Adam Weber and Stacey Lauren: Dare To Do Something Different And Exciting? Discover Why Podcasting Should Be Your Next Do The Thing Challenge

I do really believe 100% from every part of me that everyone has the capacity to be able to do the things that they want and not to be held back by the mental baggage that's in our head that we want to push through.

Welcome to the do the Thing podcast. In each episode, we get down and personal with people who go after the things they want to make all their wildest dreams come true. Join us as we unveil and dissect a formula for what it takes to do the thing. Here is your host, Stacy Lauren.

Hey, everyone. So welcome to the Start a Podcast Zoom meeting. I'm so glad you guys are here. I had so many people asking for this to be recorded, so I just decided to do the thing and was, well, I might as well just integrate it on a Facebook Live. And those that are comfortable being on the zoom could be on the zoom. Those that want to be on the Facebook Live will see it that way. And, and so I appreciate you all signing in at the last minute to the new link. I wanted to introduce you first to Adam Weber. He's the founder and the creator of the platform that my podcast is based on, Callcast. And he's so much more than that because when I first decided to do a podcast, I didn't even really decide to do the podcast. I was just wanting to get interviews for my book and wanted to get them recorded just in case I wanted to use them for a podcast. And I signed up for his little bot on his website and I was thinking I was going to get some ever evergreen webinar that was going to come and it was going to show me how to do it. But no, Adam called me, oh, hey, wanted to check in with you and see what your. What questions you have. And I was, oh my God, I'm not prepared at all for this conversation. And I pretty much just pushed him off for a few more weeks. And so anyway, point being, he's really helped me through it so much. So when I did the first interview, after the interview, I'm okay, I called him and I am not a good interviewer. I don't think I should be doing this podcast. And then he actually sent me this amazing voice note back, basically just encouraging me and supporting me through the process and saying whenever someone's new doing something, always rough and it takes time. And so. And depending on what your intention is on your goal of the podcast, it'll get you through. And if you guys are interested, his episode is episode three on my podcast where we were able to Talk through some of that stuff. And I even shared the voice notes and it's amazing. So anyway, I'm really honored to have Adam here. He's been an incredible resource for me and he is making himself available to you guys. And I don't even know how I got this lucky to have this amazing person here to talk to you guys and kind of navigate you through this. So anyway, I wanted to introduce you first, Adam, and then we'll kind of dive in a little bit more.

Brilliant. Yeah. Thank you, Stacy. Hello, everyone. Super excited to have you all join and then by the end of this call here, where each of you are on your own podcasting journey and kind of learn about what are the things that you're thinking about, excited about, interested in how we can help and support, as Stacy knows when she reached out to me, just curious, hey, Adam, what is a podcast? How does this all work? Seems like there's a lot of moving parts. How do we bring everything together and essentially just jumping into it and starting and then giving yourself permission to evolve, to learn, to create. And kind of, as you'll hear about in our conversation, what makes podcasting so special and how does it open up opportunities in your own lives to meet new people, grow and find kind of new ways to bring success and interesting things into your life? So that's why Stacy mentioned our episode earlier. Really quick, a little bit about me. I grew up extremely dyslexic. So schooling was always traditional. Schooling was always extremely difficult for me. And I didn't learn kind of the sit down classroom style of education. For me, it was about meeting new people, having conversations, learning about the world just through connecting with people and hearing about what paths they took in their life. I always, my mom tells a story about me as a little, little kid, which I remember pieces of it, but we went to visit my aunt and I snuck out of the house and my mom completely panicked. And when she found me, I had found my way down. This was in Colorado. I'd found my way down into a rain ditch and was talking with some guy who was living down in these rain ditch. And I would, I remember always, always just whoever I'd meet, I'd be just curious about their stories and asking questions, who are you? And whatnot. And she told me, oh my God, I panicked so much. But I've always been that way, just super curious about life. And I grew up my mom, everywhere we drive, she'd have NPR on and I'd just be listening to the interview styles of how people being interviewed about their life and finding it fascinating. And so it became a natural, I think, progression for me to have discovered podcasting, which is all around connecting with people, hearing your stories, and having an opportunity to learn from them. I'll turn it back over to you, Stacy, and we'll just. I'll follow your lead.

Adam did a podcast every day for 365 days, dissecting people and talking about fear. And I just thought, there's so much wisdom in that podcasting story, because when you're talking to someone about fear every day for a year, can you imagine what you would learn about fear and overcoming fear? And I thought maybe before, because I have another thing I want to do right after, but maybe just talk a little bit about that, because I think that's an idea of something that you're curious about and something maybe you want to have help with. And that could even be what your podcast is about. And then you're learning exponentially because you have a reason to do that thing and connect with people. So I'd love to have you just kind of share that a little bit.

One of the things I realized that was always getting in my way in life is the perfect, the perfectionist mindset of everything needing to be perfect. And it would always kind of freeze me up and not allow me to try new things or venture out into the world in different ways. I had been built callcast and a podcasting platform yet because I knew I loved podcasting. I loved the space, I loved the medium, But I had never been a host. I'd never recorded a podcast. I'd been on other people's podcasts, but I'd never actually kind of empathized and been in the shoes of a podcaster. And it was really hard to start and do it. But kind of what's cool about when you set challenge for yourself, kind of. I like what Stacy had done with the idea. She's exploring challenges and stuff. And I think it's a great way to. To give yourself that permission of, you know what? I'm going to challenge myself to do something for X amount of days. And then if I do that, I've completed a challenge and I've, I've done it. When it gives you that permission to take a leap of faith into something and know that there's a framework around it. For me, I do things kind of extreme. And so I was okay. My challenge for myself is 365 podcasts, one new podcast every single day. And I have to find a new person every day to do it with. And I don't care about the quality, I don't care about the being everything being perfect. Because by the time I get to podcast365, at the very end, I'll have learned so much just from each little piece, each day I'll pick up something new. And so you stop worrying about podcast number one and you set your vision for that kind of future you of on the horizon. I will be over there eventually and I'll see what I learn. And I don't have to even worry about this. I knew that the podcast I was creating and I knew if I took the topic of fear because I knew fear is what was holding me back. And it gave me an easy place, I say, where everyone has encountered fear in a certain way and I'd love to learn what their fear was and how they got over it or how they challenged it. And so it just gave me a starting point to learn about what are the elements of podcasting. And I knew if I enjoy this, I can always start another podcast. And that one, I will take what I've learned and apply what I've learned and make that one even better, the one that becomes the more professional podcast, if you will. And so it's just, I love the idea of challenges and it's a one week challenge or whatever. It just gives you permission to start, try it out, learn. And then once you do that, I'm sure Stacy will mention later she has a story about being on live right now, even doing this live, and a conversation her and I had about doing live. I'll let you tell that story, Stacy, but it's a progression. You start somewhere and you just keep at it and you're going to learn new things and progress into new things. I'll turn it back.

And I'm so glad you said that because it's. There's something so powerful in that, in this story of things that you say no to now, you may not say no to in six months. And so that's what I love about the podcast platform, because I feel like I had this whole do the Thing story before my podcast and that's why I was writing the book. But my do the Thing story has really started since the podcast because now that I have this as a platform, it's helping me connect to people so much deeper. It's getting me to go outside of my comfort zone so much faster and I'm able to explore new ideas that are interesting and fascinating to me at such a level that I've Never been able to before. And what Adam's talking about is when we first set up, like, callcast, he was like, oh, by the way, there's this really cool feature on Call Cast where you could do a live podcast and you could invite people to this guest link, and then they could all comment. Other than using Zoom, we would use callcast as a platform. And I was, there is no way in hell I'm going to do that. There's no way I'm going to do a live podcast. That's insane. And so anyway, that was kind of why, one of the reasons why I changed this last minute to live, because what I said was insane. Literally, you guys, this was in February of this year. What I said was insane in February. Here we are, we're on Zoom Live. Who cares? And I think that's the cool thing about age. Like, I'm 49 now, right? And it's, God, if I'm not going to just live for what I want now, when is it ever going to happen? And so, anyway, that's what I'm excited about. And then when Adam and I did the dating panel expert panel, I don't remember when that was now, but probably May or something, he was one of the panelists on there because he had the fear mindset. He had given the dare on that panel episode, and if you guys haven't listened to it, definitely listen to it, because that's, like, one of my favorite episodes. And he had given the dare of doing your own podcast would be a dare. So how we're doing dares now and meeting a stranger or whatever it is we're doing, his was start. Start your own podcast. And I had given that dare on the first challenge, and Adam and I did an episode on that specifically on why we think it would be cool to do that, especially in the guise of, like, the dating challenge. And no one took me up on it. And so this challenge, actually, and Paul's here, so I'm so excited you're here, Paul. Sorry, I'm going to call you out, if you don't mind. I met Paul at Toastmasters. I just joined Toastmasters, and I think. What was it, like, a month ago?

Yeah, about that.

Yeah. And then he. He joined the dating challenge, and he's the one. I don't know if you guys saw. I'm taking credit for your relationship. He met someone soon after he joined.

The owner.

And so he's not doing the challenge anymore because he's already met someone. But what he did do was he spurned the idea he relived revived the start your own podcast challenge because he had mentioned, I think it was after you heard the episode, the panel episode, and you're like, I'm interested in starting my own podcast and I'd love you to kind of talk about what you told me because this inspired me to revive it for this challenge, if you don't mind, like, what you're, why you want to do one and what you're going to do it on. And that would be amazing if you could share that.

Sure.

So the.

The whole premise of the podcast is taking questions from the big talk card game. And I have a group of three questions. I have 10 episodes already laid out. I did my first interview with a friend of mine a couple weeks ago. I got that recording call cast, and I haven't really listened to it too much, but it did seem like it come across pretty good. But the premise is taking the big talk cards, grouping them in three questions, and just going out and hitting San Diego and just finding random people to ask those three questions to. So part of that is the reason I really want to do this is one of the things I enjoy doing in life is connecting with people and just learning about them and learning about from their experiences. And I've actually learned it doesn't matter the age. Everyone can be a mentor, everyone can be a teacher, regardless of how much age difference there is between people. But I just enjoy doing that. So. Well, let me just do that. I'll start asking questions and just hit up random people, see who wants to do it. I initially started the idea when I started dating the dating challenge, thinking I can meet some really nice women in bars or out in bubble park or somewhere like that. We're going to scrap that idea right now. Not going to be trying to meet anyone for that purpose, but again, just to go out and talk to people, meet people, connect with people, and just again, push my little bit beyond my edge and my comfort zone as well.

What I really like about this, there's so much I like about this, but the other thing too, it just shows you how quickly ideas can spread into rapid fire. So when Paul told me that, I think it was on our episode, we recorded an episode because he had done a speech in Toastmasters that I loved. And so check out Paul's episode if you haven't yet. But he was talking about what his experience, from his military background to border patrol to even doing martial arts now, and, like connecting all those things together and came up with this amazing presentation. And so we Dissected that and then also talked through Toastmasters and how he. He got into that. And that's where I actually got one of the identifiers for my people. Because Paul said a really insightful thing on there with when you're around people, we are right now in this group. It's like a safe place to fail. We basically have created this amazing safe space. So if you do fail, you're in the supportive environment with people that are doing the same thing as you. But so after Paul and I talked, I'm listening to his episode, he's talking about these cards. You know, let me check out the cards. So I bought them, of course. Never heard of them before. You guys have seen me talk about the dating cards, because I love those. I had not gotten these cards. And anyway, I bought the cards, and one of the cards says, just like an example, what is something new you've recently tried? So that's cool. He'll go up to a stranger now, ask them that question, and then that will be part of his podcast. And then I also. I get kind of obsessive about things. I don't know if you guys have noticed this about me yet, but I get really excited when I get into something. And so after I got the cards, I really like them, and I wanted to hear more about it, so I googled the person that created them. She did this amazing TED Talk, and she's talking about the cards, how she created them, because she was feeling really isolated when she started college. You know, the first year in college, either you have remembered this or your kids maybe, or any time you start something new. Her first year in college, she basically was super isolated and just went through an identity crisis, essentially. So she created this card game for that purpose. And then she was talking about it, got so popular that she was really excited and thought she would be feeling really good. But then she felt really disconnected again. And so then what she realized is she had to ask herself those questions and that not just asking other people, so she would have to ask herself, what is something new? I have recently tried, and there's just something about that. I still get chills thinking about it, because it's. I feel like I got a new experience now because Paul and I talked. I don't think we would have had that deep conversation as much without me having the podcast to be able to interview him and dissect more about what he's doing and what he's up to. Right. Because when you're doing normal conversation, like, you don't get the same level of, like, being able to. You're having permission, basically, to ask someone anything you want. And so just shows how, like, one idea spurns into this whole thing. Because what do I need to ask myself that I haven't asked myself? And that could be a podcast. You don't even have to ask other people. You could just ask yourself these questions. And it doesn't have to come from this deck. I'm just showing you an example of just how easy it is to come up with a topic. So, anyway, I just found that. I just found that really cool. And thanks for sharing, Paul. So Paul is the reason we're all here, because he pretty much spurned it in me, and I'm cool. I'll do it. And then I had a few other people immediately say they were interested. And then it sort of got this motivated. Then Therese, you guys, this is funny. Teresa, you want to wave at everyone. So we went to a fitness camp together, what, like eight years ago or something? And then she recently left her job of 21 years. And to me, that's doing. The thing is, when you leave a job after that long of a time because you're no longer happy. And she. And we had an amazing episode together, and that was where she told me that she was potentially interested in doing a podcast. And so, anyway, it's just exciting how these, like, you guys are all coming together with this really cool way. And so I'd love to just maybe take a few minutes and just if you have. If you're comfortable right now and just kind of share if you have any thoughts on what you'd want to do your podcast on. And then that'll help me kind of decide what we do for the rest of the time, depending on if you have thoughts or not. If not, then we can just kind of open it up for different ideas on that level. Terese, why don't you start? You were talking a little bit, but before everyone got on. Because when we first talked, you were still really rough with your idea. And I thought maybe you can share where it started to where it is now, because just in three weeks, you have a really good idea of where you're going with it.

Yeah, well, the podcast is called Deep Dive, and it says conversations exploring culture, architecture, design, design, sex, politics, and more. And like Adam was saying, I'm trying to suspend kind of the perfect. And my sort of. You got my kind of like, the dream guests that I'd love to talk to, but I'm probably not at that level yet. So I'm like, okay, where do I find guests? What's interesting? And I tend to have a lot of interests in a lot of areas. And so I'm trying to think of different ideas around what topics. And I like that my podcast is fairly broad in nature. Just. I'll just kind of give you guys some of the topics so far. The first one is going to be about the psychology of home. And I'm it's with a woman that has a. She's an interior designer who talks a lot about our homes and the psychology of that. I'm interviewing a professor here at, actually at Portland State. I'm in Portland, Oregon on crime in society and looking at how race and class and politics kind of shape our perception of crime in society. A woman who writes a lot about forgiveness. So it's a topic on forgiveness. I don't know who this next one would be, but I'm trying to find somebody to talk about the state of middle of the road voters and where are they feeling about the state of our politics. Having a woman on that is a therapist who talks about grief and loss and then a financial planner who's going to talk about how since COVID we're all sort of rethinking what does an income look like and just kind of shaping all of that. Another architecture person. The shaping of our lives, everyday spaces, structures, and how it enforces and reinforces lives, behavior and our well being. Design called Karen Finley out of San Francisco on how design affects our life. I'm still honing that topic because it's going to be about more about race and class in the built environment. And then woman who actually does have a podcast and she's kind of a coach in various areas, but she talks about using and harnessing our erotic power in our lives. Oh yeah, that isn't just sexuality kind of over here, but how does that same energy kind of reverberate and inform and deepen all of our interactions in life? So that's kind of my preliminary guest list so far.

Yeah.

And so just so you guys know Therese from what, three weeks ago? It was just an idea. Oh, I think I'd like to do a podcast so it can happen. Wildfire. Once you, once you have the idea of what you want to do. And the other thing, before I have anyone else talk, I wanted to tell you, like at this point, you don't even have to say you want to start a podcast. I just want you to say you want to start recording. Right. And like that to me, like, because then you can decide what you do with it. Like, that's what I did. I. I pretty much had 10 episodes and I didn't publish any of them. And I wasn't sure I was going to publish. I don't know if you remember that conversation, Adam, but I hadn't even decided I was going to publish them. And then all of a sudden, he. Adam actually had referred me to this woman, Esprit, who was doing a challenge for podcasters. It's called the Cohort. And it was 70 podcasters. And because I was moving, I was already recording episodes, even though none of were published yet. She had me as like an expert speaker for these 70 people that were starting a podcast. And so I was able to talk to the people. It ended up. It was supposed to be an hour, it ended up being two hours. Just because they loved the idea of the not being perfect and being like, imperfect but still moving. And there was something about just the way they took the stuff. I said that. Then after that, I'm like, oh, this isn't even about me. This is about the people that are hearing it. So any kind of stupid monkey mind stuff that I had going was just stuff that was in my head. And so once I realized, just because I'm three weeks ahead of them. And now Therese is cool, you're three weeks ahead of some, some of the people on this call. And so you get to see how quick things move once you make a decision. So anyway, I just wanted to point that out, Adam, before we go on, I wanted to see if you wanted to add to that, because I'm feeling your energy.

Yeah, yeah, I would love to. I think Therese said something that caught my attention about dream guests. And one of the things that I think is so important is to not, in your first episodes, not to worry about the perfect guests or the guests that are like celebrity style guests. Because it's. To me, there's so much going on at the beginning that you have to get comfortable with in terms of hitting record and starting an introduction that you want your dream guests later down the line. Right. You want those. When you're an episode, whatever. Get over that. Ten episodes start with people that you're comfortable with, that if it's not recording for whatever reason or something happens, it freezes, that you're not going to panic in your mind, like, oh my God, this dream guest is on. And now everything's going to shambles and whatever. You learn how to like, recover from those things over those course of early episodes that I think that by the time you get to your dream guests. And if you stay persistent and consistent, you will get those dream guests eventually that you're so comfortable with. Oh, I've handled so many bloopers and errors and things that felt pressure and whatever that you'll just know how to handle it come, come time to have those people on. So you don't want those dream guests at the beginning.

Exactly. That's kind of what I've. I've exactly had that thought in my head, and I thought, okay, I'm calling those my aspirational guests down the road once I figure out just the exactly you said for sure.

Yeah.

And almost freeing, too, because then you feel you can kind of find your own style. You're not focusing on, again, being the perfect interviewer, but you're. You're kind of just finding your own cadence and voice. And I think it allows for a little more authenticity to kind of have the path lead itself instead of you controlling the path.

Yeah. And I love just the uniqueness of what we're talking about right now. We have Adam, who was talking about his podcast, where he did. He interviewed someone on fear for 365 days. Right. We have Paul, who's saying he wants to take the big talk cards and go up to three strangers on the street or at a bar and ask them some questions from this. And then Therese is kind of working out this plan of just different topics and being able to explore things that she's interested in. And then I did it with do the Thing, and I originally just started doing a few episodes on my own, just saying how hard it was for me to do the thing, which was start a podcast, which I found really weird because I always do the thing. And so that was like, literally my first two episodes was like, oh, my God, this is so painful. I can't even do this thing. And I couldn't understand why. And then. Anyway, so I like the idea that you guys are seeing all these different, different things. I'd love to ask you guys, you're here. What made you sign up? If anyone's open to. To kind of sharing. And then maybe if you have any thoughts on what you do or any burning questions that are coming up right now, I'll just kind of open the floor, putting you on the spot.

My name is Stephanie Blanchette, and yes, it was very serendipitous that this challenge came in the middle of this other challenge because I had been thinking about feeling pulled to do a podcast, but, like, all stuck in the perfection and all of that. And then I. I wasn't even on the original call, Stacy, that you did that introduced us to do the thing or the dare challenge. So I listened to it, like, a week later, and halfway through that, you mentioned this about the podcast, and I was, oh, my God, there's all these signs that keep coming to me that are saying I should be doing a podcast. There was just a whole bunch of them. And so I was like, okay, this is perfect. And so I am a transformational mindset coach, and I have been in this world of trying to, like, start this business and get. Be serious about it and get consistent clients and all of that, but I always am getting stuck in the conversation about what's your niche, who's your audience, who. What's their problem? How are you talking to them? And you. I get so stuck. Stuck in that because it's like, I don't exactly know yet. And then in my own personal life, I'm going through massive transitions. I resonate with leaving a job after 21 years. I just left a marriage after 22 years in the last couple years, and. Which was how I got to the do the dare thing anyway. And then my kids are transitioning out. I'm just at this place in midlife where everything is transitioning, and I'm turning into a new person and letting go of all those old stories and freeing ourselves from that, which is so fricking hard because it's this unconscious attachment to these old ways of being. Anyway, as I reach into that, I am exploring what does that look like for me? Right? And I'm really pulled towards sacred sexuality and really supporting people in midlife in exploring their sexuality and letting go of all these constructs and belief systems that are put upon us from, like, culture and religion and. And really exploring, like, sex, love, and relationships. And just all of you talking about connection is so important. I always am energetically connected. And, Teresa, you were talking about the one lady that you're going to do about the embodiment of that sexual energy and how it's more than just about sex and how we store our emotions there and all that. So I'm exploring all that. So I thought where I want to go with the podcast is figuring out who am I talking to? Who is my. Who are my people? Who is going to resonate with me? Who am I going to resonate with? And getting out there and just starting to interview people and talk to people just in their own lives and their own experiences in midlife and kind of let that reveal itself.

I just think it's just such a gift, especially as you're going through a transition, to be thinking about something like this, because there's no better time to be recording where you're at with something as when you're going through a transition. And I think something really magical of that, not only for you, but for the people that are going to be experiencing what you say. Adam, I'm wondering, because this is something you really helped me with, because what I'm hearing, too, is just there's so many different plans, right? Which I think is great. But then sometimes the problem with so many plans is it gets hard to move, and you can get stuck at certain points. So I thought maybe we could kind of talk about that for a minute for the people that have the different ideas of what they want to do, but still are sort of like staying in a moment just to kind of move a little bit. And this is just reminding me of where I was, where I was kind of stuck. And then, Adam, I'm not saying anyone's stuck, but I'm just saying it's easy to get stuck when you have a lot of ideas. And then Adam sort of helped me move, which was. Which was great.

Can I ask you also, Adam, to add into that, could you talk a little bit about your podcast? I'm really curious. Was it the same person? Was it different people every single day? Did you kind of just wing it? Because I think that really intrigues me that you did it every day and you kind of just. I don't know. That just seems like you were really open to the curiosity of things. Can you talk a little bit about that?

Yeah, happy to. And I appreciate that. I. First off, Stephanie mentioned people saying, what's your niche? And all this. And there's so many different. So much different advice out there and so many different things coming at you in different directions. My personal thinking, unless you already are, like a professional with every. You've already been in the audio, sound or whatever experience is just to start as simple as possible and just start and give yourself permission to evolve and to kind of just get comfortable with the process. And my thinking was always when I was starting the podcast journey that I was on. Now, granted, my intentions of why I was doing it are going to be different from all of your intentions of why you were doing it. Right? So for me, it was a challenge of 365 podcasts, a new person every single day, because I wanted to feel what's it like to invite somebody new? What's it like to find somebody. What do I do if somebody cancels on me? 150 podcasts in every. And I haven't missed one day. And I mean, obviously I started dealing with people, a lot of people. And how do you deal with those emotions when you schedule someone, someone and they don't show up? Is it about me? Am I the loser? Am I. Someone doesn't want to talk to me and they, oh, I'm not important enough, or I'm not interesting enough. All these, oh, it's me. You know what? I'm not going to fail this challenge. I'm going to scramble and find somebody new, right? And then what are the things that I could learn to put into place to make it so I don't feel as pressure? So I learned early on when I, you know, how do you create an onboarding list of people who want to be interviewed? And then how do you. A question I would ask people is, if somebody canceled, would you want me to call you? Do you want to move up on the list? And so putting these things in place all were things that I started to learn. Like when I was going to have a guest on and fill out a form so I could onboard them and get their information, their social media or anything that they might want to promote. Because many times people are coming onto your podcast because they have something that they want to promote and share as well. They're doing it because they want to get themselves out there and. And podcasting to me again, back to. There's many different reasons and intentions why someone might want to start a podcast. And for me, one of the most interesting things is that I don't think and I warn people who reach out to me on my website, hey, I need to make money, and can I do that through podcasting? My always warning to these people is, no, I would not look at, I'm going to start a podcast because the podcast itself is going to make me rich. What I think is it becomes. You become rich is in the people you're going to meet and the conversations you're going to have are going to open you up into having new opportunities. Because in my mind, if we live a life and we shut ourselves off from a lot of people, it becomes harder and harder to have new opportunities show up serendipitously in our lives of just. And those opportunities come, I think, from the people we meet and the networks we make. And that, to me, is what podcasting is. It's a vehicle to especially, you know, Stephanie or actually Teresa, you talked about leaving your Job and basically starting a new business, or you are going to create your own company. My sister as well, she is an architect and was at a firm, and as an architect, you know, they work our night and day, night and day. And she said, you know what? I'm going to start my own company for myself, because this is not. And what I see from a lot of people is a way in which you can market yourself and network and get out into the world. Podcasting becomes the perfect kind of excuse or reason to reach out, connect with people, have those conversations, get to know somebody on a really intimate, interesting level. I think Stacy can talk about. And I wonder how many of you have been on her podcast as well. Like, it brings people together and you really can learn about somebody's life in a deep and meaningful way. And who knows? Like, Stacy has sent me incredible messages about, oh, my God, I was out doing this thing and I met this amazing person and I asked him to be on my podcast. And because he was on my podcast and this other person was on my podcast, I put them together, and now they're doing business together. They're actually working. It's like, wow, like, the. The. The connections you can make, those things all come back around and you're forming, like, really wonderful relationships with people. And so that, to me, is what podcasting is all about. And in doing so, not worrying about having the perfect podcast from day one, give yourself permission to evolve, to learn. You'll level up on your equipment. You'll level up on whatever the different things you use, whether it's the different things of video or just audio or whatever it might be. You'll make tweaks and changes and evolve as you go. But the most important thing is just starting getting episode one done, then two, and then three, and you're like, oh, wait, let me try something different. Or. It's scary and hard to ask someone to be. To take some of their time out of their day and to. And to show up and to talk to somebody new. I always had the jitters right before, and then the second the conversation would start and then it would end, and I would think, wow, I am so glad I did that. That was amazing. To actually really connect with somebody. It felt always scary beforehand, then once it was done, it was. I am so glad I did that. It was an amazing experience.

Yeah.

And that you just pretty much pointed out what is so cool about this. It's like it gives you the opportunity to flex that muscle of doing something scary and then coming on the other side and then where that leads you in life is like, not even about podcasting anymore. It's that that ripple goes on with other things too. And that, to me, is what is so. Is so exciting. I wanted to just take this opportunity.

I have a quick question. I. Because I wanted to piggyback off of what Adam was saying. Like, you. I mean, you keep saying just start. So what would you recommend as, like, the first thing to start? Like, just start interviewing people and recording it. Is there, like, a basic equipment thing that we should start with? Yeah. What does. And did you record a bunch before you even published? I know Stacy said she had 10 recordings. Does it matter? What can you give us us to just start, you're saying?

I think starting as simple as possible and starting possibly with somebody that you're already in your network. I mean, I don't know if you've been on Stacy's podcast, but hey, Stacy, will you be my first episode? Can I record you? Right. Whoever it might be. Do you know a handful of people that you could start with and just. It's easy to get.

I've already asked people. I have a list of, like, eight people that have already said yes. And then I got asked to be on somebody else's before I even ask them. And then I'm all in my head about that too, because then they sent me an intake form, and now I think I got to have an intake form, and I got to have all the questions lined up and I got to have a bio and all this stuff. I haven't even scheduled to be on the podcast I got asked to be on. So then that's what happens. Right? So I love that.

I think.

I was going to say. I think what Theresa Bob say two things. It's a great idea to be on other people's podcasts as a host, because then you can really empathize when you are the host. You know what it feels like to be a guest, right? You know what it feels like to be on that side of the microphone. And so it is important, I think, to. To sign up or to allow yourself to be on other podcasts and we can share. There's resources out there if you want to be on other people's podcasts that you can put yourself out there and say, hey, I'm. Here's the things I would love to talk about. Anyone who wants to reach out to me. And on the flip side, as a host, there are networks out there to look for interesting guests. And also LinkedIn is a great place to find interesting Guests as well. And a lot of these people are out there trying, you know, they want to be on a podcast and they, especially if they've written a book or they have something that they're going to promote, they're really easy to get on your show because they have stuff to talk about that they want. So all you have to do is look for an alignment in whatever topic it is that you want to record about. So I think, think in terms of your question of just getting. How do you just get started? There's different ways to go about that. And my. My thinking. And I've watched Stacy evolve with different intros as she's gone. You know, going from no intro to having one intro to. I think you've evolved to another intro. And it's fine to do that, right? It's fine. I would take this early time of being in the podcasting to just say we can set you up with free account on callcast that you can come on and just try recording. You could use Zoom and I can show you later how to. To upload stuff to callcast and push it out to Apple, Spotify and all the other places like Stacy does. Call cast. We're about to launch. We're about to release a brand new. I know Paul had mentioned the audio quality. We just integrated Dolby Audio, so we're going to upgrade our audio quality to Dolby, which will be really excited and have a little video thing that you can see the other person as well. So I'd be happy to. If you want to walk through just getting started on Callcast, I'll always be here to help you get uploaded and do stuff of just getting going. But my, my thinking is pick a topic that you're interested in and everything can change as you go. You can always. We'll cover later on, maybe in another talk or if we reconnect later. The technical side of podcasting, which is called the RSS feed, which. The RSS feed is all the data about your podcast, the name, the who the host is. You know, when you're looking at Apple podcasts, it's not the audio and the. All that images and stuff. It's not actually on Apple. Apple is retrieving that information from the host. In this case, callcast is the host. And so basically it's like it just kind of reaches over to us and pulls that information as it's being requested or looked for. So the Callcast is the thing that we built that sends all that information to Apple or Spotify or wherever people want to listen to your podcast. And you can always update that. Right? You can update all that information as you. As you go, as you evolve. You could start something as your first test show and then be like, okay, this was cool. I feel like I've done Stacy's challenge of seven days of podcasting, and now that. Or however long it is now let me start a second show, and I'll take what I've learned there and upgrade it. So.

Hey, Adam, I got a question for you on your site. So I have the app on my phone, but I also have. Have you also have a beta version on online. But that. But I'm not able to edit combined audio files. Right. I have to download those separately, put them in one audio file, and then re upload it. Is that correct?

So for the website, right now we haven't added the editing tools onto the website. On the phone, it's a lot more difficult. I can give you later a list of tools if you wanted to do it on your computer, do some editing.

And I have GarageBand, if that would work.

Yeah, that's. Yeah, a lot of people use GarageBand. That's totally cool. And then you could re upload it back into callcast.

And what I love, too, Paul, is like, Adam like, got me the first six episodes. I didn't edit at all. I think I added the intro and the outro on. On callcast, but I did no editing at all. My editing didn't start until I hit episode six. So to answer your question, Stephanie, with, like, how to start. I would almost just start on Zoom honestly. And don't even plan on doing anything with callcast yet. Get some episodes going. And what would be the best way for you to get started? Would it be for you just to talk about? I mean, I even did not even Zoom. I did on. I did one. And I'll tell you about this later because Adam helped me through that. Seeing the voice memos on your phone. Like I did.

Oh, yeah, yeah.

And.

And I just, like, I just was like, this is. I was in my car. It's first. It's episode one. You can listen to it. I was in my car. And I'm like, okay, this is what I want to do. I don't know what. And it doesn't have to be this, but just an idea of, like, this is the. What I want the podcast to be at. And you'll notice once you start talking it, the clarity happens. And whether or not you publish that doesn't matter. You're just starting to talk about It. And that's what I would do. I would start with like, zoom or voice note, Whatever is the easiest for you to record on. Get five or six of those, then have Adam help you get it set up. Or we could set up another group. Call this if you guys want to get your everything set up. But otherwise, all this technical stuff, it's going to create a bottleneck. Right? And so I think it's just. And it's really cool. It gets people really involved in your. In your purpose of what you're doing by not being perfect when you start off. That's what I realized the most when I was doing that speech for the 70 podcasters three weeks in. They actually like the fact that I'm not perfect. It's getting them to be able to. To do it. And so relax a little bit.

Yeah.

The only thing I did was I did buy this at Guitar center and it just plugs right into my phone. That was the only type of thing I bought. So 40 bucks. And it sounds pretty good. It actually sounded pretty good.

I was going to mention. So my first episode, I actually liked how it sounded like the words I said, but it was so grumbled. So I remember calling Adam and going, I don't know what to do because I don't think I could recreate it. And he was like, why don't you just add a little intro and explain why it sounds bad? And so that's what I did. And it's just. Anything that's going to stop you from moving forward, eliminate that. Because no one cares. No one has the image that you have in your head.

You care.

This.

This kid, the eagle care.

That's it. Image. Yeah, that's in your head. No one else cares. And so. And whether or not you publish them, it doesn't matter. Decide once you hear it go, okay, do I like this? Do I want this to publish? So that's how I would start. I would just record five. Whether it be on zoom, whether it be on your voice note, whether you're doing it yourself. And just saying, like, this is what I think I want to do it on. This is what I'm excited about. This is what motivates me. This is what I'm curious about. Just kind of come up with. With that type of thing.

Just to piggyback on what Stacy was saying, because I really loved it is when she did her first recording, she was in the car. And then the sounds from being in the car was weird. But then she added a caveat beforehand, saying, hey, everyone, what you're about to hear is my first recording, and I was sitting in my car. And so she had this intro audio that set the listener up to understand what they were about to hear. But then it becomes even more special because she's taking you into this little time capsule journey. So I thought it was a great solution. And touch. And what she was doing is just moving forward with it and not letting. Not letting it getting caught. Like, oh, I gotta retape it. And then you retape it. You don't like that. Oh, I gotta do it again. Oh, no. And then you just freeze yourself in this constant loop of, oh, no, it's not good. It's not good. So she freed herself up by finding a creative way to invite the listener into the experience and then just kept moving forward with it. Should we send out bulleted list of getting started here? Like, we'll email everyone after. Here we. Here's a bullet list to get started. And you can follow this list and kind of pick and choose what items on the list would help you or be beneficial to you in terms of just getting started.

So we can do that with Randy's message to me saying, let's make a podcast cheat sheet. So, Randy, there you go. You're already channeling Adam's mindset.

Brilliant. And then, yeah, I'll make myself available if anyone wants to reach out. We can either do it as a group if enough people do, or individual if you want help with Callcast, because it's. It would be a deeper dive than 10. I'm looking. We have 10 minutes left. So I'd be happy just to take anyone through and help you get started and set up, and then also point you to resources that I discovered along the way when I was creating my podcast of either where you want to be found if you want to be on other people's podcasts, or how to find guests or, you know, whatever other questions that you might think of. Or someone mentioned an onboarding list. What I use tools I use to create that. And. But again, just. I think the important takeaways is to make a commitment on just a day. I'm going to start. I'm going to pick a day. I'm going to say, you know, on Monday, I'm going to start my first recording and I'm going to set up a zoom or whatever it might be and just jump in and hit the record button to do it. And know that once you have the audio, like Stacy said, you can then choose. Am I going to publish it? Am I not you can decide, but I think just jumping in and doing it is the first hurdle and barrier. And you'll find that if you can kind of set yourself. The thing I like about a challenge is I think there's a saying of some. Like there's a study that someone did where most people give up. If you have not recorded eight podcasts, that's like the threshold of where people drop and they give up. But if you get over that 8 podcast threshold, then people from there tend to keep moving forward and saying, you know what, I can do this. And they keep going, going. So I would set some kind of challenge for yourself of, I don't know if you remember when you were a kid, one of your parents saying, oh, just do it for one week and then you can decide if you're going to drop. Try it for this. Give yourself like a set amount of episodes. We all have eight people. I'm sure we could think of that we could reach out to that would be safe. People that we'd be comfortable recording with. You know, start there and then you'll find that as you go out or as you do things, all of a sudden you'll hear somebody say something at, you know, you know, you're at the bar or cafe or somewhere, and you'll hear someone mention something or say something. Oh, did you just say that? Wow, that's so interesting. I actually have a podcast. I'd love to interview you more. Would you be available for 30 minutes to. For an interview of a podcast? And you'll find that you start meeting interesting, incredible people and doors start opening and opportunities that you really weren't expecting can open up. I just. From the year I did podcasting, I started meeting people who then invited me to. Oh, wow, there's exclusive conference. I would love for you just to come and you can be my. I'll get you in. I know the person running the conference, and I didn't know these people moments before, and now all of a sudden, I'm in this, like, really private, exclusive conference, sitting there. Wow, this. None of this would have happened had I not just reached out to some. This person, you know, and ended up interviewing them. So it just leads interesting paths and doors of opportunity.

Yeah. And it keeps you open. Right. And that's why I love the guise of it being under the dating challenge when you kind of want to be open too. So let me just kind of read off. I wrote out just a couple of ideas for podcasts too, just to get you guys to think. Well, first, let me tell you, some of the benefits I wrote down were just getting you out of your comfort zone. You can connect with others, you can explore new ideas, do something totally different. Adam and I talked about this in our episode, but putting on a different lens. He's an introvert, I'm an introvert. I interviewed a friend of mine who was a like really famous reporter, you know, and she was talking about how she's an introvert, but when she is the reporter lens, she could talk to people differently. Adam talked about that with his podcast and how he's in the podcast lens. It's easier for him to talk to someone I talked about. Now I have a podcast lens. But at the time it was a sales lens. It was easy for me to talk to people if I was selling, if I was doing sales. So anyway, those are some of the benefits. The other thing I put was if you have an idea and you're not in a podcast situation, your idea might stay in a vacuum. When you talk about it, it expands. And so that's the other thing I like is you're able to just come up with something and then talk about it and then it ripples. It ripples more because you're verbalizing it and then also talking to someone else in a really deep connected way. And then the number one reason why you guys should do it is it gives you a reason to get off your couch. And you can make it a fun hobby or a side hustle depending on if you decide to monetize it it. And then I put risks. You start it and decide you don't like it and you can stop, you can. And then no harm, no foul. Some ideas I thought were challenges, you could do one alongside this kind of challenge. I did 75 hard recently. I'm sure you guys heard about that. I was pretty much talking about it throughout the whole podcast. It helped me do it. You could do self reflective episodes where you're just talking about things that you're interested. It could be about self love, it could be about divorce, it could be about kids, moving out of the house, whatever you're going through. Favorite quote. You can ponder. What do you wish there was more information on? You could do it on travel. What are you passionate about? What do you want to learn more about? Are you in a life transition? You can talk about that. What are you an expert in? Talk about that. What do you struggle with the most and want to work on? What do you enjoy doing? What is the thing you want to do? What do you know a lot about? What Do I wish there was more information? Okay, I repeated some of them.

What do you.

Okay.

Teach someone something that I thought was good. You can teach someone something new. It could even be talking to them about tennis. Oh, I just met a guy. I was telling Adam about it last week. He reviews other people's podcasts. That's his whole podcast. Just. There's like a book reviewer. He's a podcast reviewer. Going on what Paul was saying. You can ask the same three questions to each person. You could do like icebreaker type prompts. Okay. A few more things. What questions are you curious about the answers about? What do people have on their bucket list? Can you talk about? Maybe it's a bucket list podcast. What do you want to do before you die? What do you love the most?

Most?

And so anyway, those are just some of the things that I thought about and just to get your minds going. But it's exciting, you guys. It kind of opens up a new world, and that's why I'm excited about sharing it. And I'm just so thankful that you guys came on to talk about this today. And I just think it's really cool that you're looking to expand yourselves. And just even being here doing this just feels really good to me. So I appreciate you.

Well, I wanted to thank you guys for taking your time to, like, set this up for us. And I don't know if this supports or not the rest of the team. I would be open to hosting, like a get together if you want to talk through your ideas or throw them out there and get feedback from each other. I think that could be really helpful if we're feeling nervous about it or whatever. I do have some coaching backgrounds that I can help support with, like, mindset stuff. Just being able to even have accountability. Okay, Therese, you have. You have some ideas, like, when are you recording by when Just help each other move along. And then maybe when we come up with ideas of, or I mean, thought questions and stuff that we need, need that, maybe then we could reach out to you guys and bring you guys in.

Yeah, I love that. And we could integrate the I'm game, starting off with identifying the why, why do you want to do the podcast? And then mindset, which is your category. And then G would be goal. Setting a goal, holding yourself accountable through other people. And then my people would be creating this environment and then educating yourself, which is talking to people like Adam or me or even each other about. About different ideas.

So the other thing is, I don't know if you want to do it later. You could all email Stacy. If anyone's interested in this group to be on each other's podcast, it could be a great way to say, hey, I'd be happy to support you and be on your podcast and you could be on mine. It's a great way just to kick off and get going with anyone on this call supporting each other, saying, can I interview you for 30 minutes? And so if you would want to toss your hat in the ring or whatever to be support each other, to be on each other's podcasts, you could email maybe Stacy. Would that be good? We could put together a list.

Just email me if you attended. Just so Stacy, do. Or if you attended or if you're watching this after, because we're recording it, guys. And if you're open to this being on my podcast, if I decide, let me know if you're not and then I can, I can not do it. I didn't think about it until I'm, until we're doing it. I'm like, that might be kind of cool to have this episode on the podcast too. But yeah, email me at Stacey, do the thingformula.com and then let me know you want to be involved. And then Stephanie will kind of talk about, about how we want to set that because we have Natalie doing the book club for attached to. Lots of little spin off things are happening from the group, which I'm excited about because I think you guys get the concept of my people, which is surrounding yourself with people that are doing the same thing with as you.

So yeah, and anybody, feel free to like DM me if you're interested or want to connect just so then I can kind of get a feel for who. Who's interested in stuff. So we make sure that you're included.

Perfect. All right, guys, thank you and thank you Adam for being here.

Thank you, Adam.

Thank you, everybody.

Brilliant. Thank you, guys.

Okay, and I'll see you guys on Sunday. We're doing our final kickoff, final kickoff, final end of the challenge celebration that day. So thanks so much, you guys. Bye.

Thanks for listening to the do the Thing podcast. We hope you enjoyed the show. But even more, we hope you'll be inspired to do the thing. Do you have a burning question on doing the Thing that you'd like answered? How about an inspiring do the Thing story of your own that you'd like to share? We'd love to hear all about it. Just leave us a voice message at dothing callcast co or email us@helloothethingpodcast.com.