Podcasting Life and Business After Four Years-Podcast 622

Podcasting Life and Business After Four Years-Podcast 622

What’s it like to support yourself as a podcaster? I looked up the other day and asked, “How long have I been doing this?” 2009 was the actual start date. I’ve been in business supporting myself as a podcaster exclusively since 2013. Learned a lot of lessons in that time. It seems like I’ve been in business a lot longer than nearly four years. Hear some of those lessons in Podcasting Life and Business After Four Years-Podcast 622.

Soul killing corporate jobs aren’t for everyone

Some business owners wish for the peace of collecting a paycheck and doing what the boss wants. Not me. Going into business for myself has been a path of self discovery and self realization. You say goodbye to eight hour days and regimented work schedules. No more guaranteed paychecks. Some months are great. Some aren’t so great. You’re ‘On It’ pretty much 24 hours a day. Freedom is one of the rewards. Wouldn’t trade it for anything.

Self Realization

Surprisingly, how I spend my time has become one of the top priorities. I can do anything I want. Is what I am doing with my time going to benefit the business? How does the business grow? What is the core business? How is that going to change? Self Realization is one of the big benefits of being in business alone. No one around to give orders. Good decisions accrue to the business owner. So do the bad decisions. Thus, you spend a lot of time thinking things through.

Content Creators

Centuries of business have been about consolidating physical space. Farmers need more land. Ranchers need more space for more cattle. Retailers always want to open new locations. Content creators have real estate in cyber space. With the right tools we can make that space as big as it needs to be. A new world requires a complete change in thinking. Content creators don’t just have to change the ‘working for the man’ mindset, but how we think about what we do as well.

Podcasting As A Business

Podcasting is still a fledgling ‘industry’. We podcasters are cutting a new trail. As an advertising medium Podcasting works. Smaller podcasts can yield very good results too. Podcasts big and small tell stories and provide basic information on highly specific topics unavailable anywhere else. Podcasters make an authentic human connection with the listener not found in broadcast media.

Walk and Talk

The rules of the Walk and Talk Podcast are no prep, no plan. Just talk. Join me. What came up in this podcast are the life and business lessons I’ve learned since I started podcasting. If you’re considering going into business for yourself, especially as a content creator, do what you love. Passion for the work will get you through a lot of rainy days.

Sponsored by Ryan Plumbing and Heating of Saint Paul

Podcasting Life and Business After Four Years-Podcast 622

 

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Podcast 602-Snowstorm! Predictions Stories Hopes

Podcast 603-Snowstorm! Predictions Stories Hopes

We Love To Talk About The Weather

n Podcast 603-Snowstorm! Predictions Stories Hopes, people who live in the Upper Midwestern United States love to talk about the weather. Weather is safe. Talking about the weather offers a respite from political nonsense. Everyone has a pet theory about weather in all four seasons in Minnesota, Wisconsin, North and South Dakota and Iowa.

Here It Comes

When it comes to a predicted snowstorm we go into high gear. Snow out west has given way to severe weather predictions for Minnesota. Heavy Snow. Severe Winds. Blowing Snow. The return of winter to the plains and upper midwest. After a long period of unseasonably warm weather the cold returns. We’ll talk about it in Podcast 602-Snowstorm! Predictions Stories Hopes.

March Is The Cruelest Month Maybe

In our neck of the woods we often say March is the cruelest month. 20 days or so before Daylight Savings and the start of spring does not mean daisies and green fields in Minnesota. It could mean deep snow drifts and freezing temperatures.

Biggest Snow Storms In Minnesota

While late February and March is a transition period the standard weather theory is the biggest snow storms come in March. Statistically though, the biggest snowstorms have been in December and January, with only the fourth largest storm in Minnesota history occurring in March.

From November 1940 to Halloween 1991

Everyone here remembers the great Halloween Storm of 1991. Most everyone remembers twin snowstorms that his in January of 1982. The old folks remember the famous Armistice Day storm of 1940. Those did not occur in March. What happens in March though usually, is gloomy, rainy, snowy and cold weather. I’ll provide a list of the biggest storms in Podcast 603-Snowstorm! Predictions Stories Hopes.

We Aren’t Worthy

Warmer weather has lulled us into a false sense of security. Warm is something we Lutheran and Catholic Minnesotans do not deserve. When it is warm for too long in the winter we feel there must be a pay back.

We’re Gonna Get Clobbered

As if on cue, the National Weather Service models predict the possibility of a major winter storm with high winds and so much precipitation and if it is cold enough and conditions just right we will get clobbered. Accumulations of between ten and twenty inches of snow. A major winter storm. Get the details in Podcast 602-Snowstorm! Predictions Stories Hopes.

A Kid’s View of Severe Weather

In Podcast 602-Snowstorm! Predictions Stories Hopes some stories about extreme weather. Tornadoes. Snow Storms. The twister scene of the Wizard of Oz. Twisters that destroyed towns in Xenia Ohio, Siren Wisconsin and in Missouri. Tornadoes that blew over my house when I was a kid. Yes, they do sound like freight trains. Snowstorms that made schoolers happier than Christmas morning.

Turn Up The Heat and Plan The Menu

Get ready to make the trip to the store before the shelves are picked clean, Walking Dead style. Plan your menu. Get ready to settle in. Listen to a ridiculous list of tips for ‘staying alive’ during a snow storm. Get ready to shovel. The National Weather Service is predicting a major winter storm. No one is safe! Look at it this way. It gives us something to talk about on the bus.

Sponsored By Ryan Plumbing and Heating of Saint Paul and X Government Cars.

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Podcast 601-Nobody Knows Anything!

Talking Politics Is Work

It is difficult to contemplate or talk about politics. In Podcast 601-Nobody Knows Anything! a phrase attributed to screenwriter William Goldman is applied to American politics. The guy who wrote Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid and All The President’s Men once said “Nobody Knows Anything”. Goldman was referring to Hollywood know-it-alls. In those days as today producers, professors and other so called experts wanted to make people think they knew the ‘formula’ for success in the movie business. The truth is making movies is almost always a gamble because no one knows what’s going to sell before the fact. Nobody Knows Anything.

Nobody Knows Anything And Our Politics

What goes for movies goes for American politics these days. Everyone has a voice. An audience. A constituency. Everyone wants to tell you what is happening. What to do about it and what will happen next. Everyone knows. Except no one really knows anything. From the highest of the high to the lowliest position on a small town board of education. Everyone has a voice they can’t wait to use but what they have to say is empty. In Podcast 601-Nobody Knows Anything!

Tell Your Audience What They Want To Hear

Social media. Local radio. The Internet. Protect your audience. Tell it what it wants to hear. Get accolades, speaking fees, book sales, click throughs and even election certificates. Commentariat. Bloggers and podcasters. Comedians. Subpar politicians and local political operators. All ply their political but noncontroversial wares to people only too willing to applaud when they hear what they want to hear.

It’s All About Power

For those in what is called the Deep Government where policies are implemented everything is theater. Everything is Pay Back. Get Back. It’s all about power and games. Using your constituency to get what you want. In office. Out of office. All part of the game in the puzzle palace we call government  in Washington DC or your state capitol.

The Fairness Doctrine

30 years ago a regulation called ‘The Fairness Doctrine‘ was rescinded by the FCC. The Fairness Doctrine simply required broadcast licensees to both present controversial issues and to do so in a manner that was, in the FCC’s view honest, equitable and balanced. 30 years ago there was no social media. There was no political talk.

Political talk was something you heard on Sunday mornings or read on the editorial page of the Wall Street Journal or the New York Times. The news was something you heard at the top of the hour. With a technology and media revolution, political talk today isn’t just a virus. Political talk has become a cancer.

Political Saturation

Every political development is dissected, repurposed, rewritten, opinionated, worked over, subjected to satire and analysis. Today’s demons and today’s heroes. They’re only too happy to tell you what will happen tomorrow. The louder the cacophony grows the less we know. The solution isn’t some kind of new Fairness Doctrine. Maybe the cure is more of the disease. We’ll talk about it in Podcast 601-Nobody Knows Anything!

Nobody Knows Anything

The big talk radio guy speaking at your local political dinner doesn’t know anything. The guy who has the You Tube Channel or the Podcast? Nope. The local radio station talk show? Talk radio now depends on people calling in who don’t know anything to add to the conversation by two guys who don’t know anything either. Clearly the White House doesn’t know. The Pentagon doesn’t know. The people at your state capitol don’t know. The people behind the desk on the 24 hour news channel don’t know either.

Saturation Point

Open your mouth about a political issue on social media and you’re branded. We’re saturated with political talk and political partisanship. Our differences are encouraged by know it alls commanding increasingly misinformed tribes fed a steady diet of what they want to hear. A few sell ‘expertise’ on the US Constitution. Some are self appointed media experts. Many are the founders of popup political movements. Many more are simply political operators selling their wares to the highest bidder, behind the scenes. These are the new carpet baggers.

Hungry For Leadership

Those sold to us as heroes turn out to be pygmies and charlatans. We read their books. We cheer and believe in them. When they are destroyed we move on. In Podcast 601-Nobody Knows Anything I share with you my utter disgust with the political process in this country. You can forget the labels. They all suck. Republicans. Democrats. Socialists. Populists. Libertarians. It’s all noise. Memes. Rants. Photos. Guest Appearances. Stand Ups in front of the capitol. Everyone wants to be the next Juke Box Hero.

Republicans who claimed to be for freedom and less government continue to expand the scope and cost of government. Democrats who claimed to be for the little guy are increasingly associated with the rich and powerful. Both sides want to increase the surveillance state and curtail your freedoms. Are we reaching a tipping point?

In Podcast 601-Nobody Knows Anything!.

Sponsored by X Government Cars and Ryan Plumbing and Heating of Saint Paul.

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