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Because Everyone Has A Story - BEHAS
Because Everyone Has A Story - BEHAS
Music and Mental Health - A Journey of Transformation and Healing - Janey Brown : 107
Today's story, Janey Brown, dives deep into the powerful world of music and its profound impact on mental health. From Janey's fearless early performances to her high school years marked by feelings of entrapment, we follow her journey through performance anxiety and the influencing factors of nature vs. nurture in this context.
Janey is a coach with expertise in trauma, a professional singer, and a keynote speaker. She also studies psychology and plans to publish her first book in 2023.
Janey bares her soul, sharing her struggles with unresolved trauma and mental health issues that demanded her attention. Hear her story of juggling roles: from being a martial artist and performer to a fitness industry worker and aspiring musician. Witness the power of her voice, her very lifeline, fading away, and the terrifying liberation she experiences in its absence. Janey's quest for healing begins with vocal therapy - a transformative journey that enlightens and inspires.
As we journey further, Janey shares her personal growth and transformation story and how she merged art, music, and mental health to create FEARCE Academy. Gain insight into her upcoming book and her decision to let go of titles and attachments to reduce suffering. Join us in this compelling exploration of the symbiotic relationship between music/ art and mental health and how Janey turned her challenges into opportunities for growth and healing.
To connect with Janey: https://janeybrown.com/
Her new song: https://open.spotify.com/track/4ZJAFNt8KEh9LpeHPV2hgd?si=KV_gfMZJQWKil5fUN9O1-w
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Thank you for listening - Hasta Pronto!
Hi, I'm Daniela. Welcome to my podcast, because everyone has a story, the place to give ordinary people, stories, the chance to be shared and preserved. Our stories become the language of connections. Let's enjoy it, connect and relate, because everyone has a story. Welcome my guest, jane Brown. Jane is a trauma coach, a professional singer and a keynote speaker, as well as she studies psychology and plans to publish her first book in 2023. It was lovely to meet her. We had a wonderful conversation. She is a very sweet and introspective woman who has learned a lot and grown immensely, and you will never stop for her. She dives deep into the powerful world of mental health that has impacted her through her performing music and dancing. I find this is a compelling exploration of the symbiotic relationship between music, art and mental health and how Jane turned her challenges into opportunities for growth and healing, a journey that will continue. Let's enjoy her story. Welcome, Janey, to the podcast. I am very excited and grateful that you're here. I'm grateful too. Yes, yes, jane, tell me why do you want to share a story?
Janey Brown :I believe that I was put on earth to help people. Pretty plain and simple, I think. By sharing some of the things I've learned at least I hope that maybe prevent people from the same suffering that I had the learnings from the suffering, or the learnings- from the achievements.
Daniela SM :Yes, thank you for sharing a story because, as I tell everyone, it's so important that you share and then, even if nothing super bad has happened, even just your life is something that nobody can take away. It's your story and we should always share it, thank you. Thanks for asking. Yes, jane, when does your story start? I?
Janey Brown :suppose it starts September 2nd 1986, which is when I was born. But I think the one that we'll focus on today is more centered around music and mental health, and my music journey publicly began when I was 10 years old and I stepped onto my first public stage. When I first started performing I was fearless, in every sense of the word. I literally had no fear, and fear is learned, so that kind of makes sense. I hadn't really gone through the hardship of what it meant to be a performer full-time and professionally. I wasn't exposed yet at that time to the harshness of the entertainment industry, so I was fearless. Around 14, 15, I got into high school and that's when all of the insecurities start for everybody and that's when sort of the mental health struggles really started to poke their head above the surface. So that's the beginning of both my music career and probably the mental health battles is between age 10 and 15.
Daniela SM :It is interesting that you said that you have no fears at age 10, because usually people you know kids are not fearless at five, six days, start losing that and so. So how is it that you managed to be for so long fearless?
Janey Brown :Well, I'd argue that I did have fear in other things. When I was a kid, like I remember, my first sort of exposure to performance was through dance, actually, and gymnastics. I remember being very afraid, both for dance competitions and for gymnastics competitions, between you know, maybe ages five to nine. And then when I, when I got into musical theater performance because that was the first public stage connected to a production, obviously I performed in gymnastics competitions and stuff publicly, but my first production that I was in was age 10. And I think it's because fear hadn't been learned in that domain, like fear is a learned feeling and experience, and I hadn't learned to be afraid in that domain. But it came quite quickly after, like it was only like four years where I don't recall experiencing any fearful sort of episodes. It wasn't until beginning of high school where I, you know, began to really really get afraid and insecure, but I still kept going, which that is a whole other story.
Daniela SM :What happened that you started to feel secure?
Janey Brown :Yeah, I mean, I guess I can. I can describe it by way of feeling. I remember being under the spotlight, let's say prior to high school, and it was just. It was this feeling of freedom, it was this feeling of being empowered and impervious. When I entered into high school, the feeling became being trapped, being more like there was more feelings of sadness and pain, being confined or trapped and sort of having to force myself to do it, rather than just this thing that I was intrinsically inspired to do.
Janey Brown :At the time of experiencing that shift, I didn't know that that's what I was experiencing. It was I kind of just overwrote it and people would say, you know, like that's, that's what a performer experience is. It's like everyone is afraid as a performer and it's just part of the, the career. I didn't learn until much, much later that actually what I was experiencing was performance anxiety and that that performance anxiety was driven by an undiagnosed mental health condition or conditions that that were creating a traumatic experience for me. So it's it's complicated in that at the time I knew that I felt different. I just didn't know what to call it and people were invalidating the experience because they were saying, like it's normal to get butterflies. What I didn't realize is that I wasn't just experiencing butterflies. I was experiencing tiny vampire bats with machetes, and there's a difference. There's a difference between butterflies and sort of this healthy stress and tiny vampire bats with machetes and unhealthy stress. And that unhealthy stress was what I was experiencing and that grew over time until I couldn't really go on.
Daniela SM :Well, the thing is, people didn't validate it because they couldn't feel that you had machetes vampires versus butterflies. Yeah, you mentioned mental health conditions, where you had these mental issues, or they came because of the situation.
Janey Brown :I'll definitely sort of unpack that a bit, because I think it's worth unpacking. I just want to validate what you just said, which was they couldn't have validated my experience because they didn't know it and there wasn't language for it. Back then, like, mental health wasn't a topic publicly and in fact there was a much bigger stigma around it and that stigma kept it to be a very shameful subject. People didn't want to talk about fear. They didn't see that as just a fundamental part of the human experience. They saw it as a weakness, especially in the performance industry. So it wasn't really a topic that you could open up about and get help, for Fear is normal, but I had anxiety, which those are two different things. Yeah, there's wasn't language for it. We didn't have the education that we have now. We didn't have the management of the stigma, you're right, and I couldn't have been helped because it wasn't available.
Janey Brown :Okay, so with mental health conditions that are diagnosable, it's always a combination of nature versus nurture.
Janey Brown :So the age old debate in psychology is is the way that we are a by product of our nature or is the way that we are a byproduct of being nurtured a certain way by our environment?
Janey Brown :And the answer that at least I've been coming to over and over again with you know, my research is that it's both, and most, if not all, people that are educated in psychology would say the same thing. It's not just one or the other. I was predisposed to mental health conditions because of some history in my family and because of some genes that I likely carry, and it was my environment over time that cultivated an inability to manage my mental health and, by way of what you know, psychologists would call mental health conditions. It was sort of an interplay between having pretty problematic mental health challenges behind the scenes and this consistent exposure to fear and insecurity on stage and zero management around that. So it was kind of coming from both ends. It was the stage fright and the anxiety around that and the lack of coping mechanisms and this mental health condition that was developing behind the scenes that was contributing to the problem.
Daniela SM :Well, thank you for explaining that. That's really interesting. Yeah, I agree. Yes, yes. And then what happened? So you entered high school and you had no knowledge of what was. You were just feeling, but you didn't know what was going on. Yeah, exactly.
Janey Brown :So when I entered high school and at a certain point in high school I think it was around age 15, I just started to really not be able to manage my experience. I got into drugs and alcohol and I started to pull away from performing. I always did performing. I've performed every year of my life. Actually, for the last 26 years in one way or another I've been on stage. So I never stopped fully, but I remember like self sabotaging and I would slink back into sort of like background character roles and I skipped school and I just had all of these unhealthy coping mechanisms. I was a pothead and I was failing and I was escaping, I was acting out a lot.
Janey Brown :I can't really explain kind of what turned me around in those years.
Janey Brown :There were some traumatic events that happened in those years and I think that that contributed to again the compilation of everything the drugs, the need to sort of pull back from performing a little bit, the inability to manage my mental health.
Janey Brown :I think those were connected to some traumatic experiences that I had at that time. By the grace of God, I remember in the latter half of my 16th year I just realized I was never going to get out of the small town that I was born in. If I continued to do this and I just I remember just quitting Cold Turkey I just I stopped and I got focused again and I got back on track and I started to really apply myself and that sort of carried me out of my high school years and into my 20s, which are a whole other bag of ups and downs and mistakes and unhealthy coping mechanisms and lack of managing this mental health condition properly. I still didn't know that I had had trauma in my life and I still didn't know that I had really problematic mental health challenges until like my 30s and during your high school years.
Daniela SM :How were your parents helping you?
Janey Brown :My parents and I love each other to death. I know for sure that that's always something that I can carry in my heart. In my high school years there was trouble at home. It was very hard at home and they know that and we've we've really done a lot of healing together. I think they did the best they could to support me in the best way they knew how, but family life what it was, adding to the problem essentially, unfortunately, and so, and you were living in a small town at the time, and then you decided that you finish high school and leave, yeah, so actually, when I finished high school I auditioned for a bunch of different musical theater performance universities.
Janey Brown :Maybe I only auditioned for one, I can't remember, but I didn't get into the one that I wanted and there was a new program opening up in my small town and so I went there for one year and at the end of that year I got my first touring professional show and I hated it. Like it was cool to experience that, but I was really really over musical theater performance and so I kind of associated that with my childhood and it was kind of a very young you know, even though there's many adult musical theater performance shows, just the style of performing for me wasn't what I was passionate about anymore. So I actually dropped out of college and I moved. This was around 18 years old. I moved out at 17 and at 18, I moved to the city of Toronto, which is, you know, a massive city in Canada, you know, moved in with a roommate and that was the beginning of my working life as a professional and the end of my small town life, essentially.
Daniela SM :So we talk about your childhood and your high school. You want to go now on your 20s? Yeah, absolutely, from decade to decade.
Janey Brown :Yeah, exactly yeah. Luckily there's not many more decades to go. So I moved to Toronto. I move in with the most wonderful woman, who I call my second mom. She's this beautiful guy, a nice woman named Roxanne, and I met her on set for my very first photo shoot, for my very first short track, ep. You know, the day I met her I knew immediately that she just belonged in my life and she knew immediately that I belonged in her life and I ended up moving in with her and you know, she became family to me. She integrated me into her culture and her community, which was completely unknown to me. She came from a small little town and there was very, very little culture. Now I'm hanging out with mostly Caribbean's and it was such a beautiful educational experience of what the real world is like and what it's like to spend time with you know different cultures and to learn about those cultures. And she really helped me in the latter half of my developmental years, you know. So I kind of credit her to helping raise me, you know, even though I was an adult by then, because I was working and stuff, she kind of helped raise me in a way, at least in that latter half of you know my developmental years Throughout my 20s.
Janey Brown :Basically what happened is I served. I probably had about seven different serving jobs over the course of that decade, one of them being at a strip club where I was a waitress, which was just a ride. You know I don't recommend working at a strip club for any young starving artist out there. It's not going to add to your optimistic thinking. I also worked as a fitness instructor for about 15 years throughout you know, my 20s and early 30s, and that involved yoga, kickboxing because I was a martial artist growing up and got my black belt so I was able to teach kickboxing. I taught mindset and meditation and all kinds of stuff in the wellness industry. I ended up working with professional athletes in the NHL at one point in my career. Like I really peaked in my fitness career as you know, a fitness coach and did really well there.
Janey Brown :And over the course of my 20s you know I had my music career, that I was working on my fitness career, that I was working on waitressing on the side and you know I was just trying to make it all fly, but kind of in the background there was still this unresolved trauma and mental health conditions, kind of running in the background, and eventually that caught up with me. Like eventually it got to the point where it just kind of deteriorated my physical health, my mental health, my, I wasn't able to really form relationships very well. I was, I buried myself in work but I didn't really have a community. Other apart from you know, roxanne and her family became very problematic, apart from trying to manage stage fright, which I still had, make my music career fly, deal with all of the BS in the entertainment and music industry, teach fitness full-time, which was, you know, just an injury waiting to happen, waitress, like get my sleep. Like between all of that and the unresolved and untreated and undiagnosed mental health conditions, it just all kind of caught up with me.
Daniela SM :But do you think that also maybe I mean not to bring it down what you were feeling, but you were extremely busy and so that didn't give you time to be mindful, really even that you were teaching that. So isn't that maybe the main trigger versus, you know, dealing with your mental condition?
Janey Brown :Yeah, I really feel like that's a. It's a great point. People often ask me like how did you go so long having these challenges without addressing them Right? And I think when you're in survival mode which I was, you know I was doing my best just to live paycheck to paycheck for many, many years and like when you're in that space, you don't have time to think about like what's going on with you. You don't have time to.
Janey Brown :Even if I knew that I had trauma, I wouldn't, I wouldn't have had time to deal with it. You know what I mean. So it wasn't even just like I didn't have time, it's like I wasn't. As you said, I wasn't even aware that there was a problem. It wasn't until I was in this really, really meaningful interpersonal relationship where the person didn't really have the same experiences. Me growing up, you know, my behavior was reflected to me as as being kind of toxic and problematic, and it wasn't until I was thought that I was going to lose this person that I was really forced to look at what was going on behind the scenes and seek help for it.
Daniela SM :But that's very mature of you, because most people will just brush it off and say, no, I don't have any issues, you're the problem and you managed to actually, you know, be intrinsic and look inside you.
Janey Brown :Well, I did that too. I definitely blamed the people around me or whatever that you know, my boyfriends probably the boyfriends and girlfriends that I had probably got it the worst. Like they were the closest to me, they would know the most about me and they would probably get blamed the most. So I did that too, you know, I forgive myself. It's all part of learning. I'm very grateful that I was able to, I guess, have enough self awareness, to build more self awareness and to do psychoanalysis on myself and to apply the tools. I think part of it is knowing that you're capable, like you're capable, of change and being really like really understanding neuroplasticity and how the brain can change. I think part of knowing that is believing that you can change and that provides self efficacy and you can get better and better. I mean I made a lot of mistakes before I was able to really get on the other side of this thing for sure. How was the healing process? It was a long one.
Janey Brown :I actually started out in vocal therapy because one of the first things that happened when I started to like not be able to keep up the pace I was going at and sort of not deal with my problems One of the first things that went was my voice. I was in a contract at the time, a US recording contract with a Grammy award winning producer. To be honest, that contract wasn't really going well anyway, like I think we would all ultimately have always ended our deal. But one of the catalysts was, like my voice. They discovered that I had the beginning stages of vocal nodules and if you keep doing what you're doing and don't adjust how you speak and how you use your voice, you can end up with nodules and you have to get surgery for that. So in order for me to slow this thing down, I had to stop teaching, stop singing like completely text people that were sitting beside me and I had to fully stop using my voice. Yeah, it was hard, it was really hard. Anybody really not talking, oh my God. I mean it was weird because in some senses it was actually kind of liberating. I felt unchained by all of these responsibilities that I was actually, behind the scenes, quite afraid of failing at by not being able to speak. It kind of gave me time to rest and reflect and sort of like not have to be stressed about that stuff all the time. But the other side of that coin was that I didn't know if I was ever going to sing again. Like there was a complete identity shift in this. At this time I was around 25, 26, maybe complete identity shift. It was really, really, really devastating and challenging. It's good now because it forced me to start to think about well, what else am I good at?
Janey Brown :Before, this, music was all I ever wanted to do. Serving was a utility for money and fitness coaching was a utility for money and being in good shape. I loved doing it. I'm summarizing it in a pretty crass way, but fitness was not my first passion. I loved doing it and I've made people happy and I loved that.
Janey Brown :But I wanted to fulfill my music career. I was very, very attached to that. In like a survival way. I was attached to it and this helped me kind of detach a little bit from the survival aspect and show myself what else I was capable of. But anyway, all that to say is, when I lost my voice, I got into speech pathology and vocal therapy and in vocal therapy we discovered me and the therapist discovered that I actually didn't need vocal therapy, I needed real therapy, I needed psychotherapy. I was so resistant to it, like she was trying to say to me you know, you've told me some things in here that are very traumatic and I don't have the skills to help you with that. I think you need to do psychotherapy. And I was resistant and she kind of kicked me out. Like she just said I can't help you anymore. You need to get help and I can't do that. That's when the healing journey began.
Daniela SM :Okay, because you did say okay, she kicked me out, I'm going to get help.
Janey Brown :Well, I didn't. I still didn't get help. She kicked me out. I was devastated because at that point she was kind of my only line of support and remember, like this is still the days where it's really only been in the last like seven years where this huge mental health movement has occurred and ending the stigma, like going to therapy, was still very shameful as far as I was concerned.
Daniela SM :It meant that I was weak to me at the time, jane, and he's still not, so I feel like there's still a long way to go, even though it is been talked more.
Janey Brown :I completely agree. I mean, even today, I still feel stigma around myself. Like I still find myself judging myself today. So I completely agree, and I've done so much work on trying to let go of judgment etc. It's so easy for me to have compassion for other people, but when it comes to me, I still have a lot of judgment. But yeah, I mean great, it's a great point that you raised.
Janey Brown :Like of course, it was still this untouchable action back then. If it still is today and it was, I resisted it with everything I had. And it wasn't until a couple years after that, when I was in this relationship with someone who I was deeply in love with, he just basically said to me like you either need to go to therapy or I'm leaving. Ultimatums don't work with me and frankly, I don't actually know that I believe in ultimatums very much, but I will say that this was the best ultimatum anyone could have ever gave me. I'm actually super grateful for it. If he hadn't have done that, I don't know if I would have gotten into therapy as soon. Like I was deeply afraid of losing him and it was the catalyst for me to start to heal. So I mean, I'm so grateful for that Wonderful Somebody who loved you obviously.
Janey Brown :Yeah.
Daniela SM :And so then, what happened? So you decided to get help.
Janey Brown :Yeah, I decided to get help and man, like I remember getting in there and it being so painful, like it was just so painful the first few years even. But it was painful coupled with relief, I think even the first session I had with her and I knew right away that she was the one and I'm very lucky because I know that some people sometimes have to search.
Daniela SM :Yes, not easy. This is like dating you have to find the right person too.
Janey Brown :I know for sure, for sure, and that's something that I encourage. I'm actually going to do a post about this very topic soon that you know, the worst thing is when someone goes to they try one therapy modality or one therapist and it doesn't connect, it's not a good fit and they think, okay, I'm untreatable and that's just a tragic outcome. So I really encourage everyone to try and to keep going. It's a process and each step, each, let's say, like bad fit, is one step closer to a good fit. But I was lucky enough to have a good fit right away and I remember in the session it was really, really painful for me to cry in front of people. I didn't do any of that. I cried in the session and, like she just provided the safety for me.
Janey Brown :It was many, many years of psychoanalyzing my own psychology, the psychodynamic work, and in the beginning I remember saying to her like how long is this going to take, you know? And she just looked at me and didn't answer, basically, and I was like this is going to suck, like it really doesn't suck in the session, when you trust the therapist you're with, I really feel that actually I looked forward to therapy. I looked forward to being able to have the stage for my trauma, for my pain, and just be able to endlessly talk about what I was processing without people cutting me off. That's what therapy is Like. You get this unsolicited attention for an hour and a half or whatever, which allows you to process and reflect, and then you also get their reflection as well, like their professional reflection, and it's just the room is filled with compassion and respect and attention and attunement and probably all the things that you didn't get in the first place. That led you to being in there and you're a huge component of psychoeducation so you learn so much about yourself.
Janey Brown :Did therapy for about six years pretty diligently, like in the beginning it was like four hours a week, you know, two sessions of two hours a week every week, and then it over time it tapered down to one sort of two hour session a week and then maybe one hour and a half session a week and then it just kind of spread out over time and I'd maybe pull back for a month. So now I just kind of do it as needed. That was generally my therapy experience and in addition to that I did a couple of trauma trainings to really deeply understand relational trauma and get educated on that so that I can help better help my clients. And I've also am finishing up my psychology degree right now Okay, but wait, wait, wait.
Daniela SM :You never said what you were studying, because in college you were studying acting.
Janey Brown :Yeah, so musical theater performance was that one year right after high school. And then I dropped out and never, ever thought I would ever go back to school. I never thought I would get my education, definitely didn't think that I belonged in academia or university, didn't think I was capable of it at all. In 2019, I decided to get my psychology degree and I'm finishing it this year, okay it's through all these experiences that you had you said okay, I can help others.
Janey Brown :Yeah, basically that was sort of through my psychoeducation and my own therapy, through my trauma training and myself reflection of my own trauma, I thought the road looks pretty clear in terms of wanting to help people. From a mental health standpoint. My dream is to help artists, because I was an artist and am an artist. I'm still making music. You know. I have all this wellness education and now I have a psychology degree and trauma trainings. My goal has been always to merge the two art and music and mental health and that is why I created Fierce Academy, which I can absolutely get into. The goal is to merge the two, but right now I'm sort of just generally putting out content. I'm going to be releasing a book in the fall and that's pretty much something that the public in general can find value from. Yes, we will come back to that.
Daniela SM :I want to know did you lose the man that actually encouraged you to go?
Janey Brown :Yes, eventually we broke up. It was for the better ultimately for both of us, and I have great respect and love for that man. Still, every now and then I see him. I'll never stop loving him from a place of now almost family.
Daniela SM :Yes, you know like sometimes we have people that come to our life and contribute to something and a part of your life.
Janey Brown :Yeah, and so you left the exercise training, no more coaching, no more restaurant waiters yes, no, I left being a waiter maybe 2014, 2015, that kind of era and then I left teaching the public around 2016,. I was just focusing on training professional athletes. At the time I was a master trainer of other coaches that wanted to work with professional athletes, so I was leading these trainings for them and I was coaching professional athletes, and after that I decided to leave teaching fitness and focus solely on providing mindset coaching and mental health mentorship. I do suspect that when I graduate from my bachelor's that I will go on to do my masters in clinical psych so that I actually can counsel people as a psychotherapist, but that's a bit of a future endeavor, I think. For now, I think it's just good that I got my psych degree, because I know that I'll be able to better serve my community as a coach, knowing what I know now, having this degree.
Daniela SM :When did you learn or decided that you wanted to be a trainer in the fitness world?
Janey Brown :That was when I first moved to Toronto. So I was waitress saying, and I was a really an avid fitness goer and I went to a bunch of fitness classes and stuff and I would get on to an instructor and I would go to that instructor all the time and what ended up happening was the instructor that saw me in her class all the time basically just offered me a job. She was like, do you want to start teaching here? Because she was the manager of all the a bunch of different clubs and that's kind of how I got into it. I just kind of fell into it. She asked if I wanted to teach and I started doing it and I was really good at it.
Janey Brown :There's always any fitness instructor out there. At least in the era that I was in I think it was, you know, 2005, six, seven any OG fitness instructor in our city would know that there was always, always, always a need for subs, because you as a fitness coach would be really tired or you'd want to go on vacation and you just need support. So there was just a plethora of subs and then you can kind of get a regular spot, usually if you sub enough at a certain gym. So that's kind of how that happened and I loved doing it and it taught me so much and I'm just incredibly grateful for that path. Yeah good.
Daniela SM :And then, when you lost your voice, you said that you had to learn all the talents that you had. But you already had other talents. You already were a fitness trainer, can do a job in the restaurant and you were singing. So what else do you learn? All the talents that you had?
Janey Brown :Yeah, it's a great question. So I had to stop teaching fitness because that was very vocal. I had to stop singing because that was obviously very vocal and it was about a year where I completely stopped. And then, right at the end of that year, I started performing again and started teaching again. But during that time I took up a nutrition course.
Janey Brown :I have a spiritual mentor been part of my life, all my life, and he he was like you know, it's never too late to go back to school. He's always encouraged me to go back to school and I never wanted to hear it and during that time I thought well, what else am I going to do other than writing songs that I can't sing? So I took up this nutrition course, which was really, really heavy in biochemistry, which I knew nothing about, and I sort of forced myself to go through that nutrition course and I still haven't finished it to this day, which is hilarious. But I forced myself to learn the material and it caused me to just start to explore what life would look like outside of performance, outside of teaching fitness. It was more about just this newfound discovery of my capabilities as a student in this nutrition course.
Daniela SM :The one you decided to study psychology, so that would have been about four or five years later.
Janey Brown :2017 was like this huge crisis year Broke up with. That relationship had nowhere to live, found out. I had a tumor in my pelvis and was launching my new company, fierce Academy, for the first time all in the same week. So in that week, just my life blew up, basically, and that took me quite a bit to recover from. It was about a year after that that I landed this really, really amazing contract with someone who wanted to take my Fierce Academy programming, which was a blend of mental health tools and meditation and psycho education and you know, it was like a course basically, that allowed people to face their fears. So he wanted to take this programming and he wanted to develop his company with it. And it was just this massive contract where I was paid very well and I got to coach and do my art and all of that. So this is an amazing year. And then that contract ended right before COVID.
Janey Brown :I was sort of lost again. I mean, you'll know that, talking to any artist, there is this common experience where you're sort of reinventing yourself. It's like mini deaths. You'll land a contract or you'll get a gig, and it's this amazing experience and you feel successful and you make your money, and then it's like it stops and then it's like what's next? That has been the pattern of my life, and this contract was the epitome of that. It was like the best experience I've had as an artist and as a coach thus far. And then the deal just ended.
Janey Brown :I didn't feel like I could sustain the ups and downs of this industry anymore. I didn't feel like I had the resilience I needed. I felt trapped again. I felt like, well, I don't have any formal education, so if I don't want to teach fitness anymore and I'm not making enough money with my music, what am I going to do?
Janey Brown :I was encouraged by this spiritual mentor to go into university and I just thought you know what I can't handle this guy telling me to go back to school anymore. I'm just going to do it. You know like I'll do it, and just kind of say there, you know, are you happy? And, daniela, I really didn't want to go. I was totally not convinced that I was going to do well at all. I was scared. It felt too big for me. It felt like I was giving up on everything I had worked for. I was devastated. That which is hilarious, because now I look at it like, okay, I got to go to university, I had that privilege, right, but I was devastated because I felt like I had failed and then I just kept pushing through. I couldn't be more grateful that I chose to do that.
Daniela SM :But so you are full at university or you are working as well.
Janey Brown :I'm working as well, so I did the degree part time over the last four years. Yeah, every step of the way was very, very challenging, but now I am very grateful.
Daniela SM :Okay, and so, in the fear of the anatomy, how did you came up with that idea?
Janey Brown :In 2016,. I had this idea, that thought what if I take all of my wellness education and everything I know about the nervous system and breath and all of my coaching education? And what if I create a coaching program for artists to help them overcome stage fright? Because one of the things that I went into therapy for was this really high level of stage fright that I was still dealing with behind the scenes. I worked on this online program for about a year.
Janey Brown :The reason I chose the name FEARCE Academy the way I spell it is F E A R C E is because In my research and in my learning, I realized that the only way to manage fear is to integrate it into your human experience. It's not to become fearless, it's not to override the fear. That will only make you more afraid or it'll only lead to problems down the line. The only way you can deal with fear effectively is to expose yourself to it and and in a grade the fear and learn how to turn it into fuel. Now, obviously, context matters, and so fears F-E-A-R-C-E is a demonstration of the interplay of the word itself is a combination of fear and fears. You need your fear to be fears. Yeah, that's clever.
Daniela SM :I like it, thank you. And so now you're still writing songs, yes, are you singing? Yes, and do you have your degree? Tell me more. What else are you doing in the future? Now?
Janey Brown :One day, I hope, to release a full album. I actually just released a song called Thank you for Loving Me. You know that's going to be something that I continue is just to release art in pieces, the way that I can right now, the way that I have the capacity and the finances to do so. One day I will achieve a full length album, so I am writing songs in anticipation for that one day. I will be releasing a book this fall. That book is essentially all of the material that my signature coaching program is called Fear to Fierce and the book will also be titled that and it basically has taken the information, compiled it into a book so that if people don't want to do a course, they can read a book instead.
Janey Brown :I'm pushing really hard with my manager, jason Pepper, right now to get more speaking engagements and do more public speaking. So I think once I graduate at the end of the fall, we're going to really ramp up that side of the business of Fierce Academy. Those are the things that sort of on deck right now slowly but surely, more music and still going to therapy, right, and still going to therapy here and there, for sure, yep.
Daniela SM :You said that you were lost two times in the story. Yeah, we were lost twice.
Janey Brown :Well, I was lost a lot, but I was like, yes, really lost those two times. Yes, the main ones.
Daniela SM :Now I wonder if this will happen to you again, something similar. Would you handle it now, with your wisdom and all your training, in a different way?
Janey Brown :Yeah, I mean. I mean absolutely. I don't. I don't even see how I could deny that. You know, when you're a different person and we all are you have no choice but to handle it differently. In a way, I'd like to believe that I wouldn't get as lost. I know that I'm going to go through ups and downs. Just walking this path as an artist in general is a ride. It's its own mental illness being an artist and an entrepreneur like saying that tongue in cheek, but I kind of mean it. It's a lot of ups and downs, it's a lot of self doubt. It's a lot of the same symptoms that you experience with with a mental health condition. But every time I go through these challenges I do find better ways to cope with it. I'm not going to be perfect and I know that there's some things down the pipeline that are going to rock my world. I'm hoping that all the strength and resilience that I've built up will allow me to cope with it in a better way than I've been able to in the past.
Daniela SM :I do believe, and thank you for answering that question. I do believe that we are just no titles, no jobs, no nothing around us but our soul. If everything is taken away, who are you? And of course I'm not saying something really bad happens, that I will not struggle to, but at least you don't get attached to the things that you're not supposed to.
Janey Brown :That is so powerful, my God. You just put into words something that was such a prevalent experience as an artist that if you can use those mini deaths, let's say, as an opportunity to get to know yourself at the core, deeper and deeper, without these titles, without these passions, as an opportunity to remind yourself who you are, it will eliminate suffering. I think that's completely true and I think it's actually probably the reason that I did suffer for so long, because I didn't want to let go of that identity to reducing, if not eliminating, suffering, and I didn't get that for a really long time.
Daniela SM :Yes, I mean it's not easy, right? Because we're still in a world where you have to work and you have to survive and everything is busy, busy. So but at least if you're aware, then you know, at least next time something happens you will have the tools one more tool in your box.
Janey Brown :Yeah, absolutely, I completely agree. Yeah, it's, and that's a powerful tool. That's that's like the mega tool.
Daniela SM :Yes, so, Janey, thank you so much for being here. We will add in the show notes how people can read you and also your new song, awesome. I would love that. It was a pleasure. I really enjoyed my pleasure. I appreciate you being so open to sharing your story.
Janey Brown :Oh, it's my absolute pleasure. Thank you for asking amazing questions and for letting me share. Thanks, thanks.
Daniela SM :I hope you enjoyed today's episode I am Daniela and you were listening to, because everyone has a story. Please take five seconds right now and think of somebody in your life that may enjoy what you just heard, or someone that has a story to be shared and preserved. When you think of that person, shoot them a text with the link of this podcast. This would allow the ordinary magic to go further. Join me next time for another story conversation. Thank you for listening. Hasta pronto.
