What stories can you tell about the adventures of your life?

How do you use stories to connect with others in your life?

I am so honored to welcome Miri Rodriguez to the podcast. Miri is a globally recognized Storyteller for Microsoft, bestselling author of Brand Storytelling and owner of Be Mindful Be Happy. She's a leading Latina woman in in the tech industry, and making waves across the world as a sought after speaker.

Miri and I talk about the importance of storytelling and how this plays a role in our travels, our personal values & life missions, and our connection to brands around the world.

In today's episode, we discuss:

• Road tripping through Latin America with her family
• Understanding that stories are the tool to connect hearts
• Moving from Venezuela to America
• Finding the story in your travels
• Launching Be Mindful Be Happy in the US
• Miri's experience on RNR's Greece Retreat 2023

Connect with Miri:

• Website - Miri Rod
• Website - Be Mindful Be Happy
• Instagram - @mirirod
• Instagram - @bemindfulbehappy

Resources:

• Brand Storytelling: Put Customers At The Heart of your Brand Story

Connect with Kelly:

• Instagram @kelly.tolliday.yoga
• Instagram @risingnatureretreats
• Website

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Thanks for tuning in!

Travel with Kelly on an upcoming RNR Retreat!

SPONSORED BY CHILD & COMPANY

Mentioned in this episode:

Rising Nature Retreats

Child & Company

Miri Rod Interview - Kelly & Miri

Kelly: All right, here we go. Welcome, Miri

Miri: Thank

you. Welcome

Kelly: to the podcast, the Transform with Travel podcast. Thank you so much for joining this morning. We're so just grateful that you're sharing your time sharing your story. So those listening, Miri and I have known each other for about a year and a half now.

So much has blossomed and, and just really has come out of this beautiful relationship that between me, Chloe and you Miri came as a guest workshop expert teacher for us and for our Greece retreat. And it was such a beautiful culmination of the end of the retreat. I think so many of our guests got so much out of it.

So for those listening who don't know Miri Rodriguez Miri is a global recognized storyteller, bestselling author of brand storytelling, and owner of Be Mindful, Be Happy. Miri brings 15 plus years of experience. expertise, valuable industry and consulting insights matched with a lighthearted and authentic delivery and approach.

S. and mentoring men and women to build their personal brand with empathy, passion and purpose. She currently works at Microsoft as senior storyteller for health and public sector industries, and we are so grateful to have you here to be sharing this space.

Miri: Thank you, Kelly. I am so honored. Thank you for having me.

This is, this is amazing. I am, I love your podcast and I love what you're doing here. So thank you. The honor's mine.

Kelly: much. And I would love to just open up. Really open up the podcast is sharing a little bit more about your background. I know we're going to dive deep into the relaunch of your book, the second edition of your book brand storytelling and really go into, you know, what that means for traveling and sharing stories and the root of, of the root of the emotion of stories and what that means.

Miri: story, What's your story?

Kelly: What's your brand story?

Miri: Yeah, yes, so I was born and raised in Venezuela So I correct as Venezuela and my parents are mission it were missionaries So we family of five we traveled all around Latin America actually by car

Picking up stories from people, you know, my parents were preachers and so they were storytellers in their own space and I watched them all the time and I was fascinated by understanding how stories are the tool to really connect hearts When we sit down and we share what we're doing right now, I witnessed that power and I was fascinated by it I actually didn't know I was going to be doing this professionally once.

Kelly: You changed gears a

Miri: Real quick. Well, I actually went through when I came to the States, I did go four years into the Air Force ROTC and ended up being the first female commander of my school. I earned two scholarships.

Kelly: and full rights to actually go do this. Oh my god, I had no idea! No, no, no. You don't know that.

Miri: So I did three internships and I knew all the instruments. I could fly a plane by, you know, theoretically by the time I was a senior, but you know, life, life changes.

Kelly: happens.

Miri: I actually heard a crazy statistics, like only like 5 percent of people, don't quote me on that, but some real small amount of people actually get to do in life what they signed up to do in college kind of thing, you know.

So I, I switched gears and I went into comms, communications. Back then, you know, there was not a lot that you could do with that other than your regular kind of, you know old PR journalism and marketing. And I didn't know that's what I want to do. I was just like, Hey, let me just figure this out as I go.

So I've been in tech for over 15 years. I won't date myself, but it's a long time. And I've been, you know, navigating the space of comms. And of course, social media was born, digital media was born. And all these great tools that we have today that we're enjoying right now as we listen to this podcast.

Nobody, you know, you didn't go to school.

Kelly: to podcast. You didn't go to school to do social media or

Do storytelling.

Miri: I ended up in a job that it's actually, it's called a storyteller. I am a storyteller. I, it's a content strategy role for a health and public services industry, so I basically work with agency and government to tell their stories of how Microsoft's technology is enabling services to our citizens, and it's fascinating.

Kelly: Yeah. Absolutely. I, I. Thank you. I definitely want to touch on that, the storytelling relationship between each other and the empathy because I think that's just like the ground zero of relationships while you're traveling. But I want to back up a little bit and just discuss what it was like to travel with your parents and in such a unique way.

You're traveling all around Latin America and then you eventually immigrate over from Venezuela to the U. S. I'd love to hear that as a young child what that was like for you. you,

Miri: what that was like for you. You know, it's interesting and I was telling you backstage that I've been I've been working deeper on my relationship with two sisters. I'm the middle child and I absolutely live my middle child syndrome life.

Kelly: Yeah.

Miri: All of it.

And so we used a lot of imagination hours on end on the road. And we were very, Without meaning to, we were very in tune with the environment and so that really forced a, a great space of Intuition and, and mindfulness, we didn't mean it that way, but we had to be because there was, you know, it was, we woke up and it was a new town or a new place we had to eat whatever they were giving us.

So there was this really great, rich space of the entirety of the human experience, the need, human life. And in all of it at the center is the human, the human people, right? It's us. And so we, we were very lucky to. I experienced that really early in life and that when, you know,

the missions eventually invited my parents to come to the States.

So we came in the, I think it was 92 prior to 9 11 that we actually came in as legal immigrants. We still didn't speak English. We had no friends. We had no money. And so we did live a hard immigrant life when we first came in, but with that centered approach of human kindness and human life experience.

Kelly: Your whole mission of telling stories with empathy, passion, and purpose, I mean, it seems like there's the origin story of it right there.

You've been able to tell the stories of many different people's lives since you were a young child and take it in and observe, which I think would make you a very good traveler, just coming from your own experience. Where has this, I know you travel a lot for work and we'll get into that a little bit later, but is that where the origin of your passion for traveling started, is just being on the road with your family?

Yeah.

Miri: yes. My mom had gotten us a permission at school, some permit that we would just do a four day school.

thing and so we would just go Monday through Thursday. So every, every Wednesday night we were already on the road to be somewhere already by the morning of Thursday, coming back on Sunday. Sometimes even just the whole week if, you know, if we were traveling far because it was car. And so many hours on the road.

And yeah, I do travel for business, but I make, I make this space every single time to connect at the human level, and it's so enriching.

Kelly: When you moved from Caracas to the U. S., where in the U. S. did you move to?

Miri: Miami. Okay. We were actually Hialeah the first year, and then eventually a year later we came to Fort Lauderdale. It was a big move in our minds because in Miami at least we had a Latin community Exactly.

Back then, I'm talking, you know, 30 years ago Fort Lauderdale, which is where we reside now, was, there was not a lot, a lot of Hispanics here at all. I mean,

Kelly: you, the, the,

You know, Miami is not what America looks like. I'm like, this is real America. So, we were. We felt very isolated for a while, and it was a new lifestyle because we weren't traveling as much for a little while. I would say for my teenage years, so I got here when I was 12, so all the way through 20, it was kind of like living the American dream life, and I, I wasn't sure I liked it, actually.

Kelly: Yeah, I was going to ask that.

So in terms of obviously cultural differences, Miami, Miami to Caracas might be a little similar just based on having that Latin community there. But when you then when you move to Fort Lauderdale, what were the like stark contrast for

Miri: Loneliness, you know, we didn't have culture, we didn't have community, and one of the things that you find, especially in Latin America, is you grow up with a community.

And so that was lost immediately. And we, we felt that sense of, and there was no community. There were no friends. We didn't speak the language. So it was just us. And it was, it was hard. It was hard. I also, oddly enough, I don't know why I'm saying this, but I didn't understand the just the history of racism here in America.

In Venezuela. We're all Venezuelan, and we have blacks, and we have everybody, and we're all just Venezuelan. So, I was very shocked to find that stark contra contrast when I started to go to school, and, you know, I was also a victim of that, and I was just like, wow, this is, this is new. I, I, we weren't prepared.

We were not equipped to deal with something like that.

Kelly: It's all on you as an immediate family as opposed to having such an extended family around

Miri: Yeah, my dad has nine sisters.

Kelly: Wow.

Miri: and they all have kids, so we have, I have like, I don't know, 30 something cousins, and we were close.

So that, you know, when that went away, it was, it was hard for all of us as a family. I, yeah, I can,

Kelly: I can't imagine having, being uprooted like that at such a fragile age of 12, such a fragile age

Miri: this, don't try this at home.

Kelly: thrown into, you know, the U. S. school system and all the other things. In your book, Brand Storytelling, you talk about your mom being such an epic storyteller. She was just a master of storytelling and how I'm sure on your long road trips that that was something that was woven in to, you know, your life and, and woven into who you are as a person.

And, and in your book, you, you're Specifically talking to brands and how they can build their own brand storytelling and what you say in the book is,

Miri: to

Kelly: really drive home the point of why storytelling is so important, you mentioned that research confirms stories can be up to 22 times more memorable than other types of information.

And if you can think of your audience as not just, you know, your, your target audience for your brand, if you're a marketer or communicator, which is something we will get into in a little bit, but also like. Your mom trying to keep the kids enticed and keep the kids following a certain moral compass through story.

And I really loved you talking about that because I think, you know, it's important for people to remember just how important these stories thread within our life. And this is why this whole podcast, why so many other podcasts are created is to just be able to tell stories. And especially in the, in the realm of traveling.

I also worked in marketing for ten years prior, so you're speaking a lot of my own language. But I love that you talk about, and we can talk a little bit about this, but that brands need to be meaningful now. And I think especially as travelers, a lot of us are conscious of our eco impacts that we, especially as we're traveling on, you know, flights now and just the general ecological impact that we have.

And you talk about brands needing to be meaningful specifically because of generations like the Millennials, Gen Z, Alpha, I think there's another one in there. Yeah.

Miri: T is the next one, yeah.

Kelly: there's so many.

Can you talk a little bit about that, about, you know, even if it's like a small scale brand owner listening right now or, or if you're a consumer who is trying to be more conscious of the brands that you work with, like what does that mean for brands to be more meaningful?

I, you know, I take a lot of workations and so I mix both and, you know, Sometimes we miss the opportunity to find stories, but if we intend it, if we get on that plane or get on that bus and get in the car, and we're like, today I'm going to go find a story, that is the meaning of the day and I have done this, I mean, I've been doing To over 40 countries already.

I plan on doing more and every time the stories I find they're not bombastic You know, they're not like I was you know, I was in first class and what it wasn't that it was it was I entered a mosque and I was able to pray When I wasn't I didn't know I was supposed to pray because women are not supposed to enter a mosque that really happened in Morocco

Kelly: Oh my gosh.

It's the exchange of culture, it's the exchange of moments. I remember I was in Israel, for example, and we were in Jerusalem and there's a, there's an Arab quarters. So they have the, the, the, the city itself, it's a one square mile. And so they have different quarters.

And so we went to the Arab quarter and there was a market.

And I didn't have a head cover. I lost it. I think I lost mine. So, I was like, I gotta go buy a head cover. So I went into this little shop, mom and pop shop, and in a little hole in the wall, and they had these beautiful head covers, and I picked one, could not speak the language. I had a, I had a, I had a tour guide, but he was, he was Jewish.

He spoke Hebrew. He didn't speak Arab. And so he couldn't translate for me. So I went in by myself, and the woman came out, and I picked mine, and I was trying to put it on, and she saw me struggling. She was like, she just literally does not know how to do this. So, and she came up to me, and just with her hands, You know, just grab me, grab my hands and taught me, right?

I talk about moments where if a brand talks about being inclusive.

How are you meaning to be inclusive? What moments are you finding in your day to day? Whether you're a small brand and there's an exchange of an email and you, you were inclusive in that in some sort or you were not and now you have a learning lesson, yeah? So there's so many different day to day moments that the universe kind of sprinkles towards us with the opportunity that we go, okay, can I Can I have a human exchange experience here that will align to the core values of myself, of my brand?

Miri: Mm hmm

Kelly: you're making me think of all these moments in India where I was like, man, I wish I just like wrote down all of these and the details and the smells.

And I love that. And also when you're talking about, yeah. Like you said, let's say your brand mission is to be inclusive and not just your own brand as a business, but what about your own personal brand? What are your personal core values and how can I make sure that I'm living up to those in a day to day?

What are some, what are some travel brands that are really doing this well, really showing and living and aligning to their brand story?

Miri: Yeah, you know, I lived in Seattle for three years, but I always went out to Seattle because I work from, I've been at Microsoft for 11 years now.

So, you know, you get to travel to the headquarters a lot in Alaska Airlines. I love, I love Alaska as a, as a name. This is not an ad. They didn't pay me to say this. I really do love the brand. And, and I love it because they do intend to give you not just a experience that you deserve because you paid for it, but they do always try to go a little bit further, right, whatever that means.

I think I was going to Texas and you know, the sunrise was happening. It was a not yet. It had not, you know, The sun had not just yet came up, but at some point I was on, I always get the window. And so the, the AP comes on, the the pilot gets on and he's like, Hey, everyone, I'm sorry to wake you up if you're sleeping.

But if you, if you're on the left side of the plane, you might want to put your window up, you know, to see Mount Rainier. And of course we, Mount Rainier is just such an incredible sight to see. See a lot of times we know it's there, but it's hidden by all the rain , so we don't get to see it. We get to see it a lot in the summer, which is beautiful.

And so, but to see it from a, you know, from a, an airplane perspective, right, from that kind of sky view, I had never seen that. And so when I opened the window and I saw this incredible, I mean, it's just one of the most beautiful sites I have ever seen. I, I would've actually paid. More to just take that route and see that like that should be an eco tour kind of thing.

You know, he didn't take it all on his own and be like, wow, look at this and I want, he shared it. And so now it was a shared experience. And I was like, wow, incredible. Everybody's obviously took pictures. When I landed, I clearly posted all about it. And with a proud, you know, hashtag that they use, I fly Alaska.

Because They they lived to the experience. It was something they didn't have to do, but they did. And that was they found the story, right? And now the story was shared. And so now I have that story. And that's mine. And so I beyond finding the stories, what stories can you share with your customers that that leave that, you know, that connected experience that they won't forget.

22 times more memorable, any

Kelly: memorable,

Kelly: The idea that the pilot, like you said, the pilot went out of his way. And this is something that you're continuing to share over and over again. And you're going to remember every single detail of that flight, or at least those first 30 minutes or whatever it was more than all the thousands of flights that you've taken over your life.

That makes me think of, we were traveling through Greece with my family and, you know, traveling in the U S with a family is. Not easy anymore. They don't allow families to board for first. There's no priority seating. You know, it's it's really difficult as a family In the US and we got to Greece and Aegean Air and I should look up what their mission is now that I'm thinking about it But Aegean Air is all about like ease of traveling through Greece that they're they're your one stop shop and we get there and there's a family Check in line

Miri: Oh, that is so nice.

Kelly: a family security line specific for

Miri: I love that.

You talk a lot in the book about universal truths and when you're aligning your story, your values, whatever that is as a brander, as a consumer, as a traveler that

Miri: We want to align to how we want to make others people feel and this makes me think how do I want me Personally to make other people feel

Kelly: And I love this idea of what a universal truth is, and I'll, I'll let you share from your perspective as well. But in the book, you say that,

It's

a process called finding the universal truth. It's a truth we can all connect with regardless of background, age, gender, religious, or political affiliation. In other words, a universal truth is an inclusive feeling that makes a story individually relatable to every person in your audience.

Miri: I agree.

Kelly: I remember we were sitting our first night in India. We were in New Delhi and we're at an Airbnb like a apartment complex and this woman in her 50s from New Jersey comes out and A man probably in his 30 or 40s from Transylvania comes out and they go we're gonna go to an Italian restaurant in New Delhi Do you want to come with us?

Miri: Oh my

gosh. Okay, Let's

Kelly: we're sitting around the table me and Sam in our 20s from Australia and from Florida this woman in her 50s Probably actually probably closer to 60s from New Jersey And this man, from his 30s or 40s from Transylvania, having a conversation at a four top table at an Italian restaurant in New Delhi.

And had the most incredible conversation, and it makes you realize it doesn't matter where you come from, it doesn't matter what your background is, what you believe in, if you believe in God, if you believe in Allah, if you don't believe in anything, there's these universal truths that are keeping us all connected.

Miri: am. I'm saying that and I am, I, I hope and I'm encouraging brands to think about this and the way that I will tell every brand, including a personal brand, right? Look at your mission and read your mission statement.

I hope you have one. So start there. If you don't, create one. But look at your mission statement. Is there a feeling word there? I'll give the example of Microsoft when, you know, when Microsoft started. Our mission, our, you know, our mandate was to put a PC on every desk and every home. And, yeah, I mean, it changed the world and, and it was, it did what it was supposed to do.

But you know, seven, seven ish years ago when Satya Nadella came on as CEO he looked at that statement. He looked at that mandate and he's like, you know, We have an opportunity here to do something bigger, to be something bigger. And he set out to rewrite our mission, and it became to empower every person and organization on the planet to achieve more.

How does that translate to your brand? What is the word that makes people feel something, that people align that connection, and that's really branding, is the association of that feeling, you know, Disney, to be happy. So the different, different Brands really aligning to the feeling not just necessarily an entire mandate that you may not even remember and so even traveling you're you know There are I Airbnb you asked about brands and I gave you an example of Alaska Airbnb I mean, a travel company during, you know, I, I, I study brands throughout, you know, to, to inform myself and have insights.

And, and now this turned into a multi million dollar community that they have been able to monetize three years later. They didn't intend it. What they intended was to live up to the brand and of course it, you know, they were able to monetize it. So there's always, I say the universe rewards that because it, the intention is a good one to, to really create that universal truth that we cannot connect

Kelly: Yeah, and I think it's important to remember that brands and products and services exist to make money, right?

And I think that's exactly what I'm finding, at least as a consumer and also as a brand that we're moving away from this like one to one, I have a product and then it makes profit. I have a product and it makes profit and it's really moving into this people first product second profit, you know, and it's like Making sure that the people are at the forefront. We talked about these universal truths and how all these people from different backgrounds and different religions and different areas of the world have come together and find these universal truths, which I think we find on retreats really well. And Miri was a guest and a workshop leader on our Greece retreat.

I'd love to hear your experience of being in Greece, traveling on your own, coming to the retreat.

Miri: leading the workshop. Yeah, I was scared. And I'm coming back. Yeah, you know, it was interesting because I, on the professional side, I do a lot of workshops, and my main audience is tech. And so it's interesting because I get to, you know, I've learned my audience, I love my audience, and and I...

And so I just, I really took a long time to how to approach this in a way that felt connected and felt true to the audience. And I think that's the empathy that I talk about. We can, you know, trends exist for a reason. They're trends that are gonna pass. But the empathy that we have to have is always how to apply our methodologies and our content and our strategies to specific audiences.

And so I knew that even though the method had worked before, I had to tailor it. And I spent a lot of time, I'm not gonna lie,

So I took time to really understand how I could best do this. And I, for me, it was a pleasure to work through storytelling and using storytelling methods in a way that was raw and I, that had applied to myself in my own space. And so I had done a couple of self mastery workshops. Job works that I had been working for me and for my, my friends.

And, you know, we took storytelling prompts to enable that conversation. These were things as you know of actually creating moments of thinking back to when, you know, there's a child on the table or there, or, or there's an anani inanimate object that you're gonna talk to. These were prompts that, prompts that I had used in different ways to create a moment where people could just pause and tell themselves.

because we have to open up and really dig deep. And, and we can't lie to ourselves, right? We can lie to people, we can't lie to ourselves. And so in the telling of stories It's good to really open up a space for non fiction where we can create and talk to ourselves, put that mirror and really be in that healing where it needs to happen.

And so I think it was, I think it was a good, thank you for the opportunity for me to really work on that. And I'm elevating that even more. I, I told you backstage, I think that it was the catalyst for me to actually create this new methodology that I'm working on. I'm calling relationship mapping. It starts with the relationship with yourself, right?

And, and I've done this because I do personal branding. So I always talk about learn yourself, like yourself, love yourself. Conceptually sounds great, but really activating that, it's, it's a lot of work. Yeah. Yeah.

Kelly: I, I, and I can attest to the power of the workshop, the simplicity of the workshop, which is really where the power lies.

How it can be so universally applied from big global corporate brands all the way down to your own personal. mission, your own personal story. And it was for everyone listening, it was on the last day of our Greece retreat and it was just a beautiful culmination for everyone to tie in everything that they've observed about Greek culture, everything they've observed about themselves, all the different experiences that they were bringing into this retreat, and the way that they were able to kind of either let go of some things that they could let go of or be able to empower themselves to be able to integrate what they've learned.

into the next step of coming home. And so, you were able to spend a couple more weeks in Greece after

Miri: back To the

same place.

Exactly.

We stayed in the same resort. We will be back next week, next year with you guys. You know, you, you were very intentional, and it was very palpable that the space and the place and the people That infused that experience you know, it was a 360 experience even, I'll share the snippet because I'm, you know, I, somehow I decided not to drink in Greece and it wasn't, it was intuitively, I was absolutely planning to drink, you know, I was like, it's Greece, Greek wine so I was mentally ready and then when I landed, I was like, you know, something's telling me not to, I don't know why, I think it was my own body, I was preparing for a surgery after, so maybe my body was telling me to pause.

And I'm like, no. He was like, well, would you like a tonic? And I was like, A tonic. And then he goes on to tell me how he is a mixologist and he's actually mixing things for health tonics. So every morning since he made me a tonic and like twice a day he would paint me a drink. And it was a very. Specific, like this is for detoxing this, this is for your skin.

I mean, I came out of that trip glowing, you know, that I was just like, you, everybody, everybody needs to, to do this. And so it was a full body spirit and soul experience from every angle. So, well done to you and Chloe. You guys were amazing.

Miri: Are you inviting me a, the official

invitation. Yay,

So stay tuned for that. So you mentioned that you travel a lot for work.

Miri: I do.

Kelly: And when we were trying to find a time that would suit our schedules, you're like, okay, here's my travel schedule. On this day, I'm going to be in Sweden. The next day, I'm going to be in Norway. And this day, I'm going to be in Seattle.

And that's just, that's your life

Miri: my life Yeah.

Kelly: And I would love, for those listening, Miri is also the owner of Be Mindful, Be Happy. And I'd love for you to share a little bit about, you know, that brand, what you sell, all those products, the community that you've built there. And then also I'd love to hear, based on this journey that you've been on of awareness and, and elevating your consciousness and elevating health and mindfulness, how do you stay mindful and keep and elevate your health when you're traveling so much for work?

If we, if we pause and we take the time to listen to ourselves, we get the answers. And so when I started traveling for work, specifically for Microsoft, I was, I'm a mom. I have two kids. I'm a very involved mom and I was very worried about, in fact, I think the first year I said no a lot. I was like, I'm not going to travel.

My kids are young. And then I was like, how do I integrate this life? We did not have this digital ability to remote work remotely. Everybody was in the office. And it started with me making some concessions with my, my, my manager and saying, listen, if I'm going to travel somewhere, can I? You know, can I stay another day, bring my kids, and have them enjoy a weekend, or my husband, and then it became this entire system that today I have where, where I, I, as you saw my schedule, I actually schedule six months in advance, so I know where I'm going to be six months in advance, and then I send that schedule out to my community.

I pick and choose where I'm going to be. So I'm not going to like, you know, I don't know, the middle of Tennessee somewhere. I'm like going to Paris, right? So so people want to travel with me. And so I tell them yet how I'm going to be here and come. If you come join me, we'll be working from this location and then we get to spend two more days.

And so it's a one on one approach. So people I get, I'm never, never alone. And I am spending, I'm creating memories with people that are special in my life. If my friends can't for some reason then I actually extend the offer to my mentees. These, I mentor about 15 women at a time every six month cycle.

So, so it has worked really great, and it's funny because, you know, now it's a thing, like over the years, I've kind of You know, modified it to a place where it's just, it's so much fun and I look forward to the next six months and say, Hey, I'm going to be here. Who's coming? And you know, people are lined up and like, Oh, I, you know, there's like, it's a whole thing.

Kelly: like, pick me,

Miri: Yeah, I

Kelly: I

And so she was be mindful, be happy and it was just like this all aligns. And so I called her and she's like, I heard your message and I'm, she's like, I was scheduled to actually sell this to somebody else and I wasn't feeling it. And so I know, so I acquired it in 2020 and I brought it to the U S and what it is, is mindfulness as a service.

So yes, I have products and they're all green by the way, ethical, green all the things. I make no margin on that by the way, because it's not about that, but it is. an intention. To me, Be Mindful, Be Happy is this idea about having a mindful life, a mindful you know, space, like mindful life, mindful business, and a mindful you.

I just kind of bought it and maintained it, but I'm definitely going full force in 2024, and I'm excited for what's coming.

Kelly: Yeah, I really love the idea of when you're talking about the mindfulness aspect is being mindful of your time because you know you could do all the tips you could Take all the supplements and drink all the water and do all the walking during your flight Which is important like there's all these tips that you can do to stay mindful and stay healthy But but if you're go go go go go and your cortisol and your adrenaline is getting spiked like None of the green juices in the world are gonna help you there so you have to be mindful of how you do that and I think

What's

really cool to hear is you're working for a massive, massive tech company and they're saying we need you to fly here, here, and here.

Being a Latina

Miri: woman

Kelly: in tech is not the easiest path to have followed.

Miri: has not.

It's been but you know it's interesting now. And for me, personally, to look back on my trajectory as a woman in tech, we, so just to give a statistic, now I do know this statistic we represent less than 2 percent women in tech. So less than 2 percent as a gender, then you add intersectionality to that.

You add Latino, you add immigrant, you add mother, it's less than 1%,

Kelly: percent

Miri: right? So I'm less than 1 percent in this entire industry. And It's not easy, has not been easy. I always tell my mentor, my mentees that we're the digital Rosa Parks, you know, the Rosa Parks of the digital age, and we're on that bus, you know, we're sitting there, we're paving the way for the next generation.

We, we have an opportunity to open up a space where we leave generation after generation, generational legacy that our brand stands for, whether it's personal or business. Yeah,

Kelly: generation of legacy that our And you do talk about in the book how it's super important for brands to decide Where they're going to stand on certain issues and whether they make that vocal or not But at least for the internal stakeholders as well Like it's no longer okay for brands to just turn a blind eye to things If it makes sense for your brand and if it's something that makes sense for your audience We need to be aware and consumers are looking for brands who are willing to stand up for the things that they That they love or that they're passionate about With Be Mindful, Be Happy, that's a brand, right?

They love them. Beautiful t shirts, mala beads, all the things like you said, are

Miri: I owe you yours. I have not forgotten.

Kelly: Oh, it's okay. But they're beautifully handcrafted. They're, they're made ethically. You, you are so diligent about where they're coming from, who's making them, how they're being treated ethically, ecologically, how they're being shipped.

So ecologically, how they're being shipped. So that is something that is, you talk about in your book, from the packaging to the typography to the way that the package is being wrapped, it is telling your brand story from end to end. So tell us all just a little bit about Be Mindful, Be Happy and and that brand story from the physical product all the way to the ethos.

And I had this idea of interviewing 12 of my close friends. Network of women friends and I did and the question I asked them was to tell me a secret. They've never told anyone

Kelly: was,

Miri: Yeah, and I was Absolutely not prepared for that what came out after that I don't like it's just not prepared and I really I didn't nobody could have prepared me for this and so they did and these were I mean just I cannot even begin to tell you they were actually reliving the moments as they were telling me these stories and there was laughter, there was crying, there was just, I just could not, I sat there and I was like, holy crap.

And so I desisted of the idea. That was, you know, that pause made me really think, well, if I ever do something that has a product and a service, which is what Be Mindful, Be Happy is, both the products really need to live to the standards of what I am selling, that mindfulness approach. And mindful, so when we say green, that's mindful.

Kelly: the product.

Miri: And so it's not just here's your yoga equipment. It's here's, you know, there's an intention in India where my products come from you know, making sure the factories are not employing, you know, underage personnel, making sure they're getting paid well, having those conversations.

I never thought I would have to have to do that. It was really important to me and so when, when I, when I found Be Mindfully Happy and I, you know, talked to the manufacturers, talked to the shipping companies and all in the fulfillment companies, I was very pleased to find that she'd done some of that groundwork and that was elevating that.

For me, The products are just a channel and the services are another channel to inspire mindfulness with people because it is, I call it mindfulness as a service. We service each other when we just pause for a moment and think through, it's, it's not just doing good to the world, it's doing no harm.

And so it requires a mindful approach and a different set of activities to ensure that you're not harming yourself, someone else, the planet, our environment and all the things.

And so that's for me the story about me mindful be happy is I was going through personal medical as well like I was diagnosed as a BRCA mutation gene person

They did find cancer zero in both breasts reconstruction. And what I was given, and you mentioned that earlier, I was given the gift of not just life, but sitting in my bed and being. You know, I, I was just being, and I was,

learn myself, explore my dark side, which I, I went there many times come out of it, go back to it and all of that come, you know, we, you said it so well and so eloquently. Sometimes we're like, hey, let's take the vitamins, let's do the outside work, but mindfulness starts with the inside work and when you pause to go there you see the world differently and you Bond to things differently.

And so I hope with my mindful, be happy that we can create a space for everyone who comes in touch with our brand to be inspired to do that, to go in. It's scary. I know I've been there for longer than I wanted to be there. But when you come out of it, the deconstruction that happens you know, I guess my saying is everything has to be in order for you to rebuild, everything else has to be destroyed.

Kelly: Absolutely. Thank you so much for sharing that story. I think what you mentioned about the deconstruction phase, a lot of people can relate to that, and in yoga and a lot of other religious texts, we, they talk about the three main phases of life, which is, which are, you, you weave throughout.

It's not just one happens and then the other, but there's deconstruction, maintenance, and building. But you can't... You can't have any sort of building if you haven't deconstructed. You can't build on something, well you can build on something existing, but

Miri: but it's not going to be pure.

Kelly: or a strong foundation potentially.

So that deconstruction phase is so important, and the universal truth of community and belonging is what kind of holds us during that phase. And so, I'm just so grateful for you sharing so much of your life, of your story, of like the wisdom of brand storytelling from a personal level, I think so many people can walk away with.

And I think that's such a powerful tool for people to take with them. Okay. I like to finish these episodes with like rapid fire

Miri: Okay, let's

go. I haven't shared with you

Kelly: yet.

Miri: So we'll see what

happens. Oh no! Okay.

Kelly: Okay. Number one, if you could only go back to one country or one place in the world for the rest of your life, just one, where would it be and why?

Miri: It would be Morocco. Because I really tuned in to their culture. I love that it's, well first of all, the food is incredible. It's this mix, which I didn't know, of Arab and French. Like, you get the best of both and it's like, wow. It's like your, your palate goes crazy. And for me it was such a foreign...

I clearly did not. But they were, everybody was so kind and the, the spaces, you know, the food, they take time to serve. They take time to, for tea. There's a lot of mindfulness in that, in that country. And I love that it was, it's also part of Africa. Africa has a special, special place in my heart. So it's almost like you get the Mediterranean and the Middle East.

It's in Africa, which is a beautiful, beautiful combination. I would love, I would live there, absolutely, I would live in Ifrain, the city, it's in the mountains. Yeah, it's

Kelly: So I've never been to Morocco, but we keep getting from people that want to do retreats in Morocco. So maybe you got to come with us so you can be our, you can be our

Miri: Let's go. we don't

Kelly: go places unless we've been there

Miri: Oh, well, I've

been, and you would,

Miri: Yeah so I mentioned I'm from Venezuela. I have never been to Canaima. Canaima is the one of the seven wonders, natural wonders of the world. It is the Angel Falls. If you're familiar with the movie Up, Disney's movie Up, it's actually, that's where it takes, they call it Paradise Falls, but it's a real place and it's the, the, the longest, the biggest waterfall in the world.

It's nestled in the Amazon and the rivers of the Amazon, and so there, you know, I had never, Well, we never had the means, but now that I do, and after my medical processes, I did promise myself that if I came through this alive and well, and, you know, really good, I would go back to my country, I haven't been in many years specifically to visit this place.

You're eating whatever they're feeding you, you're living with them and then you end at the falls and then they pick you up by helicopter. So it's a really immersive experience, and so that is on my bucket list

Kelly: Amazing. I've never heard of that. So there we go.

Miri: we go.

Yeah. Yeah.

Kelly: Number three is what's the biggest life lesson you've learned while traveling? Oh,

Miri: what's the biggest life lesson you've learned while traveling?

Oh, what a great question. You got me. There's so many life lessons. I think it is finding stories. You know, full circle. When we endeavor to find stories we are on the look. Our brain is almost like alert to go, what am I missing? What am I missing? Where's the story? Where's the story? And then you find so many things that you...

And they had these cookies there, and I have a sweet tooth. And so I tell the cashier, I was like, are these fresh? And he's like, well, they're a day old. I'm like, no, they're not fresh. I'm not going to buy one. So he's like, well, they're fresh. I'm like, no, I like them. Like today's fresh. And

he's like okay. Yeah. I'm so spoiled. But my husband's a chef, right? So I went, I sat down and I'm having my food and then he came up to me and he brought me a cookie and he's like, I think they're fresh. We made them yesterday. Why don't you try it? It's on us. Right? And I was like. Okay. And so I tried it. It was actually very, very good.

And I'm like, you know, it was, this is, I went back and I was like, this is actually very good. And, you know, they pride themselves in, in delivering fresh food. So I was like, there it is. There's the story of the brand extending themselves. He didn't have to do that. Right. He could have just. Not skip the whole thing,

but no, I care, but he was like, Hey, I care that she thinks that this food is fresh because we live out the story of being, delivering fresh food.

And so as we are, and so it's, I, I, I know our brands and be mindful, be happy. It's a reflection of our own evolution at the core. And so as we evolve, our brand evolves and then our audiences evolve. So,

Kelly: Love that.

Miri: Yeah.

Kelly: Okay. Now, last question. Is, If there was an aspiring explorer who just wanted to get out there but wasn't quite sure what to do or how to do it, what's one piece of advice you would give to them?

Yeah

Miri: safety, of course.

Mindful safety, and that's also important. So mindful travel, it's also thinking about not just, you know, the checklist of safety. There's an awareness. I travel alone as a woman a lot. And so I have... There are

Kelly: space, I have space.

Miri: things in place that allow me to enjoy my environment, but also stay alert and stay safe. I am a mother, I'm a wife, I have people who love me, and I want to get, you know, if they're not with me in a specific moment, I want to get home safe, right?

Kelly: that to a unique answer. I haven't gotten that yet. And I think especially a lot of our listeners will be women who maybe their friends aren't quite ready to travel or their partners don't want to travel.

So they're like, okay, I'll do it on my own. And It's so important to think of that safety piece, like you said, not just the physical safety but also keeping your mind, you know, being able to be stable and serene and calm so you can take in all your surroundings and, and look at things objectively. So I think that was, honestly I'm so happy you said that because I haven't gotten that, haven't gotten that answer yet.

Miri: with you again for having me. This has been a very wonderful conversation and enlightening for me as well. I always learn from you.

You have so much to share. So thank you for having me. Anybody can get in touch with me on my website, mirirod. com. That's M I R I. R O D dot com. That's also my handle. So for social media at Miri Rod, you'll find me. You can just Google me and then you'll find me. So I'm not too hard to find even when I'm traveling.

So you and I do, I do respond to everyone personally. I, I have in the past tried to get people to help me and I'm like, no, no, no, I need, I need, that's mindful to me. I do engage with people personally. So if you shoot me a note, It will be me answering, it will be me engaging give me a little time, because sometimes it gets a little overwhelming, but I do connect with people, and that is part of my brand, is relationships first, that to me is, it's my, it's it, you know, it's my goal, so, if you connect with me, I'll be glad to respond.

Amazing,

Put customers at the heart of your brand story.

Miri: of your brand story.

And we'll see you in Sarafos next

Kelly: Yes. We'll

Miri: I'm definitely going. Yes,

Kelly: in Morocco. We'll see you in all the places. Thanks very.

Miri: you.