← The How To Podcast Series - Podcast Co-Hosts, Practical Podcast Tips, and Podcast Community
The How To Podcast Series - Podcast Co-Hosts, Practical Podcast Tips, and Podcast Community
E626 - Your First Love - Coming Back to Why You Started Podcasting
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Okay, we're rolling. And welcome back to the how to podcast series. It's so great to be with you. I just wanna, I just want to say we have the coolest podcast listeners ever. It's I. Come on, I create the episodes, put them out there in the world. You guys are fantastic. The responses, the comments, the emails, the Spotify commas, the dms, speak pipes, the buy me a coffees, my gosh, you guys have been outstanding and I just want to say thank you, thank you, thank you. New podcaster just launched a show. Mark has got a new podcast. We're going to do an episode about that and coming up soon to support new podcasters and I'd love for you to go fall in love with his show when we do an episode just about Mark. That's exciting. We're going to get together and plan that out. But new, new people starting podcasts in 2026 that listen to this show have found inspiration and now have gone and move forward to hit record. Sharon with her new podcast the Duh Factor. Again, another new podcaster finding their way and I my Hope from day one for this show 625 episodes ago was that you would find the courage, the support, the encouragement to, to hit record and put yourself out there in a unique way that you've never done before. So if that's you and you're finding inspiration, you've acted on the inspiration. I'd love to hear your story. I'd love to connect with you virtual coffee over the Internet or have you on as a guest co host to talk about your journey or you're brand new. This is your first episode, then you are among friends and family here without a podcast series. We, we really do want to pour into you and to again, not just give you the tools and the tech. That's, that's great. But how about the community, the family and the, the support you really need. I don't think anyone should podcast alone, including you. So you're in the right spot. So if somebody sent you here, they're. They love you. And if you found this on your own, then you be great at like treasure hunts. You'd be really good at that. So well done. Glad to have you here. I want to talk about your first love now, not when you were 12. Not that. No, no, let's, let's move past that because that was a nightmare. Your, your first love. Coming back to why you started podcasting in a world where there just seems to be so many additional things that come along with an idea that can be overwhelming. I want this episode to be permission for you to go back to the beginning, back to the start. Why are you doing this? And to fall in love with the reason you started in the first place. Because I think if you've been doing this for a few episodes, a few years, or a few hundred episodes, it's a good thing to go back and have a little moment with yourself and remember what was my first love when I first started podcasting. And I think I should go back there. That's what we're going to do today. Glad you're here. So this could get me in trouble, because I'm going to talk about my first love. It would have been high school. Her name was Ruth. Ruth was a couple years younger than me, a few years younger than me. Her best friend Eric was my, like, my. My. One of my best friends. I've got several people in my life that were, like those watershed moments when you just meet the right person. You just connect. Right. Eric and I connected. He's the coolest kid he had. He was riding motorcycles at 16, had dirt bikes. He had snowmobiles. He lived out in the country outside of town, and Guy was just amazing. There's Eric Ruth. Ruth was Eric's younger daughter. And then Eddie, Eric's older brother. And this family were just. They were the coolest. And I loved hanging out with them and hanging out with Eric, I got to meet his sister. And by meeting his sister, you're like, wait a second. I. This is interesting. And that whole thing is happening. Right. So I would have been grade nine. And those moments of awkwardness of your first love. You're thinking right now of your first love. I know you are. The moments of awkwardness and, like, two left feet and clumsy and saying the most absurd and stupidest things, making promises when you don't even know what tomorrow's going to be like. But you're like, oh, I promise you this. I love you to the end of the world. All this stuff. Right. Yeah. We weren't as smooth as we thought we were with our first love, were we? No. No, we weren't. No. And if you ever have a chance to meet them in the future, they'll probably confirm that you weren't as smooth as you thought you were. Yeah. But first love, we look back in fondness, we look back in a little bit of fear, and like, oh, what was I thinking? But it didn't stop us from. From being awkward. It didn't stop us from starting. It didn't stop us from Taking the leap. And even though we had no idea what we were doing, like, think about it. Go back to your first love. You had no idea. Be honest. You had no idea what you were doing. Yet it didn't stop you, did it? You had your first love. For better or for worse, you had your best, your first love. And in those moments, you learned a lot about yourself. You might have got your heart broken, you might have got overwhelmed or way too deep. You might have over promised, over committed. You might have failed, you might have succeeded. You might have turned out really great. It might have turned out really bad. All of this also sounds like podcasting, doesn't it? Yeah. Yeah. Over committing, falling in love, love blindness. Too much, too soon, right? Okay. Come on. Okay. And what happens in podcasting, over years of doing it, many, many, many episodes, is you get further and further away from the. The starting point where you began and what kicked this off in the first place. And if you don't go back there and reminisce and remind yourself of why you're still here, you might drift from your original course that you had set out for yourself. Yeah, we're going to change over time. We're going to be different people. That's why we most likely have moved on from our first love and we've found the person that, you know, we spent the rest of our life with or the person that's the one that really we needed in that moment. Right. Life has a way of doing that. Podcasting has a way of doing that. Well, what I find in podcasting is people come to podcasting from different perspectives. There are people who come to podcasting because they were super big on YouTube, and now they want to take their YouTube experience, translate it into a podcast, and reach a different audience who might not be so YouTube savvy. Great. But podcasting is different than YouTube in how YouTube works and how podcasting works. It's not the same thing. I have people that I work with who come from Instagram. They're really big on Instagram. They're an influencer, they have a big audience, they've got a big community. They built something over time. They come from Facebook, they come from Tick Tock, they come from LinkedIn, they're coming from a different platform into podcasting. Their first love is social media. Their first love is YouTube. Their first love is fill in the blank. And then they come to podcasting, and it's kind of like the next thing that they fall in love with. But it wasn't the first thing specifically, they fell in love with. I also work with podcasters who come to podcasting, and podcasting is their first love. It is the first thing that brought them into creating content in the first place. They didn't have a YouTube channel, they didn't have an Instagram, they didn't have a Facebook. They didn't have any of those things. They had no followers, they had no listeners. And like most podcasters, we all start at the same spot at zero. That first listen, that first country we've never heard of, where a listener listens in is. It's dramatic. It's a big thing. And podcasting is our first love. The moment we put our hand up and say, I want to start a podcast, then all of the emails start pouring in, all of the feedback and all the opinions start to pile up. Go into any Facebook group about podcasting and ask a simple question and watch what happens. It's like seagulls around french fries at the beach. You will be swarmed by seagulls. You will be swarmed by comments and opinions and, and people who don't agree with each other trying to pull you in their direction. It's a tug of war. And it seems like the moment you want to create one thing, other people want you to create additional things. So I want to start a podcast. Great. Do you have a blog? I. I said I wanted to start a podcast. No, no, but you need to write a blog. But I don't want to write a blog. I want to start a podcast. Oh, but do you have a tick tock? I don't have a tick tock, but I want to start a podcast. Oh, but you're going to do video. No, I'm, I'm, I'm not, I'm not starting a video podcast right now. I just want to start a, an audio podcast. That's. But you have to be on video. But, but I don't want to be on video. But do you have an Instagram? No. Do you post within 72 hours of a podcast episode going live? Because you have to do that. That's a rule I made up and sell a course about free five easy payments. You're like, wait a minute, I don't want to learn your course and I don't want five easy payments. I, I do this on the weekends and the evenings when my kids are sleeping, and, and I have a full time job, and if I buy another course or another thing, my, my partner's not going to be very happy with me. So, no, I don't want your course. I don't want your funnel. I don't want your. Do you have a newsletter? I don't want a newsletter. I want to create a podcast. Do you see what I'm saying? It just. Your first love is now the gateway into a myriad of other things that people think you need to do with. Will tell you are a rule, will tell you as a best practice and you feel overwhelmed because everybody has one more thing to add to your plate. I try to be the opposite in the show. Yes, I'm going to have people on here that are really big on Instagram. Yes, I'm going to have people on here who are really great on branding or going to be awesome at website design or artwork and artwork. All of these things are resources. But what is your first love? What is the thing that you go back to? Is it the joy of recording your voice in an audio podcast, putting it out into the world and someone sending you a message going, I love your show because of your show. I went and got mental health support for the first time because of what you said, because of your show. I got that promotion because of that, your show. I, I put myself out there and I met the love of my life because of your show. I have a new path in life. I was on a destructive course and now I'm on a positive course because of you. When that email comes in that buy me a coffee shows up and somebody of the generosity of their heart gives you a five dollar coffee donation just to say thank you, it's like the whole world stops in that moment because that's a human being reaching out to you and saying, because of you, I found value. Isn't that enough? Like, why do we have to add on all of these other things to be a successful podcast? If you don't make money with your show, you're not a successful podcaster. If you're not in the top 100, you're irrelevant. If you're not a top 1% podcast globally, then, you know, what's your problem? Like, there's all of this stuff, right? And I want this episode to be a. Let's go back to the original thing we fell in love with, and that is podcasting and be podcast first and be okay with that. And if you have time in the margins of life, you don't have a big team, you don't have a big budget, it's you. If you have time, then pick the next logical thing that your schedule will allow to help your podcast grow. But until then, don't feel like you Are not performing at your highest level by simply recording an episode and posting it to the Internet because you're doing more than many people. So be okay with your first love. And whether it's social media, whether it's podcasting, whether it's YouTube, whatever it is, radio, what's your first love? For me, my first love is podcasting. And everything else is extra. So let's talk about it. Podcasting usually starts with a spark. You remember that first time you hit record. Not because you had the perfect setup or the right content calendar or that amazing big name guest, but because it felt exciting, it felt honest. And over time, that simple joy can quietly get buried under layers of shoulds and musts and rules which there are no rules. Rules to launch a video version, to post daily clips, to manage multiple social media accounts, build a website, write a blog, start a newsletter, offer coaching, grow a community, maybe even write a book. Or hey, how about you learn how to create music for your podcast? Oh, how about that? What began as a creative outlet, a spark, an idea, a love, slowly starts to compound and resemble more of an unpaid, never ending job description. Somewhere along the way, podcasting shifted from being fun to being frustrating and overwhelming. And you catch yourself dreading that recording day. Not because you don't love talking to your audience and creating content, but because everything that now comes attached to recreating that single episode. When I finish this episode, the dread kicks in. Because now I gotta go and do all these other things to promote the episode I just recorded. Can't I just be a podcaster and be enough? Yeah, you can. I'm on this mission in this episode and with this podcast, to gently push back on all those gurus who are telling you that it's not enough to simply sit down and hit record. It's not enough anymore. You need the lights, you need the multi camera angles, you need B roll, you need editing, separate audio and video, you need to design your graphics and slice up your clips. You need to use all these AI prompts. You gotta have a. You have to have an AI prompt. You don't have an AI prompt. What's your problem? How can you live right? We need to write our posts, we need to create a blog, we need to chase the algorithms, we need to figure out SEO, we need to do all these things, we need to start looking sideways at other creators that we are trying to keep up with the podcasting Joneses out there who seem to be everywhere at once and doing it spectacularly. And here we are muddling around in A puddle trying to figure out how to make this mud look good. And we feel like we're falling behind because we're not doing all of the same things at the same scale at the same time as all those other shows. The truth is, most of us never started podcasting to keep up with anyone. We actually started because we love something about the medium itself. For some of us, the first love is audio only. It's a simple microphone, a quiet room, and intimacy of speaking directly into someone's ears. And for others, it's. It's a conversation. It's the chance to sit down with an actual human being and explore their story without the distraction of a live chat or a camera lens. Or am I getting the right good angle? Is this a good background behind me? Can you see that? That potted plant behind me? What color is the light should I have for my studio? Oh, what lens do I need for my camera? Come on. Some podcasters fall in love with editing, shaping the raw audio into a story. Like you hear on True Crime or those story podcasts like Dreamful with Jordan Blair or Afterlife Fictions with Jonathan Marshall. There's this whole world that we can build in audio, and we don't need video at all. Some podcasters come into podcasting, and they're writers at heart, and they love pouring over, creating a narrative through written word. It's their joy. And creating thoughtful scripts and show notes and companion blog posts is what lights them up. But that doesn't mean that all of us have to do that. Some people love being on camera, and they thrive. They come from a YouTube point of view, and video is first. But that doesn't mean all of us have to do YouTube, doesn't mean all of us have to do video, and it doesn't mean that your $2,000 course is good for everyone. And you should really stop telling everybody that it is, because it's not. Your first love might be community building. You just love getting people together virtually or in person and doing life together. And you just use your show as a gathering point to get people into your world so that you can build community. Does that mean everyone has to have a community? No, it doesn't. Go back to what lights you up. And for me, I love doing all of these things. I love every aspect of podcasting. But the first thing, if somebody said, dave, if I had to take everything away from you in the world of podcasting except for one thing, what would that be? You could only keep one, one thing. It would be this, right here, right now. Recording content and putting it out in the world. Everything else is in the margins. This is the main thing that fills my page, is this you, me, right now. And it's enough. It's enough. Despite what all the gurus are going to try to sell you, this is enough. This is exactly what I wanted. And everything else is a bonus. In the margins of life, it's okay to just podcast and not feel like it's not enough. As I look at podcasting right now, I think the problem is that we stack on more and more and more and we add on so many different things and bolt things onto our podcast, and we treat our original love like it's some. Like it's step one on a ladder that we're supposed to climb away from. We're supposed to move from step one and improve and get better and add more. Our whole world is about adding more. One more thing. One more thing. I listen to podcasts about podcasting religiously. I have probably, I don't know, 10, 20 shows I listen to on repeat. I want to hear what they're talking about. I want to hear where they're going. But sadly, I'm really struggling because they seem to just keep adding more to what their expectations are of us as podcasters. And I find it overwhelming and honest. It's not sustainable. It's not something that we can. We can all commit to for the long term. If we follow all of the advice currently out there around podcasting, we're all going to burn out and quit. It's just not possible to do what people are telling us are the base levels now than where we started out. So imagine that little step ladder. Your original love is not the first step on a very long ladder. It's not. There's this feeling that a small, engaged audience, you know, 10 listens, 5 listens, 20 listens to an episode, is kind of less than a Golden Globe award for podcasting or an Ambi Award or whatever you want to call it award, or an award that you can pay $500 for to be nominated to, but never win and then put that on your website. I'm a. I'm an. A nominated podcaster. I've been nominated for a podcast award. You paid $500 to say that. So anybody can do that. That doesn't. That's not a commentary on your podcast. That's just the fact that you had $500 laying around. See what I'm. We feel like we're less than because we're not as big as. And this pressure to upgrade, to expand, can be so strong that we actually forget. Staying close to your first love isn't a failure to grow. It's actually a deliberate and healthy choice to remain and never forget why you started. It's completely okay to go back to your first love in podcasting and let it be enough. It's okay to be audio only forever if you choose. It's okay to be on every social media platform if you want to as well. It's okay to not have a blog. It's okay to not have an email newsletter. It's okay to not capture emails at all. It's okay to have a membership. It's okay to have a coaching program. It's okay to charge $2,000 to certify somebody as a podcaster, although I think that's a terrible idea. It's okay to have a course attached to your show. It's okay to write a book. It's okay to not do any of those things. It's okay. What's your first love? If I walked into your studio, your recording area, and I said to you, you have to remove everything and you can only keep one thing. Think of a fire breaking out and you have time to pick one thing and run out the door. No thought, just grab it and go. Because if you don't grab it now, you're not going to take anything with you. What do you grab? What do you do for your podcast? What do you take? Is your first thing that you grab Instagram or is your first thing you grab is your podcast and that's okay. Your. Your answer is your answer, but that's your first love and it's okay to just do that. So if you're an Instagram person who feels compelled that you have to do a podcast and you're here under duress because somebody told you you had to do this, do you know it's okay to just do Instagram? You don't have to do a podcast at all. And you could be okay with that. If you're from YouTube and you're here because somebody told you you had to do an audio podcast and you're like, I don't want to do an audio podcast. It's like being sent to your room, then maybe this isn't for you and you should just do YouTube and do it well. And if you're an audio podcaster, you don't have to do anything else either. You can just do an audio podcast. It's okay. You're not a second class creator because you choose. You chose A simpler path, and you chose the path that worked right for you. It's okay to have a podcast that remains a hobby that brings you joy and connection without ever becoming a business. It's okay that your audience is small, it's human sized and it. It's meaningful instead of massive and anonymous with a bunch of people you never hear from. No engagement. You feel like you're talking to an empty room. It's okay to have five people who love you and would do anything for you because you show up for them. It's okay, is what I'm trying to say. To fall, to stay in love with your first love. I think we need a reset and I think here's a helpful way for you to do this is to pause and ask yourself a few honest questions. What part of podcasting did you love most when you started? What part of podcasting did you love the most? What part still feels light and life giving in the moment and just as important? What part feels heavy, stressful and draining? Maybe you realize that the camera is a real source of anxiety for you. Maybe it's a constant demand for more content, for more platforms and to feed this algorithm that is insatiable. And if you don't, if you miss a day, if you miss a minute, if you miss a post, you're out. Maybe it's the pressure to optimize everything for growth. And if you're not growing, you're not podcasting. Naming these things gives you permission to put them in their place. From there, you can actually shrink your show back to what you actually enjoy doing. That might mean recording audio only again and shelving the video for a season. It might mean simplifying your release schedule so you're not racing to for a weekly deadline or like me, a daily episode. It might mean simplifying your process and how you show up. It might look like choosing one place to show up outside of the podcast. One social platform, one community, one newsletter. Instead of trying to be everywhere at once. Success doesn't does during this time isn't measured in downloads and followers or sponsorships. It's measured in a simple question. Did I enjoy making this episode today? When you do this, you're not quitting on your podcast. You're not going backwards. You're protecting it. You're recognizing that your work that you do out of love tends to last longer, resonate deeper and feel, feel more like you than anything you've ever done out of obligation or out of comparison with the Joneses. In podcasting, you're also Quietly resisting a culture that insists that everything has to be scaled, everything has to be optimized, everything has to be monetized, no matter what. And if you're not on that path, you're going to get stepped on. Go to any conference with, are you going to hear, how do I make money with my show? How do I grow my show? How do I build my SEO? Here's 35,000 new AI tools that came out in the last 15 minutes. How do I learn all these things? How do I do this? How do I do better thumbnails? How do I do better YouTube? How do I beat the algorithm? And that's where people are going and what the empty rooms are. Podcasters mental health. Sadly, a good podcasting comrade, I would say. Danny Brown. DannyBrown me. Danny talks a lot about our mental health as podcasters. It's part of his journey personally, and he talks about it openly. That we create content for others, we serve, but no one serves us. So those conference events, when somebody wants to just talk about podcasters, mental health, they're not. That's not a sexy title that draws and fills a room. Nope. But AI SEO, making money with your show, growing your podcast. I want to be a top 100 podcast. That's what fills a room. And it's like drive through nutrition. It's good in the moment, but the after effects. And if that's all you eat and all you consume, it's not very healthy. Don't get me wrong. There's nothing wrong with building a business around your show. Nothing wrong with wanting your show to be successful. There's nothing wrong with wanting your podcast to reach a big audience. I want that for everyone. But is that your first love? Then be honest with yourself. My first love is creating a business. When people start a restaurant, they focus on their first love. What is it? I want to create great food. I want to be a successful restaurateur, and I want to make a million dollars. That's their first love. What's your first love? It's fine to turn your podcast into a business. That's your goal. But it's not the standard for all of us. So stop rubbing our noses in it if we aren't on the same path. And stop trying to force us into your funnel, into your way of approaching podcasting. Because it worked for you doesn't mean it works for everyone. Keep it in mind. So if podcasting has started to feel like it's too much and you're thinking about stopping and packing it in, you're overwhelmed, you're overworked, you're exhausted, and it feels like you're on this treadmill of content creation and promotion. Content creation, promotion, content creation, promotion. And you've fallen out of love with your podcast. It's become. It's become a. An anchor that's keeping you in place and keeping you chained to your computer, chained to your microphone, and chained to your algorithms. It's okay. Consider this your permission to slip. You don't have to keep up with the podcasting Joneses and the podcasting gurus. And if you've ever felt like I've pushed you on this show in that direction, I apologize, because that's never been my intent. I hope that that never happens. You don't have to do everything you see the bigger shows doing. You don't have to be trying to emulate a Golden Globe nomination in the podcasting category. You don't have to make a million dollars with your podcast. You don't have to be a guest on 2000 episodes in a year. You don't have to post on social media and promote your episode. There's gurus right now that are throwing their phone against the wall while I'm saying this, but it's true. You can simply, for the love of podcasting, turn on a mic, share your thoughts, post it to the world, shut your computer off, and go carry on with your life and do nothing else and totally be happy, fulfilled, lacking nothing, not feeling like you're missing out on anything. And be healthy, sustainable, and present for your family and for yourself without feeling overwhelmed. When you're doing this as a team of one, it is impossible to emulate anything being done by big shows with multiple people, big budgets, a team of 20. Don't try to copy that. You are allowed to return to the simple, original version of you, your show that you first fell in love with, and let that be your focus. Your first love can be your first priority again. And that might be exactly what keeps you podcasting for years to come. You're like, Dave, you are clicking on all of the buttons right now. I don't know what to do with this information because I don't hear anybody talking like this on all those other podcasts about podcasting. Yeah, because I don't have a funnel for you. I don't have anything to sell you. I do have one thing, how to podcast. CA has my calendar, and it's there and it's free, and you can use it as often as you want. You and I can just have a virtual coffee Together. I'm not going to try to force you into anything. I just want to make sure you're okay. Your mental health is more important than your podcast, and your podcast is more important than all of the things people are going to tell you you have to do to be a successful podcaster. So fall in love again with your first love. What brought you here? What brought you to podcasting? Go back there, reminisce, and fall in love with that again. I'll be waiting. And I'd love to hear how this episode helped you reset and refocus on what matters for you and your show. I'm here for you always. Talk soon. Hey, it's Dave. Thank you for sticking around to the end. This is where we do our call to action, or pathway to engagement, as I like to call it. And here's what's interesting. I've been doing this podcast for years now, hosting meetups, helping podcasters, editing for people, doing a lot of the behind the scenes stuff. And I, when we have people who follow the show, reach out to me and say, dave, guess what? I'm like, what? They said, I just hired my first consultant. I'm gonna go work with them and help me with my podcast. And I kind of go, wait a minute, you what? Yeah, yeah, I found a podcast consultant and they're gonna help me with my show. It's hard to pretend to be happy. Why? Because I, I want to work with you. I like, wait a minute, like Dave, you know the guy Dave who's been doing the how to Podcast series and eight other podcasts and the guy that's been with you the whole time and we've done meetups, we've done time together, we've spent time together. And you've hired somebody else now maybe I'm not your person. That's okay. I'm totally fine with that. By the way, keep coming back. I love having you here. But if you're like, well, I didn't hire you because you don't have anything like that, do you? And I do, and I have been for a long time and I don't talk about it enough, apparently, because people are going to other people looking for things that Dave does. So it in the spirit of Dave and in the spirit of making better connections with you, I do have personal coaching in podcasting. I have podcast community, I have all of the resources, I have all of the background, the history in podcasting, and the love for you as a fellow podcaster. If you're looking for a podcast coach, somebody who can walk with you, Somebody who cares about you. Someone who is your challenger, your cheerleader, and your coach. Because even though I've said on the show you can't be all three, I think I am. And I want to help you. So howtopodcast ca, please, before you go searching anywhere else, come to where we started and where we met first. Right here. I'd love to help you. HowToPodcast CA come reach out to me. I want to talk to you. Thanks. Ah, you're still here. Okay, this is the bonus stuff for those who boldly stay to the end. I was just cleaning up and putting stuff away. I'm glad you're still here. Okay, let's you and I just took a moment together. Everyone else is gone. I want you to think about this for a second. I'm really right now focused on some episodes coming up around fear, courage, excitement, and how you kind of navigate the fear and overwhelm in podcasting. And this thing came to me. We fear what we're interested in, and we do not fear what we're not interested in. Let me explain. I am not afraid of skydiving. Is it because I'm interested in it? Not at all. I will never be interested in skydiving, so it doesn't scare me because I'm never gonna do it. I'm also not afraid of bungee jumping. Again, because I'm interested in it. No, I have zero interest in bungee jumping. I'm happy to walk on firm ground. So I'm not afraid of bungee jumping because I'm not interested in it. The things that you're afraid of most likely are tied to some form of interest curiosity that you have in that thing, and in that, you're a little bit afraid of that thing. So make me a new relationship. That person over there is kind of cute, and I'm scared out of my mind, but I'm interested. I'd love to learn how to play the drums. I play the drums, by the way. I'd love to learn how to play the drums, but that freaks me out. I'm not going to go into any music store and sit behind a drum kit, everyone looking at me, you know, ting, ting, boom, boom, boom, boom. I don't know what I'm doing, and it's obvious, no way, But I'm interested. We usually are afraid or fearful of the things that interest us the most. We just don't know what to do with that fear. My encouragement is to take. Take that fear and turn it into excitement and curiosity. And let it unleash itself, because then you're going to go in places you have no idea you'd ever go. So if you are interested in bungee jumping, then turn your fear into excitement. Instead of, I'm afraid of bungee jumping, I get to bungee jump. If you want to jump out of a plane, perfectly good plane that's not going to crash, and you want to jump out on purpose, then go do that if that's what you're interested in. But if you have no interest in it, then fear is not attached to it. It's not. I am not afraid of climbing Mount St. El St. Everest. I will never do that. And I'm not afraid of it because I have no interest in it. So what you're interested in could lead to fear. Fear. But if you take that same fear and turn that into excitement, your body doesn't know the difference between fear and excitement. You have to label it. So label your fear as excitement and chase your passion. If that's starting a podcast, then you and I need to talk how to podcast. Ica. Don't be afraid. You got this.