IAM1216 – Founder Helps Her Clients Write their Amazing Life Stories

Lauren Befus is the founder and chief historian of Memory Lane Jane, a national life story-writing company that partners with individuals and families to preserve their loved one’s life stories and legacies in custom heirloom books. Lauren’s company is based in Grand Rapids, Michigan, where she lives with her husband and four kids, but she travels around the country interviewing and working with life story clients.

• CEO Story: Started in 2017, realizing that there are incredible stories out there, especially family, that need to be recorded or written, that’s where the seed of passion started for Lauren.
• Business Service: She interviews her clients with their life stories and collects pictures. Having a team of writers and designers they create a product that is beautifully customized book design.
• Secret Sauce: Her love for people and their stories. A very custom experience because she does personal interviews with her clients.
• CEO Hack: The importance of having a community that helps each other.
  • Recommended Books: Deep Work – creating time and space according to who you are. War of Art – a lot of success does not just happen, it's something you continually work at.
• CEO Nugget: She sometimes feels the imposter syndrome but overcomes it, reminds herself that everybody feels the same way and so she pushes herself that she is doing amazing work.
• CEO Defined: Train and empower others to tell great stories. Imparting your vision to others.

Website: www.memorylanejane.com

Facebook: memorylanejane

Instagram: memorylanejane

LinkedIn: lauren-befus-94b419151

Check out one of our favorite CEO Hack’s Audible. Get your free audiobook and check out more of our favorite CEO Hacks HERE

Transcription

The full transcription is only available to CBNation Library Members. Sign up today!

Please Note: Our team is using the AI CEO Hacks: Exemplary AI and Otter.ai to support our podcast transcription. While we know it's improving there may be some inaccuracies, we are updating and improving them. Please contact us if you notice any issues, you can also test out Exemplary AI here.

00:15 – Intro

Do you want to learn effective ways to build relationships, generate sales, and grow your business from successful entrepreneurs, startups, and CEO's without listening to a long, long, long interview? If so, you've come to the right place, value your time, and are ready to share with you precisely the information you're in search of. This is to I AM CEO podcast.

00:43 – Gresham Harkless

Hello. Hello. Hello. This is Gresh from the I AM CEO podcast. I have a very special guest on the show today. I have Lauren Beefus of Memory Lane Jane. Lauren, it's great to have you on the show.

00:52 – Lauren Befus

Thank you. Thanks. It's so great to be here. I'm excited.

00:55 – Gresham Harkless

Yes, definitely excited as well, to have you on the show and hearing about all the awesome things that you're doing. Before we jump into the interview, I want to read a little bit more about Lauren. They could hear about all the awesome things that she's doing. Lauren is the founder and chief historian of Memory Lane Jane, a national life story-writing company that partners with individuals and families to preserve their loved one's life stories and legacies and custom heirloom books. Lauren's company is based in Grand Rapids, Michigan, where she lives with her husband and four kids, but she travels around the country interviewing and working with life story clients. Lauren, super excited to have you again on the show and hear about all the awesome things that you're doing. Are you ready to speak to the I AM CEO community?

[restrict paid=”true”]

01:33 – Lauren Befus

Yes, I'm ready.

01:36 – Gresham Harkless

Awesome. Well, let's do it then. So, since you're always asking everybody about their stories and hearing all those backgrounds, I wanted to flip the script a little bit and hear a little bit more about what I call your CEO story. You started with all the awesome work you're doing.

01:47 – Lauren Befus

Great. Thank you. Yes, I know. It is always nice to be asked questions because I am always the one inquiring about everybody else. I think I like to talk, too. I like to share about me. So, yeah, let's see. I started memory lane Jane in 2017, and that was just after such a long journey. I won't go into all the details, but just kind of briefly. You know, I went to school. I went to college for writing and Journalism and got a job as a rookie newspaper reporter right out of school and started meeting a bunch of World War Two veterans. They were their stories were so incredible. They had never told anybody. Nobody knew. I would even sometimes their wives would smack them on the shoulder and say, you never told me that. We've been married for 40 years.

So I just, it kind of planted a seed in me there because I was thinking, wow, nobody's going to know these stories if they aren't recorded if they're not asked. So I just started on the side going with an old tape recorder. You know, you press the two buttons down and put it in front of them. I would do that when I had a day off or whatever. I would just go sit with these guys and ask questions and record it for their families. So that was the beginning of me just realizing, wow, there are so, so many stories out there that are incredible. Not just World War Two veterans, everybody, I mean, their story, especially to your family, matters. So that was, gosh, 22 years ago. So I went and moved into different writing jobs and still just have this over the years, this kind of, oh, there's something here.

I don't know what it is. So a bunch more experiences. Then about ten years ago, my husband's grandfather said to me, gosh, I really want to tell my story. He has a huge family. I want to tell my, kind of the patriarch of the family. I want to tell my story to my kids and grandkids. I want them to know. So he said, I know you know how to write an interview. He said all I know how to do is talk. He said, do you think that we could do something here? Put it in this beautiful hardcover, full color, 100 5160 page book. He didn't tell anybody in the family.

And so he bought, I think we had 45 of them printed. Then he surprised everyone at our family Christmas gathering, and they all opened them up at the same time. It just brought the house down. It was incredible. I mean, everyone was crying and just couldn't believe it. I think for him, it was this validation of his life. So, anyway, that in that moment, I knew this was what I wanted to do. This is what I. I just think every family should have a book like this of theirs, stories.

04:41 – Gresham Harkless

I appreciate you so much and sharing that. And so many times I feel like I always say that when you tell your stories, so many times there are so many other stories that are wrapped into it, and we sometimes forget and think that we're in silos. I absolutely, I'm a journalist at heart. My love stories love all those aspects. So, so much of that resonated with me because I love, there used to be a TV show, I think it was like, or a segment, maybe everybody has a story and it would take kind of unimposing people and talk about their story and all the awesome things that you're doing. I thought that was beautiful.

05:11 – Lauren Befus

Yeah, it's incredible. It really is. There's something so powerful about looking in someone's eyes when they're telling you their story and you learn how they came to believe what they believe. And you might not agree with it, but it's been humanized. So, they're a human being that you suddenly come to love and care for. Maybe you don't agree, but there's something in sharing your stories face to face. I would say, especially face to face, that just, it's so powerful. I don't know if anything replaces it or if there is any better way to break down barriers than that. So, I mean, I'm a little biased.

05:48 – Gresham Harkless

Yeah, well, I'm biased as well too. So you have me in that camp too. So I definitely will cosign and agree to that. I wanted to drill down a little bit. I know we touched on a little bit about how you work with your clients. Could you take us through a little bit more on your process and how you serve the clients you work with?

06:02 – Lauren Befus

Sure. Sure. Yeah. So I'm in the middle. I'm, you know, about three, well, four years in now of realizing, wow, I started out with one process and I'm doing some refining now because you don't know until you know. But typically. So I will meet with a potential client and then we go through what is our vision for this book. What do we want it to look like, you know, how many hours of interview, that kind of thing? So that ranges, I mean, that could be six to 30 hours, I mean, or whatever they want. So then once we kind of get the green light for it, I will just start interviewing and we break that up. Overdose chunks. I usually say, you know, 90 minutes, 2 hours. That's all people have to kind of go down memory lane. It's exhausting.

So we break that up over time. Then I get all of those transcribed and then I work with some amazing. I have a writing team, of three different writers. So we take the, I almost compare it to like throwing down a 5000-piece puzzle on the table. You have all the pieces there, but you're putting them together and weaving them. We're trying to keep their voice intact so that you can say, I hear my grandmother telling this story, right, but that it's cohesive and it's something that is enjoyable to read. We don't talk like how we read. We, you know, that needs a lot of work. So my team puts that together. Sometimes it's me, it's fairly collaborative, and then at the same time, we're gathering pictures and mementos working together, and then we send it off to a really great short-run printer. That's typically how it works. That would be kind of start to finish.

07:46 – Gresham Harkless

Awesome. Awesome. Awesome. Appreciate you, you know, sharing that. Also, too, I love that kind of analogy of the puzzle pieces because it seems like it really can be, for lack of a better term, custom design, according to that person, their voice, and their experiences. I really love the creativity that I imagine comes about from that. So I want to ask you, you might have already touched on this, but what I wanted to ask you for is what I call your secret sauce. This could be yourself individually, the business, or a combination of both. But what do you feel kind of sets you apart and makes you unique?

08:14 – Lauren Befus

That's a great question. I love good questions. I think, for me, and I always hate saying this because I don't want it to come across as arrogant. But I honestly think the secret sauce is me. I love. I love people, and I love their stories. So this isn't. There are some kind of big box options to preserve your stories, and they're great. I think, however, you can preserve your story if you do it. But I think I would say so. There is, you know, there's shopping at a Target, or, you know, which is great. Target's great. But then there's kind of this more personalized kind of personal shopping experience where you would go and you're treated kind of to this high-end experience. I would say that's what memory lane Jane is. It's this very custom, intimate kind of. I know.

I hate to keep saying experience, but it really is. I need maybe a better, different word, but I think, you know, most of our clients will say, besides actually getting the finished book, their favorite part of the whole process is just the time spent doing interviews, and that's with me. I do the interviews. So that's the one thing that I haven't yet. That's part of growing and learning when to give things away and train up people. I'm learning that, but, yeah.

And so I think it is. It's just a very custom personal experience. I think part of your secret sauce should be you. I mean, you're bringing the path, you're bringing the vision. So I think I'm able because I'm so obsessed with this and what I do, then I think that's contagious. So it's, I think, a unique experience for our clients and a unique experience for my staff because it's just this kind of, we think we're doing the best work in the whole world. That is coming from me, the leader, just, you know, going on and on and on about how amazing this is. So.

10:17 – Gresham Harkless

Yeah, nice. I love that secret sauce. I think especially because you see the, I guess, the secret sauces of so many people and their experiences and their lives, I can definitely see how that would be, you know, something you, you would zero in on. I think the ability to be able to, you know, of course, see that within yourself, but also be able to get that out of other people as well, too, I imagine during these interviews is extremely powerful and be able to kind of provide those, I was thinking of concierge type services. It sounds too, where you get that. You get that experience that you can't get anywhere else as you would want because your life is unlike anybody else's. So you want to make sure that you get that concierge experience so that you can share your story and leave a legacy and do so many of those awesome things. So I absolutely love that.

10:58 – Lauren Befus

Yes. That's great. I've used that word in the past and have it for a while, so thank you for that reminder.

11:03 – Gresham Harkless

There we go.

11:04 – Lauren Befus

Is exactly. It's exactly that. Yep.

11:07 – Gresham Harkless

Awesome. Awesome. Awesome. Well, I love that. So I wanted to switch gears a little bit, and I want to ask you for what I call a CEO hack. So this could be like an app, a book, or a habit that you have, but what's something that makes you more effective and efficient?

11:20 – Lauren Befus

That's a great question, too. So I read this book, and I'm totally going to botch the author's so-called deep work a little while ago. It was fabulous. So I'm a very distracted person. I'm all over the place. So he talks about where you just set up these short kind of sessions of deep work. Your phone is off, Internet is off. This is, particularly for me, I think as a writer, I have to have creative thinking and I have to have these just really structured times where I can't be distracted and do anything else. So that has been, I'm trying to find the author really quick, too, because it just. The book was so cow.

12:06 – Gresham Harkless

Newport. Cal Newport. Yes.

12:07 – Lauren Befus

Thank you. So that has been really huge, I would say. So Cal Newport deep works. Then another book, the War of Art, has been huge for me, too, just realizing that there is. Because I'm like, why is work hard? Why is creating hard? I feel. I sometimes feel like, well, maybe I'm just not meant to be a creator. Maybe this is just me. I don't. But this whole book, the War of Art, talks about how, no, this is kind of a universal thing that there is actually. It's like the universe is. There's resistance all the time to creating and doing amazing, beautiful things.

12:46 – Gresham Harkless

Absolutely. It is not. It is not hard just for you. It's hard for all of us. It is so important that we continue to kind of share that because that's when I think it starts to demystify and brings that connection and those stories and those opportunities to realize that we're going through this together so that we can all make an impact in our unique ways. So you might have already touched on this, but I want to ask you now for what I call a CEO nugget. So this is a little bit more of a word of wisdom or piece of advice. It might be something if you were to hop into a time machine, you would tell your younger business self, I.

13:15 – Lauren Befus

Have this kind of. This nagging feeling a lot, which I know a lot of people talk about, is imposter syndrome. That, oh, you're not really cut out for this. If people really knew, right, that they'd never hire you or your company. I just have to. I think that's a big one that I've, again, have learned that that is through community, that that is a universal experience. However, I wouldn't know that if I hadn't been honest about that feeling and talked to others and read and listened to podcasts. So I think that would know that everybody feels this way. You do amazing work.

13:56 – Gresham Harkless

That's a huge nugget. That's. That might even be a mountain. So I absolutely love that because I think so many times. By the way, if you run into my younger business self, my present, or even my future business self, make sure you tell him that as well, too. Because I think it's something that we realize that it doesn't go away. It's something that creeps up, especially when we're going to the next level or we're getting uncomfortable going to that next thing. It's always that imposter syndrome. Oh, I'm going to be found out. I'm not good enough. I don't have this right or that right, and I'll be known.

But I think one of the things that has helped me out as well, too, and you kind of alluded to that, is we realize that sometimes the people we look up to, the people that are most, quote-unquote, successful, and however we define that, have that, and they. The only difference is that they continued on. So once you start to do that and you start to realize that you can, we're, as we're talking, writing our story of success, and that's one of the most powerful things we have to remind ourselves of.

14:46 – Lauren Befus

It's true. Yep. I totally agree.

14:49 – Gresham Harkless

Awesome. Awesome. Awesome. So I wanted to ask you now my absolute favorite question, which is the definition of what it means to be a CEO. We're hoping to have different, quote-unquote, CEO's on the show. So, Lauren, what does being a CEO mean to you?

14:59 – Lauren Befus

I found something that I think is incredibly important and needs to happen in our world. So I have a vision and passion for that. I think as CEO of Memory Lane Jane, it is communicating that passion to everyone else that's involved. So I think, okay, my job then is to train up and empower train others to then start telling, you know, they can tell as many stories as I can, maybe more. Maybe they'll be even better.

15:32 – Gresham Harkless

Truly appreciate that definition. I, of course, appreciate your time even more. What I wanted to do is just pass you the mic, so to speak, just to see if there's anything additional that you can let our readers and listeners know and, of course, how best they can get a hold of you and find about all the awesome things you and your team are working.

15:46 – Lauren Befus

Great. Yeah, no, I'm just so grateful to have been on here and just to share some of my story and journey and hopefully bring some encouragement to your listeners. So, yeah, I mean, you can find me@memorylanejane.com. you can find me at Lauren. I have memory Lane Jane on Facebook, on Instagram as well.

16:05 – Gresham Harkless

We'll definitely have the links and information in the show notes. Appreciate you so much and reminding us of the impact that we can have on that legacy that we can start to build and remind other people of. So thank you so much for doing that, and I hope you have a phenomenal rest of the day.

16:16 – Lauren Befus

Thank you. Thanks so much.

16:20 – Outro

Thank you for listening to the I AM CEO Podcast powered by Blue 16 Media. Tune in next time and visit us at iamceo.co I AM CEO is not just a phrase, it's a community. Be sure to follow us on social media and subscribe to our podcast on iTunes Google Play and everywhere you listen to podcasts, SUBSCRIBE, and leave us a five-star rating grab CEO gear at www.ceogear.co. This has been the I AM CEO Podcast with Gresham Harkless. Thank you for listening.

[/restrict]