JASON PROKOWIEW: She says, "Do you hear yourself?

You can sing."

And those words that she says to me feels like she is getting straight to my core.

JACKIE DAVIS: And I had no idea where I was going to land.

Was I staying with the old company, or would I be out on the street without a job?

JUDAH LEBLANG: But I know that my life still needs to change, and I have this crazy idea that I would like to change my name.

WES HAZARD: Tonight's theme is "Transformation."

♪ There aren't many guarantees in life, but here are two.

One, things change.

And two, people tend to be scared of that change because familiarity, even with difficult circumstances, brings a certain level of comfort.

But we all know that in order to advance and, indeed, in order to survive, we must take on change.

♪ PROKOWIEW: My name is Jason Prokowiew.

I grew up in Sudbury, Massachusetts, and I live in Stoneham now, where I run my own disability law practice, and I am also a writer.

So how did your career as a writer begin?

A lot of the story that I'm telling today is about how I was a quiet child, but I always was able to write.

So if there was any kind of recognition of this quiet child that I can remember from when I was young, it's through my writing and teachers sort of highlighting to my parents that this is something that Jason can do.

Well, it's one thing to write, and it is a different thing to write about yourself.

I'm wondering, where did you get the courage to tell your own story?

My father was a war survivor in World War II.

He, however, didn't really tell me much of his story, um, until I started asking him questions when I was about 20 years old.

And when I began to interview him and he began to open up and tell me about what he'd been through in the war, I think I took a lot of courage from that, like the vulnerability it took for him to tell things that he wasn't comfortable telling.

♪ I was raised to be quiet, but the home I grew up in was not quiet.

It's the early 1980s, my father gets home from work about 5:00 p.m. and he heads straight for his bottle of whiskey.

And I know that I have about 30 minutes to run around the house, collect my He-Man figures, my Care Bears, and get them and myself safely behind my bedroom door.

Because around 5:30 p.m., he begins to transform.

For the next several hours, that's where I cower.

And I can hear them, my mother and my father, going at it.

Mostly it's him going at her.

"You're so stupid!

"The kids are so stupid!

They cost too much money!"

Around 10:00, he tires himself, falls asleep, and my mom comes to free me from my room.

And I finally can go use the bathroom to wash up for bed.

The next morning, she acts as though none of this has happened.

She's chipper.

My father looks withered and I think, "This is life.

When something hurts, you keep it quiet."

So when I'm at home, if I feel pain, I quiet it.

I'm quiet at school when the meanest, baddest bully snaps rubber bands against my skin.

Me, the fattest, gayest kid in all the land, I'm quiet when he and his friends lift up the rug at the entrance to the school and I tumble and fall on the ground.

Sometimes, through all of this, alone in my bedroom or in the car with my big sister, I sing.

I know the beauty of a Whitney Houston song, and I know the magic of the beats in Michael Jackson's "Billie Jean."

I know from them that there are things in this world besides rubber bands slapping on my skin and stumbling fathers.

I'm a freshman in high school-- still the fattest, still the gay kid-- and I decide to take a chance on something that I love, and I join the chorus.

And I'm thrust onto these risers with these other boys who somehow have learned that you don't have to be quiet, you can be loud.

They can sing forte.

And I do my best just to keep up.

Our music teacher, Debbie Smith, terrifies me.

She enters the room and she owns it.

The black curls on her hair bounce with everything that she says and does because there's always a hand gesture with it.

Everything that she is terrifies everything that I am.

She announces that next week there will be auditions for a solo for this song, "Shenandoah."

And I think, "Can I do this?

Should I do this?"

I go home, practice it in the bathroom to myself.

The next week, I go into the music room.

I make sure that there are no other kids there.

I slip a tape into the tape deck and I start practicing very quietly.

From 20 feet away, Miss Smith emerges from her office and she comes at me, all forward motion like a storm that's about to hit.

And she stands right next to me and I'm singing, quietly.

I'm trying to act like she is not there beside me.

I'm trying to act like her attention is not on me.

Attention on me has never done me any favors.

It means the kid's chants of ♪ Fatty, fatty two by four ♪ ♪ Couldn't fit through the bathroom door.

♪ Or my father sneering "My God, you are fat" on one of those rare nights when I dare leave my bedroom because I've left a He-Man figure out in the rest of the house.

Miss Smith's beside me now.

She says, "Sing it again."

♪ Oh Shenandoah "Stop.

Rewind.

Play."

She steps back.

"Again, sing."

I sing again.

She rushes at me.

She stops the tape-- presses, rewinds it.

Presses play, steps ten feet back.

At this point, the classes are changing over so there's maybe ten other kids in the room.

Maybe there are a thousand, maybe there are a million.

(audience laughs) I actually don't know, because there is a bubble around me and Miss Smith.

And she says, "Sing, again-- louder!"

♪ Oh Shenandoah I sing and she races at me, stops it, rewinds it.

This time she runs clear across the room to the top of the risers and she says, "Play!

Sing!"

♪ Oh Shenandoah ♪ I long to see you "Do you hear yourself?"

she says.

She's screaming it because she has to, because I'm so loud, she needs to scream at me.

And I sing... ♪ Away, you rolling river She says, "Do you hear yourself?

You can sing!

You can really sing!"

And those words that she says to me feels like she is getting straight to my core.

She may as well be singing, "Sing, Michael.

Sing, Whitney.

Sing, Jason."

(audience laughs) And her attention feels brand new to me.

It feels strange, positive, glowing.

And I sing to it.

The next month, I have my first solo.

My hands shake, my heart is pounding, my voice cracks.

But I work my way through those lingering notes.

And as I sing, I look out in the audience and I lock eyes with my mother, as she wipes tears from her cheeks.

I'm 16 and what I am has always been here.

It was just hard to see and hard to hear on the other sides of those full whiskey glasses that ruled our world.

I'm 45 now.

People like my husband or my friends may shake their heads at this idea of a "quiet" Jason who doesn't sing loudly and clearly.

And I say to them, "Well, let me tell you about high school choir."

And I feel these two distinct tugs.

One of my upbringing and of "Be quiet," and then the other, the revolutionary lessons of Debbie Smith, who demanded that I get out from behind closed doors, who demanded that I change.

Who heard me whisper into the world and she demanded, "Sing!"

Thank you.

(cheers and applause) ♪ DAVIS: I'm Jackie Davis.

I live in Massachusetts and I'm a marketer and an emerging storyteller.

When did you discover your gift for telling stories?

I don't think that I ever really thought that I was a storyteller.

But as I learned the craft and started telling stories, I said, "Oh, well, maybe this is something that you can do."

You know, I don't think I was growing up thinking, "One day I'm going to be a storyteller."

I'm not even sure I knew what a storyteller was.

You know, you hear stories, but to actually know that there is a way to tell a story, you know, I didn't know that.

The story that you're going to share with us tonight, what would you hope that our audience would take away after hearing it?

They shouldn't be afraid to fail.

I think, particularly in this time when there's the Great Resignation and people are leaving jobs and thinking about, "Well, should I go to school, get another job, start a business?"

I think that they should just go for it.

You know, if it's something that they're interested in, try it.

Don't be afraid to fail, because you can always start over again.

♪ I walk into class the first day of design school, and a student asks me if I'm the instructor.

If she had seen the fear in my eyes, she would have known that I was a student.

You see, because when I saw the student projects on display, I was mesmerized and terrified.

You see, other than decorating my bedroom when I was growing up, there was no clear evidence that I had any kind of design talent.

Besides, design school wasn't part of my big plan.

It came to me at a time when I needed an escape.

My mother had been diagnosed with cancer.

And every time the phone rang, I could feel my heart pounding in my chest.

I was so afraid of what I might hear at the other end of the line.

And at the same time, the division I worked for in a high tech company was being sold, and I had no idea where I was going to land.

Was I staying with the old company?

Was I going to the new company?

Or would I be out on the street without a job?

As it turns out, I joined the new company, and I was miserable.

I was so miserable that I hung a sign on the outside wall of my cubicle.

And the sign had a big arrow on it that pointed to the entry.

And printed above the arrow was the word "restroom."

(audience laughs) Now, it was just a regular cubicle, but I felt like I was sitting in a dark, dank gas station restroom.

It was a waste of my time, my talent, and my effort, but it didn't start off that way.

When I first joined the company, I was happy.

I was part of an events team.

That's where I got the restroom sign.

(audience laughs) But it was only temporary, and I got transferred to another division, and I felt totally underutilized.

But there was a bright spot, you see, because I was able to continue to go to design school at night.

And the nervousness that I felt initially was replaced with excitement because I was getting "A"s in my classes, and it was nowhere near as stressful as grad school.

I continue to work and to do decorating for another two years.

And then I got the call, my first paying client.

I was so nervous, I don't know what to do.

I started looking at my notes and reading textbooks and looking at pictures, and I thought, "Am I up to the challenge?

"I'm, I'm just nervous."

But then I had to calm myself.

I said, "Wait a second.

"She doesn't know if she's my first client or my hundredth client."

So I calmed down.

I got myself together, I went in and I did my thing.

I was visiting my sister one day, and she was all excited about this new TV channel, Home & Garden Television, HGTV.

I never heard of HGTV, so I decided I'd watch and see what all the fuss was about.

So I watched Decorating Cents.

Two designers went into a home and they redecorated a room in a day, using the furniture, art, and accessories that were already there.

And I thought, "Wow, that's a blast!

"I'd love to do that!"

So I told some friends and relatives, and some of them were like, "What?

"You think you can get on TV?"

I said, "Well, why not?

What do I have to lose?"

And then my sister reminded me.

She said, "You never met a microphone that you didn't like."

(laughter) "Go for it!"

So I reached out to the network, and they put me in touch with Lisa.

She was the head of the association that auditioned designers for the show.

So I called Lisa and she said, "Well...

I don't know if we're going to do that segment, but I'll get back to you."

So a few months later, she called, and Lisa asked, "Are you still interested?"

"Yes."

"It's in three weeks."

"Okay."

"It's in Minnesota."

"No problem."

Three weeks later, I took a few days off from work and I went to Minnesota.

I was paired with Julia.

We redecorated rooms in two different homes, and on Monday, I went back to work.

I acted as if nothing had happened.

Wasn't a big deal, just another few days off, but it was a big deal, because I was in my element.

Three months later, I quit that soul-sucking job.

(laughter and applause) I officially launched RoomScape Interiors.

My colleagues thought that either I was crazy or I was just kidding.

That is until they saw me on Decorating Cents.

And I continued to decorate rooms on the show for the next nine years.

(cheers and applause) But the show wasn't really what I expected.

Yeah, there were lights and cameras and all that action.

There was no glamour.

There was no chair with my name printed on the back.

And when the crew would tell me that my nose was shining, I'd yell, "Makeup!

Makeup!"

Then I'd look around and say, "Wait a second.

I am makeup."

Those years were some of the most rewarding times of my career.

Yes, there were parts that were bittersweet.

You see, my mother didn't live to see me on HGTV or to grow my career.

There was risk involved and hard times.

And I had periods of fear, uncertainty, and doubt.

But it was all worth it because I was in my element.

I was where I belonged.

I practiced my craft.

I asked for what I wanted, and I took advantage of every opportunity.

And those steps made all the difference in the world.

If I was to hang a sign outside my office door today, the word on the sign would be "happy."

(cheers and applause) DAVIS: Thank you.

(applause) ♪ LEBLANG: My name is Judah Leblang.

I live in Boston, and I'm a writer, teacher, and storyteller.

So I understand that you have a memoir about owning your own voice.

And I'm curious, could you tell us what inspired that?

I had thought a lot over the last ten, 15 years about the influence that my uncle had on my life, my only uncle, who was deaf.

And then around the age of 50, I suddenly lost about half my own hearing.

And it just was the spark (snaps fingers) to jump into the story, which I think was a kind of unique story about this connection that I had and the bond between us, which has continued, uh, all these years.

And have you felt that it's been a natural transition from memoir writing into live storytelling?

I think for me as a writer... the reward is being able to share some of... some of my material, you know, in person, and especially in front of a live audience.

Getting that kind of feedback in real time from an audience is really satisfying for me.

♪ I'm sitting across a table from a 40-ish guy, a guy about my age, at the entrance to the psych unit at a hospital near Boston.

It's spring of 1998, and I'm basically applying to get in.

You see, over the past year, I'd gone through a series of unfortunate events.

I was in a car accident, and my new career as a sign language interpreter wasn't working out.

I was rushing from job to job and found the work draining and exhausting.

I had a short-term relationship that ended, and it got to the point where I was having trouble eating, sleeping-- just getting through the day.

So the counselor asks me, "Are you a danger to yourself?

Do you think you would, you would hurt yourself?"

And I said, "No, because I'm not into pain, "and I'm kind of a hypochondriac.

"I just really want to feel better and deal with this depression."

So he tells me that I'm not eligible for the inpatient unit.

And when he tells me that, I feel both relieved and disappointed.

Relieved because maybe that means that there is hope for me yet, and disappointed because, how depressed do I have to be to get in?

(audience laughs) Well, he tells me that I would be eligible for something called their day program, where I would go from Monday to Friday, 9:00 to 5:00.

Kind of like going to school.

So I sign up.

I go to sessions on finding humor in daily life, managing stress, handling your depression.

And at the end of two weeks, I sort of graduate.

Meaning that I feel like, okay, I think I can get through the day and...

I feel a little more hopeful.

But I know that my life still needs to change.

And I have this crazy idea that I would like to change my name.

You see, I never really loved the name Bruce, and I had a name that came up for me.

The name was Judah, which was a name which was connected to my Jewish culture and background.

But I wasn't observant or religious.

Still, I knew one kid with that name in high school.

He had wavy brown hair, piercing green eyes, and a killer smile.

Looking back, I would say that I had a crush on him.

But, you know, changing one's name, that just felt to me like it would be flighty and calling attention to myself, which is something that I wasn't used to.

I mean, I was a sign language interpreter.

I was all about being in the background.

So I tucked the name away.

Now, years earlier, I lived for a year in a yoga ashram in Western Massachusetts, a place called Kripalu.

There we had an Indian guru and about 350 residents.

And many of the residents became disciples of the guru and were given Sanskrit names.

But Shrutavaan or Snehdeep Leblang, it just didn't seem to fit my, my vibe.

(audience laughs) And... so I stuck with Bruce.

So now, years later, I'm thinking, here in the outside world, you know, what would it be like to take a new name?

Around that time, I started to write.

I found that around the age of 40, I seemed to have a voice, and these pieces just poured out of me.

And some of them were funny, like dealing with the migration of my hair, which was going from the top of my head to other parts of my body.

(audience laughs) And I found that people could relate to some of these things that I was writing about.

(sighs) Another thing that I did was, I was part of a men's group, a gay men's group.

It was a therapy group.

The group was led by a psychologist named Peter, a big guy, who had kind of a confrontational style.

Like he would call us on our habitual patterns, and he was very good at it.

So when guys in the group would be talking about going off with their significant others, I would get angry, I would get jealous.

And when I express that, Peter would look at me and say, "You need to focus on the good things in your life.

"Be thankful for what you have, not always focusing on what you don't."

And then he would come out with this smile, like a smirk, which I wanted to erase with something mildly abrasive, like battery acid.

(laughter) Well, I couldn't do that.

So, again, I focused on writing.

I got a column in the local newspaper.

And I started to publish my pieces under the name Judah.

When I started to use the name in my writing on a part-time basis, I started to feel like, you know, maybe Judah is the man I can grow into.

Maybe this is a name that... it just felt right.

Over time, I was working with that, and I felt my depression starting to lift, kind of like the fog over Cape Cod.

The next year, I started a newer, lower-stress job at a local college, and since I was meeting everybody for the first time, I introduced myself as Judah, and I took on that as my name.

But it wasn't all smooth sailing.

My roommate at the time, who was not Jewish, said to me, "Well, that's a cool name, "but everybody's going to hear it as Judas and wonder what you did wrong."

(audience laughs) But over time, they came around, and again I felt like this is right.

This feels right.

The next year, I went back to a writers' conference in Cleveland, my hometown.

At the conference, we were divided into groups, and I was in a group with a man named Larry, who was obviously Jewish, like me.

He wore a yarmulke or skullcap, and over the course of the week, we became friends.

Later during the week, he said to me that he really liked my name and that Judah was his middle name.

Did I know what it meant?

Well, I knew that Judah was mentioned in the Old Testament, in the Torah, was one of Joseph's brothers, and was one of the founders of the 12 tribes of Israel, but I never thought about that it meant anything.

"Uh, no.

"Does it mean something?"

I say.

And he looks at me and says, "Judah, your name means gratitude."

And I nodded, too stunned to speak.

Sometimes, when I slow down the mental chatter in my mind, which is running around like a hamster on a wheel, I seem to tune into a smaller, quieter voice which knows things that my conscious mind does not know.

I haven't mastered the art of gratitude, but I am thankful for the gift of this name, which on some level has chosen me.

Thank you.

(applause) OKOKON: The Stories From the Stage Podcast with extraordinary, true stories.

wherever you listen to podcasts.

Consider supporting more great storytelling at give.worldchannel.org/stories at give.worldchannel.org/stories ♪