Episode 104 - Julana Dizon, Wild Adventures

Travel

Nov 23

Having a wilderness experience is one of the most fulfilling things that any traveler can do but making sure you are doing it in an ethical manner is even more fulfilling. Respect and patience equals ethical wildlife experiences no matter where you decide to go even if it is in your own backyard or your local park.

As we spend time outside, in natural areas, and wilderness, it is important to keep an eye out for what effects our actions can have on plants, animals, other humans, and even whole ecosystems. As more and more people spend time in the outdoors, conflicts between humans and wildlife are increasing.

Our increasing dependence on technology, coupled with the worldwide trend towards urban living, means that many of us are spending ever less time outside even as scientists amass evidence for the value of getting outside and experiencing the natural world.

Christine’s guest today is a no stranger to ethical animal tourism and wildlife conservation.

Julana Dizon is a professional model TV host and wildlife educator. Her travel and lifestyle blog called Julana Goes is inspired by wildlife and fueled by curiosity. She created it as a place to not only showcase earth's amazing animals and beautiful destinations but also to educate and bring awareness to ethical animal tourism, encourage outdoor exploration and share eco-friendly tips with readers in hopes of keeping our planet and species safe.

It is Julana’s main mission to inspire millennial women and couples to get offline and get outdoors to create memories together while being mindful of our planet. She is also the host of Wild Adventures with Julana which can be watched on YouTube.

In our conversation, Christine and Julana talk about the lack of representation of women in wildlife and conservation in the media, as well as the need to have more women hosting travel programs. Julana shares about her journey from biology and conservation to modeling and acting and how she's now able to bring these passions together to create content that educates about ethical wildlife experiences and the importance of spending time outdoors.

Join Christine now for her soulful conversation with Julana Dizon.

In this episode, Christine and Julana discuss:

Who is Julana and how did she get started in wildlife conservation
What the impact of wildlife tourism is and animal encounters on the environment
How you can engage with animals as you travel
The lack of representation of women in wildlife and conservation in the media
Creating a connection with people through entertainment travel

Resources & Links Mentioned in the Episode

Want more information about Julana Dizon and the work she does, check out www.julanadizon.com

Follow Julana on Instagram @julana

Watch and Subscribe to Julana’s YouTube show Wild Adventures

Join me for my Women’s Wilderness and Yoga Retreat in Alaska in March 2023!

We’ll be traveling 63 miles north of the Arctic Circle to stay at Arctic Hive, owned by my friend Mollie Busby and her husband Sean. This boutique property nestled in the Brooks Range is way off the beaten path and also off grid. We’ll stay in beautiful cabins built by hand by our hosts, practice yoga in their yoga dome lovingly referred to as The Hive, with gorgeous views of the surrounding nature.

We’ll explore the wilderness by snowshoe and dog sled, connect with members of the local community to learn about living in this remote environment, enjoy daily yoga practice and vegan meals all while keeping our eye out for the beautiful northern lights that like to show off their magic this time of year.

I only have 6 spaces for this unique adventure and a few are already taken. Hop over to the Lotus Sojourns website to book yours today.

Please share this experience with anyone you know would love this restorative adventure.

Want to learn more, you can listen to my Soul of Travel conversation, episode 67 with Mollie Busby

Visit www.lotussojourns.com/journeys to join this unique travel experience today.

To watch this interview on YouTube HERE.

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WE WON A BESSIE AWARD! The Bessie Awards recognize the achievements of women and gender-diverse people making an impact in the travel industry. To view the complete list of this year’s winners, visit bessieawards.org.

About the Soul Of Travel Podcast

Soul of Travel honors the passion and dedication of the people making a positive impact in tourism. In each episode, you’ll hear the story of women who are industry professionals and seasoned travelers and community leaders who know travel is more than a vacation. It is an opportunity for personal awareness and it is a vehicle for change. We are thought leaders, action takers, and heart-centered change makers.

The guests work in all sectors of the tourism industry. You'll hear from adventure-based community organizations, social impact businesses, travel photographers and videographers, tourism boards and destination marketing organizations, and transformational travel experts. They all honor the idea that travel is more than a vacation and focus on sustainable travel, eco-travel, community-based tourism, and intentional travel.

These conversations are meant to educate, inspire and create community. They are directed to new travelers and seasoned travelers, as well as industry professionals and those who are curious about a career in travel.

If you want to learn about new destinations, types of travel, or how to be more intentional or live life on purpose, join Christine Winebrenner Irick for soulful conversations with her community of fellow travelers exploring the heart, the mind, and the globe. These conversations highlight what tourism really means for the world.

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Credits. Christine Winebrenner Irick (Host, creator, editor.) Patricia Schultz (Guest). Original music by Clark Adams. Editing and production by Rayna Booth.

Transcript

KEYWORDS

animals, people, travel, wildlife, experiences, creating, conversations, find, book, women, space, wild adventures, hosting, content, talk, connected, encounter, podcast, place

Christine Winebrenner Irick 00:08

Thank you for joining me for soulful conversations with my community of fellow travelers, exploring the heart, the mind and the globe. These conversations highlight what travel really means for the world. Soul of Travel honors the passion and dedication of the people making a positive impact in tourism. Each week, I'll be speaking to women who are tourism professionals, world travelers and leaders in their communities will explore how travel has changed them and how that has rippled out and inspired them to change the world. These conversations are as much about travel as they are about passion, and living life with purpose, chasing dreams, building businesses, and having the desire to make the world a better place. This is a community of people who no travel is more than a vacation. It is an opportunity for personal awareness, and it is a vehicle for change. We are thought leaders, action takers, and heart centered change makers I'm Christine Winebrenner Irick. And this is the Soul of Travel.

Julana Dizon is a professional model, TV host and wildlife educator. Her travel and lifestyle blog called Julana Goes is inspired by wildlife and fueled by curiosity. She created it as a place to not only showcase Earth's amazing animals and beautiful destinations, but also to educate and bring awareness to ethical animal tourism. Encourage outdoor exploration and share eco friendly tips with readers in hopes of keeping our planet and species safe. It is her main mission to inspire millennial women and couples to get offline and get outdoors to create memories together while being mindful of our planet. She is also the host of Wild Adventures with Julana which can be watched on YouTube.

In our conversation, Julana and I talk about the lack of representation of women in wildlife and conservation in the media, as well as the need to have more women hosting travel programs. She shared about her journey from biology and conservation to modeling and acting and how she's now able to bring these passions together to create content that educates about ethical wildlife experiences and the importance of spending time outdoors. Join me now for my soulful conversation with Julana Dizon.

Welcome to the Soul of Travel Podcast. I am very happy today to be welcoming Julana Dizon onto the podcast, we have had some great connections on Instagram, we began following each other and I noticed just like sending each other messages of support. And pretty soon I was really curious about the work that she was doing. So we reached out and have had some great connections prior to this. So I'm really excited to bring your story to the podcast. So welcome to Julana.

03:25

Hello, thanks for having me.

Christine Winebrenner Irick 03:26

As we get started, I would love for you to just introduce yourself briefly and let our listeners know who you are, what you do and what you're doing, how that intersects with the space of travel.

03:39

Sure. So my name is Julana. I live in Los Angeles. And I work in entertainment primarily doing modeling , acting and TV hosting, travel hosting. So my big thing that I kind of specialize in is places that you can go to see animals and have really cool animal experiences and wildlife encounters. So yeah, I go all around the world and I specifically seek out those places to share with people.

Christine Winebrenner Irick 04:04

Great, thank you. To give us a sense of who you are and how you've gotten to where you are. Now I would love to understand maybe how you began being interested in animals and wildlife and also how travel has become a part of your life and that you wanted to bring those two pieces together.

04:26

So it pretty much goes way back to when I was a child. I always loved animals. It was kind of that thing that you don't really know when it happened. You just always remember loving that thing your whole life. So growing up, I always wanted to work with them. I I wanted to be like a zookeeper and I went to school for biology and I ended up actually doing that. So I was an animal trainer for several years right out of college. And while that was going on, and even in college was when I really started traveling a little bit with my friends like just around the states first and then I kind of how I structured it at that time. Every other year, I would take a big international trip.

And that's really how I started traveling. And then in between years, I would just go on little trips like to different states, and places that were closer. So yeah, I really started college and I would just save up all my money, literally for traveling. But as I travel because I love animals, the first thing that I was always searching for in a place was, Where do I see animals in Thailand or Belize or wherever I was going.

it's really hard to find those answers. Unless, obviously, like the zoos, and the aquariums will always come up. But I knew that there were so many other experiences where you can see them in the wild. But you really had to do a lot of digging. And then I found also when I was in the countries, you kind of find some of those out by just talking to people talking to local people. It's not always accessible, like on the web. So that's kind of how I started.

Christine Winebrenner Irick 06:00

Awesome. I love that you started working. I love that you have the dream of being in love with animals and wanting to work in the zoo. And then being able to actually do that for a period of time. We had talked before two of my daughters are currently obsessed with everything animal, they watch zoo tampa. Like, that's their favorite thing to watch. And one of my daughters is very certain that she will be, that will be what she will be when she grows up. And I take each of them on a trip when they turn 10 years old, and they get to pick wherever they want to go. And in the middle, my middle daughter just said I really want to go to the temple, I really want to go to the zoo. So I just it makes me feel like that aspiration is possible. Because sometimes you see things like that on television and your child, you get these ideas in your mind. And sometimes they don't seem fully plausible. But when you see somebody else who has actually lived that experience, and you're like, okay, it is possible someone can do that.

07:00

Yeah, that's awesome. What a great trip not super far for you.

Christine Winebrenner Irick 07:04

Yeah. So I know that you traveled you said you started traveling once every other year internationally, do you have a particular destination that really stuck out to you and, and made you realize that this was a way that you wanted to spend more of your time was focused on wildlife experiences, or one that was really powerful for you personally?

07:26

Yeah, so two different ones, one for animals, and one that's personal, my more personal one was before I moved to Los Angeles, I did a three month contract in Cape Town, South Africa. So that was the first time that I really went abroad and lived somewhere on my own. And it was a really life changing experience. I always wanted to study abroad in college, I never got to do that. But here I was, for the first time in this place. And I was working. But I was really getting to know the people and getting to know the culture. And I feel like three months is a good amount of time to really feel like you lived in a place. And you knew what it was like there. And you knew those people.

And while I was there, I did a lot of cool things like I didn't do a safari there. But we did like shark diving, which I wasn't a super fan of. It is a little scary. But we also did like they have a beach there. That's called boulder beach, and they just have penguins sitting on the beach, and you could just go there and sit with them. So that was the first time I kind of started seeing really cool animals in the wild and also being on my own in another country and getting to connect with different people for like a long period of time. The year after that. I went to Thailand. And when I was there, I didn't, I visited an elephant sanctuary. And that was really important to me, that was kind of like a bucket list thing that I'd wanted to do my whole life.

But I knew that it was kind of a touchy subject. Because anytime you're visiting a place like that, it's really important that you're going to an ethical one and not just one that's in it for things like money grabs and touristy things and not treating their animals well. So I did so much research. Like I think I read every blog, I could find an article about these elephant sanctuaries and made sure I picked one that had really good reviews and you know, was rated by accredited websites that I trusted. And that was just such a cool experience. And that was the first time I really went and had a GoPro and kind of filmed some stuff. So that was kind of my first experience like documenting a wildlife scenario. So I have this really quick one minute clip. It's not very good. I wish I could go back and do it now that I have more experience. But yeah, that was an amazing experience. So probably those two places are really dear in my heart.

Christine Winebrenner Irick 09:38

Yeah, thank you for sharing that. And also thank you for mentioning the research that you did. I think that when we start talking about wildlife, tourism and animal encounters when we travel, I think that's probably a more recent conversation where people are really trying to understand what that impact of those encounters has on the animals on the environment on communities. And so I think it's really great that you highlighted that that was something that you were focusing on. I think I've had experiences in the past where I look back.

And now having the knowledge that I have, I realized that they probably were not experiences that were creating a positive environment for the animals or for the people that were working with the animals, there were many things that I think we're probably more explosive than something that I would choose to support now. And when I was 21, and I was traveling, I just didn't have the awareness that I have now. So I think it's so important to talk about that, try to share resources, like you said, looking at accredited organizations, and see how they have vetted those experiences for you.

10:47

Yeah, that's something I really liked about your podcast, actually, is that everyone that you interview and you yourself are so conscious about travel, which I feel like is so important these days, because like you said, a lot of people just travel and just are like, What can I see? What can I do instead of how can I really visit this culture or like you always say, be a guest here. And I love that in your podcast.

Christine Winebrenner Irick 11:09

Thank you so much. I appreciate that. Well, you mentioned that you went to school for biology and conservation, and then worked briefly in the zoo. And then you started to work in entertainment. So I would love to hear a little bit about how that transition happened. And then it's also somewhat evolving. So I want to kind of walk through part of that part of your journey.

11:32

Sure. So I graduated with my biology degree, and I applied for a job. So I ended up working for a company that we did animal training for, like those educational shows at like busch gardens or SeaWorld, like live shows where they have the animals run across and the zookeepers you're talking about, um, so we were training animals for shows like that. And we would do educational talks, like animal master talks with them around the parks, and I loved it. But the sad thing about working with animals is that it's really low paying like, minimum wage. And at that time, minimum wage was almost unlivable for me in Florida.

So to supplement that, I got a part time job. And it happened to be modeling just super randomly, like, I never thought about it. But I answered a Craigslist ad, and it happened to be a modeling agency. And so I did some jobs here and there. And then I started to get more busy. And eventually, it got to the point where I thought, well, maybe this is something that I can do full time. So I ended up going that route. And I'm thankful for it, because it really did bring me all around the world. And it kind of opened up my life to see that there's a different way to live, where you can still do the things that you love, but also have time to enjoy your life. So yeah, I don't know if I would have stayed at my animal job if I would have been able to go to all the places that I've been, and have all those experiences.

But so I've been modeling for 10 years, and then I moved to Los Angeles six years ago. And once I got here, I got more into the on camera side of things. Because there's a lot of commercials, there's a lot of TV films, and there's a lot of posting here. So I started doing hosting. And at first I was doing red carpet stuff like movie premieres and events and talk shows and things like that, which is really great for learning to be on camera, and I enjoyed it a lot. But after the pandemic, I was like, I like hosting. But I'm not super passionate about the Entertainment like celebrity side of things because at that point, I was writing new stories about famous people on Tik Tok and celebrity gossip stories.

And I just didn't really feel like that was where my calling was. And for years, I had been wanting to somehow make my way back to working with animals, or having animals more present in my life. After the pandemic, I had always had this idea for a show that I wanted to do. So I finally started filming the places that I was going and really put it kind of into production in my head and then got it out and I put it out on YouTube. It's called Wild Adventures. And that's basically what it is. It's a travel show based around wildlife. So in every episode, I'm in a different city or a different country sometimes and I'm visiting a place where you can go to see animals or to see a really cool wildlife encounter but you can go to not just someone that specifically likes to work with animals. Yeah,

Christine Winebrenner Irick 14:18

I love that I have watched it a little bit. And I think it's so fun to just think about the ways that you can engage with animals as you travel. I don't think everybody is always thinking about that. And as I've traveled I see there sometimes experiences or or I guess I'm just not intentional about it. The only time I can think of when I was really excited when I went to the Amazon and I was like Oh, I know I'm going to see so many amazing cool things here and I saw nothing no I shouldn't say that I didn't see anything but I really expected it to be like in the movies or something where there was just going to be like pythons and everything everywhere and it was going to be terrifying and I was like really looking forward to that. For the level of excitement, and I remember, like one of the very first things we saw was a tarantula, which was cool. And there happened to be some snakes in the rafters of one of the dining halls.

But beyond that, we hadn't seen anything. And then one day, we were eating breakfast. And this was one of the least exciting animal encounters I've had, but I was eating and there were these giant macaws that were beautiful, and one pooped on me. And I got so magical. So magical, admits like the most amount and it was like slimed me. And there's no real showers where we were staying, which was really hilarious. And everyone's like, Oh, good. Thanks. That's bringing so much good luck to us. However, we went out into the river, the Amazon River later, and we saw pink dolphins, which are not something that a lot of people get to see.

And so I was like, Okay, I will be, I will take that experience of being pooped on by a giant Macaw anytime, if it allows for me to see these beautiful pink dolphins. But it's interesting, because that was one of the only times where I really was thinking a lot about the wildlife that I might encounter. So I'm usually focusing more on culture or connecting with women, social impact projects, and learning to start learning about like the indigenous communities. But I hadn't really spent a lot of time thinking about how I might be engaging with animals as I travel. So I love hearing your stories and watching the videos you've created because it just makes me realize there's a whole nother world of experiences that are out there when we're traveling.

16:34

Yeah, for sure. And that's one of the things too, it's like everybody likes something different. Some people are huge foodies like me personally. As long as I get food in my body to keep going on my travels. I'm fine. I'm not a foodie. But like, I love animals the way some people love food. Yeah, unless you're going to like it if you're not used to looking for animal encounters, unless you're going to a place like the Amazon, Madagascar, the Galapagos Islands, where those places are known for animals. Think about it a lot. But there's so many cool things, and especially in other countries, like we were on our honeymoon in Belize earlier this year, and we stayed in a Jungle Lodge.

And they had so much wildlife right around it was kind of like an outdoor restaurant in the treetops, and they had so much wildlife that would come at different times of the day, because they knew that's where the food was. And they had a fruit platter that they would feed the animals with. Like in the morning, there would be two cans at breakfast. And then in the afternoon, there would be these things called Kota Mondays, which are like raccoons, like all over the ground floor of the forest. And then at night, there were these, do you know what kinkajou is?

Okay, the cutest thing ever, you have to Google it, there has been my favorite animal because we actually used to have someone I worked with at the place in Florida. And so I used to be like, take care of some and they're so sweet. They're so cute. They're kind of little squirrels, but they look like theirs. But they would come at night. And they would literally come like you would be sitting at the restaurant eating and there was a railing and they would just walk along the railing. It's so close to you. They're the cutest things. But it is really cool to have these experiences where you can get really close to wildlife. But the other thing is making sure people are respectful of it. Fortunately, there are those people that just do stupid things around animals. And I think that's really hard for me to see.

And it's hard when you're in those situations to like, say something, but you have to say something and like a nice way because like you said, a lot of people just don't know, there are things that I did years ago to like, but the fairs they would bring in animals and you'd take pictures with them. And when you were 10, like you didn't know, and it's just more in the recent decade or so that we've started realizing the welfare of animals in these places and being more aware of it. I feel like you can't judge people, you can only try to help educate them when you see those things.

Christine Winebrenner Irick 18:52

Yes, and I grew up in Montana. So I spend a lot of time in both Yellowstone Park and Glacier Park. And so the idea that some people think just because wildlife is right outside of your window, somehow it's like a zoo still, and that those animals are not actually wild, was something that was always such a pain point for me, because I was I growing up there was so keenly aware of what a bear encounter or bison encounter or a moose like what those things actually meant to my personal safety as well as to the welfare of the animals.

But if you are someone who hasn't grown up in that environment, and you just see all these tourists and you see the animals, there's something in our minds, I think that tells us that there's a level of safety because you're in a tourist destination or it's a national park it's not really a does not tourist destination, but it is so that's been very interesting awareness for me as I travel and have even taken tours in those areas of how to have those conversations that I understand you want the picture I understand you're excited about engaging with this animal and yet there is a boundary between you and this animal you can't actually be in its personal space.

20:07

Yeah, I think that I've seen people get chased by Buffalo and Yellowstone, for sure. But I think like, the general thing that I try to get across to people is if they're gonna go do a wildlife encounter or be around wildlife, like, a lot of times, you'll be on a tour. And you're there to see and appreciate that animal and learn about it. And really, I think, the takeaway for me, it always takes away the feeling of coexisting, like really perfect for every other living thing on the planet and realizing how we all function together as things that live on planet Earth, right? Yeah, normally, you'll be on a tour or with a tour guide a lot of times.

And it's just listening to what they say and being respectful. But it's like we did a sea turtle or diving with sea turtles in Hawaii, which is really common out there. But don't they say don't touch the turtles, because that's a real thing you're not supposed to do. And still there were tours trying to do it. And we actually did say something then because it's like, don't just blatantly disobey the rules of the country that you're visiting, or the place you're visiting.

Christine Winebrenner Irick 21:08

Yeah, I agree. And, again, I think, yeah, you just have to have those conversations over and over. And speaking of those kinds of conversations, when you and I talked before we were talking about a little bit from the production side, or the storytelling side of how do you capture an audience and tell the story that you still want to tell? And I know, this is for a lot of people who are working in the tourism industry, who are working in entertainment, who are working in conservation, telling, talking about sustainability, all these things that are kind of maybe weighty or topics?

How do you bring audiences in and still share that message with them so that you can send them home with a piece of that understanding of that respect, and that coexisting that you were mentioning, what do you think are tools that you maybe use when you're creating content,

21:59

When I create my content, I lean more into the excitement and the genuine love for these experiences. And then there's always the fact to want to educate like, I want to be able to bring people with me and show them what it's like, but really like in my hope is to instill in them, like an offer nature and for wildlife.

Because it's so fascinating. And pretty much what I tried to do was hard, especially for animals, it's hard to show things that are really graphic, I don't really cross that line. But in my videos, I will say things about the places that I'm at, or things that you should be careful of. I pretty much try to approach it from a positive perspective of just feeding little tips and things that people might not know. Because I feel like if you travel a lot, some things are very common knowledge to you.

And things you hear everywhere, like plastic straws hurt sea turtles, plastic hurts ocean animals, but not everybody knows that just because you know it for the first time, or somebody might have heard it a lot. But because you said it in a video, something connected for them. I feel like it's hard for people to really just be like, Okay, now I'm going to be 100% sustainable, it takes little drops of hearing it from multiple people over and over and over. Until one day they go. I think maybe I'll buy reusable bags this time instead of plastic that eats just its very small steps. Yeah, I tried to just approach things from a positive place and a place of just love and education. And just hope and inspire people to like to do a little bit better.

Christine Winebrenner Irick 23:41

Yeah, I think it's so good. And it's so interesting, because I think when we have these deep passions, and we know the positive impact that we can create, if we make these changes, we sometimes want to feel like oh, I want to share that all the time with every buddy. However, we realize at the same time that it will become overwhelming. And it's almost then you can't hear any of that information. And I've talked with a few other people that are also creating content in similar arenas, and they are like I would love to just talk about sustainability all day long. But people would actually not come to me because they're really going to come to me because they want actually what you said that ah and that wonder and they want to see the beauty of a destination.

And then while I have their attention, I can also talk about how climate is affecting glaciers or how plastics are impacting the ocean. And so then you've actually by telling that story, gotten them invested in what you're talking about, because now maybe because they felt that or they have seen that animal and they are really emotionally connected to it. Then when you tell them that fact, it creates like you said that connection that maybe will be more long standing than if you just sat and created a content with all of these facts that are valuable but not relevant if you don't have context for them?

25:01

Exactly. It's almost like you have to not trick but you have to just slip it in there and they'll subconsciously pick up on it sometimes. But yeah, so when I travel, sometimes things that I do is I'm going on a trip, here's what I'm packing, but it's all sustainable. Like, I use stasher bags all the time, or I just show people like little glimpses like that. Because like I said, I think it does a lot to play in the subconscious. If you're just if they're just seeing it like, Oh, she lives like this. And she talks about this sometimes. And eventually, maybe it'll influence them a little bit.

Christine Winebrenner Irick 25:32

Yeah, no, that's so great, too. When you talk about preparing for a trip and packing, like you said, maybe my inclination is to be like, here's the stasher bag, this is why I use it, here's all the things that it could do. But you just put it in your pile of stuff, like someone's going to be curious. And then because that was a self led inquiry, it's going to mean something more to them when they find out, like why they could use that or how and I think that is so impactful to think about, and just a lot of people we've had this conversation of how do we engage people in sustainability? How do we engage them in ethical travel practices and, and finding that balance of giving them information, letting them discover information, creating the connection to it. So I think it's really helpful just to kind of keep exploring how that happens.

One thing that I wanted to talk about with you as well, which has been really interesting, over the course of doing this podcast, how many women who have connected with who have had careers beginning as on doing on camera work, doing modeling, doing stunt work, doing something in the arena of the entertainment industry, a lot of people doing red carpet work, who have now like, come into this space. And I'm sure it's because those are the people I'm attracting. But I think it's really interesting to see, like how that has happened.

And then also, the other conversation that happens so much is that many of the women I've talked to have their own programs, their own adventure programs, their own YouTube channels, maybe small programs on PBS, if they're lucky enough to do that, what I would love to talk about and I mentioned this idea, like even seeing you as someone who has gone and gotten an education, biology and then worked in a zoo.

Now that validates to me, someone can do those things. What I want to talk about is the fact that there are very few women working in the field with animals, one and two, very few women working in the space of creating entertainment travel programs. And I would just love to hear from you what your experiences have been, like maybe what barriers you've come up against. And if you have any ideas of shifts that we could create to bring more women into those spaces so that other women know that they could also break down that door. Rachel's loaded question was so many.

28:10

So that is one thing that I noticed right off the bat, if you look at the wildlife shows that have been on TV, mostly, the hosts of those shows are in the category of Caucasian male, and most of them are very excited. Well, what happens when this spider bites me or it's very kind of like shocking content, or it's like a documentary on Nat Geo where it's just very cinematic for me while I was growing up. And in the past few years, while I was thinking about doing what I'm doing now on YouTube, I was like, there's not really a show that has a female lead host that is going on location, interacting with animals and learning about them and educating people about them.

Like I found some examples, but there weren't that many, and I didn't find any that were currently airing. I think there definitely is a bit of a hole there in that category specifically for wildlife, and women working in wildlife on TV. That was one of the first things that I really noticed and that I thought a lot about, and I am hoping to open up that door. I don't really know how my first step was just getting it started for myself because I thought about it for so many years. And there was always something that held me back. And I think a lot of it was that because coming from Hollywood and being on productions and being on sets, and knowing how everything on the back end runs. For me, I had this vision in my head of what I wanted it to look like if it was on Animal Planet, or Netflix or Disney plus or discovery.

But I am just being my own person. I don't have the capacity to make it look like that because that requires a whole camera crew and audio and director and a producer and all these moving parts. So that was one of the struggles that I had was just figuring out how to do it on your own. And luckily, there are some girls that I was able to reach out to who I think you've interviewed before, who do the travel stuff on their own, like you said PBS segments or YouTube, it definitely can be done, you just, it's a lot of work. And you just have to love that thing so much that you're willing to do it. And it works out. Because the fact that you love it so much, I really get excited, like it is a lot of work. But I get excited doing it. Like when I sit down to Edit YouTube videos, I can go for three hours. And it'll be like 30 minutes flying by, because you're into it.

So I would say the hardest thing would be just learning how to do it all on my own for now, or anyone that wants to get started, I do have a goal to start trying to reach out more to hopefully get more of a woman community and help people like you, every everyone that you've interviewed on your podcast, I think is amazing. So I'm hoping to be able to make some connections with other women. And I think just having that support group just to talk about stuff, even if you're still filming and editing all your content yourself. But just to have someone that's also doing the same thing that you can check ideas over with.

Christine Winebrenner Irick 31:02

Yeah, I love that you mentioned because the background of production is that when you started to envision what you were creating, you envisioned it like this, like large scale production, or that's what you're used to seeing. That's what we're all used to seeing when we look at television these days.

And I was thinking about when I started my travel company and coming from the industry very similarly, like I had this paralysis of starting because I'm like, Okay, so the end goal is running 100 trips a year having this staff having these people doing all these things, and my marketing should look like this, and my this should look like that. And then I look back to my one, myself , the things I can do. And I'm like, totally dying, because there's no way I can do all those things.

And then at some point, you realize there's no way I can do all of those things. And that kind of gives you a little bit of permission, like you said, to do one thing to pick the thing you know how to do and take that step. And then like you'll gain some skills, and you maybe will gain some connection and some other kinds of support. And you can do the next thing. But I think for those women listening or those listeners listening, this applies to so many things beyond my starting my business and you starting creating your content that you're creating, like when we only see this image of perfection that is at such an impossible scale, and we try to match our dreams to that we will never get there. And I think our society has really set us up for that scale of perfection.

And I think it's really important to know that anyone that we've seen didn't start there, like you even think of Hollywood producers or large businesses, they didn't start here, they started here, it's just that we haven't seen all the steps it took to get here. And so I think that is a really valuable takeaway, hopefully, for people listening, maybe that will give them permission to just like, do something wrong, or do something small or do something imperfectly, first, just to get going.

33:13

Yeah, for sure. And also not trying to do, like you said everything because I was the same way. I was like, Okay, I'm gonna sit down and map out my entire plan. And once my plan is mapped out, then I'll start and the amount of time that I wasted trying to put my plan in place when I could have just started doing the thing that I was planning to do.

It's like, even if you start taking steps in that direction, like a big one for me, when I wanted to start making animal content I didn't have any animals. I have two dogs, but I know a lot of content creators and YouTubers that are big in the animal space, live on, like they have their own ranches or they have they work at a zoo or something where they have access to the animals all the time. And I was like, how am I going to do this.

But I think that also helps push me in the direction of doing my idea of where you can see animals. Because there's tons of people that love animals, but can't take care of exotic animals, they just love that they want to go see them and appreciate them. And it's once you start taking steps to that and that then I am meeting people that have animals and I'm able to do collaborations with them where I can go to them and film some content and learn about their animals and share that stuff with

Christine Winebrenner Irick 34:19

people. Yeah, yeah, I think that's so great just to kind of take stock of what you have. And then I also think that helps us understand what we really want to do so for you like that really helped you niche down to where can we go see animals like instead of just like creating content about wildlife experiences and all these different ways you could look at it there'd be a million different stories you could tell like you really found what your story was, and that will be relatable to other people that have similar experiences.

And I think that's another thing as entrepreneurs or business owners or storytellers like there's an endless amount of things available to us and so we really get lost in that And when we can, again, give ourselves permission to narrow down, find out what it is that we're really passionate about, and just really focus on that. We're going to be creating better content experiences, etc, than trying to speak to the masses. And I don't know if for you, it has been freeing for you to just step into that particular space.

35:21

So much, I can't even tell you how freeing it is. Because you're right, once you get that thing, it's more like it fuels you rather than drains you. Because I got into the social media space first on Instagram, I was doing what everybody does, when they start I was doing lifestyle and fitness and beauty and fashion and pretty much anything, because you feel like you have to cater to the masses, when the whole time I knew that I didn't really care about those things as much as I care about travel and animals.

And once I really, when I started putting out my YouTube videos, that was the point where I told myself, this is it, this is all I'm doing going forward. And it fuels me so much to the point where sometimes I almost don't want to take collaborations to work on something else. If it's not 1,000% Organic to me and authentic to me and fits already into what I'm doing. If I have to go a little bit out of what I'm doing, and spend that extra time in some other category, I almost don't want to do it because I'd rather just take that time and feed it into what I really love doing. It is really freeing, and it's a really nice kind of break from just feeling like you're hustling all the time with no direction and no end.

Christine Winebrenner Irick 36:35

Gosh, there's so many good takeaways. I feel like Yeah, we like we've obviously gone through all of this. So we're sitting in a different space even being able to have these conversations. So I want people listening to like, know that clarity does not happen overnight. And when it does, like you said, it's really freeing, but the idea for me that I was thinking about is you were just saying if something is a little bit outside of my lane, I really have to decide if I want to put my energy there.

And there's the idea that whatever you say yes to, you're saying no to something else, because your energy is in that direction. And so if you are tempted to do something because of a monetary reward, or visibility, or there's like all these things we have to take into account when we're in this space. Okay, those might be great things. But as soon as I've said yes to this other kind of energetic idea that's coming by, I don't have space to land. So if you're putting your energy into one direction, you have immediately shifted, and this other thing can't find you.

And so I think it's really important, because it can feel so scary, because we want to say yes to a paycheck, or we want to say yes to someone who can help us further our resume, or all these other things. But as soon as it doesn't feel in alignment, it's a really hard lesson to know that we need to just say no.

So the next thing can land in our space, and we can carry that forward, and then that will, like use that fuel less than that's gonna, like, bring in even more aligned things, because people are going to be really clear, they're gonna be like, Okay, I know if I want to do this Giuliana is my person. I know 100% She will communicate that story and message that is what she is passionate about. And then they know right where to find you because you're not murky. We're like, oh, I don't know, sometimes she talks about yoga.

And sometimes she talks about books. And sometimes she talks about hiking, I'm not really sure. But now like, we know what to go to you for, what your expertise is, the story you can tell where you're going to be most fired up, and then how you're going to actually attract other people to you. So it's, I feel like it's a very interesting path, like when you're walking through that space of finding out how you want to show up. Yeah, so interesting. And I think a,

38:57

It helps if you're in a space where you can do that. Because if you're just getting started, and you're creating content for trying for monetary purposes, sure. You need to say yes to things so that you can support your financial life. But it took me like six years, I thought I would go to work. And think all day long about ideas for this wild adventure show that I wanted to start. And I would just think about and think about and think about for so long.

And it got to the point where I told myself, if I don't do it this year, I'm going to trash the whole project. And if I ever see a show, one day on TV, that is like the show in my head, I'm going to be mad at myself, but I can't be mad at myself because I never took that step to do it. I would just do the show and be like, Oh, maybe that could have been me.

Yeah, it's hard because I think it's important for listeners to take away that it doesn't happen overnight. You just think it does because you see people come out of their successes and then I love diving into people's backstories because then you realize that person worked 10 years before that article or that trip, or whatever that really launched their career.

But it is so nice to just like you said, if you're saying yes to something, you're saying no to something else. So you want to make sure you're saying yes to the areas that you want your life to go in those directions.

Christine Winebrenner Irick 40:18

Yeah, I am really being reminded of the book, Elizabeth Gilbert's book, Big Magic. We're talking about the TV show, because she talks about it in that book. She had this idea for this book. And this is not a book that I can imagine anybody else would have had the idea to write. And it was very specific. And she just kept not writing it and then didn't claim it as her own. Or it realized maybe it wasn't hers. And then she meets someone later, who is writing this same book that she didn't choose to write. And it was that same idea, like these things already exist in the universe. And if it's yours, take it and make it yours. And if it's not yours, that's okay. Like release it to the universe, and the next person will find it. So I highly recommend if people are curious about what we're talking about right now, and trying to understand that's such a good book for understanding some of this