Passion Struck with John R. Miles
Lynn Smith on How to Stop Letting the Brain Bully Win | EP 692
20 Nov 2025
Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Coming up next on Passion Struck.
I called it the brain bully because it was so pervasive.
Chapter 2: What is the brain bully and how does it affect self-worth?
It's also known as the saboteur, the inner critic. It's that voice in your head that's saying to you, you're not good enough. Nobody's going to like this. Everybody hates you. This is not landing. It is the root cause of poor communication. So the whole foundation of what I do is expose the disease of your ums, sos, repeating yourself, rambling. It's the brain bully. It's not what you're saying.
It's not a power pose. It's not any quick hack. It is the voice in your head that's running the show and has the microphone. And it's coming out of your mouth in a not clear or concise way.
Welcome to Passion Struck. I'm your host, John Myles. This is the show where we explore the art of human flourishing and what it truly means to live like it matters.
Each week, I sit down with changemakers, creators, scientists, and everyday heroes to decode the human experience and uncover the tools that help us lead with meaning, heal what hurts, and pursue the fullest expression of who we're capable of becoming.
Whether you're designing your future, developing as a leader, or seeking deeper alignment in your life, this show is your invitation to grow with purpose and act with intention. Because the secret to a life of deep purpose, connection, and impact is choosing to live like you matter. Welcome back, friends, to Passion Struck. This is episode 692, and I am so glad you're here.
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Share this episode with someone who will find it valuable and leave a five-star rating or review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. It's the single best way to help new listeners discover these conversations. Throughout the month of November, we're on a journey together, a journey I'm calling the irreplaceables, not as some big concept, not as a slogan, but as a reminder.
A reminder that in a world moving faster every day, the things that make us truly human have never mattered more. Being irreplaceable isn't about achievements or titles. It's about the way you love your people. It's the courage to rewrite your story when the old one stops fitting. It's the quiet strength it takes to keep showing up when life shakes you a little harder than you were ready for.
Every episode this month, we're exploring a different piece of that humanity. Last week, I was joined by Elias Wise-Friedman, known throughout the social channels as The Doggist, who reminded us that connection can still break us open in the best way. Then on Thursday, Amina Altai helped us untangle ambition from self-worth.
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Chapter 3: Why did Lynn Smith leave her successful career in news?
It's not any quick hack. It is the voice in your head that's running the show and has the microphone and it's coming out of your mouth in a not clear or concise way. And so many times in my career, I had something similar to a Jamie. It's, You're wearing too much blush, not enough blush. After I had children, have you tried wearing a girdle? Because my belly stuck out.
And then when I tried to lose weight, don't get any smaller. It was a constant critique on my appearance. Very little feedback on my content, on my reporting, on my shows. almost I would say 99% was on my appearance. And so that inner critic was constantly eating away at me and I had to discover through a huge failure.
I bombed a keynote when I first left the business and I had to go through that lowest of the low moment to discover what I now teach, which is how to beat your brain bully. because it is it's the root cause of what held me back in my career. Even though you rattle off a lot of these great achievements, I was held back by my brain bully over and over and over again.
And now when I'm working with leaders of billion dollar companies, I am brought in to help them to have a more magnetic presence and to articulate themselves in a clear way so that investors or employees or viewers are moved by them, not being like, wait, what did he or she mean? And when I expose to them that it's that inner critic, they're like, oh, well, I'm not afraid.
And I'm like, no, no, no, because there's an ego piece here. You know, executives tend to not want to admit to fear. It's, yeah, but what's really going on in your mind when you watch this clip and you're stumbling and you're saying a lot? And he or she will say to me like, oh, well, I'm worried about not getting all the data in or saying the wrong thing and stock price goes down.
I was like, fear, fear. Or what if somebody doesn't like this? Fear. So I constantly sort of bring it back to, listen, that voice is running the show. Let me show you how to overcome it because it's really important that we don't silence it. We're biologically wired to have this inner critic. It is, you know, in prehistoric days was meant to protect us, but we're living in 2025. We've got Wi-Fi.
You know, we're not living in a pile of leaves anymore. We are going out, whether it's a stage or a media appearance or a wedding toast, and we're still operating from our prehistoric code. So if we can overcome that brain bully, the results are incredible.
We have a lot of before and afters simply to show people that within a short amount of time, once you beat that brain bully, you can show up in this magnetic way where people are just drawn to you and people have to hear more of what you have to say.
I hope you're enjoying my conversation with Lynn Smith. Want to watch this episode? You'll find the full interview shorts and exclusive content on our YouTube channels. Want to wear your purpose? Visit startmattering.com to explore intention-driven apparel designed to remind you, you matter, live like it. Now, a quick break from our sponsors. Thank you for supporting those who support the show.
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Chapter 4: How can we silence the inner critic that distorts our confidence?
He has done all these heroic things, and yet sometimes when I see him being interviewed on TV, He himself has these moments where he stumbles, he repeats. He doesn't deliver with the punch that you do who are experienced at this.
So I just want to make it real for people, even people who have done truly amazing things who we would think wouldn't fear anything, still fear being in front of the camera, having to talk in front of people. So it's something that I think impacts tons of people.
For me, one of the ways I tried to get around it was to do improv because I felt if you put yourself out there in situations like that, it's going to make it easier. But what I found even after doing that is being on TV, in those quick clips that you have to give because you have to get, yeah, whatever you're going to say in like 20 to 30 seconds and have it be very clear.
It's still really difficult to do and it's high pressure. So, so.
Especially live TV. And your brain belly is rampant. Like, wait, did that make sense? Oh, I just stumbled. Oh my gosh, this is going terribly.
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Chapter 5: What lessons does Lynn's children's book teach about resilience?
And then it starts to sort of meander and you're wandering. And this is why people bring me in and we'll watch that clip. And I'll say, what's going through your mind right there? And they say to me, Well, I stumbled and I figured that I just ruined it.
And what I find most fascinating is that I also put people on television and sometimes I'll get a phone call the second they get off the air and they call me and they're like, oh, that was terrible. And I was like, what are you talking about? I was watching. It was great. And so then we watched it together and they're like, oh, that wasn't as bad as I thought it was.
And I'm like, because the brain bully was there feeding you a little bit here and there. And they're like, oh, okay, yeah. And they start to get it. And that talking in sound bites that you're referring to, that's a specific skill set. This is not something that we're educated on in school. We're taught very tactical things.
We're taught how to execute in business, how to do spreadsheets, all of the things. We're not taught, here's how you can effectively communicate your vision. Here's how you should prepare for communication events. Here's how you can drill down your messaging so that people understand it and they're moved by it.
And a lot of people still think this is a soft skill, but you just pointed out that impression that you had of the person that you were talking about being on television, that stays with you. Unfortunately, we don't forget that first impression of somebody.
And when I started to dig into the research of this and wanted to have some sort of statistic behind it to prove this, because I talk a lot about how You have three seconds to get someone to like you and 30 seconds to get someone to trust you. So within those first 30 seconds, let's say something really powerful. So they're like, I need to know more of what this person is about.
When I dug into the research of it, there's Princeton research that found one tenth of a second is how quickly our minds make a decision about somebody. So think about that. When you walk into a dinner party or when you got on a Zoom call or when somebody clicked on this podcast and started watching me, within one-tenth of a second, they decided whatever they're going to decide about me.
So what do I do when I show up in a podcast? The second that red light goes on, I'm thinking about my presence. because I haven't even said anything yet and somebody's already decided about me. I mean, think about that, John. It boggled my mind. I was not expecting to uncover that. And this is research from 2006.
We've been trying to experiment on TikTok on what holds people's engagement. And we've been doing a series of eight second long videos where we'll put a quote or something else. And eight seconds isn't even long enough to read the quote that's on the screen. And we're finding that in many cases, people are dropping off in a second and a half.
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Chapter 6: How does perfectionism impact our communication and connections?
to me that you were talking about. And as he was going up the mountain, there were so many times that he wanted to quit and he just kept telling himself, you got to keep going. This is bigger than you. You're serving all these people who have disabilities around the world, trying to show them that anything is possible if you put your mind to it. So I love the message, Lynn.
Thank you, John.
For the people who can't see what's behind your shoulder, Just Keep Going has a beautiful illustration of a mouse in between the words. What does that mouse character represent to you personally?
So the three words, just keep going, came from a text message that I got from a very close friend of mine when I was going through an incredibly hard time in my life in my early 30s. And she just texted me, just keep going. And it wasn't, you're going to be OK. It wasn't, you're fine. None of those things help. That really helped.
And we wanted it to be a mouse because it's like that little mighty mouse. It's like the little one that could. And it represents there's a mouse in all of us. There are times in our lives where we just need that reminder from a friend. And then in the book, those friends are in the form of a deer and a bird and an owl and a butterfly.
And they encounter mouse along his journey to where he's trying to go. And they are the reminder to just keep going because Mouse is scared. Mouse has big feelings. Mouse is afraid he's going to fail. He's frustrated. And each time he has that friend that reminds him, have you tried this? Take a deep breath in and a deep breath out and just keep going.
And Mouse finally gets to his destination and realizes, oh, all of these things got me here. And when I wrote this book, the first person I read it to, of course, was my six and nine-year-old. And my six-year-old, after he started school, came home and he said, mom, can we bring your book to class? And I was like, why? And he said, well, George just started school and I think he's scared.
He's new to this school and I think he's scared and he needs your book. And I thought, you're being an owl. You're being a deer. So if we're not in a time where we're a mouse and we need the reminder, then be the owl and be the reminder for that person in your life that's going through something really hard. and remind them to just keep going.
So this book is as much for the parent or the leader that's reading it to the child, whether it's their child or a niece, nephew, whomever it may be. It's as much of a reminder for that person reading the book that sometimes you just need to put one foot in front of the other and that your fear is not something that's gonna disappear.
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Chapter 7: What is the significance of emotional presence in effective communication?
But I had to read yours, John.
Yeah.
When does it come out?
It comes out February 24th.
Oh, I can't wait.
And mine features a bunny. But what is the main character? But what I found was that often, because she's illustrated so many books, she was guiding me about why we didn't want to do things that in my head I thought we would want to do because I was trying to make it too complex. Anyway, I think...
Oftentimes, when you bring a kid's book out like this, you're trying to influence the parents or teachers as much as you are the children who are reading the book. Because I think you can subliminally teach the parents resilience and self-worth, or at least cue them in that these are important topics that outside of the book, you need to keep reinforcing with your children.
Was that something in the back of your mind you were hoping to do?
Of course, because my job is to help leaders become more confident. And if they're more confident, they communicate better, right? Well, what is confidence? Because it's such an overused term, in my opinion. Well, confidence is the true belief that you can do anything despite any circumstances. Arrogance is just thinking that you're good at everything.
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