Defining Needs (Part 2)- Applying Our Needs to Problems
Season 1; Episode 2
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For last week’s episode on Defining Needs before applying our needs to problems for your project click the below:
This episode’s transcript on applying our needs to problems for your project:
Welcome to Beyond the Template, the more than “just talk” podcast, created by me, Caroline Amelie- a writer, artist, counselor, and learning designer.
This podcast was built for those who are ready to tackle something new in their lives, but need small steps, encouragement, accountability and community to get there.
Today I will explain WHY 35 weeks, what I have been going through on my own journey, and this week we will be connecting and applying our needs to problems we want to solve. I’ll also tell you tell you who inspired me the most this week and then (you guessed it) I’ll give you some homework to do for your own projects.
Hi there it’s Friday and the start of week 2! Are you giving yourself a break? Maybe you’re listening while tapering off from the week’s hard work, or sitting with a hot drink somewhere or even soaking up some sunlight. The weekend is on its way, and I hope you will make time for yourself in the coming days to put your dreams and your goals first. Even small actions make a difference.
Last Friday I went into why I started this podcast (the REAL and vulnerable reasons), I shared why being creative is something I pursue, as an act of self-care, resilience and rebellion… and I got us started on the right track together. If you missed it, I highly recommend starting there. Everything we do from here on out will be built on that first episode and each following episode should be listened to consecutively, one step at a time. You should definitely consider grabbing each week’s content instead of trying to jump into the middle.
Here are all the ways you can follow along this season:
- For those that don’t have time to listen or prefer to read or even skim- After each episode is published on Fridays, I add the full transcript covering what you need to keep going to my blog.
- For those who focus better with visuals- I post this to my YouTube channel on Fridays as well. There you’ll find video with closed captions and a soundwave to grab ahold of.
- For those who are on their phones and just need the main takeaways- I post one short clip each week to my Instagram, LinkedIn, Bluesky and X account on Sundays.
- AND, on my blog I also have a FREE digital download to grab with key points, takeaways, and homework. This is meant for everyone, no matter your preference for media.
There’s absolutely no reason why you can’t keep yourself accountable over the next several months. I’ve got you all covered.
Lots of stuff happened this week. And per usual, as someone who moves through the world best by responding to it, I was inspired to move forward in a BUNCH of new ways. Experimentation and growth are my favorite.
Several people told me that our first episode last week was a bit heavy. YES. I am someone who believes in authenticity, intimacy and true connection. I plan to be absolutely real with you. I will put it all out there. The world is going through it! We all are. And we are all feeling lonely, I think. It’s hard when social media has become the main outlet for so many of us. And even if you have a ton of friends, quite often it might feel like you are the only one thinking what you are thinking and feeling what you are feeling right now. That’s why I hope this podcast can be of service.
I also had a listener tell me that they are writing and painting right now… where publishing their work is a long-time dream and painting is a new outlet for self-care. I am thrilled they are pursuing this. Please comment or DM me on one of my social platforms to tell me your stories as we go along! My first listener shout out goes to C in NYC for their resolution to share their voice and vision with the world.
Things that inspired me to keep going included… a new experience house sitting for TrustedHouseSitters! I will be sharing more about this eventually (it is part of the big plan for the season!). I also met with one of my mentors, had some deep conversations with AI and the iChing, and have been following some huge astrological movements this week. Here’s me coming out as an Astrology lover to the world! It’s not a fad. I have been learning about it since I was a child. I am someone who does not knock anything if it can help me move forward, expand my mind, be excited and confident in life, and connect to a spiritual sense of self. The universe is wild. It’s amazing. I love anything that brings humanity upward and onward.
So, after some thinking this week, I plan to start including the GOOD NEWS of the week again! I was posting these earlier this year as individual social media plugs, and my followers really loved it. SO, I will be doing that again, but through the podcast. News I share will all be aligned with education, creativity and innovation.
I also completely forgot to mention that I am self-producing this podcast on my own. And I am learning as I am going. So, if you have any feedback, send it along! I hope to get better and better, and it’s so important to me that I am meeting the needs of my listeners.
Finally, I want to share a secret with you. My ultimate dream is that some of you will be working on similar projects and can collaborate and connect with one another directly. My dream for this podcast is to ultimately build positive and healthy community connections and that we can collectively create a better world together. This is something AI will never take away. This is something so damn important for humans, especially right now in the world. We are meant to commune.
So, as a bonus on my socials, I encourage that my listeners chat with one another in the comments on what you have been working on, discovering, and are excited about. And to help get the conversation started I am going to add a prompt for you to interact with in the comments each week for the remainder of the season.
This week’s prompt:
What listener names do you like the best? Last week I listed them, did you catch them all? I called you my strategists and scribblers, thinkers and tinkerers, engineers and imagineers, notetakers and nomads, and planners and poets. So, VOTE on one of my socials which pair you like the most! Links for all my channels can be found in the description. PS… if you have any ideas for listener name pairs that you like even MORE… Drop them in the comments as well!
Okay, week 2- let’s get to work!
In addition to being into some eccentric things, I am a learning expert with a background in counseling and design (which I honestly have a monopoly on, no one out there is like me). With my powers and expertise combined (That’s a Captain Planet reference) process and strategy are both crucial for getting to the finish line in my work and my life! I designed this podcast to follow a traditionally researched and well-established pathway towards successful project completion.
I am sure some of you are thinking… this is going to take forever. Why does it need to take so long? Why can’t we just jump into the work? Well, you can. Absolutely. To be honest, there are other systems that allow for what we call in the learning design space “iterations”. The work loops in on itself. So rather than do the research in advance (what we are doing right now), there are some that throw themselves into the deep end only to learn they didn’t jump in with everything they needed. I liken this to the person who ends up going to the home improvement store 5 times in one weekend because they were so ready to fix whatever needed fixing, they didn’t give themselves time to measure, remember to bring a sample with them, take photographs of the finish, etc. But guess what? The project DOES get done, eventually. Just in a different way. And that information which was missed at the beginning? It ends up being learned through making mistakes. I wholly approve. Seriously. We most likely ALL will need to pivot or end up in surprising positions as we go along as well!
But I really want us to be slow and steady together. Mostly because I am a responder in my gut. And I am responding to the people I know who feel overwhelmed and overloaded. They are juggling all of the things in life already. So tiny steps towards their dream and creative approach is best. It’s like any other craft, if you learn the slow and tedious way first, you won’t miss any steps when you are ready to head forward at full speed. Iterations included.
As I said last week, the first thing any of us should be doing is defining the needs of our projects. In my own assessment of needs last week, I identified normative, comparative, felt, and expressed needs based on the version of me that I feel I should be at this point in my life in comparison to my generation and my made-up-in-my-head ideal version. Here’s what this means for me.
My friends and family can attest that I have recently been talking more about making changes in my life… including how important it is to me during this phase to show up as I am without masks. I need to be so FULLY MYSELF in a public way, that I attract the most aligned to me. Playing around with this idea, the first thing that I did to push myself was share my own songwriting online. I was shaking and physically ill the entire day leading up to filming myself and posting me and my little ukulele. But. People liked it! That was a pivotal moment which led me to feeling confident enough to post my first podcast episode last week. AND, if you picked up on it, write my own theme song. Yes! That’s me singing and playing ukulele. Doing all of this gave me the same feelings by the way. Same anxieties. But I posted anyway. This is my rebellion. Showing up as I am, to find others who need to see someone like themselves DOING something. I am completely over the superficial, fake, influencer, celebrity without substance stuff that has been shoved into my face since I was a little person. We need real heroes right now. So here I am, feeling ill, feeling cringey, feeling afraid. And doing it anyway.
In terms of creativity as rebellion against the shackling consumption society has built to keep normal people low… identifying needs isn’t just about creating for creativity’s sake. I have true artists in my life and, let me tell you, yes some of them create for themselves without an agenda. Of course. I love an artist. But I am a designer. I would like to propose we each create something which makes an impact on both our own sanity and wellbeing and also those around us. Last week I went into this more, and I listed just about anything and everything someone might seek to create (or manifest, if I were to use the overpopularized term). People are seeking to create new lives for themselves, new relationships, new artistic endeavors, new businesses or streams of income, improvements to their homes and friendships and families. We are all seeking the “right” new opportunity. But I uphold that by taking action, we will hit goals… which might or might not be our original ones… but absolutely will be new, exciting, uplifting and empowering. And anyone that can consume can also create.
If you, like me, do best when you are sparked vs. coming up with ideas on your own, here are some ways I believe creativity makes a direct impact on the world around us. Consider creating a…
- course or workshop that spreads knowledge and expertise in a field you are passionate about
- event which pulls others together over a shared mission or passion
- first business which serves your community
- script for a film or play providing thought leadership for those who see it
- song or choreography piece that inspires others
- community mural that makes someone smile and adds beauty to the neighborhood
- organization or club to help with isolation or loneliness
- new or stronger relationship with a loved one
- book that teaches or advocates
- community garden project
- environmentally friendly home improvement project
- stronger and healthier family unit, social life, or romantic life
- or even a new and improved version of yourself
Within this process towards change, identifying needs isn’t enough. In my own process, I had to figure out what the main problems are which my needs address. And whether or not creative solutions will solve them. I needed to know that my project has a purpose directly linked to my identified needs. Next week I will share with you what I learned. The reflection questions I answered are the same ones you will get at the end.
Many people who have invented something amazing, took their time getting there using both slow-and-steady as well as trial-and-error approaches. I fully expect that my plans this season will not pan out perfectly. I expect to be confused, change my mind, feel disappointed and frustrated, slather myself in imposter syndrome, and even want to give up. But what I have learned, if anything, from listening to creatives, even the millionaires, is that failure only happens if you stop trying. The continuous trying makes for success… maybe it won’t look like what you intended… but something new and amazing will happen.
My expander this week is chemist Stephanie Kwolek, born over 100 years ago from two Polish immigrants in Pennsylvania, USA. Her mother was a homemaker, who instilled a love of fabrics and sewing in her (paving the way for her most outstanding career achievement!). Kwolek was also influenced by her father who called himself a Naturalist, someone whose love of Nature ran so deep it was neither work nor hobby. Sadly, he passed away when she was only 10 years old, but the hours and hours they spent together discovering the world around them in nature, stuck with her, and into the sciences she dove, quickly advancing from grade school on.
Kwolek got her chemistry career started during the post-WWII years in medical school, where she worked in a lab on creating synthetic fibers for DuPont, the same company which introduced nylon prior to the start of the war. Because of that success, and because of seeing a growing NEED during and after the war years, DuPont narrowed its focus on the ever-expanding field. Kwolek was soon swept into the fold, and remained at DuPont for decades to come.
Kwolek filed 28 patents during her 40-year career researching polymers. But she is most well-known for her work over 10-years on aromatic polymides where she invented Poly-p-phenylene terephthalamide, one of the first ever prepared “liquid crystal polymers” which was eventually released under the commercial name Kevlar… now used in more than 200 applications- including gloves, sleeves, jackets, coverings for cuts, abrasions, and heat, sports equipment, vehicle parts, firefighting gear, airplanes and the most well-known use…lightweight bullet-proof vests.
Kwolek used her own experiences and passions eventually for advocating to increase women’s interest and participation in STEM fields. In her later years she was a speaker and a teacher for those who might not have otherwise considered a career in a male-dominated field. She’s incredible, in my opinion. Her gains in life didn’t happen during a weekend bootcamp, a three-week web series, or even a year of her life. She built a legacy of work over decades of passionate pursual. So, with this in mind, what do you think? Do you think this was time well spent? Do you think her career would have turned out differently had she been impatient? How might the world be different today without Kevlar? Can you see yourself building something amazing by taking the time and consistent effort to do so?
For more on Kwolek, check out the links in this episode’s description.
Alright now, let’s turn it back to you. Here are the four questions that guided me this week, so grab your notebook, and see how they land for you. Also, please remember that these, along with this episode’s key concepts and takeaways can be found in my blog for you as a FREE digital download. This along with the full transcript. Links can be found in the podcast description.
Reflection question number…
- Based on your identified needs, what are the main problems which you clearly see need to be solved?
- In terms of your desired creative project, endeavor, approach and solution, will exploring this avenue assist you in your journey towards solving these problems?
- What do you think is the purpose of your creation?
- Do you think this new creation will solve your present needs? Or the needs of others?
I asked myself these same questions, and it was pretty affirming. I hope these help you feel that you are on the right path! That’s the whole point. In a world full of options, decision fatigue is so real. When you are intentional at the beginning and think it all through, there’s no room left for “what if this isn’t the right way?” You know it will be.
Thank you all for joining me! We are done with needs! Next week we’ll begin considering the characteristics and traits which are relevant to your project for whoever the project is for, whether it’s for you, your loved ones, your community, your students or customers. I’ll tell you about the problems I hope to solve and share with you about someone who found a creative solution to address the needs of those on BOTH sides of a war.
Thank you for listening to Beyond the Template! You are doing great. Keep it up. Keep it creative.
My name is Caroline Amelie LeBoeuf. I have a degree in art and in counseling and also professional level certificates in educational advising and learning design & technology. Roles I have carried include illustrator, photographer, writer, traveler, mentor, instructor and most recently entrepreneur!
If you are curious to learn further about the work I offer my clients, check out cameliedesigns.com, that’s cameliedesigns.com.
This episode’s digital download on applying our needs to problems for your project:
More from Caroline!
Check out MORE on this week’s “expander”
- The Life and Achievements of Chemist Stephanie Kwolek
- How Stephanie Kowlek Invented Kevlar and Revolutionized Safety
Get SOCIAL with me! (connect with other listeners in the BTT community)
Need help in applying needs to your problems?
Let’s Connect!
Learn how you can Work with Me.
Book a FREE 30-minute ReSPARK session to explore how we define your needs fully.
Until next time – keep shining for those who would otherwise remain in the dark. Be the light!
