celebrated as, as like a savior. And by itself I probably wouldn't have recognized that, but a couple months back I did something on the story of Thanksgiving in this country.
Amy Hallberg 7:42
Oh, yeah.
Michael Trotta 7:58
And I knew the story was always a little bit off, but when I really dug in, because I have a friend who is Wampanoag, so his ancestors were the ones that were met by the pilgrims. And it's a very painful story for him.
Amy Hallberg 9:36
Right.
Michael Trotta 9:37
And if you ask why, or look into why, you'll, I mean, at surface, it's, you know, the Indians and the Pilgrims got together and shared a meal and lived happily ever after, and that's not the story at all. Not at all. And it was really the opening of a door to oppression and genocide and colonization. And just on that surface, like, explanation, you can go "Oh, yeah, I can, I can see how that's a problem." But if you really look into it, and I didn't know this until recently, so "The First Thanksgiving" was in 1621, "The First Thanksgiving," that's in quotes because, you know, native people giving thanks was a daily practice, and is to those that I know. The Pilgrims wouldn't have called it Thanksgiving, they actually had a celebration around something called Thanksgiving, but, which would have been a day of fasting, not feasting. So that's a little twist in the story.
Amy Hallberg 10:33
Yeah, that's interesting.
Michael Trotta 10:35
But then hear this, it wasn't until the 1840s that some documents from the people who were at that first gathering in 1621 surfaced. Nobody knew about Thanksgiving up until 1840 something. It wasn't heard of in this country. And so by the time the Civil War rolled around, I think it was Lincoln, and there was somebody before him, who were like, well, if we create this, traditionally New England, like yearly kind of harvest celebration, it wasn't called Thanksgiving, and turn it into something that's national, we can bring the North and the South- it was a big political move, really is what it was. And then after that, after the 1880s, then they started popularizing it because by and large, native people had been driven onto reservations and had been defeated. Before that, though, 1840 to 1865, 70, it wasn't told that way, because they needed people to have a poor idea or reflection of native people.
Amy Hallberg 11:39
I knew- I was following right with you until you went there, and I'm like, oh, my gosh, wow.
Michael Trotta 11:43
That's mischief, right? Like, that's-
Amy Hallberg 11:45
Right!
Michael Trotta 11:45
That's the stuff I'm talking about. And so it was that, also, I won't go long into it, but the story of Columbus wasn't popularized until the beginning of the 20th century when Italian Americans were looking, which I'm also Italian, were looking for somebody that could be recognized to get a foothold in this country, right? Because they weren't looked at very favorably like the Irish, but now all of a sudden the founder of the country was Italian, so hey! Another little bit of story mischief there. So those two significant bits of story, and how they've been used to sort of manipulate and create our cultural identity, when I hit the St. Patrick's thing this year, I just was like, whoa, wait a minute, is this another? And that's where all that came from.
Amy Hallberg 12:33
Well, and I think it's so fascinating you say that, because it's true, you start one place, and you just keep following, and everything's connected to everything, there is no end to it, you're never gonna get to the end of this exploration. But it is interesting, where this thing shows up and takes on this meaning, and it didn't have that meaning at all. It's serving a purpose. Every story serves a purpose.
Michael Trotta 12:56
And the thing too though, is that it served some things in a great purpose, like the Irish take a lot of pride around that celebration, or the Italians take a lot of pride around Columbus. Great. But we're in a time in our culture right now where we are also starting saying at what cost?
Amy Hallberg 13:13
You know, I didn't tell you this, but I'm actually completing my second book. Right now I'm like eight chapters from the end. Hopefully by the time this airs it will have been written. And the thing I'm exploring is that my grandmother is DAR. And my grandma was Daughters of the American Revolution. And she's very proud of that heritage. That was something that really meant a lot to her. She did a lot with genealogy. So I have struggled with genealogy my whole life long, because what else does she have to be proud of? And the truth is, a lot. But those stories, there's a lot of investment in those stories, and I think there's a lot of pushback about, you know, what stories do white people even get to tell? Um, a lot of them as long as we own our perspective, but there's a lot of pushback about "If that story is not true, what does it mean about my grandma? What does it mean about my people? What does it mean about my heritage?"
Michael Trotta 14:07
Your whole identity changes, right? And that's what makes it so that people don't want to have those conversations. Because if I'm not that story, then what am I?
Amy Hallberg 14:16
Right. Well, and, you know, let's, let's extend it further. Who are you to tell, you tell a lot of stories from indigenous people, you're a white guy, who are you to tell those stories? And I think there's a lot of people, they don't even want to go near them. But I will also tell you, I went to something, this goes in my book too, by the way, I've already written it. I went to an event where the featured speaker was a black woman. And I ended up talking with her in the lobby, you know, and I'm like, "Here's my book, it's about Germany and how I as a white woman sort of got to know my country through Germany." I'm like, "But you know, as a white woman, I don't know if I should be telling these stories." And she hit me. Not hard, and it was, you know, Minnesota and it's winter and like, you know, big fluffy coat she didn't- but she was like, she was like getting my attention, "Look in my eyes," and she was like, she was like, "Would you please tell your stories? From your perspective, to your people. Like, talk about it, because we're tired." I've told this story a lot of times because it just always reminds me like, no, we don't get to exempt ourselves out of it, but I'm curious how you approach a story that is so laden with, what? It's almost like it's sacred to people. How do you poke a sacred bubble?
Michael Trotta 15:29
I don't poke sacred bubbles just to poke them, just to mess with people. Normally when I'm poking them, I am genuinely curious as to the other side of the coin, and I ask a question about it. And that tends to poke people. My ability or vision to do that comes from, I think, anyway, learning stories, like you had said, I tell a lot of stories from indigenous cultures. But what I've I've found is the same stories are told in different cultures all over the world, right? So there are stories, myths, for example, that are unique to a place and a people and a time, and those are the ones I tend not to tell. But if they're ones that have traveled, and that you can find in, you know, following the same patterns and basically characters, those are ones that I'll tell. And when you get to see what they look like in different cultures, you start to see consistencies, and you also start to see inconsistencies. And it's, there's something about those inconsistencies that creates like a little doorway, that you can go, oh, wait a second, there's something off here. And it's in those places that I tend to ask the questions. I don't know if that makes sense but that is kind of how it works, for me anyway. The other thing is when I tell stories, they do the poking. That probably happens more than anything. I will tell a story, but the way I work with myths, when I tell stories, fairy tales, too, is I kind of go in assuming that they are their own living thing. They are, they've got their own medicine going on. And when I tell a story, it has a way of finding a place in a person that needs some looking at. And it either makes them really happy, or it makes them really sad, or it brings them to some place, some memory that they're not, that needs some looking, that needs some light shined on it. And so I'll tell a story, and I've had, on many occasions people be, "Why would you tell that story? That's an awful story." And I'll just say, "Well, tell me about it. What was it-" "That makes no sense." Or, "That character had no legs." Or, "Why would-" And it's like, you know, and I just keep inviting them to tell me more, but it almost always speaks to some wounded part of themselves.
Amy Hallberg 17:45
That's really true. I think that when we listen to a story, how we respond to it reveals so much about us. And you know, when I'm working with writers, sometimes they'll be afraid, like, "Who's gonna want to hear my story?" And I'm like, no, actually, the more you ground yourself in with a really specific detail, so people don't have to think too hard, they start to locate themselves in that story, what they say about it, that reminds me of... that brings up this... this, that, the other thing, it's actually a really effective way to get at things that were your blind spots.
Michael Trotta 18:17
I'm teaching a class that I put together called Awaken the Mythic Self, and the very last class, which is coming up, is entitled, Your Story is Not Really About You. And, of course it is, like you're telling your story, it's about you. But if you tell it in the way that you're describing, you're telling other people's stories, too. And that's why they want to hear your story. Because sometimes that slightly different perspective or that they don't think that they're reading their story will let them see their story in yours. And that can open up doors for people.
Amy Hallberg 18:48
Absolutely. And I also have to say, as a memoir writer, there is a real danger in releasing it too soon. So like, my book, that is out there. I've had people come back and start sort of interpreting it through the lens of their life, and I'm fine now, thanks, you know, it details a hard time in my life, but I'm fine. And so I'm like, well, it's just a story. What you make of my story isn't really my business. But if they were picking and prodding and poking around in my story before I did a lot of the personal work in the writing of it, I would be attached to all those details. I'm really not, I really love seeing what people come up with in my- like, that they see in my story that I didn't mean to put there.
Michael Trotta 19:29
Because you've given it time to kind of move away from it.
Amy Hallberg 19:33
Right. So you know, referring back again to me in the life coach class with you, right? It's straight out of teaching where I was still, you know, not okay. You know, if you'd poke me too much about well, but why? But why is the labyrinth so scary? I think I'd have been really pissed off. You know, and I'd have spent an hour afterwards talking about how pissed off I was at Michael Trotta for being an asshole to me.
Michael Trotta 19:54
What people often do. You wouldn't have been special in that game.
Amy Hallberg 19:59
But sometimes those things that make us the most pissed off are the best part of the story in terms of like, there's the gold. Right there.
Michael Trotta 20:08
The gold and the shadow, you know, and that's the opportunity. And I do my best to tell people that before going into it. And, you know, when I first realized this, I was invited to talk to a group of teachers, and I thought teachers were going to be the most receptive to the stuff I was talking about, and it was quite the inverse.
Amy Hallberg 20:28
Uh-huh
Michael Trotta 20:28
Okay, good, so you get what I'm talking about.
Amy Hallberg 20:29
Oh yeah, yeah.
Michael Trotta 20:30
Not that teachers aren't amazing, but in the structure of the school and the system they were in where I was, there's sort of like a group mind that kind of happens. And in any case, I, I told the story about this boy connecting with his genius, essentially, and then in the story, there was another boy who didn't quite connect with his. And for me, it was like this really inspiring, exciting story, like it just brought me to life. And when I was done telling it, I look over and there's two or three teachers with big smiles, like, just like I experienced it.
Amy Hallberg 21:03
Right.
Michael Trotta 21:03
I was like, "Yes!" And I look over and there's two teachers sitting there with their arms crossed. I was like what's happening?
Amy Hallberg 21:08
I've been in the room with those teachers, yeah.
Michael Trotta 21:09
Then I look over, there's two teachers crying, like crying.
Amy Hallberg 21:12
Oh my gosh.
Michael Trotta 21:13
Like, I've got people in trauma, I've got people pissed off at me, I've got people who think I'm the greatest. And I know none of it's about me, but it's sometimes hard not to think that it's not, you know, my fault or whatever. And that was the beginning of me realizing that everybody brings something very different to the stories that I tell. And that the story is telling different stories to different people, they may hear the same words, but each person hears a different story, and there is some kind of magic in that that I think is for me, it's kind of addictive. And I love going back to that place. Because every time I tell a story to a group of people, I learn a different story.
Amy Hallberg 21:53
I think it speaks to these parallel cultures we have that we think are the same, and they are not. So you reference education. Part of my challenge moving into the life coaching world is that they look on the outside very similar, but they have vastly different aims. I mean, education, it is your job to find every child's genius and make sure that they, they find their genius in the way that you have prescribed to them. Like there's a lot of should.
Michael Trotta 22:18
Supposed to be.
Amy Hallberg 22:19
Right? Right, right, and life coach training is all about stripping away the should and going okay, well, if you get rid of all the things that you should be doing, what's left? It's two vastly different end goals.
Michael Trotta 22:31
Yeah.
Amy Hallberg 22:32
And to me, that was, that was a really hard passage for me just understanding that, no, I'm still going to be teaching, but I'm not the person I was, as a teacher.
Michael Trotta 22:44
Have you gone back to working with teachers or in the schools or something where you've seen the contrast about where you were, now where you are?
Amy Hallberg 22:50
Well, it's interesting, because I think I was the canary. Right now, it's a shitty time to be a teacher.
Michael Trotta 22:56
Yeah.
Amy Hallberg 22:57
And the teachers that tend to reach out to me are the ones who saw me breaking paradigms because I had no other options. Like, basically, I ran out of other options, and was like, "Oh, I don't know what else I'm going to do. I'm gonna just break paradigms." So I break paradigms all over the place on my way out, leave very publicly, it was, it was not easy. But I went through a lot of what teachers are going through now. So the teachers who reached out to me they actually want to know, when you break the paradigms, what happens and how are you not dead yet? Like how, it was interesting, because at first people would reach out to me just to kind of be like, "Hey, we see you, we love you, you have gifts." You know, and like, create little safe bubbles around me. And some people, you could see that they were very uncomfortable with what I was saying about what had happened to me. And I use that term very, very deliberately, right? Whereas it was interesting when people started saying, "Well, how did you get from there to here?" And I'm like, oh, now the story has power because they know I'm okay. They don't see how I got there, but they just want to know, like, what happened? And so you know, you can't- I see a lot of people who are like, "I'm gonna write my book." And they want to write it really fast, and the truth is, no, if you want it to be the kind of story you're describing, like those myths didn't happen. One day, a guy sat down, made up a myth and told everybody, the end. There's a lot of revision that happened over a long period of time.
Michael Trotta 24:21
Oh, yeah. Long, long period of time. Yeah.
Amy Hallberg 24:24
And that's where you get rid of some of that stuff that didn't need to be there too. Like, if it doesn't stay with the story, it almost falls away, what, what remains is what is essential, almost.
Michael Trotta 24:34
Yeah, you know, in this class I'm teaching, and something I've recognized- like, people are familiar with The Hero's Journey, Joseph Campbell's outline for myths. I've created and recognized a completely, not completely different, adventure journey that happens but I look at it through the lens of initiation. Because I've, I've worked with initiation and have initiated people, youth and adults for years through ceremony. And one of the, the processes of initiation is there's a point where when you leave the village, so to speak, and you kind of are like in that kind of chaotic, like what's happening, I can't believe I'm doing this, maybe I should have gone back. And if you can stay in that tension long enough, you awaken to this new possibility. But the mistake that most people make is that once they awaken, they think the journey is over, and it's really only half complete. There's the, you've got to make your way back, different, but make your way back to where you started. And so you might have an idea for a book, or you might even write the book. But what comes out, like I have a friend who just finished a book, and I called him up, I go, "You got to feel great. Like, are you excited?" And he's like, "No, now I realized there's a ton of work to do to get people to even know about the book." I think the same thing is true, just with your story, you know what your story is, but then there's work. I call it the expand phase, where you, you really put yourself into figuring out what that looks like, and then there's the next phase is release, you've got to let go of those parts of the old identity that you're holding onto. Which I can imagine you like myself, having left teaching, it took years for me to finally let go of that identity. In fact, when I left, I tell this story all the time, when I left my job as a teacher, and I loved teaching, I just hated the system,
Amy Hallberg 26:20
Right.
Michael Trotta 26:21
I created my own nature based mentoring programs for kids. So I was really connecting with their genius, but I didn't have to do any of the curriculum stuff. Amy, I swear to you within a year, because it was so much fun for me, and because it was so easy for me, I was like something's wrong. So unconsciously, obviously, but I started to create report cards for each kid and send things home, like I recreated the stuff I hated to validate this new identity, and infuse it with something of the old identity and it started to take the fun out of it. Fortunately, I realized what I was doing,
Amy Hallberg 26:58
Yeah.
Michael Trotta 26:59
and was able to reverse it.
Amy Hallberg 27:01
Yeah.
Michael Trotta 27:01
But yeah, when it comes to writing a book or telling your story, whatever it is, I'm someone who believes that you should handle it with care and take time and give it the process that it needs and the respect that it needs. And I don't know how I feel about write your whole life story in a weekend.
Amy Hallberg 27:19
Well, you're writing into something that never existed before.
Michael Trotta 27:22
Yeah.
Amy Hallberg 27:23
So you know, you're not going back and piecing it back into the old thing. You're creating something entirely new. And you know, I just told somebody this yesterday, you know when you give birth to a book, and you're starting to write it, it's a baby. It's a baby. And what babies do is they eat, they poop, they cry, and they sleep. You know, you don't start educating that baby and putting it into the- you just kind of let the baby do that and become who the baby is, and it's going to show you, you know, and we don't need to, you know, we don't, yes, there's structure, you know, you have to have some kind of a framework, but the book will show you. And I talked to so many people like, "Can you tell me about publishing?" Have you written the book first? Because the publishing will come, the audience will come, the book will find its place in the world. But maybe we don't have to have an agenda for it. Maybe we can let the story tell us what it wants to be.
Michael Trotta 28:20
Well, that, I mean, there's a, that's a big cultural thing. Infact, I'm writing something right now myself, and, around that idea of, that's what I suggest people do when they hear a story. Just, just be with it for a little while. You don't have to do anything. And just notice what you notice about it. And, and there will be time for journaling on it and asking questions about it and reading other versions of it. Like that's to come, don't worry. But just let it do its thing for a little, give it some room, trust it. And that's one of the hardest things that people have, experience, when it comes to relating to myths and fairy tales. And just like what you're saying, writing their own book, because we've been taught, if you're not making it do something, if it's not producing for you, then what's the point? I don't know if you feel the same way but I think trying to rush that before you get there is the best way to make the whole process take a lot longer and you know, (unclear)
Amy Hallberg 29:22
Right. Paradoxically, if you just let it be, you will get there so much sooner. And it'll still take years, but you'll get there.
Michael Trotta 29:33
Yeah. I agree with that.
Amy Hallberg 29:34
Hey, thank you so so much for being here today and I hope we can talk again because this was just fascinating.
Michael Trotta 29:40
Yeah, totally. I enjoyed it. Thank you very much.
Amy Hallberg 29:45
Thanks for listening to Courageous Wordsmith. Today's episode featured Michael Trotta. You can read more about him and check out his links in the show notes. Backstage at Courageous Wordsmith, my editor is the talented Will Quie, and my producer is the wonderful Zoe Wood. If you enjoyed this podcast, you can help it thrive and grow. Please tell your friends and sign up for my email so that you'll hear about future episodes. And if you're feeling the call to write, join us in our free community for real life writers. You'll find these links right on this page. You can learn more about me and my books and my work with book writers at amyhallberg.com. I am Amy Hallberg and until we meet again, travel safely.