Hey, quiet thinkers. Welcome to episode one of the Amplified Introvert podcast. Super excited to have you here. My name is Robert Rupp and I'm gonna be your host. I have about 33 years of marketing experience that I'm going to use to help you break your chains of quietude. All right? And we're gonna do that each week with content through Substack, through the podcast, and other places.
So to get started, I invite you to go to amplifiedintrovert.com and sign up for that Substack 'cause what this is gonna do, it's gonna give you some VIP rewards, all right?
You want those rewards, everyone wants rewards and free stuff. So go to amplifiedintrovert.com to get yours.
I don't know about you, but it is tough to be an introvert, right? Constantly living each day. In an extroverted world, constantly almost being bullied by people to speak up, to go out.
And for those of us that don't like to drink, I know, you know what I mean when I say it's very hard to not be a drinker in social groups because they want you to drink as well.
So it's, we're living in a very, I don't know, it's, uh, unidirectional maybe type of world, right? It's just not meant for us. But there are ways you can get past it.
And how I did it... now, I went from being a poor kid, right? Grew up really poor in an abusive household. There's just a lot of traumas and uh, stuff there that went on.
That's what made me introverted was just the abuse and being bullied at a young age that made me an introverted person. So, in my teenage years, I started playing with computers. You know, I was, I was a quiet kid, I was a nerd.
So that's when I started learning how to build websites.
Uh, gosh, I was 13 years old.
It was 1996 at the time, and uh, I built one of the first 2,376 damn websites in the world. I'm like, can you believe that shit?
A 13-year-old kid, right? Who the hell was I?
But it was 1996 and no one was really building websites, so, I didn't know what I was doing at the time, and I didn't know the magnitude of what I had built, but what I found out was how exciting it was to be able to sit behind a keyboard and a computer screen and to just have my voice heard, or even to have my words read, right?
At the time, you couldn't really do multimedia like we can do today. So at the time it was just make graphics with Photoshop version one, right? Which was what I was using. It was totally, uh, when I got it, it was pirated.
Because I was a kid, man, I didn't know how to get software, but I knew how to use the online bulletin boards, right? Please, if you're listening to this, come on, don't, please don't sue me. It's been like 30 fucking years.
Please don't crash my parade now. But that's what got my career started and I used the Hotdog Pro web editor and it was basically like, you know, notepad.
So I put those two things together, built a real crappy version of, uh, my first website, but. It was a Marilyn Manson fan site.
I liked listening to Marilyn Manson music, but that's when I learned. Right.
And honestly, I think I was one of the first content creators in the world. I know I was one of the first 2,300 as far as websites go, but of those 2,300, I'm sure a lot were just like educational sites, right?
Because that's kind of what the internet was made for. It was a communication tool for educational reasons, but... Where was I going with this?
You know, I don't know. Anyway, there's the ADHD kicking in too, so hey, how many of you actually have that too? Do you have attention deficit with like overthinking and some other stuff going on?
I wonder.
I think it's quite common, honestly. The more research I do, the more I find that while I thought I was special and all those years went by and I was an introvert and I didn't talk. I didn't really reach out. I didn't really say a lot because I thought I was special, but not special in a good way. I thought that I was different.
But now, over the past year, well, a year and a half that I've been doing work with introverts and talking to a few hundred, I realize, huh, well, I'm not special.
I'm not special at all, and neither are you.
Yeah, you are special. But introverts we're like more than 47% of the population. Did you know that? Did you know that?
So, more than half of the world probably, because I'm sure the research, right, it says 47%, but I'm sure it's even more than that because there's ones that aren't accounted for, and people that don't even answer the surveys, but we have to be more than half the population. So I'm not gonna let us sit down anymore and be quiet.
Guys, ladies, gentlemen, cats, trees, whoever, you, whatever, whoever's listening, we gotta amplify. We gotta get together.
First of all, we have to get together in the comfort of our own homes, right? I mean, let's be real. We're introverts, baby, but we have a lot to say.
So if you're with me and you want to do this thing each week, and you wanna start to use the marketing that I've used for the past 30 years? Now, I took myself from nothing, right? From absolute poverty. I couldn't afford shit. I mean, no joke.
Gosh, I remember a time when I had to go to the fucking coin star to get cat food for my cat, and that's what really changed in life that day that I had to feed my cat.
I went to the fucking coin star to get him food. I didn't eat, I fed the cat, but that's when I realized, what the fuck am I doing?
Holy shit.
So then I made a real promise to myself that I was just gonna, you know what?
I was just gonna stop being so quiet. I was gonna market myself. I was gonna start an agency. I was gonna work with people. I was gonna do good in the world.
And seven years later, I went from practically having no car at all.
Well, it was like $300 car, a piece-o-shit car, but I went from having a $300 piece of shit car to a Corvette. I went from living in a 400 square foot apartment with bullet holes in my kitchen to owning my own fucking home here in Texas, and I didn't do that by being quiet. I sure as hell didn't do that by sitting down not saying anything.
I sure as hell didn't do that by letting others know what I could do, by selling myself, by just going out there and putting myself on the line because I had nothing to lose.
So if you have nothing to lose and you're ready to go out there with me each week, i'm gonna teach you how to do some personal branding.
We're gonna talk about psychology.
All right, well, we're gonna talk about how we can actually just be ourselves, right?
How we can amplify our unique voice, gain some damn clarity on what we're good at, and build a connected life that authentically honors, right, who we are, not change us.
Honors who we are because we're people too.
And while the world might not be built for us, damn it, we live here.
We built half of the world and the internet, what I'm talking to you on right now, oh, you bet your ass introverts built the internet. All right?
And about every other damn thing that we enjoy as a society.
So why are you so scared?
Why are you so quiet?
You have more to offer than you think you do.
Tune in next week or tomorrow, or whenever I record the next damn episode. I don't know when it's gonna be, but tune in.
All right, and while you're at it, go to amplifiedintrovert.com, sign up, reach out, join the community. Get in on the chat, because I'm gonna put some special subscriber-only things in there on the Substack, right?
So, this podcast is a companion to the Substack and the Substack's a companion to this book I'm writing, but will probably never publish 'cause that's what I love to do.
I love to start stuff and never finish it.
But I tell you what, I got this first damn podcast episode recorded.
Yeah. I've been procrastinating on this for weeks. And it's done, it's recorded.
And you know what?
If I did it, if this poor kid from Williamsport, Pennsylvania. If this poor, abused kid with PTSD and depression and everything else can do what I've done, what is your excuse?
I'd love to know.
Hey, all, that's it.
We're at time. 10 minutes, nine and a half.
I'm gonna get off here, give you a few seconds back.
Tune in next time.
Seriously, thank you for listening.
It's been a pleasure to serve you today, and I can't wait to talk to you again soon.
Bye-bye.
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