Meet Yulia Denisyuk

We were lucky to catch up with Yulia Denisyuk recently and have shared our conversation below.

Yulia , we’re thrilled to have you sharing your thoughts and lessons with our community. So, for folks who are at a stage in their life or career where they are trying to be more resilient, can you share where you get your resilience from?

I get my resilience from a lineage of strong women. My mother and grandmother both are strong women who have had many challenges in life. My grandmother grew up during World War II in the hunger-stricken Soviet Union. She raised three children alone. My mother went through the fall of the Soviet Union, raising her daughter (me) alone as well in a situation of a complete economic crash and currency devaluation. They’ve both left their homes in search of better lives elsewhere and started life over many times. As an immigrant, I’ve faced my share of challenges in this country, but I have always drawn strength from some invisible well. Today I know the source of that well: it is my lineage.

Thanks for sharing that. So, before we get any further into our conversation, can you tell our readers a bit about yourself and what you’re working on?

Like all of us, I don’t fit into one neat box. I am a creator, a journalist, an immigrant, a military vet, an educator, a traveler, an entrepreneur, and more. I organize storytelling workshops worldwide and lead occasional small-group tours to places I love.

Ultimately, I am a storyteller. I believe that stories are fundamental to our humanity. I also believe that travel has the power to bring us closer together. It makes us better human beings—more tolerant, open-minded, and sensitive to cultures and viewpoints different than our own.

I was born in Kazakhstan and grew up in Estonia. I have traveled the world extensively and turned to a career in travel media after getting an MBA and working more than a decade for large organizations—first as a Navy Sailor, then as a brand manager at Fortune 500 companies. Over four decades on this planet, I’ve led many different lives and traveled to over 100 countries. For past assignments with publications like National Geographic, TIME, and more, I’ve shared a roof with nomads in Mongolia, traced the origins of Iznik tiles with artisans in Turkey, and learned the art of imigongo with artist collectives in Rwanda.

Today, I’m building the Going Places platform. It’s a weekly podcast and newsletter with a vision to become a platform for storytellers across the globe to share their voices. On the show, I’ve interviewed the CEO of Adventure Shannon Stowell, the Middle East’s first female olive oil sommelier Amelia Bilbeisi, Palestinian peace activist Aziz Abu Sarah, and more.

Looking back, what do you think were the three qualities, skills, or areas of knowledge that were most impactful in your journey? What advice do you have for folks who are early in their journey in terms of how they can best develop or improve on these?

Consistency, commitment, and getting back up after a fall. First, consistency: as a creator, you have to keep showing up with your voice in all areas of your public life. That helps you build an area of expertise that people start recognizing you for. Second, commitment: building a creative career takes time. When you commit to your path (while figuring out how to support yourself financially as you do it), you will see results. But you need to be patient because there is no such thing as an overnight success. It took me years to build my career to its current level. Not giving up was the single most important thing that contributed to my success. Third, getting back up. I heard “no” so many times in my career. There were many projects I worked on that never went anywhere. Being able to fail and come back again to your practice is crucial. Don’t take your rejections, set backs, and failures personally and keep going.

How can folks who want to work with you connect?

I am looking for aligned travel brands and destinations to partner with. There are several ways to work with me: I run storytelling and media workshops for travel organizations, helping them improve their marketing efforts and media relations. I also work as a consultant who can help travel organizations refine their message and improve their earned media efforts. Finally, I partner with brands on my Going Places show, where their stories can be told through my voice and point of view to my audience of social media followers, email subscribers, and podcast listeners.

Contact Info:

Image Credits

Credit: Yulia Denisyuk

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