Back in the Saddle: I Hate Cowboy Idioms

I'm back! This week we are going super casual with all the rules and restrictions mostly gone so I can take a moment to enjoy doing what got me into podcasting in the first place, as well as a little life update for those who are interested. 

I'll spend way too much time talking about structure and rethinking everything as well as cover what's been going on over the last 5 months and what the next 5 look like for the podcast. If you were curious about how or even when this would continue, I'll cover all of that in a politically vague way that still hints and cool stuff to come. 

There might be a mention of some podcast milestones and jazz music, but none of that should surprise you if you've listened to previous episodes. Happy to be back and being creative. 

Transcript

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[00:00:00] Hi there. My name is Shawn, and this is the Grind XP podcast, a casual coffee chat that explores leveling up in life and creatively engaging with others to share in that process. This week, I am back in your ears and taking some time to enjoy updating the podcast and planning for what's coming next. So grab your coffee or your tea.

I am working with coffee tonight, and let's dive right in.

Welcome back. Well, welcome back to me. [00:01:00] But welcome back to the podcast. Uh, if you've noticed, I've been gone for a few months. And now I'm back. And we're gonna pick this back up. I was in the mood tonight to sit down and do something creative. I literally had an itch. I was like, I need to be creative.

I had my iPad out. I had been working on some art pieces that just weren't hitting it. And I was thinking about podcasting, storytelling, that kind of thing. I realized I hadn't done it in a while. And I had originally planned to come back shortly after getting a job. We'll talk more about that whole period.

But I had the intention to come back, uh, sometime in August and creative juices were flowing, but I really was not quite to [00:02:00] that point where I was ready to jump back into it. And within the last couple of weeks, I've felt with the change in the season and wanting to be intentionally at home and In a creative space I was like, you know what I think it's time and today just was the perfect day It's a Friday.

This is when we're recording it. I Was done with work. I had a really good week at work. I felt very productive very accomplished and I decided you know what? I think it's time to kick this off again. So I am back and this episode is really gonna be mostly about just me talking. I really wanted to talk, not have a whole lot of structure and just enjoy creating a podcast.

That's what I got into this for. And so I wanted to enjoy doing that a little bit tonight. [00:03:00] So we'll talk a little bit about what's happened over the last few months. Um, What getting back into updating the podcast on a regular basis looks like now kind of rethinking some things about the podcast and Then getting back into that consistency and what the next few months will look like for the podcast Sneak peek on that last point.

It's a little bit in flux. We'll see what happens That's kind of the theme of this episode. So Let's dive into What's been going on? Um, I have had, well, let's start back with when I started this, created the first five episodes, had a great time, learned a lot, really felt like I was getting the hang of things.

I knew what was going on. I understood the basics, what I needed to do, that kind of thing. And I [00:04:00] think I got to a really good spot where I understood what I needed to do to make a podcast. I could sit down at any point in time and I could make a podcast. I could do all of the editing. I could pull everything together, write up the notes, come up with a topic, research the theme, uh, research the background to what I wanted to talk about and how to get handled for that.

Didn't have it polished in any way, shape or form. And I think the, uh, enormity of not feeling completely happy with how I was doing things. Really wanted to get more into something that felt like me. And I'll confess, I think I went a little bit overboard with structuring things. I mean, we've talked about my neurodivergent brain and how it likes to have everything planned out so that nothing will go wrong.

And I think what I've realized is that when I'm being creative, sometimes I need to have a little bit of unpredictability, uh, in the mix, just to let things kind of go where they need to. If [00:05:00] you try to structure things too much, you will wind up Suffocating it a little bit and I think I suffocated the podcast a little bit or I suffocated myself in the process of trying to create the podcast There's a lot that I want to put into the podcast, but I also had a lot of External pressures I decided to kick this thing off when I had a lot of free time I had I was between jobs, so I had quit one job, was in the process of looking for another one, and felt pretty confident that I was going to find something pretty quickly.

And so I decided in the meantime, while I have all of this free time, let's jump into doing something creative and started the podcast. Had lots of time. I put a really aggressive schedule on myself for that podcast. Um, I was uploading once a week for about a month and a half. And once a week was a lot.[00:06:00] 

I think once a week might work at some point in the future, but right now that's. a little too aggressive. So the pressures of that, being unemployed, all that kind of came a little bit to a head. I sometimes struggle when I'm not completely secure in the basics. So like a job, housing, stuff like that. The times in my life when I've been, uh, the most suppressed creatively tend to be those times when I'm just kind of struggling a little bit.

And the last five months were really a little bit of a struggle. Not all of them. It was, it was a really good first couple of months of recuperating, recovering, coming back from a little bit of burnout, wanting to really recenter myself, understand the balance of my life and like where my career really fit into things and where creative side and hobbies and social life where that all kind of fit into things.[00:07:00] 

So. I wanted to, uh, make sure that I had all of that kind of together. And after the first couple of months, uh, the pressure of not finding a job as quickly as I wanted to really started to kick in and that creativity kind of vanished a little bit. And I realized it's very hard to come up with podcast topics that are going to be engaging for the listener and will make them want to , hang out, stick around.

So I put a pause on it. Wished I would have done it a little bit differently because I think had I announced a pause, it would have made more sense to the handful of people who listen to this on a regular basis, but I didn't. And it's good notes for next time. And going forward, I think it gives me a little bit of a very valuable experience [00:08:00] to push through and fire head.

So we had a period of taking a break and surviving really is how I would caption the entirety of the last couple of months really was just kind of in that survival mode where I needed to just focus on, um, Reducing expenses, reducing my need to be doing a lot of things, dissociate for a little bit, a lot of it.

, take time to just focus on finding that job, keeping myself sane, not getting wrapped up or worried about what was going to come next. Uh, something that I like to, I like to really hang on to during those times is this, saying that my sister had, which is, uh, you always somehow managed to figure a way through.

You always come out on top. And I did never really thought that wouldn't be the case, but I really, it was getting tight there and the worry really built up a lot. In the [00:09:00] meantime, obviously creative efforts really kind of dipped. Um, Other things popped up, um, reconnected with some friends, found a job, which is fantastic.

I'm very happy with that. Really landed on something that I think is really, really good. Feeling , very positive about that. I'm still in the early stages of it, but really appreciating the maturity of the company, maturity of my direct supervisors. Thank you. Really appreciating the competency and the bond and the teamwork that I'm seeing in the team that I am managing.

I'm very happy about kind of how all of that is coming together, connected with some really good people. I've had some really good conversations. Some of it has inspired topics that we will probably talk about on here at some point in time, around things like management, mentorship. Um, leading teams, inspiring and [00:10:00] motivating teams, things that I have struggled with in the past.

Um, so I've had a lot of really good conversations. Um, there's been weather. We went through the hottest months in Texas. Uh, during that time, we went through the two hottest weeks of the year , back in August. And that was, that was, uh, that was a miserable period, but we made it through. Um, I do love the summers in Austin and it's beautiful here.

It's especially beautiful now. And I think the cooler weather has really put me in the mood to do more inside stuff, stuff that makes me want to sit back while it's raining outside and just kind of relax and enjoy and think and let my, let my mind expand on things.

My favorite K pop group, uh, released a new album, which is fun. I've been listening to a lot of music recently, which is very exciting. It's given me a lot of ideas of how I want to change the intro and theme music for the podcast. I really feel like [00:11:00] something that is a little bit More jazzy, more cozy nighttime podcast.

Maybe fits a little bit better. I think I initially resisted that a little bit because I wanted it to be upbeat and I wanted it to be in your face. And let's deliver all of this value to you right off the bat. I watched too many TikToks and listen to too many podcasters talk about what the best podcast was.

I realized I don't need to make the best podcast. Eventually I hope we'll get to be. the best podcast I can make, but for now, I want to make something that makes me happy to make it. And my personal life is starting to , give me some ideas for how to make that happen. So lots of music has been listened to recently, connecting with friends, having K pop and fried chicken dinners with friends who are also into K pop and fried chicken, uh, doing more of the kind of shopping and cooking that I enjoy now that I have the money to do that. Having [00:12:00] a salary is fantastic. Having a paycheck is pretty great. It means you can go and splurge at the Korean market and get some good Korean food. So yeah, cooking is back in. I've done a lot of like cleaning up and tidying around my house, reorganizing things, making my house feel a little bit more, uh, cozy, a little bit more my speed.

I plan on being here for a while, so I might as well make it as cozy as I can. I've already started thinking about things that I can add to my decor, like art on the walls. I've always been very resistant to putting art on the walls, and that's probably a topic for another podcast or another conversation, but I've been resistant to putting art on the walls until probably the last couple places that I've lived, and I have some art that needs to go up on the walls here, but I was never sure if I was going to settle, like really settle.

And now with a job that kind of requires me to settle for a while, [00:13:00] uh, it looks like I'm going to need to at least settle into the place that I'm currently at. So I'm very happy with that. Um, it gives me a little bit of stability that I know, okay, you're going to be here for a little bit.

You can make those DIY projects happen. You can make your house a home and plan to visit those places that you've been wanting to visit for a while. , Spend more time upstate in New York with the family, going overseas, doing international trips, uh, going back to New York to see friends, uh, visiting the West coast, all of that, all possible.

So. All of that has got me very inspired, bringing it back around to this podcast. There's lots of ideas . There's a lot of good mojo happening creatively. I've gotten back into actual digital art and putting that stuff together, um, exploring more [00:14:00] in animation. So things are kind of coming back to normal.

And so with all of that back comes the podcast. , I've had, I've had a few, I mentioned this a little bit earlier, but I've had a few like reservations about how I structure the podcast. And I still really want this podcast to be something that is me talking about the things that I've learned.

Obviously, that's where I get a lot of my inspiration to make podcast episodes where I learn something new and I want to talk about it. I'm a very introverted person, whether I'm a true introvert or just someone who's neurodivergent and masking and doesn't really want to expend the energy to socialize.

Either way, I end up being at home on my own a lot, and that's fine. I enjoy that.

If you are anyone who actually knows me in person, which is probably most of the people who listen to this podcast. [00:15:00] You know that I picked up the quarantine or the lockdown quirk of enjoying spending time in my car, kicking back, getting a coffee, watching the traffic, watching the people in my own space, but out.

And that has changed my life. that is still very much a thing for me. And actually I think introduces some opportunities to maybe start doing recordings on the go. Like I love my office and I like recording here. It's a very controlled environment where I can control the sound, that kind of thing. But I also love that there's opportunities for me to do it outside of that as well.

So in the event that I decide to spend the money on some recording equipment that lets me take this mobile, um, We might be doing some of these future episodes from the car, which is very exciting. Um, [00:16:00] I'm also kind of exploring this idea of maybe not structuring the topics so strictly. I wanted to keep a really good flow.

I'm still going to try to plan out a good flow of topics from week to week so that, you know, we don't have things being too disjointed from episode to episode. But I also want to follow a little bit looser outline, let myself talk a little bit more, but focus more on being candid and conversational in how I talk about things and Respecting the time limit because obviously I don't want to drone on for hours like I could You know, I get me info dumping and I will info dump for However long I have an open channel, which in this case is until I pass out.

So I don't want to do that. That would be a nightmare to edit, but I do want to revisit, um, how I'm structuring the podcast, that kind of thing. And I think everybody thinks about this on a regular basis. So at some point I would promise I will stop talking about [00:17:00] restructuring and planning and all of that for the podcast, but it's been, it's been heavy on my mind, especially with making this decision to come back when I did.

I also entertain the idea of like, do I do seasons? Do I give myself a break? And I think maybe at some point that makes sense. Um, I need to figure out the tempo, the tempo that works for me. Weekly obviously was not working for me. Um, I think with how much I enjoy doing this, I think it makes a lot of sense to leave it open to the possibility of uploading more regularly when things make sense.

You know, really are striking, but I also want to practice some sort of cadence and rhythm in how I do upload, because that realistically is what's best for the audience. The audience needs to have that dependability, that confidence that every day on, you know, or every specific day at a specific time, there's going to be a new podcast uploading.

My, some of my favorite podcasts do this. Um, and I personally love that. Um, and I know that. [00:18:00] Generally, that's what people appreciate in a podcast is that level of consistency. So I really want to bring that same value for the podcast to future episodes and I want to continue to explore the idea of bringing specific topics up every podcast.

every episode. But I also wanted to leave some time to just kind of talk. Like, I am very much enjoying this right now, and I knew that I would, which is what really got me from sitting in the car having coffee and thinking about doing this to coming home, setting up all of the sound equipment so that I could sit down and make this.

That really, that was the motivation. I was like, I want to have a casual podcast and just talk. So I know that that gets me excited to podcast, talking to an audience and not having a lot of restrictions around that. [00:19:00] We know that that's an important element. And I think the next few months are going to be really doing a lot of the same things, uh, workflow wise, and how I approach the podcast while visiting new topics.

Um, but really kind of starting to feel out what works better for me and being open to changing things and maybe not being quite so strict about how I do things and making sure that I have a cookie cutter approach that works every single time.

There was a lot, I think, in previous episodes that worked. Having a topic, having all of the research behind it. It was a lot of fun. It was a lot of work. A lot of fun. And I think I want to spend more time on that research. One thing that I really think didn't work before was when I felt pressured to rush a couple of episodes, and I actually ended up canning a couple of episodes because I just felt like there was [00:20:00] Not enough time put into fleshing out the details.

While I may have learned, you know, something about a topic and really got interested in the topic, I always want to make sure that I do the work to explore everything I can about it in the background. Things that maybe might not have been relevant to me at the time, but when I'm talking to someone else about it, I want to make sure that I have those finer points right.

And that takes some time. And it takes energy and it takes a certain amount of motivation and the right headspace to make that happen. Um, and I know that when I was pressured and rushed to kind of get some of those episodes out, I didn't do as good a job as I wanted to. And when I don't feel confident in what I'm talking about, it really does come out.

I've noticed in the podcast. It's a lot of what I've learned. about podcasting has come in the listening back to myself over and over and over again, [00:21:00] which I understand why people get editors now because no one wants to listen to themselves over and over and over again. Uh, maybe, maybe a select, you know, select few, uh, maybe there's an art to the narcissists out there.

Maybe they enjoy that, but I personally don't find that particularly appealing. It really does Suck a lot of the fun out of the podcast. And I think editing is the struggle point for a lot of people when it comes to any sort of content creation. But I think moving away from Moving away from those things that really clearly were not working as well, giving myself more time to research.

I think those will be, I think that will make this whole process a lot easier in the future and a lot more fun, a lot more enjoyable. So really, you know, really going to focus on that. Um, and like I said, we're going to, we're going to do it more conversational. Um, I've, I mentioned [00:22:00] previously in a previous, I think it was the last episode that I uploaded episode five, I mentioned that I was.

Recording while listening to mood setting music. And I'm doing the same thing today, where I've got some nice slow jazz in the background. I'm on a slow jazz kick at the moment. I find it really focuses me when I'm at work. I have a morning jazz, uh, playlist that I play in the mornings that goes on for basically the entire day.

If I don't have a meeting or if I don't have to be on a call. I can have that going in the background and it does the job. I don't know what it is about jazz or that bossa nova sound, but it really does keep me focused, but also relaxed in the right mindset, in the right mood, not too tired. Um, so having that on in the background really is making this experience for me.

I know you can't hear it, but it's making this experience for me. Very nice. A lot [00:23:00] of fun. I'm very much enjoying this. Uh, definitely will be doing this more often, but it also kind of, I think brings a, it brings the theme that I really, I really want to make part of this podcast, which is a casual chat over coffee, because that is where I, that's one of my happy places.

That is my third place, um, is a coffee shop. And whether I am with friends or by myself, that is one of the places where I am happiest is in a coffee shop. So kind of recreating that atmosphere I think really is a key piece of this podcast for me and will be a big theme moving forward and will probably influence the music that I decide to choose for my intro.

Again, going back to, I probably need something that is a little less punchy and maybe a little more uh, lo fi chill. Jazzy vibes. We'll see. Um, it's another project that I don't know if I have time for [00:24:00] at the moment. But at some point, I will and we'll get back to composing a new intro. So, there will definitely be, uh, a more organic flow to it, but hopefully not something that's going to make you regret having listened to an episode.

And we're going to come back around to a little bit more consistency too, like I recently hit, it's a small, it's a really small mile marker, but, uh, we hit 75 episodes or 75 episode downloads. Which is not that big of a deal, but it is something that I celebrated. I had been sitting at 74 for the longest time and I got the 75th download and got a little email and I was like It feels good And it really, I mean, hitting those little, those little mile markers is not the whole reason I do a podcast.

It's a nice benefit. I was having a conversation today with a coworker [00:25:00] about how much I enjoy data. That's why I do things like wearing an Apple watch, wearing an aura ring. I love data when it comes to my health, when it comes to my activities, when it comes to tracking my moods, when it comes to looking at, you know, what music I listened to over the year.

My end of the year recap is always a very exciting time. I like looking at like what the mood was over the months. I think if I had more access to my data in a data visualization platform, I'd probably do a lot more with it. Um, it's always an exciting part to any job when I get to work with a lot of data.

Reporting is one of those things that everybody hates doing. I feel like in this, you know, in, in any sort of like management, uh, management. Uh, industry. It's one of my favorite things. I spent entirely too much time learning about reporting on one of our platforms in a previous company I worked for. And I did get a little bit too excited today when my boss and I were talking about [00:26:00] our reports and the data and where it comes from and how to look at it and how to sort it.

And I started looking at all of the cool stuff that I could do with it. So data is definitely one of those things that I think I can have a really good time with. And I think I do on a pretty regular basis have a good time with it. But when it comes to like personal stuff, obviously, yeah, enjoy it. It's a lot of fun.

Um, but I do, I do come back around to the actual topic of this part of the episode. I do, I do enjoy hitting those little mile markers. And I do want to have a little bit more consistency when it comes to how the podcast is coming out. Thanks I want to hit a nice rhythm for it. I also want to set some realistic goals and I think having a goal of once a month makes the most sense for right now.

I'm definitely still in the early stages of new job and that's put a hold on some things like learning Korean, uh, that's gone down to like basically a trickle. And I'm definitely not reading as much as I want [00:27:00] to, um, because I've been pursuing certifications and getting those certifications and doing some much needed, uh, training for the job.

And when your brain is really, really full, it's hard to pick up new things. So. recognizing that I have a limit on how far I can push my brain and that I need to be eating well, getting lots of sleep, exercising. All of that has to happen before I can really budget any time to doing new episodes. So I think shooting for once a month makes the most sense.

I haven't figured out exactly when the month works, but that's a point that I don't need to ramble on about. I could talk, probably, for a good 15 minutes about the best timing for when a podcast episode should come out. They'll still come out on Wednesdays. I still plan on releasing them on Wednesdays.

This one will come out next Wednesday on the 11th. So you will be listening to this on the 11th. [00:28:00] Um, but I don't know if the next one's gonna also come out a month from then, or if it's gonna be the first. Wednesday of the month kind of thing. We'll see. Um, I'm sure we'll find a rhythm somewhere in the mix and whatever that rhythm is, it'll work and we'll just stick with that.

My biggest strategy for kind of maintaining all of this momentum is one, I need to have a creative outlet. We've talked about this in the past. The best way Hobbies help you keep your sanity and being creative helps you keep your sanity. Um, it's important obviously to have a job. You have to have a job for money, um, reframe money into freedom and having a job that provides you the freedom to do the things that you want to do or the things that you need to do with your life.

Like pay your bills, go on trips, buy good food, make good food, um, buy fun toys. [00:29:00] That's all important. But the job should be part of your life. And I have a, I have had a bad habit in the past of making the job the entirety of my life, because I wanted to really be the best, and I wanted to really allow myself to hyper fixate and hyper focus on mastering the job, being the best at the job, or achieving certain goals within the job.

and devoting all of that time and energy and focus to one thing is incredibly unhealthy. So we've talked about how having, uh, hobbies and things that you do on the outside is essential to keeping that balance in your life. And thankfully I'm in a place that celebrates that and, uh, encourages that. And I have a boss who has a mandatory minimum amount of vacation days that I need to be taking, uh, on a yearly basis.

So [00:30:00] I'm happy that that balance is there. I need to figure out what that balance is, but I know that I have to keep some sort of consistency and momentum going when it comes to my creative projects. So I think not completely deep diving and going all in on them will be important. Um, I noticed a tendency to do that, especially when I get locked into an idea.

Um, I stayed up. Entirely too late working on a piece that I, I actually, I saw a piece of art that someone had done. It was Sailor Moon inspired, I believe. Um, but it was a very beautiful neon comic book style, um, piece of art. I really liked the look of it and I wanted to recreate it. And so I saved it and I started working on it and I got some of the basic line work done and the basic idea for it done, but I really settled on what I wanted to do with the final piece.

And so the following night after work, [00:31:00] I sat down and I went to town on that thing and I got so locked into it that I think I was up until like maybe midnight, one o'clock on a school night. Which is not good because I cannot sacrifice sleep. If I, if I'm going to bed after midnight and getting up at 5.

30 in the morning, I'm gonna have a rough day. Even on the days when I can afford to have a little bit of flex time, cause it's my job, it is hybrid. So, first half of the week I'm going into the office, second half of the week I'm working from home, second half of the week it's a little bit easier for me to not sleep.

Go to bed exactly on time, even though it is very, very important and a very good idea to have a regular schedule and stick to that schedule even when you're not mandated by that schedule to like wake up and get up a certain time or you're going to be late. Um, for the days when I do, , have to be at work at [00:32:00] nine, but I am working from home.

It's a little bit easier to fudge that morning a little bit and wake up at, 6. 45, seven o'clock and take that hour and a half to get ready before I really settle down and start to kind of prep for getting ready for the job. But it's never a good idea to push yourself two to three hours past your bedtime.

even if it is for a really fun creative project. But I did that and I had a lot of fun with it and it was beautiful. Um, I have a lot of ideas for what I did wrong with it that I need to go back and revisit and I actually want to completely redo it again because it wasn't a hard one to do. Um, it was a pretty simple one.

It just, there was a lot of techniques that I didn't have down and a lot of frustration that came in probably about 75 percent of the way and I was like, Oh, I just, I know what I want and I just can't quite get it there. And I just kind of want to finish this. And so I rushed it, but it was also late at night.

And that's part of the reason why I think I got a little bit frustrated [00:33:00] because I wanted to, I wanted to have made more progress and I didn't want to put it down and I wanted to finish it. So I just stayed up and I pushed through that last 25 percent and it, it wasn't good. It wasn't good. I was happy enough with the way it came out, but I wasn't a hundred percent happy with how it came out and I think I could do a better job with it.

So I'm going to redo it at some point in time, but I need to measure out how much I can put into creative stuff, like making a podcast, creating digital art, composing music, that kind of things. I need to, I need to budget that so that I can keep a consistent, consistent. Momentum rather than kind of burning it all out in one big burst and then not doing anything with it for two, three weeks, four weeks.

So that's what's, that's what's going to keep me , moving forward at a regular speed and hopefully it turns out high quality podcasts on a monthly basis. [00:34:00] Um, as far as topics go for upcoming episodes. I have a lot kind of in the, I always have ideas that are kind of, um, landing inside of my notion set up.

Um, I have a repository that I just dump ideas for different podcasts and things that I've learned, certain things that are probably more interesting bubble up to the top and get it a little bit higher priority. Um, stuff that I don't have to plan for as much obviously gets a much higher priority, but, um, I always have a lot of ideas out there, but, um, yeah.

I really think the theme is gonna, it's going to be a mix of some of my favorite things to talk about. Psychology, um, leadership, um, motivation to a certain extent. I had a really good conversation with a family member about how to tackle learning, but also how to deal with stress and anxiety.

And that [00:35:00] led me down some, some rabbit holes and some deep dives into how certain types of anxiety are managed. I found that incredibly fascinating and I want to talk about that more. So that will definitely be a topic, maybe a couple of episodes, uh, or maybe we go on big episode, who knows, but I definitely, definitely, I'm going to stick to a lot of the stuff that you're probably probably fits with what you've heard so far.

Um, I am reading a really good book at the moment about, um, overcoming the summit of the mountain, um, which weirdly is, is a, it's a, it's a, there's a lot of really good parallels so far in what I'm reading. Um, I'll talk about the book more at some point in time, I'm sure. Um, but it was recommended to me by a coworker who found it to be really, really helpful in, Managing her team and being a leader, uh, within her portion with her department in the company.

And, [00:36:00] I really liked what she was saying and really liked the ideas. And she said, read this book. This is going to be, this is, this is a book that's not about leadership and management that will teach you a lot about leadership and management. So I'm currently working through that and I know that I'm going to want to talk about that.

I also want to talk about self sabotage at some point. Um, I really loved the mountain is you, uh, by Brianna Weiss, I believe her last name. Um, It was a very good book. It was a book that I did not expect to be as good as it was. It maybe doesn't go quite as deep. I think there might be some issues with how some things are understood.

I think there's like, there's a glossing over of certain parts of, of Sabotage. Um, but the, the majority of the book, the content there is quality content. And. Whether it's the best content in the world or not, it made me think and rethink and really change how I looked at myself and the things that I do and how I [00:37:00] definitely do self sabotage.

So it was beneficial to me. It's the approach I take to anything. It's like, yeah, it may be a shit movie, but if I enjoyed it, doesn't matter. It's the best movie. Um, So that's what we can expect for topics. Um, themes. We're going to be casual. We're going to be chill. I'm going to talk about it.

I'm going to have fun. I'm going to get excited. Um, I don't know if we'll have guests, maybe. I don't know. I feel like a guest is probably an easy thing for me to do at this point in time, but I don't know that it's necessary. I don't also necessarily know anyone right off the top of my head who, would want to do this.

And if I have a good format in place for how to talk about something with a guest. So guests are still a maybe, uh, and eventuality. I'm sure it will happen at some point in time. I know there are podcasts where people rely heavily on guests. [00:38:00] This is definitely not going to be one of those. Um, me being the introvert that I am don't always necessarily want to have someone Um, around and a podcast is a nice excuse to just talk and not have to worry about that.

But, um, I know that there are going to be topics that I'm going to want to talk to people who are more experienced than I am, or people who have different opinions than I do, um, as a means to have a really good conversation about that topic. So that will definitely happen at some point in time.

So we'll see, we'll see how that goes. Um, I mean, if there's always, if there's stuff that you guys would love to hear more about, um, maybe something that you thought I didn't go in depth on or maybe could explore more of in previous episodes, that invitation to suggest revisiting a topic or going deeper into a specific aspect of a topic or an entirely new topic that you, for whatever reason, think you'd like to hear me talk about it, [00:39:00] please let me know.

Easiest way to do that is to DM me on Instagram. Um, I will be sure to take note of that and we'll probably be way too excited about getting feedback. I spent a lot of time this week learning about feedback and how to receive feedback and how to give feedback. And how that feedback is a gift. And it is.

I'm not, I sound like I'm being sarcastic. I know that it is a gift. I just talked about it a lot this week. I'm a little burnt out. But I would appreciate and love to your feedback if you have ideas for something you'd like to hear me ramble about. If I can apply my autistic brain to a topic that you think would be fascinating to listen to coming out of my mouth, suggest a way.

Suggest a way. I think we're going to wrap it up there. This has been a lot of fun. Um, I [00:40:00] have really enjoyed doing. this. We've been at this for almost our full time and it has been a much easier experience than some of my previous episodes. So I think, I think I might've figured something out with this podcast episode.

Um, maybe I, maybe I hit a sweet spot. Maybe I know what I'm doing now. Definitely room for improvement always, but maybe this was the shift that I needed. Thanks The music is definitely helping.

If you have, uh, any patience left after listening to me talk for the last however long it's been, because let's be honest, I'm probably going to edit this down a little bit, although I'm not going to spend too much time in editing. That's another thing that I want to change. I want to reduce the amount of editing that I have to do.

So I'm [00:41:00] being careful with, uh, My speech making sure I don't not saying um a lot having careful pauses I don't want to cut too much out of this and spend all of my time editing it But I do have some I have some runway before next week. So Feeling pretty good about it But if you do have any patience left, I thank you for that patience and Appreciate that you took the time to download this It may not seem like a huge thing You But for me, it's, it's very cool to see that people are interested.

We talked about data earlier. I actually looked at some of the data for the podcast and it's interesting to see which episodes have gotten the most downloads and which ones have not. I'm actually surprised that one of them has not gotten as many downloads. I thought it would, I thought he'll be so much more interested in that episode.

And nobody was, which is interesting. Gives me feedback, tells me what people are. More interested in tells me maybe where my strength is when it comes to podcasting. So we're going to use that [00:42:00] data. We're going to see how it goes. I'm going to focus on topics that I think people are going to want to listen to and topics that I want to talk about.

We'll definitely have some duds at some point in time, but if you checked in and listened to this, I appreciate that. Um, I appreciate you taking any time out of your day to listen to this, to engage with. me on social media. Um, please feel free to subscribe to this. If you're not already, you can subscribe on Apple podcasts, Spotify, or any of the other sites that have podcasts available for your podcast fix every week.

Um, you can follow the larger creative project as always on Instagram at grind XP, uh, where updates are more likely to show up. than anywhere else. Or you can visit the website eventually once I finish it at www. [00:43:00] grindxp. art and we'll have all of the previous episodes and an article version of those episodes up there for anyone who enjoys that format better, um, again once I finally have it finished.

Another project. out of the many that I have on my plate. So anyway, have a fantastic rest of your week, everyone. Get out there, grind one experience point at a time, and I will see all of you in the next episode. Good night.