How I found my passion for presenting and how to discover your passion

For me, becoming an event moderator has been a journey. It still is a journey. It is hard work, learning and excitement all at the same time. Most importantly, though, it is a passion.

Even as a child, I have always been an entrepreneurial and self-starting person. At age eight, I created a magazine and asked friends and cousins to write about their hobbies. Just like real journalists. I was in charge of the layout, puzzles and jokes, and called myself Editor in Chief. 

At age 20, I got a sense for entrepreneurship once again – though certainly in a more professional setting. After doing a voluntary marcom internship at a well-known publisher and being surprised that they didn’t have an English-language website, I decided I could make a difference. I took the advantage of having lived in the USA for three years and founded Chelle Media to help companies translate their essential content into on-fleek English.

Translating soon turned into copywriting, then Search Engine Optimization (SEO), communication planning, consulting, and more. With Chelle Media, I focused my services largely on entrepreneurs and startups.

I decided to stay in the tech startup scene by supporting tech incubator YES!Delft and acted as Product Owner for the new YES!Delft website, thereafter co-initiating Startup Corner, a platform for startup-corporate collaboration. Pretty soon I had a great portfolio with experience in project management, business development and also event management at various female business networks. Yet, there was still something more I wanted to commit to.

In the rather male-dominated scene that tech entrepreneurship still is, I saw the potential and – in fact – the need for a more prominent female presence. With so many events, pitch competitions and hackathons, I barely saw women on stage. 

Parallel to this insight, I was talking to a business coach about a career path. We discussed tons of things, but it really clicked for me when we concluded that I didn’t have a passion - something I feel excited about and want to do more of. I decided to write down all that I did as a child (ages 5-15) - arts & crafts, singing, writing, dancing, blogging, playback shows, making up a show for family that visited, etc. And then I saw it - ‘the common thread’ - it was presenting and performing. And when I looked closely, I was already presenting and making videos for work-related matters but I didn’t think much of it but ‘Oh, this is something I do so easily and I always love doing it when I get the chance’. So hey, there it was - my passion!!

Being the go-getter person that I am, I took action into my own hands by reaching out to a presenting company (Iris Barzilay, Margreet Jacobs) for an all-round presenting course. Already in the first session, we decided to film the whole journey so that I could see my progress and have others learn from my lessons too.

And so it began - I started vlogging about my journey to becoming a presenter, talked to experts in the fields of authenticity, passion, pitching and more. After a few months, I realized that live presenting with an audience and room for improvisation fits my personality perfectly. I embarked on a new professional journey - I decided to become an event moderator! I went on with my videos to practice more and posted a new video series. 

Meanwhile, working towards this new goal of mine, I was hired by a corporate client as their Project Lead and Host for a five-day hackathon end of 2018. That hackathon ended with a Demo Day - and guess who got to present it :-)

Thereafter I was hooked, I launched my moderation website and started reaching out to events - big and small. My niche being tech, startups, and diversity and 9/10 events that I host are English-spoken. Ever since, I have had the opportunity to moderate some really amazing events, including TEDx Amsterdam Women Startup Awards, EMERCE Lean Innovation Summit, YES!Delft UNConference 2019 and EBF Conference 2019 Groningen University. That passion really turned into much more than a hobby - it’s a professional gig! 

So, how I found my passion and how you can find yours too:

1.Explore. Make it a passion project.

First, jot down all the things you really like to do. Now and in the past. Things that made you smile, moments when people said “you’re a natural at that!” and things that gave you energy even when you felt really tired. Give this process some time. Surely, you will find more than 1 thing that you can call a Potential Passion. So, go after each of them one by one and see how it feels. If you enjoyed drawing years ago, take an afternoon to pick up your old hobby again and see if it clicks or not. Talk to your parents or friends from your childhood to rediscover what you liked to do.

2. Immerse. Take action right away.

Read books, watch shows and videos, find thought leaders or experts in that field. If we’re talking about an activity such as writing, then sign up for a writing course right away. Understand why you feel so good while practicing your Potential Passion. Do you forget the world around you? Do you meet like-minded people while practicing it? How does it make you feel?

3. Find mentors that can bring you ahead.

Find mentors in that field. Make a list of all of them - 3x people that are ‘near’ you (that you can reach out to right away), 3x people that are in a further away network (through a friend, through a vague contact) and 3x people that are gurus you cannot reach out to so easily (Tony Robbins, Michelle Obama, Warren Buffett).

Start with the 3 people closest to you right now. Just ask them to share their knowledge and experience and offer to pay for their coffee/lunch/drink in return. [Given the current home-bound situation, make it a virtual meetup!] You have no idea how much people are willing to help. People like sharing their experience, especially to people that have the potential to grow in their field! Don’t be shy, show guts and be humble when they take their time.

I’ve done this dozens of times, it is amazing. Just imagine this: only paying those few euros for the food/drinks is nothing compared to the expert knowledge and connection you just received. There is your gold!

[The other 6 people further away from you are ones you can look up to, find out more about and eventually reach out to when you feel that you are ready].

4. Record your journey. See your progress and support others.

As mentioned, I started recording my progress as presenter on camera. But, that isn’t logical for every Potential Passion. How about you share your art work on Instagram? What about posting your first chapters of a book on a blog? Or make a podcast about all you learned about financial education up till now?

By recording your steps, you will 1) learn more because you need to deliver, 2) be forced to actually work on your Potential Passion and 3) inspire others around you to follow their dreams or a similar passion as well. Because I recorded videos and then shared them online, people in my network started thinking of me for presenting gigs. This is how I started moderating professionally.

5. Take yourself seriously and forget others’ opinions.

‘What if people think I’m showing myself too much? / I worry what X will think/say’

> My opinion is that 99% of the people who think/say this aren’t showing themselves at all or enough. Even better, there is barely anyone who thinks this - it’s in YOUR head! Cut the crap, your thought is a mirror or your own fear of failure. If I thought this thought back then, I would never turned this passion into a professional offering, because this is how I got projects and how people recommended me. And: not all your connections see all your posts/updates all the time. People need to be reminded! Show your worth, be proud of what you’re accomplishing!

‘My [fill in Potential Passion] is not good enough. This can’t be shared. I need to get better first.’

> You are your worst critic. Do you think Van Gogh’s first painting was the best one ever? Do you have any idea how Amy Winehouse started her singing career? [answer: in small, local pubs where nobody was even listening].

1) Practice makes perfect! Go from first draft, to first exposed product, to an improved version, to a format for how you go about it, etc etc.

2) Enjoy the process! No addition needed.

'My passion is not my priority, so I don’t want to invest too much in it now.’

> What a waste! Of course, it will not hand you money (right away), but if you know what kind of feeling you get while working on your passion - wouldn’t that make it worth it to invest in? If you know it makes you feel mega happy, then why not practice it when you feel low? If you really want to start a marathon in 3 months, you need to train for it at least weekly. Build up with small steps and watch yourself and your passion grow!

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I hope my story and my tips inspired you to (re)discover your Potential Passion. Please share below what passion you have or want to explore!

Keep rocking it??,

- Rachelle