My guest is Aaron Calafato, an award-winning storyteller, narrative designer, and content strategist, for some of the world’s fastest growing companies. His podcast, 7 Minute Stories, is autobiographical and extemporaneous — the man writes nothing down — and has achieved a cult following, reaching more than 30 million people worldwide. When he’s not telling seven-minute stories, he’s also the co-creator, co-producer, and co-host of Glassdoor’s The Lonely Office podcast, which has quickly become a Top 50 Career Podcast.
My guest is Aaron Calafato, an award-winning storyteller, narrative designer, and content strategist, for some of the world’s fastest growing companies. His podcast, 7 Minute Stories, is autobiographical and extemporaneous — the man writes nothing down — and has achieved a cult following, reaching more than 30 million people worldwide. When he’s not telling seven-minute stories, he’s also the co-creator, co-producer, and co-host of Glassdoor’s The Lonely Office podcast, which has quickly become a Top 50 Career Podcast.
Aaron is a master at adapting. If the world tells him no, he turns it into a resounding yes, usually by telling a story. Who else can turn crushing student debt into a successful one-man show performed for three years across the country? He’s resourceful, resilient, and like me, a fellow believer in the power story.
Takeaways:
Resources:
Listen to 7 Minute Stories.
Subscribe to Aaron’s YouTube Channel.
Follow him on instagram @aaroncalafato.
Aaron
My name is Aaron Calafato. You can hear me telling seven minute extemporaneous autobiographical stories all over podcast land. And this is no time to be timid.
Tricia
Hey there, I'm Tricia Rose Burt. And in this podcast, we talk to artists who show us how to find the courage to take risks, step out of our comfort zones, and use our creativity to make our work and change our world. Pay close attention because this is no time to be timid.
Welcome to the last show of the season. Well, I say last show, but it's not really the last show because we're working on two bonus episodes, but it's the last official show and I'm so excited you're joining us.
And hey listen, if you've had a favorite episode this season or in one of the first, you know, season one, two or three, we'd love to know which one it was. I received an email last week from a listener in Spain, we're global, who told us what a difference the podcast has made in her life, which is so great to hear, and cited Nora Fiffer’s episode from season three as a real game changer for her. So which one's spoken to you? Please email us at podcast@triciaroseburt.com and let us know what's resonated. But before you log in, listen to this episode because it may end up being your favorite. My guest is Aaron Calafato, an award-winning storyteller, narrative designer, and content strategist for some of the world's fastest growing companies. His podcast, Seven Minute Stories, which he produces in his basement studio in Ohio, is autobiographical and extemporaneous – the man writes nothing down – and has achieved a cult following reaching more than 30 million people worldwide. When he's not telling seven-minute stories, he's also the co-creator, co-producer, and co-host of Glassdoor's The Lonely Office podcast, which has quickly become a top-50 career podcast.
Like anyone who ends up as a storyteller, Aaron's path is anything but linear. Shout out to the No Time to Be Timid Manifesto and the third principle, don't expect a linear path. And Aaron is a master at adapting. If the world tells him no, he turns it into a resounding yes, usually by telling a story. Who else can turn crushing student debt into a successful one-man show performed for three years across the country? He's resourceful, resilient, and like me, a fellow believer in the power of story. Some takeaways from our conversation: The impact of personal stories can transcend individual experiences. The more specific a story is, the more universal it can become. Believe in yourself and in your work. And creativity often requires sacrifice and always requires courage.
There are a few things that make me happier than talking to a fellow storyteller. I'm so glad you're joining us.
Tricia
Hey Aaron, welcome to the show.
Aaron
Thank you, Tricia. Thank you for having me.
Tricia
I've been a fan for a while, but I've really immersed myself in your stories in the past couple of days. And I got so tickled to hear about that you made a film in high school.
Aaron
Yeah, I was going to say you went deep into the archive there.
Tricia
I went deep. I went deep. So you made this film in high school. Did you know then that you were a storyteller? Was that your first foray into, I'm going to start doing this? And by the way, what was the film about?
Aaron
Well, let me start with what the film was about. The film was called Disclosure. And it was from the director's point of view, when I say this, we were 18 year old kids, okay? So from the director's point of view. It was an homage to sort of that Jerry Bruckheimer kind of like action vibe. And no, I had no idea I was a storyteller or what that was. I knew it inherently in terms of what we did is – friends and with my family and growing up in a hybrid sort of Italian American background with one part of my family on my mother's side, they've been in Indiana and they've been farmers and working in the middle of America for as long as they can remember. And on the other side, relatively new people to this country. And that's the Italian American, Sicilian American, folks from Naples and stuff. So I had this sort of interesting background of folks who've had roots here for a long time on one side. And then other folks who are trying to plant roots after coming from a place that's important to them that is home, but where they're seeking something better here. So no, I didn't know. And really, I actually thought I was gonna be a rock star. I had the, listen, my dreams were, I thought I was gonna be a guitar player. I was a guitar player. I was into music. I was…
Tricia
Did you play the guitar?
Aaron
I was playing solo.
Tricia
Yeah, you did play the guitar. Okay.
I was inspired by Rush and progressive rock bands. I had big dreams. So no, I didn't know. I just remember a buddy of mine said, hey, I'm making this film and you know, you're in high school. You want to impress people that you have crushes on and you want to express and you're trying to find out who you are. And so he was like, I want you to star in this movie. By the way, again, two 18 years old.This conversation is ridiculous. So I think the audacity of it, and I'm actually considering it. I'm like, all right, well, listen, I got to check to see with a band schedule, when are we going to be playing out at the local house party. No, but a buddy asked me to do it and I was in the movie. It was a really fun experience though.
Tricia
Two things real quick. So you had a band at the time in high school. So you were in a band and you were the lead guitarist in the band?
Aaron
Oh yeah.
Tricia
Okay. All right. So you have a thriving musical career in high school and then you get this opportunity to star in a film. So the setup is good here. All right. Then you – So you're starring in the film. How long is the film?
Aaron
Film’s about 35 minutes. It's not quite a short short. Yeah, it was a pretty big, you know, it was a big cut. And back then, Tricia, I say back then, this is like 2000. There was no, you know, the editing software was just coming into the 21st century. It was just so wildly difficult to make this film. And I watched…
Tricia
Yes!
You know, I came into this kind of tongue in cheek because we were kids, but we really did want to create stuff. That was when creation started bubbling for me. But yeah, you see people making film in such a complex way. I had an insight. One, I was just sort of a performer, but I would hang out with the filmmakers, these kids, and I would see them, the dedication and the time and the patience of uploading and downloading and cutting and editing. So it was the first time I got a, I saw how the sausage was made. And so it was kind of like, oh, okay, so all these actors and musicians that I love, they're there, they're doing their thing, but at least in the recorded form, visually or sonically, there's another actor at play. There's another conductor. And that was a beautiful insight. So yeah, that's how it at least started for me from a performance standpoint, but I had no idea I was gonna do this weird storytelling thing.
Tricia
So when did that happen? So like you and I both know, we're both storytellers, we both know there's not like, I went to college and majored in storytelling. Like what did you do when you went to college? Like what did you think you were gonna do when you went to school?
Aaron
When I went to college, I was going to be a music major. And the problem was that I failed my audition because I pretended to know that I read music. So I learned by ear playing the guitar. I memorized scales and I was able to play. I didn't have perfect pitch, but I was able to sort of almost in a jazz-like way improvise.
And so I wasn't a songwriter, but I was a lead guitarist. I could go in there and add that extra texture of solos and that sort of sonic experience. Problem was this was a jazz program and I had no idea what I'm doing. Like I was just like, you go to college. I guess I can major in music, but I didn't have the, it's funny looking back, I didn't understand how systems worked. And I just sort of had almost like an eighties, nineties movie viewpoint. You just show up and you have this amazing audition and there's someone who nods at you dramatically and things happen for you. So I went and auditioned and I got a rude awakening because the guy was like, hey, you don't know how to read music. And I was like, how did you find out? He's like, I can tell you memorized it. He tested me. He put a piece of music in front of me and I said, I can't play it. He goes, you can't be in the program. You're out.
Tricia
Oh wow.
Aaron
He goes, you're gonna play every sharp I tell you, every flat I tell you. Yeah.
Tricia
And so how did that make you feel? Were you like, was it a crushing blow or was it, wait a second, this is gonna be a redirection for me and how I move forward.
Aaron
No, I thought my life was over. I mean, creatively it was crushing. Yeah, because and again, a little over dramatic 18 year old, 19 year old, like I think my life is over. But it really was at that time without judging the past self. I, you know, I had worked my way up and practicing and practicing and playing and you kind of construct stories. We construct stories within ourselves of our own identity and our dreams. And so in this internal story, I was a musician. I was going to find a way down that road. And when that came to a halt, or at least that was a huge obstacle, I was like, holy shit, what do I do? I have no idea what I'm doing. So I was walking around campus as an undecided major because it was one of those programs where you got accepted into the school first and then you had to audition into the conservatory. So I was accepted at the school. This is Bowling Green State University in Northwest Ohio.
And so I'm walking around campus and I have no idea what I wanna do. And I'm literally spinning in my head. I realized something in that moment actually that I hated traveling. And I actually, wasn't just a justification for myself, it's because of the failure or at least because of this obstacle. I realized, wait a second, if I'm a musician, see how things come to me late, Tricia? I go, wait a second, if I'm a musician, that means I'm gonna be on a tour bus for most of the time I'm traveling.
And so then I was like, wait a second, this is the greatest gift that's ever been given to me. I don't have to tour all over the country.
Tricia
That's fabulous.
Aaron
I was like, well, that solves that problem. I feel good about that. But then it's like, okay, I can play guitar as a hobby, but what do I do next? And I literally that, I think just a couple of weeks from then I saw a poster for a play audition and it was just a two person play. And I remembered the student film I made in high school. And I was like, well, I have acted before. Maybe I give this career a second chance. So I audition. You know what, you want to know what I did though? You went for the audition and I'll get out of your way to, cause I know you got, your questions are great.
Tricia
No, listen, no, I'm loving hearing this. Go.
Aaron
Sorry, I'm going in storyteller mode. the audition, because I didn't have any acting training, my favorite actor was Al Pacino and still is. I'm actually listening to his recent memoir. And I grew up watching all his films. Again, same thing, my grandfather, Italian American, you gotta watch Pacino, you gotta watch De Niro, all the, you were, that was part of growing up. You sat down, I was like 10 watching The Godfather. He's like, you see this? This is what family's all about. And it's a bit of a trope, but it's also real too that sort of Italian American upbringing, you know, it's one of these things where you're immersed with kind of, hey, remember all the good things about our culture, all the things that are troublesome about the culture, all the elements of what Italian Americans have contributed to society. So that was a big sort of point of pride. So that's why I got into Pacino's work. And so for this audition, I didn't have any acting skills. I just did my, an Al Pacino impression. Like I did a monologue. It's the most, can you imagine casting this?
This guy walks in and they're like, you're reading for the part. I'm probably some like, you know, 20 year old sort of like, it was like a 20 year old trust fund kid and blah, blah, blah. And I go in and no idea, I start doing a Pacino impression. And I'm just like, what do I know? And I'm just like, who am I? It was ridiculous. And somehow though, the guy was like, Hey, this audition was really weird, but I really like your energy and I like your raw.
Something's happening here. And he cast me in the play.
Tricia
That's a hoot.
Aaron
So that was kind of the spark to the whole thing.
Tricia
What was the play?
Aaron
I can't even remember. I literally can't. It may have been something called The Author's Voice. I think it may have been The Author's Voice. It's someone who is, it's like a one person play or it's a person who has multiple personalities. But I got to interact with my different personalities.
Tricia
That sounds fun.
Aaron
Yeah, it was cool. And so that's how I got into the acting thing. But again, still not the storytelling.
Tricia
So how long did you do the acting thing?
Aaron
So I did it through undergrad and just did a lot of the, it's not Broadway, but it was just the little plays because I was never trained. So I didn't know how to act on stage. My first experience was on a film. So actually I learned in an opposite way than a lot of theater folks. So I learned about like on film, work with your eyes, work with your thought. It's what you don't say necessarily. And so I kind of learned backwards so that when I was in the theater program at Bowling Green State University, I'm mumbling on stage like Marlon Brando. Because I thought that's kind of, that's acting. They're like, we can't hear you. Please, we gotta hear you in the back. So then I learned from pain of not getting any auditions and not getting roles about learning how to project and learning how to articulate on stage and kind of have that wider range of realism, but at the same time, still being presentational. So I learned those skillsets, again, by accident and default. So I did that in undergrad. And then I went out to New York because, again, growing up 20 minutes south of Cleveland, all I heard was like, you either go to New York or Los Angeles. And I just read biographies about what my favorite actors did. So I just went out there because I heard there was a place called The Actor's Studio. And then you just show up and then you have this career.
So that's, again, always operating based on assumption and false narratives. That's how I ended up out there. And I started, I actually started training as an actor in New York. So that's when that started.
Tricia
And how long were you in New York training as an actor? I mean, how long did you stay in New York?
Aaron
It's about six years. Six years.
Tricia
Then it just like didn't blow your skirt up and you decided to go back to the Midwest?
Aaron
Yeah, so actually the training was amazing. I studied at a place called the Michael Howard Studio and had some wonderful teachers. Olympia Dukakis was one of them. Rest in peace. She's a wonderful teacher.
Tricia
My yes. Yes.
Aaron
So that experience there at that conservatory in New York shaped my artistic experience. We were talking pre-show about my Basquiat shirt. That's when I learned about Basquiat and Warhol and art. Again, I knew really nothing about that scene and it was just interesting to kind of learn. I learned about The Performance Garage and Spalding Gray. It was the first time I heard about Eric Bogosian and some of these kind of folks. I'm like, whoa, there's these people doing this thing.
So I was there and I got some bit roles and I did some television and some stand-in work. So I was working a little bit and doing some theater, but it was, we were so crushed by student debt. We had so much debt. It was also an education, Tricia, into just the socioeconomic reality of going from a mid-market city to a city like New York. And it's like, holy shit. That was a whole new reality. So I stayed as long as I could and had to make the decision to come back because one, I was about to get married at the time, but to be real with you, we tell stories, right? The real story was we just couldn't do it anymore. And so what I was trying to figure out was how do I tell this story about how I'm not a failure back to the people in Ohio? Because you leave and they send you off and it's like, what's he doing out there? And to come back at that time, signified to me, my ego and everything, that I didn't achieve. I wasn't Al Pacino. I was just a person with experiences and I had some great moments of success, but nothing sustainable. But there was one thing that happened to bring me back to the Midwest, to your question. One thing that happened was a seed that really sprouted what we're doing and what I'm doing right now. Next to my acting studio, there was a diner, little, greasy spoon diner. And the guy who owned the diner, I’d go in there every morning and get a bacon, egg, and cheese. That was my favorite – I love bacon, egg, and cheese. Bacon, egg, and cheese on a bagel or on a roll. And we got talking and he would have me talk for an hour every morning. He said, hey, if I pay you a hundred bucks, would you just talk to people, keep them laughing, keep them drinking coffee, because the line would get long at this place. There was one cook, one guy, and there's 60 sandwiches. There's people taking them to go. There's people sitting down. There's people and the coffee, you know, New York, it's wild. And so he's like, you just talk to them. He's like, tell them about Northeast Ohio. Tell them about the suburbs in Cleveland and Ohio. They think it's like a whole thing of corn. I'm like, no, we actually have an amazing, it's incredible city here. like, yeah, talk about your life and the weird things that you did. And he had me talk. And that was the first time anyone paid me money to tell a story.
Tricia
Okay, so this is what I, I just love how this works. We don't realize we are being shaped and groomed for the thing we're supposed to be doing. Right? I mean, and it just, the way the seeds were being planted for you, so it could come together as it did. So clear New York was a great experience for you, but not the place you were supposed to stay. I mean, I was in New York for three years. I've been in Boston for six years. They're places you go and then you get escorted out of them because you have learned what you need to learn while you're there. And then you just combine them all together. I think it is so fantastic that you were paid to talk to people in line. I mean, come on, that's where you start learning your improvisational skills, your storytelling skills, how to, mean, just how to respond to an audience. It's such fabulous experience.
But I also know that sense of leaving and thinking I have left home and I am supposed to be a big success now.
Aaron
That's right.
Tricia
I've never gone back to Tampa, but I'm always checking in. Wait, am I successful as we all thought I was going to be when I left home? Do you know?
Aaron
That’s real.
Tricia
So I appreciate your vulnerability in saying that. But now I know that you did a solo show around debt. And so again, it all coming together. Talk about that experience and what made you finally say, gonna get on stage and do this.
Aaron
So it's a perfect transition here. Clearly, know, you're here. This is great. You know what you're doing. It's like an it's like a story to people, the conversations, the architecture is beautiful. It's a beautiful thing. Come back to Cleveland, like you said, after New York and tried to figure out what am I what am I doing? How do I how do I do this thing? Because I didn't want to give up on this thing. By the way, the thing wasn't the money I got handed to your point. The thing was, and I think you and I've heard you talk with other guests on this show. This whole idea of no time to be timid, I think to me is also, you can't be timid with the thing that carbonates you. What is the calling of the thing? And it is a calling. You don't want it. And any creatives listening right now, you know this. You wish you didn't have it. It's a freaking affliction. You wake up in the middle of night, I got this thing.
And it's against all odds, man. It's against all odds because everything in logic tells you, you could with the creative thought process, so many folks in the field of creativity absolutely can have stable careers. They can absolutely do things, but they choose to take a path less taken because why? Because they're wild? Well, maybe a little bit, but it's because they feel they have something to give to add to the world. They wanna make it better than they found it. And regardless of the audience size, right? Regardless, whether it's a stage, whether it's a theater, or whether you're talking globally, they want to impact and change lives at scale. They want to do that. It's either the ocean or a drop in the ocean, but they want to do it. So that's what drove me. So when I got back to Ohio, that didn't go away. So it wasn't a question of just like, okay, I'm going to stop or I'm a failure, whatever. It was never that. It was just like, okay, how do I adapt?
How do I still do this thing? you know, like Sinatra says, do it my way? All the, you know, so it's like, how do I do it my way? And so as soon as I get back to Cleveland, I get a call from a friend of mine who was running a theater back in New York. And he goes, listen, we're doing The Seagull by Chekhov and we need someone to do the weekday shows. We're doing the weekends. And I know that you were doing these stories.
Aaron
Would you want to fill that space? And I was like, yeah. And the funny thing is, Tricia, at the time, I was formulating a story about the student debt I experienced out in New York and how oppressive that was, not just because it affected my dream, like, the world's smallest violin, but when I thought about it, I was like, well, for me, and I was in a relative position of privilege, even though I came from a working class background, how does debt as a phenomenon affect young people coming out of school?
Young employees or even just folks in the workforce who are trying to not only make a living, but give back to the economy? And then when you start seeing the numbers, I started talking with some smart people. It's like, there was a $1 trillion student debt crisis happening then. That was only second to credit card debt in the United States of America. And so what I realized was there's an individual story to your point, a nonpartisan story, a story about what it's like to try to navigate a new working world with debt that no generation has seen per person in the history of America. And I was just one of millions of people. So I started telling that story and part of it came from New York and part of it was where I came from and part of it was what loans meant and kind of deconstructing what it was like to go into banks and what their interests were. And I started kind of deconstructing that experience and just telling that story as a way just to open up awareness.
So I was formulating that just out of frustration. And when my buddy calls and says, out to New York, I premiered this monologue called For Profit, kind of tongue in cheek titled about what that actually means. And it was that story. And the wild thing is when I went out to New York, I started learning what I did out there. I realized I couldn't just show up. So two months beforehand, I'm emailing everybody in all these different places. I made up a manager and I just like – by the way, Shannon's real. I have a real PR person now, but back then I had to make them up.
Tricia
I love that.
Aaron
Shannon's real. I'll introduce you to her. But you know, by any means necessary, it's like, I got to get this out. And the funny thing is, you know, you've been in New York. You know, when you go to Times Square or back in the day, it might be different. They would have these paper listings of what shows you could see on Broadway. And for tourists, primarily, they kind of list, like, go see this. And they would do like one through 20, one through 10. Somehow, For Profit ended up on one of these lists.
Tricia
Oh wow.
Aaron
And we ended up like selling out like Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday. And then my buddy is like, what happened? Like he's doing Chekov on the weekends, but he was happy. But we brought in a lot of people. And when I did this monologue, I was able to shape it. It wasn't perfect, but there was someone there from the Chronicle of Higher Education who was a writer, which kind of goes out to all the universities around the country, and they wrote a piece about it. And when they wrote a piece about it, when I got back to Cleveland, so I was living in Cleveland, did the show in New York, came back to Cleveland, my inbox is full, probably about 50 emails saying, can you bring this monologue to our campus? The student organizations wanna bring you in because they're facing this thing. And that started about three years of touring around the country and doing the monologue that you asked about.
Tricia
So even though you don't like to travel, you are able to travel around the country with that show. It is amazing what we will do when we have a story that we want to tell. You know what I'm saying? It's amazing what we will put ourselves through.
Aaron
Absolutely
Tricia
If I get a chance to tell this story, I'm going to do it.
Tricia
We'll get back to the second half of our conversation in a moment, but right now, I want to tell you about our sponsor, Interabang Books, a Dallas-based independent bookstore which was named one of the country's top five bookstores by Publishers Weekly. They have a fabulous, curated online collection, and it's just as easy to shop with them as it is with Amazon. Who doesn't want to support an independent bookstore?
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Tricia
So I have this manifesto and you're just checking off so many of them. It's like constraints are opportunities, right? If you have a constraint, how do you make it work for you, right? Failure is your friend. Absolutely. Like, so this didn't work, so how am I going to pivot and turn that experience? And one of my favorite ones is creativity is not a frivolous pursuit because think of the lives that you were able to touch telling the story about crushing student debt and how many people were either validated or motivated or energized by that experience. And it's all because you were creative and said, I need to tell the story and people need to hear it. I mean, it's a really powerful tool, creativity. It is a powerful tool. And I'm so glad that you just sort of stepped into it.
Aaron
Well, you make a great point. And one thing I want to lay out too, on the heels of what you just said, again, in a nonpartisan way, for anyone listening, whatever the issue is that you're passionate about, right? Whether it's, you know, your neighborhood, your community, whatever, the one thing I learned, and I'm always learning by just falling down. Like I, now that I'm, I'm 42 now, so like now I'm starting to get perspective and going, oh, that's like, all these things you're talking about. I wish I had that. I wish I had that monologue happening where it's like, don't worry, this is good for you. I'm like, failure’s your friend. I'm just in it, just going, like I'm a muppet, right? I'm just like Kermit, as we all are. So that said, it's one of those things where I realized that issues, numbers, facts, data, need story. And you can ask any venture capitalist this, any small business owner this, any data scientist this, because all the research, all the great things that are happening in academia, they need people to listen and they need people to fund it. And how do you get that? You got to be able to…
Tricia
Tell a story.
Aaron
Tell a damn story. And so what I realized with the student debt issue was the reason why I was able to do a tour and I had people showing up, by the way,we weren't showing up to empty auditoriums. There was a couple of folks, friends to this day who started a petition that got over a million signatures and they formed a nonprofit called a studentdebtcrisis.org. And so they brought me on as sort of like a co-founder and we essentially used that list as an email list when I would go to these different schools. And hated traveling. I don't fly. I barely fly now because I hate flying, but I took rental cars, drove everywhere across the United States. So it's funny, right? I was like, oh, I don't want to be a guitar player because I don't want to be in a van all over the country. Here I go. Right? But I did this. And what I realized, what crystallized for this issue wasn't the number. Right? Because you hear it all the time. You could say something like, oh, we have this terrible debt atrocity. It's over one trillion dollars. And people go, they'll nod and they'll go, whoa. And it'll have a momentary impact.
But if you say something to the extent of like, hey, I went to school.And in order to do so, my grandmother had to take a private loan for me to do that. When I came home from break to visit her, she wasn't at her house. Where I did find her though, was at a nursing home. Not because she needed to be in the nursing home, it's because she came out of retirement to clean floors to pay off that debt she took from me. Now, if you position student debt like that, that compared to one trillion dollars in a graph, you know the thing that's gonna communicate the human thing. And that's what I realized was like issues, research, topics, whatever those kind of architectural aspect of all things society have to have great stories to communicate them. That was the lesson for me in that.
Aaron
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I'm working right now with, I mean, you know, like you, I teach storytelling to any, I've worked with nuns, I'm currently working with private equity folks. You know, they're raising some money for social impact they’re doing, it's this combination of mission and margin. And it's, they have to be able to tell a story with that data or no one's going to be moved. And that's what storytelling is about, is moving people to make a decision or action or something. Entertaining is great. We love to be entertained as well. But if we can move someone in some way to think differently or to take an action they wouldn't normally take, it's a real gift to be able to do that. But I want to know, when did you decide I'm going to take the storytelling thing and I'm going to step into the podcast world. Because I know your first one was in May of 2018. What made you start a podcast and what made you put it in the framework of seven minute stories?
Aaron
Yeah, great question. In short, the tour I was just talking about with For Profit, the monologue, lasted for about three years. I did over 200 performances in 20 states. And I remember at the end of that, or even towards the end, because I was just like, I can't do this anymore because of the physical toll on what that meant.
Tricia
That's a heavy lift.
Aaron
Even if it's like, okay, I'm making money doing what I love. What I realized was the inertia and the effort to reach all of those people to sustain that was so taxing. And if you want to know, I, in the tour, there was a guy that reached out to me. He's – at the time he wasn't with CNN, but he's a CNN contributor now – Van Jones. And he heard about the For Profit monologue and he ended up being a really nice guy. And we did a couple of events together in DC and where I would do the monologue and he would do the post show and he was great. He really cared about the issue. And so we've remained colleagues to this day. And so when I was touring after three years, I actually texted him. I was like, hey, I kind of don't know where to go next. I don't know what made me text him, but I just saw his career and I thought maybe he could give me some advice. Cause I felt like I'm doing this show, but like what next? Because it felt like it reached an end. And I had so many other stories to tell. I didn't want to be the student debt guy in Vegas when I’m 96. I don't want to be the student debt guy. So it wasn't that it's not important, but it was just a product of my storytelling. And I had all these stories. So he just said, to your point earlier, he's like, you got to adapt and pivot. Just, he goes, things have to shift. Just change. Just stop and start something new but use the thread of what you love to start that new thing. And so that's kind of what gave birth to the idea because podcasting was starting to emerge. It wasn't like I was on the forefront of it. People were already doing it. It wasn't where it's at now, but you know, there was a precedent already set and there was a couple of other factors to answer your question of why seven minutes and all that stuff. The first thing was my first effort in a podcast was kind of an interview podcast like this. The issue was though I did that because I didn't think anyone wanted to hear my stories. And I say that because I did about 50 episodes of an interview podcast. I did it in person. It wasn't traveling. I wasn't traveling. So that wasn't too difficult, but it was still a lot of inertia and effort to go to the place, set up the mics. It was costing tons of money. It wasn't scalable. But the lesson I learned from that was I don't, and it was my wife, she was like, well, you just love telling stories. Why are you doing this interview show to kick off this new phase? I said, well, I just want to do the interview show so that I can sneak in my story. And she's like, well, why don't you just tell the stories and not do the interview? And I was like, well, then I don't know. People want to hear from Van Jones or Tricia or Shannon Cason or some of these other. They don't want to hear from me. This was, you know, 10 years ago. She goes, I think they do. You just did this play. And I was like, I just had this thing where for some reason I felt that I had done the stage monologue, but I wasn't. I've never really said this. I wasn't really confident it would translate to the podcast space.
So she's my wife, Corey was the one who was like, just do what you love. You always say that. Do the thing. You're not really starting totally new, but I kind of was. And the other thing, Tricia, that like I made this feasible. My monologues, I don't write anything. So I haven't written a word in my, I mean, I've written a word, but I've never written anything for what I perform. A single word. So the value proposition I think of my stories are that they are purely extemporaneous. They are autobiographical and they're extemporaneous. So what I do, even the For Profit monologue, by the way, that was all just, and so every night I would have a format and I kind of knew beginning, middle and end, but it became muscle memory and mind memory. And I would just perform for an hour extemporaneous, no notes, anything.
So my style of storytelling always has been just like this, I'm telling you a story. Okay, this happens, this happens. So I've learned early in my life without knowing it was gonna be a career to be a story catcher. I'd catch stories. Oh, I saw this thing, what does it mean? I break them down in my head beginning, middle and end. And then I just can perform them. So what happened with this is I realized, wait a second, I got all these stories. And when I would watch the tape and listen to the audio of those full hour monologues, I noticed my natural habit was to always tell stories in a approximately seven minute cadence. Little vignettes.
Tricia
Oh how interesting.
Aaron
It was weird. I would do like a Monday quarterback. I’d go, OK, because I would listen to the tape to get better of the full hour monologues of For Profit. And it was like I’d do the time. It was like seven minutes and twenty three seconds, seven minutes fifty nine seconds, seven minutes four seconds, eight minutes and two seconds. And I was like seven, seven, seven, seven. So I realized that I had a natural cadence – didn't ever come up with it – of being able to tell a short impactful story in seven minutes. So I tested it. I stopped that initial interview podcast I did. I sunset that. I took my wife's advice. I put a timer on. I turned on the microphone and I told a story about a cruise. It was seven minutes. Then I was like, I have a show.
So that's what became 7 Minute Stories, where every week I just record, I press a timer. I have an idea and I tell the story and that was scalable. I didn't have to travel. I don't have to go anywhere. And I realized even in a big sea of lots of audience and me being like nobody in that sense, I was saw we were getting, we were like, we got like a few thousand downloads. I'm like, I wouldn't reach a thousand people in three months on the road.
And like, can reach a thousand. And by the way, here's me again, the realization of like, whoa, everybody knew this 20 years ahead of Aaron. And I'm just like, wait a second. So you're saying with a thing called the radio, you can reach people, but now you could do it on their smartphones. And I was like, I got this great idea. And my wife's like, sure you do. So anyways, but it's a complex answer, but that's why and how.
Tricia
Well, see, that's the thing. It's like one of the reasons why I have a podcast is because it was February of 2020. I'd been working on a memoir. It did not get picked up. The pandemic happened in March of 2020. I lost all my work. In August of 2020, my husband flew into the side of a mountain and almost died. And in October of 2020, I turned 60. And I'm like, okay, we have to just reset here. I mean, you know, we need to reset.
And I was like, I don't want to travel anymore because I have this man. He's perfectly fine now, but you know, but I almost lost him. I have this great studio in my backyard. Why am I traveling everywhere? You and so you sort of look at your life and go, what do I want it to be? How do I want to, what do want to do when I wake up every day? You know, and then how do I become a creative person in that? Like how do I make, join these worlds together? And, and for you, you just, your natural – the way it works for you. It's like a sprinter saying, I think what I need to do is run the marathon. I mean, that makes no sense. Like your gift is like, you can deliver this in seven minutes, you know that.
Aaron
That’s right. Just anecdotally, really quick from you, why do you think we do that? But why do you think we do that to ourselves as creatives? Why do you think that when we have a natural cadence to kind of move into a form that suits us, is that just human nature to make things harder? What's your take on that?
Tricia
I think sometimes we distrust things that are easy. A lot of time I would say in my head, if I was a real artist, I would be able to X, Y, and Z. And so when I was making visual work, I was like, if I was a real artist, I'd be able to draw from the figure. I'd be able to do really good figure drawing. And that just plagued me. I was at an artist residency and one of the artists that were there talking to different, those of us that were in this residency said, yeah, you're terrible at drawing from the figure. He said, but your use of line is amazing. And then when, and so I was like, there's another criteria. So I think we go into stuff with, there's a certain kind of criteria. I'm gonna speak for myself. There's a certain kind of criteria, which means I'm either a real artist or I'm successful or whatever. And it's not a real criteria. We get to do what we want as artists. And so you just soar in seven minutes.
That's your gift. Step into it. There's other areas where I soar. Don't try to be something I'm not. Be what I'm good at.
Aaron
It's such great advice.
Tricia
But I think sometimes we're just hard on ourselves. We need to be, if it comes easily, I can't trust it, or wait, I should look like something else as opposed to what I am. It's like, this is actually what I'm good at. So just run with that.
Aaron
It makes total sense and it brings me kind of some clarity on what I was telling you earlier. Thanks. I feel like I should send you a copay for this therapy session. But no, seriously, I was talking about Al Pacino and Marlon Brando. These are all people I admire, but they also, what I'm realizing, they signify a certain level of artistic integrity that I thought I needed to follow that arc. And that arc was their arc.
I didn't think that. And so in my mind, the idea of telling stories, why it came so easily is because I never sought it out. It was just, people were literally going, here's a hundred dollars. Can you tell? And I'm like, I, sorry, that's not real art. I have to be really affected and mumble. I'm gonna be mumbling. Like, I just got to look at birds and read cue cards and I got to own islands and be, no, it's a, you're right. It's not me. And what was funny was accepting the fact that there are some, listen, I'm a better storyteller than I was an actor. And the idea is don't deny it for me. And I thought, like you said, lean into it. And what I realized was it was something people responded to. And ultimately I love doing it. But if there's no one feeling different, changed, or for the better on the other side of it, then there's no reason for me to do it.
Because then I'm just punching at the breeze and I'm talking to scarecrows in a field. Then you're just some person who's just kind of talking. My aim has always been the audience. My aim has always been, you hear me? Are you with me right now? I'm speaking to some part of you. Maybe someone different. I don't know who you are. We have total different backgrounds, but I know there's something I'm feeling. Do you feel this too? And that's the synergy there. And so that's where it came in.
Aaron
So the seven minute story thing really freed me and I tested it and I developed my own style. I'm not pushing the envelope in my style. People have called my stuff folksy. It's humorous tongue in cheek, but I also, I did learn from great storytellers when I was in New York as well because when I started seeing my expression, my form shifting to doing that, I started watching guys like I mentioned, Spaulding Gray and Eric Bogosian and I would watch their story and I would go, I can be funny and serious. It's not standup comedy because that's a totally, that's, I'd never do it because the expectation is too hard. It's like, make me laugh. No way, no way. But if I can accidentally make you laugh, that's what wins because you come and go, and it's this weird story about a plane. But I then can shift in a second and I can take you and go, yeah, it's this weird plane, blah, blah, blah, blah, doing this thing, everything going crazy. I have all this neuroses. And then I thought about my dad.
Now you, I'm, I like that pivot. I like that moment to do that. So it freed me and I could be voluminous in my, in my output. I like moving fast, quick and putting lots of stuff out there. I don't like sitting and waiting. I'm not patient. And this allowed me a form that got me out of the whole film thing. Like I respected the film stuff being in that student film, but I was like, this is how long is, folks, can we just get the thing out?
What do we do? And I understand and appreciate that level of artistry. I just don't have it. So I loved not being inhibited by other hands. I like to just self.
Tricia
Yeah, oh no, yeah, yeah, absolutely, absolutely. And it's also like you pick your medium. It's like, I could never use oil paint. It takes too long to dry. I could do acrylics, glue, paper. You know, I just, I know I need to move fast. I need to move fast. I'm in the same way. And so you pick the medium that works for you. The reason why your stories are effective is because you are authentic. It's not because you're folksy or whatever, whatever.
I mean, that may be it, but for me, it's because you're authentic and you're vulnerable. And so that's why I'm connecting with you, because it's like, OK, I believe this guy also, he's being vulnerable. And that combination is incredibly powerful.
Aaron
I receive that.
Tricia
Good, thank you. I want you to talk about the dandelion salad experience and how it surprised you and how it didn't surprise you.
Aaron
Yeah, so as we were growing Seven Minute Stories weekly audio across the podcast landscape, I am very strategic. And so once I find something that I love to do, I'm all in and I don't, I try not to leave what I, I try not to leave too much to chance. Life is just chance in certain aspects. So I try to control what I can control. But then I've learned also surrender what I can't. But there are things you can. And one thing was just being unashamed of promoting it, of telling about it, getting people to listen to it. I'm okay with building things like a startup and bootstrapping things and getting support. So as I'm building that and we're telling those audio stories, you had mentioned you had a shift during COVID as so many of us did. It's like, what a wild time. For me, it was just more time because I had started my own consultancy because I was remote. I had an opportunity to get a bunch of clients, help them learn about storytelling and podcasting. And so I built that and I was able to work fully remotely at this point at home during COVID. So I was very lucky. I could work at full time at home. I could do the Seven Minute stories thing at night and I had my consultancy during the day, all in the same ecosystem. But then I started telling little short stories. I thought like, well, why don't I just experiment with YouTube shorts? And is there a way I can summarize or condense seven minutes into one minute or 60 seconds or whatever. And again, I didn't have this understanding of what like reels were or TikTok. I didn't, again, it's a form that already existed, but my thought was like, how would these do? And I started just telling short little stories, terribly filmed, terrible lighting. I was in a closet and just telling the stories, but they seemed to do well. And there was one that I told that really hit in a viral way about this dandelion salad. And so it was a short that I put out there and it got over like 17 million views. It was wild.
Tricia
When you did that, did you know it was going to have that kind like, you said, did you have a particular love of that story? Did you have a sense it would do well? I mean, like, what did you think?
Aaron
Yeah, you're right. Let me contextualize better. So this is now part of what I'm doing right now, which is it's sort of the I always keep saying how's the sausages made. There's the art that you see and then there's the stuff that goes into the art, as you know. And so for me, the shorts initially were actually an exercise for me to work out a story. So the Dandelion story was actually a story I was trying to formulate in my brain to do a seven minute story about but I just hadn't kind of fully formulated it. So I was like, well, I know the quick beginning, middle and end. Let me essentially workshop it as a short, see how the audience reacts, see if there's a, If I can test it. And so I just did that. And the story in its simplest form is, you know, it just starts with my grandfather and I in my thirties having lunch. This is a couple of years before his passing and I I had finally had some success with the podcast stuff and some of my work there. And I took them out to lunch and it was at a fancy restaurant and we ordered dandelion salad and it was like, there are dandelions all over it. And he's eating it and he tells me a story about how he grew up during the depression. And they had a little strip of lawn outside their inner city Cleveland home and his mother, my great grandma would send my grandfather and his sister out to that little strip of lawn and they would pick the dandelions and then my great-grandmother would wash them, clean them, saute them, and that's what they would have for lunch. And that's it. That's the story. And I think the button at the end was my grandfather saying what he really did, which was, thank you for taking me to lunch. Congratulations. I'm proud of you. But something about my mom's dandelion salad, it's just a little bit better.
Aaron
He wasn't insulting me, but it was this kind of homage to it. So all of that within one minute and I told the story and there was just a great reaction to it globally. What was cool was so many people filtered in the comments that were just talking about growing up, making do with what you had. There was people from the South talking about the greens and okra and different stuff that they had. There was people in Portugal and Italy who were like, that's just what we eat every day here. We still have dandelions. So it was a really cool thing that seemed to hit a nerve.
And what I learned from it to your question was like, one, it was validation and I had to be careful because it felt good from an ego standpoint, because I was like, yeah, this is great. But it, but it was validation in terms of that inhibition I had about like, or anybody can listen to my stories. I was like, no, this is because they're not mine. Ultimately, they come, everyone tells one and that it becomes part of the, the ether. So what I realized was like, no, I should be doing this. This is a real thing.
The audio on Seventh Minute Stories is great. These shorts are now another growth opportunity to share my storytelling with the world. And that became kind of part of my storytelling universe as well. So that's how that started. And that I was able to build a YouTube channel around it and stuff. So it was a really cool experience. And it just showed to me short stories connect with people and it kind of fit what I did naturally.
Tricia
And you had a universal theme. That's what was so key about that story is it wasn't about you. It was about this larger theme, you know, of one connecting with your grandfather, but this making do with what you have and the resilience of some people. I mean, it was just a universal thing that people could tap into. I mean, we know the more specific you become, the more universal it is.
Aaron
That's right.
Tricia
It has been so much fun to talk to you, Aaron. So let me ask you this question. What do you need courage for right now?
Aaron
This is a really good question. I think I need courage to continue to grow and tell stories in the way that I'm supposed to, not in the way that I think I should. I think I need courage to continue to grow this career wherever it goes in the way that I'm supposed to. If it leads me to a place that's more about deep experiences rather than scalable growth, and business and clicks and metrics. That's such a seductive thing because it's important to know that you're on track, to know that you're gaining an audience, to know that you're doing what you love. But man, I need courage to make sure that that's not my North Star. And it never has been. And so I need the courage every day to remind myself, stay true. Follow that lighthouse of what you know to be true, which is to your point. Just be authentic. Be vulnerable. Tell the story you want to tell, and that's the thing you got to follow. That's staying true. All the other stuff are just ways and tools to measure that story, but that's not the thing you're aiming at. And I have to tell myself that all the time because it's easy to say, like, yeah, you got to follow your love. It's really hard to follow what you love because the love requires sacrifice. It's really hard to follow the things that you're passionate about because it requires something of you that is sacrificial.
Oftentimes it means the thing you want, your ego, the desire for more attention. And so in the weird space of telling stories, you need attention, but I need courage to make sure I'm doing it the right way and to keep doing it the right way.
Tricia
That's a great answer. Thank you so much, Aaron. We're just so tickled you were on the show and best of luck with everything that you're doing. You're really providing a great service to the world. So thank you so much.
Aaron
Thank you so much for having me and please stay cool. I know you're like in the hottest weather ever. Thanks for even being here, having a conversation with me. I really appreciate it.
Tricia
I wouldn't have missed it. Thank you.
Tricia
What a way to end our season. I just loved having Aaron on the show. And of course, he left me thinking about some questions. First, how do you adapt? How do you still do that thing that you love to do? Second, how are you working within your constraints or within your cadence? And lastly, what are you willing to sacrifice to make sure you can tell your story the way you want to tell it whether it's visual art, or podcasting, or a new business?
Make sure you listen to and subscribe to Aaron's podcast, Seven Minute Stories, and subscribe to his YouTube channel, and follow him on Instagram. I'm especially excited that this fall, I'll be a guest on Aaron's Storytelling University. Make sure to tune in and we'll let you know when the episode is going to drop.
And if you have a story you're eager to tell, either to meet personal or business goals, and need help bringing it to life, I'd love to work with you. Please reach out to me at tricia@triciaroseburt.com.
Tricia
So that concludes season four. We want to thank our amazing guests who all exemplify the No Time to Be Timid Manifesto. Please follow their work and support what they do. And I especially want to thank my producer, Adam Arnone, who makes everything sound effortless and beautiful and on occasion talks me off the ledge. Also our executive producers, Amy Grant, Nancy Perot and Sage Wheeler, who helped to make this show possible.
And even though the season's ending, please tee us up for season five and review our podcast, subscribe to the show, and spread the word. We want as many people as possible to get the courage they need to do their creative work. As I said at the top of the show, we'll be dropping a few special episodes in the fall. So for those updates, you can follow me on Instagram and LinkedIn at Trisha Rose Burt. And if you'd like to be added to my mailing list, please go to my website, trisharoseburt.com.
Most importantly, remember that this is no time to be timid.
No Time to Be Timid is written and produced by me, Trisha Rose Burt. Our episodes are produced and scored by Adam Arnone of Echo Finch. And our executive producers are Amy Grant, Nancy Perot, and Sage Wheeler. I'd also like to thank contributors to my Fractured Atlas Fiscal Sponsorship, which helps make this podcast happen. No Time to Be Timid is a presentation of I Will Be Good Productions.